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The Banker's Secret - From Readings Over The Teacups - Five Stories And A Sequel

by Oliver Wendell Holmes

The Banker's dinner is the stateliest feast

The town has heard of for a year, at least;

The sparry lustres shed their broadest blaze,

Damask and silver catch and spread the rays;

The florist's triumphs crown the daintier spoil

Won from the sea, the forest, or the soil;

The steaming hot-house yields its largest pines,

The sunless vaults unearth their oldest wines;

With one admiring look the scene survey,

And turn a moment from the bright display.

Of all the joys of earthly pride or power,

What gives most life, worth living, in an hour?

When Victory settles on the doubtful fight

And the last foeman wheels in panting flight,

No thrill like this is felt beneath the sun;

Life's sovereign moment is a battle won.

But say what next? To shape a Senate's choice,

By the strong magic of the master's voice;

To ride the stormy tempest of debate

That whirls the wavering fortunes of the state.

Third in the list, the happy lover's prize

Is won by honeyed words from women's eyes.

If some would have it first instead of third,

So let it be, - I answer not a word.

The fourth, - sweet readers, let the thoughtless half

Have its small shrug and inoffensive laugh;

Let the grave quarter wear its virtuous frown,

The stern half-quarter try to scowl us down;

But the last eighth, the choice and sifted few,

Will hear my words, and, pleased, confess them true.

Among the great whom Heaven has made to shine,

How few have learned the art of arts, - to dine!

Nature, indulgent to our daily need,

Kind-hearted mother! taught us all to feed;

But the chief art, - how rarely Nature flings

This choicest gift among her social kings

Say, man of truth, has life a brighter hour

Than waits the chosen guest who knows his power?

He moves with ease, itself an angel charm, -

Lifts with light touch my lady's jewelled arm,

Slides to his seat, half leading and half led,

Smiling but quiet till the grace is said,

Then gently kindles, while by slow degrees

Creep softly out the little arts that please;

Bright looks, the cheerful language of the eye,

The neat, crisp question and the gay reply, -

Talk light and airy, such as well may pass

Between the rested fork and lifted glass; -

With play like this the earlier evening flies,

Till rustling silks proclaim the ladies rise.

His hour has come, - he looks along the chairs,

As the Great Duke surveyed his iron squares.

That's the young traveller, - is n't much to show, -

Fast on the road, but at the table slow.

Next him, - you see the author in his look, -

His forehead lined with wrinkles like a book, -

Wrote the great history of the ancient Huns, -

Holds back to fire among the heavy guns.

Oh, there's our poet seated at his side,

Beloved of ladies, soft, cerulean-eyed.

Poets are prosy in their common talk,

As the fast trotters, for the most part, walk.

And there's our well-dressed gentleman, who sits,

By right divine, no doubt, among the wits,

Who airs his tailor's patterns when he walks,

The man that often speaks, but never talks.

Why should he talk, whose presence lends a grace

To every table where he shows his face?

He knows the manual of the silver fork,

Can name his claret - if he sees the cork, -

Remark that "White-top" was considered fine,

But swear the "Juno" is the better wine; -

Is not this talking? Ask Quintilian's rules;

If they say No, the town has many fools.

Pause for a moment, - for our eyes behold

The plain unsceptred king, the man of gold,

The thrice illustrious threefold millionnaire;

Mark his slow-creeping, dead, metallic stare;

His eyes, dull glimmering, like the balance-pan

That weighs its guinea as he weighs his man.

Who's next? An artist in a satin tie

Whose ample folds defeat the curious eye.

And there 's the cousin, - must be asked, you know, -

Looks like a spinster at a baby-show.

Hope he is cool, - they set him next the door, -

And likes his place, between the gap and bore.

Next comes a Congressman, distinguished guest

We don't count him, - they asked him with the rest;

And then some white cravats, with well-shaped ties,

And heads above them which their owners prize.

Of all that cluster round the genial board,

Not one so radiant as the banquet's lord.

Some say they fancy, but they know not why,

A shade of trouble brooding in his eye,

Nothing, perhaps, - the rooms are overhot, -

Yet see his cheek, - the dull-red burning spot, -

Taste the brown sherry which he does not pass, -

Ha! That is brandy; see him fill his glass!

But not forgetful of his feasting friends,

To each in turn some lively word he sends;

See how he throws his baited lines about,

And plays his men as anglers play their trout.

A question drops among the listening crew

And hits the traveller, pat on Timbuctoo.

We're on the Niger, somewhere near its source, -

Not the least hurry, take the river's course

Through Kissi, Foota, Kankan, Bammakoo,

Bambarra, Sego, so to Timbuctoo,

Thence down to Youri; - stop him if we can,

We can't fare worse, - wake up the Congressman!

The Congressman, once on his talking legs,

Stirs up his knowledge to its thickest dregs;

Tremendous draught for dining men to quaff!

Nothing will choke him but a purpling laugh.

A word, - a shout, - a mighty roar, - 't is done;

Extinguished; lassoed by a treacherous pun.

A laugh is priming to the loaded soul;

The scattering shots become a steady roll,

Broke by sharp cracks that run along the line,

The light artillery of the talker's wine.

The kindling goblets flame with golden dews,

The hoarded flasks their tawny fire diffuse,

And the Rhine's breast-milk gushes cold and bright,

Pale as the moon and maddening as her light;

With crimson juice the thirsty southern sky

Sucks from the hills where buried armies lie,

So that the dreamy passion it imparts

Is drawn from heroes' bones and lovers' hearts.

But lulls will come; the flashing soul transmits

Its gleams of light in alternating fits.

The shower of talk that rattled down amain

Ends in small patterings like an April's rain;

With the dry sticks all bonfires are begun;

Bring the first fagot, proser number one

The voices halt; the game is at a stand;

Now for a solo from the master-hand

'T is but a story, - quite a simple thing, -

An aria touched upon a single string,

But every accent comes with such a grace

The stupid servants listen in their place,

Each with his waiter in his lifted hands,

Still as a well-bred pointer when he stands.

A query checks him: "Is he quite exact?"

(This from a grizzled, square-jawed man of fact.)

The sparkling story leaves him to his fate,

Crushed by a witness, smothered with a date,

As a swift river, sown with many a star,

Runs brighter, rippling on a shallow bar.

The smooth divine suggests a graver doubt;

A neat quotation bowls the parson out;

Then, sliding gayly from his own display,

He laughs the learned dulness all away.

So, with the merry tale and jovial song,

The jocund evening whirls itself along,

Till the last chorus shrieks its loud encore,

And the white neckcloths vanish through the door.

One savage word! - The menials know its tone,

And slink away; the master stands alone.

"Well played, by - -"; breathe not what were best unheard;

His goblet shivers while he speaks the word, -

"If wine tells truth, - and so have said the wise, -

It makes me laugh to think how brandy lies!

Bankrupt to-morrow, - millionnaire to-day, -

The farce is over, - now begins the play!"

The spring he touches lets a panel glide;

An iron closet harks beneath the slide,

Bright with such treasures as a search might bring

From the deep pockets of a truant king.

Two diamonds, eyeballs of a god of bronze,

Bought from his faithful priest, a pious bonze;

A string of brilliants; rubies, three or four;

Bags of old coin and bars of virgin ore;

A jewelled poniard and a Turkish knife,

Noiseless and useful if we come to strife.

Gone! As a pirate flies before the wind,

And not one tear for all he leaves behind

From all the love his better years have known

Fled like a felon, - ah! but not alone!

The chariot flashes through a lantern's glare, -

Oh the wild eyes! the storm of sable hair!

Still to his side the broken heart will cling, -

The bride of shame, the wife without the ring

Hark, the deep oath, - the wail of frenzied woe, -

Lost! lost to hope of Heaven and peace below!

He kept his secret; but the seed of crime

Bursts of itself in God's appointed time.

The lives he wrecked were scattered far and wide;

One never blamed nor wept, - she only died.

None knew his lot, though idle tongues would say

He sought a lonely refuge far away,

And there, with borrowed name and altered mien,

He died unheeded, as he lived unseen.

The moral market had the usual chills

Of Virtue suffering from protested bills;

The White Cravats, to friendship's memory true,

Sighed for the past, surveyed the future too;

Their sorrow breathed in one expressive line, -

"Gave pleasant dinners; who has got his wine?"

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The reader paused, - the Teacups knew his ways, -

He, like the rest, was not averse to praise.

Voices and hands united; every one

Joined in approval: "Number Three, well done!"

"Now for the Exile's story; if my wits

Are not at fault, his curious record fits

Neatly as sequel to the tale we've heard;

Not wholly wild the fancy, nor absurd

That this our island hermit well might be

That story's hero, fled from over sea.

Come, Number Seven, we would not have you strain

The fertile powers of that inventive brain.

Read us 'The Exile's Secret'; there's enough

Of dream-like fiction and fantastic stuff

In the strange web of mystery that invests

The lonely isle where sea birds build their nests."

"Lies! naught but lies!" so Number Seven began, -

No harm was known of that secluded man.

He lived alone, - who would n't if he might,

And leave the rogues and idiots out of sight?

A foolish story, - still, I'll do my best, -

The house was real, - don't believe the rest.

How could a ruined dwelling last so long

Without its legends shaped in tale and song?

Who was this man of whom they tell the lies?

Perhaps - why not? - NAPOLEON! in disguise, -

So some said, kidnapped from his ocean coop,

Brought to this island in a coasting sloop, -

Meanwhile a sham Napoleon in his place

Played Nap. and saved Sir Hudson from disgrace.

Such was one story; others used to say,

"No, - not Napoleon, - it was Marshal Ney."

"Shot?" Yes, no doubt, but not with balls of lead,

But balls of pith that never shoot folks dead.

He wandered round, lived South for many a year,

At last came North and fixed his dwelling here.

Choose which you will of all the tales that pile

Their mingling fables on the tree-crowned isle.

Who wrote this modest version I suppose

That truthful Teacup, our Dictator, knows;

Made up of various legends, it would seem,

The sailor's yarn, the crazy poet's dream.

Such tales as this, by simple souls received,

At first are stared at and at last believed;

From threads like this the grave historians try

To weave their webs, and never know they lie.

Hear, then, the fables that have gathered round

The lonely home an exiled stranger found.