THE TITLED CONVICT.
ON the morning after my arrival at Newgate it was with considerable
surprise that I saw a man in convict dress, who was apparently the object
of special watch and guard. My curiosity was considerably increased from
the circumstance of his being the only individual out of some two hundred
in this conspicuous attire; he was moreover clearly not a novice, but
wore the dreadful suit with the apparent ease of a man to whom it was by
no means a novelty. He looked horribly ill, and a terrible eruption that
showed itself on his neck, face, and hands gave unmistakable evidence
that the unhappy wretch was literally rotten; added to this, however,
there was a something about him, a “_je ne sais quoi_,” that marked the
gentleman and asserted the blue blood, despite the convict dress, the
loathsome disease, and the degrading surroundings. A fixed melancholy
seemed never to desert him. When he moved, it was with eyes cast down,
and nothing appeared to interest him; it was the motions of a human
machine, bowed down with grief or shame, or meditating some awful
vengeance. I was so struck with all this that I determined to lose no
opportunity of scraping an acquaintance with the mysterious stranger. I
enquired of a warder, but all he knew or pretended to know was that he
was undergoing a sentence of 20 years’ penal servitude, and had lately
been drafted there from a convict prison; that he had only been there a
few days, and would in all probability be moved elsewhere very shortly.
Chance favoured my desire to make his acquaintance. It was on a Saturday
afternoon, a time devoted to a very general and extra clean up, and when
almost everyone is put on a job. My warder—like a brick—had put me, at
my urgent request, to “dusting” the rails, a duty, I had observed, at
which the convict was frequently employed. I got as near as discretion
would permit, and ventured to ask him who and what he was. He looked at
me at first with a mingled expression of surprise and distrust, but being
apparently reassured by either my manner or my dress, began in short,
jerky sentences in something of the following style: “You ask me who I
am. That’s a question I haven’t heard for six long years. Since that
time I’ve been an unit, 4016 of Portland, and praying night and day that
death would release me.” I was alarmed at his excited manner; his eyes
flashed, he quivered like a maniac, and I begged him to be calm. This
appeal seemed to touch some long dried-up spring; kind words evidently
sounded strange to him, and a tear trickled down his seamed and hollow
cheeks. The weakness, however, was but momentary, and wiping his eyes
with his coarse blue handkerchief, he began in a melancholy voice the
following sad story:—
“You ask me who I am, or rather who I was. Know, then, that six years
ago I was known as —.” I started at the name, for it was a well-known
and titled one. “At an early age my parents died, leaving me the
possessor (under guardians) of £20,000 a year, an estate in England, and
another in Ireland, a house in London, and an ancient title. My uncle
and guardian, alas! was actuated by no affection for me, but considered
that if he placed me under a good tutor, insured me a liberal education,
and sent me to see the world, he was fairly earning the handsome salary
allowed him by the Court of Chancery, whose ward I was. At the age of 18
I started with my tutor on a three years’ tour, it having been decided
that I should thus have seen everything, and made a fitting termination
to the education of a man with the bright prospects I so confidently
considered were in store for me. Would to God I had been born a navvy; I
should never then have become what you now see me. The eventful era in
my life at length arrived. After seeing everything and going half over
the world, I found myself in England again, and on the eve of being
invested with the absolute control of my huge estates. I will not insult
you, nor deceive myself, by concealing any of my blemishes. Know, then,
I was a drunkard, a confirmed sot at 21, too weak to resist the dram
bottle, and capable of every folly, every crime, when under the influence
of its fatal spell. I moreover hated the society of gentlemen, and was
never happy except in low company. In London, whither I came after
taking possession of my estates, I did not know a soul; the few
respectable friends or relatives of my father I studiously avoided.
Pleasure for me was only to be attained by herding with cads and
prostitutes. My position, my title, my wealth, made this an easy task,
and I soon became acquainted with a number of that voracious, threadbare
class. My most intimate friends were broken-down gentlemen and
spendthrifts of shady reputation; fighting men and banjo men, and
blood-suckers of every type, who flattered my vanity, and led me as it
were, with the one hand, whilst they rifled my pockets with the other.
They ate at my expense, they drank at my expense; I paid their debts in
many instances, and any rascal had only to recount to me a tissue of lies
for me to at once offer him consolation by the ‘loan’ of a cheque. ‘What
matters it,’ thought I; ‘was I not —, and had I not more money than I
could possibly spend in a century?’ I was passionately fond of theatres,
not respectable ones where I should have had to behave decently, but low
East-end and transpontine ones, where I was a very swan amongst the
geese, and where my title and wealth obtained me the inestimable
privilege of going behind the scenes, and throwing money about in
handfuls. On these almost nightly visits I was invariably dunned and
asked for aid by every designing knave; they saw I was a fool, and
usually drunk, and what I mistook for homage was in reality the treatment
that only a contemptible drunkard with money, such as I, ever gets.
Every scene-shifter had a harrowing tale, or an imaginary subscription
list, to all of whom I administered bounteous monetary consolation; and
any varlet with a whole hand, and a greasy rag round it, at once received
a ‘fiver’ as a mark of sympathy for his painful accident. In short, I
was a fool, looked on as only fit to be fleeced, and simply tolerated for
the sake of my money. Would to God I had confined myself to these
contemptible but otherwise harmless follies!
“It was on a dull foggy night—a night I can never forget—that some
half-dozen of my boon companions had been dining with me at a celebrated
restaurant. The _débris_ of the dessert had not been removed, and they
were sipping their coffee whilst I was settling the bill, when a
suggestion was made that we should go to the ‘Sussex.’ The ‘Sussex’ was
a very disreputable theatre, situated somewhere over the water, and
supported entirely by the lowest classes and a few golden calves, such as
myself, who were serving their apprenticeship, and who were permitted the
inestimable privilege of going behind the scenes—entering the green-room,
or indeed any room, and paying ten shillings a bottle for as much fluid
of an effervescent nature in champagne bottles as anybody and everybody
chose to call for. On these occasions we were ushered into the sacred
precincts, with a certain amount of implied caution similar to and about
as necessary as that assumed by a ragamuffin in the streets when asking
you to buy a spurious edition of the _Fruits of Philosophy_. This,
however, in my ignorance, only enhanced the pleasure. We were, as I
believed, participating in some illegal transaction, permitted only to
the most fortunate. As a fact, we were violating no law; and if the Lord
Chamberlain did not object, Scotland Yard certainly didn’t. Etiquette on
these occasions demanded that we should be formally introduced to the
various ‘ladies’ that frequented the green-room—a custom I considered
highly commendable, for in my ignorance I believed that not the slightest
difference existed between the highest exponent of tragedy and the
frowsiest ballet-girl in worsted tights and spangles.
“On this particular night, as I was watching the transformation scene
being ‘set,’ and listening to the sallies of the tawdry ‘fairies’ that
crowded the wings, my attention was attracted by a tall woman, who was
gnawing a bone with a gusto that conveyed to me the impression she hadn’t
eaten for a month. I felt for the poor creature, and went and stood near
her. I thought at the time (for I was very drunk) that she was the most
beautiful being I had ever seen; her pink-and-white complexion (it was in
reality dabs of paint) appeared to me to be comparable only to a
beautiful shell. I was spellbound by the sight, and instantaneously and
hopelessly in love. It would have been a mercy—may God forgive me!—if
that bone had choked her. That woman eventually became ‘her ladyship.’
But I’m anticipating.”
The poor fellow here became so affected that I begged him to pause; it
was, however, useless.
“The sight of her in a measure sobered me, and I asked her who and what
she was. She told me a harrowing tale of how she was the eldest of seven
children; that her mother was bed-ridden and her father blind; and how
she toiled at a sewing-machine all day and at the theatre all night, and
then only earned a miserable pittance, barely sufficient to keep a roof
over their heads. The recital affected me considerably (drunken people
are easily moved to tears), as she went on to tell me how she had been in
the theatre since 11 that morning (for it was the pantomime season, and
there had been a morning performance), and how she had not tasted food
until a carpenter had kindly given her the remains of his supper. I lost
no time in procuring a bottle of champagne, and felt happier than I had
for years as she placed a tumblerful to her parched lips and drank it off
at a gulp. A few moments later I saw ‘little Rosie’ (for so she told me
her blind parent loved to call her) being lashed to an ‘iron,’ and posing
as an angel for the great transformation scene in course of preparation.
I subsequently discovered—though, alas! too late—that ‘little Rosie’ was
nightly to be seen outside the ‘Criterion’ and in front of the ‘Raleigh,’
and was known as ‘big Rose.’ But my mind has again got in advance of my
story. Oh, dear! oh, dear! where am I?”
At this stage I really got alarmed, far his excitement was evidently
increasing. Happily, however, a passing official necessitated silence,
and he eventually resumed with comparative composure.
“I will not weary you with unnecessary details; suffice it to say that
within a month we were married, and the vows that were made ’till death
should us part’ were eventually broken by the living death that consigned
me to penal servitude. After our marriage ‘little Rosie’s’ nature
gradually began to change; and the frankness and _naïveté_ that had so
captivated me gradually gave way to habits and sentiments that astonished
and alarmed me. I verily believe that, had I found in her the woman I
hoped and believed her to be, I should truly have reformed, and given up
that vile curse, drink. Instead of that, however, I found at my elbow
one who was always ready to encourage me in the vice. Port was her
favourite tipple, and though my own state seldom permitted me to judge of
her consumption, still in my lucid intervals of sobriety I was astonished
at the amount she consumed. Gradually we began to turn night into day,
and nights of debauch regularly followed the few hours of daylight we
seldom or ever saw. Even yet I had not abandoned all hope of reform. My
conscience smote me when I was sober enough to heed it, and in hopes of
avoiding temptation I hurried with my wife to Ireland; but even here she
could not rest quiet. The cloven foot persisted in showing itself, and
we were tabooed by the whole county. In this I found further cause for
mortification—I who might have been looked up to and sought after. I
tried to spare my wife’s feelings by concealing the real cause of our
existence being ignored; but, fool that I was, I gave way to her
importunings, and actually called on those who had avoided us. The
well-merited reward of my temerity was not long in coming. Some of the
county families returned our cards by post, whilst others sent them back
by a servant; and at a subscription ball that took place not long after
we received the cut dead. This filled up the cup of my humiliation, and
I rushed back to London. I had realised the fact that virtue won’t herd
with vice.
“A cousin about this time made his appearance, and gradually became a
daily visitor; and had my muddled faculties been more capable of forming
an opinion, I might have been puzzled how a well-dressed and apparently
gentlemanly man could be the nephew of either the blind father or the
bed-ridden mother. Gradually, however, my suspicions were aroused, and I
employed a detective to watch them both. He fulfilled his duty, alas!
too well, and I received incontestable proof that my wife was a —, and
that the ‘cousin’ was a man with whom she had lived for years. A sickly
child, too, that frequently came to the house, and whom she often told
me, with tears in her eyes, was her ‘dead sister’s,’ I had reason to
suspect was a much nearer relative. But my feelings outstride my
discretion. I’m again going too fast, and surely you’ve heard enough?”
I begged him to continue, for I was deeply interested in his tale.
“My wife now began to display reckless extravagance; nothing was good
enough for her; the handsome settlement I had made on her failed to meet
a fraction of her expenses, and she became so degraded as to borrow money
of my very servants. Love, they say, is blind, and in my case, I fear,
was frequently blind drunk. On these occasions I would agree to
anything, and gradually signed away first one thing, and then another,
till I found myself divested of house, estates, everything, and a
pensioner on my wife’s bounty. It may seem incredible that anything
should be capable of bringing the blush of shame to such as I—I who for
six long years have worn this dreadful dress—but, believe me, my cheeks
tingle even now when I think of it all. I was at length compelled to
resort to the pawnbroker’s, and watch, chain, ring, everything, found
their way to an establishment in — Road. My credit, once good, was
entirely gone; tradesmen to whom I owed money began to dun me; others
refused me the smallest credit; servants, washerwomen, butchers, and
bakers all were creditors; writs and County Court summonses were of daily
occurrence; and the family mansion that my ancestors had never disgraced
was in the hands of the bailiffs. How I cried out in my anguish will
never be known. Relations I had none to whom I could apply for sympathy
or advice. My only friend was ‘drink,’ and in my misery I turned to it
with redoubled energy. I have not much more to tell; the climax which
brought me here was very near at hand. One afternoon I had returned to
our lodgings (we were then in apartments at 28, — Place) rather sooner
than expected from a fruitless endeavour to borrow a few pounds. I had
stopped at every public-house, and gulped down a dram of cheap spirits,
in hopes of lightening my sorrow; I was, I believe, almost mad with
misery and drink. As I entered the room the first thing that met my gaze
was the hated ‘Cousin.’ To seize a loaded pistol that always hung over
the mantel-piece was the work of a second, and, without aim, without
deliberation, I fired. The report and my wife’s screams alarmed a
policeman who happened to be passing by; he entered and found her
swooning on the ground, but happily uninjured. Thank God! I’m free of
that crime—and the tell-tale bullet lodged in the wall. Concealment was
hopeless. I was there and then arrested, and eventually sentenced, on
the evidence of my wife and her paramour, to ‘twenty years’ penal
servitude.’”
His excited state alarmed me. I feared we should be observed, but it was
hopeless to attempt to check him as, with eyes starting, and the tears
flowing fast, he added, pointing to his seamed and blotchy face: “The
worst has yet to be told; look at these scars that I shall carry with me
to the grave. Can you suspect what they are? My —.”
“Hush!” I said, “they have noticed us.”
I never saw him again, but heard, months after, that the unhappy man had
died, and that the bright expectations accruing from youth, birth, and
fortune, that had been formed six short years ago, lie buried in a
nameless convict’s grave.
Not long ago I walked round to the pawn shop in — Road, with the morbid
desire of testing the truth of some of his assertions, and found that the
watch, chain, and ring were still there. I informed the worthy
pawnbroker of the real name and sad fate of his former customer, and was
almost tempted to purchase the cat’s-eye as a souvenir of my
quasi-friend; but more prudent counsels prevailed, and I relegated them
to the auction-room, to go forth with their crests and monograms, a sad
memento of fallen greatness.