THE LUCK AND ILL LUCK OF IMPECUNIOSITY.
Shakespeare, though he says "There's a divinity doth shape our ends,
rough-hew them how we will," admits that "There is a tide in the affairs
of men, which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune," which certainly
looks as if we had something to do with the matter. "Man," it has been
said, "is the architect of his own fortune," but it is equally a fact that
some individuals have many more chances than others of making that
fortune, especially those who are apparently undeserving. In the same way,
impecuniosity has with some been the very means of introducing them to the
road to success, while it has only plunged others in suffering.
Amongst the former may be ranked Benjamin Charles Incledon, who flourished
in the latter part of the eighteenth century, and in the beginning of the
nineteenth. He was born at Callington, in Cornwall, and at a very early
age was a choir-boy in Exeter Cathedral, in which city he received his
musical education from Jackson, the composer. At sixteen he entered the
navy, and in the course of the two years that he remained in the service
was in several engagements. When the _Formidable_ was paid off at Chatham,
in 1784, the young sailor turned his steps towards Cornwall, but when he
reached Hitchen Ferry, near Southampton, he had got rid of whatever money
he started with, and had to ask assistance of a recruiting sergeant, who
not only gave him the means to get ferried over, but invited him to a
public-house in the town, where they made merry over bread and cheese, and
ale. The company became convivial, and Incledon, in his turn, sang a
ballad which delighted everybody, but especially the prompter of the
Southampton Theatre, who happened to be sitting in the bar-parlour smoking
his pipe, and who rushed out to his manager before the song was finished
to tell him of the _rara avis_ he had found. Collins, the manager,
returned forthwith, and was so delighted with the sailor's vocal abilities
that he offered him an engagement at _half-a-guinea a week_, there and
then, which offer was accepted, Incledon making his first appearance as
Alphonso in 'The Castle of Andalusia.' His career was most successful, and
he is spoken of by more than one authority as the first English singer on
the stage of his day.
Under the circumstances it must surely be conceded, that the impecuniosity
which caused him to sing that song at that particular time, was
particularly lucky, and Incledon is not the only individual who has been
blessed with good fortune through the same means. In 'The Life of a
Showman,' by D. G. Miller, that gentleman relates that one winter's
afternoon he arrived with his family at a Cumberland village in a most
pitiable plight, for though he had several "children he had but one
sixpence." The journey, effected with a horse and cart, had been extremely
trying, because across the road they had travelled ran a small rivulet,
which was frozen, and a passage through which had to be made for the
horse, the driver standing upon the shafts across the back of the horse,
while the showman waded through the water nearly up to his waist, a state
of discomfort enhanced by the plunging of the horse and the shrieks of the
children. When the party arrived at the public-house (where there was a
large room which was occasionally let for entertainments, &c.), they were
nearly frozen, and proceeded to warm themselves by the kitchen fire. After
calling for a quart of ale, and paying for it with the solitary sixpence
in his possession, the showman proceeded to look after his properties, and
found that the man with the cart, being anxious to get back, had unloaded
the luggage at the door. Enquiring of the landlady if he could engage the
large room for a few nights for a very superior exhibition, the itinerant
performer was informed by her, "I can't tell, but I think not. The last
people who were here didn't pay the rent. However, the landlord is not at
home, and I can say nothing about it."
After this he asked if they could be supplied with some tea, and on being
replied to in the affirmative, says, "The expression on my wife's face
seemed to say, 'Are you mad--where will you get the money to pay for it?'
I paid no attention, however, to her look: the tea was got ready, and we
sat down and made a hearty meal--at least, the children and I did. As to
my wife, she was alarmed at my conduct, and was too frightened to eat,
although she had tasted nothing since breakfast."
After tea he asked if they could be accommodated with beds, but was
refused by the landlord, who showed his suspicions. The showman pointed to
the snow, which was falling heavily, and asked permission for his wife and
children to remain by the fire all night, professing to be able to pay,
and at last the landlord sulkily agreed to let them have beds. After the
wife and children retired, a good number of customers came in, and a
raffle was started for a watch, thirty members at a shilling. While this
was being arranged the visitors joked and sang, and presently the showman
was asked if he would oblige with a song; he readily complied, and was
voted a jolly good fellow by all present, including the landlord, who
apologised then for having demurred about the accommodation. When the
raffle began, it was found there was one more subscriber wanted, and the
showman was asked to join, which he said he would gladly do, but his wife
kept the purse and she had gone to bed, and being very tired he did not
like to disturb her. The landlord at once said, "Certainly not, here's a
shilling; pay me in the morning." He accepted the proffered coin, threw
the dice, and won the watch, which he sold for a sovereign. He then gave
an exhibition of his skill with sleight of hand tricks, to the great
delight of the customers, and was informed by the landlord before he went
to bed that he could have the big room for a night or two. To this he
replied, "I will think it over," and joined his wife, whom he found in a
state of the greatest trepidation at the thought of their not having the
money to pay for their board and lodging. He set her fears literally at
rest, by showing her the proceeds of the watch he had sold. The next and
two following evenings he gave three most successful performances in the
big room, and finally left the village with flying colours, _en route_ for
Carlisle. His good fortune, as in the case of Incledon, being fairly
attributable to the singing of a song; which savours strongly to my mind
of what is generally understood by the term "lucky."
Though somewhat different in detail, the impecuniosity of the late
distinguished journalist, G. A. Sala, when a young man, was equally
felicitous. Born in 1827 of not over-wealthy parents (Mrs. Sala was an
operatic singer and teacher of music), he from an early age suffered with
bad eyes, which prevented him learning to read until he was nine years
old. When fourteen he began to earn his own living, and from that time
till he was four-and-twenty, his mode of existence seems to have been more
or less precarious. At one time engaged in copying plans of projected
railways, then acting as assistant scene-painter at fifteen shillings a
week, afterwards designing the cheapest and least elegant description of
valentines, and subsequently drawing woodcuts for those inferior
periodicals pretty generally known as "penny dreadfuls." In the year 1851
his health gave way while he was pursuing the avocation of an engraver.
The acids used in engraving so affecting his eyes that for a time he was
quite blind, and loss of eyesight meant loss of work, and loss of work
involved loss of income. The poverty he suffered at this time must have
been of the direst; but though he had lost almost everything else, he
never apparently quite lost heart, and when his sight improved he dashed
off an article called "The Key of the Street," descriptive of a night
spent by a poor wanderer in London, which he sent in to Dickens, who had
not long started _Household Words_. The feelings of the homeless man were
described in a manner that shows the writer _felt_ his subject, although
it is hinted that the experiences related may have been the result of
caprice.
He says, "I have no bed to-night. Why, it matters not. Perhaps I have lost
my latch-key--perhaps I never had one; yet am fearful of knocking up my
landlady after midnight. Perhaps I have a caprice--a fancy--for stopping
up all night. At all events, I have no bed; and, saving ninepence
(sixpence in silver, and threepence in coppers), no money. I must walk the
streets all night; for I cannot, look you, get anything in the shape of a
bed for less than a shilling. Coffee-houses, into which--seduced by their
cheap appearance--I have entered, and where I have humbly sought a
lodging, laugh my ninepence to scorn. They demand impossible
eighteenpences--unattainable shillings. There is clearly no bed for me.
"It is midnight--so the clanging tongue of St. Dunstan's tells me--as I
stand thus bedless at Temple Bar. I have walked a good deal during the
day, and have an uncomfortable sensation in my feet, suggesting the idea
that the soles of my boots are made of roasted brickbats. I am thirsty too
(it is July and sultry), and just as the last chime of St. Dunstan's is
heard, I have half-a-pint of porter, and a ninth part of my ninepence is
gone from me for ever. The public-house where I have it (or rather the
beer-shop, for it is an establishment of 'the glass of ale and sandwich'
description) is an early closing one, and the proprietor, as he serves me,
yawningly orders the potboy to put the shutters up, for he is 'off to
bed.' Happy proprietor! There is a bristly-bearded tailor too, very beery,
having his last pint, who utters a similar somniferous intention. He calls
it 'Bedfordshire.' Thrice happy tailor!
"I envy him fiercely, as he goes out, though, God wot, his bedchamber may
be but a squalid attic, and his bed a tattered hop-sack, with a slop
great-coat from the emporium of Messrs. Melchisedek & Son, and which he
had been working at all day, for a coverlid. I envy his children (I am
sure he has a frouzy, ragged brood of them) _for they have at least
somewhere to sleep. I haven't_."
Then follows a most graphic account of the persons encountered during the
eight hours' enforced prowl (including a flying visit to a fourpenny
lodging-house, which was not a "model" of cleanliness), all the personages
met with, and the occurrences witnessed being described with a freshness
and fidelity that stamped the author as a descriptive writer of uncommon
power. Charles Dickens at once forwarded a cheque for the contribution
named, and, in the words of Oliver Twist, "asked for more;" and the late
George Augustus Sala has for years been regarded as the journalist _par
excellence_ of the day.
In like manner the needy circumstances of Charlotte Cushman had much to do
with her obtaining an engagement at the Princess's Theatre, and making the
great reputation she achieved in England. When first introduced to Mr.
Maddox, the then lessee and manager of the house in Oxford Street, she did
not impress him favourably. She had no pretensions to beauty, and Mr.
Maddox considered she had not the qualities essential to a stage heroine.
From London she went to Paris, in the hope of getting engaged by an
English company performing there, but failing, and having obtained a
letter of introduction from some one supposed to have great influence with
the lessee, she again sought Mr. Maddox, with no better result. Stung to
the quick by this second repulse, and made desperate by her critical
situation, she turned when she had almost reached the door, exclaiming,
"I know I have enemies in this country, but" (here she cast herself on her
knees, raising her clenched hand aloft), "so help me Heaven, I'll defeat
them!" Mr. Maddox was at once satisfied with the tragic power of his
visitor, and offered her an engagement forthwith.
If there is any doubt as to Charlotte Cushman's success being attributable
to impecuniosity the case of O'Brien, the celebrated Irish giant, is most
clear.
This lengthy individual, whose height was 8ft. 7in., was born at Kinsale,
where, with his father, he laboured as a bricklayer. His extraordinary
size soon attracted the attention of a travelling showman, who, on payment
of L50 per annum, acquired the right of exhibiting him for three years in
England.
Not satisfied with this extremely good bargain, his master tried to sublet
him to another person in the show business, a proceeding which Cotter (the
giant's real name) objected to, and for which objection he was saddled
with a fictitious debt, and thrown into Bristol Jail. This apparent
misfortune was, in the end, one of the luckiest things that could have
happened to him. While in prison he was visited by a gentleman who took
compassion on his distress, and believing him to be unjustly detained,
very generously became his bail, ultimately investigating the affair so
successfully as to obtain for him not only his liberty but his freedom to
discontinue serving his taskmaster any longer. It happened to be September
when he was liberated, and by the further assistance of his benefactor he
was enabled to set up for himself in the fair then held in St. James's,
and such an attraction did he prove that in three days he realised the
considerable sum of L30. From that time he continued to exhibit himself
for twenty-six years, when, having realised a fortune sufficient to enable
him to keep a carriage and live in luxury, he retired into private life.
A practical joke led to the ultimate success of Edward Knight, a popular
comedian of last century. While with Mr. Nunns, manager of the Stafford
company, he received a message from a stranger desiring his presence at a
certain inn. On repairing thither he was courteously received by a
gentleman who desired to show his gratification at Knight's performance by
giving him permission to use his name (Phillips) to Mr. Tate Wilkinson,
the manager of the York Theatre, who, the stranger felt sure, on account
of his intimacy with him would be sure to give Knight a good engagement.
Next morning a letter was sent by the elated actor, who in due course
received the following reply:
"Sir,--I am not acquainted with any Mr. Phillips, except a rigid
Quaker, and he is the last man in the world to recommend an actor to
my theatre. I don't want you.
"TATE WILKINSON."
This rebuff was so unexpected, and so mortifying, that the recipient sent
a short and sharp answer:
"Sir,--I should as soon think of applying to a Methodist parson to
preach for my benefit as to a Quaker to recommend me to Mr. Wilkinson.
I don't want to come.
"E. KNIGHT."
After an interval of twelve months, when the elder Mathews seceded from
his company, he wrote to Knight as follows:
"Mr. Methodist Parson,--I have a living that produces twenty-five
shillings per week. Will you hold forth?
"TATE WILKINSON."
The invitation was gladly accepted, and for seven years he continued at
York with unvarying success; at the end of which time he obtained an
engagement at Drury Lane, and became a metropolitan favourite.
Though perhaps not so striking an example as any of the foregoing, an
episode in the life of William Dobson (called by Charles the First "the
English Tintoret") is more or less of the same fortunate nature. Dobson,
who always betrayed in his best efforts the want of proper training, was,
as a boy, apprenticed to a Mr. Peake, who was more of a dealer in, than a
painter of, pictures, and who consequently was anything but a competent
teacher. Nevertheless, his collection of paintings, which included some by
Titian and Van Dyck, was most valuable to the youngster, who copied both
those masters with such wonderful correctness that none but an _expert_
could detect the difference. When very young, and very poor, he managed to
get one of his copies of a Van Dyck exhibited in a shop window on Snow
Hill, which, strangely enough, was seen by no less a person than the
author of the original, who immediately sought out the individual who had
reproduced his work with such fidelity, and finding him toiling away in a
miserable garret, took him by the hand, and brought him to the notice of
King Charles.
Another instance of luck not dissociated with impecuniosity is found in
the case of Perry, of _The Morning Chronicle_. Educated at Marischal
College, Aberdeen, which he entered in 1771, he was first employed in that
town as a lawyer's clerk; but full of literary ambition, and possessed of
much literary culture, he made his way to Edinburgh, where he almost
starved, not being able to find employment of any kind. From Edinburgh he
went to Manchester, where he just managed to eke out an existence; but
believing London was the El Dorado for men of letters, he was not content
till he had started for the great city. Amongst others who had promised
him work was Urquart, the bookseller, to whom he wrote without success.
One morning he called upon that gentleman, and was leaving the shop after
a fruitless interview, when the bookseller said he had just experienced
great pleasure in reading an article in _The General Advertiser_, and,
said he, "If you could write like that, I could soon find you an
engagement." It so happened that Perry had sent in an article to that
paper, and his joy may be imagined when he was able to claim the lauded
production as his own; bringing out of his pocket another of the same
sort, which he was about to drop into the editor's box as before. He was
immediately engaged as a paid contributor to _The General Advertiser_ and
_Evening Post_, and ultimately became editor and proprietor of _The
Morning Chronicle_.
One of the most remarkable of the lucky illustrations, however, is that of
Hogarth, when he was a struggling artist. At the time referred to, when
studying at St. Martin's Lane Academy, he was oftentimes reduced to the
lowest possible water-mark; and while laying the foundation of his future
celebrity, he was exposed to all the humiliating inconveniences too
frequently associated with penury, not the least of such annoyances being
the contemptuous insolence of an ignorant letter of lodgings. The story
goes that on one of these occasions when he was unmercifully dunned by his
landlady for the small sum of a sovereign, he was so exasperated that,
with a view to being revenged upon her, he made a sketch of her face so
excruciatingly ugly, that it revealed at once his marvellous power as a
caricaturist.
Turning to the opposite side of the subject--the unlucky, there is, it
must be admitted, a dearth of similarly appropriate examples. It is not
that there is any scarcity of cases of great misfortune in connection with
impecuniosity, but the circumstances connected with such cases are not so
apparently the result of accident. In the lucky instances enumerated the
chance element was conspicuous, but the same cannot be said of the adverse
anecdotes; for they, or rather those that have come under my notice, are
unfortunate cases rather than unlucky. For instance, the impecuniosity
that introduced the Irish giant to some one he would not otherwise have
met, who put him in the way of realising a competency, was manifestly
lucky; but the impecuniosity that attended Stow, the antiquary, in his
latest years, could not in the same sense be called _un_lucky, inasmuch as
it was owing to no particular act or chance circumstance that he continued
poor. The kind of cases that I consider would more properly illustrate
this phase of the subject would be those of persons who, from, say,
missing an appointment with some patron of eminence owing to being hard
up, lost an opportunity of advancement, which never occurred again; or by
not having some small amount of ready money were unable to avail
themselves of an advantageous offer, which would have resulted in a
fortune. That such mishaps have occurred in the long list of unrecorded
lives there is little doubt; but I cannot call any to remembrance at the
present time. The only instances I have met with in my research being
those of unfortunate persons, whose histories of hardship would be more
fittingly recounted as the sad side of impecuniosity.
The individual just referred to, John Stow, the antiquary, is a most
melancholy case in point. A profound scholar in every sense, he devoted
his life and substance to the study of English antiquities; oftentimes
travelling tremendous distances on foot to save monuments, and rescue rare
works from the dispersed libraries of monasteries. His enthusiasm for
study was unbounded, and at his death he left stupendous excerpts in his
own handwriting. At an advanced age, when worn out by study and travel,
and the cares and anxieties of poverty--for he was utterly neglected by
the pretended patrons of learning--his other troubles were increased by
most acute pains in the feet, which he good-humouredly referred to by
saying "his affliction lay in that part which formerly he had made so much
use of." At last he became so necessitous that he petitioned James the
First for a licence to collect alms for himself, "as a recompense for his
labour and travel of forty-five years, in setting forth the Chronicles of
England, and eight years taken up in the Survey of the Cities of London
and Westminster, towards his relief now in his old age: having left his
former means of living, and only employing himself for the service and
good of his country"--which petition was granted by letters patent under
the Great Seal, permitting him to seek assistance from all well-disposed
people within this realm of England. The terms in which this permit was
set forth ("to ask, gather, and take the alms of all our loving subjects")
were scarcely correct; that is to say, "to ask, gather, and take the alms
of all our loving subjects--who will give" would have been more complete;
for though the letters patent were published by the clergy from their
pulpits, the result was so trifling that they had to be renewed for
another twelvemonth; one entire parish in the city subscribing but seven
and sixpence to the poor scholar's appeal.
Learning in Stow's time, and for a long time after, was evidently but
poorly patronised, for his is by no means an isolated experience. Myles
Davies, author of 'Athenae Britannicae,' &c., published in 1716, suffered
similar neglect; his mind, it is alleged, becoming quite confused amidst
the loud cries of penury and despair.
Alluding to those who were supposed to support such as himself, he
scathingly says, "Some parsons would halloo enough to raise the whole
house and home of the domestics to raise a poor crown; at last all that
flutter ends in sending Jack or Tom out to change a guinea, and then 'tis
reckoned over half-a-dozen times before the fatal crown can be picked out,
which must be taken as it is given, with all the parade of almsgiving
[Davies, be it remembered, was a Welsh divine], and so to be received with
all the active and passive ceremonial of mendication and alms-receiving,
as if the books, printing, and paper were worth nothing at all, and as if
it were the greatest charity for them to touch them, or let them be in the
house. 'For I shall never read them,' says one of the five-shilling chaps.
'I have no time to look into them,' says a third. ''Tis so much money
lost,' says a grave dean. 'My eyes being so bad,' said a bishop, 'that I
can scarce read at all.' 'What do you want with me?' said another. 'Sir, I
presented you the other day with my 'Athenae Britannicae,' being the last
part published.' 'I don't want books, take them again; I don't understand
what they mean.' 'The title is very plain,' said I, 'and they are writ
mostly in English.' 'I'll give you a crown for both the volumes.' 'They
stand me, sir, in more than that, and 'tis for a bare subsistence I
present or sell them; how shall I live?' 'I care not a farthing for
that--live or die, 'tis all one to me.' 'Damn my master,' said Jack,
''twas but last night he was commending your books and your learning to
the skies, and now he would not care if you were starving before his eyes;
nay, he often makes game at your clothes, though he thinks you the
greatest scholar in England.'"
So much for the way literature was encouraged in the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, and that it was little better in the eighteenth
century is only too well-known a fact; for "in those days, a large
proportion of working literary men were little better than
outcasts;--persons exiled from decent society, partly by their own vices,
partly by the fact of their following a profession which had hardly
acquired a recognised standing in the world, or found for itself a
definite and indisputable sphere of usefulness. The reading public was not
sufficient to maintain an extensive fraternity of writers, and the writers
consequently often starved, and broke their hearts in wretched garrets, or
earned a despicable living by flattering the great."
These animadversions are especially meant to apply to that class of
_litterateurs_ known as "Grub Street pamphleteers," but not a few notable
names in the world of letters can be found to verify the gloomy picture.
Nathaniel, or "Nat" Lee, as he is more often called, was one of those who
failed to find fortune, but it must be admitted his "own vices" are
answerable for his indigence. The son of a clergyman, he was educated at
Westminster School, and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he took his
B.A.; and, at a very early age, manifested conspicuous ability for
dramatic writing; his first effort, 'Nero, Emperor of Rome,' produced in
1675, being received with marked success. From that time until his death,
which occurred fifteen years later, he brought out eleven plays, not one
of which was a failure, but he was so rakishly extravagant as to be
frequently plunged into the lowest depths of misery. In November 1684, his
excesses, coupled with a naturally excitable temperament, succeeded in
fitting him to be an inmate of Bedlam, where he was confined for four
years. On his release in April 1688, he resumed his occupation of
dramatist, producing 'The Princess of Cleve' in 1689, and 'The Massacre
of Paris' the following year. Notwithstanding the considerable profits
arising from these performances he was reduced to so low an ebb, that a
weekly stipend of 10_s._ from the Theatre Royal was his chief dependence.
He died the same year, 1690, the result of a drunken frolic in the street;
and although the author of eleven plays, all acted with applause, and
dedicated, when printed, to the Earls of Dorset, Mulgrave, and Pembroke,
and the Duchesses of Portsmouth and Richmond, who were numbered among his
patrons, _he was buried by the Parish_ of St. Clement Danes, Strand.
The vicissitudes of Spenser, in contrast to those of the author just
referred to, were undoubtedly due to a want of appreciation on the part of
those in power; for none of his biographers even hint at want of rectitude
in his past life. Created Poet Laureate by Queen Elizabeth, he, for some
time, only wore the barren laurel, and possessed the place without the
pension; for Lord Treasurer Burleigh, for some motive or other,
intercepted the Queen's intended bounty to him. It is said that Her
Majesty, upon Spenser presenting some poems to her, ordered him L100, but
that her Lord Treasurer, objecting to it, said with considerable scorn,
"What! all this for a song?" Whereupon the Queen replied, "Then give him
what is reason." Some time after, the poet, not having received the
promised gift, penned the following poetic petition--
"I was promised on a time,
To have reason for my rime; (_sic_)
From that time unto this season
I received nor rime nor reason"--
which, when sent to his sovereign, had the desired effect of producing the
monetary reward, and also obtained for Lord Burleigh the reprimand he so
well deserved. That Spenser felt keenly the neglect to which he was
subsequently subjected is pretty clearly shown in the following lines--
"Full little knowest thou, that hast not try'd
What hell it is in suing long to bide:
To lose good days that might be better spent,
To wast long nights in pensive discontent:
To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow,
To feed on hope, to pine with fear and sorrow:
To have thy Prince's grace, yet want her peers,
To have thy asking, yet wait many years:
To fret thy soul with crosses and with cares,
To eat thy heart with comfortless despairs:
To fawn, to crouch, to wait, to ride, to run,
To spend, to give, to want, to be undone"--
which is but one of many bemoanings of hard and undeserved treatment; and
though there be some who have accused him of lacking philosophy in thus
making known his poverty, I should think it very much too literally _poor_
philosophy that would suffer in silence when it comes to a matter of bread
and cheese. There were times, of course, in Spenser's history, when his
genius was fully acknowledged, both before and after the neglect recorded,
when, for instance, he made the acquaintance of that chivalrous poet
soldier, Sir Philip Sidney--the historically self-denying Sir Philip, who
when mortally wounded at the battle of Zutphen, and about to revel in a
draught of water that he had called for, denied himself the coveted drink,
and gave it away to a poor comrade. He it was who was the first to
recognise Spenser's great claim as a poet. It is stated that when a
perfect stranger to Sir Philip, Spenser went to Leicester House, and
introduced himself by sending in the ninth canto of 'The Fairy Queen,'
which he had just completed.
The young nobleman was much surprised with the description of "Despair" in
that canto, and betrayed an unusual kind of transport on the discovery of
so new and uncommon a genius. After he had read some verses he called his
steward, and bade him give the person who brought those verses L50; but
upon reading the next stanza, he ordered the sum to be doubled. The
steward was as much surprised as his master, and thought it his duty to
make some delay in executing so sudden and lavish a bounty; but upon
reading one stanza more, Sir Philip raised his gratuity to L200, and
commanded the steward to give it immediately, lest, as he read farther, he
might be tempted to give away his whole estate. Unfortunately this
generous patron was killed at the early age of thirty-two, and it was
after his decease that Spenser for a time was under a cloud. Subsequently
he was befriended by the Earl of Leicester, and upon the appointment of
Lord Grey of Wilton to be Lord Deputy of Ireland, the poet became his
secretary, and was rewarded by a grant from the Queen of three thousand
acres. This he was not destined to enjoy very long, for in the rebellion
of Tyrone he was plundered, and deprived of his estate, and when he
arrived in England he was heart-broken by his misfortunes. He died in the
greatest distress on the 16th January, 1599, and though interred in
Westminster Abbey at the expense of the Earl of Essex, his death according
to Ben Jonson was actually occasioned by "lack of bread."
It is difficult to determine which is the more pitiable, the want and
misery produced by the neglect of others, or the destitution resulting
from evil courses; both demand our commiseration, though some of the stern
moralists affect to have "no pity" for those whose troubles are the
outcome of self-indulgence and dissipation. "A fellow-feeling makes us
wondrous kind," and only those who have been the victims of that enslaving
mania for drink, which has blasted so many bright lives will have
compassion for such a man as Samuel Boyce. This misguided mortal, the son
of a dissenting minister, was born at Dublin in the year 1708, and when
eighteen was sent to the Glasgow University, his father having designed
him for the ministry. He married when he had been at college little more
than a year, and soon developed habits of indulgence and extravagance,
which effectually ruined him, in spite of much assistance received from
the nobility and others. In the year 1731 he published a volume of poems,
to which is subjoined the "Tablature of Cebes," and a letter upon liberty,
which appeared originally in the _Dublin Journal_ five years previously.
These productions gained him considerable reputation and substantial
patronage from the Countess of Eglinton, to whom they were dedicated.
His next successful effort was an elegy upon the death of the Viscountess
Stormont (a woman of the most refined taste, well versed in science, and a
great admirer of poetry), entitled, 'The Tears of the Muses,' which so
pleased Lord Stormont, the deceased lady's husband, that he advertised for
the author in one of the weekly papers, and caused his attorney to make
him a very handsome present. In addition to the favour of Lady Eglinton
and Lord Stormont, he was also befriended by the Duchess of Gordon, who
gave him most material assistance while he continued in Scotland; and when
he went to London, gave him a letter of introduction to Pope, and obtained
another for him to Sir Peter King, Lord Chancellor of England. He had many
other most valuable recommendations when he arrived in the metropolis,
and possessing as he did ability of no common order, his opportunities
were exceptionally fine; but nothing can withstand the devastating
influences of the demon of drink; and at the age of thirty-two he is
described as reduced to such an extremity of human wretchedness that he
had not a shirt, a coat, or any kind of apparel to put on. The sheets in
which he lay were carried to the pawnbroker's, and he was obliged to be
confined to his bed with no other covering than a blanket, and in this
condition, thrusting his arm through a hole, he scribbled a quantity of
verse for the _Gentleman's Magazine_.
His genius was not confined to poetry, for he was skilled in painting,
music, and heraldry; but by his pen alone, had he chosen to live decently,
he could have commanded a very good living. His translations from the
French were admittedly excellent; but the drawback to employing him at
this work was that when he had copied a page or two he would pawn the
original and re-pawn it as often he could induce his acquaintances to "get
it out" for him. On one occasion Dr. Johnson managed to get up a sixpenny
subscription for him in order to redeem his clothes, but the effort to
help him was useless, for within two days he pawned them again, and the
last state was at any rate no better than the first. He seems to have been
so demoralised by drink that he was dead to every sense of honour and
humanity; for, whenever he obtained half-a-guinea, whether by writing
poetry or a begging letter, he would sit squandering it in a tavern while
his wife and child starved at home. He got from bad to worse, and in 1742,
when locked up in a spunging-house, sent the following appeal to Cave:
"I am every moment threatened to be turned out here, because I have not
money to pay for my bed two nights past, which is usually paid beforehand;
and I am loth to go into the Compter, till I can see if my affairs can
possibly be made up. I hope, therefore, you will have the humanity to send
me half-a-guinea for support till I finish your papers in my hands. I
humbly entreat your answer, not having tasted anything since Tuesday
evening I came here; and my coat will be taken off my back for the charge
of the bed, so that I must go into prison naked, which is too shocking for
me to think of."
There are several accounts given of his death, which occurred when he was
but forty-one years of age; and, though they vary as to the precise nature
of his end, there is no doubt that it was accelerated by the habit he
indulged in--of drinking hot beer to excess, which at last obscured and
confused his intellectual faculties.
The sad side of impecuniosity is, unfortunately, so vast a subject that it
would require an entire volume, instead of part of a chapter, to properly
record the miseries of mind and body endured by those in past ages, who,
not unknown to fame, have been permitted to pine and die in despair. The
poets alone, so prolific are they in this respect, would furnish material
sufficient; but the neglect of genius is anything but an uncommon thing,
and therefore commonplace sufferings might not be regarded as
"_Curiosities_ of impecuniosity," though in one sense it certainly is
curious that their wants should not have been recognised. Men like Henry
Carey or Cary, the author of 'Sally in our Alley,' and said by some to be
the composer of the National Anthem, who was considered by all authorities
to be a true son of the Muses, have been driven to desperation through
want. It is said, "At the time that this poet could neither walk the
streets nor be seated at the convivial board without listening to his own
songs and his own music--for in truth the whole nation was echoing his
verse, and crowded theatres were applauding his wit and humour; while this
very man himself, urged by his strong humanity, founded a 'Fund for
Decayed Musicians'--he was so broken-hearted, and his own common comforts
so utterly neglected, that in despair, not waiting for nature to relieve
him from the burden of existence, he laid violent hands on himself; and
when found dead _had only a halfpenny in his pocket_."
The following lines written some time before his melancholy end show that
he was no stranger to the "slings and arrows of outrageous fortune," and
that his self-destruction was not the result of momentary madness, but
rather induced by the humiliating torture of ills long borne.
"Far, far away then chase the harlot Muse,
Nor let her thus thy noon of life abuse;
Mix with the common crowd, unheard, unseen,
And if again thou tempt'st the vulgar praise,
May'st thou be crown'd with birch instead of bays!"
The untimely end of Chatterton is a companion picture to that of Cary,
but the circumstances of his early death, his being without food for two
days, and his poisoning himself with arsenic and water, when lodging at
Mrs. Angel's, a sack-maker in Brook Street, Holborn, are so well known
that it is only necessary to mention his melancholy fate, which if it
stood alone in the history of literature would be sufficient to show there
is a very pathetic side to impecuniosity. Although this rash act is
attributed to the state of starvation to which the poet was reduced, there
is little doubt that Horace Walpole by his unsympathising, though strictly
correct, reproof had much to do with the disordered condition of the poor
fellow's mind. When living at Bristol, Chatterton became possessed of some
parchments which had been extracted from the coffin of a Mr. Canynge, and
upon these he produced some poetry, which he described as a production of
Thomas Canynge, and of his friend, one Thomas Rowley, a priest; sent them
to Walpole and asked for assistance to enable him to quit his uncongenial
occupation, and pursue one more poetic. The poems were submitted to
competent antiquaries, and pronounced forgeries, whereupon Horace Walpole
refused the boy's application for help, at the same time reproving the
attempted fraud in the most cold and cutting terms. For this treatment the
great wit and prince of letter-writers has been severely censured; one
writer remarking, "Just or unjust, the world has never forgiven Horace
Walpole for Chatterton's misery. His indifference has been contrasted with
the generosity of Edmund Burke to Crabbe, a generosity to which we owe
'The Village,' 'The Borough,' and to which Crabbe owed his peaceful old
age, and almost his existance. The cases were different, but Crabbe had
his faults, and Chatterton was worth saving. It is well for genius that
there are souls in the world more sympathising, less worldly, and more
indulgent, than those of such men as Horace Walpole."
Another most melancholy, and equally tragical record connected with
impecuniosity is furnished in the life of Dr. Dodd, a literary divine, and
one of the most popular preachers of the last century; though _his_
troubles were not the outcome of actual want, but rather the result of
want of self-control and principle. He commenced as a writer for the
press, published 'The Beauties of Shakespeare,' obtained several
lectureships, which he held with great success, and subsequently became
Chaplain to the King. The list of his different appointments is most
numerous, and most of them not only important, but highly remunerative,
but his extravagance was such that no income would have been sufficient to
keep him out of debt. Owing to his excesses he lost the royal favour, and
though he was in the receipt of a large income from his preaching, it was
not enough to satisfy his expensive habits, and he foolishly sent an
anonymous letter to Lady Apsley offering her L3000 if she would prevail on
her husband, the Lord Chancellor, to appoint him to the rectory of St.
George's, Hanover Square. The letter was traced to the doctor, and in
consequence his name was struck off the list of royal chaplains. After a
sojourn abroad he returned to this country, obtained from Lord
Chesterfield a living in Buckinghamshire, but could not forsake his old
habits; he still plunged into debt, and _from being pressed for money_
forged the name of his patron to a bill for L4200, was tried, found
guilty, and executed at the Old Bailey, in 1777.
The career of Thomas Otway, the dramatist, though short, for he was but
thirty-four years of age when he died, was one continued course of
monetary difficulty, the result of irregular living. The son of a Sussex
rector and educated at Winchester and Christ Church, Oxford, he betrayed
no anxiety to follow his father's footsteps, but at the age of
twenty-three manifested a most practical preference for Thespis rather
than theology, though he does not seem to have possessed any great genius
for acting. He subsequently became a cornet in a regiment, which was sent
to Flanders, but distinguished himself most as a dramatic writer, for
which profession he was eminently suited, many of his plays meeting with
exceptional success, particularly 'Venice Preserved,' which has held
possession of the stage for about two hundred years. His circumstances,
never good, gradually went from bad to worse, owing to his dissolute
proclivities, and he died at last on the 14th April, 1685, in a wretched
state of penury, at a public-house called 'The Bull,' on Tower Hill,
whither he had gone to avoid the too pressing attention of his creditors.
It is generally believed that the actual cause of his death was choking,
which occurred through his having been without food for some time, and
then too eagerly devouring a piece of bread which, through the generosity
of a friend, he had been able to purchase. That Otway should have excelled
in tragedy is not surprising, the power that he displayed in depicting
domestic suffering being easily accounted for by the fact that he must
have been constantly experiencing distress in private life, for when his
tragic end was brought about he was hiding from sheriff's officers, his
misery terminating only with death.
It is terribly sad to see such men as these, blessed with natural gifts
far beyond the common, yet in spite of these endowments sinking to a lower
level than their inferiors in intellect; and unfortunately the literary
list of these erring ones is a long one, for since the days of Robert
Greene, said to be the first Englishman who wrote for a living, and who
died in the house of a poor shoemaker, who took pity upon him when he was
destitute, there have always been men unable to withstand the seductions
of vicious courses, and who have consequently paid the penalty of
intemperance, and immorality, by death-beds of misery, and remorse, to say
nothing of the life-long inconveniences of impecuniosity. Lamentable as is
the contemplation of these lost lives, there is yet a sadder picture
still, for pitiable as it is to think of men, indifferent alike to their
well-being in this world and in that which is to come, the sadness is
intensified when the object of pity is a woman, one who has been referred
to as "a sort of female Otway, without his genius."
The individual in question was Colley Cibber's younger daughter,
Charlotte, whose education from her earliest years was eminently
masculine, which resulted in the girl becoming proficient in manly sports
and pastimes, such as shooting, hunting, riding, &c. When very young she
married Mr. Richard Clarke, a celebrated violinist, with whom she soon
disagreed, and from whom she speedily separated, and she then devoted
herself to the stage, and commenced a career, which for strange and
harrowing vicissitudes is unequalled in the annals of British
biography--one day courted, admired and affluent; the next an outcast,
uncared for, and despised. Singularly enough, the first character she
assumed on the stage after the quarrel with her husband was Mademoiselle
in 'The Provoked Wife,' in which character, and several subsequent
assumptions at the Haymarket Theatre, she was highly successful, and
obtained an uncommonly good salary. Her temper however, like herself, was
eccentric, and it was not long before she quarrelled with Fleetwood, the
manager, and left the theatre at a moment's notice. From being a regular
performer, she then took to travelling about the country with strollers,
and shared with them the starvation fate that is so often associated with
their nomadic existence. Tiring of this, she set up as a grocer, in Long
Acre, but failed in that business, as well as at puppet-show keeping, at
which she tried her hand in a street near the Haymarket. On the death of
her husband, she was thrown into prison for debt, but released by the
subscriptions of ladies of questionable repute, whose charity is
proverbially more conspicuous than their virtue. After remarrying, and
again becoming a widow, Charlotte Clarke (for by that name she has always
been known) assumed male attire, and obtained occasional engagements at
the theatres, and, though she suffered most distressing deprivations was
able to present so good an appearance, that an heiress became madly
attached to her, and was inconsolable when the wretched woman revealed her
sex. The next adventure she claims to have participated in is her becoming
valet to an Irish nobleman, which situation she did not retain for any
length of time; and then she attempted to earn her living as a
sausage-maker, but was unsuccessful. Twice she became a tavern proprietor,
and for a time was in the most flourishing circumstances, but her
prosperity was excessively ephemeral, and amongst the other occupations
that she is credited with having undertaken are those of waiter at the
King's Head, Marylebone; worker of a set of puppets, and authoress of her
extraordinary biography, which she published in 1755. It was with the
proceeds of this book that she was enabled to open one of the
public-houses mentioned; but the amount realised by its sale was not of
much benefit to the poor misguided creature, for within five years (she
died in 1760), she was discovered in a more wretched, forlorn condition
than ever, according to the account of two gentlemen who visited her. The
widow, who, petted and pampered by her parents, had, as a child been
brought up in luxury, was then domiciled in a wretched, thatched hovel in
the purlieus of Clerkenwell Bridewell, at that time a wild suburb, where
the scavengers used to throw the cleansings of the streets. The house and
its scanty furniture sufficiently indicated the extreme poverty of the
inmates.
"Mrs. Clarke sat on a broken chair by a little scrap of fire, and the
visitors were accommodated with a rickety deal board. A half-starved dog
lay at the authoress's feet; a cat sat on one hob, and a monkey on the
other; while a magpie perched on the back of its mistress's chair. A
worn-out pair of bellows served for a writing-desk, and a broken cup for
an inkstand; these were matched by the pen, which was worn down to the
stump, and was the only one on the premises. The lady asked thirty
guineas for the copyright. The bookseller offered five, but was at length
induced by his friend to give ten, on condition that Mr. Whyte (the
friend) would pay a moiety and take half the risk of the novel."
In the year 1759 she played Marplot, in 'The Busybody,' for her own
benefit at the Haymarket, when the following advertisement appeared.
"As I am entirely dependent on chance for a subsistence, and am desirous
of getting into business, I hope the town will favour me on the occasion,
which, added to the rest of their indulgence, will ever be gratefully
acknowledged by their truly obliged, and obedient servant, CHARLOTTE
CLARKE."
This was shortly before her death, which took place on the 6th April,
1760.
It would be extremely difficult to find a more sorrowful story in
connection with impecuniosity than that of Colley Cibber's daughter; and
though the degraded character of the greater part of her life has robbed
her misfortunes of much of the sympathy that would otherwise have been
freely accorded, it would have been well if some who have animadverted so
severely upon her shortcomings had remembered that much in her life that
was so unwomanly was undoubtedly due to her masculine and defective
training.
The celebrated actress Mrs. Jordan--whose acting, according to
Hazlitt--"gave more pleasure than that of any other actress, because she
had the greatest spirit of enjoyment in herself"--was so unfortunate in
her last days, that she is fully entitled to a place with those whose
monetary embarrassments have been particularly sad. For years she had
lived in uninterrupted domestic harmony with the Duke of Clarence,
afterwards William the Fourth; but when the connection was suddenly
severed in 1811, a yearly allowance of L4400, was settled upon her for the
maintenance of herself and daughters; with a provision that, if Mrs.
Jordan should resume her profession, the care of the duke's daughters,
together with L1500 per annum allowed for them, should revert to his Royal
Highness. Within a few months of this arrangement she did return to the
stage, but through having incautiously given blank notes of hand to a
friend in difficulties on the understanding that the amounts to be filled
in were but small, she awoke one morning to find herself called upon to
pay amounts utterly beyond her power. In her terror and dismay she fled
to France, but her peace of mind was gone. Separated from her children,
and racked by the torturing thought of the liability she was unable to
discharge, she gradually pined away, and died in terrible distress of mind
at St. Cloud in June 1816.
Contrasted with its brilliant beginning the close of Mrs. Jordan's life is
painfully sad, and it might be urged that the sorrowful end was but an
instance of retributive justice on account of the fair and frail one's
social sin. Experience, however, proves that the breaking of the moral law
does not always involve punishment in this life, and even if this were not
so, many instances could be cited of misfortunes as heavy, and far
heavier, falling to the lot of those who to all intents and purposes have
led blameless lives.
Foremost among such cases would be the crushing blow that befell the noble
and greatly gifted novelist and poet, Sir Walter Scott, at the age of
fifty-five years, when, having given to the world the greater part of
those glorious works that have placed his name pre-eminent in the world of
literature, and being, as was supposed, the happy enjoyer of a handsome
fortune and splendid estate, it transpired that he was a ruined man. So
successful had been his literary labours for thirty years that it was
generally and naturally supposed that the enormous sums spent on
Abbotsford were the proceeds of his novels and poems, but it seems he had
for a long time been a partner in the printing firm of Ballantyne & Co.,
who were closely connected with Messrs. Constable, the publishers. These
firms had engaged in transactions of a speculative character, and in the
commercial crisis of 1825 both failed, Sir Walter's immense private
fortune being swallowed up in the crash, while as a partner in the house
of Ballantyne he was responsible for the enormous amount of L147,000. At
the time of this calamity his health had already been considerably
shattered, the slightly grey hair had in the year 1819 been turned to
snowy white by an attack of jaundice, and his frame further enfeebled four
years later by an attack of apoplexy, so that it would not have been
surprising if this frightful crash had proved his death-blow. Far from it;
with a heroism unparalleled, and a high sense of honour, that adds more
lustre to his name than the most brilliant effusion of his pen, he
determined manfully to face this overwhelming catastrophe, refusing all
proffered aid, and merely asking for time. "Gentlemen," said he to the
creditors, "time and I against any two. Let me take this good ally into
my company, and I believe I shall be able to pay you every farthing. It is
very hard thus to lose all the labours of a lifetime and to be made a poor
man at last when I ought to have been otherwise, but, if God grant me life
and strength for a few years longer, I have no doubt I shall redeem it
all." The redemption referred to his property, all of which he gave up,
retiring into modest lodgings, where he zealously set to work to
accomplish the Herculean task of writing off the gigantic sum named.
'Woodstock,' which realised L8228, was the first novel after his
misfortune, and that occupied him only three months; but it was as, he
said, "very hard" at his time of life to every day perform the allotted
task of producing thirty pages of printed matter, for the work on which he
was then occupied was not that fiction which he wrote with such facility,
but a voluminous 'Life of Napoleon Buonaparte,' necessitating reference to
no end of books and papers; and day after day for many a month might he
have been seen, slowly and sorrowfully, wading through work after work in
order to verify each date and fact. The nine volumes were finished in
1827, and these were followed by 'The Chronicles of the Canongate,' 'Tales
of a Grandfather,' 'The Fair Maid of Perth,' 'Count Robert,' and 'Castle
Dangerous'--the last named published in 1831--a year before his death,
which may be fairly attributed to the undue strain of mind and body; the
_raison-d'etre_ of this overtaxing of his strength being simply and solely
impecuniosity.
The picture of this truly great man being obliged to wear out the last
years of his life by unceasing labour when he should have been enjoying a
well-earned rest, is excessively sad and touching--but the sadness is to
some extent relieved by the heroic nature of the act. The melancholy end
of the man is swallowed up in the imperishable name he has left behind,
which name, for generations to come, will serve as the synonym of honour.
Sad, far more sad, were the closing days of Sheridan, whose last moments
were also darkened by impecuniosity, but utterly unrelieved by any acts of
self-sacrifice; and made far more melancholy by the fact that the monetary
misery was caused by unnecessary extravagance.
Alas, poor Sheridan! If ever man in his declining days had good reason to
say with the preacher, "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity," thou hadst!
for thou wert bitterly punished at the last, by the desertion and neglect
of those who should have succoured and solaced thee. True thy
shortcomings were many, but only one blessed with such brilliant gifts
could possibly realise thy temptation; and the sorrow thou didst endure
must silence detraction. Says one of his biographers, "For six years after
the burning of the old theatre, he continued to go down and down. Disease
now attacked him fiercely. In the spring of 1816 he was fast waning
towards extinction. His day was past, he had outlived his fame as a wit
and social light; he was forgotten by many, if not by most, of his old
associates. He wrote to Rogers, 'I am absolutely undone and
broken-hearted.' Poor Sheridan! in spite of all thy faults, who is he
whose morality is so stern that he cannot shed one tear over thy latter
days! God forgive us, we are all sinners; and if we weep not for this
man's deficiency, how shall we ask tears when our day comes? Even as I
write, I feel my hand tremble and my eyes moisten over the sad end of one
whom I love, though he died before I was born. 'They are going to put the
carpets out of window,' he wrote to Rogers, 'and break into Mrs. S.'s room
and _take me_. For God's sake let me see you!' See him! see one friend who
could and would help him in his misery! Oh, happy man may that man count
himself who has never wanted that one friend, and felt the utter
helplessness of that want. Poor Sheridan! had he ever asked, or hoped, or
looked for that Friend out of _this_ world it had been better; for 'the
Lord thy God is a jealous God,' and we go on seeking human friendship and
neglecting the divine till it is too late. He found one hearty friend in
his physician, Dr. Bain, when all others had forsaken him. The spirit of
White's and Brookes', the companion of a prince and a score of noblemen,
the enlivener of every fashionable table, was forgotten by all but this
one doctor. Let us read Moore's description. 'A sheriff's officer at
length arrested the dying man _in his bed_, and was about to carry him off
in his blankets to a spunging-house, when Dr. Bain interfered?' Who would
live the life of revelry that Sheridan lived to have such an end? A few
days after, on the 7th July, 1816, in his sixty-fifth year, he died. Of
his last hours the late Professor Smythe wrote an admirable and most
touching account, a copy of which was circulated in manuscript. The
professor, hearing of Sheridan's condition asked to see him, with a view
not only of alleviating present distress, but of calling the dying man to
repentance. From his hands the unhappy Sheridan received the Holy
Communion; his face during that solemn rite--doubly solemn when it is
performed in the chamber of death--'expressed,' Smythe relates, '_the
deepest awe_.' That phrase conveys to the mind impressions not easy to be
defined, not easy to be forgotten.
"Peace! There was not peace even in death, and the creditor pursued him
even into the 'waste wide,' even to the coffin. He was lying in state,
when a gentleman in the deepest mourning called, it is said, at the house,
and introducing himself as an old and much-attached friend of the
deceased, begged to be allowed to look upon his face. The tears which rose
in his eyes, the tremulousness of his quiet voice, the pallor of his
mournful face, deceived the unsuspecting servant, who accompanied him to
the chamber of death, removed the lid of the coffin, turned down the
shroud, and revealed features which had once been handsome, but long since
rendered almost hideous by drinking. The stranger gazed with profound
emotion, while he quietly drew from his pocket a bailiff's wand, and
touching the corpse's face with it, suddenly altered his manner to one of
considerable glee, and informed the servant that he had arrested the
corpse in the King's name for a debt of L500. It was the morning of the
funeral, which was to be attended by half the grandees of England, and in
a few minutes the mourners began to arrive. But the corpse was the
bailiff's property till his claim was paid, and nought but the money would
soften the iron capturer. Canning and Lord Sidmouth agreed to settle the
matter, and over the coffin the debt was paid."
The pall-bearers were the Duke of Bedford, the Earl of Lauderdale, Earl
Mulgrave, Lord Holland, Lord Spencer, and the Bishop of London, and the
body was followed by two Royal Highnesses--the Dukes of York and
Sussex--by two Marquises, seven Earls, three Viscounts, five Lords, and a
perfect army of honourables and right honourables. This _show_ of respect
and homage after death, when nothing had been done to assuage his last
sufferings in life, was regarded by those who loved him as a bitter
mockery, and Moore's lines justly denounced it.
"Oh, it sickens the heart to see bosoms so hollow,
And friendship so false in the great and high-born,
To think what a long line of titles may follow,
The relics of him who died friendless and lorn!
How proud they can press to the funeral array
Of him whom they shunned in his sickness and sorrow,
How bailiffs may seize his last blanket to-day,
Whose pall shall be held up by nobles to-morrow!"