Chapter i.
_Being the first chapter of the eighth book._
The history must now look a little backwards to those circumstances
which led to the catastrophe mentioned at the end of the last book.
When Amelia went out in the morning she left her children to the care
of her husband. In this amiable office he had been engaged near an
hour, and was at that very time lying along on the floor, and his little
things crawling and playing about him, when a most violent knock
was heard at the door; and immediately a footman, running upstairs,
acquainted him that his lady was taken violently ill, and carried into
Mrs. Chenevix’s toy-shop.
Booth no sooner heard this account, which was delivered with great
appearance of haste and earnestness, than he leapt suddenly from the
floor, and, leaving his children, roaring at the news of their mother’s
illness, in strict charge with his maid, he ran as fast as his legs
could carry him to the place; or towards the place rather: for, before
he arrived at the shop, a gentleman stopt him full butt, crying,
“Captain, whither so fast?”--Booth answered eagerly, “Whoever you are,
friend, don’t ask me any questions now.”--“You must pardon me, captain,”
answered the gentleman; “but I have a little business with your
honour--In short, captain, I have a small warrant here in my pocket
against your honour, at the suit of one Dr Harrison.” “You are a bailiff
then?” says Booth. “I am an officer, sir,” answered the other. “Well,
sir, it is in vain to contend,” cries Booth; “but let me beg you will
permit me only to step to Mrs. Chenevix’s--I will attend you, upon my
honour, wherever you please; but my wife lies violently ill there.” “Oh,
for that matter,” answered the bailiff, “you may set your heart at ease.
Your lady, I hope, is very well; I assure you she is not there. You will
excuse me, captain, these are only stratagems of war. _Bolus and virtus,
quis in a hostess equirit?_” “Sir, I honour your learning,” cries Booth,
“and could almost kiss you for what you tell me. I assure you I would
forgive you five hundred arrests for such a piece of news. Well, sir,
and whither am I to go with you?” “O, anywhere: where your honour
pleases,” cries the bailiff. “Then suppose we go to Brown’s
coffee-house,” said the prisoner. “No,” answered the bailiff, “that will
not do; that’s in the verge of the court.” “Why then, to the nearest
tavern,” said Booth. “No, not to a tavern,” cries the other, “that is
not a place of security; and you know, captain, your honour is a shy
cock; I have been after your honour these three months. Come, sir,
you must go to my house, if you please.” “With all my heart,” answered
Booth, “if it be anywhere hereabouts.” “Oh, it is but a little ways
off,” replied the bailiff; “it is only in Gray’s-inn-lane, just by
almost.” He then called a coach, and desired his prisoner to walk in.
Booth entered the coach without any resistance, which, had he been
inclined to make, he must have plainly perceived would have been
ineffectual, as the bailiff appeared to have several followers at hand,
two of whom, beside the commander in chief, mounted with him into the
coach. As Booth was a sweet-tempered man, as well as somewhat of a
philosopher, he behaved with all the good-humour imaginable, and indeed,
with more than his companions; who, however, shewed him what they call
civility, that is, they neither struck him nor spit in his face.
Notwithstanding the pleasantry which Booth endeavoured to preserve, he
in reality envied every labourer whom he saw pass by him in his way. The
charms of liberty, against his will, rushed on his mind; and he could
not avoid suggesting to himself how much more happy was the poorest
wretch who, without controul, could repair to his homely habitation
and to his family, compared to him, who was thus violently, and yet
lawfully, torn away from the company of his wife and children. And their
condition, especially that of his Amelia, gave his heart many a severe
and bitter pang.
At length he arrived at the bailiff’s mansion, and was ushered into
a room in which were several persons. Booth desired to be alone; upon
which the bailiff waited on him up-stairs into an apartment, the windows
of which were well fortified with iron bars, but the walls had not the
least outwork raised before them; they were, indeed, what is generally
called naked; the bricks having been only covered with a thin plaster,
which in many places was mouldered away.
The first demand made upon Booth was for coach-hire, which amounted
to two shillings, according to the bailiff’s account; that being just
double the legal fare. He was then asked if he did not chuse a bowl of
punch? to which he having answered in the negative, the bailiff replied,
“Nay, sir, just as you please. I don’t ask you to drink, if you don’t
chuse it; but certainly you know the custom; the house is full of
prisoners, and I can’t afford gentlemen a room to themselves for
nothing.”
Booth presently took this hint--indeed it was a pretty broad one--and
told the bailiff he should not scruple to pay him his price; but in
fact he never drank unless at his meals. “As to that, sir,” cries the
bailiff, “it is just as your honour pleases. I scorn to impose upon any
gentleman in misfortunes: I wish you well out of them, for my part.
Your honour can take nothing amiss of me; I only does my duty, what I
am bound to do; and, as you says you don’t care to drink anything, what
will you be pleased to have for dinner?”
Booth then complied in bespeaking a dish of meat, and told the bailiff
he would drink a bottle with him after dinner. He then desired
the favour of pen, ink, and paper, and a messenger; all which were
immediately procured him, the bailiff telling him he might send wherever
he pleased, and repeating his concern for Booth’s misfortunes, and a
hearty desire to see the end of them.
The messenger was just dispatched with the letter, when who should
arrive but honest Atkinson? A soldier of the guards, belonging to the
same company with the serjeant, and who had known Booth at Gibraltar,
had seen the arrest, and heard the orders given to the coachman. This
fellow, accidentally meeting Atkinson, had acquainted him with the whole
affair.
At the appearance of Atkinson, joy immediately overspread the
countenance of Booth. The ceremonials which past between them are
unnecessary to be repeated. Atkinson was soon dispatched to the attorney
and to Mrs. Ellison, as the reader hath before heard from his own mouth.
Booth now greatly lamented that he had writ to his wife. He thought she
might have been acquainted with the affair better by the serjeant. Booth
begged him, however, to do everything in his power to comfort her; to
assure her that he was in perfect health and good spirits; and to lessen
as much as possible the concern which he knew she would have at the
reading his letter.
The serjeant, however, as the reader hath seen, brought himself the
first account of the arrest. Indeed, the other messenger did not arrive
till a full hour afterwards. This was not owing to any slowness of his,
but to many previous errands which he was to execute before the delivery
of the letter; for, notwithstanding the earnest desire which the bailiff
had declared to see Booth out of his troubles, he had ordered the
porter, who was his follower, to call upon two or three other bailiffs,
and as many attorneys, to try to load his prisoner with as many actions
as possible.
Here the reader may be apt to conclude that the bailiff, instead of
being a friend, was really an enemy to poor Booth; but, in fact, he was
not so. His desire was no more than to accumulate bail-bonds; for the
bailiff was reckoned an honest and good sort of man in his way, and had
no more malice against the bodies in his custody than a butcher hath to
those in his: and as the latter, when he takes his knife in hand, hath
no idea but of the joints into which he is to cut the carcase; so the
former, when he handles his writ, hath no other design but to cut out
the body into as many bail-bonds as possible. As to the life of the
animal, or the liberty of the man, they are thoughts which never obtrude
themselves on either.
Chapter ii.
_Containing an account of Mr. Booth’s fellow-sufferers._
Before we return to Amelia we must detain our reader a little longer
with Mr. Booth, in the custody of Mr. Bondum the bailiff, who now
informed his prisoner that he was welcome to the liberty of the house
with the other gentlemen.
Booth asked who those gentlemen were. “One of them, sir,” says Mr.
Bondum, “is a very great writer or author, as they call him; he hath
been here these five weeks at the suit of a bookseller for eleven pound
odd money; but he expects to be discharged in a day or two, for he hath
writ out the debt. He is now writing for five or six booksellers, and
he will get you sometimes, when he sits to it, a matter of fifteen
shillings a-day. For he is a very good pen, they say, but is apt to be
idle. Some days he won’t write above five hours; but at other times I
have know him at it above sixteen.” “Ay!” cries Booth; “pray, what are
his productions? What does he write?” “Why, sometimes,” answered Bondum,
“he writes your history books for your numbers, and sometimes your
verses, your poems, what do you call them? and then again he writes
news for your newspapers.” “Ay, indeed! he is a most extraordinary man,
truly!--How doth he get his news here?” “Why he makes it, as he doth
your parliament speeches for your magazines. He reads them to us
sometimes over a bowl of punch. To be sure it is all one as if one was
in the parliament-house--it is about liberty and freedom, and about the
constitution of England. I say nothing for my part, for I will keep my
neck out of a halter; but, faith, he makes it out plainly to me that all
matters are not as they should be. I am all for liberty, for my part.”
“Is that so consistent with your calling?” cries Booth. “I thought,
my friend, you had lived by depriving men of their liberty.” “That’s
another matter,” cries the bailiff; “that’s all according to law, and in
the way of business. To be sure, men must be obliged to pay their debts,
or else there would be an end of everything.” Booth desired the bailiff
to give him his opinion on liberty. Upon which, he hesitated a moment,
and then cried out, “O ‘tis a fine thing, ‘tis a very fine thing,
and the constitution of England.” Booth told him, that by the old
constitution of England he had heard that men could not be arrested for
debt; to which the bailiff answered, that must have been in very bad
times; “because as why,” says he, “would it not be the hardest thing in
the world if a man could not arrest another for a just and lawful debt?
besides, sir, you must be mistaken; for how could that ever be? is not
liberty the constitution of England? well, and is not the constitution,
as a man may say--whereby the constitution, that is the law and liberty,
and all that--”
Booth had a little mercy upon the poor bailiff, when he found him
rounding in this manner, and told him he had made the matter very clear.
Booth then proceeded to enquire after the other gentlemen, his fellows
in affliction; upon which Bondum acquainted him that one of the
prisoners was a poor fellow. “He calls himself a gentleman,” said
Bondum; “but I am sure I never saw anything genteel by him. In a week
that he hath been in my house he hath drank only part of one bottle of
wine. I intend to carry him to Newgate within a day or two, if he can’t
find bail, which, I suppose, he will not be able to do; for everybody
says he is an undone man. He hath run out all he hath by losses in
business, and one way or other; and he hath a wife and seven children.
Here was the whole family here the other day, all howling together. I
never saw such a beggarly crew; I was almost ashamed to see them in my
house. I thought they seemed fitter for Bridewell than any other place.
To be sure, I do not reckon him as proper company for such as you, sir;
but there is another prisoner in the house that I dare say you will like
very much. He is, indeed, very much of a gentleman, and spends his money
like one. I have had him only three days, and I am afraid he won’t stay
much longer. They say, indeed, he is a gamester; but what is that to me
or any one, as long as a man appears as a gentleman? I always love to
speak by people as I find; and, in my opinion, he is fit company for
the greatest lord in the land; for he hath very good cloaths, and money
enough. He is not here for debt, but upon a judge’s warrant for an
assault and battery; for the tipstaff locks up here.”
The bailiff was thus haranguing when he was interrupted by the
arrival of the attorney whom the trusty serjeant had, with the utmost
expedition, found out and dispatched to the relief of his distressed
friend. But before we proceed any further with the captain we will
return to poor Amelia, for whom, considering the situation in which we
left her, the good-natured reader may be, perhaps, in no small degree
solicitous.
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Chapter iii.
_Containing some extraordinary behaviour in Mrs. Ellison._
The serjeant being departed to convey Mrs. Ellison to the captain, his
wife went to fetch Amelia’s children to their mother.
Amelia’s concern for the distresses of her husband was aggravated at the
sight of her children. “Good Heavens!” she cried, “what will--what can
become of these poor little wretches? why have I produced these little
creatures only to give them a share of poverty and misery?” At which
words she embraced them eagerly in her arms, and bedewed them both with
her tears.
The children’s eyes soon overflowed as fast as their mother’s, though
neither of them knew the cause of her affliction. The little boy, who
was the elder and much the sharper of the two, imputed the agonies
of his mother to her illness, according to the account brought to his
father in his presence.
When Amelia became acquainted with the child’s apprehensions, she soon
satisfied him that she was in a perfect state of health; at which the
little thing expressed great satisfaction, and said he was glad she was
well again. Amelia told him she had not been in the least disordered.
Upon which the innocent cried out, “La! how can people tell such fibs?
a great tall man told my papa you was taken very ill at Mrs. Somebody’s
shop, and my poor papa presently ran down-stairs: I was afraid he would
have broke his neck, to come to you.”
“O, the villains!” cries Mrs. Atkinson, “what a stratagem was here to
take away your husband!”
“Take away!” answered the child--“What! hath anybody taken away
papa?--Sure that naughty fibbing man hath not taken away papa?”
Amelia begged Mrs. Atkinson to say something to her children, for that
her spirits were overpowered. She then threw herself into a chair,
and gave a full vent to a passion almost too strong for her delicate
constitution.
The scene that followed, during some minutes, is beyond my power of
description; I must beg the readers’ hearts to suggest it to themselves.
The children hung on their mother, whom they endeavoured in vain to
comfort, as Mrs. Atkinson did in vain attempt to pacify them, telling
them all would be well, and they would soon see their papa again.
At length, partly by the persuasions of Mrs. Atkinson, partly from
consideration of her little ones, and more, perhaps, from the relief
which she had acquired by her tears, Amelia became a little composed.
Nothing worth notice past in this miserable company from this time till
the return of Mrs. Ellison from the bailiff’s house; and to draw out
scenes of wretchedness to too great a length, is a task very uneasy to
the writer, and for which none but readers of a most gloomy complexion
will think themselves ever obliged to his labours.
At length Mrs. Ellison arrived, and entered the room with an air of
gaiety rather misbecoming the occasion. When she had seated herself in
a chair she told Amelia that the captain was very well and in good
spirits, and that he earnestly desired her to keep up hers. “Come,
madam,” said she, “don’t be disconsolate; I hope we shall soon be able
to get him out of his troubles. The debts, indeed, amount to more than I
expected; however, ways may be found to redeem him. He must own himself
guilty of some rashness in going out of the verge, when he knew to what
he was liable; but that is now not to be remedied. If he had followed my
advice this had not happened; but men will be headstrong.”
“I cannot bear this,” cries Amelia; “shall I hear that best of creatures
blamed for his tenderness to me?”
“Well, I will not blame him,” answered Mrs. Ellison; “I am sure I
propose nothing but to serve him; and if you will do as much to serve
him yourself, he will not be long a prisoner.”
“I do!” cries Amelia: “O Heavens! is there a thing upon earth--”
“Yes, there is a thing upon earth,” said Mrs. Ellison, “and a very easy
thing too; and yet I will venture my life you start when I propose it.
And yet, when I consider that you are a woman of understanding, I know
not why I should think so; for sure you must have too much good sense to
imagine that you can cry your husband out of prison. If this would have
done, I see you have almost cried your eyes out already. And yet you may
do the business by a much pleasanter way than by crying and bawling.”
“What do you mean, madam?” cries Amelia.--“For my part, I cannot guess
your meaning.”
“Before I tell you then, madam,” answered Mrs. Ellison, “I must inform
you, if you do not already know it, that the captain is charged with
actions to the amount of near five hundred pounds. I am sure I would
willingly be his bail; but I know my bail would not be taken for that
sum. You must consider, therefore, madam, what chance you have of
redeeming him; unless you chuse, as perhaps some wives would, that he
should lie all his life in prison.”
At these words Amelia discharged a shower of tears, and gave every mark
of the most frantic grief.
“Why, there now,” cries Mrs. Ellison, “while you will indulge these
extravagant passions, how can you be capable of listening to the voice
of reason? I know I am a fool in concerning myself thus with the affairs
of others. I know the thankless office I undertake; and yet I love you
so, my dear Mrs. Booth, that I cannot bear to see you afflicted, and I
would comfort you if you would suffer me. Let me beg you to make your
mind easy; and within these two days I will engage to set your husband
at liberty.
“Harkee, child; only behave like a woman of spirit this evening, and
keep your appointment, notwithstanding what hath happened; and I am
convinced there is one who hath the power and the will to serve you.”
Mrs. Ellison spoke the latter part of her speech in a whisper, so that
Mrs. Atkinson, who was then engaged with the children, might not hear
her; but Amelia answered aloud, and said, “What appointment would you
have me keep this evening?”
“Nay, nay, if you have forgot,” cries Mrs. Ellison, “I will tell you
more another time; but come, will you go home? my dinner is ready by
this time, and you shall dine with me.”
“Talk not to me of dinners,” cries Amelia; “my stomach is too full
already.”
“Nay, but, dear madam,” answered Mrs. Ellison, “let me beseech you to
go home with me. I do not care,” says she, whispering, “to speak before
some folks.” “I have no secret, madam, in the world,” replied Amelia
aloud, “which I would not communicate to this lady; for I shall always
acknowledge the highest obligations to her for the secrets she hath
imparted to me.”
“Madam,” said Mrs. Ellison, “I do not interfere with obligations. I
am glad the lady hath obliged you so much; and I wish all people were
equally mindful of obligations. I hope I have omitted no opportunity of
endeavouring to oblige Mrs. Booth, as well as I have some other folks.”
“If by other folks, madam, you mean me,” cries Mrs. Atkinson, “I confess
I sincerely believe you intended the same obligation to us both; and I
have the pleasure to think it is owing to me that this lady is not as
much obliged to you as I am.”
“I protest, madam, I can hardly guess your meaning,” said Mrs.
Ellison.--“Do you really intend to affront me, madam?”
“I intend to preserve innocence and virtue, if it be in my power,
madam,” answered the other. “And sure nothing but the most eager
resolution to destroy it could induce you to mention such an appointment
at such a time.”
“I did not expect this treatment from you, madam,” cries Mrs. Ellison;
“such ingratitude I could not have believed had it been reported to me
by any other.”
“Such impudence,” answered Mrs. Atkinson, “must exceed, I think,
all belief; but, when women once abandon that modesty which is the
characteristic of their sex, they seldom set any bounds to their
assurance.”
“I could not have believed this to have been in human nature,” cries
Mrs. Ellison. “Is this the woman whom I have fed, have cloathed, have
supported; who owes to my charity and my intercessions that she is not
at this day destitute of all the necessaries of life?”
“I own it all,” answered Mrs. Atkinson; “and I add the favour of a
masquerade ticket to the number. Could I have thought, madam, that you
would before my face have asked another lady to go to the same place
with the same man?--but I ask your pardon; I impute rather more
assurance to you than you are mistress of.--You have endeavoured to keep
the assignation a secret from me; and it was by mere accident only that
I discovered it; unless there are some guardian angels that in general
protect innocence and virtue; though, I may say, I have not always found
them so watchful.”
“Indeed, madam,” said Mrs. Ellison, “you are not worth my answer; nor
will I stay a moment longer with such a person.--So, Mrs. Booth, you
have your choice, madam, whether you will go with me, or remain in the
company of this lady.”
“If so, madam,” answered Mrs. Booth, “I shall not be long in determining
to stay where I am.”
Mrs. Ellison then, casting a look of great indignation at both the
ladies, made a short speech full of invectives against Mrs. Atkinson,
and not without oblique hints of ingratitude against poor Amelia; after
which she burst out of the room, and out of the house, and made haste
to her own home, in a condition of mind to which fortune without guilt
cannot, I believe, reduce any one.
Indeed, how much the superiority of misery is on the side of wickedness
may appear to every reader who will compare the present situation of
Amelia with that of Mrs. Ellison. Fortune had attacked the former with
almost the highest degree of her malice. She was involved in a scene of
most exquisite distress, and her husband, her principal comfort, torn
violently from her arms; yet her sorrow, however exquisite, was all soft
and tender, nor was she without many consolations. Her case, however
hard, was not absolutely desperate; for scarce any condition of fortune
can be so. Art and industry, chance and friends, have often relieved the
most distrest circumstances, and converted them into opulence. In all
these she had hopes on this side the grave, and perfect virtue and
innocence gave her the strongest assurances on the other. Whereas, in
the bosom of Mrs. Ellison, all was storm and tempest; anger, revenge,
fear, and pride, like so many raging furies, possessed her mind, and
tortured her with disappointment and shame. Loss of reputation, which is
generally irreparable, was to be her lot; loss of friends is of this
the certain consequence; all on this side the grave appeared dreary
and comfortless; and endless misery on the other, closed the gloomy
prospect.
Hence, my worthy reader, console thyself, that however few of the
other good things of life are thy lot, the best of all things, which is
innocence, is always within thy own power; and, though Fortune may make
thee often unhappy, she can never make thee completely and irreparably
miserable without thy own consent.
Chapter iv.
_Containing, among many matters, the exemplary behaviour of Colonel
James._
When Mrs. Ellison was departed, Mrs. Atkinson began to apply all her art
to soothe and comfort Amelia, but was presently prevented by her. “I am
ashamed, dear madam,” said Amelia, “of having indulged my affliction so
much at your expense. The suddenness of the occasion is my only excuse;
for, had I had time to summon my resolution to my assistance, I hope
I am mistress of more patience than you have hitherto seen me exert. I
know, madam, in my unwarrantable excesses, I have been guilty of many
transgressions. First, against that Divine will and pleasure without
whose permission, at least, no human accident can happen; in the
next place, madam, if anything can aggravate such a fault, I have
transgressed the laws of friendship as well as decency, in throwing upon
you some part of the load of my grief; and again, I have sinned against
common sense, which should teach me, instead of weakly and heavily
lamenting my misfortunes, to rouse all my spirits to remove them. In
this light I am shocked at my own folly, and am resolved to leave my
children under your care, and go directly to my husband. I may comfort
him. I may assist him. I may relieve him. There is nothing now too
difficult for me to undertake.”
Mrs. Atkinson greatly approved and complimented her friend on all the
former part of her speech, except what related to herself, on which
she spoke very civilly, and I believe with great truth; but as to her
determination of going to her husband she endeavoured to dissuade
her, at least she begged her to defer it for the present, and till the
serjeant returned home. She then reminded Amelia that it was now past
five in the afternoon, and that she had not taken any refreshment but
a dish of tea the whole day, and desired she would give her leave to
procure her a chick, or anything she liked better, for her dinner.
Amelia thanked her friend, and said she would sit down with her to
whatever she pleased; “but if I do not eat,” said she, “I would not have
you impute it to anything but want of appetite; for I assure you all
things are equally indifferent to me. I am more solicitous about these
poor little things, who have not been used to fast so long. Heaven knows
what may hereafter be their fate!”
Mrs. Atkinson bid her hope the best, and then recommended the children
to the care of her maid.
And now arrived a servant from Mrs. James, with an invitation to Captain
Booth and to his lady to dine with the colonel the day after the next.
This a little perplexed Amelia; but after a short consideration she
despatched an answer to Mrs. James, in which she concisely informed her
of what had happened.
The honest serjeant, who had been on his legs almost the whole day, now
returned, and brought Amelia a short letter from her husband, in which
he gave her the most solemn assurances of his health and spirits, and
begged her with great earnestness to take care to preserve her own,
which if she did, he said, he had no doubt but that they should shortly
be happy. He added something of hopes from my lord, with which Mrs.
Ellison had amused him, and which served only to destroy the comfort
that Amelia received from the rest of his letter.
Whilst Amelia, the serjeant, and his lady, were engaged in a cold
collation, for which purpose a cold chicken was procured from the tavern
for the ladies, and two pound of cold beef for the serjeant, a violent
knocking was heard at the door, and presently afterwards Colonel James
entered the room. After proper compliments had past, the colonel told
Amelia that her letter was brought to Mrs. James while they were at
table, and that on her shewing it him he had immediately rose up, made
an apology to his company, and took a chair to her. He spoke to her with
great tenderness on the occasion, and desired her to make herself easy;
assuring her that he would leave nothing in his power undone to serve
her husband. He then gave her an invitation, in his wife’s name, to his
own house, in the most pressing manner.
Amelia returned him very hearty thanks for all his kind offers, but
begged to decline that of an apartment in his house. She said, as she
could not leave her children, so neither could she think of bringing
such a trouble with her into his family; and, though the colonel gave
her many assurances that her children, as well as herself, would be very
welcome to Mrs. James, and even betook himself to entreaties, she still
persisted obstinately in her refusal.
In real truth, Amelia had taken a vast affection for Mrs. Atkinson, of
the comfort of whose company she could not bear to be deprived in her
distress, nor to exchange it for that of Mrs. James, to whom she had
lately conceived no little dislike.
The colonel, when he found he could not prevail with Amelia to accept
his invitation, desisted from any farther solicitations. He then took
a bank-bill of fifty pounds from his pocket-book, and said, “You will
pardon me, dear madam, if I chuse to impute your refusal of my house
rather to a dislike of my wife, who I will not pretend to be the most
agreeable of women (all men,” said he, sighing, “have not Captain
Booth’s fortune), than to any aversion or anger to me. I must insist
upon it, therefore, to make your present habitation as easy to you as
possible--I hope, madam, you will not deny me this happiness; I beg you
will honour me with the acceptance of this trifle.” He then put the note
into her hand, and declared that the honour of touching it was worth a
hundred times that sum.
“I protest, Colonel James,” cried Amelia, blushing, “I know not what to
do or say, your goodness so greatly confounds me. Can I, who am so well
acquainted with the many great obligations Mr. Booth already hath to
your generosity, consent that you should add more to a debt we never can
pay?”
The colonel stopt her short, protesting that she misplaced the
obligation; for, that if to confer the highest happiness was to oblige,
he was obliged to her acceptance. “And I do assure you, madam,” said he,
“if this trifling sum or a much larger can contribute to your ease, I
shall consider myself as the happiest man upon earth in being able to
supply it, and you, madam, my greatest benefactor in receiving it.”
Amelia then put the note in her pocket, and they entered into a
conversation in which many civil things were said on both sides; but
what was chiefly worth remark was, that Amelia had almost her husband
constantly in her mouth, and the colonel never mentioned him: the former
seemed desirous to lay all obligations, as much as possible, to the
account of her husband; and the latter endeavoured, with the utmost
delicacy, to insinuate that her happiness was the main and indeed only
point which he had in view.
Amelia had made no doubt, at the colonel’s first appearance, but that he
intended to go directly to her husband. When he dropt therefore a hint
of his intention to visit him next morning she appeared visibly shocked
at the delay. The colonel, perceiving this, said, “However inconvenient
it may be, yet, madam, if it will oblige you, or if you desire it, I
will even go to-night.” Amelia answered, “My husband will be far from
desiring to derive any good from your inconvenience; but, if you put it
to me, I must be excused for saying I desire nothing more in the world
than to send him so great a comfort as I know he will receive from
the presence of such a friend.” “Then, to show you, madam,” cries the
colonel, “that I desire nothing more in the world than to give you
pleasure, I will go to him immediately.”
Amelia then bethought herself of the serjeant, and told the colonel his
old acquaintance Atkinson, whom he had known at Gibraltar, was then
in the house, and would conduct him to the place. The serjeant was
immediately called in, paid his respects to the colonel, and was
acknowledged by him. They both immediately set forward, Amelia to the
utmost of her power pressing their departure.
Mrs. Atkinson now returned to Amelia, and was by her acquainted with the
colonel’s late generosity; for her heart so boiled over with gratitude
that she could not conceal the ebullition. Amelia likewise gave her
friend a full narrative of the colonel’s former behaviour and friendship
to her husband, as well abroad as in England; and ended with declaring
that she believed him to be the most generous man upon earth.
Mrs. Atkinson agreed with Amelia’s conclusion, and said she was glad to
hear there was any such man. They then proceeded with the children to
the tea-table, where panegyric, and not scandal, was the topic of their
conversation; and of this panegyric the colonel was the subject; both
the ladies seeming to vie with each other in celebrating the praises of
his goodness.
Chapter v.
_Comments upon authors._
Having left Amelia in as comfortable a situation as could possibly be
expected, her immediate distresses relieved, and her heart filled with
great hopes from the friendship of the colonel, we will now return to
Booth, who, when the attorney and serjeant had left him, received a
visit from that great author of whom honourable mention is made in our
second chapter.
Booth, as the reader may be pleased to remember, was a pretty good
master of the classics; for his father, though he designed his son for
the army, did not think it necessary to breed him up a blockhead. He did
not, perhaps, imagine that a competent share of Latin and Greek would
make his son either a pedant or a coward. He considered likewise,
probably, that the life of a soldier is in general a life of idleness;
and might think that the spare hours of an officer in country quarters
would be as well employed with a book as in sauntering about the
streets, loitering in a coffee-house, sotting in a tavern, or in laying
schemes to debauch and ruin a set of harmless ignorant country girls.
As Booth was therefore what might well be called, in this age at least,
a man of learning, he began to discourse our author on subjects of
literature. “I think, sir,” says he, “that Dr Swift hath been generally
allowed, by the critics in this kingdom, to be the greatest master
of humour that ever wrote. Indeed, I allow him to have possessed most
admirable talents of this kind; and, if Rabelais was his master, I think
he proves the truth of the common Greek proverb--that the scholar is
often superior to the master. As to Cervantes, I do not think we can
make any just comparison; for, though Mr. Pope compliments him with
sometimes taking Cervantes’ serious air--” “I remember the passage,”
cries the author;
“O thou, whatever title please thine ear,
Dean, Drapier, Bickerstaff, or Gulliver;
Whether you take Cervantes’ serious air,
Or laugh and shake in Rabelais’ easy chair--”
“You are right, sir,” said Booth; “but though I should agree that
the doctor hath sometimes condescended to imitate Rabelais, I do not
remember to have seen in his works the least attempt in the manner of
Cervantes. But there is one in his own way, and whom I am convinced
he studied above all others--you guess, I believe, I am going to name
Lucian. This author, I say, I am convinced, he followed; but I think he
followed him at a distance: as, to say the truth, every other writer of
this kind hath done in my opinion; for none, I think, hath yet equalled
him. I agree, indeed, entirely with Mr. Moyle, in his Discourse on
the age of the Philopatris, when he gives him the epithet of the
incomparable Lucian; and incomparable, I believe, he will remain as long
as the language in which he wrote shall endure. What an inimitable piece
of humour is his Cock!” “I remember it very well,” cries the author;
“his story of a Cock and a Bull is excellent.” Booth stared at this, and
asked the author what he meant by the Bull? “Nay,” answered he, “I don’t
know very well, upon my soul. It is a long time since I read him. I
learnt him all over at school; I have not read him much since. And
pray, sir,” said he, “how do you like his Pharsalia? don’t you think Mr.
Rowe’s translation a very fine one?” Booth replied, “I believe we are
talking of different authors. The Pharsalia, which Mr. Rowe translated,
was written by Lucan; but I have been speaking of Lucian, a Greek
writer, and, in my opinion, the greatest in the humorous way that ever
the world produced.” “Ay!” cries the author, “he was indeed so, a very
excellent writer indeed! I fancy a translation of him would sell very
well!” “I do not know, indeed,” cries Booth. “A good translation of him
would be a valuable book. I have seen a wretched one published by Mr.
Dryden, but translated by others, who in many places have misunderstood
Lucian’s meaning, and have nowhere preserved the spirit of the
original.” “That is great pity,” says the author. “Pray, sir, is he well
translated in the French?” Booth answered, he could not tell; but that
he doubted it very much, having never seen a good version into that
language out of the Greek.” To confess the truth, I believe,” said he,
“the French translators have generally consulted the Latin only; which,
in some of the few Greek writers I have read, is intolerably bad. And
as the English translators, for the most part, pursue the French, we may
easily guess what spirit those copies of bad copies must preserve of the
original.”
“Egad, you are a shrewd guesser,” cries the author. “I am glad the
booksellers have not your sagacity. But how should it be otherwise,
considering the price they pay by the sheet? The Greek, you will allow,
is a hard language; and there are few gentlemen that write who can read
it without a good lexicon. Now, sir, if we were to afford time to find
out the true meaning of words, a gentleman would not get bread and
cheese by his work. If one was to be paid, indeed, as Mr. Pope was for
his Homer--Pray, sir, don’t you think that the best translation in the
world?”
“Indeed, sir,” cries Booth, “I think, though it is certainly a noble
paraphrase, and of itself a fine poem, yet in some places it is no
translation at all. In the very beginning, for instance, he hath not
rendered the true force of the author. Homer invokes his muse in the
five first lines of the Iliad; and, at the end of the fifth, he gives
his reason:
[Greek]
For all these things,” says he, “were brought about by the decree of
Jupiter; and, therefore, he supposes their true sources are known only
to the deities. Now, the translation takes no more notice of the [Greek]
than if no such word had been there.”
“Very possibly,” answered the author; “it is a long time since I read
the original. Perhaps, then, he followed the French translations. I
observe, indeed, he talks much in the notes of Madam Dacier and Monsieur
Eustathius.”
Booth had now received conviction enough of his friend’s knowledge of
the Greek language; without attempting, therefore, to set him right,
he made a sudden transition to the Latin. “Pray, sir,” said he, “as you
have mentioned Rowe’s translation of the Pharsalia, do you remember how
he hath rendered that passage in the character of Cato?--
_----Venerisque huic maximus usus
Progenies; urbi Pater est, urbique Maritus._
For I apprehend that passage is generally misunderstood.”
“I really do not remember,” answered the author. “Pray, sir, what do you
take to be the meaning?”
“I apprehend, sir,” replied Booth, “that by these words, _Urbi Pater
est, urbique Maritus_, Cato is represented as the father and husband to
the city of Rome.”
“Very true, sir,” cries the author; “very fine, indeed.--Not only the
father of his country, but the husband too; very noble, truly!”
“Pardon me, sir,” cries Booth; “I do not conceive that to have been
Lucan’s meaning. If you please to observe the context; Lucan, having
commended the temperance of Cato in the instances of diet and cloaths,
proceeds to venereal pleasures; of which, says the poet, his principal
use was procreation: then he adds, _Urbi Pater est, urbique Maritus;_
that he became a father and a husband for the sake only of the city.”
“Upon my word that’s true,” cries the author; “I did not think of it.
It is much finer than the other.--_Urbis Pater est_--what is the
other?--ay--_Urbis Maritus._--It is certainly as you say, sir.”
Booth was by this pretty well satisfied of the author’s profound
learning; however, he was willing to try him a little farther. He asked
him, therefore, what was his opinion of Lucan in general, and in what
class of writers he ranked him?
The author stared a little at this question; and, after some hesitation,
answered, “Certainly, sir, I think he is a fine writer and a very great
poet.”
“I am very much of the same opinion,” cries Booth; “but where do you
class him--next to what poet do you place him?”
“Let me see,” cries the author; “where do I class him? next to whom do I
place him?--Ay!--why--why, pray, where do you yourself place him?”
“Why, surely,” cries Booth, “if he is not to be placed in the first rank
with Homer, and Virgil, and Milton, I think clearly he is at the head of
the second, before either Statius or Silius Italicus--though I allow to
each of these their merits; but, perhaps, an epic poem was beyond the
genius of either. I own, I have often thought, if Statius had ventured
no farther than Ovid or Claudian, he would have succeeded better; for
his Sylvae are, in my opinion, much better than his Thebais.”
“I believe I was of the same opinion formerly,” said the author.
“And for what reason have you altered it?” cries Booth.
“I have not altered it,” answered the author; “but, to tell you the
truth, I have not any opinion at all about these matters at present. I
do not trouble my head much with poetry; for there is no encouragement
to such studies in this age. It is true, indeed, I have now and then
wrote a poem or two for the magazines, but I never intend to write any
more; for a gentleman is not paid for his time. A sheet is a sheet with
the booksellers; and, whether it be in prose or verse, they make no
difference; though certainly there is as much difference to a gentleman
in the work as there is to a taylor between making a plain and a laced
suit. Rhimes are difficult things; they are stubborn things, sir. I have
been sometimes longer in tagging a couplet than I have been in writing
a speech on the side of the opposition which hath been read with great
applause all over the kingdom.”
“I am glad you are pleased to confirm that,” cries Booth; “for I
protest it was an entire secret to me till this day. I was so perfectly
ignorant, that I thought the speeches published in the magazines were
really made by the members themselves.”
“Some of them, and I believe I may, without vanity, say the best,” cries
the author, “are all the productions of my own pen! but I believe I
shall leave it off soon, unless a sheet of speech will fetch more than
it does at present. In truth, the romance-writing is the only branch of
our business now that is worth following. Goods of that sort have had so
much success lately in the market, that a bookseller scarce cares what
he bids for them. And it is certainly the easiest work in the world;
you may write it almost as fast as you can set pen to paper; and if
you interlard it with a little scandal, a little abuse on some living
characters of note, you cannot fail of success.”
“Upon my word, sir,” cries Booth, “you have greatly instructed me. I
could not have imagined there had been so much regularity in the trade
of writing as you are pleased to mention; by what I can perceive, the
pen and ink is likely to become the staple commodity of the kingdom.”
“Alas! sir,” answered the author, “it is overstocked. The market is
overstocked. There is no encouragement to merit, no patrons. I have been
these five years soliciting a subscription for my new translation of
Ovid’s Metamorphoses, with notes explanatory, historical, and critical;
and I have scarce collected five hundred names yet.”
The mention of this translation a little surprized Booth; not only
as the author had just declared his intentions to forsake the tuneful
muses; but, for some other reasons which he had collected from his
conversation with our author, he little expected to hear of a proposal
to translate any of the Latin poets. He proceeded, therefore, to
catechise him a little farther; and by his answers was fully satisfied
that he had the very same acquaintance with Ovid that he had appeared to
have with Lucan.
The author then pulled out a bundle of papers containing proposals for
his subscription, and receipts; and, addressing himself to Booth, said,
“Though the place in which we meet, sir, is an improper place to solicit
favours of this kind, yet, perhaps, it may be in your power to serve
me if you will charge your pockets with some of these.” Booth was just
offering at an excuse, when the bailiff introduced Colonel James and the
serjeant.
The unexpected visit of a beloved friend to a man in affliction,
especially in Mr. Booth’s situation, is a comfort which can scarce
be equalled; not barely from the hopes of relief or redress by his
assistance, but as it is an evidence of sincere friendship which scarce
admits of any doubt or suspicion. Such an instance doth indeed make a
man amends for all ordinary troubles and distresses; and we ought to
think ourselves gainers by having had such an opportunity of discovering
that we are possessed of one of the most valuable of all human
possessions.
Booth was so transported at the sight of the colonel, that he dropt the
proposals which the author had put into his hands, and burst forth into
the highest professions of gratitude to his friend; who behaved very
properly on his side, and said everything which became the mouth of a
friend on the occasion.
It is true, indeed, he seemed not moved equally either with Booth or the
serjeant, both whose eyes watered at the scene. In truth, the colonel,
though a very generous man, had not the least grain of tenderness in his
disposition. His mind was formed of those firm materials of which nature
formerly hammered out the Stoic, and upon which the sorrows of no man
living could make an impression. A man of this temper, who doth not much
value danger, will fight for the person he calls his friend, and the
man that hath but little value for his money will give it him; but such
friendship is never to be absolutely depended on; for, whenever the
favourite passion interposes with it, it is sure to subside and vanish
into air. Whereas the man whose tender disposition really feels the
miseries of another will endeavour to relieve them for his own sake;
and, in such a mind, friendship will often get the superiority over
every other passion.
But, from whatever motive it sprung, the colonel’s behaviour to Booth
seemed truly amiable; and so it appeared to the author, who took the
first occasion to applaud it in a very florid oration; which the reader,
when he recollects that he was a speech-maker by profession, will not
be surprized at; nor, perhaps, will be much more surprized that he soon
after took an occasion of clapping a proposal into the colonel’s hands,
holding at the same time a receipt very visible in his own.
The colonel received both, and gave the author a guinea in exchange,
which was double the sum mentioned in the receipt; for which the author
made a low bow, and very politely took his leave, saying, “I suppose,
gentlemen, you may have some private business together; I heartily
wish a speedy end to your confinement, and I congratulate you on the
possessing so great, so noble, and so generous a friend.”
Chapter vi.
_Which inclines rather to satire than panegyric._
The colonel had the curiosity to ask Booth the name of the gentleman
who, in the vulgar language, had struck, or taken him in for a guinea
with so much ease and dexterity. Booth answered, he did not know his
name; all that he knew of him was, that he was the most impudent and
illiterate fellow he had ever seen, and that, by his own account, he was
the author of most of the wonderful productions of the age. “Perhaps,”
said he, “it may look uncharitable in me to blame you for your
generosity; but I am convinced the fellow hath not the least merit or
capacity, and you have subscribed to the most horrid trash that ever was
published.”
“I care not a farthing what he publishes,” cries the colonel. “Heaven
forbid I should be obliged to read half the nonsense I have subscribed
to.”
“But don’t you think,” said Booth, “that by such indiscriminate
encouragement of authors you do a real mischief to the society? By
propagating the subscriptions of such fellows, people are tired out
and withhold their contributions to men of real merit; and, at the same
time, you are contributing to fill the world, not only with nonsense,
but with all the scurrility, indecency, and profaneness with which
the age abounds, and with which all bad writers supply the defect of
genius.”
“Pugh!” cries the colonel, “I never consider these matters. Good or bad,
it is all one to me; but there’s an acquaintance of mine, and a man of
great wit too, that thinks the worst the best, as they are the surest to
make him laugh.”
“I ask pardon, sir,” says the serjeant; “but I wish your honour would
consider your own affairs a little, for it grows late in the evening.”
“The serjeant says true,” answered the colonel. “What is it you intend
to do?”
“Faith, colonel, I know not what I shall do. My affairs seem so
irreparable, that I have been driving them as much as possibly I could
from my mind. If I was to suffer alone, I think I could bear them with
some philosophy; but when I consider who are to be the sharers in my
fortune--the dearest of children, and the best, the worthiest, and the
noblest of women---Pardon me, my dear friend, these sensations are above
me; they convert me into a woman; they drive me to despair, to madness.”
The colonel advised him to command himself, and told him this was not
the way to retrieve his fortune. “As to me, my dear Booth,” said he,
“you know you may command me as far as is really within my power.”
Booth answered eagerly, that he was so far from expecting any more
favours from the colonel, that he had resolved not to let him know
anything of his misfortune. “No, my dear friend,” cries he, “I am
too much obliged to you already;” and then burst into many fervent
expressions of gratitude, till the colonel himself stopt him, and begged
him to give an account of the debt or debts for which he was detained in
that horrid place.
Booth answered, he could not be very exact, but he feared it was upwards
of four hundred pounds.
“It is but three hundred pounds, indeed, sir,” cries the serjeant; “if
you can raise three hundred pounds, you are a free man this moment.”
Booth, who did not apprehend the generous meaning of the serjeant as
well as, I believe, the reader will, answered he was mistaken; that he
had computed his debts, and they amounted to upwards of four hundred
pounds; nay, that the bailiff had shewn him writs for above that sum.
“Whether your debts are three or four hundred,” cries the colonel, “the
present business is to give bail only, and then you will have some time
to try your friends: I think you might get a company abroad, and then
I would advance the money on the security of half your pay; and, in the
mean time, I will be one of your bail with all my heart.”
Whilst Booth poured forth his gratitude for all this kindness, the
serjeant ran down-stairs for the bailiff, and shortly after returned
with him into the room.
The bailiff, being informed that the colonel offered to be bail for his
prisoner, answered a little surlily, “Well, sir, and who will be the
other? you know, I suppose, there must be two; and I must have time to
enquire after them.”
The colonel replied, “I believe, sir, I am well known to be responsible
for a much larger sum than your demand on this gentleman; but, if your
forms require two, I suppose the serjeant here will do for the other.”
“I don’t know the serjeant nor you either, sir,” cries Bondum; “and,
if you propose yourselves bail for the gentleman, I must have time to
enquire after you.”
“You need very little time to enquire after me,” says the colonel, “for
I can send for several of the law, whom I suppose you know, to satisfy
you; but consider, it is very late.”
“Yes, sir,” answered Bondum, “I do consider it is too late for the
captain to be bailed to-night.”
“What do you mean by too late?” cries the colonel.
“I mean, sir, that I must search the office, and that is now shut up;
for, if my lord mayor and the court of aldermen would be bound for him,
I would not discharge him till I had searched the office.”
“How, sir!” cries the colonel, “hath the law of England no more regard
for the liberty of the subject than to suffer such fellows as you to
detain a man in custody for debt, when he can give undeniable security?”
“Don’t fellow me,” said the bailiff; “I am as good a fellow as yourself,
I believe, though you have that riband in your hat there.”
“Do you know whom you are speaking to?” said the serjeant. “Do you know
you are talking to a colonel of the army?”
“What’s a colonel of the army to me?” cries the bailiff. “I have had as
good as he in my custody before now.”
“And a member of parliament?” cries the serjeant.
“Is the gentleman a member of parliament?--Well, and what harm have I
said? I am sure I meant no harm; and, if his honour is offended, I
ask his pardon; to be sure his honour must know that the sheriff is
answerable for all the writs in the office, though they were never so
many, and I am answerable to the sheriff. I am sure the captain can’t
say that I have shewn him any manner of incivility since he hath been
here.--And I hope, honourable sir,” cries he, turning to the colonel,
“you don’t take anything amiss that I said, or meant by way of
disrespect, or any such matter. I did not, indeed, as the gentleman here
says, know who I was speaking to; but I did not say anything uncivil as
I know of, and I hope no offence.”
The colonel was more easily pacified than might have been expected, and
told the bailiff that, if it was against the rules of law to discharge
Mr. Booth that evening, he must be contented. He then addressed himself
to his friend, and began to prescribe comfort and patience to him;
saying, he must rest satisfied with his confinement that night; and the
next morning he promised to visit him again.
Booth answered, that as for himself, the lying one night in any place
was very little worth his regard. “You and I, my dear friend, have both
spent our evening in a worse situation than I shall in this house. All
my concern is for my poor Amelia, whose sufferings on account of my
absence I know, and I feel with unspeakable tenderness. Could I be
assured she was tolerably easy, I could be contented in chains or in a
dungeon.”
“Give yourself no concern on her account,” said the colonel; “I will
wait on her myself, though I break an engagement for that purpose, and
will give her such assurances as I am convinced will make her perfectly
easy.”
Booth embraced his friend, and, weeping over him, paid his
acknowledgment with tears for all his goodness. In words, indeed, he was
not able to thank him; for gratitude, joining with his other passions,
almost choaked him, and stopt his utterance.
After a short scene in which nothing past worth recounting, the colonel
bid his friend good night, and leaving the serjeant with him, made the
best of his way back to Amelia.
Chapter vii.
_Worthy a very serious perusal._
The colonel found Amelia sitting very disconsolate with Mrs. Atkinson.
He entered the room with an air of great gaiety, assured Amelia that
her husband was perfectly well, and that he hoped the next day he would
again be with her.
Amelia was a little comforted at this account, and vented many grateful
expressions to the colonel for his unparalleled friendship, as she was
pleased to call it. She could not, however, help giving way soon after
to a sigh at the thoughts of her husband’s bondage, and declared that
night would be the longest she had ever known.
“This lady, madam,” cries the colonel, “must endeavour to make it
shorter. And, if you will give me leave, I will join in the same
endeavour.” Then, after some more consolatory speeches, the colonel
attempted to give a gay turn to the discourse, and said, “I was engaged
to have spent this evening disagreeably at Ranelagh, with a set of
company I did not like. How vastly am I obliged to you, dear Mrs. Booth,
that I pass it so infinitely more to my satisfaction!”
“Indeed, colonel,” said Amelia, “I am convinced that to a mind so
rightly turned as yours there must be a much sweeter relish in the
highest offices of friendship than in any pleasures which the gayest
public places can afford.”
“Upon my word, madam,” said the colonel, “you now do me more than
justice. I have, and always had, the utmost indifference for such
pleasures. Indeed, I hardly allow them worthy of that name, or, if they
are so at all, it is in a very low degree. In my opinion the highest
friendship must always lead us to the highest pleasure.”
Here Amelia entered into a long dissertation on friendship, in which she
pointed several times directly at the colonel as the hero of her tale.
The colonel highly applauded all her sentiments; and when he could
not avoid taking the compliment to himself, he received it with a most
respectful bow. He then tried his hand likewise at description, in which
he found means to repay all Amelia’s panegyric in kind. This, though he
did with all possible delicacy, yet a curious observer might have been
apt to suspect that it was chiefly on her account that the colonel had
avoided the masquerade.
In discourses of this kind they passed the evening, till it was very
late, the colonel never offering to stir from his chair before the clock
had struck one; when he thought, perhaps, that decency obliged him to
take his leave.
As soon as he was gone Mrs. Atkinson said to Mrs. Booth, “I think,
madam, you told me this afternoon that the colonel was married?”
Amelia answered, she did so.
“I think likewise, madam,” said Mrs. Atkinson, “you was acquainted with
the colonel’s lady?”
Amelia answered that she had been extremely intimate with her abroad.
“Is she young and handsome?” said Mrs. Atkinson. “In short, pray, was it
a match of love or convenience?”
Amelia answered, entirely of love, she believed, on his side; for that
the lady had little or no fortune.
“I am very glad to hear it,” said Mrs. Atkinson; “for I am sure the
colonel is in love with somebody. I think I never saw a more luscious
picture of love drawn than that which he was pleased to give us as the
portraiture of friendship. I have read, indeed, of Pylades and Orestes,
Damon and Pythias, and other great friends of old; nay, I sometimes
flatter myself that I am capable of being a friend myself; but as for
that fine, soft, tender, delicate passion, which he was pleased
to describe, I am convinced there must go a he and a she to the
composition.”
“Upon my word, my dear, you are mistaken,” cries Amelia. “If you had
known the friendship which hath always subsisted between the colonel
and my husband, you would not imagine it possible for any description
to exceed it. Nay, I think his behaviour this very day is sufficient to
convince you.”
“I own what he hath done to-day hath great merit,” said Mrs. Atkinson;
“and yet, from what he hath said to-night--You will pardon me, dear
madam; perhaps I am too quick-sighted in my observations; nay, I am
afraid I am even impertinent.”
“Fie upon it!” cries Amelia; “how can you talk in that strain? Do you
imagine I expect ceremony? Pray speak what you think with the utmost
freedom.”
“Did he not then,” said Mrs. Atkinson, “repeat the words, _the
finest woman in the world_, more than once? did he not make use of an
expression which might have become the mouth of Oroondates himself? If
I remember, the words were these--that, had he been Alexander the Great,
he should have thought it more glory to have wiped off a tear from the
bright eyes of Statira than to have conquered fifty worlds.”
“Did he say so?” cries Amelia--“I think he did say something like it;
but my thoughts were so full of my husband that I took little notice.
But what would you infer from what he said? I hope you don’t think he is
in love with me?”
“I hope he doth not think so himself,” answered Mrs. Atkinson; “though,
when he mentioned the bright eyes of Statira, he fixed his own eyes on
yours with the most languishing air I ever beheld.”
Amelia was going to answer, when the serjeant arrived, and then she
immediately fell to enquiring after her husband, and received such
satisfactory answers to all her many questions concerning him, that
she expressed great pleasure. These ideas so possessed her mind, that,
without once casting her thoughts on any other matters, she took her
leave of the serjeant and his lady, and repaired to bed to her children,
in a room which Mrs. Atkinson had provided her in the same house; where
we will at present wish her a good night.
Chapter viii.
_Consisting of grave matters._
While innocence and chearful hope, in spite of the malice of fortune,
closed the eyes of the gentle Amelia on her homely bed, and she enjoyed
a sweet and profound sleep, the colonel lay restless all night on his
down; his mind was affected with a kind of ague fit; sometimes scorched
up with flaming desires, and again chilled with the coldest despair.
There is a time, I think, according to one of our poets, _when lust and
envy sleep_. This, I suppose, is when they are well gorged with the food
they most delight in; but, while either of these are hungry,
Nor poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drousy syrups of the East,
Will ever medicine them to slumber.
The colonel was at present unhappily tormented by both these fiends.
His last evening’s conversation with Amelia had done his business
effectually. The many kind words she had spoken to him, the many
kind looks she had given him, as being, she conceived, the friend and
preserver of her husband, had made an entire conquest of his heart.
Thus the very love which she bore him, as the person to whom her little
family were to owe their preservation and happiness, inspired him with
thoughts of sinking them all in the lowest abyss of ruin and misery;
and, while she smiled with all her sweetness on the supposed friend of
her husband, she was converting that friend into his most bitter enemy.
Friendship, take heed; if woman interfere,
Be sure the hour of thy destruction’s near.
These are the lines of Vanbrugh; and the sentiment is better than the
poetry. To say the truth, as a handsome wife is the cause and cement
of many false friendships, she is often too liable to destroy the real
ones.
Thus the object of the colonel’s lust very plainly appears, but the
object of his envy may be more difficult to discover. Nature and Fortune
had seemed to strive with a kind of rivalship which should bestow
most on the colonel. The former had given him person, parts, and
constitution, in all which he was superior to almost every other man.
The latter had given him rank in life, and riches, both in a very
eminent degree. Whom then should this happy man envy? Here, lest
ambition should mislead the reader to search the palaces of the great,
we will direct him at once to Gray’s-inn-lane; where, in a miserable
bed, in a miserable room, he will see a miserable broken lieutenant, in
a miserable condition, with several heavy debts on his back, and
without a penny in his pocket. This, and no other, was the object of
the colonel’s envy. And why? because this wretch was possessed of the
affections of a poor little lamb, which all the vast flocks that
were within the power and reach of the colonel could not prevent that
glutton’s longing for. And sure this image of the lamb is not improperly
adduced on this occasion; for what was the colonel’s desire but to lead
this poor lamb, as it were, to the slaughter, in order to purchase a
feast of a few days by her final destruction, and to tear her away from
the arms of one where she was sure of being fondled and caressed all the
days of her life.
While the colonel was agitated with these thoughts, his greatest comfort
was, that Amelia and Booth were now separated; and his greatest terror
was of their coming again together. From wishes, therefore, he began to
meditate designs; and so far was he from any intention of procuring the
liberty of his friend, that he began to form schemes of prolonging his
confinement, till he could procure some means of sending him away far
from her; in which case he doubted not but of succeeding in all he
desired.
He was forming this plan in his mind when a servant informed him that
one serjeant Atkinson desired to speak with his honour. The serjeant was
immediately admitted, and acquainted the colonel that, if he pleased to
go and become bail for Mr. Booth, another unexceptionable housekeeper
would be there to join with him. This person the serjeant had procured
that morning, and had, by leave of his wife, given him a bond of
indemnification for the purpose.
The colonel did not seem so elated with this news as Atkinson expected.
On the contrary, instead of making a direct answer to what Atkinson
said, the colonel began thus: “I think, serjeant, Mr. Booth hath told me
that you was foster-brother to his lady. She is really a charming woman,
and it is a thousand pities she should ever have been placed in the
dreadful situation she is now in. There is nothing so silly as for
subaltern officers of the army to marry, unless where they meet with
women of very great fortunes indeed. What can be the event of their
marrying otherwise, but entailing misery and beggary on their wives and
their posterity?”
“Ah! sir,” cries the serjeant, “it is too late to think of those matters
now. To be sure, my lady might have married one of the top gentlemen in
the country; for she is certainly one of the best as well as one of the
handsomest women in the kingdom; and, if she had been fairly dealt by,
would have had a very great fortune into the bargain. Indeed, she is
worthy of the greatest prince in the world; and, if I had been the
greatest prince in the world, I should have thought myself happy with
such a wife; but she was pleased to like the lieutenant, and certainly
there can be no happiness in marriage without liking.”
“Lookee, serjeant,” said the colonel; “you know very well that I am the
lieutenant’s friend. I think I have shewn myself so.”
“Indeed your honour hath,” quoth the serjeant, “more than once to my
knowledge.”
“But I am angry with him for his imprudence, greatly angry with him for
his imprudence; and the more so, as it affects a lady of so much worth.”
“She is, indeed, a lady of the highest worth,” cries the serjeant. “Poor
dear lady! I knew her, an ‘t please your honour, from her infancy;
and the sweetest-tempered, best-natured lady she is that ever trod on
English ground. I have always loved her as if she was my own sister.
Nay, she hath very often called me brother; and I have taken it to be a
greater honour than if I was to be called a general officer.”
“What pity it is,” said the colonel, “that this worthy creature should
be exposed to so much misery by the thoughtless behaviour of a man
who, though I am his friend, I cannot help saying, hath been guilty of
imprudence at least! Why could he not live upon his half-pay? What had
he to do to run himself into debt in this outrageous manner?”
“I wish, indeed,” cries the serjeant, “he had been a little more
considerative; but I hope this will be a warning to him.”
“How am I sure of that,” answered the colonel; “or what reason is there
to expect it? extravagance is a vice of which men are not so easily
cured. I have thought a great deal of this matter, Mr. serjeant; and,
upon the most mature deliberation, I am of opinion that it will be
better, both for him and his poor lady, that he should smart a little
more.”
“Your honour, sir, to be sure is in the right,” replied the serjeant;
“but yet, sir, if you will pardon me for speaking, I hope you will be
pleased to consider my poor lady’s case. She suffers, all this while,
as much or more than the lieutenant; for I know her so well, that I am
certain she will never have a moment’s ease till her husband is out of
confinement.”
“I know women better than you, serjeant,” cries the colonel; “they
sometimes place their affections on a husband as children do on their
nurse; but they are both to be weaned. I know you, serjeant, to be a
fellow of sense as well as spirit, or I should not speak so freely to
you; but I took a fancy to you a long time ago, and I intend to serve
you; but first, I ask you this question--Is your attachment to Mr. Booth
or his lady?”
“Certainly, sir,” said the serjeant, “I must love my lady best. Not but
I have a great affection for the lieutenant too, because I know my lady
hath the same; and, indeed, he hath been always very good to me as far
as was in his power. A lieutenant, your honour knows, can’t do a great
deal; but I have always found him my friend upon all occasions.”
“You say true,” cries the colonel; “a lieutenant can do but little;
but I can do much to serve you, and will too. But let me ask you one
question: Who was the lady whom I saw last night with Mrs. Booth at her
lodgings?”
Here the serjeant blushed, and repeated, “The lady, sir?”
“Ay, a lady, a woman,” cries the colonel, “who supped with us last
night. She looked rather too much like a gentlewoman for the mistress of
a lodging-house.”
The serjeant’s cheeks glowed at this compliment to his wife; and he was
just going to own her when the colonel proceeded: “I think I never saw
in my life so ill-looking, sly, demure a b---; I would give something,
methinks, to know who she was.”
“I don’t know, indeed,” cries the serjeant, in great confusion; “I know
nothing about her.”
“I wish you would enquire,” said the colonel, “and let me know her name,
and likewise what she is: I have a strange curiosity to know, and let me
see you again this evening exactly at seven.”
“And will not your honour then go to the lieutenant this morning?” said
Atkinson.
“It is not in my power,” answered the colonel; “I am engaged another
way. Besides, there is no haste in this affair. If men will be imprudent
they must suffer the consequences. Come to me at seven, and bring me all
the particulars you can concerning that ill-looking jade I mentioned to
you, for I am resolved to know who she is. And so good-morrow to you,
serjeant; be assured I will take an opportunity to do something for
you.”
Though some readers may, perhaps, think the serjeant not unworthy of
the freedom with which the colonel treated him; yet that haughty officer
would have been very backward to have condescended to such familiarity
with one of his rank had he not proposed some design from it. In truth,
he began to conceive hopes of making the serjeant instrumental to his
design on Amelia; in other words, to convert him into a pimp; an office
in which the colonel had been served by Atkinson’s betters, and which,
as he knew it was in his power very well to reward him, he had no
apprehension that the serjeant would decline--an opinion which the
serjeant might have pardoned, though he had never given the least
grounds for it, since the colonel borrowed it from the knowledge of his
own heart. This dictated to him that he, from a bad motive, was capable
of desiring to debauch his friend’s wife; and the same heart inspired
him to hope that another, from another bad motive, might be guilty of
the same breach of friendship in assisting him. Few men, I believe,
think better of others than of themselves; nor do they easily allow the
existence of any virtue of which they perceive no traces in their own
minds; for which reason I have observed, that it is extremely difficult
to persuade a rogue that you are an honest man; nor would you ever
succeed in the attempt by the strongest evidence, was it not for the
comfortable conclusion which the rogue draws, that he who proves himself
to be honest proves himself to be a fool at the same time.
Chapter ix.
_A curious chapter, from which a curious reader may draw sundry
observations._
The serjeant retired from the colonel in a very dejected state of mind:
in which, however, we must leave him awhile and return to Amelia; who,
as soon as she was up, had despatched Mrs. Atkinson to pay off her
former lodgings, and to bring off all cloaths and other moveables.
The trusty messenger returned without performing her errand, for Mrs.
Ellison had locked up all her rooms, and was gone out very early that
morning, and the servant knew not whither she was gone.
The two ladies now sat down to breakfast, together with Amelia’s two
children; after which, Amelia declared she would take a coach and visit
her husband. To this motion Mrs. Atkinson soon agreed, and offered to be
her companion. To say truth, I think it was reasonable enough; and the
great abhorrence which Booth had of seeing his wife in a bailiff’s house
was, perhaps, rather too nice and delicate.
When the ladies were both drest, and just going to send for their
vehicle, a great knocking was heard at the door, and presently Mrs.
James was ushered into the room.
This visit was disagreeable enough to Amelia, as it detained her from
the sight of her husband, for which she so eagerly longed. However,
as she had no doubt but that the visit would be reasonably short, she
resolved to receive the lady with all the complaisance in her power.
Mrs. James now behaved herself so very unlike the person that she lately
appeared, that it might have surprized any one who doth not know that
besides that of a fine lady, which is all mere art and mummery, every
such woman hath some real character at the bottom, in which, whenever
nature gets the better of her, she acts. Thus the finest ladies in the
world will sometimes love, and sometimes scratch, according to their
different natural dispositions, with great fury and violence, though
both of these are equally inconsistent with a fine lady’s artificial
character.
Mrs. James then was at the bottom a very good-natured woman, and the
moment she heard of Amelia’s misfortune was sincerely grieved at it.
She had acquiesced on the very first motion with the colonel’s design
of inviting her to her house; and this morning at breakfast, when he had
acquainted her that Amelia made some difficulty in accepting the offer,
very readily undertook to go herself and persuade her friend to accept
the invitation.
She now pressed this matter with such earnestness, that Amelia, who was
not extremely versed in the art of denying, was hardly able to refuse
her importunity; nothing, indeed, but her affection to Mrs. Atkinson
could have prevailed on her to refuse; that point, however, she would
not give up, and Mrs. James, at last, was contented with a promise that,
as soon as their affairs were settled, Amelia, with her husband and
family, would make her a visit, and stay some time with her in the
country, whither she was soon to retire.
Having obtained this promise, Mrs. James, after many very friendly
professions, took her leave, and, stepping into her coach, reassumed the
fine lady, and drove away to join her company at an auction.
The moment she was gone Mrs. Atkinson, who had left the room upon the
approach of Mrs. James, returned into it, and was informed by Amelia of
all that had past.
“Pray, madam,” said Mrs. Atkinson, “do this colonel and his lady live,
as it is called, well together?”
“If you mean to ask,” cries Amelia, “whether they are a very fond
couple, I must answer that I believe they are not.”
“I have been told,” says Mrs. Atkinson, “that there have been instances
of women who have become bawds to their own husbands, and the husbands
pimps for them.”
“Fie upon it!” cries Amelia. “I hope there are no such people. Indeed,
my dear, this is being a little too censorious.”
“Call it what you please,” answered Mrs. Atkinson; “it arises from my
love to you and my fears for your danger. You know the proverb of a
burnt child; and, if such a one hath any good-nature, it will dread the
fire on the account of others as well as on its own. And, if I may
speak my sentiments freely, I cannot think you will be in safety at this
colonel’s house.”
“I cannot but believe your apprehensions to be sincere,” replied Amelia;
“and I must think myself obliged to you for them; but I am convinced you
are entirely in an error. I look on Colonel James as the most generous
and best of men. He was a friend, and an excellent friend too, to my
husband, long before I was acquainted with him, and he hath done him a
thousand good offices. What do you say of his behaviour yesterday?”
“I wish,” cries Mrs. Atkinson, “that this behaviour to-day had been
equal. What I am now going to undertake is the most disagreeable office
of friendship, but it is a necessary one. I must tell you, therefore,
what past this morning between the colonel and Mr. Atkinson; for, though
it will hurt you, you ought, on many accounts, to know it.” Here she
related the whole, which we have recorded in the preceding chapter, and
with which the serjeant had acquainted her while Mrs. James was paying
her visit to Amelia. And, as the serjeant had painted the matter rather
in stronger colours than the colonel, so Mrs. Atkinson again a little
improved on the serjeant. Neither of these good people, perhaps,
intended to aggravate any circumstance; but such is, I believe, the
unavoidable consequence of all reports. Mrs. Atkinson, indeed, may be
supposed not to see what related to James in the most favourable light,
as the serjeant, with more honesty than prudence, had suggested to his
wife that the colonel had not the kindest opinion of her, and had called
her a sly and demure---: it is true he omitted ill-looking b---;
two words which are, perhaps, superior to the patience of any Job in
petticoats that ever lived. He made amends, however, by substituting
some other phrases in their stead, not extremely agreeable to a female
ear.
It appeared to Amelia, from Mrs. Atkinson’s relation, that the colonel
had grossly abused Booth to the serjeant, and had absolutely refused to
become his bail. Poor Amelia became a pale and motionless statue at
this account. At length she cried, “If this be true, I and mine are all,
indeed, undone. We have no comfort, no hope, no friend left. I cannot
disbelieve you. I know you would not deceive me. Why should you, indeed,
deceive me? But what can have caused this alteration since last night?
Did I say or do anything to offend him?”
“You said and did rather, I believe, a great deal too much to please
him,” answered Mrs. Atkinson. “Besides, he is not in the least offended
with you. On the contrary, he said many kind things.”
“What can my poor love have done?” said Amelia. “He hath not seen the
colonel since last night. Some villain hath set him against my husband;
he was once before suspicious of such a person. Some cruel monster hath
belied his innocence!”
“Pardon me, dear madam,” said Mrs. Atkinson; “I believe the person who
hath injured the captain with this friend of his is one of the worthiest
and best of creatures--nay, do not be surprized; the person I mean is
even your fair self: sure you would not be so dull in any other case;
but in this, gratitude, humility, modesty, every virtue, shuts your
eyes.
_Mortales hebetant visus,_
as Virgil says. What in the world can be more consistent than his
desire to have you at his own house and to keep your husband confined
in another? All that he said and all that he did yesterday, and, what is
more convincing to me than both, all that he looked last night, are very
consistent with both these designs.”
“O Heavens!” cries Amelia, “you chill my blood with horror! the idea
freezes me to death; I cannot, must not, will not think it. Nothing but
conviction! Heaven forbid I should ever have more conviction! And did he
abuse my husband? what? did he abuse a poor, unhappy, distrest creature,
opprest, ruined, torn from his children, torn away from his wretched
wife; the honestest, worthiest, noblest, tenderest, fondest, best--”
Here she burst into an agony of grief, which exceeds the power of
description.
In this situation Mrs. Atkinson was doing her utmost to support her
when a most violent knocking was heard at the door, and immediately the
serjeant ran hastily into the room, bringing with him a cordial which
presently relieved Amelia. What this cordial was, we shall inform the
reader in due time. In the mean while he must suspend his curiosity; and
the gentlemen at White’s may lay wagers whether it was Ward’s pill or Dr
James’s powder.
But before we close this chapter, and return back to the bailiff’s
house, we must do our best to rescue the character of our heroine from
the dulness of apprehension, which several of our quick-sighted readers
may lay more heavily to her charge than was done by her friend Mrs.
Atkinson.
I must inform, therefore, all such readers, that it is not because
innocence is more blind than guilt that the former often overlooks and
tumbles into the pit which the latter foresees and avoids. The truth is,
that it is almost impossible guilt should miss the discovering of all
the snares in its way, as it is constantly prying closely into every
corner in order to lay snares for others. Whereas innocence, having
no such purpose, walks fearlessly and carelessly through life, and is
consequently liable to tread on the gins which cunning hath laid to
entrap it. To speak plainly and without allegory or figure, it is
not want of sense, but want of suspicion, by which innocence is often
betrayed. Again, we often admire at the folly of the dupe, when we
should transfer our whole surprize to the astonishing guilt of the
betrayer. In a word, many an innocent person hath owed his ruin to this
circumstance alone, that the degree of villany was such as must have
exceeded the faith of every man who was not himself a villain.
Chapter x.
_In which are many profound secrets of philosophy._
Booth, having had enough of the author’s company the preceding day,
chose now another companion. Indeed the author was not very solicitous
of a second interview; for, as he could have no hope from Booth’s
pocket, so he was not likely to receive much increase to his vanity
from Booth’s conversation; for, low as this wretch was in virtue, sense,
learning, birth, and fortune, he was by no means low in his vanity. This
passion, indeed, was so high in him, and at the same time so blinded him
to his own demerits, that he hated every man who did not either flatter
him or give him money. In short, he claimed a strange kind of right,
either to cheat all his acquaintance of their praise or to pick their
pockets of their pence, in which latter case he himself repaid very
liberally with panegyric.
A very little specimen of such a fellow must have satisfied a man of Mr.
Booth’s temper. He chose, therefore, now to associate himself with that
gentleman of whom Bondum had given so shabby a character. In short, Mr.
Booth’s opinion of the bailiff was such, that he recommended a man most
where he least intended it. Nay, the bailiff in the present instance,
though he had drawn a malicious conclusion, honestly avowed that
this was drawn only from the poverty of the person, which is never, I
believe, any forcible disrecommendation to a good mind: but he must have
had a very bad mind indeed, who, in Mr. Booth’s circumstances, could
have disliked or despised another man because that other man was poor.
Some previous conversation having past between this gentleman and Booth,
in which they had both opened their several situations to each other,
the former, casting an affectionate look on the latter, exprest great
compassion for his circumstances, for which Booth, thanking him, said,
“You must have a great deal of compassion, and be a very good man, in
such a terrible situation as you describe yourself, to have any pity to
spare for other people.”
“My affairs, sir,” answered the gentleman, “are very bad, it is true,
and yet there is one circumstance which makes you appear to me more the
object of pity than I am to myself; and it is this--that you must from
your years be a novice in affliction, whereas I have served a long
apprenticeship to misery, and ought, by this time, to be a pretty good
master of my trade. To say the truth, I believe habit teaches men to
bear the burthens of the mind, as it inures them to bear heavy burthens
on their shoulders. Without use and experience, the strongest minds and
bodies both will stagger under a weight which habit might render easy
and even contemptible.”
“There is great justice,” cries Booth, “in the comparison; and I think
I have myself experienced the truth of it; for I am not that tyro in
affliction which you seem to apprehend me. And perhaps it is from the
very habit you mention that I am able to support my present misfortunes
a little like a man.”
The gentleman smiled at this, and cried, “Indeed, captain, you are a
young philosopher.”
“I think,” cries Booth, “I have some pretensions to that philosophy
which is taught by misfortunes, and you seem to be of opinion, sir, that
is one of the best schools of philosophy.”
“I mean no more, sir,” said the gentleman, “than that in the days of our
affliction we are inclined to think more seriously than in those seasons
of life when we are engaged in the hurrying pursuits of business or
pleasure, when we have neither leisure nor inclination to sift and
examine things to the bottom. Now there are two considerations which,
from my having long fixed my thoughts upon them, have greatly supported
me under all my afflictions. The one is the brevity of life even at its
longest duration, which the wisest of men hath compared to the short
dimension of a span. One of the Roman poets compares it to the duration
of a race; and another, to the much shorter transition of a wave.
“The second consideration is the uncertainty of it. Short as its utmost
limits are, it is far from being assured of reaching those limits. The
next day, the next hour, the next moment, may be the end of our course.
Now of what value is so uncertain, so precarious a station? This
consideration, indeed, however lightly it is passed over in our
conception, doth, in a great measure, level all fortunes and conditions,
and gives no man a right to triumph in the happiest state, or any reason
to repine in the most miserable. Would the most worldly men see this in
the light in which they examine all other matters, they would soon feel
and acknowledge the force of this way of reasoning; for which of them
would give any price for an estate from which they were liable to be
immediately ejected? or, would they not laugh at him as a madman who
accounted himself rich from such an uncertain possession? This is the
fountain, sir, from which I have drawn my philosophy. Hence it is that I
have learnt to look on all those things which are esteemed the blessings
of life, and those which are dreaded as its evils, with such a degree of
indifference that, as I should not be elated with possessing the former,
so neither am I greatly dejected and depressed by suffering the
latter. Is the actor esteemed happier to whose lot it falls to play the
principal part than he who plays the lowest? and yet the drama may run
twenty nights together, and by consequence may outlast our lives; but,
at the best, life is only a little longer drama, and the business of
the great stage is consequently a little more serious than that which
is performed at the Theatre-royal. But even here, the catastrophes and
calamities which are represented are capable of affecting us. The wisest
men can deceive themselves into feeling the distresses of a tragedy,
though they know them to be merely imaginary; and the children will
often lament them as realities: what wonder then, if these tragical
scenes which I allow to be a little more serious, should a little
more affect us? where then is the remedy but in the philosophy I have
mentioned, which, when once by a long course of meditation it is reduced
to a habit, teaches us to set a just value on everything, and cures
at once all eager wishes and abject fears, all violent joy and grief
concerning objects which cannot endure long, and may not exist a
moment.”
“You have exprest yourself extremely well,” cries Booth; “and I entirely
agree with the justice of your sentiments; but, however true all this
may be in theory, I still doubt its efficacy in practice. And the cause
of the difference between these two is this; that we reason from our
heads, but act from our hearts:
_---Video meliora, proboque;
Deteriora sequor._
Nothing can differ more widely than wise men and fools in their
estimation of things; but, as both act from their uppermost passion,
they both often act like. What comfort then can your philosophy give to
an avaricious man who is deprived of his riches or to an ambitious
man who is stript of his power? to the fond lover who is torn from his
mistress or to the tender husband who is dragged from his wife? Do you
really think that any meditations on the shortness of life will soothe
them in their afflictions? Is not this very shortness itself one
of their afflictions? and if the evil they suffer be a temporary
deprivation of what they love, will they not think their fate the
harder, and lament the more, that they are to lose any part of an
enjoyment to which there is so short and so uncertain a period?”
“I beg leave, sir,” said the gentleman, “to distinguish here. By
philosophy, I do not mean the bare knowledge of right and wrong, but an
energy, a habit, as Aristotle calls it; and this I do firmly believe,
with him and with the Stoics, is superior to all the attacks of
fortune.”
He was proceeding when the bailiff came in, and in a surly tone bad
them both good-morrow; after which he asked the philosopher if he was
prepared to go to Newgate; for that he must carry him thither that
afternoon.
The poor man seemed very much shocked with this news. “I hope,” cries
he, “you will give a little longer time, if not till the return of the
writ. But I beg you particularly not to carry me thither to-day, for I
expect my wife and children here in the evening.”
“I have nothing to do with wives and children,” cried the bailiff;
“I never desire to see any wives and children here. I like no such
company.”
“I intreat you,” said the prisoner, “give me another day. I shall take
it as a great obligation; and you will disappoint me in the cruellest
manner in the world if you refuse me.”
“I can’t help people’s disappointments,” cries the bailiff; “I must
consider myself and my own family. I know not where I shall be paid the
money that’s due already. I can’t afford to keep prisoners at my own
expense.”
“I don’t intend it shall be at your expense” cries the philosopher; “my
wife is gone to raise money this morning; and I hope to pay you all I
owe you at her arrival. But we intend to sup together to-night at your
house; and, if you should remove me now, it would be the most barbarous
disappointment to us both, and will make me the most miserable man
alive.”
“Nay, for my part,” said the bailiff, “I don’t desire to do anything
barbarous. I know how to treat gentlemen with civility as well as
another. And when people pay as they go, and spend their money like
gentlemen, I am sure nobody can accuse me of any incivility since I have
been in the office. And if you intend to be merry to-night I am not the
man that will prevent it. Though I say it, you may have as good a supper
drest here as at any tavern in town.”
“Since Mr. Bondum is so kind, captain,” said the philosopher, “I hope
for the favour of your company. I assure you, if it ever be my fortune
to go abroad into the world, I shall be proud of the honour of your
acquaintance.”
“Indeed, sir,” cries Booth, “it is an honour I shall be very ready
to accept; but as for this evening, I cannot help saying I hope to be
engaged in another place.”
“I promise you, sir,” answered the other, “I shall rejoice at your
liberty, though I am a loser by it.”
“Why, as to that matter,” cries Bondum with a sneer, “I fancy, captain,
you may engage yourself to the gentleman without any fear of breaking
your word; for I am very much mistaken if we part to-day.”
“Pardon me, my good friend,” said Booth, “but I expect my bail every
minute.”
“Lookee, sir,” cries Bondum, “I don’t love to see gentlemen in an error.
I shall not take the serjeant’s bail; and as for the colonel, I have
been with him myself this morning (for to be sure I love to do all I
can for gentlemen), and he told me he could not possibly be here to-day;
besides, why should I mince the matter? there is more stuff in the
office.”
“What do you mean by stuff?” cries Booth.
“I mean that there is another writ,” answered the bailiff, “at the
suit of Mrs. Ellison, the gentlewoman that was here yesterday; and the
attorney that was with her is concerned against you. Some officers would
not tell you all this; but I loves to shew civility to gentlemen while
they behave themselves as such. And I loves the gentlemen of the army in
particular. I had like to have been in the army myself once; but I liked
the commission I have better. Come, captain, let not your noble courage
be cast down; what say you to a glass of white wine, or a tiff of punch,
by way of whet?”
“I have told you, sir, I never drink in the morning,” cries Booth a
little peevishly.
“No offence I hope, sir,” said the bailiff; “I hope I have not treated
you with any incivility. I don’t ask any gentleman to call for liquor
in my house if he doth not chuse it; nor I don’t desire anybody to stay
here longer than they have a mind to. Newgate, to be sure, is the place
for all debtors that can’t find bail. I knows what civility is, and I
scorn to behave myself unbecoming a gentleman: but I’d have you consider
that the twenty-four hours appointed by act of parliament are almost
out; and so it is time to think of removing. As to bail, I would not
have you flatter yourself; for I knows very well there are other things
coming against you. Besides, the sum you are already charged with is
very large, and I must see you in a place of safety. My house is no
prison, though I lock up for a little time in it. Indeed, when gentlemen
are gentlemen, and likely to find bail, I don’t stand for a day or two;
but I have a good nose at a bit of carrion, captain; I have not carried
so much carrion to Newgate, without knowing the smell of it.”
“I understand not your cant,” cries Booth; “but I did not think to have
offended you so much by refusing to drink in a morning.”
“Offended me, sir!” cries the bailiff. “Who told you so? Do you think,
sir, if I want a glass of wine I am under any necessity of asking my
prisoners for it? Damn it, sir, I’ll shew you I scorn your words. I can
afford to treat you with a glass of the best wine in England, if you
comes to that.” He then pulled out a handful of guineas, saying, “There,
sir, they are all my own; I owe nobody a shilling. I am no beggar, nor
no debtor. I am the king’s officer as well as you, and I will spend
guinea for guinea as long as you please.”
“Harkee, rascal,” cries Booth, laying hold of the bailiff’s collar.
“How dare you treat me with this insolence? doth the law give you any
authority to insult me in my misfortunes?” At which words he gave the
bailiff a good shove, and threw him from him.
“Very well, sir,” cries the bailiff; “I will swear both an assault and
an attempt to a rescue. If officers are to be used in this manner, there
is an end of all law and justice. But, though I am not a match for you
myself, I have those below that are.” He then ran to the door and called
up two ill-looking fellows, his followers, whom, as soon as they entered
the room, he ordered to seize on Booth, declaring he would immediately
carry him to Newgate; at the same time pouring out a vast quantity of
abuse, below the dignity of history to record.
Booth desired the two dirty fellows to stand off, and declared he would
make no resistance; at the same time bidding the bailiff carry him
wherever he durst.
“I’ll shew you what I dare,” cries the bailiff; and again ordered the
followers to lay hold of their prisoner, saying, “He has assaulted me
already, and endeavoured a rescue. I shan’t trust such a fellow to walk
at liberty. A gentleman, indeed! ay, ay, Newgate is the properest place
for such gentry; as arrant carrion as ever was carried thither.”
The fellows then both laid violent hands on Booth, and the bailiff stept
to the door to order a coach; when, on a sudden, the whole scene was
changed in an instant; for now the serjeant came running out of breath
into the room; and, seeing his friend the captain roughly handled by two
ill-looking fellows, without asking any questions stept briskly up to
his assistance, and instantly gave one of the assailants so violent a
salute with his fist, that he directly measured his length on the floor.
Booth, having by this means his right arm at liberty, was unwilling to
be idle, or entirely to owe his rescue from both the ruffians to the
serjeant; he therefore imitated the example which his friend had
set him, and with a lusty blow levelled the other follower with his
companion on the ground.
The bailiff roared out, “A rescue, a rescue!” to which the serjeant
answered there was no rescue intended. “The captain,” said he, “wants
no rescue. Here are some friends coming who will deliver him in a better
manner.”
The bailiff swore heartily he would carry him to Newgate in spite of all
the friends in the world.
“You carry him to Newgate!” cried the serjeant, with the highest
indignation. “Offer but to lay your hands on him, and I will knock your
teeth down your ugly jaws.” Then, turning to Booth, he cried, “They will
be all here within a minute, sir; we had much ado to keep my lady from
coming herself; but she is at home in good health, longing to see your
honour; and I hope you will be with her within this half-hour.”
And now three gentlemen entered the room; these were an attorney, the
person whom the serjeant had procured in the morning to be his bail with
Colonel James, and lastly Doctor Harrison himself.
The bailiff no sooner saw the attorney, with whom he was well acquainted
(for the others he knew not), than he began, as the phrase is, to pull
in his horns, and ordered the two followers, who were now got again on
their legs, to walk down-stairs.
“So, captain,” says the doctor, “when last we parted, I believe we
neither of us expected to meet in such a place as this.”
“Indeed, doctor,” cries Booth, “I did not expect to have been sent
hither by the gentleman who did me that favour.”
“How so, sir?” said the doctor; “you was sent hither by some person, I
suppose, to whom you was indebted. This is the usual place, I apprehend,
for creditors to send their debtors to. But you ought to be more
surprized that the gentleman who sent you hither is come to release you.
Mr. Murphy, you will perform all the necessary ceremonials.”
The attorney then asked the bailiff with how many actions Booth was
charged, and was informed there were five besides the doctor’s, which
was much the heaviest of all. Proper bonds were presently provided, and
the doctor and the serjeant’s friend signed them; the bailiff, at the
instance of the attorney, making no objection to the bail.
[Illustration: _Lawyer Murphy_]
Booth, we may be assured, made a handsome speech to the doctor for such
extraordinary friendship, with which, however, we do not think proper
to trouble the reader; and now everything being ended, and the company
ready to depart, the bailiff stepped up to Booth, and told him he hoped
he would remember civility-money.
“I believe” cries Booth, “you mean incivility-money; if there are any
fees due for rudeness, I must own you have a very just claim.”
“I am sure, sir,” cries the bailiff, “I have treated your honour with
all the respect in the world; no man, I am sure, can charge me with
using a gentleman rudely. I knows what belongs to a gentleman better;
but you can’t deny that two of my men have been knocked down; and I
doubt not but, as you are a gentleman, you will give them something to
drink.”
Booth was about to answer with some passion, when the attorney
interfered, and whispered in his ear that it was usual to make a
compliment to the officer, and that he had better comply with the
custom.
“If the fellow had treated me civilly,” answered Booth, “I should have
had no objection to comply with a bad custom in his favour; but I am
resolved I will never reward a man for using me ill; and I will not
agree to give him a single farthing.”
“‘Tis very well, sir,” said the bailiff; “I am rightly served for my
good-nature; but, if it had been to do again, I would have taken care
you should not have been bailed this day.”
Doctor Harrison, to whom Booth referred the cause, after giving him a
succinct account of what had passed, declared the captain to be in the
right. He said it was a most horrid imposition that such fellows were
ever suffered to prey on the necessitous; but that the example would be
much worse to reward them where they had behaved themselves ill. “And I
think,” says he, “the bailiff is worthy of great rebuke for what he hath
just now said; in which I hope he hath boasted of more power than is in
him. We do, indeed, with great justice and propriety value ourselves
on our freedom if the liberty of the subject depends on the pleasure of
such fellows as these!”
“It is not so neither altogether,” cries the lawyer; “but custom hath
established a present or fee to them at the delivery of a prisoner,
which they call civility-money, and expect as in a manner their due,
though in reality they have no right.”
“But will any man,” cries Doctor Harrison, “after what the captain hath
told us, say that the bailiff hath behaved himself as he ought; and,
if he had, is he to be rewarded for not acting in an unchristian and
inhuman manner? it is pity that, instead of a custom of feeing them
out of the pockets of the poor and wretched, when they do not behave
themselves ill, there was not both a law and a practice to punish them
severely when they do. In the present case, I am so far from agreeing to
give the bailiff a shilling, that, if there be any method of punishing
him for his rudeness, I shall be heartily glad to see it put in
execution; for there are none whose conduct should be so strictly
watched as that of these necessary evils in the society, as their office
concerns for the most part those poor creatures who cannot do themselves
justice, and as they are generally the worst of men who undertake it.”
The bailiff then quitted the room, muttering that he should know better
what to do another time; and shortly after, Booth and his friends left
the house; but, as they were going out, the author took Doctor Harrison
aside, and slipt a receipt into his hand, which the doctor returned,
saying, he never subscribed when he neither knew the work nor the
author; but that, if he would call at his lodgings, he would be very
willing to give all the encouragement to merit which was in his power.
The author took down the doctor’s name and direction, and made him as
many bows as he would have done had he carried off the half-guinea for
which he had been fishing.
Mr. Booth then took his leave of the philosopher, and departed with the
rest of his friends.
END OF VOL. II.
VOL. III.