INTRODUCTORY, CONCERNING THE PEDIGREE OF THE CHUZZLEWIT FAMILY
As no lady or gentleman, with any claims to polite breeding, can
possibly sympathize with the Chuzzlewit Family without being first
assured of the extreme antiquity of the race, it is a great
satisfaction to know that it undoubtedly descended in a direct line
from Adam and Eve; and was, in the very earliest times, closely
connected with the agricultural interest. If it should ever be
urged by grudging and malicious persons, that a Chuzzlewit, in any
period of the family history, displayed an overweening amount of
family pride, surely the weakness will be considered not only
pardonable but laudable, when the immense superiority of the house
to the rest of mankind, in respect of this its ancient origin, is
taken into account.
It is remarkable that as there was, in the oldest family of which we
have any record, a murderer and a vagabond, so we never fail to
meet, in the records of all old families, with innumerable
repetitions of the same phase of character. Indeed, it may be laid
down as a general principle, that the more extended the ancestry,
the greater the amount of violence and vagabondism; for in ancient
days those two amusements, combining a wholesome excitement with a
promising means of repairing shattered fortunes, were at once the
ennobling pursuit and the healthful recreation of the Quality of
this land.
Consequently, it is a source of inexpressible comfort and happiness
to find, that in various periods of our history, the Chuzzlewits
were actively connected with divers slaughterous conspiracies and
bloody frays. It is further recorded of them, that being clad from
head to heel in steel of proof, they did on many occasions lead
their leather-jerkined soldiers to the death with invincible
courage, and afterwards return home gracefully to their relations
and friends.
There can be no doubt that at least one Chuzzlewit came over with
William the Conqueror. It does not appear that this illustrious
ancestor 'came over' that monarch, to employ the vulgar phrase, at
any subsequent period; inasmuch as the Family do not seem to have
been ever greatly distinguished by the possession of landed estate.
And it is well known that for the bestowal of that kind of property
upon his favourites, the liberality and gratitude of the Norman were
as remarkable as those virtues are usually found to be in great men
when they give away what belongs to other people.
Perhaps in this place the history may pause to congratulate itself
upon the enormous amount of bravery, wisdom, eloquence, virtue,
gentle birth, and true nobility, that appears to have come into
England with the Norman Invasion: an amount which the genealogy of
every ancient family lends its aid to swell, and which would beyond
all question have been found to be just as great, and to the full as
prolific in giving birth to long lines of chivalrous descendants,
boastful of their origin, even though William the Conqueror had been
William the Conquered; a change of circumstances which, it is quite
certain, would have made no manner of difference in this respect.
There was unquestionably a Chuzzlewit in the Gunpowder Plot, if
indeed the arch-traitor, Fawkes himself, were not a scion of this
remarkable stock; as he might easily have been, supposing another
Chuzzlewit to have emigrated to Spain in the previous generation,
and there intermarried with a Spanish lady, by whom he had issue,
one olive-complexioned son. This probable conjecture is
strengthened, if not absolutely confirmed, by a fact which cannot
fail to be interesting to those who are curious in tracing the
progress of hereditary tastes through the lives of their unconscious
inheritors. It is a notable circumstance that in these later times,
many Chuzzlewits, being unsuccessful in other pursuits, have,
without the smallest rational hope of enriching themselves, or any
conceivable reason, set up as coal-merchants; and have, month after
month, continued gloomily to watch a small stock of coals, without
in any one instance negotiating with a purchaser. The remarkable
similarity between this course of proceeding and that adopted by
their Great Ancestor beneath the vaults of the Parliament House at
Westminster, is too obvious and too full of interest, to stand in
need of comment.
It is also clearly proved by the oral traditions of the Family, that
there existed, at some one period of its history which is not
distinctly stated, a matron of such destructive principles, and so
familiarized to the use and composition of inflammatory and
combustible engines, that she was called 'The Match Maker;' by which
nickname and byword she is recognized in the Family legends to this
day. Surely there can be no reasonable doubt that this was the
Spanish lady, the mother of Chuzzlewit Fawkes.
But there is one other piece of evidence, bearing immediate
reference to their close connection with this memorable event in
English History, which must carry conviction, even to a mind (if
such a mind there be) remaining unconvinced by these presumptive
proofs.
There was, within a few years, in the possession of a highly
respectable and in every way credible and unimpeachable member of
the Chuzzlewit Family (for his bitterest enemy never dared to hint
at his being otherwise than a wealthy man), a dark lantern of
undoubted antiquity; rendered still more interesting by being, in
shape and pattern, extremely like such as are in use at the present
day. Now this gentleman, since deceased, was at all times ready to
make oath, and did again and again set forth upon his solemn
asseveration, that he had frequently heard his grandmother say, when
contemplating this venerable relic, 'Aye, aye! This was carried by
my fourth son on the fifth of November, when he was a Guy Fawkes.'
These remarkable words wrought (as well they might) a strong
impression on his mind, and he was in the habit of repeating them
very often. The just interpretation which they bear, and the
conclusion to which they lead, are triumphant and irresistible. The
old lady, naturally strong-minded, was nevertheless frail and
fading; she was notoriously subject to that confusion of ideas, or,
to say the least, of speech, to which age and garrulity are liable.
The slight, the very slight, confusion apparent in these expressions
is manifest, and is ludicrously easy of correction. 'Aye, aye,'
quoth she, and it will be observed that no emendation whatever is
necessary to be made in these two initiative remarks, 'Aye, aye!
This lantern was carried by my forefather'--not fourth son, which is
preposterous--'on the fifth of November. And HE was Guy Fawkes.'
Here we have a remark at once consistent, clear, natural, and in
strict accordance with the character of the speaker. Indeed the
anecdote is so plainly susceptible of this meaning and no other,
that it would be hardly worth recording in its original state, were
it not a proof of what may be (and very often is) affected not only
in historical prose but in imaginative poetry, by the exercise of a
little ingenious labour on the part of a commentator.
It has been said that there is no instance, in modern times, of a
Chuzzlewit having been found on terms of intimacy with the Great.
But here again the sneering detractors who weave such miserable
figments from their malicious brains, are stricken dumb by evidence.
For letters are yet in the possession of various branches of the
family, from which it distinctly appears, being stated in so many
words, that one Diggory Chuzzlewit was in the habit of perpetually
dining with Duke Humphrey. So constantly was he a guest at that
nobleman's table, indeed; and so unceasingly were His Grace's
hospitality and companionship forced, as it were, upon him; that we
find him uneasy, and full of constraint and reluctance; writing his
friends to the effect that if they fail to do so and so by bearer,
he will have no choice but to dine again with Duke Humphrey; and
expressing himself in a very marked and extraordinary manner as one
surfeited of High Life and Gracious Company.
It has been rumoured, and it is needless to say the rumour
originated in the same base quarters, that a certain male
Chuzzlewit, whose birth must be admitted to be involved in some
obscurity, was of very mean and low descent. How stands the proof?
When the son of that individual, to whom the secret of his father's
birth was supposed to have been communicated by his father in his
lifetime, lay upon his deathbed, this question was put to him in a
distinct, solemn, and formal way: 'Toby Chuzzlewit, who was your
grandfather?' To which he, with his last breath, no less distinctly,
solemnly, and formally replied: and his words were taken down at the
time, and signed by six witnesses, each with his name and address in
full: 'The Lord No Zoo.' It may be said--it HAS been said, for human
wickedness has no limits--that there is no Lord of that name, and
that among the titles which have become extinct, none at all
resembling this, in sound even, is to be discovered. But what is
the irresistible inference? Rejecting a theory broached by some
well-meaning but mistaken persons, that this Mr Toby Chuzzlewit's
grandfather, to judge from his name, must surely have been a
Mandarin (which is wholly insupportable, for there is no pretence of
his grandmother ever having been out of this country, or of any
Mandarin having been in it within some years of his father's birth;
except those in the tea-shops, which cannot for a moment be regarded
as having any bearing on the question, one way or other), rejecting
this hypothesis, is it not manifest that Mr Toby Chuzzlewit had
either received the name imperfectly from his father, or that he had
forgotten it, or that he had mispronounced it? and that even at the
recent period in question, the Chuzzlewits were connected by a bend
sinister, or kind of heraldic over-the-left, with some unknown noble
and illustrious House?
From documentary evidence, yet preserved in the family, the fact is
clearly established that in the comparatively modern days of the
Diggory Chuzzlewit before mentioned, one of its members had attained
to very great wealth and influence. Throughout such fragments of
his correspondence as have escaped the ravages of the moths (who, in
right of their extensive absorption of the contents of deeds and
papers, may be called the general registers of the Insect World), we
find him making constant reference to an uncle, in respect of whom
he would seem to have entertained great expectations, as he was in
the habit of seeking to propitiate his favour by presents of plate,
jewels, books, watches, and other valuable articles. Thus, he
writes on one occasion to his brother in reference to a gravy-spoon,
the brother's property, which he (Diggory) would appear to have
borrowed or otherwise possessed himself of: 'Do not be angry, I have
parted with it--to my uncle.' On another occasion he expresses
himself in a similar manner with regard to a child's mug which had
been entrusted to him to get repaired. On another occasion he says,
'I have bestowed upon that irresistible uncle of mine everything I
ever possessed.' And that he was in the habit of paying long and
constant visits to this gentleman at his mansion, if, indeed, he did
not wholly reside there, is manifest from the following sentence:
'With the exception of the suit of clothes I carry about with me,
the whole of my wearing apparel is at present at my uncle's.' This
gentleman's patronage and influence must have been very extensive,
for his nephew writes, 'His interest is too high'--'It is too much'
--'It is tremendous'--and the like. Still it does not appear (which
is strange) to have procured for him any lucrative post at court or
elsewhere, or to have conferred upon him any other distinction than
that which was necessarily included in the countenance of so great a
man, and the being invited by him to certain entertainment's, so
splendid and costly in their nature, that he calls them 'Golden
Balls.'
It is needless to multiply instances of the high and lofty station,
and the vast importance of the Chuzzlewits, at different periods.
If it came within the scope of reasonable probability that further
proofs were required, they might be heaped upon each other until
they formed an Alps of testimony, beneath which the boldest
scepticism should be crushed and beaten flat. As a goodly tumulus
is already collected, and decently battened up above the Family
grave, the present chapter is content to leave it as it is: merely
adding, by way of a final spadeful, that many Chuzzlewits, both male
and female, are proved to demonstration, on the faith of letters
written by their own mothers, to have had chiselled noses,
undeniable chins, forms that might have served the sculptor for a
model, exquisitely-turned limbs and polished foreheads of so
transparent a texture that the blue veins might be seen branching
off in various directions, like so many roads on an ethereal map.
This fact in itself, though it had been a solitary one, would have
utterly settled and clenched the business in hand; for it is well
known, on the authority of all the books which treat of such
matters, that every one of these phenomena, but especially that of
the chiselling, are invariably peculiar to, and only make themselves
apparent in, persons of the very best condition.
This history having, to its own perfect satisfaction, (and,
consequently, to the full contentment of all its readers,) proved
the Chuzzlewits to have had an origin, and to have been at one time
or other of an importance which cannot fail to render them highly
improving and acceptable acquaintance to all right-minded
individuals, may now proceed in earnest with its task. And having
shown that they must have had, by reason of their ancient birth, a
pretty large share in the foundation and increase of the human
family, it will one day become its province to submit, that such of
its members as shall be introduced in these pages, have still many
counterparts and prototypes in the Great World about us. At present
it contents itself with remarking, in a general way, on this head:
Firstly, that it may be safely asserted, and yet without implying
any direct participation in the Manboddo doctrine touching the
probability of the human race having once been monkeys, that men do
play very strange and extraordinary tricks. Secondly, and yet
without trenching on the Blumenbach theory as to the descendants of
Adam having a vast number of qualities which belong more
particularly to swine than to any other class of animals in the
creation, that some men certainly are remarkable for taking uncommon
good care of themselves.