Aged thirty-one, from near Petersfield, Hants, admitted 17th October
1822. This poor simpleton had been a farmer, and rented a few hundred
acres of land; but, from the late misfortunes attending agriculture, as
well as from his own want of skill and judgment in the management of
his affairs, from which, with all his industry, he could not pay rent,
tithes, and taxes, he was reduced, with his wife and family, to extreme
poverty; and would probably have come to his parish-workhouse, but
for the temporary aid of his friends. Without knowledge or experience
for any other pursuit than that of farming, or capital to adopt any
if he were competent (and he has made some efforts), he became quite
low and despondent; for he was destitute of employment, with nothing
but famine and despair in his prospects. In this state he was sent to
this hospital, where, after a short time, he affected to throw off his
melancholy and cheer up his drooping spirits, and determined, in his
own phrase, “never to say die.”
He details amongst his fellow-patients, whom he can induce to listen,
a series of adventures in search of livelihood, after he abandoned
farming. He first resolved to try his fortune in London, as a
promising field of speculation. He waggoned it up to town, attired
in his professional smock-frock, and lodged for a short time with a
relation, who advised him to try an advertisement in the newspapers for
a place; and the first that offered was a situation in Hart Street,
Covent Garden, where his duty was to attend as major-domo, in a hotel
occupied by six single ladies, and to bring them gin, beer, and such
other refreshments as they occasionally required. When gentlemen came
to visit any of the ladies, he was to act as master of the ceremonies,
and to preserve order and decorum; and suffer none to depart without
paying their costs, for sundry accommodations furnished them. The
better to discharge this office of comptroller, he was to take his post
near the street door; and, in remuneration for his services, he was to
live as well as the ladies, his employers, and receive custom-fees of
office, in the way of perquisites.
He was quite willing to accept this engagement, wholly unsuspecting its
true nature, but was dissuaded by his friend.
The next post that offered was to take care of a horse and gig, and
carry out small parcels, for a young gentleman who kept an oil-shop;
but, having no skill in the management of a gig, and not knowing the
topography of London, this prospect failed.
Another situation offered, better suited to his taste and
qualifications, where much activity or address were not requisite. It
was to distribute printed papers in Oxford-street, for the information
of such ladies or gentlemen as might happen to be peculiarly
indisposed. These papers were the professional announcements of the
celebrated Doctor Eady, of Dean-street, Soho; who was pleased with poor
Foster’s operations, and paid him a shilling per day. The faithful
distributor did his duty with zeal, and indiscriminately, to personages
of all classes and descriptions, from the right reverend prelate, or
the noble peer, to the lowest porter; from the duchess ascending her
_vis-à-vis_, to the match-girl or barrow-wench; all were faithfully
apprized, in print, of the doctor’s unparalleled skill. But as his
trivial income by no means equalled his expenditure in the articles
of food, drink, lodging, and washing, and the occasional drops of
comfort he had been used to enjoy, he relinquished his employment,
and commenced business on his own account, in retailing playbills,
at nights, about the entrances of the minor theatres, for the ladies
and gentlemen “to know all about the play.” The unsold surplus of
one evening’s merchandize he vended on the next or succeeding night,
no matter how the performance changed. But this trade was too good
to last: for the fruit-women, and other ladies in the bill trade,
considered him an illegitimate intruder on their privileges; and by
dint of eloquence, and threats to tear his eyes out, obliged him to
retire.
His next occupation was to bear about a pole, sustaining a sort of
banneret, emblazoned by a large printed sheet, with a great many names
on it, describing “all about how the play was to be done.” His station
was assigned in Leicester-square; but such a number of folks came
to stare at him and his board, that he was soon stared quite out of
countenance, and he resigned this employment.
The next post that offered was with a reverend gentleman, a Methodist
parson, near Newington. It was to cultivate a small kitchen-garden,
attend two pigs, milk a cow, wait at table, transact the business of
valet to his master, and attend devotions morning and evening. But so
many occupations were beyond his skill: besides, he had no taste for
psalmody, and therefore he declined so lucrative a post, though it was
ten pounds a year!
He then applied to an eminent cow-keeper at Islington, where he was
told there was a vacancy for a skilful milker. But, unfortunately, the
post was previously filled by a more fortunate candidate.
A great variety of other occupations tempted his ambition, and
cherished for some weeks his hopes of advancement: but he was always
either too late, or not liked. He was at one time in ardent hopes of
a good place at the English Opera House, to clean sinks and gutters,
dust scenes, and other minor offices about this court of Thespis,
at fourteen shillings a week, but then there was a long vacation to
intervene before his talents could be put into action; and seeing no
chance of any other engagement, he took the resolution of returning
to the country, with his extensive stock of London experience and
knowledge. Unhappily, he could not find any one to estimate his value,
and his speculations ended in transmission to this asylum.
He now thinks himself competent for any thing, and contemplates a
hundred different employments, some of which he is to adopt the moment
he gets out. He intends to give a bottle of wine to a celebrated
dancing-master in Nelson’s-square, for teaching him to dance; and then
he can soon get a guinea a day on the stage, for he has seen a play,
and he that played the farmer seemed to know nothing about it. At
another time he will make his brother-in-law procure him an engagement
with a great haberdasher in Fore-street. He understands measuring
land; and, of course, he must know how to measure flannels, calicoes,
ribbons, and tapes. But a still more feasible project is, that when
he gets out, and has money enough, he will go to Cambridge University,
and learn to be a parson. No people, he says, have less to do than
the parsons, and none live better. He will soon reform things in that
way, for he will only take half the tythes. He will be very good to
the poor, attentive to the sick, and preach twice every Sunday, and he
will charge no fees for weddings, or christenings, or burials, to poor
people. At another time he is to go to a chandler’s-shop in London, to
study the business for three months, and then set up for himself, and
make a fortune.
But, at all events, he will never be a farmer again, though he should
get land rent-free; for all his hard work could hardly raise produce to
pay tythes and taxes, and keep his family, and he knows fifty farmers,
not called madmen, who think the same way.
One of the keepers sometimes plays on a flute, and poor Foster,
who is alive to the sympathies of merry music, instantly begins
to dance--certainly not in the most graceful style. Some of his
fellow-patients, rather more tame than himself, are cunning enough to
make fun of him; they encourage his dancing-fits by mock applause, and
persuade him to strip off all his clothes, his breeches and shirt only
excepted, telling him it is best for good dancers to be as loose and
unencumbered as possible. To the agility of his dancing he sometimes
adds his musical powers of voice; and they highly applaud his songs,
which are groaned in a style at war with all harmony, while his motions
in the _pas seul_ surpass in awkwardness those of a bear. But these
mirthful intervals do not at all divert his clerical speculations,
for he says he is about composing his first sermon in a few days. He
declares he is perfectly well, and never was so happy in all his life,
which is probably true, as to his own state of mind. And then he says
he has learned so much since he came into Bethlem, that in less than
twelve months after he gets out, he would not call the King his uncle,
nor the Lord Chancellor his grandmother. He is in robust bodily health,
and, by way of counteracting his mirth, will sometimes weep bitterly,
which he says is to do him good; and if happiness consists in opinion,
few men enjoy more of it than poor Foster.