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"That must be young Popworth who used to be in our office," I said. "I heard that he was going to be married this year. You must certainly call and leave cards." "Which sort, and how many?" "Without referring to a book, I can hardly say precisely. These things are very much a matter of taste. Leave enough say one of each sort for each person in the house. There should be no stint."
Popworth not to speak it profanely followed suit! The reverend egotist couldn't take in the possibility of anybody but himself being invited to say grace at our table, he being present; he hadn't noticed my nod to the Doctor, and the Doctor's low, earnest voice didn't reach him; and there, with one blessing going on one side of the table, he, as I said, pitched in on the other!
You've seen him; the eminently respectable elderly gentleman who came one day last summer just as you were going; book under his arm, you remember; weed on his hat; dry smile on bland countenance; tall, lank individual in very seedy black. With him my tale begins; for if I had never indulged in an Uncle Popworth I should never have sported an Iron-Clad.
We were placidly seated; there was a hush, agreeably filled with the fragrance of the delicious fruit: even my uncle Popworth, from long habit, turned off his talk at that suggestive moment: when I did what I thought a shrewd thing. Wortleby began; and I was congratulating myself on my adroit management of a delicate matter, when conceive my consternation!
Here we had respite, respite and nepenthe from our memories of Uncle Popworth; here we used to sit down in the evening and talk of the past with grateful and tranquil emotions, as people speak of awful things endured in days that are no more. To us the height of human happiness was raising green corn and strawberries, in a retired neighborhood where uncles were unknown.
There's three pair of your socks in the basket waiting to be darned, as it is." "And, good heavens! That Popworth can't be my Popworth. If he's only married this year, he can't, in the nature of things, have got eleven children. And a house like this can't call on a house like that without a something to justify it." "That's what I thought." "Then what on earth did you call for?" "I didn't.
"How am I to know how many persons there are?" "Ask the butcher with whom they deal." On the following day I remarked that Popworth must have come in for money, to be taking so large a house, and I hoped she had left the cards. "I asked the butcher, and he said there was Popworth, his wife, two sisters, a German friend, and eleven children.
As Popworth lifted up his loud, nasal voice, the old Doctor raised his voice, in the vain hope, I suppose, of making himself heard by his lusty competitor. If you have never had two blessings running opposition at your table, in the presence of invited guests, you can never imagine how astounding, how killingly ludicrous it was!
She said that it did not prevent them from being used again, if they were ever wanted. "Pardon me," I said, "but cards for social purposes should not be bent or frayed at the edge, and can hardly be too clean. Oblige me by not doing that again!" That evening Eliza told me that No. 14 in the Crescent had been taken by some people called Popworth.
Being my guest, Wortleby could do no less than listen to Popworth, who is my uncle. He listened with interest and sympathy for the first half-hour; and then continued listening for another half-hour, after his interest and sympathy were exhausted. Then, attempting to go, he got his hat, and sat with it in his hand half an hour longer.
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