HOW FORTUNE AGAIN SMILED, AND THEN FROWNED UPON HIM.
"----Fortune is merry,
And in this mood will give us any thing."--_Shakspeare._
"Full oft 'tis seen our mere defects
Prove our commodities."--_Idem._
"----A motley company,
Blacklegs, and thieves, and would-be gentlemen."--_Idem._
"The lottery of my destiny bars me the right of voluntary
choosing."--_Idem._
The succeeding stage in the life of my hero and friend, was marked by
no very striking or extraordinary event; but the incidents attending it
were nevertheless quite characteristic of his varying fortunes. It so
happened that in adjusting the results of his mercantile experiment,
Mr. Wheelwright became possessed of a questionable claim upon the
government, for property said to have been destroyed by the enemy on
the northern frontier, during the late war with Great Britain. It came
into his hands by way of satisfaction for a debt due from a country
merchant; and although the chances were as twenty to one, either that
it had already been paid, or that it had no existence in equity, or
that even if ever so just, like the claim for Amy Dardin's celebrated
blood-horse, the period of two generations would be consumed in
petitioning for relief, yet he determined forthwith to proceed to the
federal capital, and prosecute his suit before the august majesty of
the people in congress assembled. What with boats taken by General
Wilkinson for the public service, in his memorable descent of the St.
Lawrence,--for the purpose, among other things, of celebrating
Christmas in Montreal--a festival, by the way, which an obstinate enemy
would not allow him to keep there,--and buildings so effectually
destroyed during an irruption of the British across the lines, that
their sites have never been discovered to this day,--all duly set forth
in the papers with which he was furnished,--Mr. Wheelwright presented a
claim, respectable in amount, which was referred to the proper
committee of the "collective wisdom." The hawk-eyed Whittlesey was not
then its chairman. In process of time, therefore, the committee
reported in his favor; and, in the end, to the astonishment of every
body, he succeeded in obtaining it! How, or by what artful appliances,
he became thus successful,--and that, too, during the first session,--I
have never been clearly informed. It was, however, a winter of great
activity and excitement at Washington. A distinguished "military
chieftain," flushed with the pride of victory, and crowned with Indian
laurels, had suddenly appeared in the capital, to defend himself
against charges preferred by the legislative authorities of the
nation,--authorities, which he openly derided, and threatened to beard
in their own council-chambers;--and it is not unlikely that while some
of the members were engaged in studying the arts of self-defence, and
others holding with both hands upon the ears that had been openly
threatened, the bill for the liquidation and payment of Mr.
Wheelwright's claims, was passed in the alarm and confusion, without
observation. It is not impossible, moreover, that as the claimant had
resided at Albany, and as the Albanian tactics had not then been
introduced into Washington, he might have tried his hand at some of
those ingenious devices, of the successful operation of which he had
been the silent witness in the pure and incorruptible capital of the
empire state.
Be all these matters, however, as they may, it is certain that he
succeeded in his application beyond the most sanguine expectations
alike of himself and his friends. Thus far, therefore, all was well; a
brighter prospect seemed to dawn upon his fortunes; and all would
probably have continued well, had he turned his back upon the capital
the day after receiving the auditor's warrant upon the treasury, and
hastened home. But the President's levees were about opening for the
season; and two or three of those most insufferable of all coxcombs,
the _attachés_ of foreign embassies,--whisking their dandy rattans
and sporting finely curled mustachoes;--who, to his unsophisticated
observation, appeared to be men of far greater importance than their
less-pretending diplomatic masters,--and who not unfrequently shared
oysters with him during the day at Laturno's, and canvass-backs and
champagne at O'Neal's by night,--persuaded him to remain a few weeks
longer,--not much to the advantage of his exchequer, as may well be
supposed. Still, as he was not a gambler, and was withal a moral man,
no great inroad upon his purse would have resulted from a few
entertainments thus bestowed upon his sponging acquaintances,--who, as
he really supposed, were reversing the order of the obligation, by the
light and flashy touches they gave him of high life in Europe,--relating,
with great particularity, their adventures in France,--dining with the
Dukes of Chartres and Angouleme, and attending the opera with the Duke
of Berry and the Countess de Chausel,--visiting Rome with the grand
Duke of Tuscany, and flirting with the Countess Guiccioli, in the
absence of Lord Byron,--engaged in the chase with the Percies of
Northumberland, or at Almack's, with the Marchioness of Conyngham,--all
of which apocryphal incidents and adventures my simple-minded friend
received as sober verity, and felt himself exceedingly edified thereby.
The result was, that Wheelwright whiled away the whole winter in
Washington; and it was a marvel, that what between the mid-day
dissipation at Laturno's--that unhallowed den in the base of the
capitol, which has proved the grave of so many reputations,--and the
suppers at Brown's and O'Neal's, he did not quite use himself up. But
he escaped in those respects; and notwithstanding his natural
indifference to public and intellectual matters, he actually became not
a little interested in the great debates on the Seminole war, and the
conduct of the commander who had conducted it according to law "as he
understood it."
It was during these interesting proceedings that Mr. Wheelwright most
unluckily formed two other acquaintances, in the persons of a clever
and plausible lottery-broker at Washington, the author of the
celebrated parody of "Hail to the Chief," beginning--
"All hail to Ben Tyler, who sells all the prizes," &c.
and the chief manager of the memorable Washington Monument Lottery.
Both were acute, and the manager no less plausible than the
vender;--and the easy good nature of Mr. Wheelwright, who was not a
little credulous withal, pointed him out as a person whose pockets
would not be of difficult access. It is not necessary to descend
minutely into particulars in this place. Suffice it to say, that the
next ensuing scheme of the lottery promised a capital prize of one
hundred thousand dollars, besides one of thirty thousand, another of
twenty, with the customary lots of smaller ones; and as my hero had yet
a lingering attachment to "CIRCLES," he was very soon persuaded to
mount upon the wheel of Fortune. Every body has heard of the honest
Hibernian, who, in order to ensure the highest prize, determined to
purchase the whole lottery; and although Mr. Wheelwright did not
exactly form the same resolve, yet he understood enough of the doctrine
of chances, to know, that the more tickets he possessed, the greater
his number of chances of obtaining the splendid capital he was
seeking,--he stopped not to reflect that the odds were two to one
against him for any thing, even the smallest prize, and twenty-nine
thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine to one against him for the great
prize, besides the discount of fifteen per centum on the whole.
Forgetting these trifling drawbacks, therefore, he invested the whole
of his revenues in the aforesaid lottery; and from that day until the
drawing thereof, he lived upon the brightest hopes. The golden shower
of the heathen poets, in which Jove once descended, was but a little
sprinkle, in comparison with the river of that precious metal, soon to
flow into his coffers. But alas! the goddess, being blind, not only
failed to discern his peculiar claims upon her regard, but was cheated
herself! A shrewd Virginian dreamed the ticket which drew the hundred
thousand dollars, into his own pocket; the manager failed, and thereby
turned all the prizes into blanks;--and Mr. Daniel Wheelwright found
himself flat on his back, at the bottom of the wheel, when he least
anticipated such a downfall. He was therefore, on his return to
New-York, again in the condition of Bob Logic, "with pockets to
let"--or perchance of the poor Yankee, who complained, not without
reason, that with him there were five OUTS to one IN, viz: _out_ of
money, and _out_ of clothes; _out_ at the heels, and _out_ at the toes;
Out of credit, and _in_ debt!