Chapter 31

On our arrival in Denmark, we found the king and queen of that country
elevated in two arm-chairs on a kitchen-table, holding a Court. The whole of the
Danish nobility were in attendance; consisting of a noble boy in the
wash-leather boots of a gigantic ancestor, a venerable Peer with a dirty face
who seemed to have risen from the people late in life, and the Danish chivalry
with a comb in its hair and a pair of white silk legs, and presenting on the
whole a feminine appearance. My gifted townsman stood gloomily apart, with
folded arms, and I could have wished that his curls and forehead had been more
probable.

Several curious little circumstances transpired as the action proceeded. The
late king of the country not only appeared to have been troubled with a cough at
the time of his decease, but to have taken it with him to the tomb, and to have
brought it back. The royal phantom also carried a ghostly manuscript round its
truncheon, to which it had the appearance of occasionally referring, and that
too, with an air of anxiety and a tendency to lose the place of reference which
were suggestive of a state of mortality. It was this, I conceive, which led to
the Shade’s being advised by the gallery to "turn over!"—a recommendation which
it took extremely ill. It was likewise to be noted of this majestic spirit, that
whereas it always appeared with an air of having been out a long time and walked
an immense distance, it perceptibly came from a closely contiguous wall. This
occasioned its terrors to be received derisively. The Queen of Denmark, a very
buxom lady, though no doubt historically brazen, was considered by the public to
have too much brass about her; her chin being attached to her diadem by a broad
band of that metal (as if she had a gorgeous toothache), her waist being
encircled by another, and each of her arms by another, so that she was openly
mentioned as "the kettle-drum." The noble boy in the ancestral boots was
inconsistent, representing himself, as it were in one breath, as an able seaman,
a strolling actor, a grave-digger, a clergyman, and a person of the utmost
importance at a Court fencing-match, on the authority of whose practised eye and
nice discrimination the finest strokes were judged. This gradually led to a want
of toleration for him, and even—on his being detected in holy orders, and
declining to perform the funeral service—to the general indignation taking the
form of nuts. Lastly, Ophelia was a prey to such slow musical madness, that
when, in course of time, she had taken off her white muslin scarf, folded it up,
and buried it, a sulky man who had been long cooling his impatient nose against
an iron bar in the front row of the gallery, growled, "Now the baby’s put to bed
let’s have supper!" Which, to say the least of it, was out of keeping.

Upon my unfortunate townsman all these incidents accumulated with playful
effect. Whenever that undecided Prince had to ask a question or state a doubt,
the public helped him out with it. As for example; on the question whether ’twas
nobler in the mind to suffer, some roared yes, and some no, and some inclining
to both opinions said "Toss up for it;" and quite a Debating Society arose. When
he asked what should such fellows as he do crawling between earth and heaven, he
was encouraged with loud cries of "Hear, hear!" When he appeared with his
stocking disordered (its disorder expressed, according to usage, by one very
neat fold in the top, which I suppose to be always got up with a flat iron), a
conversation took place in the gallery respecting the paleness of his leg, and
whether it was occasioned by the turn the ghost had given him. On his taking the
recorders,—very like a little black flute that had just been played in the
orchestra and handed out at the door,—he was called upon unanimously for Rule
Britannia. When he recommended the player not to saw the air thus, the sulky man
said, "And don’t you do
it, neither; you’re a deal worse than him!"
And I grieve to add that peals of laughter greeted Mr. Wopsle on every one of
these occasions.

But his greatest trials were in the churchyard, which had the appearance of a
primeval forest, with a kind of small ecclesiastical wash-house on one side, and
a turnpike gate on the other. Mr. Wopsle in a comprehensive black cloak, being
descried entering at the turnpike, the gravedigger was admonished in a friendly
way, "Look out! Here’s the undertaker a coming, to see how you’re a getting on
with your work!" I believe it is well known in a constitutional country that Mr.
Wopsle could not possibly have returned the skull, after moralizing over it,
without dusting his fingers on a white napkin taken from his breast; but even
that innocent and indispensable action did not pass without the comment,
"Wai-ter!" The arrival of the body for interment (in an empty black box with the
lid tumbling open), was the signal for a general joy, which was much enhanced by
the discovery, among the bearers, of an individual obnoxious to identification.
The joy attended Mr. Wopsle through his struggle with Laertes on the brink of
the orchestra and the grave, and slackened no more until he had tumbled the king
off the kitchen-table, and had died by inches from the ankles upward.

We had made some pale efforts in the beginning to applaud Mr. Wopsle; but they
were too hopeless to be persisted in. Therefore we had sat, feeling keenly for
him, but laughing, nevertheless, from ear to ear. I laughed in spite of myself
all the time, the whole thing was so droll; and yet I had a latent impression
that there was something decidedly fine in Mr. Wopsle’s elocution,—not for old
associations’ sake, I am afraid, but because it was very slow, very dreary, very
up-hill and down-hill, and very unlike any way in which any man in any natural
circumstances of life or death ever expressed himself about anything. When the
tragedy was over, and he had been called for and hooted, I said to Herbert, "Let
us go at once, or perhaps we shall meet him."

We made all the haste we could down stairs, but we were not quick enough either.
Standing at the door was a Jewish man with an unnatural heavy smear of eyebrow,
who caught my eyes as we advanced, and said, when we came up with him,—

"Mr. Pip and friend?"

Identity of Mr. Pip and friend confessed.

"Mr. Waldengarver," said the man, "would be glad to have the honor."

"Waldengarver?" I repeated—when Herbert murmured in my ear, "Probably Wopsle."

"Oh!" said I. "Yes. Shall we follow you?"

"A few steps, please." When we were in a side alley, he turned and asked, "How
did you think he looked?—I dressed him."

I don’t know what he had looked like, except a funeral; with the addition of a
large Danish sun or star hanging round his neck by a blue ribbon, that had given
him the appearance of being insured in some extraordinary Fire Office. But I
said he had looked very nice.

"When he come to the grave," said our conductor, "he showed his cloak beautiful.
But, judging from the wing, it looked to me that when he see the ghost in the
queen’s apartment, he might have made more of his stockings."

I modestly assented, and we all fell through a little dirty swing door, into a
sort of hot packing-case immediately behind it. Here Mr. Wopsle was divesting
himself of his Danish garments, and here there was just room for us to look at
him over one another’s shoulders, by keeping the packing-case door, or lid, wide
open.

"Gentlemen," said Mr. Wopsle, "I am proud to see you. I hope, Mr. Pip, you will
excuse my sending round. I had the happiness to know you in former times, and
the Drama has ever had a claim which has ever been acknowledged, on the noble
and the affluent."

Meanwhile, Mr. Waldengarver, in a frightful perspiration, was trying to get
himself out of his princely sables.

"Skin the stockings off Mr. Waldengarver," said the owner of that property, "or
you’ll bust ’em. Bust ’em, and you’ll bust five-and-thirty shillings. Shakspeare
never was complimented with a finer pair. Keep quiet in your chair now, and
leave ’em to me."

With that, he went upon his knees, and began to flay his victim; who, on the
first stocking coming off, would certainly have fallen over backward with his
chair, but for there being no room to fall anyhow.

I had been afraid until then to say a word about the play. But then, Mr.
Waldengarver looked up at us complacently, and said,—

"Gentlemen, how did it seem to you, to go, in front?"

Herbert said from behind (at the same time poking me), "Capitally." So I said
"Capitally."

"How did you like my reading of the character, gentlemen?" said Mr.
Waldengarver, almost, if not quite, with patronage.

Herbert said from behind (again poking me), "Massive and concrete." So I said
boldly, as if I had originated it, and must beg to insist upon it, "Massive and
concrete."

"I am glad to have your approbation, gentlemen," said Mr. Waldengarver, with an
air of dignity, in spite of his being ground against the wall at the time, and
holding on by the seat of the chair.

"But I’ll tell you one thing, Mr. Waldengarver," said the man who was on his
knees, "in which you’re out in your reading. Now mind! I don’t care who says
contrairy; I tell you so. You’re out in your reading of Hamlet when you get your
legs in profile. The last Hamlet as I dressed, made the same mistakes in his
reading at rehearsal, till I got him to put a large red wafer on each of his
shins, and then at that rehearsal (which was the last) I went in front, sir, to
the back of the pit, and whenever his reading brought him into profile, I called
out "I don’t see no wafers!" And at night his reading was lovely."

Mr. Waldengarver smiled at me, as much as to say "a faithful Dependent—I
overlook his folly;" and then said aloud, "My view is a little classic and
thoughtful for them here; but they will improve, they will improve."

Herbert and I said together, O, no doubt they would improve.

"Did you observe, gentlemen," said Mr. Waldengarver, "that there was a man in
the gallery who endeavored to cast derision on the service,—I mean, the
representation?"

We basely replied that we rather thought we had noticed such a man. I added, "He
was drunk, no doubt."

"O dear no, sir," said Mr. Wopsle, "not drunk. His employer would see to that,
sir. His employer would not allow him to be drunk."

"You know his employer?" said I.

Mr. Wopsle shut his eyes, and opened them again; performing both ceremonies very
slowly. "You must have observed, gentlemen," said he, "an ignorant and a blatant
ass, with a rasping throat and a countenance expressive of low malignity, who
went through—I will not say sustained—the rôle (if I may use a French
expression) of Claudius, King of Denmark. That is his employer, gentlemen. Such
is the profession!"

Without distinctly knowing whether I should have been more sorry for Mr. Wopsle
if he had been in despair, I was so sorry for him as it was, that I took the
opportunity of his turning round to have his braces put on,—which jostled us out
at the doorway,—to ask Herbert what he thought of having him home to supper?
Herbert said he thought it would be kind to do so; therefore I invited him, and
he went to Barnard’s with us, wrapped up to the eyes, and we did our best for
him, and he sat until two o’clock in the morning, reviewing his success and
developing his plans. I forget in detail what they were, but I have a general
recollection that he was to begin with reviving the Drama, and to end with
crushing it; inasmuch as his decease would leave it utterly bereft and without a
chance or hope.

Miserably I went to bed after all, and miserably thought of Estella, and
miserably dreamed that my expectations were all cancelled, and that I had to
give my hand in marriage to Herbert’s Clara, or play Hamlet to Miss Havisham’s
Ghost, before twenty thousand people, without knowing twenty words of it.