Now this book, naturally enough, begins with Mr. Brimberly's whiskers;
begins at that moment when he coughed and pulled down his waistcoat for
the first time. And yet (since action is as necessary to the success of
a book as to life itself) it should perhaps begin more properly at the
psychological moment when Mr. Brimberly coughed and pulled down the
garment aforesaid for the third time, since it is then that the real
action of this story commences.
Be that as it may, it is beyond all question that nowhere in this wide
world could there possibly be found just such another pair of whiskers
as those which adorned the plump cheeks of Mr. Brimberly; without them
he might have been only an ordinary man, but, possessing them, he was
the very incarnation of all that a butler could possibly be.
And what whiskers these were! So soft, so fleecy, so purely white, that
at times they almost seemed like the wings of cherubim, striving to soar
away and bear Mr. Brimberly into a higher and purer sphere. Again, what
Protean whiskers were these, whose fleecy pomposity could overawe the
most superior young footmen and reduce page-boys, tradesmen, and the
lower orders generally, to a state of perspiring humility; to his
equals how calmly aloof, how blandly dignified; and to those a misguided
fate had set above him, how demurely deferential, how obligingly
obsequious! Indeed, Mr.
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