Loe raamatut: «Jack Hinton: The Guardsman», lehekülg 6

CHAPTER VIII. THE VISIT

I have already recorded the first twenty-four hours of my life in Ireland; and, if there was enough in them to satisfy me that the country was unlike in many respects that which I had left, there was also some show of reason to convince me that, if I did not conform to the habits and tastes of those around me, I should incur a far greater chance of being laughed at by them than be myself amused by their eccentricities. The most remarkable feature that struck me was the easy, even cordial manner with which acquaintance was made. Every one met you as if he had in some measure been prepared for the introduction; a tone of intimacy sprang up at once; your tastes were hinted, your wishes guessed at, with an unaffected kindness that made you forget the suddenness of the intimacy: so that, when at last you parted with your dear friend of some half an hour’s acquaintance, you could not help wondering at the confidences you had made, the avowals you had spoken, and the lengths to which you had gone in close alliance with one you had never seen before, and might possibly never meet again. Strange enough as this was with men, it was still more singular when it extended to the gentler sex. Accustomed as I had been all my life to the rigid observances of etiquette in female society, nothing surprised me so much as the rapid steps by which Irish ladies passed from acquaintance to intimacy, from intimacy to friendship. The unsuspecting kindliness of woman’s nature has certainly no more genial soil than in the heart of Erin’s daughters. There is besides, too, a winning softness in their manner towards the stranger of another land that imparts to their hospitable reception a tone of courteous warmth I have never seen in any other country.

The freedom of manner I have here alluded to, however delightful it may render the hours of one separated from home, family, and friends, is yet not devoid of its inconveniences. How many an undisciplined and uninformed youth has misconstrued its meaning and mistaken its import How often have I seen the raw subaltern elated with imaginary success – flushed with a fancied victory – where, in reality, he had met with nothing save the kind looks and the kind words in which the every-day courtesies of life are couched, and by which, what, in less favoured lands, are the cold and chilling observances of ceremony, are here the easy and familiar intercourse of those who wish to know each other.

The coxcomb who fancies that he can number as many triumphs as he has passed hours in Dublin, is like one who, estimating the rich production of a southern clime by their exotic value in his own colder regions, dignifies by the name of luxury what are in reality but the every-day productions of the soil: so he believes peculiarly addressed to himself the cordial warmth and friendly greeting which make the social atmosphere around him.

If I myself fell deeply into this error, and if my punishment was a heavy one, let my history prove a beacon to all who follow in my steps; for Dublin is still a garrison city, and I have been told that lips as tempting and eyes as bright are to be met there as heretofore. Now to my story.

Life in Dublin, at the time I write of, was about as gay a thing as a man can well fancy. Less debarred than in other countries from partaking of the lighter enjoyments of life, the members of the learned professions mixed much in society; bringing with them stores of anecdote and information unattainable from other sources, they made what elsewhere would have proved the routine of intercourse a season of intellectual enjoyment. Thus, the politician, the churchman, the barrister, and the military man, shaken as they were together in dose intimacy, lost individually many of the prejudices of their caste, and learned to converse with a wider and more extended knowledge of the world. While this was so, another element, peculiarly characteristic of the country, had its share in modelling social life – that innate tendency to drollery, that bent to laugh with every one and at everything, so eminently Irish, was now in the ascendant. From the Viceroy downwards, the island was on the broad grin. Every day furnished its share, its quota of merriment. Epigrams, good stories, repartees, and practical jokes rained in showers over the land. A privy council was a conversazione of laughing bishops and droll chief-justices. Every trial at the bar, every dinner at the court, every drawing-room, afforded a theme for some ready-witted absurdity; and all the graver business of life was carried on amid this current of unceasing fun and untiring drollery, just as we see the serious catastrophe of a modern opera assisted by the crash of an orchestral accompaniment.

With materials like these society was made up; and into this I plunged with all the pleasurable delight of one who, if he could not appreciate the sharpness, was at least dazzled by the brilliancy of the wit that flashed around him. My duties as aide-de-camp were few, and never interfered with my liberty: while in my double capacity of military man and attaché to the court, I was invited everywhere, and treated with marked courtesy and kindness. Thus passed my life pleasantly along, when a few mornings after the events I have mentioned, I was sitting at my breakfast, conning over my invitations for the week, and meditating a letter, home, in which I should describe my mode of life with as much reserve as might render the record of my doings a safe disclosure for the delicate nerves of my lady-mother. In order to accomplish this latter task with success, I scribbled with some notes a sheet of paper that lay before me. “Among other particularly nice people, my dear mother,” wrote I, “there are the Rooneys. Mr. Rooney – a member of the Irish bar, of high standing and great reputation – is a most agreeable and accomplished person. How much I should like to present him to you.” I had got thus far, when a husky, asthmatic cough, and a muttered curse on the height of my domicile, apprised me that some one was at my door. At the same moment a heavy single knock, that nearly stove in the panel, left no doubt upon my mind.

“Are ye at home, or is it sleeping ye are? May I never, if it’s much else the half of ye’s fit for. Ugh, blessed hour! three flights of stairs, with a twist in them instead of a landing. Ye see he’s not in the place. I tould you that before I came up. But if s always the same thing. Corny, run here; Corny, fly there; get me this, take that. Bad luck to them! One would think they badgered me for bare divarsion, the haythins, the Turks!”

A fit of coughing, that almost convinced me that Corny had given his last curse, followed this burst of eloquence, just as I appeared at the door.

“What’s the matter, Corny?”

“The matter? – ugh, ain’t I coughing my soul out with a wheezing and whistling in my chest like a creel of chickens. Here’s Mr. Rooney wanting to see ye; and faith,” as he added in an under tone, “if s not long you wor in making his acquaintance. That’s his room,” added he, with a jerk of his thumb. “Now lave the way if you plase, and let me got a howld of the banisters.”

With these words Corny began his descent, while I, apologising to Mr. Rooney for not having sooner perceived kirn, bowed him into the room with all proper ceremony.

“A thousand apologies, Mr. Hinton, for the unseasonable hour of my visit, but business – ”

“Pray not a word,” said I; “always delighted to see you. Mrs. Rooney is well, I hope?”

“Charming, upon my honour. But, as I was saying, I could not well come later; there is a case in the King’s Bench – Rex versus Ryves – a heavy record, and I want to catch the counsel to assure him that all’s safe. God knows, it has cost me an anxious night. Everything depended on one witness, an obstinate beast that wouldn’t listen to reason. We got hold of him last night; got three doctors to certify he was out of his mind; and, at this moment, with his head shaved, and a grey suit on him, he is the noisiest inmate in Glassnevin madhouse.”

“Was not this a very bold, a very dangerous expedient?”

“So it was. He fought like a devil, and his outrageous conduct has its reward, for they put him on low diet and handcuffs the moment he went in. But excuse me, if I make a hurried visit. Mrs. Rooney requests that – that – but where the devil did I put it?”

Here Mr. Rooney felt his coat-pockets, dived into those of his waistcoat, patted himself all over, then looked into his hat, then round the room, on the floor, and even outside the door upon the lobby.

“Sure it is not possible I’ve lost it.”

“Nothing of consequence, I hope?” said I.

“What a head I have,” replied he, with a knowing grin, while at the same moment throwing up the sash of my window, he thrust out the head in question, and gave a loud shrill whistle.

Scarcely was the casement closed when a ragged urchin appeared at the door, carrying on his back the ominous stuff-bag containing the record of Mr. Rooney’s rogueries.

“Give me the bag, Tim,” quoth he; at the same moment he plunged his hand deep among the tape-tied parcels, and extricated a piece of square pasteboard, which, having straightened and flattened upon his knee, he presented to me with a graceful bow, adding, jocosely, “an ambassador without his credentials would never do.”

It was an invitation to dinner at Mr. Rooney’s for the memorable Friday for which my friend O’Grady had already received his card.

“Nothing will give me more pleasure – ”

“No, will it though? how very good of you! a small cosy party – Harry Burgh, Bowes Daley, Barrington, the judges, and a few more. There now, no ceremony, I beg of you. Come along, Joe. Good morning, Mr. Hinton: not a step further.”

So saying, Mr. Rooney backed and shuffled himself out of my room, and, followed by his faithful attendant, hurried down stairs, muttering a series of self-gratulations, as he went, on the successful result of his mission. Scarcely had he gone, when I heard the rapid stride of another visitor, who, mounting four steps at a time, came along chanting, at the top of his voice,

 
“My two back teeth I will bequeath
To the Reverend Michael Palmer;
His wife has a tongue that’ll match them well,
She’s a devil of a scold, God d – n her!”
 

“How goes it, Jack my hearty?” cried he, as he sprang into the room, flinging his sabre into the corner, and hurling his foraging cap upon the sofa.

“You have been away, O’Grady? What became of you for the last two days?”

“Down at the Curragh, taking a look at the nags for the Spring Meeting. Dined with the bar at Naas; had a great night with them; made old Moore gloriously tipsy, and sent him into court the next morning with the overture to Mother Goose in his bag instead of his brief. Since daybreak I have been trying a new horse in the Park, screwing him over all the fences, and rushing him at the double rails in the pathway, to see if he can’t cross the country.”

“Why the hunting season is nearly over.”

“Quite true; but it is the Loughrea Steeple-chase I am thinking of. I have promised to name a horse, and I only remembered last night that I had but twenty-four hours to do it. The time was short, but by good fortune I heard of this grey on my way up to town.”

“And you think he’ll do?”

“He has a good chance, if one can only keep on his back; but what between bolting, plunging, and rushing through his fences, he is not a beast for a timid elderly gentleman. After all, one must have something: the whole world will be there; the Rooneys are going; and that pretty little girl with them. By-the-by, Jack, what do you think of Miss Bellew?”

“I can scarcely tell you; I only saw her for a moment, and then that Hibernian hippopotamus, Mrs. Paul, so completely overshadowed her, there was no getting a look at her.”

“Devilish pretty girl, that she is; and one day or other, they say, will have an immense fortune. Old Rooney always shakes his head when the idea is thrown out, which only convinces me the more of her chance.”

“Well, then, Master Phil, why don’t you do something in that quarter?”

“Well, so I should; but somehow, most unaccountably, you’ll say, I don’t think I made any impression. To be sure, I never went vigorously to work: I couldn’t get over my scruples of making up to a girl who may have a large fortune, while I myself am so confoundedly out at the elbows; the thing would look badly, to say the least of it; and so, when I did think I was making a little running, I only ‘held in’ the faster, and at length gave up the race. You are the man, Hinton. Your chances, I should say – ”

“Ah, I don’t know.”

Just at this moment the door opened, and Lord Dudley de Vere entered, dressed in coloured clothes, cut in the most foppish style of the day, and with his hands stuck negligently behind in his coat-pockets. He threw himself affectedly into a chair, and eyed us both without speaking.

“I say, messieurs, Rooney or not Rooney? that’s the question. Do we accept this invitation for Friday?”

“I do, for one,” said I, somewhat haughtily.

“Can’t be, my boy,” said O’Grady; “the thing is most unlucky: they have a dinner at court that same day; our names are all on the list; and thus we lose the Rooneys, which, from all I hear, is a very serious loss indeed. Daley, Barrington, Harry Martin, and half a dozen others, the first fellows of the day, are all to be there.”

“What a deal they will talk,” yawned out Lord Dudley. “I feel rather happy to have escaped it. There’s no saying a word to the woman beside you, as long as those confounded fellows keep up a roaring fire of what they think wit. What an idea! to be sure; there is not a man among them that can tell you the odds upon the Derby, nor what year there was a dead heat for the St. Léger. That little girl the Rooneys have got is very pretty, I must confess; but I see what they are at: won’t do, though. Ha! O’Grady, you know what I mean?”

“Faith, I am very stupid this morning; can’t say that I do.”

“Not see it! It is a hollow thing; but perhaps you are in the scheme too. There, you needn’t look angry; I only meant it in joke – ha! ha! ha! I say, Hinton, do you take care of yourself: Englishers have no chance here; and when they find it won’t do with me, they’ll take you in training.”

“Anything for a pis-aller” said O’Grady, sarcastically; “but let us not forget there is a levee to-day, and it is already past twelve o’clock.”

“Ha! to be sure, a horrid bore.”

So saying, Lord Dudley lounged one more round the room, looked at himself in the glass, nodded familiarly to his own image, and took his leave. O’Grady soon followed; while I set about my change of dress with all the speed the time required.

[Transcriber’s note: The remainder of this file digitized from a different print copy which uses single quotation marks for all quotes.]

CHAPTER IX. THE BALL

As the day of Mr. Rooney’s grand entertainment drew near, our disappointment increased tenfold at our inability to be present. The only topic discussed in Dublin was the number of the guests, the splendour and magnificence of the dinner, which was to be followed by a ball, at which above eight hundred guests were expected. The band of the Fermanagh militia, at that time the most celebrated in Ireland, was brought up expressly for the occasion. All that the city could number of rank, wealth, and beauty had received invitations, and scarcely a single apology had been returned.

‘Is there no possible way.’ said I, as I chatted with O’Grady on the morning of the event; ‘is there no chance of our getting away in time to see something of the ball at least?’

‘None whatever,’ replied he despondingly; ‘as ill-luck would have it, it’s a command-night at the theatre. The duke has disappointed so often, that he is sure to go now, and for the same reason he ‘ll sit the whole thing out. By that time it will be half-past twelve, we shan’t get back here before one; then comes supper; and – in fact, you know enough of the habits of this place now to guess that after that there is very little use of thinking of going anywhere.’

‘It is devilish provoking,’ said I.

‘That it is: and you don’t know the worst of it. I ‘ve got rather a heavy book on the Loughrea race, and shall want a few hundreds in a week or so; and, as nothing renders my friend Paul so sulky as not eating his dinners, it is five-and-twenty per cent, at least out of my pocket, from this confounded contretemps. There goes De Vere. I say, Dudley, whom have we at dinner to-day?’

‘Harrington and the Asgills, and that set,’ replied he, with an insolent shrug of his shoulder.

‘More of it, by Jove,’ said O’Grady, biting his lip. ‘One must be as particular before these people as a young sub. at a regimental mess. There’s not a button of your coat, not a loop of your aiguillette, not a twist of your sword-knot, little Charley won’t note down; and as there is no orderly-book in the drawing-room, he will whisper to his grace before coffee.’

‘Whatabore!’

‘Ay, and to think that all that time we might have been up to the very chin in fun. The Rooneys to-day will outdo even themselves. They’ve got half-a-dozen new lords on trial; all the judges; a live bishop; and, better than all, every pretty woman in the capital. I’ve a devil of a mind to get suddenly ill, and slip off to Paul’s for the dessert.’

‘No, no, that’s out of the question; we must only put up with our misfortunes as well as we can. As for me, the dinner here is, I think, the worst part of the matter.’

‘I estimate my losses at a very different rate. First, there is the three hundred, which I should certainly have had from Paul, and which now becomes a very crooked contingency. Then there’s the dinner and two bottles – I speak moderately – of such burgundy as nobody has but himself. These are the positive bonâ fide losses: then, what do you say to my chance of picking up some lovely girl, with a stray thirty thousand, and the good taste to look out for a proper fellow to spend it with? Seriously, Jack, I must think of something of that kind one of these days. It’s wrong to lose time; for, by waiting, one’s chances diminish, while becoming more difficult to please. So you see what a heavy blow this is to me: not to mention my little gains at short-whist, which in the half-hour before supper I may fairly set down as a fifty.’

‘Yours is a very complicated calculation; for, except the dinner, and I suppose we shall have as good a one here, I have not been able to see anything but problematic loss or profit.’

‘Of course you haven’t: your English education is based upon grounds far too positive for that; but we mere Irish get a habit of looking at the possible as probable, and the probable as most likely. I don’t think we build castles more than our neighbours, but we certainly go live in them earlier; and if we do, now and then, get a chill for our pains, why we generally have another building ready to receive us elsewhere for change of air.’

‘This is, I confess, somewhat strange philosophy.’

‘To be sure it is, my boy; for it is of pure native manufacture. Every other people I ever heard of deduce their happiness from their advantages and prosperity. As we have very little of one or the other, we extract some fun out of our misfortunes; and, what between laughing occasionally at ourselves, and sometimes at our neighbours, we push along through life right merrily after all. So now, then, to apply my theory: let us see what we can do to make the best of this disappointment. Shall I make love to Lady Asgill? Shall I quiz Sir Charles about the review? Or can you suggest anything in the way of a little extemporaneous devilry, to console us for our disappointment? But, come along, my boy, we’ll take a canter; I want to show you Moddiridderoo. He improves every day in his training; but they tell me there is only one man can sit him across a country, a fellow I don’t much fancy, by-the-bye; but the turf, like poverty, leads us to form somewhat strange acquaintances. Meanwhile, my boy, here come the nags; and now for the park till dinner.’

During our ride O’Grady informed me that the individual to whom he so slightly alluded was a Mr. Ulick Burke, a cousin of Miss Bellew. This individual, who by family and connections was a gentleman, had contrived by his life and habits to disqualify himself from any title to the appellation in a very considerable degree. Having squandered the entire of his patrimony on the turf, he had followed the apparently immutable law on such occasions, and ended by becoming a hawk, where he had begun as a pigeon. For many years past he had lived by the exercise of those most disreputable sources, his own wits. Present at every racecourse in the kingdom, and provided with that undercurrent of information obtainable from jockeys and stable-men, he understood all the intrigue, all the low cunning of the course: he knew when to back the favourite, when to give, when to take the odds; and, if upon any occasion he was seen to lay heavily against a well-known horse, the presumption became a strong one, that he was either ‘wrong’ or withdrawn. But his qualifications ended not here; for he was also that singular anomaly in our social condition – a gentleman-rider, ready upon any occasion to get into the saddle for any one that engaged his services; a flat race, or a steeplechase, all the same to him. His neck was his livelihood, and to support, he must risk it. A racing-jacket, a pair of leathers and tops, a heavy-handled whip, and a shot-belt, were his stock-in-trade, and he travelled through the world a species of sporting Dalgetty, minus the probity which made the latter firm to his engagements, so long as they lasted. At least, report denied the quality to Mr. Burke; and those who knew him well scrupled not to say that fifty pounds had exactly twice as many arguments in its favour as five-and-twenty.

So much then in brief concerning a character to whom I shall hereafter have occasion to recur; and now to my own narrative.

O’Grady’s anticipations as to the Castle dinner were not in the least exaggerated; nothing could possibly be more stiff or tiresome; the entertainment being given as a kind of ex officio civility, to the commander-of-the-forces and his staff, the conversation was purely professional, and never ranged beyond the discussion of military topics, or such as bore in any way upon the army. Happily, however, its duration was short. We dined at six, and by half-past eight we found ourselves at the foot of the grand staircase of the theatre in Crow Street, with Mr. Jones in the full dignity of his managerial costume waiting to receive us.

‘A little late, I fear, Mr. Jones,’ said his grace with a courteous smile. ‘What have we got?’

‘Your Excellency selected the Inconstant, said the obsequious manager; while a lady of the party darted her eyes suddenly towards the duke, and with a tone of marked sarcastic import, exclaimed —

‘How characteristic!’

‘And the after-piece, what is it?’ said the duchess, as she fussed her way upstairs.

‘Timour the Tartar, your grace.’

The next moment the thundering applause of the audience informed us that their Excellencies had taken their places. Cheer after cheer resounded through the building, and the massive lustre itself shook under the deafening acclamations of the audience. The scene was truly a brilliant one. The boxes presented a perfect blaze of wealth and beauty; nearly every person in the pit was in full dress; to the very ceiling itself the house was crammed. The progress of the piece was interrupted, while the band struck up ‘God Save the King,’ and, as I looked upon the brilliant dress-circle, I could not but think that O’Grady had been guilty of some exaggeration when he said that Mrs. Rooney’s ball was to monopolise that evening the youth and the beauty of the capital The National Anthem over, ‘Patrick’s Day’ was called for loudly from every side, and the whole house beat time to the strains of their native melody, with an energy that showed it came as fully home to their hearts as the air that preceded it. For ten minutes at least the noise and uproar continued; and, although his grace bowed repeatedly, there seemed no prospect to an end of the tumult, when a voice from the gallery called out, ‘Don’t make a stranger of yourself, my lord; take a chair and sit down.’ A roar of laughter, increased as the duke accepted the suggestion, shook the house; and poor Talbot, who all this time was kneeling beside Miss Walstein’s chair, was permitted to continue his ardent tale of love, and take up the thread of his devotion where he had left it twenty minutes before.

While O’Grady, who sat in the back of the box, seemed absorbed in his chagrin and disappointment, I myself became interested in the play, which was admirably performed; and Lord Dudley, leaning affectedly against a pillar, with his back towards the stage, scanned the house with his vapid, unmeaning look, as though to say they were unworthy of such attention at his hands.

The comedy was at length over, and her grace, with the ladies of her suite, retired, leaving only the Asgills and some members of the household in the box with his Excellency. He apparently was much entertained by the performance, and seemed most resolutely bent on staying to the last. Before the first act, however, of the after-piece was over, many of the benches in the dress-circle became deserted, and the house altogether seemed considerably thinner.

‘I say, O’Grady,’ said he, ‘what are these good people about? There seems to be a general move among them. Is there anything going on?’

‘Yes, your grace,’ said Phil, whose impatience now could scarcely be restrained, ‘they are going to a great ball in Stephen’s Green; the most splendid thing Dublin has witnessed these fifty years.’

‘Ah, indeed! Where is it? Who gives it?’ ‘Mr. Rooney, sir, a very well-known attorney, and a great character in the town.’

‘How good! And he does the thing well?’ ‘He flatters himself that he rivals your grace.’ ‘Better still! But who has he? What are his people?’ ‘Every one; there is nothing too high, nothing too handsome, nothing too distinguished for him. His house, like the Holyhead packet, is open to all comers, and the consequence is, his parties are by far the pleasantest thing going. One has such strange rencontres, sees such odd people, hears such droll things; for, besides having everything like a character in the city, the very gravest of Mr. Rooney’s guests seems to feel his house as a place to relax and unbend in. Thus, I should not be the least surprised to see the Chief-Justice and the Attorney-General playing small plays, nor the Bishop of Cork dancing Sir Roger de Coverley.’

‘Glorious fun, by Jove! But why are you not there, lads? Ah, I see; on duty. I wish you had told me. But come, it is not too late yet. Has Hinton got a card?’

‘Yes, your grace.’

‘Well, then, don’t let me detain you any longer. I see you are both impatient; and ‘faith, if I must confess it, I half envy you; and mind and give me a full report of the proceedings to-morrow morning.’

‘How I wish your grace could only witness it yourself!’

‘Eh? Is it so very good, then?’

‘Nothing ever was like it; for, although the company is admirable, the host and hostess are matchless.’

‘Egad! you’ve quite excited my curiosity. I say, O’Grady, would they know me, think ye? Have you no uncle or country cousin about my weight and build?’

‘Ah, my lord, that is out of the question; you are too well known to assume an incognito. But still, if you wish to see it for a few minutes, nothing could be easier than just to walk through the rooms and come away. The crowd will be such, the thing is quite practicable, done in that way.’

‘By Jove, I don’t know; but if I thought – To be sure, as you say, for five minutes or so one might get through. Come, here goes; order up the carriages. Now mind, O’Grady, I am under your management. Do the thing as quietly as you can.’

Elated at the success of his scheme, Phil scarcely waited for his grace to conclude, but sprang down the box-lobby to give the necessary orders, and was back again in an instant.

‘Don’t you think I had better take this star off?’

‘Oh no, my lord, it will not be necessary. By timing the thing well, we’ll contrive to get your grace into the midst of the crowd without attracting observation. Once there, the rest is easy enough.’

Many minutes had not elapsed ere we reached the corner of Grafton Street. Here we became entangled with the line of carriages, which extended more than half-way round Stephen’s Green, and, late as was the hour, were still thronging and pressing onwards towards the scene of festivity. O’Grady, who contrived entirely to engross his grace’s attention by many bits of the gossip and small-talk of the day, did not permit him to remark that the viceregal liveries and the guard of honour that accompanied us enabled us to cut the line of carriages, and taking precedence of all others, arrive at the door at once. Indeed, so occupied was the duke with some story at the moment, that he was half provoked as the door was flung open, and the clattering clash of the steps interrupted the conversation.

‘Here we are, my lord,’ said Phil.

‘Well, get out, O’Grady. Lead on. Don’t forget it is my first visit here; and you, I fancy, know the map of the country.’

The hall in which we found ourselves, brilliantly lighted and thronged with servants, presented a scene of the most strange confusion and tumult; for, such was the eagerness of the guests to get forward, many persons were separated from their friends: turbaned old ladies called in cracked voices for their sons to rescue them, and desolate daughters seized distractedly the arm nearest them, and implored succour with an accent as agonising as though on the eve of shipwreck. Mothers screamed, fathers swore, footmen laughed, and high above all came the measured tramp of the dancers overhead, while fiddles, French horns, and dulcimers scraped and blew their worst, as if purposely to increase the inextricable and maddening confusion that prevailed.