Theodore Edward Hook was born in Charlotte Street, Bedford Square, on
the 22d of September, 1788. His father was an eminent musical composer,
who "enjoyed in his time success and celebrity"; his elder brother James
became Dean of Windsor, whose son is the present learned and eloquent
Dean of Chichester; the mother of both was an accomplished lady, and
also an author.
His natural talent, therefore, was early nursed. Unfortunately, the
green-room was the too frequent study of the youth; for his father's
fame and income were chiefly derived from the composition of operetta
songs, for which Theodore usually wrote the libretti. When little more
than a boy he had produced perhaps thirty farces, and in 1808 gave birth
to a novel. Those who remember the two great actors of a long period,
Mathews and Liston, will be at no loss to comprehend the popularity of
Hook's farces: for they were his "props."
In 1812, when his finances were low, and the chances of increasing them
limited, and when, perhaps, also, his constitution had been tried by
"excesses," he received the appointment of Accountant-General and
Treasurer at the Mauritius,--a post with an income of two thousand
pounds a year. Hook seems to have derived his qualifications for this
office from his antipathy to arithmetic and his utter unfitness for
business.
The result might have been easily foreseen. In 1819 he returned to
England: the cause may be indicated by his very famous pun, when, the
Governor of the Cape having expressed a hope that he was not returning
because of ill health, he was "sorry to say they think there is
something wrong in the _chest_." He was found guilty of owing twelve
thousand pounds to the Government: yet he was "without a shilling in his
pocket." If public funds had been abstracted, he was none the richer,
and there was certainly no suspicion that the money had been dishonestly
advantageous to him.
Although kept for years in hot water, battling with the Treasury, it was
not until 1823 that the penalty was exacted,--sometime after the "John
Bull" had made him a host of enemies. Of course, as he could not pay in
purse, he was doomed to "pay in person." After spending some months
"pleasantly" at a dreary sponging-house in Shoe Lane, where there was
ever "an agreeable prospect, _barring_ the windows," he was removed to
the "Rules of the Bench," residing there a year, being discharged from
custody in 1825.
Hook, while in the Rules, was under very little restraint; he was almost
as much in society as ever, taking special care not to be seen by any of
his creditors, who might have pounced upon him and made the Marshal
responsible for the debt. The danger was less in Hook's case than in
that of others, for his principal "detaining creditor" was the King. I
remember his telling me, that, during his "confinement" in the Rules, he
made the acquaintance of a gentleman, who, while a prisoner there, paid
a visit to India. The story is this. The gentleman called one morning on
the Marshal, who said,--
"Mr. ----, I have not had the pleasure to see you for a long time."
"No wonder," was the answer; "for since you saw me last I have been to
India."