Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (12 page)

Mr Lascelles was so persuasive upon the subject and conjured up such visions of Mr Norrell’s articles upon every library-table and Mr Norrell’s opinions discussed in every drawing-room that, had it not been for the great dislike that Mr Norrell had to
The Edinburgh Review
, he would have sat down there and then to begin writing. Unfortunately,
The Edinburgh Review
was a publication renowned chiefly for radical opinions, criticism of the Government and opposition to the war with France — none of which Mr Norrell could approve.

“Besides,” said Mr Norrell, “I really have no desire to write reviews of other people’s books. Modern publications upon magic are the most pernicious things in the world, full of misinformation and wrong opinions.”

“Then sir, you may say so. The ruder you are, the more the editors will be delighted.”

“But it is my own opinions which I wish to make better known, not other people’s.”

“Ah, but, sir,” said Lascelles, “it is precisely by passing judgements upon other people’s work and pointing out their errors that readers can be made to understand your own opinions better. It is the easiest thing in the world to turn a review to one’s own ends. One only need mention the book once or twice and for the rest of the article one may develop one’s theme just as one chuses. It is, I assure you, what every body else does.”

“Hmm,” said Mr Norrell thoughtfully, “you may be right. But, no. It would seem as if I were lending support to what ought never to have been published in the first place.”

And upon this point Mr Norrell proved unpersuadable.

Lascelles was disappointed;
The Edinburgh Review
far surpassed its rivals in brilliance and wit. Its articles were devoured by everyone in the kingdom from the meanest curate to the Prime Minister. Other publications were very dull in comparison.

He was inclined to abandon the notion altogether and had almost forgotten all about it when he happened to receive a letter from a young bookseller named Murray. Mr Murray respectfully requested that Mr Lascelles and Mr Drawlight would do him the honour of permitting him to wait upon them at any hour and upon any day to suit them. He had, he said, a proposal to put before them, a proposal which concerned Mr Norrell.

Lascelles and Drawlight met the bookseller at Mr Lascelles’s house in Bruton-street a few days later. His manner was energetic and businesslike and he laid his proposal before them immediately.

“Like every other inhabitant of these isles, gentlemen, I have been amazed and delighted at the recent extraordinary revival of English magic. And I have been equally struck by the enthusiasm with which the British Public has greeted this reappearance of an art long thought dead. I am convinced that a periodical devoted to magic would achieve a wide circulation. Literature, politics, religion and travel are all very well — they will always be popular subjects for a periodical, but magic — real, practical magic like Mr Norrell’s — has the advantage of complete novelty. I wonder, gentlemen, if you could tell me whether Mr Norrell would look favourably upon my proposal? I have heard that Mr Norrell has a great deal to say upon the subject. I have heard that Mr Norrell’s opinions are quite surprizing! Of course we all learnt a little of the history and theory of magic in our schoolrooms, but it is so long since any magic was practised in these islands that I dare say what we have been taught is full of errors and misconceptions.”

“Ah!” cried Mr Drawlight. “How perceptive of you, Mr Murray! How happy it would make Mr Norrell to hear you say so! Errors and misconceptions — exactly so! Whenever, my dear sir, you are privileged to enjoy Mr Norrell’s conversation — as I have been upon many occasions — you will learn that such is the exact state of affairs!”

“It has long been the dearest wish of Mr Norrell’s heart,” said Lascelles, “to bring a more precise understanding of modern magic before a wider audience, but alas, sir, private wishes are often frustrated by public duties, and the Admiralty and the War Office keep him so busy.”

Mr Murray replied politely that of course all other considerations must give way before the great consideration of the war and Mr Norrell was a National Treasure. “But I hope that some way might be found to arrange matters so that the chief burden did not fall upon Mr Norrell’s shoulders. We would employ an editor to plan each issue, solicit articles and reviews, make changes — all under Mr Norrell’s guidance, naturally.”

“Ah, yes!” said Lascelles. “Quite. All under Mr Norrell’s guidance. We would insist upon that.”

The interview ended very cordially upon both sides with Lascelles and Drawlight promising to speak to Mr Norrell immediately.

Drawlight watched Mr Murray leave the room. “A Scotchman,” he said as soon as the door was closed.

“Oh, quite!” agreed Lascelles. “But I do not mind that. The Scotch are often very able, very canny in business. I believe this might do very well.”

“He seemed quite a respectable person — almost a gentleman in fact. Except that he has a queer trick of fixing his right eye upon one while his other eye travels the room. I found that a little disconcerting.”

“He is blind in his right eye.”

“Indeed?”

“Yes. Canning told me. One of his schoolmasters stuck a pen-knife in it when he was a boy.”

“Dear me! But, just imagine, my dear Lascelles! A whole periodical devoted to one person’s opinions! I would never have believed it possible! The magician will be astonished when we tell him.”

Mr Lascelles laughed. “He will consider it the most natural thing in the world. His vanity is beyond any thing.”

As Lascelles had predicted, Mr Norrell found nothing extraordinary in the proposal, but straightaway he began to make difficulties. “It is an excellent plan,” he said, “but unfortunately completely impracticable. I have no time to edit a periodical and I could scarcely entrust so important a task to any one else.”

“I was quite of the same mind, sir,” said Mr Lascelles, “until I thought of Portishead.”

“Portishead? Who is Portishead?” asked Mr Norrell.

“Well,” said Lascelles, “He
was
a theoretical magician, but …”

“A theoretical magician?” interrupted Mr Norrell in alarm. “You know what I think of that!”

“Ah, but you have not heard what follows,” said Lascelles. “So great is his admiration of
you
, sir, that on being told you did not approve of theoretical magicians he immediately gave up his studies.”

“Did he indeed?” said Mr Norrell, somewhat placated by this information.

“He has published one or two books. I forget what exactly — a history of sixteenth-century magic for children or something of that sort.
²
I really feel that you might safely entrust the periodical to Lord Portishead, sir. There is no danger of him publishing any thing of which you disapprove; he is known as one of most honourable men in the kingdom. His first wish will be to please you, I am quite certain.”
³

Somewhat reluctantly Mr Norrell agreed to meet Lord Portishead and Mr Drawlight wrote a letter summoning him to Hanover-square.

Lord Portishead was about thirty-eight years of age. He was very tall and thin with long, thin hands and feet. He habitually wore a whitish coat and light-coloured breeches. He was a gentle soul whom everything made uncomfortable: his excessive height made him uncomfortable; his status as a former theoretical magician made him uncomfortable (being an intelligent man he knew that Mr Norrell disapproved of him); meeting such polished men of the world as Drawlight and Lascelles made him uncomfortable and meeting Mr Norrell — who was his great hero — made him most uncomfortable of all. At one point he became so agitated that he began to sway backwards and forwards — which, taken in conjunction with his height and whitish clothes, gave him the appearance of a silver-birch tree in a high wind.

Despite his nervousness he managed to convey his great sense of the honour done to him in being summoned to meet Mr Norrell. Indeed so gratified was Mr Norrell by Lord Portishead’s extreme deference towards him that he graciously gave his permission for Lord Portishead to study magic again.

Naturally Lord Portishead was delighted, but when he heard that Mr Norrell desired him to sit for long periods of time in a corner of Mr Norrell’s own drawing-room, soaking up Mr Norrell’s opinions upon modern magic, and then to edit, under Mr Norrell’s direction, Mr Murray’s new periodical, it seemed that he could conceive of no greater happiness.

The new periodical was named
The Friends of English Magic
, the title being taken from Mr Segundus’s letter to
The Times
in the previous spring. Curiously none of the articles which appeared in
The Friends of English Magic
were written by Mr Norrell, who was found to be entirely incapable of finishing a piece of writing; he was never satisfied with what he had written. He could never be sure that he had not said too much or too little.
⁴

There is not much to interest the serious student of magic in the early issues and the only entertainment to be got from them is contained in several articles in which Portishead attacks on Mr Norrell’s behalf: gentleman-magicians; lady-magicians; street-magicians; vagabond-magicians; child-prodigy-magicians; the Learned Society of York Magicians; the Learned Society of Manchester Magicians; learned societies of magicians in general; any other magicians whatsoever.

13
The magician of Threadneedle-street

December 1807

The most famous street-magician in London was undoubtedly Vinculus. His magician’s booth stood before the church of St Christopher Le Stocks in Threadneedle-street opposite the Bank of England, and it would have been difficult to say whether the bank or the booth were the more famous.

Yet the reason for Vinculus’s celebrity — or notoriety — was a little mysterious. He was no better a magician than any of the other charlatans with lank hair and a dirty yellow curtain. His spells did not work, his prophecies did not come true and his trances had been proven false beyond a doubt.

For many years he was much addicted to holding deep and weighty conference with the Spirit of the River Thames. He would fall into a trance and ask the Spirit questions and the voice of the Spirit would issue forth from his mouth in accents deep, watery and windy. On a winter’s day in 1805 a woman paid him a shilling to ask the Spirit to tell her where she might find her runaway husband. The Spirit provided a great deal of quite surprizing information and a crowd began to gather around the booth to listen to it. Some of the bystanders believed in Vinculus’s ability and were duly impressed by the Spirit’s oration, but others began to taunt the magician and his client. One such jeerer (a most ingenious fellow) actually managed to set Vinculus’s shoes on fire while Vinculus was speaking. Vinculus came out of his trance immediately: he leapt about, howling and attempting to pull off his shoes and stamp out the fire at one and the same time. He was throwing himself about and the crowd were all enjoying the sight immensely, when something popt out of his mouth. Two men picked it up and examined it: it was a little metal contraption not more than an inch and a half long. It was something like a mouth-organ and when one of the men placed it in his own mouth he too was able to produce the voice of the Spirit of the River Thames.

Despite such public humiliations Vinculus retained a certain authority, a certain native dignity which meant that he, among all the street-magicians of London, was treated with a measure of respect. Mr Norrell’s friends and admirers were continually urging him to pay a visit to Vinculus and were surprized that he shewed no inclination to do it.

On a day in late December when storm clouds made Alpine landscapes in the sky above London, when the wind played such havoc in the heavens that the city was one moment plunged in gloom and the next illuminated by sunlight, when rain rattled upon the windowpane, Mr Norrell was seated comfortably in his library before a cheerful fire. The tea table spread with a quantity of good things stood before him and in his hand was Thomas Lanchester’s
The Language of Birds
. He was turning the pages in search of a favourite passage when he was nearly frightened out of his wits by a voice suddenly saying very loudly and contemptuously, “Magician! You think that you have amazed everyone by your deeds!”

Mr Norrell looked up and was astonished to find that there was someone else in the room, a person he had never seen before, a thin, shabby, ragged hawk of a man. His face was the colour of three-day-old milk; his hair was the colour of a coal-smoke-and-ashes London sky; and his clothes were the colour of the Thames at dirty Wapping. Nothing about him — face, hair, clothes — was particularly clean, but in all other points he corresponded to the common notion of what a magician should look like (which Mr Norrell most certainly did not). He stood very erect and the expression of his fierce grey eyes was naturally imperious.

“Oh, yes!” continued this person, glaring furiously at Mr Norrell. “You think yourself a very fine fellow! Well, know this, Magician! Your coming was foretold long ago. I have been expecting you these past twenty years! Where have you been hiding yourself?”

Mr Norrell sat in amazed silence, staring at his accuser with open mouth. It was as if this man had reached into his breast, plucked out his secret thought and held it up to the light. Ever since his arrival in the capital Mr Norrell had realized that he had indeed been ready long ago; he could have been doing magic for England’s benefit years before; the French might have been defeated and English magic raised to that lofty position in the Nation’s regard which Mr Norrell believed it ought to occupy. He was tormented with the idea that he had betrayed English magic by his dilatoriness. Now it was as if his own conscience had taken concrete form and started to reproach him. This put him somewhat at a disadvantage in dealing with the mysterious stranger. He stammered out an inquiry as to who the person might be.

“I am Vinculus, magician of Threadneedle-street!”

“Oh!” cried Mr Norrell, relieved to find that at least he was no supernatural apparition. “And you have come here to beg I suppose? Well, you may take yourself off again! I do not recognize you as a brother-magician and I shall not give you any thing! Not money. Not promises of help. Not recommendations to other people. Indeed I may tell you that I intend …”

“Wrong again, Magician! I want nothing for myself. I have come to explain your destiny to you, as I was born to do.”

“Destiny? Oh, it’s prophecies, is it?” cried Mr Norrell contemptuously. He rose from his chair and tugged violently at the bell pull, but no servant appeared. “Well, now I really have nothing to say to people who pretend to do prophecies.
Lucas!
Prophecies are without a doubt one of the most villainous tricks which rascals like you play upon honest men. Magic cannot see into the future and magicians who claimed otherwise were liars.
Lucas!
”

Vinculus looked round. “I hear you have all the books that were ever written upon magic,” he said, “and it is commonly reported that you have even got back the ones that were lost when the library of Alexandria burnt — and know them all by heart, I dare say!”

“Books and papers are the basis of good scholarship and sound knowledge,” declared Mr Norrell primly. “Magic is to be put on the same footing as the other disciplines.”

Vinculus leaned suddenly forward and bent over Mr Norrell with a look of the most intense, burning concentration. Without quite meaning to, Mr Norrell fell silent and he leaned towards Vinculus to hear whatever Vinculus was about to confide to him.

“
I reached out my hand
,” whispered Vinculus, “
England’s rivers turned and flowed the other way
…”

“I beg your pardon?”

“
I reached out my hand
,” said Vinculus, a little louder, “
my enemies’s blood stopt in their veins
…” He straightened himself, opened wide his arms and closed his eyes as if in a religious ecstasy of some sort. In a strong, clear voice full of passion he continued:

“
I reached out my hand; thought and memory flew out of my enemies’ heads like a flock of starlings;

My enemies crumpled like empty sacks.

I came to them out of mists and rain;

I came to them in dreams at midnight;

I came to them in a flock of ravens that filled a northern sky at dawn;

When they thought themselves safe I came to them in a cry that broke the silence of a winter wood …
”

“Yes, yes!” interrupted Mr Norrell. “Do you really suppose that this sort of nonsense is new to me? Every madman on every street-corner screams out the same threadbare gibberish and every vagabond with a yellow curtain tries to make himself mysterious by reciting something of the sort. It is in every third-rate book on magic published in the last two hundred years! ‘I came to them in flock of ravens!’ What does that
mean
, I should like to know? Who came to whom in a flock of ravens?
Lucas!
”

Vinculus ignored him. His strong voice overpowered Mr Norrell’s weak, shrill one.

“
The rain made a door for me and I went through it;

The stones made a throne for me and I sat upon it;

Three kingdoms were given to me to be mine forever;

England was given to me to be mine forever.

The nameless slave wore a silver crown;

The nameless slave was a king in a strange country
…”

“Three kingdoms!” exclaimed Mr Norrell. “Ha! Now I understand what this nonsense pretends to be! A prophecy of the Raven King! Well, I am sorry to tell you that if you hope to impress me by recounting tales of that gentleman you will be disappointed. Oh, yes, you are entirely mistaken! There is no magician whom I detest more!”
¹

“
The weapons that my enemies raised against me are venerated in Hell as holy relics;

Plans that my enemies made against me are preserved as holy texts;

Blood that I shed upon ancient battlefields is scraped from the stained earth by Hell’s sacristans and placed in a vessel of silver and ivory.

I gave magic to England, a valuable inheritance

But Englishmen have despised my gift

Magic shall be written upon the sky by the rain but they shall not be able to read it;

Magic shall be written on the faces of the stony hills but their minds shall not be able to contain it;

In winter the barren trees shall be a black writing but they shall not understand it
…”

“It is every Englishman’s birthright to be served by competent and well-educated magicians,” interrupted Mr Norrell. “What do you offer them instead? Mystical ramblings about stones and rain and trees! This is like Godbless who told us that we should learn magic from wild beasts in the forest. Why not pigs in the sty? Or stray dogs, I wonder? This is not the sort of magic which civilized men wish to see practised in England nowadays!” He glared furiously at Vinculus and, as he did so, something caught his eye.

Vinculus had dressed himself with no particular care. His dirty neckcloth had been negligently wound about his neck and a little gap of unclean skin shewed between neckcloth and shirt. In that space was a curious curving mark of a vivid blue, not unlike the upward stroke of a pen. It might have been a scar — the relic of a street brawl perhaps — but what it most resembled was that barbaric painting of the skin which is practised by the natives of the South Sea islands. Curiously Vinculus, who was able to stand entirely at his ease in another man’s house railing at him, seemed embarrassed by this mark and when he saw that Mr Norrell had observed it he put his hand to his throat and plucked at the cloth to hide it.

“
Two magicians shall appear in England
…”

A sort of exclamation broke from Mr Norrell, an exclamation that began as a cry and ended as a soft, unhappy sigh.

“
The first shall fear me; the second shall long to behold me;

The first shall be governed by thieves and murderers; the second shall conspire at his own destruction;

The first shall bury his heart in a dark wood beneath the snow, yet still feel its ache;

The second shall see his dearest possession in his enemy’s hand
…”

“Oh! Now I know that you have come here with no other aim but to wound me! False Magician, you are jealous of my success! You cannot destroy my magic and so you are determined to blacken my name and destroy my peace …”

“
The first shall pass his life alone; he shall be his own gaoler;

The second shall tread lonely roads, the storm above his head, seeking a dark tower upon a high hillside
…”

Just then the door opened and two men ran in.

“Lucas! Davey!” screeched Mr Norrell, hysterically. “Where have you been?”

Lucas began to explain something about the bell-cord.

“What? Seize hold of him! Quickly!”

Davey, Mr Norrell’s coachman, was built on the same generous scale as others of his profession and had the strength that comes from daily opposing his will to that of four high-bred coach-horses in the prime of life. He took hold of Vinculus around his body and his throat. Vinculus struggled energetically. He did not neglect in the meantime to continue berating Mr Norrell:

“
I sit upon a black throne in the shadows but they shall not see me.

The rain shall make a door for me and I shall pass through it;

The stones shall make a throne for me and I shall sit upon it
…”

Davey and Vinculus careered against a little table upsetting a pile of books that stood upon it.

“Aaaah! Be careful!” exclaimed Mr Norrell, “For God’s sake be careful! He will knock over that ink pot! He will damage my books!”

Lucas joined Davey in endeavouring to pinion Vinculus’s wild, windmilling arms, while Mr Norrell scampered round the library a great deal faster than any one had seen him move for many years, gathering up books and putting them out of harm’s way.

“
The nameless slave shall wear a silver crown
,” gasped Vinculus — Davey’s arm tightening about his throat rendered his oration decidedly less impressive than before. Vinculus made one last effort and pulled the upper part of his body free of Davey’s grasp and shouted, “
The nameless slave shall be a king in a strange country
…” Then Lucas and Davey half-pulled, half-carried him out of the room.