BOOK I

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THE WORKS OF HENRY FIELDING

VOLUME TEN

THE

HISTORY OF THE LIFE

OF THE LATE

MR. JONATHAN WILD

THE GREAT

WITH THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE, AND AN INTRODUCTION BY G. H. MAYNADIER,

Ph. D.

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH, HARVARD UNIVERSITY

INTRODUCTION

Jonathan Wild, born about 1682 and executed at Tyburn in 1725, was

one of the most notorious criminals of his age. His resemblance to

the hero in Fielding's satire of the same name is general rather

than particular. The real Jonathan (whose legitimate business was

that of a buckle-maker) like Fielding's, won his fame, not as a

robber himself, but as an informer, and a receiver of stolen

goods. His method was to restore these to the owners on receipt of

a commission, which was generally pretty large, pretending that he

had paid the whole of it to the thieves, whom for disinterested

motives he had traced. He was a great organiser, and he controlled

various bands of robbers whose lives he did not hesitate to

sacrifice, when his own was in danger. Naturally he was so hated

by many of his underlings that it is a wonder he was able to

maintain his authority over them as many years as he did. His

rascality had been notorious a long time before his crimes could

actually be proved. He was executed at last according to the

statute which made receivers of stolen goods equally guilty with

the stealers.

Beyond this general resemblance, the adventures of the real

Jonathan, so far as we know them, are not much like those of the

fictitious. True, the real Jonathan's married life was unhappy,

though his quarrel with his wife did not follow so hard upon his

wedding as the quarrel of Fielding's hero and the chaste Laetitia.

Not until a year from his marriage did the real Jonathan separate

from his spouse, after which time he lived, like Fielding's, not

always mindful of his vows of faithfulness. Like Fielding's, too,

he was called upon to suppress rebellions in his gangs, and once

he came very near being killed in a court of justice by one Blake,

alias Blueskin. Apart from these misadventures, the experiences of

Fielding's Wild seem to be purely imaginary. "My narrative is

rather of such actions which he might have performed," the author

himself says, [Footnote: Introduction to Miscellanies, 1st ed., p.

xvii.] "or would, or should have performed, than what he really

did. ... The Life and Actions of the Late Jonathan Wild, got out

with characteristic commercial energy by Defoe, soon after the

criminal's execution, is very different from Fielding's satirical

narrative, and probably a good deal nearer the truth."

Jonathan Wild was published as the third volume of the

Miscellanies "by Henry Fielding, Esq." which came out in the

spring of 1743. From the reference to Lady Booby's steward, Peter

Pounce, in Book II., it seems to have been, as Mr. Austin Dobson

has observed, and as the date of publication would imply, composed

in part at least subsequently to Joseph Andrews, which appeared

early in 1742. But the same critic goes on to say that whenever

completed, Jonathan Wild was probably "planned and begun before

Joseph Andrews was published, as it is in the highest degree

improbable that Fielding, always carefully watching the public

taste, would have followed up that fortunate adventure in a new

direction by a work so entirely different from it as Jonathan

Wild." [Footnote: Henry Fielding, 1900, p. 145.] Mr. Dobson's

surmise is undoubtedly correct. The "strange, surprising

adventures" of Mrs. Heartfree belong to a different school of

fiction from that with which we commonly associate Fielding. They

are such as we should expect one of Defoe's characters to go

through, rather than a woman whose creator had been gratified only

a year before at the favourable reception accorded to Fanny and

Lady Booby and Mrs. Slipslop.

That Jonathan Wild is for the most part a magnificent example of

sustained irony, one of the best in our literature, critics have

generally agreed. The comparison steadfastly insisted upon between

Jonathan Wild's greatness and the greatness which the world looks

up to, but which without being called criminal is yet devoid of

humanity, is admirable. Admirable, too, is the ironical humour, in

which Fielding so excelled, and which in Jonathan Wild he seldom

drops. It would take too long to mention all the particularly good

ironical passages, but among them are the conversation between

Wild and Count La Ruse, and the description of Miss Tishy Snap in

the first book; the adventures of Wild in the boat at the end of

the second book; and, in the last, the dialogue between the

ordinary of Newgate and the hero, the death of Wild, and the

chapter which sets forth his character and his maxims for

attaining greatness. And yet as a satire Jonathan Wild is not

perfect. Fielding himself hits upon its one fault, when, in the

last book, after the long narrative of Mrs. Heartfree's adventures

by sea and by land, he says, "we have already perhaps detained our

reader too long ... from the consideration of our hero." He has

detained us far too long. A story containing so much irony as

Jonathan Wild should be an undeviating satire like A Tale of a

Tub. The introduction of characters like the Heartfrees, who are

meant to enlist a reader's sympathy, spoils the unity. True, the

way they appear at first is all very well. Heartfree is "a silly

fellow," possessed of several great weaknesses of mind, being

"good-natured, friendly, and generous to a great excess," and

devoted to the "silly woman," his wife. But later Fielding becomes

so much interested in the pair that he drops his ironical tone.

Unfortunately, however, in depicting them, he has not met with his

usual success in depicting amiable characters. The exemplary

couple, together with their children and Friendly, are much less

real than the villain and his fellows. And so the importance of

the Heartfrees in Jonathan Wild seems to me a double blemish. A

satire is not truth, and yet in Mr. and Mrs. Heartfree Fielding

has tried--though not with success--to give us virtuous characters

who are truly human. The consequence is that Jonathan Wild just

fails of being a consistently brilliant satire.

As to its place among Fielding's works, critics have differed

considerably. The opinion of Scott found little in Jonathan Wild

to praise, but then it is evident from what he says, that Scott

missed the point of the satire. [Footnote: Henry Fielding in

Biographical and Critical Notices of Eminent Novelists. "It is not

easy to see what Fielding proposed to himself by a picture of

complete vice, unrelieved by anything of human feeling. ..."].

Some other critics have been neither more friendly than Sir

Walter, nor more discriminating, in speaking of Jonathan Wild and

Smollett's Count Fathom in the same breath, as if they were

similar either in purpose or in merit. Fathom is a romantic

picaresque novel, with a possibly edifying, but most unnatural

reformation of the villainous hero at the last; Jonathan Wild is a

pretty consistent picaresque satire, in which the hero ends where

Fathom by all rights should have ended,--on the gallows. Fathom is

the weakest of all its author's novels; Jonathan Wild is not

properly one of Fielding's novels at all, but a work only a little

below them. For below them I cannot help thinking it, in spite of

the opinion of a critic of taste and judgment so excellent as

Professor Saintsbury's. When this gentleman, in his introduction

to Jonathan Wild, in a recent English edition of Fielding's works,

says that: "Fielding has written no greater book," he seems to me

to give excessive praise to a work of such great merit that only

its deserved praise is ample.

A great satire, I should say, is never the equal of a great novel.

In the introductions which I have already written, in trying to

show what a great novel is, I have said that an essential part of

such a book is the reality of its scenes and characters. Now

scenes and characters will not seem real, unless there is in them

the right blend of pleasure and pain, of good and bad; for life is

not all either one thing or the other, nor has it ever been so.

Such reality is not found in a satire, for a satire, as

distinguished from a novel, both conceals and exaggerates: it

gives half-truths instead of whole truths; it shows not all of

life but only a part; and even this it cannot show quite truly,

for its avowed object is to magnify some vice or foible. In doing

so, a satire finds no means so effective as irony, which makes its

appeal wholly to the intellect. A good novel, on the contrary,

touches the head and the heart both; along with passages which

give keen intellectual enjoyment, it offers passages which move

its reader's tears. Still, a good novelist without appreciation of

irony cannot be imagined, for without the sense of humour which

makes irony appreciated, it is impossible to see the objects of

this world in their right proportions. Irony, then, which is the

main part of a satire, is essential to a good novel, though not

necessarily more than a small part of it. Intellectually there is

nothing in English literature of the eighteenth century greater

than A Tale of a Tub or the larger part of Gullivers Travels;

intellectually there is nothing in Fielding's works greater than

most of Jonathan Wild; but taken all in all, is not a novel like

Tom Jones, with its eternal appeal to the emotions as well as the

intellect, greater than a perfect satire? Even if this be not

admitted, Jonathan Wild, we have already seen, is not a perfect

satire. For a work of its kind, it is too sympathetically human,

and so suffers in exactly the opposite way from Vanity Fair, which

many people think is kept from being the greatest English novel of

the nineteenth century because it is too satirical.

No, I cannot agree with Professor Saintsbury that "Fielding has

written no greater book" than Jonathan Wild. It was unquestionably

the most important part of the Miscellanies of 1743. Its

brilliancy may make it outrank even that delightful Journal of the

Voyage to Lisbon. A higher place should not be claimed for it. Mr.

Dobson, in his Henry Fielding, has assigned the right position to

Jonathan Wild when he says that its place "in Fielding's works is

immediately after his three great novels, and this is more by

reason of its subject than its workmanship," which if not perfect,

is yet for the most part excellent.

G. H. MAYNADIER.

THE LIFE OF THE LATE

MR. JONATHAN WILD

BOOK I

CHAPTER ONE

SHEWING THE WHOLESOME USES DRAWN FROM RECORDING THE ACHIEVEMENTS

OF THOSE WONDERFUL PRODUCTIONS OF NATURE CALLED GREAT MEN.

As it is necessary that all great and surprising events, the

designs of which are laid, conducted, and brought to perfection by

the utmost force of human invention and art, should be produced by

great and eminent men, so the lives of such may be justly and

properly styled the quintessence of history. In these, when

delivered to us by sensible writers, we are not only most

agreeably entertained, but most usefully instructed; for, besides

the attaining hence a consummate knowledge of human nature in

general; of its secret springs, various windings, and perplexed

mazes; we have here before our eyes lively examples of whatever is

amiable or detestable, worthy of admiration or abhorrence, and are

consequently taught, in a manner infinitely more effectual than by

precept, what we are eagerly to imitate or carefully to avoid.

But besides the two obvious advantages of surveying, as it were in

a picture, the true beauty of virtue and deformity of vice, we may

moreover learn from Plutarch, Nepos, Suetonius, and other

biographers, this useful lesson, not too hastily, nor in the

gross, to bestow either our praise or censure; since we shall

often find such a mixture of good and evil in the same character

that it may require a very accurate judgment and a very elaborate

inquiry to determine on which side the balance turns, for though

we sometimes meet with an Aristides or a Brutus, a Lysander or a

Nero, yet far the greater number are of the mixt kind, neither

totally good nor bad; their greatest virtues being obscured and

allayed by their vices, and those again softened and coloured over

by their virtues.

Of this kind was the illustrious person whose history we now

undertake; to whom, though nature had given the greatest and most

shining endowments, she had not given them absolutely pure and

without allay. Though he had much of the admirable in his

character, as much perhaps as is usually to be found in a hero, I

will not yet venture to affirm that he was entirely free from all

defects, or that the sharp eyes of censure could not spy out some

little blemishes lurking amongst his many great perfections.

We would not therefore be understood to affect giving the reader a

perfect or consummate pattern of human excellence, but rather, by

faithfully recording some little imperfections which shadowed over

the lustre of those great qualities which we shall here record, to

teach the lesson we have above mentioned, to induce our reader

with us to lament the frailty of human nature, and to convince him

that no mortal, after a thorough scrutiny, can be a proper object

of our adoration.

But before we enter on this great work we must endeavour to remove

some errors of opinion which mankind have, by the disingenuity of

writers, contracted: for these, from their fear of contradicting

the obsolete and absurd doctrines of a set of simple fellows,

called, in derision, sages or philosophers, have endeavoured, as

much as possible, to confound the ideas of greatness and goodness;

whereas no two things can possibly be more distinct from each

other, for greatness consists in bringing all manner of mischief

on mankind, and goodness in removing it from them. It seems

therefore very unlikely that the same person should possess them

both; and yet nothing is more usual with writers, who find many

instances of greatness in their favourite hero, than to make him a

compliment of goodness into the bargain; and this, without

considering that by such means they destroy the great perfection

called uniformity of character. In the histories of Alexander and

Caesar we are frequently, and indeed impertinently, reminded of

their benevolence and generosity, of their clemency and kindness.

When the former had with fire and sword overrun a vast empire, had

destroyed the lives of an immense number of innocent wretches, had

scattered ruin and desolation like a whirlwind, we are told, as an

example of his clemency, that he did not cut the throat of an old

woman, and ravish her daughters, but was content with only undoing

them. And when the mighty Caesar, with wonderful greatness of

mind, had destroyed the liberties of his country, and with all the

means of fraud and force had placed himself at the head of his

equals, had corrupted and enslaved the greatest people whom the

sun ever saw, we are reminded, as an evidence of his generosity,

of his largesses to his followers and tools, by whose means he had

accomplished his purpose, and by whose assistance he was to

establish it.

Now, who doth not see that such sneaking qualities as these are

rather to be bewailed as imperfections than admired as ornaments

in these great men; rather obscuring their glory, and holding them

back in their race to greatness, indeed unworthy the end for which

they seem to have come into the world, viz. of perpetrating vast

and mighty mischief?

We hope our reader will have reason justly to acquit us of any

such confounding ideas in the following pages; in which, as we are

to record the actions of a great man, so we have nowhere mentioned

any spark of goodness which had discovered itself either faintly

in him, or more glaringly in any other person, but as a meanness

and imperfection, disqualifying them for undertakings which lead

to honour and esteem among men.

As our hero had as little as perhaps is to be found of that

meanness, indeed only enough to make him partaker of the

imperfection of humanity, instead of the perfection of diabolism,

we have ventured to call him THE GREAT; nor do we doubt but our

reader, when he hath perused his story, will concur with us in

allowing him that title.

CHAPTER TWO

GIVING AN ACCOUNT OF AS MANY OF OUR HERO'S ANCESTORS AS CAN BE

GATHERED OUT OF THE RUBBISH OF ANTIQUITY, WHICH HATH BEEN

CAREFULLY SIFTED FOR THAT PURPOSE.

It is the custom of all biographers, at their entrance into their

work, to step a little backwards (as far, indeed, generally as

they are able) and to trace up their hero, as the ancients did the

river Nile, till an incapacity of proceeding higher puts an end to

their search.

What first gave rise to this method is somewhat difficult to

determine. Sometimes I have thought that the hero's ancestors have

been introduced as foils to himself. Again, I have imagined it

might be to obviate a suspicion that such extraordinary personages

were not produced in the ordinary course of nature, and may have

proceeded from the author's fear that, if we were not told who

their fathers were, they might be in danger, like prince

Prettyman, of being supposed to have had none. Lastly, and perhaps

more truly, I have conjectured that the design of the biographer

hath been no more than to shew his great learning and knowledge of

antiquity. A design to which the world hath probably owed many

notable discoveries, and indeed most of the labours of our

antiquarians.

But whatever original this custom had, it is now too well

established to be disputed. I shall therefore conform to it in the

strictest manner.

Mr. Jonathan Wild, or Wyld, then (for he himself did not always

agree in one method of spelling his name), was descended from the

great Wolfstan Wild, who came over with Hengist, and distinguished

himself very eminently at that famous festival, where the Britons

were so treacherously murdered by the Saxons; for when the word

was given, i.e. Nemet eour Saxes, take out your swords, this

gentleman, being a little hard of hearing, mistook the sound for

Nemet her sacs, take out their purses; instead therefore of

applying to the throat, he immediately applied to the pocket of

his guest, and contented himself with taking all that he had,

without attempting his life.

The next ancestor of our hero who was remarkably eminent was Wild,

surnamed Langfanger, or Longfinger. He flourished in the reign of

Henry III., and was strictly attached to Hubert de Burgh, whose

friendship he was recommended to by his great excellence in an art

of which Hubert was himself the inventor; he could, without the

knowledge of the proprietor, with great ease and dexterity, draw

forth a man's purse from any part of his garment where it was

deposited, and hence he derived his surname. This gentleman was

the first of his family who had the honour to suffer for the good

of his country: on whom a wit of that time made the following

epitaph:--

O shame o' justice! Wild is hang'd, For thatten he a pocket

fang'd, While safe old Hubert, and his gang, Doth pocket o' the

nation fang.

Langfanger left a son named Edward, whom he had carefully

instructed in the art for which he himself was so famous. This

Edward had a grandson, who served as a volunteer under the famous

Sir John Falstaff, and by his gallant demeanour so recommended

himself to his captain, that he would have certainly been promoted

by him, had Harry the fifth kept his word with his old companion.

After the death of Edward the family remained in some obscurity

down to the reign of Charles the first, when James Wild

distinguished himself on both sides the question in the civil

wars, passing from one to t'other, as Heaven seemed to declare

itself in favour of either party. At the end of the war, James not

being rewarded according to his merits, as is usually the case of

such impartial persons, he associated himself with a brave man of

those times, whose name was Hind, and declared open war with both

parties. He was successful in several actions, and spoiled many of

the enemy: till at length, being overpowered and taken, he was,

contrary to the law of arms, put basely and cowardly to death by a

combination between twelve men of the enemy's party, who, after

some consultation, unanimously agreed on the said murder.

This Edward took to wife Rebecca, the daughter of the above-

mentioned John Hind, esq., by whom he had issue John, Edward,

Thomas, and Jonathan, and three daughters, namely, Grace, Charity,

and Honour. John followed the fortunes of his father, and,

suffering with him, left no issue. Edward was so remarkable for

his compassionate temper that he spent his life in soliciting the

causes of the distressed captives in Newgate, and is reported to

have held a strict friendship with an eminent divine who solicited

the spiritual causes of the said captives. He married Editha,

daughter and co-heiress of Geoffry Snap, gent., who long enjoyed

an office under the high sheriff of London and Middlesex, by

which, with great reputation, he acquired a handsome fortune: by

her he had no issue. Thomas went very young abroad to one of our

American colonies, and hath not been since heard of. As for the

daughters, Grace was married to a merchant of Yorkshire who dealt

in horses. Charity took to husband an eminent gentleman, whose

name I cannot learn, but who was famous for so friendly a

disposition that he was bail for above a hundred persons in one

year. He had likewise the remarkable humour of walking in

Westminster-hall with a straw in his shoe. Honour, the youngest,

died unmarried: she lived many years in this town, was a great

frequenter of plays, and used to be remarkable for distributing

oranges to all who would accept of them.

Jonathan married Elizabeth, daughter of Scragg Hollow, of Hockley-

in-the-Hole, esq.; and by her had Jonathan, who is the illustrious

subject of these memoirs.

CHAPTER THREE

THE BIRTH, PARENTAGE, AND EDUCATION OF MR. JONATHAN WILD THE

GREAT.

It is observable that Nature seldom produces any one who is

afterwards to act a notable part on the stage of life, but she

gives some warning of her intention; and, as the dramatic poet

generally prepares the entry of every considerable character with

a solemn narrative, or at least a great flourish of drums and

trumpets, so doth this our Alma Mater by some shrewd hints pre-

admonish us of her intention, giving us warning, as it were, and

crying--

--Venienti occurrite morbo.

Thus Astyages, who was the grandfather of Cyrus, dreamt that his

daughter was brought to bed of a vine, whose branches overspread

all Asia; and Hecuba, while big with Paris, dreamt that she was

delivered of a firebrand that set all Troy in flames; so did the

mother of our great man, while she was with child of him, dream

that she was enjoyed in the night by the gods Mercury and Priapus.

This dream puzzled all the learned astrologers of her time,

seeming to imply in it a contradiction; Mercury being the god of

ingenuity, and Priapus the terror of those who practised it. What

made this dream the more wonderful, and perhaps the true cause of

its being remembered, was a very extraordinary circumstance,

sufficiently denoting something preternatural in it; for though

she had never heard even the name of either of these gods, she

repeated these very words in the morning, with only a small

mistake of the quantity of the latter, which she chose to call

Priapus instead of Priapus; and her husband swore that, though he

might possibly have named Mercury to her (for he had heard of such

an heathen god), he never in his life could anywise have put her

in mind of that other deity, with whom he had no acquaintance.

Another remarkable incident was, that during her whole pregnancy

she constantly longed for everything she saw; nor could be

satisfied with her wish unless she enjoyed it clandestinely; and

as nature, by true and accurate observers, is remarked to give us

no appetites without furnishing us with the means of gratifying

them; so had she at this time a most marvellous glutinous quality

attending her fingers, to which, as to birdlime, everything

closely adhered that she handled.

To omit other stories, some of which may be perhaps the growth of

superstition, we proceed to the birth of our hero, who made his

first appearance on this great theatre the very day when the

plague first broke out in 1665. Some say his mother was delivered

of him in an house of an orbicular or round form in Covent-garden;

but of this we are not certain. He was some years afterwards

baptized by the famous Mr. Titus Oates.

Nothing very remarkable passed in his years of infancy, save that,

as the letters TH are the most difficult of pronunciation, and the

last which a child attains to the utterance of, so they were the

first that came with any readiness from young master Wild. Nor

must we omit the early indications which he gave of the sweetness

of his temper; for though he was by no means to be terrified into

compliance, yet might he, by a sugar-plum, be brought to your

purpose; indeed, to say the truth, he was to be bribed to

anything, which made many say he was certainly born to be a great

man.

He was scarce settled at school before he gave marks of his lofty

and aspiring temper; and was regarded by all his schoolfellows

with that deference which men generally pay to those superior

geniuses who will exact it of them. If an orchard was to be robbed

Wild was consulted, and, though he was himself seldom concerned in

the execution of the design, yet was he always concerter of it,

and treasurer of the booty, some little part of which he would now

and then, with wonderful generosity, bestow on those who took it.

He was generally very secret on these occasions; but if any

offered to plunder of his own head, without acquainting master

Wild, and making a deposit of the booty, he was sure to have an

information against him lodged with the schoolmaster, and to be

severely punished for his pains.

He discovered so little attention to school-learning that his

master, who was a very wise and worthy man, soon gave over all

care and trouble on that account, and, acquainting his parents

that their son proceeded extremely well in his studies, he

permitted his pupil to follow his own inclinations, perceiving

they led him to nobler pursuits than the sciences, which are

generally acknowledged to be a very unprofitable study, and indeed

greatly to hinder the advancement of men in the world: but though

master Wild was not esteemed the readiest at making his exercise,

he was universally allowed to be the most dexterous at stealing it

of all his schoolfellows, being never detected in such furtive

compositions, nor indeed in any other exercitations of his great

talents, which all inclined the same way, but once, when he had

laid violent hands on a book called Gradus ad Parnassum, i. e. A

step towards Parnassus, on which account his master, who was a man

of most wonderful wit and sagacity, is said to have told him he

wished it might not prove in the event Gradus ad Patibulum, i. e.

A step towards the gallows.

But, though he would not give himself the pains requisite to

acquire a competent sufficiency in the learned languages, yet did

he readily listen with attention to others, especially when they

translated the classical authors to him; nor was he in the least

backward, at all such times, to express his approbation. He was

wonderfully pleased with that passage in the eleventh Iliad where

Achilles is said to have bound two sons of Priam upon a mountain,

and afterwards to have released them for a sum of money. This was,

he said, alone sufficient to refute those who affected a contempt

for the wisdom of the ancients, and an undeniable testimony of the

great antiquity of priggism.[Footnote: This word, in the cant

language, signifies thievery.] He was ravished with the account

which Nestor gives in the same book of the rich booty which he

bore off (i.e. stole) from the Eleans. He was desirous of having

this often repeated to him, and at the end of every repetition he

constantly fetched a deep sigh, and said IT WAS A GLORIOUS BOOTY.

When the story of Cacus was read to him out of the eighth Aeneid

he generously pitied the unhappy fate of that great man, to whom

he thought Hercules much too severe: one of his schoolfellows

commending the dexterity of drawing the oxen backward by their

tails into his den, he smiled, and with some disdain said, HE

COULD HAVE TAUGHT HIM A BETTER WAY.

He was a passionate admirer of heroes, particularly of Alexander

the Great, between whom and the late king of Sweden he would

frequently draw parallels. He was much delighted with the accounts

of the Czar's retreat from the latter, who carried off the

inhabitants of great cities to people his own country. THIS, he

said, WAS NOT ONCE THOUGHT OF BY Alexander; BUT added, PERHAPS HE

DID NOT WANT THEM.

Happy had it been for him if he had confined himself to this

sphere; but his chief, if not only blemish, was, that he would

sometimes, from an humility in his nature too pernicious to true

greatness, condescend to an intimacy with inferior things and

persons. Thus the Spanish Rogue was his favourite book, and the

Cheats of Scapin his favourite play.

The young gentleman being now at the age of seventeen, his father,

from a foolish prejudice to our universities, and out of a false

as well as excessive regard to his morals, brought his son to

town, where he resided with him till he was of an age to travel.

Whilst he was here, all imaginable care was taken of his

instruction, his father endeavouring his utmost to inculcate

principles of honour and gentility into his son.

CHAPTER FOUR

MR. WILD'S FIRST ENTRANCE INTO THE WORLD. HIS ACQUAINTANCE WITH

COUNT LA RUSE.

An accident soon happened after his arrival in town which almost

saved the father his whole labour on this head, and provided

master Wild a better tutor than any after-care or expense could

have furnished him with. The old gentleman, it seems, was a

FOLLOWER of the fortunes of Mr. Snap, son of Mr. Geoffry Snap,

whom we have before mentioned to have enjoyed a reputable office

under the Sheriff of London and Middlesex, the daughter of which

Geoffry had intermarried with the Wilds. Mr. Snap the younger,

being thereto well warranted, had laid violent hands on, or, as

the vulgar express it, arrested one count La Ruse, a man of

considerable figure in those days, and had confined him to his own

house till he could find two seconds who would in a formal manner

give their words that the count should, at a certain day and place

appointed, answer all that one Thomas Thimble, a taylor, had to

say to him; which Thomas Thimble, it seems, alleged that the count

had, according to the law of the realm, made over his body to him

as a security for some suits of cloaths to him delivered by the

said Thomas Thimble. Now as the count, though perfectly a man of

honour, could not immediately find these seconds, he was obliged

for some time to reside at Mr. Snap's house: for it seems the law

of the land is, that whoever owes another 10 pounds, or indeed 2

pounds, may be, on the oath of that person, immediately taken up

and carried away from his own house and family, and kept abroad

till he is made to owe, 50 pounds, whether he will or no; for

which he is perhaps afterwards obliged to lie in gaol; and all

these without any trial had, or any other evidence of the debt

than the above said oath, which if untrue, as it often happens,

you have no remedy against the perjurer; he was, forsooth,

mistaken.

But though Mr. Snap would not (as perhaps by the nice rules of

honour he was obliged) discharge the count on his parole, yet did

he not (as by the strict rules of law he was enabled) confine him

to his chamber. The count had his liberty of the whole house, and

Mr. Snap, using only the precaution of keeping his doors well

locked and barred, took his prisoner's word that he would not go

forth.

Mr. Snap had by his second lady two daughters, who were now in the

bloom of their youth and beauty. These young ladies, like damsels

in romance, compassionated the captive count, and endeavoured by

all means to make his confinement less irksome to him; which,

though they were both very beautiful, they could not attain by any

other way so effectually as by engaging with him at cards, in

which contentions, as will appear hereafter, the count was greatly

skilful.

As whisk and swabbers was the game then in the chief vogue, they

were obliged to look for a fourth person in order to make up their

parties. Mr. Snap himself would sometimes relax his mind from the

violent fatigues of his employment by these recreations; and

sometimes a neighbouring young gentleman or lady came in to their

assistance: but the most frequent guest was young master Wild, who

had been educated from his infancy with the Miss Snaps, and was,

by all the neighbours, allotted for the husband of Miss Tishy, or

Laetitia, the younger of the two; for though, being his cousin-

german, she was perhaps, in the eye of a strict conscience,

somewhat too nearly related to him, yet the old people on both

sides, though sufficiently scrupulous in nice matters, agreed to

overlook this objection.

Men of great genius as easily discover one another as freemasons

can. It was therefore no wonder that the count soon conceived an

inclination to an intimacy with our young hero, whose vast

abilities could not be concealed from one of the count's

discernment; for though this latter was so expert at his cards

that he was proverbially said to PLAY THE WHOLE GAME, he was no

match for master Wild, who, inexperienced as he was,

notwithstanding all the art, the dexterity, and often the fortune

of his adversary, never failed to send him away from the table

with less in his pocket than he brought to it, for indeed

Langfanger himself could not have extracted a purse with more

ingenuity than our young hero.

His hands made frequent visits to the count's pocket before the

latter had entertained any suspicion of him, imputing the several

losses he sustained rather to the innocent and sprightly frolick

of Miss Doshy, or Theodosia, with which, as she indulged him with

little innocent freedoms about her person in return, he thought

himself obliged to be contented; but one night, when Wild imagined

the count asleep, he made so unguarded an attack upon him, that

the other caught him in the fact: however, he did not think proper

to acquaint him with the discovery he had made, but, preventing

him from any booty at that time, he only took care for the future

to button his pockets, and to pack the cards with double industry.

So far was this detection from causing any quarrel between these

two prigs,[Footnote: Thieves] that in reality it recommended them

to each other; for a wise man, that is to say a rogue, considers a

trick in life as a gamester doth a trick at play. It sets him on

his guard, but he admires the dexterity of him who plays it.

These, therefore, and many other such instances of ingenuity,

operated so violently on the count, that, notwithstanding the

disparity which age, title, and above all, dress, had set between

them, he resolved to enter into an acquaintance with Wild. This

soon produced a perfect intimacy, and that a friendship, which had

a longer duration than is common to that passion between persons

who only propose to themselves the common advantages of eating,

drinking, whoring, or borrowing money; which ends, as they soon

fail, so doth the friendship founded upon them. Mutual interest,

the greatest of all purposes, was the cement of this alliance,

which nothing, of consequence, but superior interest, was capable

of dissolving.

CHAPTER FIVE

A DIALOGUE BETWEEN YOUNG MASTER WILD AND COUNT LA RUSE, WHICH,

HAVING EXTENDED TO THE REJOINDER, HAD A VERY QUIET, EASY, AND

NATURAL CONCLUSION.

One evening, after the Miss Snaps were retired to rest, the count

thus addressed himself to young Wild: "You cannot, I apprehend,

Mr. Wild, be such a stranger to your own great capacity, as to be

surprised when I tell you I have often viewed, with a mixture of

astonishment and concern, your shining qualities confined to a

sphere where they can never reach the eyes of those who would

introduce them properly into the world, and raise you to an

eminence where you may blaze out to the admiration of all men. I

assure you I am pleased with my captivity, when I reflect I am

likely to owe to it an acquaintance, and I hope friendship, with

the greatest genius of my age; and, what is still more, when I

indulge my vanity with a prospect of drawing from obscurity

(pardon the expression) such talents as were, I believe, never

before like to have been buried in it: for I make no question but,

at my discharge from confinement, which will now soon happen, I

shall be able to introduce you into company, where you may reap

the advantage of your superior parts.

"I will bring you acquainted, sir, with those who, as they are

capable of setting a true value on such qualifications, so they

will have it both in their power and inclination to prefer you for

them. Such an introduction is the only advantage you want, without

which your merit might be your misfortune; for those abilities

which would entitle you to honour and profit in a superior station

may render you only obnoxious to danger and disgrace in a lower."

Mr. Wild answered, "Sir, I am not insensible of my obligations to

you, as well for the over-value you have set on my small

abilities, as for the kindness you express in offering to

introduce me among my superiors. I must own my father hath often

persuaded me to push myself into the company of my betters; but,

to say the truth, I have an aukward pride in my nature, which is

better pleased with being at the head of the lowest class than at

the bottom of the highest. Permit me to say, though the idea may

be somewhat coarse, I had rather stand on the summit of a dunghill

than at the bottom of a hill in Paradise. I have always thought it

signifies little into what rank of life I am thrown, provided I

make a great figure therein, and should be as well satisfied with

exerting my talents well at the head of a small party or gang, as

in the command of a mighty army; for I am far from agreeing with

you, that great parts are often lost in a low situation; on the

contrary, I am convinced it is impossible they should be lost. I

have often persuaded myself that there were not fewer than a

thousand in Alexander's troops capable of performing what

Alexander himself did.

"But, because such spirits were not elected or destined to an

imperial command, are we therefore to imagine they came off

without a booty? or that they contented themselves with the share

in common with their comrades? Surely, no. In civil life,

doubtless, the same genius, the same endowments, have often

composed the statesman and the prig, for so we call what the

vulgar name a thief. The same parts, the same actions, often

promote men to the head of superior societies, which raise them to

the head of lower; and where is the essential difference if the

one ends on Tower-hill and the other at Tyburn? Hath the block any

preference to the gallows, or the ax to the halter, but was given

them by the ill-guided judgment of men? You will pardon me,

therefore, if I am not so hastily inflamed with the common outside

of things, nor join the general opinion in preferring one state to

another. A guinea is as valuable in a leathern as in an

embroidered purse; and a cod's head is a cod's head still, whether

in a pewter or a silver dish."

The count replied as follows: "What you have now said doth not

lessen my idea of your capacity, but confirms my opinion of the

ill effect of bad and low company. Can any man doubt whether it is

better to be a great statesman or a common thief? I have often

heard that the devil used to say, where or to whom I know not,

that it was better to reign in Hell than to be a valet-de-chambre

in Heaven, and perhaps he was in the right; but sure, if he had

had the choice of reigning in either, he would have chosen better.

The truth therefore is, that by low conversation we contract a

greater awe for high things than they deserve. We decline great

pursuits not from contempt but despair. The man who prefers the

high road to a more reputable way of making his fortune doth it

because he imagines the one easier than the other; but you

yourself have asserted, and with undoubted truth, that the same

abilities qualify you for undertaking, and the same means will

bring you to your end in both journeys--as in music it is the same

tune, whether you play it in a higher or a lower key. To instance

in some particulars: is it not the same qualification which

enables this man to hire himself as a servant, and to get into the

confidence and secrets of his master in order to rob him, and that

to undertake trusts of the highest nature with a design to break

and betray them? Is it less difficult by false tokens to deceive a

shopkeeper into the delivery of his goods, which you afterwards

run away with, than to impose upon him by outward splendour and

the appearance of fortune into a credit by which you gain and he

loses twenty times as much? Doth it not require more dexterity in

the fingers to draw out a man's purse from his pocket, or to take

a lady's watch from her side, without being perceived of any (an

excellence in which, without flattery, I am persuaded you have no

superior), than to cog a die or to shuffle a pack of cards? Is not

as much art, as many excellent qualities, required to make a

pimping porter at a common bawdy-house as would enable a man to

prostitute his own or his friend's wife or child? Doth it not ask

as good a memory, as nimble an invention, as steady a countenance,

to forswear yourself in Westminster-hall as would furnish out a

complete tool of state, or perhaps a statesman himself? It is

needless to particularize every instance; in all we shall find

that there is a nearer connexion between high and low life than is

generally imagined, and that a highwayman is entitled to more

favour with the great than he usually meets with. If, therefore,

as I think I have proved, the same parts which qualify a man for

eminence in a low sphere, qualify him likewise for eminence in a

higher, sure it can be no doubt in which he would chuse to exert

them. Ambition, without which no one can be a great man, will

immediately instruct him, in your own phrase, to prefer a hill in

Paradise to a dunghill; nay, even fear, a passion the most

repugnant to greatness, will shew him how much more safely he may

indulge himself in the free and full exertion of his mighty

abilities in the higher than in the lower rank; since experience

teaches him that there is a crowd oftener in one year at Tyburn

than on Tower-hill in a century." Mr. Wild with much solemnity

rejoined, "That the same capacity which qualifies a mill-

ken,[Footnote: A housebreaker.] a bridle-cull,[Footnote: A

highwayman.] or a buttock-and-file, [Footnote: A shoplifter. Terms

used in the Cant Dictionary.] to arrive at any degree of eminence

in his profession, would likewise raise a man in what the world

esteem a more honourable calling, I do not deny; nay, in many of

your instances it is evident that more ingenuity, more art, are

necessary to the lower than the higher proficients. If, therefore,

you had only contended that every prig might be a statesman if he

pleased, I had readily agreed to it; but when you conclude that it

is his interest to be so, that ambition would bid him take that

alternative, in a word, that a statesman is greater or happier

than a prig, I must deny my assent. But, in comparing these two

together, we must carefully avoid being misled by the vulgar

erroneous estimation of things, for mankind err in disquisitions

of this nature as physicians do who in considering the operations

of a disease have not a due regard to the age and complexion of

the patient. The same degree of heat which is common in this

constitution may be a fever in that; in the same manner that which

may be riches or honour to me may be poverty or disgrace to

another: for all these things are to be estimated by relation to

the person who possesses them. A booty of L10 looks as great in

the eye of a bridle-cull, and gives as much real happiness to his

fancy, as that of as many thousands to the statesman; and doth not

the former lay out his acquisitions in whores and fiddles with

much greater joy and mirth than the latter in palaces and

pictures? What are the flattery, the false compliments of his gang

to the statesman, when he himself must condemn his own blunders,

and is obliged against his will to give fortune the whole honour

of success? What is the pride resulting from such sham applause,

compared to the secret satisfaction which a prig enjoys in his

mind in reflecting on a well-contrived and well-executed scheme?

Perhaps, indeed, the greater danger is on the prig's side; but

then you must remember that the greater honour is so too. When I

mention honour, I mean that which is paid them by their gang; for

that weak part of the world which is vulgarly called THE WISE see

both in a disadvantageous and disgraceful light; and as the prig

enjoys (and merits too) the greater degree of honour from his

gang, so doth he suffer the less disgrace from the world, who

think his misdeeds, as they call them, sufficiently at last

punished with a halter, which at once puts an end to his pain and

infamy; whereas the other is not only hated in power, but detested

and contemned at the scaffold; and future ages vent their malice

on his fame, while the other sleeps quiet and forgotten. Besides,

let us a little consider the secret quiet of their consciences:

how easy is the reflection of having taken a few shillings or

pounds from a stranger, without any breach of confidence, or

perhaps any great harm to the person who loses it, compared to

that of having betrayed a public trust, and ruined the fortunes of

thousands, perhaps of a great nation! How much braver is an attack

on the highway than at a gaming-table; and how much more innocent

the character of a b--dy-house than a c--t pimp!" He was eagerly

proceeding, when, casting his eyes on the count, he perceived him

to be fast asleep; wherefore, having first picked his pocket of

three shillings, then gently jogged him in order to take his

leave, and promised to return to him the next morning to

breakfast, they separated: the count retired to rest, and master

Wild to a night-cellar.

CHAPTER SIX

FURTHER CONFERENCES BETWEEN THE COUNT AND MASTER WILD, WITH OTHER

MATTERS OF THE GREAT KIND.

The count missed his money the next morning, and very well knew

who had it; but, as he knew likewise how fruitless would be any

complaint, he chose to pass it by without mentioning it. Indeed it

may appear strange to some readers that these gentlemen, who knew

each other to be thieves, should never once give the least hint of

this knowledge in all their discourse together, but, on the

contrary, should have the words honesty, honour, and friendship as

often in their mouths as any other men. This, I say, may appear

strange to some; but those who have lived long in cities, courts,

gaols, or such places, will perhaps be able to solve the seeming

absurdity.

When our two friends met the next morning the count (who, though

he did not agree with the whole of his friend's doctrine, was,

however, highly pleased with his argument) began to bewail the

misfortune of his captivity, and the backwardness of friends to

assist each other in their necessities; but what vexed him, he

said, most, was the cruelty of the fair: for he intrusted Wild

with the secret of his having had an intrigue with Miss Theodosia,

the elder of the Miss Snaps, ever since his confinement, though he

could not prevail with her to set him at liberty. Wild answered,

with a smile, "It was no wonder a woman should wish to confine her

lover where she might be sure of having him entirely to herself;"

but added, he believed he could tell him a method of certainly

procuring his escape. The count eagerly besought him to acquaint

him with it. Wild told him bribery was the surest means, and

advised him to apply to the maid. The count thanked him, but

returned, "That he had not a farthing left besides one guinea,

which he had then given her to change." To which Wild said, "He

must make it up with promises, which he supposed he was courtier

enough to know how to put off." The count greatly applauded the

advice, and said he hoped he should be able in time to persuade

him to condescend to be a great man, for which he was so perfectly

well qualified.

This method being concluded on, the two friends sat down to cards,

a circumstance which I should not have mentioned but for the sake

of observing the prodigious force of habit; for though the count

knew if he won ever so much of Mr. Wild he should not receive a

shilling, yet could he not refrain from packing the cards; nor

could Wild keep his hands out of his friend's pockets, though he

knew there was nothing in them.

When the maid came home the count began to put it to her; offered

her all he had, and promised mountains in futuro; but all in vain--

the maid's honesty was impregnable. She said, "She would not

break her trust for the whole world; no, not if she could gain a

hundred pound by it." Upon which Wild stepping up and telling her

"She need not fear losing her place, for it would never be found

out; that they could throw a pair of sheets into the street, by

which it might appear he got out at a window; that he himself

would swear he saw him descending; that the money would be so much

gains in her pocket; that, besides his promises, which she might

depend on being performed, she would receive from him twenty

shillings and ninepence in ready money (for she had only laid out

threepence in plain Spanish); and lastly, that, besides his

honour, the count should leave a pair of gold buttons (which

afterwards turned out to be brass) of great value, in her hands,

as a further pawn."

The maid still remained inflexible, till Wild offered to lend his

friend a guinea more, and to deposit it immediately in her hands.

This reinforcement bore down the poor girl's resolution, and she

faithfully promised to open the door to the count that evening.

Thus did our young hero not only lend his rhetoric, which few

people care to do without a fee, but his money too (a sum which

many a good man would have made fifty excuses before he would have

parted with), to his friend, and procured him his liberty.

But it would be highly derogatory from the GREAT character of

Wild, should the reader imagine he lent such a sum to a friend

without the least view of serving himself. As, therefore, the

reader may easily account for it in a manner more advantageous to

our hero's reputation, by concluding that he had some interested

view in the count's enlargement, we hope he will judge with

charity, especially as the sequel makes it not only reasonable but

necessary to suppose he had some such view.

A long intimacy and friendship subsisted between the count and Mr.

Wild, who, being by the advice of the count dressed in good

cloaths, was by him introduced into the best company. They

constantly frequented the assemblies, auctions, gaming-tables, and

play-houses; at which last they saw two acts every night, and then

retired without paying--this being, it seems, an immemorial

privilege which the beaus of the town prescribe for themselves.

This, however, did not suit Wild's temper, who called it a cheat,

and objected against it as requiring no dexterity, but what every

blockhead might put in execution. He said it was a custom very

much savouring of the sneaking-budge, [Footnote: Shoplifting] but

neither so honourable nor so ingenious.

Wild now made a considerable figure, and passed for a gentleman of

great fortune in the funds. Women of quality treated him with

great familiarity, young ladies began to spread their charms for

him, when an accident happened that put a stop to his continuance

in a way of life too insipid and inactive to afford employment for

those great talents which were designed to make a much more

considerable figure in the world than attends the character of a

beau or a pretty gentleman.

CHAPTER SEVEN

MASTER WILD SETS OUT ON HIS TRAVELS, AND RETURNS HOME AGAIN. A

VERY SHORT CHAPTER, CONTAINING INFINITELY MORE TIME AND LESS

MATTER THAN ANY OTHER IN THE WHOLE STORY.

We are sorry we cannot indulge our reader's curiosity with a full

and perfect account of this accident; but as there are such

various accounts, one of which only can be true, and possibly and

indeed probably none; instead of following the general method of

historians, who in such cases set down the various reports, and

leave to your own conjecture which you will chuse, we shall pass

them all over.

Certain it is that, whatever this accident was, it determined our

hero's father to send his son immediately abroad for seven years;

and, which may seem somewhat remarkable, to his majesty's

plantations in America--that part of the world being, as he said,

freer from vices than the courts and cities of Europe, and

consequently less dangerous to corrupt a young man's morals. And

as for the advantages, the old gentleman thought they were equal

there with those attained in the politer climates; for travelling,

he said, was travelling in one part of the world as well as

another; it consisted in being such a time from home, and in

traversing so many leagues; and [he] appealed to experience

whether most of our travellers in France and Italy did not prove

at their return that they might have been sent as profitably to

Norway and Greenland.

According to these resolutions of his father, the young gentleman

went aboard a ship, and with a great deal of good company set out

for the American hemisphere. The exact time of his stay is

somewhat uncertain; most probably longer than was intended. But

howsoever long his abode there was, it must be a blank in this

history, as the whole story contains not one adventure worthy the

reader's notice; being indeed a continued scene of whoring,

drinking, and removing from one place to another.

To confess a truth, we are so ashamed of the shortness of this

chapter, that we would have done a violence to our history, and

have inserted an adventure or two of some other traveller; to

which purpose we borrowed the journals of several young gentlemen

who have lately made the tour of Europe; but to our great sorrow,

could not extract a single incident strong enough to justify the

theft to our conscience.

When we consider the ridiculous figure this chapter must make,

being the history of no less than eight years, our only comfort

is, that the histories of some men's lives, and perhaps of some

men who have made a noise in the world, are in reality as absolute

blanks as the travels of our hero. As, therefore, we shall make

sufficient amends in the sequel for this inanity, we shall hasten

on to matters of true importance and immense greatness. At present

we content ourselves with setting down our hero where we took him

up, after acquainting our reader that he went abroad, staid seven

years, and then came home again.

CHAPTER EIGHT

AN ADVENTURE WHERE WILD, IN THE DIVISION OF THE BOOTY, EXHIBITS AN

ASTONISHING INSTANCE OF GREATNESS.

The count was one night very successful at the hazard-table, where

Wild, who was just returned from his travels, was then present; as

was likewise a young gentleman whose name was Bob Bagshot, an

acquaintance of Mr. Wild's, and of whom he entertained a great

opinion; taking, therefore, Mr. Bagshot aside, he advised him to

provide himself (if he had them not about him) with a case of

pistols, and to attack the count in his way home, promising to

plant himself near with the same arms, as a corps de reserve, and

to come up on occasion. This was accordingly executed, and the

count obliged to surrender to savage force what he had in so

genteel and civil a manner taken at play.

And as it is a wise and philosophical observation, that one

misfortune never comes alone, the count had hardly passed the

examination of Mr. Bagshot when he fell into the hands of Mr.

Snap, who, in company with Mr. Wild the elder and one or two more

gentlemen, being, it seems, thereto well warranted, laid hold of

the unfortunate count, and conveyed him back to the same house

from which, by the assistance of his good friend, he had formerly

escaped.

Mr. Wild and Mr. Bagshot went together to the tavern, where Mr.

Bagshot (generously, as he thought) offered to share the booty,

and, having divided the money into two unequal heaps, and added a

golden snuff-box to the lesser heap, he desired Mr. Wild to take

his choice.

Mr. Wild immediately conveyed the larger share of the ready into

his pocket, according to an excellent maxim of his, "First secure

what share you can before you wrangle for the rest;" and then,

turning to his companion, he asked with a stern countenance

whether he intended to keep all that sum to himself? Mr. Bagshot

answered, with some surprize, that he thought Mr. Wild had no

reason to complain; for it was surely fair, at least on his part,

to content himself with an equal share of the booty, who had taken

the whole. "I grant you took it," replied Wild; "but, pray, who

proposed or counselled the taking it? Can you say that you have

done more than executed my scheme? and might not I, if I had

pleased, have employed another, since you well know there was not

a gentleman in the room but would have taken the money if he had

known how, conveniently and safely, to do it?" "That is very

true," returned Bagshot, "but did not I execute the scheme, did

not I run the whole risque? Should not I have suffered the whole

punishment if I had been taken, and is not the labourer worthy of

his hire?" "Doubtless," says Jonathan, "he is so, and your hire I

shall not refuse you, which is all that the labourer is entitled

to or ever enjoys. I remember when I was at school to have heard

some verses which for the excellence of their doctrine made an

impression on me, purporting that the birds of the air and the

beasts of the field work not for themselves. It is true, the

farmer allows fodder to his oxen and pasture to his sheep; but it

is for his own service, not theirs, In the same manner the

ploughman, the shepherd, the weaver, the builder, and the soldier,

work not for themselves but others; they are contented with a poor

pittance (the labourer's hire), and permit us, the GREAT, to enjoy

the fruits of their labours. Aristotle, as my master told us, hath

plainly proved, in the first book of his politics, that the low,

mean, useful part of mankind, are born slaves to the wills of

their superiors, and are indeed as much their property as the

cattle. It is well said of us, the higher order of mortals, that

we are born only to devour the fruits of the earth; and it may be

as well said of the lower class, that they are born only to

produce them for us. Is not the battle gained by the sweat and

danger of the common soldier? Are not the honour and fruits of the

victory the general's who laid the scheme? Is not the house built

by the labour of the carpenter and the bricklayer? Is it not built

for the profit only of the architect and for the use of the

inhabitant, who could not easily have placed one brick upon

another? Is not the cloth or the silk wrought into its form and

variegated with all the beauty of colours by those who are forced

to content themselves with the coarsest and vilest part of their

work, while the profit and enjoyment of their labours fall to the

share of others? Cast your eye abroad, and see who is it lives in

the most magnificent buildings, feasts his palate with the most

luxurious dainties, his eyes with the most beautiful sculptures

and delicate paintings, and clothes himself in the finest and

richest apparel; and tell me if all these do not fall to his lot

who had not any the least share in producing all these

conveniences, nor the least ability so to do? Why then should the

state of a prig[Footnote: A thief.] differ from all others? Or why

should you, who are the labourer only, the executor of my scheme,

expect a share in the profit? Be advised, therefore; deliver the

whole booty to me, and trust to my bounty for your reward." Mr.

Bagshot was some time silent, and looked like a man thunderstruck,

but at last, recovering himself from his surprize, he thus began:

"If you think, Mr. Wild, by the force of your arguments, to get

the money out of my pocket, you are greatly mistaken. What is all

this stuff to me? D--n me, I am a man of honour, and, though I

can't talk as well as you, by G--you shall not make a fool of me;

and if you take me for one, I must tell you you are a rascal." At

which words he laid his hand to his pistol. Wild, perceiving the

little success the great strength of his arguments had met with,

and the hasty temper of his friend, gave over his design for the

present, and told Bagshot he was only in jest. But this coolness

with which he treated the other's flame had rather the effect of

oil than of water. Bagshot replied in a rage, "D--n me, I don't

like such jests; I see you are a pitiful rascal and a scoundrel."

Wild, with a philosophy worthy of great admiration, returned, "As

for your abuse, I have no regard to it; but, to convince you I am

not afraid of you, let us lay the whole booty on the table, and

let the conqueror take it all." And having so said, he drew out

his shining hanger, whose glittering so dazzled the eyes of

Bagshot, that, in tone entirely altered, he said, "No! he was

contented with what he had already; that it was mighty ridiculous

in them to quarrel among themselves; that they had common enemies

enough abroad, against whom they should unite their common force;

that if he had mistaken Wild he was sorry for it; and as for a

jest, he could take a jest as well as another." Wild, who had a

wonderful knack of discovering and applying to the passions of

men, beginning now to have a little insight into his friend, and

to conceive what arguments would make the quickest impression on

him, cried out in a loud voice, "That he had bullied him into

drawing his hanger, and, since it was out, he would not put it up

without satisfaction." "What satisfaction would you have?"

answered the other. "Your money or your blood," said Wild. "Why,

look ye, Mr. Wild," said Bagshot, "if you want to borrow a little

of my part, since I know you to be a man of honour, I don't care

if I lend you; for, though I am not afraid of any man living, yet

rather than break with a friend, and as it may be necessary for

your occasions--" Wild, who often declared that he looked upon

borrowing to be as good a way of taking as any, and, as he called

it, the genteelest kind of sneaking-budge, putting up his hanger,

and shaking his friend by the hand, told him he had hit the nail

on the head; it was really his present necessity only that

prevailed with him against his will, for that his honour was

concerned to pay a considerable sum the next morning. Upon which,

contenting himself with one half of Bagshot's share, so that he

had three parts in four of the whole, he took leave of his

companion and retired to rest.

CHAPTER NINE

WILD PAYS A VISIT TO MISS LETITIA SNAP. A DESCRIPTION OF THAT

LOVELY YOUNG CREATURE, AND THE SUCCESSLESS ISSUE OF MR. WILD'S

ADDRESSES.

The next morning when our hero waked he began to think of paying a

visit to Miss Tishy Snap, a woman of great merit and of as great

generosity; yet Mr. Wild found a present was ever most welcome to

her, as being a token of respect in her lover. He therefore went

directly to a toy-shop, and there purchased a genteel snuff-box,

with which he waited upon his mistress, whom he found in the most

beautiful undress. Her lovely hair hung wantonly over her

forehead, being neither white with, nor yet free from, powder; a

neat double clout, which seemed to have been worn a few weeks

only, was pinned under her chin; some remains of that art with

which ladies improve nature shone on her cheeks; her body was

loosely attired, without stays or jumps, so that her breasts had

uncontrolled liberty to display their beauteous orbs, which they

did as low as her girdle; a thin covering of a rumpled muslin

handkerchief almost hid them from the eyes, save in a few parts,

where a good-natured hole gave opportunity to the naked breast to

appear. Her gown was a satin of a whitish colour, with about a

dozen little silver spots upon it, so artificially interwoven at

great distance, that they looked as if they had fallen there by

chance. This, flying open, discovered a fine yellow petticoat,

beautifully edged round the bottom with a narrow piece of half

gold lace which was now almost become fringe: beneath this

appeared another petticoat stiffened with whalebone, vulgarly

called a hoop, which hung six inches at least below the other; and

under this again appeared an under-garment of that colour which

Ovid intends when he says,

----Qui color albus erat nunc est contrarius albo.

She likewise displayed two pretty feet covered with silk and

adorned with lace, and tied, the right with a handsome piece of

blue ribbon; the left, as more unworthy, with a piece of yellow

stuff, which seemed to have been a strip of her upper petticoat.

Such was the lovely creature whom Mr. Wild attended. She received

him at first with some of that coldness which women of strict

virtue, by a commendable though sometimes painful restraint,

enjoin themselves to their lovers. The snuff-box, being produced,

was at first civilly, and indeed gently, refused; but on a second

application accepted. The tea-table was soon called for, at which

a discourse passed between these young lovers, which, could we set

it down with any accuracy, would be very edifying as well as

entertaining to our reader; let it suffice then that the wit,

together with, the beauty, of this young creature, so inflamed the

passion of Wild, which, though an honourable sort of a passion,

was at the same time so extremely violent, that it transported him

to freedoms too offensive to the nice chastity of Laetitia, who

was, to confess the truth, more indebted to her own strength for

the preservation of her virtue than to the awful respect or

backwardness of her lover; he was indeed so very urgent in his

addresses, that, had he not with many oaths promised her marriage,

we could scarce have been strictly justified in calling his

passion honourable; but he was so remarkably attached to decency,

that he never offered any violence to a young lady without the

most earnest promises of that kind, these being, he said, a

ceremonial due to female modesty, which cost so little, and were

so easily pronounced, that the omission could arise from nothing

but the mere wantonness of brutality. The lovely Laetitia, either

out of prudence, or perhaps religion, of which she was a liberal

professor, was deaf to all his promises, and luckily invincible by

his force; for, though she had not yet learnt the art of well

clenching her fist, nature had not however left her defenceless,

for at the ends of her fingers she wore arms, which she used with

such admirable dexterity, that the hot blood of Mr. Wild soon

began to appear in several little spots on his face, and his full-

blown cheeks to resemble that part which modesty forbids a boy to

turn up anywhere but in a public school, after some pedagogue,

strong of arm, hath exercised his talents thereon. Wild now

retreated from the conflict, and the victorious Laetitia, with

becoming triumph and noble spirit, cried out, "D--n your eyes, if

this be your way of shewing your love, I'll warrant I gives you

enough on't." She then proceeded to talk of her virtue, which Wild

bid her carry to the devil with her, and thus our lovers parted.

CHAPTER TEN

A DISCOVERY OF SOME MATTERS CONCERNING THE CHASTE LAETITIA WHICH

MUST WONDERFULLY SURPRISE, AND PERHAPS AFFECT, OUR READER.

Mr. Wild was no sooner departed than the fair conqueress, opening

the door of a closet, called forth a young gentleman whom she had

there enclosed at the approach of the other. The name of this

gallant was Tom Smirk. He was clerk to an attorney, and was indeed

the greatest beau and the greatest favourite of the ladies at the

end of the town where he lived. As we take dress to be the

characteristic or efficient quality of a beau, we shall, instead

of giving any character of this young gentleman, content ourselves

with describing his dress only to our readers. He wore, then, a

pair of white stockings on his legs, and pumps on his feet: his

buckles were a large piece of pinchbeck plate, which almost

covered his whole foot. His breeches were of red plush, which

hardly reached his knees; his waistcoat was a white dimity, richly

embroidered with yellow silk, over which he wore a blue plush coat

with metal buttons, a smart sleeve, and a cape reaching half way

down his back. His wig was of a brown colour, covering almost half

his pate, on which was hung on one side a little laced hat, but

cocked with great smartness. Such was the accomplished Smirk, who,

at his issuing forth from the closet, was received with open arms

by the amiable Laetitia. She addressed him by the tender name of

dear Tommy, and told him she had dismissed the odious creature

whom her father intended for her husband, and had now nothing to

interrupt her happiness with him.

Here, reader, thou must pardon us if we stop a while to lament the

capriciousness of Nature in forming this charming part of the

creation designed to complete the happiness of man; with their

soft innocence to allay his ferocity, with their sprightliness to

soothe his cares, and with their constant friendship to relieve

all the troubles and disappointments which can happen to him.

Seeing then that these are the blessings chiefly sought after and

generally found in every wife, how must we lament that disposition

in these lovely creatures which leads them to prefer in their

favour those individuals of the other sex who do not seem intended

by nature as so great a masterpiece! For surely, however useful

they may be in the creation, as we are taught that nothing, not

even a louse, is made in vain, yet these beaus, even that most

splendid and honoured part which in this our island nature loves

to distinguish in red, are not, as some think, the noblest work of

the Creator. For my own part, let any man chuse to himself two

beaus, let them be captains or colonels, as well-dressed men as

ever lived, I would venture to oppose a single Sir Isaac Newton, a

Shakespear, a Milton, or perhaps some few others, to both these

beaus; nay, and I very much doubt whether it had not been better

for the world in general that neither of these beaus had ever been

born than that it should have wanted the benefit arising to it

from the labour of any one of those persons.

If this be true, how melancholy must be the consideration that any

single beau, especially if he have but half a yard of ribbon in

his hat, shall weigh heavier in the scale of female affection than

twenty Sir Isaac Newtons! How must our reader, who perhaps had

wisely accounted for the resistance which the chaste Laetitia had

made to the violent addresses of the ravished (or rather

ravishing) Wild from that lady's impregnable virtue--how must he

blush, I say, to perceive her quit the strictness of her carriage,

and abandon herself to those loose freedoms which she indulged to

Smirk! But alas! when we discover all, as to preserve the fidelity

of our history we must, when we relate that every familiarity had

past between them, and that the FAIR Laetitia (for we must, in

this single instance, imitate Virgil when he drops the pius and

the pater, and drop our favourite epithet of chaste), the FAIR

Laetitia had, I say, made Smirk as happy as Wild desired to be,

what must then be our reader's confusion! We will, therefore, draw

a curtain over this scene, from that philogyny which is in us, and

proceed to matters which, instead of dishonouring the human

species, will greatly raise and ennoble it.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CONTAINING AS NOTABLE INSTANCES OF HUMAN GREATNESS AS ARE TO BE

MET WITH IN ANCIENT OR MODERN HISTORY. CONCLUDING WITH SOME

WHOLESOME HINTS TO THE GAY PART OF MANKIND.

Wild no sooner parted from the chaste Laetitia than, recollecting

that his friend the count was returned to his lodgings in the same

house, he resolved to visit him; for he was none of those half-

bred fellows who are ashamed to see their friends when they have

plundered and betrayed them; from which base and pitiful temper

many monstrous cruelties have been transacted by men, who have

sometimes carried their modesty so far as to the murder or utter

ruin of those against whom their consciences have suggested to

them that they have committed some small trespass, either by the

debauching a friend's wife or daughter, belying or betraying the

friend himself, or some other such trifling instance. In our hero

there was nothing not truly great: he could, without the least

abashment, drink a bottle with the man who knew he had the moment

before picked his pocket; and, when he had stripped him of

everything he had, never desired to do him any further mischief;

for he carried good-nature to that wonderful and uncommon height

that he never did a single injury to man or woman by which he

himself did not expect to reap some advantage. He would often

indeed say that by the contrary party men often made a bad bargain

with the devil, and did his work for nothing.

Our hero found the captive count, not basely lamenting his fate

nor abandoning himself to despair, but, with due resignation,

employing himself in preparing several packs of cards for future

exploits. The count, little suspecting that Wild had been the sole

contriver of the misfortune which had befallen him, rose up and

eagerly embraced him, and Wild returned his embrace with equal

warmth. They were no sooner seated than Wild took an occasion,

from seeing the cards lying on the table, to inveigh against

gaming, and, with an usual and highly commendable freedom, after

first exaggerating the distressed circumstances in which the count

was then involved, imputed all his misfortunes to that cursed itch

of play which, he said, he concluded had brought his present

confinement upon him, and must unavoidably end in his destruction.

The other, with great alacrity, defended his favourite amusement

(or rather employment), and, having told his friend the great

success he had after his unluckily quitting the room, acquainted

him with the accident which followed, and which the reader, as

well as Mr. Wild, hath had some intimation of before; adding,

however, one circumstance not hitherto mentioned, viz. that he had

defended his money with the utmost bravery, and had dangerously

wounded at least two of the three men that had attacked him. This

behaviour Wild, who not only knew the extreme readiness with which

the booty had been delivered, but also the constant frigidity of

the count's courage, highly applauded, and wished he had been

present to assist him. The count then proceeded to animadvert on

the carelessness of the watch, and the scandal it was to the laws

that honest people could not walk the streets in safety; and,

after expatiating some time on that subject, he asked Mr. Wild if

he ever saw so prodigious a run of luck (for so he chose to call

his winning, though he knew Wild was well acquainted with his

having loaded dice in his pocket). The other answered it was

indeed prodigious, and almost sufficient to justify any person who

did not know him better in suspecting his fair play. "No man, I

believe, dares call that in question," replied he. "No, surely,"

says Wild; "you are well known to be a man of more honour; but

pray, sir," continued he, "did the rascals rob you of all?" "Every

shilling," cries the other, with an oath: "they did not leave me a

single stake."

While they were thus discoursing, Mr. Snap, with a gentleman who

followed him, introduced Mr. Bagshot into the company. It seems

Mr. Bagshot, immediately after his separation from Mr. Wild,

returned to the gaming-table, where having trusted to fortune that

treasure which he had procured by his industry, the faithless

goddess committed a breach of trust, and sent Mr. Bagshot away

with as empty pockets as are to be found in any laced coat in the

kingdom. Now, as that gentleman was walking to a certain reputable

house or shed in Convent-garden market he fortuned to meet with

Mr. Snap, who had just returned from conveying the count to his

lodgings, and was then walking to and fro before the gaming-house

door; for you are to know, my good reader, if you have never been

a man of wit and pleasure about town, that, as the voracious pike

lieth snug under some weed before the mouth of any of those little

streams which discharge themselves into a large river, waiting for

the small fry which issue thereout, so hourly, before the door or

mouth of these gaming-houses, doth Mr. Snap, or some other

gentleman of his occupation, attend the issuing forth of the small

fry of young gentlemen, to whom they deliver little slips of

parchment, containing invitations of the said gentlemen to their

houses, together with one Mr. John Doe,[Footnote: This is a

fictitious name which is put into every writ; for what purpose the

lawyers best know.] a person whose company is in great request.

Mr. Snap, among many others of these billets, happened to have one

directed to Mr. Bagshot, being at the suit or solicitation of one

Mrs. Anne Sample, spinster, at whose house the said Bagshot had

lodged several months, and whence he had inadvertently departed

without taking a formal leave, on which account Mrs. Anne had

taken this method of SPEAKING WITH him.

Mr. Snap's house being now very full of good company, he was

obliged to introduce Mr. Bagshot into the count's apartment, it

being, as he said, the only chamber he had to LOCK UP in. Mr. Wild

no sooner saw his friend than he ran eagerly to embrace him, and

immediately presented him to the count, who received him with

great civility.

CHAPTER TWELVE

OTHER PARTICULARS RELATING TO MISS TISHY, WHICH PERHAPS MAY NOT

GREATLY SURPRISE AFTER THE FORMER. THE DESCRIPTION OF A VERY FINE

GENTLEMAN. AND A DIALOGUE BETWEEN WILD AND THE COUNT, IN WHICH

PUBLIC VIRTUE IS JUST HINTED AT, WITH, ETC.

Mr. Snap had turned the key a very few minutes before a servant of

the family called Mr. Bagshot out of the room, telling him there

was a person below who desired to speak with him; and this was no

other than Miss Laetitia Snap, whose admirer Mr. Bagshot had long

been, and in whose tender breast his passion had raised a more

ardent flame than that which any of his rivals had been able to

raise. Indeed, she was so extremely fond of this youth, that she

often confessed to her female confidents, if she could ever have

listened to the thought of living with any one man, Mr. Bagshot

was he. Nor was she singular in this inclination, many other young

ladies being her rivals in this matter, who had all the great and

noble qualifications necessary to form a true gallant, and which

nature is seldom so extremely bountiful as to indulge to any one

person. We will endeavour, however, to describe them all with as

much exactness as possible. He was then six feet high, had large

calves, broad shoulders, a ruddy complexion, with brown curled

hair, a modest assurance, and clean linen. He had indeed, it must

be confessed, some small deficiencies to counterbalance these

heroic qualities; for he was the silliest fellow in the world,

could neither write nor read, nor had he a single grain or spark

of honour, honesty, or good-nature, in his whole composition.

As soon as Mr. Bagshot had quitted the room the count, taking Wild

by the hand, told him he had something to communicate to him of

very great importance. "I am very well convinced," said he, "that

Bagshot is the person who robbed me." Wild started with great

amazement at this discovery, and answered, with a most serious

countenance, "I advise you to take care how you cast any such

reflections on a man of Mr. Bagshot's nice honour, for I am

certain he will not bear it." "D--n his honour!" quoth the enraged

count; "nor can I bear being robbed; I will apply to a justice of

peace." Wild replied, with great indignation, "Since you dare

entertain such a suspicion against my friend, I will henceforth

disclaim all acquaintance with you. Mr. Bagshot is a man of

honour, and my friend, and consequently it is impossible he should

be guilty of a bad action." He added much more to the same

purpose, which had not the expected weight with the count; for the

latter seemed still certain as to the person, and resolute in

applying for justice, which, he said, he thought he owed to the

public as well as to himself. Wild then changed his countenance

into a kind of derision, and spoke as follows: "Suppose it should

be possible that Mr. Bagshot had, in a frolic (for I will call it

no other), taken this method of borrowing your money, what will

you get by prosecuting him? Not your money again, for you hear he

was stripped at the gaming-table (of which Bagshot had during

their short confabulation informed them); you will get then an

opportunity of being still more out of pocket by the prosecution.

Another advantage you may promise yourself is the being blown up

at every gaming-house in town, for that I will assure you of; and

then much good may it do you to sit down with the satisfaction of

having discharged what it seems you owe the public. I am ashamed

of my own discernment when I mistook you for a great man. Would it

not be better for you to receive part (perhaps all) of your money

again by a wise concealment: for, however seedy [Footnote: Poor.]

Mr. Bagshot may be now, if he hath really played this frolic with

you, you may believe he will play it with others, and when he is

in cash you may depend on a restoration; the law will be always in

your power, and that is the last remedy which a brave or a wise

man would resort to. Leave the affair therefore to me; I will

examine Bagshot, and, if I find he hath played you this trick, I

will engage my own honour you shall in the end be no loser." The

count answered, "If I was sure to be no loser, Mr. Wild, I

apprehend you have a better opinion of my understanding than to

imagine I would prosecute a gentleman for the sake of the public.

These are foolish words of course, which we learn a ridiculous

habit of speaking, and will often break from us without any design

or meaning. I assure you, all I desire is a reimbursement; and if

I can by your means obtain that, the public may--;" concluding

with a phrase too coarse to be inserted in a history of this kind.

They were now informed that dinner was ready, and the company

assembled below stairs, whither the reader may, if he please,

attend these gentlemen.

There sat down at the table Mr. Snap, and the two Miss Snaps his

daughters, Mr. Wild the elder, Mr. Wild the younger, the count,

Mr. Bagshot, and a grave gentleman who had formerly had the honour

of carrying arms in a regiment of foot, and who was now engaged in

the office (perhaps a more profitable one) of assisting or

following Mr. Snap in the execution of the laws of his country.

Nothing very remarkable passed at dinner. The conversation (as is

usual in polite company) rolled chiefly on what they were then

eating and what they had lately eaten. In this the military

gentleman, who had served in Ireland, gave them a very particular

account of a new manner of roasting potatoes, and others gave an

account of other dishes. In short, an indifferent by-stander would

have concluded from their discourse that they had all come into

this world for no other purpose than to fill their bellies; and

indeed, if this was not the chief, it is probable it was the most

innocent design Nature had in their formation.

As soon as THE DISH was removed, and the ladies retired, the count

proposed a game at hazard, which was immediately assented to by

the whole company, and, the dice being immediately brought in, the

count took up the box and demanded who would set him: to which no

one made any answer, imagining perhaps the count's pockets to be

more empty than they were; for, in reality, that gentleman

(notwithstanding what he had heartily swore to Mr. Wild) had,

since his arrival at Mr. Snap's, conveyed a piece of plate to

pawn, by which means he had furnished himself with ten guineas.

The count, therefore, perceiving this backwardness in his friends,

and probably somewhat guessing at the cause of it, took the said

guineas out of his pocket, and threw them on the table; when lo,

(such is the force of example) all the rest began to produce their

funds, and immediately, a considerable sum glittering in their

eyes, the game began.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

A CHAPTER OF WHICH WE ARE EXTREMELY VAIN, AND WHICH INDEED WE LOOK

ON AS OUR CHEF-D'OEUVRE; CONTAINING A WONDERFUL STORY CONCERNING

THE DEVIL, AND AS NICE A SCENE OF HONOUR AS EVER HAPPENED.

My reader, I believe, even if he be a gamester, would not thank me

for an exact relation of every man's success; let it suffice then

that they played till the whole money vanished from the table.

Whether the devil himself carried it away, as some suspected, I

will not determine; but very surprising it was that every person

protested he had lost, nor could any one guess who, unless THE

DEVIL, had won.

But though very probable it is that this arch fiend had some share

in the booty, it is likely he had not all; Mr. Bagshot being

imagined to be a considerable winner, notwithstanding his

assertions to the contrary; for he was seen by several to convey

money often into his pocket; and what is still a little stronger

presumption is, that the grave gentleman whom we have mentioned to

have served his country in two honourable capacities, not being

willing to trust alone to the evidence of his eyes, had frequently

dived into the said Bagshot's pocket, whence (as he tells us in

the apology for his life afterwards published [Footnote: Not in a

book by itself, in imitation of some other such persons, but in

the ordinary's account, &c., where all the apologies for the lives

of rogues and whores which have been published within these twenty

years should have been inserted.]), though he might extract a few

pieces, he was very sensible he had left many behind. The

gentleman had long indulged his curiosity in this way before Mr.

Bagshot, in the heat of gaming, had perceived him; but, as Bagshot

was now leaving off play, he discovered this ingenious feat of

dexterity; upon which, leaping up from his chair in violent

passion, he cried out, "I thought I had been among gentlemen and

men of honour, but, d--n me, I find we have a pickpocket in

company." The scandalous sound of this word extremely alarmed the

whole board, nor did they all shew less surprise than the CONV--N

(whose not sitting of late is much lamented) would express at

hearing there was an atheist in the room; but it more particularly

affected the gentleman at whom it was levelled, though it was not

addressed to him. He likewise started from his chair, and, with a

fierce countenance and accent, said, "Do you mean me? D--n your

eyes, you are a rascal and a scoundrel!" Those words would have

been immediately succeeded by blows had not the company

interposed, and with strong arm withheld the two antagonists from

each other. It was, however, a long time before they could be

prevailed on to sit down; which being at last happily brought

about, Mr. Wild the elder, who was a well-disposed old man,

advised them to shake hands and be friends; but the gentleman who

had received the first affront absolutely refused it, and swore HE

WOULD HAVE THE VILLAIN'S BLOOD. Mr. Snap highly applauded the

resolution, and affirmed that the affront was by no means to be

put up by any who bore the name of a gentleman, and that unless

his friend resented it properly he would never execute another

warrant in his company; that he had always looked upon him as a

man of honour, and doubted not but he would prove himself so; and

that, if it was his own case, nothing should persuade him to put

up such an affront without proper satisfaction. The count likewise

spoke on the same side, and the parties themselves muttered

several short sentences purporting their intentions. At last Mr.

Wild, our hero, rising slowly from his seat, and having fixed the

attention of all present, began as follows: "I have heard with

infinite pleasure everything which the two gentlemen who spoke

last have said with relation to honour, nor can any man possibly

entertain a higher and nobler sense of that word, nor a greater

esteem of its inestimable value, than myself. If we have no name

to express it by in our Cant Dictionary, it were well to be wished

we had. It is indeed the essential quality of a gentleman, and

which no man who ever was great in the field or on the road (as

others express it) can possibly be without. But alas! gentlemen,

what pity is it that a word of such sovereign use and virtue

should have so uncertain and various an application that scarce

two people mean the same thing by it? Do not some by honour mean

good-nature and humanity, which weak minds call virtues? How then!

Must we deny it to the great, the brave, the noble; to the sackers

of towns, the plunderers of provinces, and the conquerors of

kingdoms! Were not these men of honour? and yet they scorn those

pitiful qualities I have mentioned. Again, some few (or I am

mistaken) include the idea of honesty in their honour. And shall

we then say that no man who withholds from another what law, or

justice perhaps, calls his own, or who greatly and boldly deprives

him of such property, is a man of honour? Heaven forbid I should

say so in this, or, indeed, in any other good company! Is honour

truth? No; it is not in the lie's going from us, but in its coming

to us, our honour is injured. Doth it then consist in what the

vulgar call cardinal virtues? It would be an affront to your

understandings to suppose it, since we see every day so many men

of honour without any. In what then doth the word honour consist?

Why, in itself alone. A man of honour is he that is called a man

of honour; and while he is so called he so remains, and no longer.

Think not anything a man commits can forfeit his honour. Look

abroad into the world; the PRIG, while he flourishes, is a man of

honour; when in gaol, at the bar, or the tree, he is so no longer.

And why is this distinction? Not from his actions; for those are

often as well known in his flourishing estate as they are

afterwards; but because men, I mean those of his own party or

gang, call him a man of honour in the former, and cease to call

him so in the latter condition. Let us see then; how hath Mr.

Bagshot injured the gentleman's honour? Why, he hath called him a

pick-pocket; and that, probably, by a severe construction and a

long roundabout way of reasoning, may seem a little to derogate

from his honour, if considered in a very nice sense. Admitting it,

therefore, for argument's sake, to be some small imputation on his

honour, let Mr. Bagshot give him satisfaction; let him doubly and

triply repair this oblique injury by directly asserting that he

believes he is a man of honour." The gentleman answered he was

content to refer it to Mr. Wild, and whatever satisfaction he

thought sufficient he would accept. "Let him give me my money

again first," said Bagshot, "and then I will call him a man of

honour with all my heart." The gentleman then protested he had not

any, which Snap seconded, declaring he had his eyes on him all the

while; but Bagshot remained still unsatisfied, till Wild, rapping

out a hearty oath, swore he had not taken a single farthing,

adding that whoever asserted the contrary gave him the lie, and he

would resent it. And now, such was the ascendancy of this great

man, that Bagshot immediately acquiesced, and performed the

ceremonies required: and thus, by the exquisite address of our

hero, this quarrel, which had so fatal an aspect, and which

between two persons so extremely jealous of their honour would

most certainly have produced very dreadful consequences, was

happily concluded.

Mr. Wild was indeed a little interested in this affair, as he

himself had set the gentleman to work, and had received the

greatest part of the booty: and as to Mr. Snap's deposition in his

favour, it was the usual height to which the ardour of that worthy

person's friendship too frequently hurried him. It was his

constant maxim that he was a pitiful fellow who would stick at a

little rapping [Footnote: Rapping is a cant word for perjury.] for

his friend.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

IN WHICH THE HISTORY OF GREATNESS IS CONTINUED.

Matters being thus reconciled, and the gaming over, from reasons

before hinted, the company proceeded to drink about with the

utmost chearfulness and friendship; drinking healths, shaking

hands, and professing the most perfect affection for each other.

All which were not in the least interrupted by some designs which

they then agitated in their minds, and which they intended to

execute as soon as the liquor had prevailed over some of their

understandings. Bagshot and the gentleman intending to rob each

other; Mr. Snap and Mr. Wild the elder meditating what other

creditors they could find out to charge the gentleman then in

custody with; the count hoping to renew the play, and Wild, our

hero, laying a design to put Bagshot out of the way, or, as the

vulgar express it, to hang him with the first opportunity. But

none of these great designs could at present be put in execution,

for, Mr. Snap being soon after summoned abroad on business of

great moment, which required likewise the assistance of Mr. Wild

the elder and his other friend, and as he did not care to trust to

the nimbleness of the count's heels, of which he had already had

some experience, he declared he must LOCK UP for that evening.

Here, reader, if them pleasest, as we are in no great haste, we

will stop and make a simile. As when their lap is finished, the

cautious huntsman to their kennel gathers the nimble-footed

hounds, they with lank ears and tails slouch sullenly on, whilst

he, with his whippers-in, follows close at their heels, regardless

of their dogged humour, till, having seen them safe within the

door, he turns the key, and then retires to whatever business or

pleasure calls him thence; so with lowring countenance and

reluctant steps mounted the count and Bagshot to their chamber, or

rather kennel, whither they were attended by Snap and those who

followed him, and where Snap, having seen them deposited, very

contentedly locked the door and departed. And now, reader, we

will, in imitation of the truly laudable custom of the world,

leave these our good friends to deliver themselves as they can,

and pursue the thriving fortunes of Wild, our hero, who, with that

great aversion to satisfaction and content which is inseparably

incident to great minds, began to enlarge his views with his

prosperity: for this restless, amiable disposition, this noble

avidity which increases with feeding, is the first principle or

constituent quality of these our great men; to whom, in their

passage on to greatness, it happens as to a traveller over the

Alps, or, if this be a too far-fetched simile, to one who travels

westward over the hills near Bath, where the simile was indeed

made. He sees not the end of his journey at once; but, passing on

from scheme to scheme, and from hill to hill, with noble

constancy, resolving still to attain the summit on which he hath

fixed his eve, however dirty the roads may be through which he

struggles, he at length arrives----at some vile inn, where he

finds no kind of entertainment nor conveniency for repose. I

fancy, reader, if thou hast ever travelled in these roads, one

part of my simile is sufficiently apparent (and, indeed, in all

these illustrations, one side is generally much more apparent than

the other); but, believe me, if the other doth not so evidently

appear to thy satisfaction, it is from no other reason than

because thou art unacquainted with these great men, and hast not

had sufficient instruction, leisure, or opportunity, to consider

what happens to those who pursue what is generally understood by

GREATNESS: for surely, if thou hadst animadverted, not only on the

many perils to which great men are daily liable while they are in

their progress, but hadst discerned, as it were through a

microscope (for it is invisible to the naked eye), that diminutive

speck of happiness which they attain even in the consummation of

their wishes, thou wouldst lament with me the unhappy fate of

these great men, on whom nature hath set so superior a mark, that

the rest of mankind are born for their use and emolument only, and

be apt to cry out, "It is pity that THOSE for whose pleasure and

profit mankind are to labour and sweat, to be hacked and hewed, to

be pillaged, plundered, and every war destroyed, should reap so

LITTLE advantage from all the miseries they occasion to others."

For my part, I own myself of that humble kind of mortals who

consider themselves born for the behoof of some great man or

other, and could I behold his happiness carved out of the labour

and ruin of a thousand such reptiles as myself I might with

satisfaction exclaim, Sic, sic juvat: but when I behold one GREAT

MAN starving with hunger and freezing with cold, in the midst of

fifty thousand who are suffering the same evils for his diversion;

when I see another, whose own mind is a more abject slave to his

own greatness, and is more tortured and racked by it, than those

of all his vassals; lastly, when I consider whole nations rooted

out only to bring tears into the eyes of a GREAT MAN, not indeed

because he hath extirpated so many, but because he had no more

nations to extirpate, then truly I am almost inclined to wish that

Nature had spared us this her MASTERPIECE, and that no GREAT MAN

had ever been born into the world.

But to proceed with our history, which will, we hope, produce much

better lessons, and more instructive, than any we can preach: Wild

was no sooner retired to a night-cellar than he began to reflect

on the sweets he had that day enjoyed from the labours of others,

viz., first, from Mr. Bagshot, who had for his use robbed the

count; and, secondly, from the gentleman, who, for the same good

purpose, had picked the pocket of Bagshot. He then proceeded to

reason thus with himself: "The art of policy is the art of

multiplication, the degrees of greatness being constituted by

those two little words MORE or LESS. Mankind are first properly to

be considered under two grand divisions, those that use their own

hands, and those who employ the hands of others. The former are

the base and rabble; the latter, the genteel part of the creation.

The mercantile part of the world, therefore, wisely use of the

term EMPLOYING HANDS, and justly prefer each other as they employ

more or fewer; for thus one merchant says he is greater than

another because he employs more hands. And now indeed the merchant

should seem to challenge some character of greatness, did we not

necessarily come to a second division, viz., of those who employ

hands for the use of the community in which they live, and of

those who employ hands merely for their own use, without any

regard to the benefit of society. Of the former sort are the

yeoman, the manufacturer, the merchant, and perhaps the gentleman.

The first of these being to manure and cultivate his native soil,

and to employ hands to produce the fruits of the earth. The second

being to improve them by employing hands likewise, and to produce

from them those useful commodities which serve as well for the

conveniences as necessaries of life. The third is to employ hands

for the exportation of the redundance of our own commodities, and

to exchange them with the redundances of foreign nations, that

thus every soil and every climate may enjoy the fruits of the

whole earth. The gentleman is, by employing hands, likewise to

embellish his country with the improvement of art and sciences,

with the making and executing good and wholesome laws for the

preservation of property and the distribution of justice, and in

several other manners to be useful to society. Now we come to the

second part of this division, viz., of those who employ hands for

their own use only; and this is that noble and great part who are

generally distinguished into conquerors, absolute princes,

statesmen, and prigs [Footnote: Thieves.]. Now all these differ

from each other in greatness only--they employ MORE or FEWER

hands. And Alexander the Great was only GREATER than a captain of

one of the Tartarian or Arabian hordes, as he was at the head of a

larger number. In what then is a single prig inferior to any other

great man, but because he employs his own hands only; for he is

not on that account to be levelled with the base and vulgar,

because he employs his hands for his own use only. Now, suppose a

prig had as many tools as any prime minister ever had, would he

not be as great as any prime minister whatsoever? Undoubtedly he

would. What then have I to do in the pursuit of greatness but to

procure a gang, and to make the use of this gang centre in myself?

This gang shall rob for me only, receiving very moderate rewards

for their actions; out of this gang I will prefer to my favour the

boldest and most iniquitous (as the vulgar express it); the rest I

will, from time to time, as I see occasion, transport and hang at

my pleasure; and thus (which I take to be the highest excellence

of a prig) convert those laws which are made for the benefit and

protection of society to my single use."

Having thus preconceived his scheme, he saw nothing wanting to put

it in immediate execution but that which is indeed the beginning

as well as the end of all human devices: I mean money. Of which

commodity he was possessed of no more than sixty-five guineas,

being all that remained from the double benefits he had made of

Bagshot, and which did not seem sufficient to furnish his house,

and every other convenience necessary for so grand an undertaking.

He resolved, therefore, to go immediately to the gaming-house,

which was then sitting, not so much with an intention of trusting

to fortune as to play the surer card of attacking the winner in

his way home. On his arrival, however, he thought he might as well

try his success at the dice, and reserve the other resource as his

last expedient. He accordingly sat down to play; and as Fortune,

no more than others of her sex, is observed to distribute her

favours with strict regard to great mental endowments, so our hero

lost every farthing in his pocket. This loss however he bore with

great constancy of mind, and with as great composure of aspect. To

say truth, he considered the money as only lent for a short time,

or rather indeed as deposited with a banker. He then resolved to

have immediate recourse to his surer stratagem; and, casting his

eyes round the room, he soon perceived a gentleman sitting in a

disconsolate posture, who seemed a proper instrument or tool for

his purpose. In short (to be as concise as possible in these least

shining parts of our history), Wild accosted this man, sounded

him, found him fit to execute, proposed the matter, received a

ready assent, and, having fixed on the person who seemed that

evening the greatest favourite of Fortune, they posted themselves

in the most proper place to surprise the enemy as he was retiring

to his quarters, where he was soon attacked, subdued, and

plundered; but indeed of no considerable booty; for it seems this

gentleman played on a common stock, and had deposited his winnings

at the scene of action, nor had he any more than two shillings in

his pocket when he was attacked.

This was so cruel a disappointment to Wild, and so sensibly

affects us, as no doubt it will the reader, that, as it must

disqualify us both from proceeding any farther at present, we will

now take a little breath, and therefore we shall here close this

book.