THE SHIFTS OF IMPECUNIOSITY.
In 1748 there resided in the wilds of Connaught a lady named Gunning, of
whom little is known but that before her marriage she was the Hon. Bridget
Bourke, and that after it she became the mother of two exquisitely
beautiful daughters, destined to make such a stir in Society, as was
unknown before, and has been unequalled since. Before they left Dublin
they were invited to some brilliant festivities at the Castle, which were
on a scale of magnificence unequalled, it is said, in the memory of the
oldest courtier. To such an entertainment Mrs. Gunning was anxious to
introduce her daughters, for their faces were literally their fortunes;
but the overwhelming difficulty of dress presented itself. They had
nothing that by any amount of manipulation could be transformed into Court
costumes, so in her difficulty Mrs. Gunning obtained an introduction to
Tom Sheridan, who was then managing the Dublin Theatre. He was struck by
the beauty and grace of the girls, placed the wardrobe of the theatre at
their disposal; and by lending them the dresses of Lady Macbeth and
Juliet, in which they appeared most lovely, enabled them to obtain the
_entree_ to that aristocratic circle in which they afterwards shone so
brilliantly. In addition to providing the necessary garments for the great
event Tom Sheridan is credited with superintending the finishing touches
of their toilets, for which it is said he claimed a kiss from each as his
reward. These beautiful creatures were at one time in even greater straits
for funds.
Miss Bellamy, the actress, asserts that she once found Mrs. Gunning and
her children in the greatest distress, with bailiffs in the house and the
family threatened with immediate eviction. With the assistance of her
man-servant, who stood under the windows of the house at night, after the
bailiffs were admitted, everything that could be carried away, was
removed. But for this and other help the Gunnings were not grateful.
Indeed, in the case of the Countess of Coventry who had borrowed money
from Miss Bellamy, presumably for her wedding _trousseau_, the monetary
obligation was repaid by unpardonable insult. One night when this actress
was playing Juliet, and had just arrived at the most impressive part of
the tragedy, the countess, who occupied the stage-box, uttered a loud
laugh. Miss Bellamy was so overcome by the interruption that she was
obliged to leave the stage, and when Lady Coventry was remonstrated with,
she replied that "since she had seen Mrs. Cibber act Juliet she could not
_endure_ Miss Bellamy." When they came to London in the autumn of 1751 the
fashionable world went mad after "the beautiful Miss Gunnings," who were
positively mobbed in the Park and elsewhere, and were compelled on one
occasion to obtain the protection of a file of the Guards. When they
travelled in the country the roads were lined with people anxious to catch
a glimpse of their lovely faces; and hundreds of people were known to
remain all night outside an inn at which they were staying, in order to
behold them in the morning.
Not many months after their _debut_ in London, the Duke of Hamilton, owner
of three dukedoms in Scotland, England, and France, and regarded as the
haughtiest man in the kingdom, became deeply enamoured of the younger
sister, and was married to her at Mayfair Chapel one night at half-past
twelve o'clock, the suddenness of the ceremony compelling the divine who
performed the service to make use of a ring from a bed-curtain.
The elder sister, became Countess of Coventry in the following March, and
was then acknowledged as leader of fashion in the metropolis, although
from the seclusion in which the early part of her life had been spent in
Ireland, she was little fitted, so far as accomplishments were concerned,
to hold that post. Her reign was brief as it was brilliant. In 1759 her
health completely broke down, and she died in October 1760, of
consumption, the result of artificial aids to beauty, which in her case
were utterly unnecessary.
Curran, the advocate and wit, experienced vicissitudes almost as
startling. He was born at Newmarket, County Cork, in 1750, and describes
himself as "a little ragged apprentice to every kind of idleness and
mischief, all day studying whatever was eccentric in those older, and
half the night practising it for the amusement of those who were younger
than myself. One morning I was playing at marbles in the village ball
alley, with a light heart and a lighter pocket. The gibe, and the jest,
and the plunder, went gaily round. Those who won laughed, and those who
lost cheated, when suddenly there appeared amongst us a stranger of a very
venerable and cheerful aspect. His intrusion was not the least restraint
upon our merry little assemblage; he was a benevolent creature, and the
days of infancy (after all, the happiest we shall ever see) perhaps rose
upon his memory. God bless him! I see his fine form, at the distance of
half a century, just as he stood before me in the little ball alley in the
days of my childhood. His name was Boyse; he was the rector of Newmarket.
To me he took a particular fancy.... Some sweetmeats easily bribed me home
with him. I learned from poor Boyse my alphabet, and my grammar, and the
rudiments of the classics: he taught me all he could, and then he sent me
to the school at Middleton--in short, _he made a man of me_. I recollect
it was about five-and-thirty years afterwards when I had risen to some
eminence at the bar, and when I had a seat in Parliament, and a good house
in Ely Place, on my return one day from Court, I found an old gentleman
seated alone in the drawing-room, his feet familiarly placed on each side
of the Italian marble chimney-piece, and his whole air bespeaking the
consciousness of one quite at home. He turned round--it was _my friend of
the ball alley_. I rushed instinctively into his arms. I could not help
bursting into tears. Words cannot describe the scene that followed. 'You
are right, sir--you are right; the chimney-piece is yours, the pictures
are yours, the house is yours; you gave me all I have--my friend--my
father!'"[2]
[2] Many struggles had to be endured, however, before this pinnacle of
prosperity was attained.
After leaving school at Middleton, Curran passed to Trinity College,
Dublin, which he entered as a sizar when nineteen years of age. He does
not appear to have distinguished himself at the University, from whence he
proceeded to London, and contrived, _quodcunque modo_, to enter his name
on the books of the Middle Temple. At that time, he says, he read "ten
hours every day; seven at law, and three at history and the general
principles of politics, and that I may have time enough"--it is believed
he wrote for the magazines, etc., as a means of support--"I rise at
half-past four. I have contrived a machine after the manner of an
hour-glass, which wakens me regularly at that hour. Exactly over my head I
have suspended two vessels of tin, one above the other. When I go to bed,
which is always at ten, I pour a bottle of water into the upper vessel, in
the bottom of which is a hole of such a size as to let the water pass
through so as to make the inferior reservoir overflow in six hours and a
half;" so that if he wished to remain in bed after daylight, he could only
do so by consenting to a cold shower-bath.
He was called to the bar in 1775, and for some time had a tremendously
uphill fight, wearing, according to his own account, his teeth to the
stumps at the Cork Sessions without any adequate recompense. He then
removed to Dublin, and for a time fared no better. "I then lived" said he,
"upon Hog Hill: my wife and children were the chief furniture of my
apartments, and as to my rent it stood pretty much the same chance of
liquidation with the National Debt. Mrs. Curran, however, was a
barrister's lady, and what she wanted in wealth she was determined should
be supplied by dignity. The landlady, on the other hand, had no idea of
any gradation except that of pounds, shillings, and pence. I walked out
one morning to avoid the perpetual altercations on the subject, in no very
enviable mood. I fell into the gloom, to which from my infancy I had been
occasionally subject. I had a family for whom I had no dinner, and a
landlady for whom I had no rent. I had gone abroad in despondence, I
returned home almost in desperation. When I opened the door of my study,
where _Lavater_ alone could have found a library, the first object which
presented itself was an immense folio of a brief, twenty gold guineas
wrapped up beside it, and the name of _Old Bob Lyons_ marked upon the back
of it. I paid my landlady, bought a good dinner, gave Bob Lyons a share of
it, and that dinner was the date of my prosperity." From this time he
rapidly rose to the top of his profession, and his services were eagerly
sought for. Wonderfully eloquent, with a highly imaginative and powerfully
poetic mind, his sway was something marvellous, for, added to these gifts,
his wit and power of mimicry were unapproachable.
In the case of Valentine Jamerai Duval, who ultimately became Professor of
Antiquities and Ancient and Modern Geography in the Academy of Luneville,
youthful hardships occasioned extraordinary expedients. The son of
labouring people, at the age of fourteen he was ignorant of the alphabet.
His occupation was that of turkey-keeper, but after an attack of
small-pox, which nearly killed him, he wandered through certain parts of
Champagne, then in a condition of famine, in search of employment. When he
reached the Duchy of Lorraine, he obtained a situation as shepherd, and
became acquainted with the hermit, Brother Palimon, whom he helped in his
rural labours. In return for these services the hermit gave him
instruction, and subsequently he lived as a labourer with the four hermits
of St. Anne, studying arithmetic and geography in his leisure moments. His
one object then was to obtain books, impossible without money, which,
situated as he was, seemed equally unattainable. Finding out, however,
that a furrier at Luneville purchased skins, he set snares for wild
animals, and by this means realised enough money to procure the books he
coveted.
But beyond the self-denial of Curran with his primitive invention for
early rising, and the contrivance of Duval for obtaining the needful, is
the interesting career of Bernard Palissy, the Potter, who, in addition to
his fame as an artist in pottery, was celebrated as a glass painter,
naturalist, philosopher, and for his devotion to the Protestant cause in
the sixteenth century. Born in 1510, at Chapelle Biron, a poor hamlet near
the small town of Perigord, he was brought up as a worker in painted
glass, in pursuit of which occupation he travelled considerably, devoting
all the spare time of his wanderings to the study of natural history, in
which he delighted. Though an ardent student of nature, he yet found
opportunity to make himself acquainted with the teaching of Paracelsus, of
the alchemists and of the reformers of the Church. He did not settle down
till nearly thirty years of age, when he established himself at Saintes as
a painter on glass, and surveyor, and then turned his attention to the
making of pottery and the production of white enamel, which latter was
useless excepting as a covering for ornamental pottery, and at this time
Palissy was not sufficiently skilled to make a rough pipkin. Under these
circumstances it is not surprising that his wife took exception to the
money expended in the purchase of drugs, the buying of pots, and the
building of a furnace, as the loss of time told heavily on his limited
resources; and it would be perfectly truthful to say that the first things
Bernard Palissy produced in the way of pottery were family jars. Mrs.
Palissy was undoubtedly very wroth at his going on in this way, more
especially because, as is so frequently the case, his family increased as
his income decreased, and she succeeded at last in stopping his
experiments for a time. He then obtained an appointment as Surveyor to the
Government, in which profession he was remarkably proficient, but before
very long the old craving for experimenting returned with redoubled
vigour, and he again set to work in search of white enamel. The expense
incurred was so great that his wife and children became ragged and hungry:
nothing daunted, he broke up twelve new earthen pots, hired a glass
furnace, and for months continued watching, burning, and baking. At last
his eager eyes were gladdened by the sight of a piece of white enamel
amidst the bakings. Urged on by this, he felt he must have another
furnace; he succeeded in obtaining the bricks on credit, became his own
bricklayer's boy and mason, and built the structure himself. On one
occasion he spent six days and nights watching his baking clay, sleeping
only a few minutes at a time near his fire, but disappointment was all the
result. The vessels were spoilt. In desperation he borrowed more money for
his experiments, which was consumed in like manner, until at last he was
without fuel for the furnace. Insensible to everything but the project on
which he was bent, he tore up the palings from the garden, and when these
were exhausted he broke up the chairs and tables. His wife and children
rushed about frantic, thinking that he had lost his senses, and well they
might when they saw the demolition of the furniture followed by the
tearing up of the floor. Success ultimately crowned his praiseworthy
perseverance, but not until he had devoted sixteen years of unremunerated
labour, enduring unexampled fatigue and discouragements. When at length he
succeeded in obtaining a pure white enamel he was enabled to produce works
in which natural objects were represented with remarkable skill, his fame
spread rapidly, his sculptures in clay and his enamelled pottery being at
once accepted as works of art of the highest order. His career, however,
was destined to be remarkable at every stage, for no sooner had he
acquired renown and riches than he was subjected to religious persecution,
which would have ended in death had it not been for the Duke de
Montmorency, one of his patrons, who succeeded in rescuing him from
prison. When established in Paris, assisted by his sons, he continued to
produce most remarkable specimens of ornamental pottery, and in addition
to his artistic labours instituted a series of conferences which were
attended by the most distinguished doctors and scientific _savants_, where
he set forth his views on fountains, stones, metals, etc., desirous of
knowing whether the great philosophers of antiquity interpreted nature as
he did. Although in the ordinary sense an unlettered man, his theories
were never once controverted, and for ten years his lectures were
delivered before the most enlightened of that age, but his teaching once
more arousing the animosity of his religious opponents, he was thrown into
the Bastille, where he died after being incarcerated for two years.
After such a "shift" as having to tear up the floor of a dwelling, most
other instances might be expected to appear more or less tame; but the
experiences of William Thom, the Inverary poet, are scarcely inferior in
intensity. This untutored, but extremely sweet songster, whose first poem,
'Blind Boys' Pranks,' appeared in the _Edinburgh Herald_, was a hand-loom
weaver, who was deprived of his occupation by the failure of certain
American firms, and compelled to tramp the country as a pedlar. Before
resorting to that line of life, and when in the receipt of the sum of five
shillings weekly, he relates how on a memorable spring morning, he
anxiously awaited the arrival of this small amount: and though the clock
had struck eleven, the windows of the room were still curtained, in order
that the four sleeping children, who were bound to be hungry when awake,
might be deluded into believing that it was still night, for the only food
in their parents' possession was one handful of meal saved from the
previous day. The mother with the tenderest anxiety sat by the babes'
bedside lulling them off to sleep as soon as they exhibited the least sign
of wakefulness, and speaking to her husband in whispers as to the cooking
of the little meal remaining, for the youngest child could no longer be
kept asleep, and by its whimpering woke the others. Face after face sprang
up, each little one exclaiming, "Oh, mither, mither, give me a piece;" and
says the poor fellow, "The word sorrow was too weak to apply to the
feelings of myself and wife during the remainder of that long and dreary
forenoon." When compelled to leave the humble dwelling which,
poverty-stricken though it was, had all the endearing influences of home,
he made up a pack consisting of second-hand books and some trifling
articles of merchandise, and sadly started with wife and bairns through
mountain paths and rugged roads, often sleeping at night in barns and
outhouses. The precarious nature of a pedlar's life must have been
terribly trying to one so sensitive, especially when, as in his case, it
ended in his having to have recourse to the profession of musical beggar.
Before entering Methven he sold a book to a stone-breaker on the road, the
proceeds of which (fivepence halfpenny) was all the money he possessed.
The purchaser when making the bargain had noticed Thom's flute which he
carried with him, and had offered such a good price for the instrument
that the poet had been much tempted to part with it, though it had been
his solace and companion on many and many an occasion. Thinking that
possibly it might be the means of his earning a few pence, he resisted the
temptation to part with it, and soon after took up his post outside a
genteel-looking house, and played 'The Flowers of the Forest' with such
exquisite expression that window after window was raised, and in ten
minutes after he found himself possessed of three and ninepence, which sum
was increased to five shillings before he reached his lodging.
It would hardly be possible to conceive anything more truly touching than
the shift of William Thom, when he practised the pardonable deception upon
his hungry children of turning day into night, though for downright
deprivation the experience of John Ledyard, the traveller, may be said to
excel it. This celebrated discoverer, who came into Europe from the United
States in 1776, when making a tour of the world with Captain Cook, as
corporal of a troop of Marines, arrived in England in 1780. He then formed
the design of penetrating from the North West to the East Coast of
America, for which purpose Sir Joseph Banks furnished him with some money.
He bought sea stores with the intention of sailing to Nootka Sound, but
altered his mind, and determined to travel overland to Kamschkatka, from
whence the passage is short to the opposite shore of the American
continent. Towards the close of the year 1786, he started with ten guineas
in his pocket, went to and from Stockholm, because the Gulf of Bothnia was
frozen; proceeding north he walked to the Arctic Circle, passed round the
head of the Gulf of Bothnia, and descended on its east side to St.
Petersburg, where he arrived in March 1787, without shoes or stockings.
He proceeded to the house of the Portuguese Ambassador, who gave him a
good dinner, and obtained for him twenty guineas on a bill drawn in the
name of Sir Joseph Banks, with which sum he proceeded to Yakutz,
accompanying a convoy of provisions, and there met Captain Cook. He says
in his Journal, "I have known both hunger and nakedness to the utmost
extremity of human endurance. I have known what it is to have food given
me as charity to a madman, and I have at times been obliged to shelter
myself under the miseries of that character to avoid a heavier calamity.
My distresses have been greater than I have ever owned, or will own to any
man. Such evils are terrible to bear, but they never yet had power to turn
me from my purpose."
To have to submit to be thought a lunatic to escape starvation must
certainly have been rather trying, though from the fact of part of the
journey being performed without shoes or stockings it would certainly look
as if John Ledyard were anything but particular; and it is well for us
that he and other glorious pioneers were not, otherwise we should not be
living in such an age of marvellous enlightenment as is our present
privilege. Round the world in eighty days, facilitated by Cook's tourist
coupons would hardly have been practicable, had not men like Ledyard been
martyrs in the cause of exploration.
_Apropos_ of travelling in days gone by, an incident in the life of the
Rev. Henry Tevuge presents a somewhat strange shift; at any rate, strange
for a clergyman. This eccentric clerical was Rector of Alcester in 1670,
and afterwards Incumbent of Spernall, which he appears to have left in
1675, for on May 20th in that year he writes, "This day I began my voyage
from my house at Spernall, in the county of Warwick, with small
accoutrements, saving what I carried under me in an old sack. My steed
like that of Hudibras, for mettle, courage, and colour (though not of the
same bigness), and for flesh, one of Pharaoh's lean mares ready to seize
(for hunger) on those that went before her, had she not been short-winged,
or rather leaden-heeled. My stock of moneys was also proportionable to the
rest; being little more than what brought me to London in an old coat and
breeches of the same, an old pair of hose, and shoes, and a leathern
doublet of nine years old and upwards. Indeed, by reason of the
suddenness of my journey, I had nothing but what I was ashamed of, save
only
"An old fox broad sword, and a good black gown,
And thus old Henry came to London Town."
At that time chaplains were not provided with bed or bedding, and the
divine, having no money, and wishing to redeem a cloak which had been long
in pawn for 10_s._, he sold his lean mare, saddle and bridle for 26_s._,
released the cloak, but only to re-pledge it for L2. A writer, alluding to
that period, says "it must have been a rare time for cavaliers, clerical
and secular, when the cloak that had been pawned for 10_s._ acquired a
fourfold value when offered as a new pledge." It must have been a rare
time for clergymen of the Church of England when a navy chaplain is found
on such intimate terms with "No. 1 round the corner," but that
circumstance is accounted for by the fact that the Rev. Mr. Tevuge is
spoken of as having "contracted convivial and expensive habits."
The literary, musical, and dramatic professions are the most prolific in
furnishing curious cases of impecuniosity; and separate chapters will be
devoted to those three branches of art, but there are a few instances more
directly of the nature of "shifts" which I have included in the present
portion of the subject; amongst others being the incident of Dr. Johnson
dining with his publisher, and being so shabby that, as there was a third
person present, he hid behind a screen. This happened soon after the
publication of the lexicographer's 'Life of Savage,' which was written
anonymously, and though the circumstance of the hiding must have been
rather humiliating to the mighty Samuel, yet the attendant consequences
were pleasant. The visitor who was dining with Harte, the publisher, was
Cave, who, in course of conversation, referred to 'Savage's Life,' and
spoke of the work in the most flattering terms. The next day, when they
met again, Harte said, "You made a man very happy yesterday by your
encomiums on a certain book." "I did?" replied Cave. "Why, how could that
be; there was no one present but you and I?" "You might have observed,"
explained Harte, "that I sent a plate of meat behind a screen. There
skulked the biographer, one Johnson, whose dress was so shabby that he
durst not make his appearance. He overheard our conversation, and your
applause of his performance delighted him exceedingly." It is also
recorded that so indigent was the doctor on another occasion that he had
not money sufficient for a bed, and had to make shift by walking round and
round St. James' Square with Savage; when, according to Boswell, they were
not at all depressed by their situation, but in high spirits, and brimful
of patriotism; inveighing against the ministry, and resolving that they
would _stand_ by their country.
Being thus intimately associated, it is only natural that the doctor in
his 'Life of Savage' should thoroughly believe that individual's version
of his own birth and parentage, which was that he was the illegitimate son
of the Countess of Macclesfield, and that his father was Lord Rivers; the
birth of Richard Savage giving his mother an excuse for obtaining a
divorce from her husband, whom she hated. It is stated that "he was born
in 1696, in Fox Court, a low alley leading out of Holborn, whither his
mother had repaired under the name of Mrs. Smith--her features concealed
in a mask, which she wore throughout her confinement. Discovery was
embarrassed by a complication of witnesses; the child was handed from one
woman to another until, like a story bandied from mouth to mouth, it
seemed to lose its paternity." Lord Rivers, it is alleged, looked on the
boy as his own, but his mother seems always to have disliked him; and the
fact that Lady Mason, the mother of the countess, looked after the child's
education, and had him put to a Grammar School at St. Albans, certainly
favours the view of his aristocratic parentage. He was subsequently
apprenticed to a shoemaker, but discovering the secret, or the supposed
secret, of his birth, for not a few discredit his story, he cut leather
for literature, and appealed to his mother for assistance. His habit was
to walk of an evening before her door in the hope of seeing her, and
making an appeal; but his efforts were in vain, he could neither open her
heart nor her purse. He was befriended by many, notably by Steele, Wilks
the actor, and Mrs. Oldfield, a "beautiful" actress, who allowed him an
annuity of L50 during her life; but in spite of all the assistance he
received, his state was one of chronic impecuniosity. No sooner was he
helped out of one difficulty than he managed to get into another, and
though he is described by some biographers as a literary genius, his
genius seemed principally a knack of getting into debt. Rambling about
like a vagabond, with scarcely a shirt to his back, he was in such a
plight when he composed his tragedy (without a lodging, and often,
without a dinner) that he used to write it on scraps of paper picked up by
accident, or begged in the shops which he occasionally stepped into, as
thoughts occurred to him, craving the favour of pen and ink as if it were
just to make a memorandum.
The able author of 'The Road to Ruin' was likewise one who had travelled
some distance on that thorny path, for at one time he found himself in the
streets of London without money, without a home, or a friend to whom his
shame or pride would permit his making known his necessity. Wandering
along he knew not whither, plunged in the deepest despondency, his eye
caught sight of a printed placard, "To Young Men," inviting all spirited
young fellows to make their fortunes as common soldiers in the East India
Company's Service. After reading it over a second time he determined
without hesitation to hasten off and enroll himself in that honourable
corps, when he met with a person he had known at a sporting club he had
been in the habit of frequenting. His companion seeing his bundle and
rueful face, asked him where he was going, to which Holcroft replied that
had he enquired five minutes before he could not have told him, but that
now he was "for the wars." At this his friend appeared greatly surprised,
and told him he thought he could put him up to something better than that.
Macklin, the famous London actor, was going over to play in Dublin, and
had asked him if he happened to be acquainted with a young fellow who had
a turn for the stage, and, said his friend, "I should be happy to
introduce you." The offer was gladly accepted, and when the introduction
had been managed Holcroft was asked by Macklin "what had put it into his
head to turn actor?" to which he replied, "He had taken it into his head
to suppose it was genius, but that it was very possible he might be
mistaken."
Holcroft was engaged for the tour, became an actor, and though he does not
appear to have shone particularly strong on the stage, acquired
considerable celebrity as a dramatic author, his play before mentioned
being one of the few works of the old dramatists that has not become out
of date with the playgoing public.
More than one literary man of note, has been compelled by poverty to
accept the Queen's shilling. Coleridge, according to one of his
biographers, left Cambridge partly through the loss of his friend
Middleton, and partly on account of college debts. Vexed and fretted by
the latter, he was overtaken by that inward grief which in after life he
described in his 'Ode to Dejection.'
"A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear,
A stifled, drowsy, unimpassioned grief,
Which finds no natural outlet, no relief,
In word, or sigh, or tear."
In this state of mind he came to London, strolled about the streets till
night, and then rested on the steps of a house in Chancery Lane. Beggars
importuned him for alms and to them he gave the little money he had left.
Next morning he noticed a bill to the effect that a few smart lads were
wanted for the 15th Elliot's Light Dragoons. Thinking to himself "I have
all my life had a violent antipathy to soldiers and horses, and the sooner
I can cure myself of such absurd prejudices the better," he went to the
enlisting-station, where the sergeant finding that Coleridge had not been
in bed all night, made him have some breakfast and rest himself.
Afterwards, he told him to cheer up, to well consider the step he was
about to take, and suggested that he had better have half-a-guinea, go to
the play, shake off his melancholy and not return. Coleridge went to the
theatre, but afterwards resought the sergeant, who was extremely sorry to
see him, and saying with evident emotion, "Then it must be so," enrolled
him. In the morning he was marched to Reading with his new comrades, and
there inspected by the general of the district. Looking at Coleridge, that
officer said,--
"What's your name?"
"Comberback!"
"What do you come here for, sir?"
"For what most other persons come, to be made a soldier!"
"Do you think you can run a Frenchman through the body, sir?"
"I do not know," said Coleridge, "as I never tried, but I'll let a
Frenchman run me through the body, before I'll run away."
"That will do," said the general; and Coleridge was turned into the ranks.
Alexander Somerville, author of 'Cobdenic Policy,' 'Conservative Science
of Nations,' &c., &c., was also driven to the extremity of enlisting under
circumstances more or less humorous. Unlike Coleridge, Alexander
Somerville was not of gentle birth, being, as he styles himself in 'The
Autobiography of a Working Man,' "One who has whistled at the plough." He
received as a boy but scant education, being sent to a common day school
where cruel discipline and unnecessary severity preponderated over
learning. Though put to farm-work, where he was by turns carter, mower,
stable-boy, thresher, wood-sawyer and excavator, his natural intelligence
and love of books made him anxious to turn his face from the parish of
Oldhamstocks, where he was brought up, in a westerly direction towards
Edinburgh. When about eighteen years of age he was much interested in the
Reform Bill of 1830, and gave evidence then of his enthusiasm for
politics, became canvasser for a weekly newspaper, but does not appear to
have succeeded in this vocation, for his circumstances were such that he
wandered about moneyless; and meeting with an old chum they agreed to go
and have a chat at any rate with the recruiting corporal of the dragoon
regiment popularly known as the Scots Greys.
"My companion," he says, "had seen the Greys in Dublin, and having a
natural disposition to be charmed with the picturesque, was charmed with
them. He knew where to enquire for the corporal, and having enquired, we
found him in his lodging up a great many pairs of stairs, I do not know
how many, stretched in his military cloak, on his bed. He said he was glad
to see anybody upstairs in his little place, now that the regimental order
had come out against moustachios; for since he had been ordered to shave
his off, his wife had sat moping at the fireside, refusing all consolation
to herself and all peace to him. 'I ha'e had a weary life o't,' he said
plaintively 'since the order came out to shave the upper lip. She grat
there. I'm sure she grat as if her heart would ha'e broken when she saw me
the first day without the moustachios.' Having listened to this and heard
a confirmation of it from the lady herself, as also a hint that the
corporal had been lying in bed half the day, when he should have been out
looking for recruits, for each of whom he had a payment of ten shillings,
we told him that we had come looking for him to offer ourselves as
recruits. He looked at us for a few moments, and said if we 'meant' it he
saw nothing about us to object to; and as neither seemed to have any beard
from which moustachios could grow, he could only congratulate us on the
order that had come out against them as we should not have to be at the
expense of getting burnt corks to blacken our upper lips, to make us look
uniform with those who wore hair. We assured the corporal that we were in
earnest, and that we did mean to enlist, whereupon he began by putting the
formal question, 'Are you free, able and willing to serve his Majesty King
William the Fourth?'
"But there was a hitch, two shillings were requisite to enlist two
recruits, and there was only one shilling. We proposed that he should
enlist one of us with it, and that this one should then lend it to him to
enlist the other. But his wife would not have the enlistment done in that
way. She said 'That would not be _law_: and a bonny thing it would be to
do it without it being law. Na na,' she continued, 'it maun be done as the
law directs.' The corporal made a movement as if he would take us out with
him to some place where he could get another shilling but she thought it
possible that another of the recruiting party might share the prize with
him--take one of us or both: so she detained him, shut the door on us,
locked it, took the key with her and went in search of the King's
requisite coin. Meanwhile as my friend was impatient I allowed him to take
precedence of me, and have the ceremony performed with the shilling then
present. On the return of the corporal's wife, who though younger than he
in years seemed to be an 'older soldier,' I also became the King's man."
In connection with music the name of Loder, the clever composer (author of
the 'Night Dancers' and other charming musical compositions), recalls an
interesting episode in his life revealing a remarkable shift to which he
was put. One evening when leaving his lodgings with a friend named Jay for
the purpose of enjoying a quiet little dinner at Simpson's, he received an
ominous tap on the shoulder from one of those individuals whose attentions
are not appetising, since without you can settle the little amount, they
require your immediate company. Loder was by no means able to satisfy the
law's demands, and the sheriff's officer refused to lose sight of his man,
even though "he had a most particular appointment;" so the only thing to
be done was to invite the bailiff to join them at dinner. After the repast
was concluded the party repaired to Sloman's, a notorious spunging-house
in Cursitor Street, Chancery Lane, when just as Jay was taking leave of
Loder the latter remembered having something in his pocket which might be
turned to account. It was a song by Samuel Lover. "Goodbye, old fellow,"
said Loder. "Come to-morrow morning, and see what I shall have ready." As
soon as his friend had gone he set to work and set Lover's words of 'The
Three Stages of Love' to music, which was a most successful and
satisfactory way of composing himself to sleep, for when Jay called in the
morning he received a manuscript which, when taken to Chappell's, realised
L30. The proceeds enabled Loder to pay the debt, and dine with his friend
at Simpson's in the afternoon, without the unwelcome guest of the
preceding day.
John Palmer, the original Joseph Surface, in which character he was
considered unapproachable, was a man evidently of the greatest
plausibility. When complimented by a friend upon the ease of his address,
he said, "No, I really don't give myself the credit of being so
irresistible as you have fancied me. There is one thing, though, which I
think I _am_ able to do. Whenever I am arrested I can always persuade the
sheriff's officer to bail me."
Contemporary with John Palmer was another celebrated comedian, also
addicted to more extravagant tastes than his income warranted--Charles
Bannister, who made his first appearance in London with Palmer in a piece
called the "Orators" in May 1762. In this he gave musical imitations, but
the performances taking place in the mornings, his convivial habits over
night precluded him from shining as he might have done; a fact which was
noticed by Foote, the manager. To this Bannister replied, "I knew it would
be so; I am all right at night, but neither I, nor my voice, can _get up_
in the morning." He was invariably in difficulties: on the death of Sir
Theodosius Boughton, the topic of the hour in 1781, as he was said to have
been poisoned by laurel water, Bannister, said "Pooh! Don't tell me of
your laurel leaves; I fear none but a bay-leaf" (bailiff). Once when
returning from Epsom to town in a gig, accompanied by a friend, they were
unable to pay the toll at Kennington Gate, and the man would not let them
pass. Bannister immediately offered to sing a song, and struck up 'The
Tempest of War.' His voice was heard afar, the gate being soon thronged by
voters returning from Brentford, who encored his effort, and the
turnpike-man, calling him a noble fellow, expressed his willingness to pay
"fifty tolls for him at any gate."
John Joseph Winckelmann, who became one of the most famous of German
writers on classical antiquities, was the son of a poor cobbler, who not
only had to struggle with poverty, but with disease which, while his boy
was yet young, compelled him to avail himself of the hospital. When
placed at the burgh seminary there, the rector was struck with young
Winckelmann's dawning genius, and by accepting less than the usual fee,
and getting him placed in the choir, contrived that the boy should receive
all the advantages the school afforded. The rector continued to take the
greatest interest in his apt pupil, made him usher, and when seventeen
years of age, sent him to Berlin with a letter of introduction to the
rector of a gymnasium, with whom he remained twelve months. While there
Winckelmann heard that the library of the celebrated Fabricius was about
to be sold at Hamburgh, and he determined to proceed there on foot and be
present at the sale. He set out accordingly, asking charity (a practice
not considered derogatory to struggling students in Germany) of the
clergymen whose houses he passed; and, having collected in this way
sufficient to purchase some of his darling poets at the sale, returned to
Berlin in great glee. After studying at Halle and elsewhere for six years,
his early passion for wandering revived, and fascinated with a fresh
perusal of Caesar's 'Commentaries,' he began in the summer of 1740 a
pedestrian journey to France, to visit the scene of the great Roman's
military exploits. His funds, however, soon became exhausted, and when
close to Frankfort-on-the-Maine, he was obliged to return.
When he arrived at the bridge of Fulda, he remarked his own dishevelled,
travel-stained appearance, and believing himself alone, began to effect an
alteration. He had pulled out a razor, and was about to operate on his
chin, when he was disturbed by shrieks from a party of ladies, who,
imagining that he was about to make away with himself, cried loudly for
help. The facts were soon explained, and the fair ones insisted on his
accepting a monetary gift that enabled him to return without
inconvenience.
It was not until the year 1755, when Winckelmann was thirty-eight years of
age, and had published his first book, the 'Reflections on Imitation of
the Greeks in Painting and Statuary,' that he freed himself from penury.
Flaxman, who throughout his honourable life seems to have entertained a
most modest view of his own talents, married before he had acquired
distinction, though regarded as a skilful and exceedingly promising pupil;
and when Sir Joshua Reynolds heard of the indiscretion of which he had
been guilty, he exclaimed, "Flaxman is ruined for an artist!" But his
mistake was soon made manifest. When Mrs. Flaxman heard of the remark, she
said, "Let us work and economize. It shall never be said that Ann Denham
ruined John Flaxman as an artist;" and they economised accordingly, her
husband undertaking amongst other things to collect the local rates in
Soho.
It is to a "shift" of this nature that we are to a certain extent indebted
for the writings of Bishop Jeremy Taylor. After the death of Charles I.,
Dr. Taylor's living of Uppingham, in Rutlandshire, was sequestered, and
the gifted ecclesiastic repaired to Golden Grove, Carmarthenshire, and
taught a school for the subsistence of his children and himself. While
thus employed, he produced some of those copious and fervent discourses,
whose fertility of composition, eloquence of expression and
comprehensiveness of thought, have enabled him to rank as one of the first
writers in the English language.
Beau Brummell, the autocrat of fashion when in his zenith, was in the days
of his decline particularly shifty. After George IV. had cut him, and when
he was about to depart for France to undertake the consulate of Caen, he
made a desperate effort to raise money, and, amongst other people, he
wrote to Scrope Davies for a couple of hundred pounds, which he promised
to repay on the following morning, giving as a reason for his request,
that the banks were shut for the day, and all his money was in the Three
per Cents. To this Davies, who happened to know how hard up Brummell was,
sent the following laconic reply:--
"MY DEAR GEORGE,
"'Tis very unfortunate, but all _my_ money is in the Three per Cents.
"Yours,
"S. DAVIES."
Brummell's appointment at Caen, owing to the representations of Madame la
Marquise de Seran, and others who had known him in London, was known in
that place some time before he arrived, which had the effect of making all
the young Frenchmen of the Carlist party anxious to become acquainted with
him. Soon after he was settled down, three of them paid him a morning
visit, and, though late in the day, found him deep in the mysteries of his
toilet. They naturally wished to retire, but Brummell insisted on their
remaining. "Pray stay," said he, as he laid down the silver tweezers with
which he had just removed a straggling hair, "pray remain; I have not yet
breakfasted--no excuses. There is a _pate de foie gras_, a game pie," and
many other dainties that he enumerated with becoming gastronomic fervour,
but which failed to overcome the scruples of the young men, who went away
enchanted with Brummell's politeness and hospitality, one of the trio
afterwards remarking that "he must live very well."
There is not the slightest doubt that the beau was pretty sure his
visitors had breakfasted, and it was only the extreme improbability of
their accepting his invitation that made him give it. Had they taken him
at his word, instead of the magnificent repast which he offered them, his
guests would have sat down to an uncommonly plain breakfast, for the
polite and hospitable host had nothing but a penny roll and the coffee
simmering by his bedroom fire. On another occasion a visitor called on
him, and in course of conversation said he was going to dine with a
certain Mr. Jones, a retired soap-boiler, who had radically opposed the
appointment of a man like Brummell to superintend the British interests at
Caen.
"Well I think I shall dine there too," said Brummell.
"But you haven't an invitation, have you?"
"No," was the reply; "but I think I shall dine there all the same."
As soon as the caller left, Brummell sent a _pate de foie gras_, which he
had received from Paris, with a grand message to Jones. The courtesy
seemed so disinterested, that the Radical sent a pressing invitation by
return; and when Brummell's visitor of the morning joined the party, he
saw the beau installed in the seat of honour at the hostess's right.
Brummell told his friend next day how he had managed. The gentleman said,
"But I did not see the pie on the table."
"True," explained Brummell; "I know it never made its appearance. It was a
splendid pie--a _chef-d'oeuvre_, and I felt deeply interested in its fate.
When going away I inquired what had been done with the pie. The cook said,
'Master had kept it for Master Harry's birthday.' To be the 'cut and come
again' of a nursery dinner. To be the prey of the little Joneses and their
nurses was atrocious. It was an insult to me and my pie! 'Go,' I said, 'to
your kitchen; I particularly want to see the _pate de foie gras_.' Feeling
that it would have been a sin to leave it with such people, I took it
away. It was not honest, but as I cut into it this morning I almost felt
justified, for I never inserted a knife into such another."
It certainly was anything but honest, and it would have been well had
Brummell remembered the childish saying about "give a thing and take a
thing," but where a person's _amour-propre_ is touched on such an
important matter as a game pie it would not be right of course to judge
the action by the ordinary standard. The idea of taking the pie back for
the reasons alleged was really funny, though the fact of the beau being
extremely "hard up" very possibly had a good deal to do with his conduct.
_Apropos_ of this condition it may be news to some to know that there once
existed an institution called the "Hard Up Club" the formation of which is
alluded to by "Baron" Nicholson in his autobiography. He says "just before
I left the Queen's Bench I had a visit from Pellatt (a well-known man
about town in that day, who had formerly been clerk and solicitor to the
Ironmongers' Company), with the news that he and another jolly old friend
of mine had made a discovery of a place of rest suitable to our condition
in life, which I must say was seedy in every respect. Pellatt had been in
the habit of coming over to the Bench almost daily to dine with me and
others, who were delighted with his amusing qualities. He gave excellent
imitations of the past and present London actors, and his genius for
entertaining was brought into active operation in our prison circle. The
history of the discovery of 'The Nest,' or tranquil house of
entertainment, was this: Pellatt and a friend of his, 'Old Beans' (whose
right name was Bennett, yclept 'Old Beans' for shortness), were strolling
about the Strand one foggy November night, their habiliments were
uncomfortably ventilated, their crab-shells of the order hydraulic; snow
was on the ground, and their castors 'shocking bad hats.' Not liking to
enter any very public places they strayed round the back streets on the
river side of the Strand, and turning from Norfolk Street into Howard
Street, _vis-a-vis_ they perceived a tavern, a dull, unlighted (save by a
dim lamp), small, old-fashioned public-house in Arundel Street, with the
sign of 'The Swan.' '"The Swan,"' said Pellatt, as he read the sign, 'will
never sink! Beans, old fellow, we'll go into the 'Never Sink!'
"The house was better known for years afterwards by this name than by its
real sign. The two wayfarers entered. Old Charles Mathews in his 'At
Home' used to tell a story of pulling up at a road-side inn, and
interrogating the waiter as to what he could have for dinner.
"'Any hot joint?' said the traveller.
"'No, sir; no hot joint, sir.'
"'Any cold one?'
"'Cold one, sir? No, sir; no cold one, sir.'
"'Can you broil me a fowl?'
"'Fowl, sir? No, sir; no fowl, sir.'
"'No fowl, and in a country inn!' exclaimed Mathews. 'Let me have some
eggs and bacon then.'
"'Eggs and bacon, sir?' said the waiter. 'No eggs and bacon, sir.'
"'Confound it,' at length said the traveller. 'What have you got in the
house?'
"'An execution, sir,' was the prompt response of the doleful waiter.
"And so it was at 'The Swan.' When Pellatt and his friend entered the
parlour there was but a glimmer of light, and no fire. A most civil man,
whose name turned out to be Mathews, informed his guests that he would
instantly light a fire and make them comfortable.
"'Not worth while,' said Pellatt, 'We only want a glass of gin and water,
and a pipe.'
"The host would not be denied. In a few minutes there was a blazing fire,
the hot grog was upon the table, and Pellatt and Old Beans were smoking
away like steam. The supposed landlord was invited to take a seat with
them, and during the conversation informed them that he was the man in
possession, and that he was allowed to provide a little spirits, and a
cask of beer, and reap the profits himself just to keep the house open
until a purchaser could be found for it, and he further stated how glad he
should be if the gentlemen would come again. Being told by Pellatt all
about the 'Never Sink,' when I again left the Queen's Bench Prison, and
visited the outer world, I aided them in establishing what we dignified by
the title of 'The Hard Up Club.' Its institution commenced by Old Beans
being appointed steward, and in that capacity began his campaign by buying
a pound of cold boiled beef at Cautis's, Temple Bar, and four pennyworth
of hot roasted potatoes from the man who stood with the baked 'tatur' can
in front of Clement's Inn. As the club increased in number so did our
commissariat in supplies and importance, and the office of 'Old Beans'
became no sinecure. His duty, and it was performed _con amore_, was to be
in attendance early in the day at the club to provide the dinner. The
money to pay for this was invariably collected over night; and I have
known the funds to be so short that 'Old Beans's' ingenuity has been
frequently and greatly taxed to meet the necessary requirements and
expenditure. A shoulder of mutton was a familiar dish, Beans preparing
heaps of potatoes, and with a skilful culinary nicety, for which he was
eminent, making the onion sauce himself. A bullock's heart was also a
favourite with us, provided always that Old Beans made the gravy and
stuffing. I said to our gracious and economical steward the first day we
had the ox heart, 'Beany, you'll want some gravy beef.'
"'The deaf ears' (the hard, gristly substance attached to the top of a
bullock's heart), said he, 'will make excellent gravy. The 'Hard Ups'
can't afford beef. No, no, we'll make the deaf ears do.' It may be
imagined that Old Beans's place was a difficult one. One Kay, a large,
seedy lawyer, who wore shabby black and white stockings, and shoes, was
always behindhand with his share of cash. If a shilling were required, Kay
would pay into the hands of the steward about nine pence halfpenny, vowing
that he had no more, and Beans always declared himself out of pocket by
Kay. We had, however, a visitor who added lustre to our association, but
he was not a dining member--he could not be--his means were too limited
even for our humble carousings. This member was a very old man, Colonel
Curry, formerly a member of the Irish Parliament. He lodged in one room in
Arundel Street, therefore the 'Never Sink' was to him a convenient
hostelry, and he could do as he liked. He did so. On a small shelf over
the parlour-door the colonel kept his own table-napkin, mustard, pepper,
and salt. He also had a small gravy-tight tin case, and in that he brought
with him every day four pennyworth of hot meat, generally bought at the
corner of Angel Inn Yard, Clement's Inn. All he spent at the 'Never Sink'
was three halfpence for a glass of rum, which he diluted from six o'clock
in the evening till eleven o'clock at night: in the last mixing the rum
was unrecognisable, the water colourless. Curry was a proud Irishman,
never accepting the oft-proffered hospitality of others. His conversation
was delightful, amusing, instructive. He never complained, and we were
left to doubt whether his economy proceeded from parsimony or poverty; but
from his highly honourable sentiments I should conclude the latter. It was
a rule with the club that all the good sort of fellows with whom the
members might be acquainted should be pressed into the general service of
the club: thus any member who in better days had been a good customer to a
thriving publican (and there was scarcely one exception in the whole
society) should use his best endeavour to introduce that publican to the
'Never Sink,' and get him to stand treat. The number of dinners and
liquors obtained by such endeavours were prodigious. The club included
several members of the republic of letters, who, to quote Tom Hood, had
not a sovereign amongst them. Indeed, they had but one passable crown. One
hat served nine; their shirts were latent; their dinners intermittent, and
their grog often eleemosynary. Nothing sparkled about them but their wit,
which was as keen as their appetites. The man of genius crouches in social
poverty in a commonwealth of mutual privation.
"'There wit, subdued by poverty's sharp thorn,
Was joined by wisdom equally forlorn;
And stinted genius took a draught of malt
On baked potatoes mixed with attic salt.'"