Бразильский кот. Английские новеллы XIX века

УДК 
372.8
ББК 
81.2 Англ-93
 
Б 87

ISBN 978-5-9925-0504-7

Б 87 Бразильский кот. Английские новеллы XIX века: Книга для чтения на английском языке. — 
СПб.: КАРО, 2010. — 288 с. — (Серия «Classical 
Li te ra ture»).

ISBN 978-5-9925-0504-7.

В книге представлены новеллы английских писателей второй половины XIX века — Ч. Диккенса, Р. Киплинга, Т. Харди, 
Г. Дж. Уэллса, А. Конан Дойла и др. Читатель сможет в полной мере оценить не только слог и стиль авторов, но и саму 
жизнь Викторианской эпохи.
Приводится полный неадаптированный текст на языке оригинала. Для студентов языковых вузов и всех любителей англоязычной литературы.

УДК 372.8
ББК 81.2 Англ-93

© КАРО, 2010

Эпоха,
отраженная в новелле

Новеллы, вошедшие в сборник, были написаны во 
времена правления королевы Виктории, царствовавшей в 
Англии с 1837 по 1901 год. Бурный рост промышленности, 
расширение колониальных владений сделали Британскую 
империю самым могущественным государством в мире. 
Именно Англию Викторианской эпохи принято называть 
«старой доброй Англией»: люди были серьезными, браки — 
постоянными. Вступил в свои права средний класс, и в 
обществе стали преобладать исповедуемые им ценности. 
Трезвость, пунктуальность, трудолюбие, экономность 
и хозяйственность ценились и до правления Виктории, 
но именно в ее эпоху эти качества стали доминирующей 
нормой. Пример подала сама королева: ее жизнь до конца 
была подчинена долгу и семье. Большая часть общества 
последовала ее примеру.
Ценности и энергия среднего класса легли в основу 
всех достижений Викторианской эпохи. Правда, его представители обладали и малопривлекательными чертами: 
мещанской уверенностью в том, что процветание — это 
вознаграждение за добродетель (а стало быть, неудачники 
просто не достойны лучшего); доведенным до крайности 
пуританством в семейной жизни, порождавшим чувство 
вины и лицемерие.
Викторианская эпоха не очень легко поддается описанию, хотя бы потому, что правление королевы Виктории 

оказалось невероятно длинным. Сменялись стили и направления в литературе и искусстве, но оставалось основополагающее мировосприятие. Типичными писателями 
Викторианской эпохи являются Чарльз Диккенс, Уильям 
Мейкпис Теккерей, Энтони Троллоп, сестры Бронте, 
поэтами — Альфред Теннисон, Роберт Браунинг и Мэтью 
Арнольд, художниками — прерафаэлиты.
Рассказы, собранные под этой обложкой, затрагивают 
социальные, гуманитарные, политические проблемы, 
иллюстрируют различные аспекты жизни английского 
общества середины — второй половины XIX века, даже 
если действие происходит за пределами Англии (например, как в рассказе Р. Киплинга «Without Benefi t of Clergy», 
в котором события разворачиваются в Индии). Снова и 
снова авторы напоминают нам, что деньги определяют 
социальный статус человека: те, у кого они есть, высокомерно и недоверчиво относятся к тем, у кого их нет. 
Снобизм, выросший на этой почве, проявляется жестко и 
жестоко (как в рассказе Т. Харди «Th e Son’s Veto»), портит 
того, кто стоит выше на социальной лестнице, ломает 
жизнь тому, кто не хочет и не может карабкаться по этой 
лестнице наверх. А. Конан Дойл, писавший не только о 
Шерлоке Холмсе и докторе Ватсоне, представлен в книге 
новеллой «Бразильский кот», где, помимо интриги, читатель находит портрет человека, который стремится подняться вверх, не имея ни талантов, ни денег, ни желания 
зарабатывать даже на пропитание.
Викторианская эпоха полна противоречий. Это время 
крайнего оптимизма и крайнего же пессимизма, время 
строгих моральных правил и время, когда в Лондоне 
процветала проституция, время триумфа империи и время 
Джека Потрошителя. Все это самым непосредственным 
образом отразилось в литературе и искусстве.

William Schwenk Gilbert

My Maiden Brief

Late on a certain May morning, as I was sitting at a 
modest breakfast in my “residence chambers,” Pump 
Court, Temple, my attention was claimed by a single 
knock at an outer door, common to the chambers of 
Felix Polter, and of myself, Horace Penditton, both 
barristers-at-law of the Inner Temple.
Th e outer door was not the only article common to 
Polter and myself. We also shared what Polter (who 
wrote farces) was pleased to term a “property” clerk, who 
did nothing at all, and a “practicable” laundress, who 
did everything. Th ere existed also a communion of interest in teacups, razors, gridirons, candlesticks, etc.; 
for although neither of us was particularly well supplied 
with the necessaries of life1, each happened to possess 
the very articles in which the other was defi cient. So we 
got on uncommonly well together, each regarding his 
friend in the light of an indispensable other self. We 
had both embraced the “higher walk” of the legal pro
1 with the necessaries of life — (разг.) предметами первой 
необходимости

WILLIAM SCHWENK GILBERT

6

fession, and were patiently waiting for the legal profession to embrace us.
Th e single knock raised some well-founded 
apprehensions in both our minds.
“Walker!” said I to the property clerk.
“Sir!”
“If that knock is for me, I’m out, you know.”
“Of course, sir!”
“And Walker!” cried Polter.
“Sir!”
“If it’s for me, I’m not a home!”
Polter always rejoiced if he could manage to make 
the conversation partake of a Maddisonian Mortonic 
character.
Mr. Walker opened the door. “Mr. Penditton’s 
a-break fasting with the Master of the Rolls, if it’s him 
you want; and if it isn’t, Mr. Polter’s with the AttorneyGeneral.”
“You don’t say so!1” remarked the visitor; “then 
p’raps you’ll give this to Mr. Penditton, as soon as the 
Master can make up his mind to part with him.”
And, so saying, the visitor handed Walker a lovely 
parcel of brief-paper, tied up neatly with a piece of red 
tape, and minuted:
“Central Criminal Court, May Sessions, 1860. — 
Th e Queen on the prosecution of Ann Back v.2 Elizabeth 
Briggs. Brief for the prisoner. Mr. Penditton, one 
guinea. — Poddle and Shaddery, Hans Place.”

1 You don’t say so! — (разг.) Да что вы говорите!
2 v. — сокр. от лат. versus, против

MY MAIDEN BRIEF

7

So it had come at last! Only an Old Bailey1 brief, it is 
true; but still a brief. We scarcely knew what to make of 
it. Polter looked at me, and I looked at Polter, and then 
we both looked at the brief.
It turned out to be a charge against Elizabeth Briggs, 
widow, of picking pockets2 in an omnibus. It appeared 
from my “instructions,” that my client was an elderly 
lady, and religious. On the 2nd of April then last, she 
entered an Islington omnibus, with the view of attending 
a tea and prayer meeting in Bell Court, Islington. 
A woman in the omnibus missed her purse, and accused 
Mrs. Briggs, who sat on her right, of having stolen it. 
Th e poor soul, speechless with horror at the charge, was 
dragged out of the omnibus, and as the purse was found 
in a pocket in the left -hand side of her dress, she was 
given into custody3. As it was stated by the police that 
she had been “in trouble” before, the infatuate magistrate 
who examined her committed her for trial.
“Th ere, my boy, your fortune’s made!” said Polter.
“But I don’t see the use of my taking it,” said I; “there’s 
nothing to be said for her.”
“Not take it? Won’t you, though? I’ll see about that. 
You shall take it, and you shall get her off , too! Highly 
respectable old lady — attentive member of well-known 

1 Old Bailey — разговорное название самого известного 
в Британии суда, рассматривающего серьезные преступления против личности
2 widow, of picking pockets — (разг.) вдовы, которая обчищала карманы
3 was given into custody — (разг.) была взята под стражу 
(арестована)

WILLIAM SCHWENK GILBERT

8

congregation — parson to speak to her character, no 
doubt. As honest as you are!”
“But the purse was found on her!”
“Well, sir, and what of that? Poor woman left -handed, and pocket in left  of dress. Robbed woman righthanded, and pocket in right of dress. Poor woman sat 
on right of robbed woman. Robbed woman, replacing 
her purse, slipped it accidentally into poor woman’s 
pocket. Ample folds of dress, you know — crinolines 
overlapping, and all that. Splendid defence for you!”
“Well, but she’s an old hand1, it seems. Th e police 
know her.”
“Police always do. ‘Always know everybody’ — 
police maxim. Swear anything, they will.”
Polter really seemed so sanguine about it that I 
began to look at the case hopefully, and to think that 
something might be done with it. He talked to me with 
such eff ect that he not only convinced me that there 
was a good deal to be said in Mrs. Briggs’s favour, but I 
actually began to look upon her as an innocent victim 
of circumstantial evidence, and determined that no 
eff ort should be wanting on my part to procure her 
release from a degrading but unmerited confi nement.
Of the fi rm of Poddle and Shaddery I knew nothing 
whatever, and how they came to entrust Mrs. Briggs’s 
case to me I can form no conception. As we (for Polter 
took so deep a personal interest in the success of 
Mrs. Briggs’s case that he completely identifi ed himself, 

1 she’s an old hand — (разг.) она давно этим занимается 
(промышляет)

MY MAIDEN BRIEF

9

in my mind, with her fallen fortunes) resolved to go to 
work in a thoroughly businesslike manner, we determined to commence operations by searching for the 
fi rm of Poddle and Shaddery in the Law List. To our 
dismay the Law List of that year had no record of 
Poddle, neither did Shaddery fi nd a place in its pages. 
Th is was serious, and Polter did not improve matters by 
suddenly recollecting that he once heard an old Q.C.1 
say that, as a rule, the further west of Temple Bar, the 
shadier the attorney; so that assuming Polter’s friend to 
have been correct on this point, a fi rm from Brompton 
Square whose name did not appear in Mr. Dalbiac’s 
Law List was a legitimate object of suspicion.
But Polter, who took a hopeful view of anything 
which he thought might lead to good farce “situations,” 
and who probably imagined that my fi rst appearance on 
any stage as counsel for the defence was likely to be rich 
in suggestions, remarked that they might possibly have 
been certifi cated since the publishing of the last Law List; 
and as for the dictum about Temple Bar, why, the case of 
Poddle and Shaddery might be one of those very 
exceptions whose existence is necessary to the proof of 
every general rule. So Polter and I determined to treat 
the fi rm in a spirit of charity, and accept their brief.
As the May sessions did not commence until the 
8th, I had four clear days in which to study my brief and 
prepare my defence. Besides, there was a murder case, 

1 Q.C. — сокр. от Queen’s Council, в британской правовой системе адвокат высокого ранга, член Королевского совета

WILLIAM SCHWENK GILBERT

10

and a desperate burglary or two, which would probably 
be taken fi rst, so that it was unlikely that the case of the 
poor soul whose cause I had espoused would be tried 
before the 12th. So I had plenty of time to master what 
Polter and I agreed was one of the most painful cases of 
circumstantial evidence ever submitted to a British 
jury; and I really believe that by the fi rst day of the May 
sessions I was intimately acquainted with the details of 
every case of pocket-picking reported in Cox’s Criminal 
Cases and Buckler’s Shorthand Reports.
On the night of the 11th I asked Bodger of Brazenose, 
Norton of Gray’s Inn, Cadbury of the Lancers, and three 
or four other men, college chums principally, to drop 
in1 at Pump Court, and hear a rehearsal of my speech 
for the defence, in the forthcoming cause célèbre2 of the 
Queen on the prosecution of Ann Back v. Elizabeth 
Briggs. At nine o’clock they began to appear, and by ten 
all were assembled. Pipes and strong waters3 were 
produced, and Norton of Gray’s was forthwith raised to 
the Bench by the style and dignity of Sir Joseph Norton, 
one of the barons of her Majesty’s Court of Exchequer; 
Cadbury, Bodger, and another represented the jury; 
Wilkinson of Lincoln’s Inn was counsel for the 
prosecution, Polter was clerk of arraigns, and Walker, 
my clerk, was the prosecutrix.
Everything went satisfactorily: Wilkinson broke 
down in his speech for the prosecution; his witness 

1 to drop in — (разг.) заглянуть; заскочить
2 cause célèbre — (фр.) громкое дело
3 strong waters — (разг.) спиртные напитки