Headlong Hall | Page 3

each in its turn engenders two new ones; so that the
next generation has a hundred, the next two hundred, the next four
hundred, till every human being becomes such a helpless compound of
perverted inclinations, that he is altogether at the mercy of external
circumstances, loses all independence and singleness of character, and
degenerates so rapidly from the primitive dignity of his sylvan origin,
that it is scarcely possible to indulge in any other expectation, than that
the whole species must at length be exterminated by its own infinite
imbecility and vileness."
"Your opinions," said Mr Jenkison, a round-faced little gentleman of
about forty-five, "seem to differ toto coelo. I have often debated the
matter in my own mind, pro and con, and have at length arrived at this
conclusion,--that there is not in the human race a tendency either to
moral perfectibility or deterioration; but that the quantities of each are
so exactly balanced by their reciprocal results, that the species, with
respect to the sum of good and evil, knowledge and ignorance,
happiness and misery, remains exactly and perpetually in statu quo."

"Surely," said Mr Foster, "you cannot maintain such a proposition in
the face of evidence so luminous. Look at the progress of all the arts
and sciences,--see chemistry, botany, astronomy----"
"Surely," said Mr Escot, "experience deposes against you. Look at the
rapid growth of corruption, luxury, selfishness----"
"Really, gentlemen," said the Reverend Doctor Gaster, after clearing
the husk in his throat with two or three hems, "this is a very sceptical,
and, I must say, atheistical conversation, and I should have thought, out
of respect to my cloth----"
Here the coach stopped, and the coachman, opening the door,
vociferated--"Breakfast, gentlemen;" a sound which so gladdened the
ears of the divine, that the alacrity with which he sprang from the
vehicle superinduced a distortion of his ankle, and he was obliged to
limp into the inn between Mr Escot and Mr Jenkison; the former
observing, that he ought to look for nothing but evil, and, therefore,
should not be surprised at this little accident; the latter remarking, that
the comfort of a good breakfast, and the pain of a sprained ankle, pretty
exactly balanced each other.
CHAPTER II
The Squire--The Breakfast
Squire Headlong, in the meanwhile, was quadripartite in his locality;
that is to say, he was superintending the operations in four scenes of
action--namely, the cellar, the library, the picture-gallery, and the
dining-room,--preparing for the reception of his philosophical and
dilettanti visitors. His myrmidon on this occasion was a little red-nosed
butler, whom nature seemed to have cast in the genuine mould of an
antique Silenus, and who waddled about the house after his master,
wiping his forehead and panting for breath, while the latter bounced
from room to room like a cracker, and was indefatigable in his
requisitions for the proximity of his vinous Achates, whose advice and
co-operation he deemed no less necessary in the library than in the
cellar. Multitudes of packages had arrived, by land and water, from

London, and Liverpool, and Chester, and Manchester, and Birmingham,
and various parts of the mountains: books, wine, cheese, globes,
mathematical instruments, turkeys, telescopes, hams, tongues,
microscopes, quadrants, sextants, fiddles, flutes, tea, sugar, electrical
machines, figs, spices, air-pumps, soda-water, chemical apparatus, eggs,
French-horns, drawing books, palettes, oils and colours, bottled ale and
porter, scenery for a private theatre, pickles and fish-sauce, patent
lamps and chandeliers, barrels of oysters, sofas, chairs, tables, carpets,
beds, looking-glasses, pictures, fruits and confections, nuts, oranges,
lemons, packages of salt salmon, and jars of Portugal grapes. These,
arriving with infinite rapidity, and in inexhaustible succession, had
been deposited at random, as the convenience of the moment
dictated,--sofas in the cellar, chandeliers in the kitchen, hampers of ale
in the drawing-room, and fiddles and fish-sauce in the library. The
servants, unpacking all these in furious haste, and flying with them
from place to place, according to the tumultuous directions of Squire
Headlong and the little fat butler who fumed at his heels, chafed, and
crossed, and clashed, and tumbled over one another up stairs and down.
All was bustle, uproar, and confusion; yet nothing seemed to advance:
while the rage and impetuosity of the Squire continued fermenting to
the highest degree of exasperation, which he signified, from time to
time, by converting some newly unpacked article, such as a book, a
bottle, a ham, or a fiddle, into a missile against the head of some
unfortunate servant who did not seem to move in a ratio of velocity
corresponding to the intensity of his master's desires.
In this state of eager preparation we shall leave the happy inhabitants of
Headlong Hall, and return to the three philosophers and the unfortunate
divine, whom we left limping with a sprained ankle, into the
breakfast-room of