DOI article:
Harland, Henry: Tirala-tirala...
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.27805#0072
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Tirala-tirala . .
yes, as plainly as at this moment I see the paper I’m writing on ;
but I won’t turn aside now to speak of that. And as for my finds,
on two or three occasions, at least, they had more than a subjective
metaphysical importance. The first was a chest filled with
jewellery and trinkets, an iron chest, studded with nails, in size
and shape like a small trunk, with a rounded lid. I dragged it out
of a dark corner, from amidst a quantity of rubbish, and (it wasn’t
even locked !) fancy the eyes I made when I beheld its contents:
half-a-dozen elaborately carved, high-backed tortoise-shell combs,
ranged in a morocco case; a beautiful old-fashioned watch, in the
form of a miniature guitar ; an enamelled snuff-box ; and then no
end of rings, brooches, buckles, seals, and watch-keys, set with
precious stones—not very precious stones, perhaps—only garnets;
amethysts, carnelians ; but mercy, how they glittered ! I ran off
in great excitement to call my grandmother ; and she called my
uncle Edmond ; and he, alas, applied the laws of seigniory to the
transaction, and I saw my trover appropriated. My other im-
portant finds were appropriated also, but about them I did not care
so much—they were only papers. One was a certificate, dated in
the Year III, and attesting that my grandfather’s father had taken
the oath of allegiance to the Republic. As I was a fierce Legiti-
mist, this document afforded me but moderate satisfaction. The
other was a Map of the World, covering a sheet of cardboard
nearly a yard square, executed in pen-and-ink, but with such a
complexity of hair-lines, delicate shading, and ornate lettering, that,
until you had examined it closely, you would have thought it a
carefully finished steel-engraving. It was signed “ Herminie de
Pontacq, 1814”; that is to say, by my grandmother herself, who
in 1814 had been twelve years old ; dear me, only twelve years
old ! It was delightful and marvellous to think that my own
grandmother, in 1814, had been so industrious, and painstaking,
and
Tirala-tirala . .
yes, as plainly as at this moment I see the paper I’m writing on ;
but I won’t turn aside now to speak of that. And as for my finds,
on two or three occasions, at least, they had more than a subjective
metaphysical importance. The first was a chest filled with
jewellery and trinkets, an iron chest, studded with nails, in size
and shape like a small trunk, with a rounded lid. I dragged it out
of a dark corner, from amidst a quantity of rubbish, and (it wasn’t
even locked !) fancy the eyes I made when I beheld its contents:
half-a-dozen elaborately carved, high-backed tortoise-shell combs,
ranged in a morocco case; a beautiful old-fashioned watch, in the
form of a miniature guitar ; an enamelled snuff-box ; and then no
end of rings, brooches, buckles, seals, and watch-keys, set with
precious stones—not very precious stones, perhaps—only garnets;
amethysts, carnelians ; but mercy, how they glittered ! I ran off
in great excitement to call my grandmother ; and she called my
uncle Edmond ; and he, alas, applied the laws of seigniory to the
transaction, and I saw my trover appropriated. My other im-
portant finds were appropriated also, but about them I did not care
so much—they were only papers. One was a certificate, dated in
the Year III, and attesting that my grandfather’s father had taken
the oath of allegiance to the Republic. As I was a fierce Legiti-
mist, this document afforded me but moderate satisfaction. The
other was a Map of the World, covering a sheet of cardboard
nearly a yard square, executed in pen-and-ink, but with such a
complexity of hair-lines, delicate shading, and ornate lettering, that,
until you had examined it closely, you would have thought it a
carefully finished steel-engraving. It was signed “ Herminie de
Pontacq, 1814”; that is to say, by my grandmother herself, who
in 1814 had been twelve years old ; dear me, only twelve years
old ! It was delightful and marvellous to think that my own
grandmother, in 1814, had been so industrious, and painstaking,
and