IaMrs Blackshaw had a baby. It would be an exaggeration to say that the baby interested the entire town, Bursley being an ancient, blase1 sort of borough2 of some thirty thousand inhabitants. Babies, in fact, arrived in Bursley at the rate of more than a thousand every year. Nevertheless, a few weeks after the advent3 of Mrs Blackshaw's baby, when the medical officer of health reported to the Town Council that the births for the month amounted to ninety-five, and that the birth-rate of Bursley compared favourably5 with the birth-rates of the sister towns, Hanbridge, Knype, Longshaw, and Turnhill—when the medical officer read these memorable6 words at the monthly meeting of the Council, and the Staffordshire Signal reported them, and Mrs Blackshaw perused7 them, a blush of pride spread over Mrs Blackshaw's face, and she picked up the baby's left foot and gave it a little peck of a kiss. She could not help feeling that the real solid foundation of that formidable and magnificent output of babies was her baby. She could not help feeling that she had done something for the town—had caught the public eye.
As for the baby, except that it was decidedly superior to the average infant in external appearance and pleasantness of disposition8, it was, in all essential characteristics, a typical baby—that is to say, it was purely9 sensuous10 and it lived the life of the senses. It was utterly11 selfish. It never thought of anyone but itself. It honestly imagined itself to be the centre of the created universe. It was convinced that the rest of the universe had been brought into existence solely12 for the convenience and pleasure of it—the baby. When it wanted anything it made no secret of the fact, and it was always utterly unscrupulous in trying to get what it wanted. If it could have obtained the moon it would have upset all the astronomers13 of Europe and made Whitaker's Almanack unsalable without a pang14. It had no god but its stomach. It never bothered its head about higher things. It was a bully15 and a coward, and it treated women as beings of a lower order than men. In a word, it was that ideal creature, sung of the poets, from which we gradually sink and fall away as we grow older.
At the age of six months it had quite a lot of hair, and a charming rosy16 expanse at the back of its neck, caused through lying on its back in contemplation of its own importance. It didn't know the date of the Battle of Hastings, but it knew with the certainty of absolute knowledge that it was master of the house, and that the activity of the house revolved17 round it.
Now, the baby loved its bath. In any case its bath would have been an affair of immense and intricate pomp; but the fact that it loved its bath raised the interest and significance of the bath to the nth power. The bath took place at five o'clock in the evening, and it is not too much to say that the idea of the bath was immanent in the very atmosphere of the house. When you have an appointment with the dentist at five o'clock in the afternoon the idea of the appointment is immanent in your mind from the first moment of your awakening19. Conceive that an appointment with the dentist implies heavenly joy instead of infernal pain, and you will have a notion of the daily state of Mrs Blackshaw and Emmie (the nurse) with regard to the baby's bath.
Even at ten in the morning Emmie would be keeping an eye on the kitchen fire, lest the cook might let it out. And shortly after noon Mrs Blackshaw would be keeping an eye on the thermometer in the bedroom where the bath occurred. From four o'clock onwards the clocks in the house were spied on and overlooked like suspected persons; but they were used to that, because the baby had his sterilized20 milk every two hours. I have at length allowed you to penetrate21 the secret of his sex.
And so at five o'clock precisely22 the august and exciting ceremony began in the best bedroom. A bright fire was burning (the month being December), and the carefully-shaded electric lights were also burning. A large bath-towel was spread in a convenient place on the floor, and on the towel were two chairs facing each other, and a table. On one chair was the bath, and on the other was Mrs Blackshaw with her sleeves rolled up, and on Mrs Blackshaw was another towel, and on that towel was Roger (the baby). On the table were zinc23 ointment18, vaseline, scentless24 eau de Cologne, Castile soap, and a powder-puff.
Emmie having pretty nearly filled the bath with a combination of hot and cold waters, dropped the floating thermometer into it, and then added more waters until the thermometer indicated the precise temperature proper for a baby's bath. But you are not to imagine that Mrs Blackshaw trusted a mere25 thermometer. No. She put her arm in the water up to the elbow. She reckoned the sensitive skin near the elbow was worth forty thermometers.
Emmie was chiefly an audience. Mrs Blackshaw had engaged her as a nurse, but she could have taught a nigger-boy to do all that she allowed the nurse to do. During the bath Mrs Blackshaw and Emmie hated and scorned each other, despite their joy. Emmie was twice Mrs Blackshaw's age, besides being twice her weight, and she knew twice as much about babies as Mrs Blackshaw did. However, Mrs Blackshaw had the terrific advantage of being the mother of that particular infant, and she could always end an argument when she chose, and in her own favour. It was unjust, and Emmie felt it to be unjust; but this is not a world of justice.
Roger, though not at all precocious26, was perfectly27 aware of the carefully-concealed hostility28 between his mother and his nurse, and often, with his usual unscrupulousness, he used it for his own ends. He was sitting upon his mother's knees toying with the edge of the bath, already tasting its delights in advance. Mrs Blackshaw undressed the upper half of him, and then she laid him on the flat of his back and undressed the lower half of him, but keeping some wisp of a garment round his equatorial regions. And then she washed his face with a sponge and the Castile soap, very gently, but not half gently enough for Emmie, nor half gently enough for Roger, for Roger looked upon this part of the business as insulting and superfluous29. He breathed hard and kicked his feet nearly off.
'Yes, it's dreadful having our face washed, isn't it?' said Mrs Blackshaw, with her sleeves up, and her hair by this time down. 'We don't like it, do we? Yes, yes.'
Emmie grunted30, without a sound, and yet Mrs Blackshaw heard her, and finished that face quickly and turned to the hands.
'Potato-gardens every day,' she said. 'Evzy day-day. Enough of that, Colonel!' (For, after all, she had plenty of spirit.) 'Fat little creases31! Fat little creases! There! He likes that! There! Feet! Feet! Feet and legs! Then our back. And then WHUP we shall go into the bath! That's it. Kick! Kick your mother!'
And she turned him over.
'Harridan33!' said the eyes of Mrs Blackshaw. 'I wouldn't let you bath him for twenty thousand pounds!'
Roger continued to breathe hard, as if his mother were a horse and he were rubbing her down.
'Now! Zoop! Whup!' cried his mother, and having deprived him of his final rag, she picked him up and sat him in the bath, and he was divinely happy, and so were the women. He appeared a gross little animal in the bath, all the tints34 of his flesh shimmering35 under the electric light. His chest was superb, but the rolled and creased36 bigness of his inordinate37 stomach was simply appalling38, not to mention his great thighs39 and calves40. The truth was, he had grown so that if he had been only a little bit bigger, he would have burst the bath. He resembled an old man who had been steadily41 eating too much for about forty years.
And he splashed. Oh! he splashed. You see, he had learnt how to splash, and he had certainly got an inkling that to splash was wicked and messy. So he splashed—in his mother's face, in Emmie's face, in the fire. He pretty well splashed the fire out. Ten minutes before, the bedroom had been tidy, a thing of beauty. It was now naught43 but a wild welter of towels, socks, binders—peninsulas of clothes nearly surrounded by water.
Finally his mother seized him again, and, rearing his little legs up out of the water, immersed the whole of his inflated44 torso beneath the surface.
'Hallo!' she exclaimed. 'Did the water run over his mouf? Did it?'
'Angels and ministers of grace defend us! How clumsy she is!' commented the eyes of Emmie.
'There! I fink that's about long enough for this kind of wevver,' said the mother.
'I should think it was! There's almost a crust of ice on the water now!' the nurse refrained from saying.
And Roger, full of regrets, was wrenched45 out of the bath. He had ceased breathing hard while in the water, but he began again immediately he emerged.
'We don't like our face wiped, do we?' said his mother on his behalf. 'We want to go back into that bath. We like it. It's more fun than anything that happens all day long! Eh? That old dandruff's coming up in fine style. It's a-peeling off like anything.'
And all the while she wiped him, patted eau de Cologne into him with the flat of her hand, and rubbed zinc ointment into him, and massaged46 him, and powdered him, and turned him over and over and over, till he was thoroughly47 well basted48 and cooked. And he kept on breathing hard.
Then he sneezed, amid general horror!
'I told you so!' the nurse didn't say, and she rushed to the bed where all the idol's beautiful, clean, aired things were lying safe from splashings, and handed a flannel49 shirt, about two inches in length, to Mrs Blackshaw. And Mrs Blackshaw rolled the left sleeve of it into a wad and stuck it over his arm, and his poor little vaccination50 marks were hidden from view till next morning. Roger protested.
'We don't like clothes, do we?' said his mother. 'We want to tumble back into our tub. We aren't much for clothes anyway. We'se a little Hottentot, aren't we?'
And she gradually covered him with one garment or another until there was nothing left of him but his head and his hands and feet. And she sat him up on her knees, so as to fasten his things behind. And then it might have been observed that he was no longer breathing hard, but giving vent4 to a sound between a laugh and a cry, while sucking his thumb and gazing round the room.
'That's our little affected51 cry that we start for our milk, isn't it?' his mother explained to him.
And he agreed that it was.
And before Emmie could fly across the room for the bottle, all ready and waiting, his mouth, in the shape of a perfect rectangle, had monopolized52 five-sixths of his face, and he was scarlet53 and bellowing54 with impatience55.
He took the bottle like a tiger his prey56, and seized his mother's hand that held the bottle, and he furiously pumped the milk into that insatiable gulf57 of a stomach. But he found time to gaze about the room too. A tear stood in each roving eye, caused by the effort of feeding.
'Yes, that's it,' said his mother. 'Now look round and see what's happening. Curiosity! Well, if you WILL bob your head, I can't help it.'
'Of course you can!' the nurse didn't say.
Then he put his finger into his mouth side by side with the bottle, and gagged himself, and choked, and gave a terrible—excuse the word—hiccough. After which he seemed to lose interest in the milk, and the pumping operations slackened and then ceased.
'Goosey!' whispered his mother, 'getting seepy? Is the sandman throwing sand in your eyes? Old Sandman at it? Sh—' ... He had gone.
Emmie took him. The women spoke58 in whispers. And Mrs Blackshaw, after a day spent in being a mother, reconstituted herself a wife, and began to beautify herself for her husband.
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1
blase
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| adj.厌烦于享乐的 | |
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borough
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| n.享有自治权的市镇；(英)自治市镇 | |
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3
advent
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| n.(重要事件等的)到来，来临 | |
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4
vent
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| n.通风口，排放口；开衩；vt.表达，发泄 | |
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5
favourably
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| adv. 善意地，赞成地 =favorably | |
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6
memorable
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| adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的 | |
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7
perused
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| v.读（某篇文字）( peruse的过去式和过去分词 )；（尤指）细阅；审阅；匆匆读或心不在焉地浏览（某篇文字） | |
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disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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9
purely
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| adv.纯粹地，完全地 | |
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10
sensuous
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| adj.激发美感的；感官的，感觉上的 | |
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11
utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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12
solely
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| adv.仅仅，唯一地 | |
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13
astronomers
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| n.天文学者，天文学家( astronomer的名词复数 ) | |
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14
pang
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| n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷 | |
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15
bully
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| n.恃强欺弱者，小流氓；vt.威胁，欺侮 | |
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16
rosy
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| adj.美好的，乐观的，玫瑰色的 | |
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17
revolved
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| v.（使）旋转( revolve的过去式和过去分词 )；细想 | |
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18
ointment
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| n.药膏，油膏，软膏 | |
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19
awakening
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| n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的 | |
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20
sterilized
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| v.消毒( sterilize的过去式和过去分词 )；使无菌；使失去生育能力；使绝育 | |
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21
penetrate
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| v.透(渗)入；刺入，刺穿；洞察，了解 | |
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22
precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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23
zinc
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| n.锌；vt.在...上镀锌 | |
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24
scentless
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| adj.无气味的，遗臭已消失的 | |
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25
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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26
precocious
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| adj.早熟的；较早显出的 | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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28
hostility
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| n.敌对，敌意；抵制［pl.］交战，战争 | |
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29
superfluous
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| adj.过多的，过剩的，多余的 | |
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30
grunted
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| （猪等）作呼噜声( grunt的过去式和过去分词 )； （指人）发出类似的哼声； 咕哝着说 | |
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31
creases
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| （使…）起折痕，弄皱( crease的第三人称单数 )； （皮肤）皱起，使起皱纹 | |
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32
Bungler
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| n.笨拙者，经验不够的人 | |
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33
harridan
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| n.恶妇；丑老大婆 | |
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34
tints
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| 色彩( tint的名词复数 )； 带白的颜色； （淡色）染发剂； 痕迹 | |
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35
shimmering
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| v.闪闪发光，发微光( shimmer的现在分词 ) | |
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36
creased
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| （使…）起折痕，弄皱( crease的过去式和过去分词 )； （皮肤）皱起，使起皱纹； 皱皱巴巴 | |
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37
inordinate
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| adj.无节制的；过度的 | |
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38
appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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39
thighs
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| n.股，大腿( thigh的名词复数 )；食用的鸡（等的）腿 | |
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40
calves
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| n.(calf的复数)笨拙的男子，腓；腿肚子( calf的名词复数 )；牛犊；腓；小腿肚v.生小牛( calve的第三人称单数 )；（冰川）崩解；生（小牛等），产（犊）；使（冰川）崩解 | |
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41
steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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42
candidly
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| adv.坦率地，直率而诚恳地 | |
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43
naught
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| n.无，零 [=nought] | |
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44
inflated
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| adj.（价格）飞涨的；（通货）膨胀的；言过其实的；充了气的v.使充气（于轮胎、气球等）( inflate的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）膨胀；（使）通货膨胀；物价上涨 | |
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45
wrenched
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| v.（猛力地）扭( wrench的过去式和过去分词 )；扭伤；使感到痛苦；使悲痛 | |
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46
massaged
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| 按摩，推拿( massage的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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47
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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48
basted
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| v.打( baste的过去式和过去分词 )；粗缝；痛斥；（烤肉等时）往上抹[浇]油 | |
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49
flannel
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| n.法兰绒；法兰绒衣服 | |
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50
vaccination
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| n.接种疫苗，种痘 | |
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51
affected
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| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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52
monopolized
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| v.垄断( monopolize的过去式和过去分词 )；独占；专卖；专营 | |
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53
scarlet
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| n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的 | |
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54
bellowing
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| v.发出吼叫声，咆哮（尤指因痛苦）( bellow的现在分词 )；（愤怒地）说出（某事），大叫 | |
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55
impatience
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| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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56
prey
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| n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨 | |
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gulf
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| n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂 | |
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58
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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