Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 10, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 November 1874 — L’ENFANT TERRIBLE AND THE BAD BOY. [ARTICLE]

L’ENFANT TERRIBLE AND THE BAD BOY.

BY CHARLES DIMITRY.

The enfant terrible in the first stages of his career has the guise of a little St. John —to borrow a simile from the French —with the unrecognized genius of a Mephistopheles—but of a Mephistophefes'without guile. In liis second stage, however, he loses the artlessness and sweet innocence of the first stage and becomes simply and emphatically a bad boy, who is dangerous without being interesting. The enfant, t rrible proper is a living denial ot the excellence and desirability of truth and candor, as he is the best argument in favor of the hypocrisies of soeiety. Truth bubbles from his lips in confusing words, traustormed by the time it reaches the ear into the voice of accusatory Fate. He is the only inspired oracle that is left to mankind, for he is the only created thing whose instincts arenmerring and who has the hardihood in a world of sham to dare affirm what is, without fear or favor. Before his nimble tongue the humbugs the artificialities the little pretenses with which we mutually close each other’s eyes—all topple to the S round, a wreck of falsehood and detected isguises. If the enfant terrible be silent when the masquerader is around, he is silent because he is thinking; and woe to the pretender whose pretense is not unfathomable to the happily feeble intelligence of this child-seer! His observant eyes, his open ears, his logical mind—for the enfant terrible is nothing if not logical —are constantly at work aiding him to store his mental armory with weapons which shall surely cut sharply when the ready tongue, obeying the call of the inquisitive mind, makes the last fatal use of them. ts? . “ Ha, what’s a rosy-posy?” “A. rosy-posy, my sweetsipeetsy? Wherever could you have heard that wordv John, did you hear that little monkey’s question?” “Eh? Oh, yes!" “ Ma, what is a rosy-posy?” “ Why, you are a rosy-posy.” “ And is Johanna a rosy-posy,,too?” “Johanna? No; why?” Why, because pa he pinched Johanna’s cheeks yesterday behind the kitcshen-dboF - while you was out, and he said, 1 Oh, jrnu rosy-posv, you!’—didn’t you, pa?—and so Johanna must be a rosy-posy, too, ain’t siu.-4>a?” .Heje is a little dialogue which concerns ma: “ Fa, ma was right mad this mornin’.” “Mad? Why, what had you been doing, you little rogue?” “ Oh, ma wasn’t mad with me; it was with Mister Torpeder; Mister Torpeder hearted to kisaina’s hand in the parlor anatna, sl& gnre him a good slap—-didn’t you, ma? - 1 tell you ma was mad with Mister Torpeder.” JVIa, suddenly compelled to make pronoun for the entertainment of an old friend w hom pa has brought home unexpectedly to dinner, consoles herself with the remark, in the hearing of the enfant terible, that the soup will just go round, 1 and adds nervously to pa: ' 1 “How dreadful t*mild it be if Dawkins fl>r souji a second time—sqm), you know, is his favorite dish."

At dinner, the catastrophe feared actually occurs. “ Your soud, njy dear ma’am,” blandly observes Dawkins, in * jComplimantary tone, “ is so delightful that I will take the libe'rty’bf requesting just another spoonful, if you please.” “ Oh, ma, how dreadful Mr. Dawkins wants some mote soup, and there ain’t enough 8° round but once!” exclaims the unforgetlui enfant terrible , anxiously looking at the plate that Dawkins extends toward the empty tureen. Maj. Pepper, a well-preserved old beau, precise and formal in manners, fastidious in dress, touchy in disposition, and as vain - as a turkeyqrobbler of his influence widi the sex—Maj. Pepper is a tefl'iously-constant visitor at the house of a certain enfant terrible —a young and vivacious widow. Intentions matrimonial, and in consequence rather bothersome to Trippitt, a young gallant, whose intentions are similar, and whom he always permits to leave the widow’s presence first on the occasion of a call. “ Hangit,” as the Major vigorously remarks to himself, “ I’ll have the last word with the widow if I’ve got to wing that young parrot to have it!” The question with the widow is, how to get rid of the Major without causing ill-feeling. Enfant terrible solves the problem in his own way—rather abruptly, -however. —-———- - Standing with his hands clasped behind him, with his sturdy legs stretched apart, and gazing contemplatively at Maj. Pepper, while that suitor is airily turning a complimentary period, he interrupts his platitudes with: I Maj. Peppers, is you as ole as ole Methusleum?” “ Why, what dy’e mean?” “ Our Susan says you’s ever so ole; she says you’s as ole as the hills.” “ Why, you little— —” “ifu-jor iVp-per!” interrupts the widow, bridling up. “I would prefer that no names be applied to my child! It may be his misfortune that he is intelligent beyond his years, but that is no reason why he should be shamefully spoken to in this way!” “ Shamefully spoken to in this way! Madam, your child may be a prodigy of precocity—and I dare* say he is—but it strikes me that he has been put up to this thing. It was only day before yesterday, while I was waiting for you, that he inquired of me why 1 came to the house so often —in the presence of Trippitt, too, by the way, who had the impudence to giggle behind his handkerchief; and last week when I casually asked him what I should bring him as a present he actually replied that he would like to have a live jackass!” “ Well, sir, I don’t see anything so extraordinary in that answer.” “ Don’t you, indeed, madam? Nothing in the way of a suggestion —of a diabolical innuendo?” “ Goodness gracious, no! But it seems to me, Maj. Pepper, that a person of your age should reflect before beginning to quarrel with a child of four years.” “J quarrel with a child! Why, hang it! —beg pardon -this is worse than the boy’s insolence!” “ Yes, quarrel with a child—l repeat it. And, as regards the age of Methuselah —which the child absurdly twisted it into Methusleum —there was nothing in the question that should have aroused your anger. Nobody knows positively, how old Methuselah was. Some authorities put his age at not more than one hundred and thir ” “Eh? Well, Madam, I have too profound a regard for your sex to allow myself to be vexed at anything a lady may say to me; but, as for this ill-bred little nuisance of yours, I should like to lay him across my knee for a minute or two!" “ Maj. Pepper!” “ Madam —l—l ” Vivacious widow rises, pale and panting. Maj. Pepper rises, as red in the face as the commodity of which his name is the synonym. “It occurs to me, Madam, that this interview had better end here. Goodmorning.” “ And the acquaintance, if you please. Crcod-morning, Major.” The first stage of the enfant terrible may be said to last until the age of seven years; up to that period he may be described as inopportune and artless. As he grows older, however, he becomes, as before stated, simply the “ bad boy,” and generally develops into the open and avowed enemy of his older sister, especially when the latter’s beau happens to be on hand. It is the normal condition of the bad boy to be never allowed to go where he wishes to go; and this is why we uniformly find him expelled from the parlor. To him the parlor is what the seventh heaven is to the followers of the Prophet i but in order that it may present this fascination to him it must be occupied —especially Hty his older sister and her beau. Tte'watehes for the young —or old—gentleman’s coming with pertinacity, and when the latter finally comes he uses every strategy to obtain admittance. He may enter under the wretched subterfuge of inquiring of the beau —as if that person knew anything about it—the latitude of Borneo or the exact temperature of Patagonia; and when his sister (as she invariably does) promptly orders him out, and the beau refers him to the geography he holds in his hand, he retires with an insolent chuckle which brings a blush to the beau’s cheeks. If a sturdy and defiant boy, as he often is, he will force his way in violently when the mood is oh’hiin, and, as lie is never at a loss for ingenious methods of torment, his sister is compelled to cry a truce. It is a great pleasure with the bad boy to be able to out-sit his sister’s beau; still greater is his delight when he sees that he makes them uncomfortable by remaining. On such occasions he is never sleepy, although he nods almost immediately after denying the fact, if charged with an inclination to slumber. He likewise derives great satisfaction from offering to walk off on his ear for the beau’s edification, or from challenging him to a game of mumble-the-peg on the carpet, if in a cheerful mood he will almost invariably appropriate to himself whatever attentions the beau has to spare, to his sister’s utter discomfiture. Nine out of ten men in such a position, noi knowing of the existence of the skeleton in the closet, will pet the bad boy Under the dclnsion that nis friendly notice of the lad will be a passport to (he family’s—and the sister’s—favor. Outside, of gourse, the suitor.anathematizes him as afnghtful little monster"; but it is only when matters have so progressed in his affair that his lady-love is enabled to impart to him in confidence that the boy is the torment of her life that he throws off the ma k and’brutally invites him to go and play sofiiewhere else. The bad boy is most triumphant when he can manage to come into possession of some secret of his sister’s —secret, of

course, so far as the beau is concerned. It is then that he concocts carefullyplanned surprises, and revenges himself for liis expulsion from the parlor by threats Of disastrous "revelations. He treasures .up casual remarks and holds them np before bis sister! as a warning and a terror. So long as, overcoming his natural tendency to proclaim his knowledge of things, the bad boy can refrain from telling what he knows, he possesses In his sister’s secret a powerful talisman wherewith to extort her obedience to his exactions. He is even permitted to enter the parlor freely on his promise, which he ratifies with an “ honest vow,” that he will not stay very long, and that he M ill not pull the caller’s coat-tail, or tickle his ear, making believe it is bugs, or offer to walk off on bis own. If on such occasions the caller be the one. concerning whom the sister may have made the remark which forms the great “ secret,” the bad boy wiH not resist the temptation to swing his legs under his chair and clap his hands together softly, with an “ Oh, I know something, I know something!” and a glance at the beau which says, as plainly as words, “ Wouldn’t' you like to know what it is, now?” If the beau be a little uncertain regarding the opinion entertained of him by the sister—although his vanity naturally- infers that the ©pinion is a favor--able one—he will probably be urgent to know what the bad boy knows. “ Come now, Joey, out with it! What do you know?” he will exclaim. “ Now, Joe,” will the sister say, coaxingly, but trembling in her boots. Beau, more confident than ever, and vastly pleased with himself, continues to play with fire by questioning the boy. “Never mind Sis,” with an arch and significant glance at that young lady, “what is it, Joey?” “Don’t question him, please,” from sister, imploringly. “Well, I’ll let you off this time,” magnanimously, anu with a fine sense of proprietorship in his tone —“ I’ll let you off this time, but some other day, when you are not here, I’ll get Joey to tell - me.” _ „± And so passes away the danger for the moment. . , The time comes, however —as it must inevitably come —when the bad boy, smarting under some fresh injury to Ms feelings, makes the revelation. The -war between himself and his sister, which has been temporarily interrupted by the arrival of the beau, is resumed in his presence. Tne sister imprudently informs him that he is worrying thijj, visitor, and requests him to let the laiter’s ear alone. “ Don’t encourage him, Mr. Bodkin,” she says, raspingly. “ lie ought to be in bed and asleep, instead of troubling people at this hour.” “ Oh,” says the beau, kindly, “he doesn’t disturb me. I rather like Joey’s ways; lie’s got so much life in him, has Joey!” “ 1 suppose,” remarks the bad boy to his sister, “ you’d like him to encourage you, —wouldn’t you? You know w r hat you said the other day.” “ You, Joe! If you dare, now!” “Let’s have it, Joey! What loas it that Sis said ?” “ She said something about you; and she needn’t look at me in that way. I ain’t afeard of her!” “ Go out of the parlor this instant, sir! Do let him alone, Mr. Bodkin. I have no patience with him.” “ I want to hear first what Joey has to say.” __ . . “Well, I think it’s very mean of you to say that, especially when Joe would just as soon make up a story as not. Here, you, Joe, come out!” Dragged to the door, kicking and scratching with all his strength, the bad boy turns at the threshold, and suddenly checks the beau’s laughter with the following crushing revelation, which he shrieks back at him, as the door closes on him: “ Sis told ma you was the biggest fool she ever saw, and she just wished you wouldn’t keep on coming here!” It is well for society perhaps that this type of child rarely carries with him into the arena of mature manhood the traits and the disposition that made liis childhood terrible. If he should progress from the condition of the. enfant terrible into that of the bad boy he seldom adds more to it than the closing dangerous stage of wild young man. As he grows into maturity the memory of Mliat he once was fades away, and he drops quietly into the ways of the orderly citizen and the man of family. Nobody is more astonished than he at the extraordinary forwardness of some children, of the performances and sayings, of the enfant terrible and the bad boy reach his ear. Indeed, he himself may have an enfant terrible at home —his eldest-born—and, if this second edition of his own earlier years should at any time violate the proprieties and throw everybody, parents, guests, and all, into confusion by some artless inquiry or embarrassing remark, he will be the first, probably, to express wonder at the circumstance. “ Wife” (we can imagine him as saying), “that Tom of ours is a most Singular child. Did you hear him to-night when he asked my old friend Jarnagin whether he had two beards, and what he had done with that black beard he wore here last Wednesday to dinner? Who ever would have thought that so young a child would have noticed that Jarnagin sometimes forgets to dye his whiskers? Where in the world could our Tom have acquired this trait of his?” And then the Reformed enfant terrible looks curiously at his wife, who shakes her head, and looks curiously, in her turn, at the little monster in the trundlebed, who sleeps the peaceful sleep of the innocent. “Oh,” exclaims the wife, “look! Is auythingtthe matter with him? See how hard-set his mouth is, and his lips arcmoving.” “ Nothing is the matter with him—nothing, except, perhaps, that Jpe is dreaming about Jarnagin.” Ah, child of shadowy youth! are you looking forward to the future to • see yourself, changing with the changing years, climbing that ascent whereon the rare violets and roses that bloom at its foot are misplaced, after a while, by unsightly flowers and by stinging thistles? Do you see your face, from which the light of childhood has passed away, w ith the shade of later knowledge upon it—the shade which shall gradually deepen ■asthe years of adolescence gather behind you, and which shall grow at last to be an ineffaceable shadow when the world is opened before you? Do you see ho,w, one by one, the brave aspirations of your youth have perished by the roadside, and how the little airy bubbles of hope, light and fantastic as the visions of a dreamer in Cathay, have burst and vanished forevermore? Dreaming of Jarnagin, I wonder? — Appleton's Journal.