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ON HIS WAY THROUGH THE WORLD 153
CHAPTER VI
BRANDON'S
THORNHAUGH STREET is but a poor place now, and the
houses look as if they had seen better days : but that house
with the cut centre drawing-room window, which has the
name of Brandon on the door, is as neat as any house in the
quarter, and the brass plate always shines like burnished gold.
About Easter time many fine carriages stop at that door, and
splendid people walk in, introduced by a tidy little maid, or else
by an athletic Italian, with a glossy black beard and gold earrings,
who conducts them to the drawing-room floor, where Mr. Ridley,
the painter, lives, and where his pictures are privately exhibited
before they go to the Royal Academy.
As the carriages drive up, you will often sec a red-faced man,
in an olive-green wig, smiling blandly over the blinds of the parlour,
on the ground-floor. That is Captain Gann, the father of the lady
who keeps the house. I don't know how he came by the rank
of captain, but he has borne it so long and gallantly that there
is no use in any longer questioning the title. He does not claim
it, neither does he deny it. But the wags who call upon Mrs.
Brandon can always, as the phrase is, "draw" her father, by
speaking of Prussia, France, Waterloo, or battles in general, until
the Little Sister says, " Now, never mind about the battle of
Waterloo, papa" (she says pa—her h's are irregular—I can't help
it)—"Never mind about Waterloo, papa; you've told them all
about it. And don't go on, Mr. Beans, don't, please, go on in
that way."
Young Beans has already drawn "Captain Gann (assisted by
Shaw, the Life-Guardsman) killing twenty-four French cuirassiers
at Waterloo." " Captain Gann defending Hougoumont." " Captain
Gann, called upon by Napoleon Bonaparte to lay down his arms,
flaying, 'A captain of militia dies, but never surrenders.'" "The
Duke of Wellington pointing to the advancing Old Guard, and
flaying, 'Up, Gann, and at them.'" And these sketches are
so droll, that even the Little Sister, Gann's own daughter, can't
help laughing at them. To be sure, she loves fun, the Little