gentry, who _every morning_ offend my feelings--in their cruel parade
through Charles Street, to and from market:--they vend potatoes
in the day--and thieve in the night season.--A tall lazy villian
was bestriding his poor beast (although loaded with two panniers
of potatoes at the same time), and another of his companions was
good-naturedly employed in whipping the poor sinking animal--that the
gentleman-rider might enjoy the two-fold pleasure of blasphemy and
cruelty:--this is a too common evil--and, for the honor of rationality,
calls loudly for redress.--I do believe it might be in some measure
amended--either by a hint in the papers, of the utility of impressing
such vagrants for the king’s service--or by laying a heavy tax upon
the poor Jack-asses.--I prefer the former, both for thy sake and
mine:--and, as I am convinced we feel instinctively the injuries of our
_fellow creatures_; I do insist upon your exercising your talents in
behalf of the honest sufferers.--I ever had a kind of sympathetic (call
it what you please) for that animal--_and do I not love you?_--Before
Sterne had wrote them into respect, I had a friendship for them--and
many a civil greeting have I given them at casual meetings:--what has
ever (with me) stamped a kind of uncommon value and dignity upon the
long-ear’d kind of the species, is that our Blessed Saviour, in his
day of worldly triumph, chose to use that in preference to the rest
of his own blessed creation--“meek and lowly, riding upon an ass.” I
am convinced that the general inhumanity of mankind proceeds--first,
from the cursed false principle of common education;--and, secondly,
from a total indifference (if not disbelief) of the Christian
faith;--a heart and mind impressed with a firm belief of the Christian
tenets, must of course exercise itself in a constant uniform general
philanthropy:--such a being carries his heaven in his breast!--and such
be thou! therefore write me a bitter Philippick against the misusers of
Jack-asses;--it shall honor a column in the Morning Post--and I will
bray--bray my thanks to you:--thou shalt figure away the champion of
poor friendless asses here--and hereafter shalt not be ashamed in the
great day of retribution.
Mrs. Sancho would send you some tamarinds.--I know not her reasons;--as
I hate contentions, I contradicted not--but shrewdly suspect she
thinks you want cooling.--Do you hear, Sir? send me some more good
news about your head.--Your letters will not be the less welcome for
talking about J---- M----; but pray do not let vanity so master
your judgement--to fancy yourself upon a footing with George for
well looking:--if you were indeed a proof-sheet--you was marred in
the taking-off--for George (ask the girls) is certainly the fairest
impression.
I had an order from Mr. H---- on Thursday night to see him do
Falstaff;--I put some money to it, and took Mary and Betsy with me:--it
was Betty’s first affair--and she enjoyed it in truth--H----’s Falstaff
is entirely original--and I think as great as his Shylock;--he kept the
house in a continual roar of laughter:--in some things he falls short
of Quin--in many I think him equal.--When I saw Quin play, he was at
the height of his art, with thirty years judgement to guide him. H----,
in seven years more, will be all that better--and confessedly the first
man on the English stage, or I am much mistaken.
I am reading a little pamphlet, which I much like: it favours an
opinion which I have long indulged--which is the improbability
of eternal Damnation--a thought which almost petrifies one--and,
in my opinion, derogatory to the fullness, glory, and benefit
of the blessed expiation of the Son of the Most High God--who
died for the sins of all--all--Jew, Turk, Infidel, and
Heretic;--fair--sallow--brown--tawney--black--and you--and I--and every
son and daughter of Adam.--You must find eyes to read this book--head
and heart--with a quickness of conception thou enjoyest--with
many--many advantages--which have the love--and envy almost of yours,
I. SANCHO.
Respects in folio to Mrs. H----.
LETTER XLIX.
TO MR. R----.
August 27, 1777.
DEAR FRIEND,
WHETHER this finds your officially parading on Newmarket turfs--or
in the happier society of the good geniuses of B---- house--may it
find you well--in good joyous spirits--gay, debonnair--happy at
heart--happy as I have seen my meaning expressed in the countenance
of my friend Mrs. C----, where humanity--humility--and goodwill--have
outshone beauty--in one of the finest faces of your country--but this
between ourselves;--and pray how does the aforesaid lady do?--does she
ride, walk, and dance, with moderation?--and can you tell me that she
continues as well as when she first went down--and still finds good
from her western expedition?--And the little Syren Miss C----?--Have
there no letters, sent by Cupid’s post, sticking on the arrow’s point,
been picked up about your grounds, blown by western breezes across the
country?--Tell her nothing can ever hurt her but Love and Time.--May
Love bring her happiness, and Time honour!--As to wealth--may she
have no more than she can manage with comfort and credit!--Monsieur
L----’s letter is a good one--and I think it would make one laugh
even in the gout.--God bless this old boy--for he is a true type of
beggarly pride--cunning--narrow-hearted--vain and mean--one of Satan’s
dupes--who do his dirty work for a little worldly trash--and cheat
themselves at last.--I know a man who delights to make every one he
can happy--that same man treated some honest girls with expences for
a Vauxhall evening.--If you should happen to know him--you may tell
him from me--that last night--three great girls--a boy--and a fat old
fellow--were as happy and pleas’d as a fine evening--fine place--good
songs--much company--and good music--could make them.--Heaven and
Earth!--how happy, how delighted, were the girls!--Oh! the pleasures
of novelty to youth!--We went by water--had a coach home--were gazed
at--followed, &c. &c.--but not much abused.--I must break off before I
have half finished--for Mr. ---- is just come in--you are not the first
good friend that has been neglected for a fop.
IGN. SANCHO.
LETTER L.
TO MR. M----.
September 3, 1777.
I FEEL it long since I heard from you--very long since I saw you--and
three or four days back had some notion, I should never, in this paltry
world, see thee again--but (thanks to the Father of Mercies!) I am
better, and have a higher relish of health and ease, from contrasting
the blessings with the pains I have endured.--Would to God you could
say that your dizzy dismal headachs were flown to the moon, or
embarked for Lapland--there to be tied up in a witch’s bag--and sold to
Beelzebub with a cargo of bad winds--religious quarrels--politics--my
gout--and our American grievances!--But what are you about in your last
(where you dropt the candid friend and assumed the flatterer)?--You
hinted as if there was a chance of seeing you in Charles Street: I wish
it much.--My friend, I have had a week’s gout in my hand, which was
by much too hard for my philosophy.--I am convinced, let the Stoics
say what they list--that pain is an evil;--in short, I was wishing for
death--and little removed from madness--but (thank Heaven)! I am much
better--my spirits will be mended if I hear from you--better still to
see you.--I find it painful to write much, and learn that two hands
are as necessary in writing as eating.--You see I write, like a lady,
from one corner of the paper to the other.--My respects--and love--and
admiration--and compliments--to Mrs. ----, and Mrs. and Miss ----. Tell
M----l, he kept his word in calling to see us before he left town!--I
hope--confound the ink!--what a blot! Now don’t you dare suppose I was
in fault--no, Sir, the pen was disabled--the paper worse--there was a
concatenation of ill-sorted chances--all--all--coincided to contribute
to that fatal blot--which has so disarranged my ideas--that I must
perforce finish before I had half disburthened my head and heart:--but
is N---- a good girl?--and how does my honest George do? Tell Mrs.
H---- what you please in the handsome way of me.--Farewell, I will
write no more nonsense this night--that’s flat.
IGN. SANCHO.
How do you like the print:--Mr. D---- says, and his wife says the
same--that you are exceedingly clever--and they shall be happy
to do any thing which is produced by the same hand which did the
original--and if Mr. D---- can be of any service to you in the
etching--you may command him when you please.
LETTER LI.
TO MR. M----.
September 16, 1777.
SIR, he is the confounded’st dunderhead--sapscull--looby--clodpate,
nincompoop--ninnyhammer--booby-chick--farcical--loungibuss--
blunderbuss--this good day in the three kingdoms!--You would
bless yourself, were it possible for you to analyze such a being--not
but his heart is susceptible of a kind of friendly warmth--but then
so cursed careless--ever in a hurry--ever in the wrong, at best but
blundering about the right.--Why now, for example, when you sent
the ----, I can make oath, if need be--that the dunce I speak of
longed more for a letter than the animal. The basket was searched
with hurry--not care;--no letter? well, it can’t be help’d--his head
ach’d--he had not time, &c. &c.--the P---- was disengaged from the
basket--the straw consigned to the chimney:--this being rather a
coolish morning, a little fire was thought necessary--and in raking
up the loose dirty waste stuff under the grate, there appeared a
very bloody letter, which seemed unopened:--your hand-writing was
discernible through the dirt and blood;--curiosity and affection ran
a race to pick up and examine it--when, behold, it proved to be the
companion of the P----, but so effaced with blood--that very--very
little of my friend’s good sense could be made out.--Your poor letter
is a type of what daily happens--merit oppressed and smothered by
rubbish.--Alas, poor letter! it shared the fate the poor world, which
we inhabit, will hereafter undergo:--one bright gleam of imitation
of the mind that dictated it--some few sparks.--Alas! alas! my poor
letter--pass but a few years--perhaps a few months--thy generous
friendly compost may--thy friend whose heart glows while he writes--who
feels thy worth--yea, and reveres it too.--Nonsense, why we know the
very hinges of our last cradles will rust and moulder;--and that,
in the course of another century, neither flesh, bone, coffin, nor
nail--will be dicernible from mother earth.--Courage--while we live,
let us live--to Virtue--Friendship--Religion--Charity--then drop (at
death’s call) our cumbrous (you are thin) load of flesh, and mount
in spirit to our native home.--Bless us, at what a rate have I been
travelling!--I am quite out of breath--Why! my friend, the business
was to thank you for the pig.--Had you seen the group of heads--aye,
and wise ones too--that assembled at the opening of the fardel--the
exclamations--Oh! the finest--fattest--cleanest--why, Sir, it was a
pig of pigs;--the pettitoes gave us a good supper last night--they
were well dressed--and your pig was well eat--it dined us Sunday and
Monday.--Now, to say truth, I do not love pig--merely pig--I like
not--but pork corned--alias--salted--either roast or boiled--I will eat
against any filthy Jew naturalized--or under the bann.--On Saturday
night the newsman brought me two papers of J---- 13th and 20th;--right
joyful did I receive them:--I ran to Mrs. Sancho--with, I beg you
will read my friend’s sensible and spirited defence of--of, &c.--She
read--though it broke in upon her work--she approved;--but chance or
fortune--or ill-luck--or what you ever mean by accident--has
played us a confounded trick;--for since Saturday they have--both
papers--disappeared--without hands--or legs--or eyes--for no one has seen
them;--bureau--boxes--cupboards--drawers--parlour--chamber--shop--all--all
has been rummaged--pockets--port-folio--holes--corners--all been
searched;--Did you see them?--did you?--where can they be?--I know
not--nor I--nor I--but God does!--Omnipotence knoweth all things.--It
has vexed me--fretted dame Sancho--teazed the children--but so it
is;--hereafter I suppose they will be found in some obvious (though now
unthought of) place, and then it will be, Good Lord, who could have
thought it!
Where is the _Jack-ass_ business?--do not be lazy--I feel myself a
party concerned--and when I see you, I have a delicious morsel of true
feminine grace and generosity to shew you.--I shall not apologize for
this crude epistle;--but mark and remark--I do thank you in the name
of every Sancho but self--they eat, and were filled;--I have reason to
thank you;--but as I do not affect pig--in a piggish sense--I hold
myself excepted;--and, although I did eat--and did also commend, yet I
will not thank you, that’s poss.
I. SANCHO.
The papers are found, as you will see:--here is one and a piece; it has
suffered through ignorance;--but what cannot be cured, must be endured.
LETTER LII.
TO MR. R.----.
September 17, 1777.
MY RESPECTED FRIEND,
I FEEL myself guilty of an unmannerly neglect, in delaying to give my
good Mrs. C---- some account of the little commissions she honoured
me with.--You must exert your friendly influence, in making my peace
with her;--not but that I well know mercy has the blest preponderancy
in her scale--nor can kindness or mercy be lodged in a fairer
breast;--in faith, I am scarce half alive;--yet what really is alive
about me--hungers to hear news from B----: first, how Mrs. C---- got
down--and her good companion;--how her health is: tell her, I hope
she left all her pains behind her;--if so, I believe I have taken
possession of them all. Alas, my friend, I never was but half so bad
before;--both feet knocked up at once; plenty of excruciating pains,
and a great lack of patience.--Mrs. Sancho has had a blessed week of
it;--for my companion did not contribute much to the sweetening my
temper--it was the washing-week, which you know made it a full chance
and half better.--she was forced to break sugar, and attend shop.--God
bless her, and reward her!--she is good--good in heart--good in
principle--good by habit--good by Heaven! God forgive me, I had almost
sworn.--Tell me how the ladies got down--how they do; and what they
do;--how you do;--and how ---- feels, now the broom is hung on his door
top.--The certainty that B---- and his connexions are all alive and
merry--will be a cure for my gout--and thou shalt be sole doctor, as
well as first friend, to thy ever obliged true friend.
I. SANCHO.
LETTER LIII.
TO MR. M----.
September 20, 1777.
“What Reason warrants, and what Wisdom guides,
“All else is tow’ring frenzy, or rank folly.”
SO says Addison--
--And so well knoweth my friend I. M----. Well, and what then? why
it follows of course--that, instead of feeling myself delighted and
gratefully thankful, for--I will and must speak out--yet if these
kindnesses cost the pocket of my friend--they are not kindnesses
to the Sanchos.--For innate goodness of heart--greatness of
spirit--urbanity--humanity--temperance--justice--with the whole sweet
list of heaven-born manly virtues--I do, without flattery, give thee
(and with pride do I avouch it) credit--I respect thy person, and
love thy principles;--but, my good M----, there is a prior duty--which
I dare believe you will never willingly be deficient in--and yet
your generosity of soul may let even such a worm as I break into
it;--now, that should not be--for--take me right--I do not mean any
thing derogatory to your rank in the world--or to the strength of your
finances--what Sterne said of himself that think I of you--that you
are as good a gentleman as the King--but not quite so rich.--I honor
thy feelings--and am happy that I can honestly say, that I conceive
them;--the joy of giving and making happy is almost the attribute of a
God--and there is as much sweetness conveyed to the senses by doing a
right well-natured deed, as our frame can consistently bear--_So much
for chastisement--a pretty way of thanking!_--Well, I have critically
examined thy song--some parts I like well--as it is a maidenhead, it
should be gently treated--But why N---- Oh! Nature! A true passion
is jealous even of the initials of its mistress’s name.--Well, N----
let it be--I will certainly attempt giving it a tune--such as I
can--the first leisure--but it must undergo some little pruning
when we meet.--I have had another little visit from the gout--and
my hand yet remembers the rough salute; my spirits have been rather
low.--Young’s ninth night, the Consolation, has been my last week’s
study. It is almost divine;--how many times has it raised, warmed, and
charmed me!--and is still new. I hope you found your mother and honest
George as well as you wished--and had the full enjoyment of maternal
and filial affections.--The girls are rampant-well--and Billy gains
something every day.--The rogue is to excess fond of me--for which I
pity him--and myself more.--My respects and kind enquiry to your old
horse.--Tell him, I wish him better--and am a real friend to honest
brutes--some I could almost envy.--To say I am rejoiced to hear you
are better, is telling you no news--be but as well as I wish you--as
rich--and as good--Sampson, Solomon, and the Duke de Penthievre, will
never be comparisons more.--Adieu.
Yours, &c.
I. SANCHO.
I am as melancholy--as a tea-kettle when it sings (as the maidens calls
it) over a dead fire.
Oh!--but is it N---- indeed?--now don’t you be after humming me;
believe me, honey--if I never find out the truth, I shall know it for
all that.
LETTER LIV.
TO MR. S----.
October 24, 1777.
I DENY it. That I ought to have acknowledged your favour two weeks ago
I confess--but my silence was not so long--nor broad--nor rusty--nor
fusty as yours.--Blithe health--festive hours--and social mirth--be
thine, my friend! Thy letter, though late, was truly welcome--it
unbended the brow of care--and suspended, for some hours, disagreeable
thoughts.----By St. Radagunda! quoth I--(ramming my nostrils with
Hardham) he has catched the mantle.--Alas, poor Yorick! oh! that thou
hadst, by divine permission, been suffered a little--little longer,
amongst the moonstruck children of this namby-pamby world! Father of
light and life! thy will be done;--but surely--half the wit--half the
good sense--of this present age--were interred in Sterne’s grave. His
broad philanthropy--like the soul-cheering rays of the blessed sun,
invested his happy spirit, and soared into Heaven with it--where, in
progressive rise from bliss to bliss, he drinks in large draughts of
rapture, love, and knowledge, and chants the praises of redeeming love,
with joy unbounded, and unceasing vigour.--Your invocation has mounted
me, Merry-Andrew like, upon stilts.--I ape you as monkeys ape men, by
walking upon two.--That you have recovered the true tone of your health
and spirits, I rejoice--to be happy in despight of fortune, shews the
Philosopher--the Hero--the Christian. I must confess, my fortitude
(which is wove of very flimsy materials) too oft gives way in the
rough and unfriendly jostles of life:--Madam Fortune, who by the way
is a bunter (and such I love not), has been particularly cross and
untoward to me since you left us. They say she is fond of fools--’tis
false and scandalous--she hates me--and I have the vanity to say and
believe--that if folly, sheer folly, had any charms--I should stand
as fair in her esteem--as A. B. C. D. E. F.--or any of Folly’s family
through the whole alphabet.--You halted at Burleigh--you did just
what I wished you to do--and left it, I trust, as well in health as
you entered that sweet mansion--stopp’d at Retford--and found your
venerable parents well--and contributed to their happiness--increased
their felicity by the many nice little attentions of filial love--which
the good heart delights in--and even angels approve.--And how do the
worthy souls of Hull and its environs?--Do they credit themselves
by esteeming a good-enough kind of mortal?--You cannot imagine what
hold little Billy gets of me--he grows--prattles--and every day
learns something new--and by his good-will would be ever in the
shop with me. The monkey! he clings round my legs--and if I chide
him or look sour--he holds up his little mouth to kiss me;--I know
I am the fool--for parent’s weakness is child’s strength:--truth
orthodox--which will hold good between lover and lovee--as well as
- - - - - - - - - - - - - -. Mrs. Sancho and her virgins are so, so.
Mr. Sancho, the virgins, well as youth and innocence, souls void of
care and consciences of offence, can be.--Dame Sancho would be better
if she cared less.--I am her barometer--if a sigh escapes me, it is
answered by a tear in her eye;--I oft assume a gaiety to illume her
dear sensibility with a smile--which twenty years ago almost bewitched
me;--and _mark_!--after twenty years enjoyment--constitutes my highest
pleasure!--Such be your lot--with a competency--such as will make
œconomy a pleasant acquaintance--temperance and exercise your chief
physician--and the virtues of benevolence your daily employ--your
pleasure and reward! And what more can friendship wish you?--but to
glide down the stream of time--blest with a partner of congenial
principles, and fine feelings--true feminine eloquence--whose very
looks speak tenderness and sentiment.--Your infants growing--with the
roseate bloom of health--minds cultured by their father--expanding
daily in every improvement--blest little souls!--and happy--happy
parents!--such be thy lot in life--in marriage;--but take a virgin--or
a maiden--to thy arms;--but--be that as thy fate wills it.--Now
for news.--Two hours ago (in tolerable health and cheary spirits)
considering his journey not so fatigued as might be expected--followed
by four superb carriages--their Royal Highnesses the Duke and Dutchess
of Gloucester arrived in town. As to America, if you know any thing
at Hull, you know more than is known in London.--Samuel Foote, Esq;
is dead--a leg was buried some years since--and now the whole _foote_
follows.--I think you love a pun.--Colman is the gainer, as he
covenanted to give him 1600_l._ _per annum_, for his patent;--in short,
Colman is happy in the bargain--and I trust Foote is no loser.--I have
seen poor Mr. de Groote but once--and then could not attend to speak
with him, as I had customers in the shop.--I waited by appointment for
Mr. ----, to get your honor’s address--and then three weeks before I
could get the franks--a fortnight since for Mr. ---- writing to you--I
call this a string of beggarly apologies.--I told M---- you expected a
line from him--he wanted faith.--I made him read your letter--and what
then? “truly he was not capable--he had no classical education--you
write with elegance--ease--propriety.”----Tut, quoth I, pr’ythee give
not the reins to pride--write as I do--just the effusions of a warm
though foolish heart:--friendship will cast a veil of kindness over thy
blunders--they will be accepted with a complacent smile--and read with
the same eye of kindness which indulges now the errors of his sincere
friend,
IGN. SANCHO.
A true Genius will always remember to leave a space unwritten--to come
in contact with the wax or wafer--by which means the reader escapes
half an hour’s puzzle to make out a sentence;--and ever while you
live--never omit--no--not that--what?--what!--dates! dates!--am not I a
grocer?----Pun the Second.
LETTER LV.
TO MRS. C----.
Charles Street, Nov. 5, 1777.
NOW, whether to address--according to the distant, reserved, cold,
mechanical forms of high-breeding--where polished manners, like a horse
from the manage, prances fantastic--and, shackled with the rules of
art, proudly despises simple nature;--or shall I, like the patient,
honest, sober, long-ear’d animal, take plain Nature’s path, and address
you according to my feelings?--My dear friend--you wanted to know the
reason I had never addressed a line to you;--the plain and honest truth
is, I thought writing _at_--was better than writing _to_ you;--that’s
one reason:--now a second reason is--I know my own weakness too well to
encounter with your little friend--whom I fear as a critic--and envy
as a writer:--another reason is--a case of conscience--which some time
or other you may have explained:--reason the fourth--a secret--and so
must be--till the blessed year 1797;--and then, if you will deign
to converse with an old friend--you shall know all.--Kitty sends her
respects to Nutts--and her duty to her godmother.--Billy looks wisely
by turns--and will speak for himself--if you should ever come to town
again.--The girls all improve in appetite. Mrs. Sancho is tolerably
well--and I am yours very seriously,
I. SANCHO.