Modern Times, OR THE ADVENTURES OF GABRIEL OUTCAST. SUPPOSED TO BE WRITTEN BY HIMSELF▪ IN IMITATION OF GIL BLAS.
QUI CAPIT, ILLE FACIT.
Prov.
IN THREE VOLUMES. VOLUME I.
LONDON:
PRINTED FOR THE AUTHOR, BY THE LITERARY SOCIETY, At the
LOGOGRAPHIC PRESS,
AND SOLD BY J. WALTER, PRINTING-HOUSE-SQUARE, BLACKFRYARS.
M,DCC,LXXXV.
ADVERTISEMENT.
IT may be necessary in this age of slander and detraction, for the writer of the following novel to declare, that, in the characters here drawn, he has pointed at no particular person, his view being merely to lay before the rising generation, the arts and deceptions of the generality of mankind. He is very sensible that there are in all classes of life, men of honour and respectability; but it must be allowed, at the same time, that there are not wanting men of the reverse disposition. It is a matter of lamentation that there are too many of them in the world, and by exposing them to the eye of the incautious, the author flatters himself, he is doing as laudable an act, as pointing out to the unwary a pit artfully concealed to entrap them.
SOME readers may possibly be acquainted with one anecdote, and some with another here told, they being facts of notoriety; be that as it may, it they serve to elucidate, or give a colouring to the subject they are upon, there can be no more impropriety in introducing them, than in repeating a good and well timed story in a large company, because some men in that company may have heard it before.
BEFORE the reviewers think proper to pass their opinion upon these volumes, they are desired attentively to read the twentieth chaper.
MODERN TIMES.
CHAPTER I.
FROM an opinion that a recital of my adventures through life may be useful to society, I have been induced to give them to the world; and flatter myself that if they have not a tendency to make men philosophers, they, at least, will teach them worldly knowledge, and shew them, that he is the richest and happiest of mortals, whose resources are within himself, and who depends least upon the assistance of others.
WHO my parents were, is, indeed, very immaterial, but it may be necessary to say, that I am the only child of a very respectable, though not very opulent couple. My father's name was Wilbraham; he was descended from the younger branch of a good family; and though his estate in the county of Nottingham did not exceed one hundred pounds a year, pride of blood prevented his putting me out to any trade, but made him ambitious of bringing me up, as he called it, a
Gentleman.
One hundred a year was a scanty pittance to encourage such notions; but he lived, as half the world does, upon expectation; looked forward to the death of an uncle, mortgaged his little patrimony to keep up appearances, and died, as the common phrase is, some hundreds of pounds worse than nothing. The only advantage I received from him was a tolerable education, acquired at a grammar-school in the neighbourhood. As he could not afford me a horse, nor any of those rural indulgencies, which young gentlemen are taught to expect, I was under the necessity of seeking my amusement at home, and I have blessed myself since a thousand times, in that necessity. Being fond of study, I became master of the Classicks, and the vicar of the parish, who professed to have my interest much at heart, furnished me with the loan of such books, as he thought would improve my mind, and which our circulating library did not possess. By the time I was nineteen, I became, through these means, a tolerable proficient in history, and the
belles lettres,
and was thought to be a pretty good scholar; nor did I want the outward accomplishments of a gentleman. My father took care I should learn to dance, and the fencing-master who attended at the school where I was bred, finding me, as he was pleased to say, an active, well-made young man, gave me, voluntarily, a sufficient number of lessons on the small sword, to enable me to defend myself, was I ever attacked in that way. This, added to a natural gaiety of temper, led me into the good graces of many; and had he left me his little estate unincumbered, I should have passed through life without any difficulty. As it is, few men have experienced a greater vicissitude of fortune, or more embarrassments. My father caught the small pox, and my mother, who loved him too tenderly to quit the house, though she had never had that disorder, imprudently busied herself about him, caught the infection, and I was thus deprived of both my parents at once; she fell a sacrifice to the distemper a few days after my father, and they were both buried in the same grave.
WITH the assistance of my good friend the vicar, I soon looked round me, and found I had nothing to depend on but myself; the mortgagees seized the estate, which, owing to the decrease in value of land, was barely sufficient to pay the money borrowed; and the cash into which his furniture, and other things were converted, was divided among his creditors, and did not pay more than twelve shillings in the pound; so that had not the vicar felt for my situation, I should not have known how to have acted. Application was made to my father's uncle, but to no manner of purpose. His answer was,
I had been brought up a
Gentleman,
and he should
now
see how I could make out upon the profession: he had never been consulted upon my education, and was determined not to give me a shilling: I might apply to my mother's relations, (who, by the by, were not in a situation to assist me)
he
desired never to hear any thing of me.
In short, had it not been for the humanity of the vicar, who procured me a collection of fifty pounds among the neighbouring gentry, and who took me into his house, till my father's affairs were adjusted, I might have been turned out into the street a vagrant. To him I am indebted for the first good office I experienced, and I am sure it was disinterested.—The God of Compassion taught him mercy,— and he practised it where he could.
THE next step the vicar took, was to find a situation to place me in. He had a brother who kept a school in the neighbourhood of London, to him he applied, and prevailed on him to take me in as an assistant. Part of my money was expended in equiping me with necessaries, and on the eve of my departure, which was soon after, on counting my wealth, I found myself possessed of three ten pound bank notes, and five pounds fifteen shillings in cash; more money than I ever was master of, and of which I simply thought, I never should see the end. My good friend advised me to husband it to the utmost, and with this view I took a place to London on the roof of the coach; but that no future situation of mine might hurt the pride of my father's family, I changed my name, and called, myself,
Gabriel Outcast.
CHAP. II.
THE first day's journey passed tolerably well. It was fine weather, and I had a companion on the roof, an itinerant pedlar. The passengers within were, a footman and two maid servants of a Nottinghamshire Baronet, an outrider to a tradesman in London, and a smuggler; so that in point of company, I thought myself as happy without, as I should have been within. The only knowledge I could gather from the pedlar, was some part of the mysteries of his profession: he took a great deal of pains to persuade me he was a rascal; such as that, under a travelling licence, and the idea of selling things cheap, the articles he dealt in were of the worst kind, and generally damaged, for which he got the best price, and very often sold goods to the ignorant and unwary thirty per cent. dearer than they could be bought for of the fair dealer. However, I had nothing to do with him; as I did not set up for a corrector of other men's conduct, I left him in the enjoyment of his iniquity, and we passed through the day as sociable as beggars generally are; for I determined on my first outset, to bring my mind, if possible, to a conformity with the humility of any situation I might be thrown into. But, notwithstanding my philosophy, I found myself rather hurt at the close of the day. Though riding on the roof of the coach, I considered myself, from family, from education, from property, much superior to those within; but
my
thinking so did not lead the landlord of the inn where we were to sleep, and his wife, to think the same. I found a manifest difference between riding
without,
and riding
within.
The pedlar, accustomed to such travelling, took his place, instantly on alighting, in the corner of the kitchen chimney; but on my engaging the attention of the chambermaid, to whom I addressed myself very civilly, she was soon routed by her mistress, with a
I wish to God, Betty, you'd leave that fellow, and attend to the inside passengers.
It was in vain for me to plead a head-ache, and a wish to be shewn to my chamber. She told me, that she had no beds but for the gentlemen and ladies that came in the coach, and that I must turn into the loft or the stable. In vain did Betty argue in my favour, in vain did she say, that I and the
gentleman
in the chimney-corner, meaning the pedlar, might lay together in the spare garret; nothing would do, till I pulled out my purse, and asked her to change me a ten pound note: for one of the notes I had lodged in my purse, the others were safe stowed in my trunk. The naming of a ten pound note altered her tone, she
begged my pardon for not being able to attend to me in the hurry she was in; but that if I could dispense with laying at the top of the house with my fellow-traveller, the bed was a good one, and it should be clean sheeted.
I was too fatigued, and too much shaken with my journey, to be very nice about my lodging; I could have slept upon the boards. I told her,
I would get something warm to drink, settle the matter with my fellow-traveller, and when the chambermaid had waited on the coach
gentry,
I would be shewn to my room.
Finding the benefit I derived from the naming a bank note, I began again to display my wealth, in order to get consequence at the fire-side,—and I discovered, that it not only procured me the warmest place, but the attention of the whole kitchen. A butcher in the further corner observed to me, that
he had known
gem'men
ride upon the roof of the coach through choice, for his part he never rode any where else; it was pleasanter, and he could
nater
the country.
In short, after a few ceremonies about place were adjusted, and a few coals laid on, we presently became acquainted, and the state of the nation was debated on. The butcher said,
the minister was a man of his own
kidney,
that he handled a
knife
well, and got to the bottom of a
wound
at once; did not stand niggling as some of our statesmen do, but when he
cut,
cut at a single stroke, and chopped off every unnecessary part of the constitution at a blow:
Yes, yes,
says an exciseman, who sat opposite to him,
he
does
cut, with a vengeance; I am sure I have reason to say so, for he has cut
me
out of a vote for the county, and now, in all probability, I may lose my place.
And no harm,
replies the butcher,
if you was. D— me, it would be happy for this country if there wasn't an exciseman in it. We should then have our beer at half price,
"Yes, by G-d," returns the exciseman,
rogues would be then triumphant.
Finding the conversation grow warm, I consulted the pedlar, and we retired to our chamber; we paid our reckoning, however, first; for the landlady told us, it was customary for all outside passengers to pay for their beds before they slept in them, as it saved a world of trouble in the morning; and it was lucky for me that this custom was complied with; for my display of my money at the fire-side had so fascinated the attention of the pedlar, that he thought proper to rise an hour before the coach set off, and make free with my purse and its contents, which laid in my breeches pocket, on the chair beside me; but which from the sound sleep I was in, I was insensible of his taking. All I know is, that having paid my reckoning the night before, I had no occasion for money in the morning, and never missed it, till I wanted to pay for my breakfast; and that the pedlar had taken it was beyond a doubt, as he was seen to leave the inn with his wallet before the coachman was visible, and had not, though he had taken his place for London, paid any part of his fare. As we are apt to make the best of misfortunes, like the philosopher, who having broke his leg, rejoiced that it was not his neck, I consoled myself in not having lost my trunk, that having been commited to the care of the coachman, in which the remainder of my money was stowed, and of which I determined to be more careful.
WE had now no one on the outside but the coachman and myself whom I addressed in his own way, and whom a glass of brandy or gin at every village where he stopped, had made very eloquent and communicative.
This will be a d-mned poor journey for me,
says he,
nobody without, and none but beggars within!
—for I found his attention was always engrossed with what he should get upon the road. I asked him, if he was not paid by his master?
Yes, by G-d,
says he,
after a manner,—twelve shillings a week,— which will scarce find me in gin and tobacco. If it was not now and then for a generous passenger, we coachmen might starve. 'Tis true we get a shilling or two occasionally, by a short passenger, or for the carriage of a parcel that is not booked, but that's a poor pittance in these hard times.
On my observing to him, that these occasional shillings were, in my opinion, the property of his master: "Are they by G-d?" says he,
then the devil may drive his coach for me.—No, no master, we don't stand all weathers, late and early, for twelve shillings a week; I have known coachmen get three guineas, and richly deserve it too.
—
But not honestly?
—
Yes, honestly. My coach carries four, and if I now and then pick up a fifth upon the road, how is he the worse for it?
In short, as it is in vain to dispute with a man against his interest, I dropped the argument, and contented myself with general topics, till we arrived at the inn, where we were to breakfast, and where I first discovered the friendliness of my last night's bed-fellow, who, finding me embarrassed, as he thought, with too much money, was kind enough to ease me of part of it. However, as I knew not his name, and he was a stranger to the house where we lodged, I could do no otherwise than reconcile myself to the loss, have recourse to my trunk, and supply my pocket afresh. Nothing of any consequence happened the remainder of the day; I was set down at Highgate, five miles short of London, where the vicar's brother resided; and as I tipped the coachman a shilling, I had his blessing at parting; so easy is it to procure the good wishes of these blades of the whip!
CHAP. III.
DR. SLASHEM, the vicar's brother in law, to whom I was recommended, received me at his door with apparent civility, but soon gave me to understand that he had reckoned without his host, when he proposed taking an assistant. His school was but of late establishment, two scholars had lest him the day before, and he had no greater number than he could attend to himself; however, out of respect to his brother, he would contrive to give me house-room, till I could find a situation to my liking, and as he understood I was not able to afford great things, provided I would occasionally assist him in school hours, I should not pay for my lodging and board more than fifteen shillings a week.—I was not so young but I could see the drift of this gentleman's civility; instead of paying me for my assistance, as I expected, I was to pay for my board and lodging, and give him my labour gratis; however, being a stranger in that part of the world, and not knowing where to go, I dissembled in my turn, told him how much I thought myself obliged to him, and accepted his
friendly
offer. He introduced me to his family, which consisted of a wife, a daughter about seventeen, rather pretty than otherwise, and ten boys between the ages of nine and fourteen. Mrs. Slashem was some years younger than the Doctor, and seemed to look upon her daughter with a jealous eye, and as one who told her she was growing in years. Miss, in her turn, was of a forward cast, and thought she had more right to be noticed than her mother, who was a married woman, and in her time had had her share of admirers: in short, I no sooner entered, than I discovered that both had shot their arrows at me at once. "Biddy," says Mrs. Slashem,
I wish you'd get down stairs, you stare at the young man as if you never saw a young man before.
Ah, get down, you young baggage,
says the doctor,
and get us something nice for supper.
Miss slammed the door after her, but not without giving me to understand by her looks, that she was angry at being sent out of the room. Mrs. Slashem, primming up her mouth, and adjusting her features into an affected form of reserved politeness,
hoped I would excuse the awkwardness of her girl, who had seen but little of the world, and had rather out-grown her age; for though in size she resembled a woman, she was, in fact, little more than a child.
Indeed, my dear,
replies the Doctor,
you wrong the girl, for you was married at her age.
If I was,
retorts the wife angrily, and bridling up,
I hope I had more discretion, and more of the woman in me.
"Discretion," returns the Doctor,
I will say nothing about, but as to the
woman,
I will admit that you had always enough of that;
giving me a wink with his left eye.
But come, the young man, I dare say, will be glad of a little refreshment, if you will be kind enough to provide it.
For, as we had come a long day's journey, I began to wish for supper, though it was but eight o'clock. Mrs. Slashem retired to provide for our repast, and get the boys to bed, and of course left me and the Doctor together. He then gave me a long detail of the difficulties he had met with in establishing his school. I told him,
that no doubt his character had recommended him, and that as he came to be better known, his number of scholars would increase.
Character, my good friend,
says he,
is the least recommendation; parents, now-a-days, will put their children out where they have the most taught for the least money. In order to get a good price, schoolmasters are reduced to artifice.
Good God!—Artifice;
exclaimed I,
can artifice avail where children should be kept strangers to deceit?
You misunderstand me, Sir,
replies the Doctor,
I mean artifice in the establishment of a school. I'll explain it to you, it may be of use to you in life, if you propose to follow the same profession.—Parents have an idea, that the fewer scholars a man has, the better he can attend to them, and then, of course, he can demand a better price. A man taking only four boys, may expect fifty pounds a year for each, whereas if he takes fourteen, he will find it difficult to get more than twenty. After a man has got one or two to begin with, that he may not be supposed to want scholars, he gives out, that he will take no greater number than four,—then, he has room for two more:—he procures them:—he then finds he can attend to ten, to which number he will confine himself; but that is only till he can get another ten; so that he never stops till in fact he can
get
no more.
In short, he gave me to understand, that by such means, and by a little extra attention and tenderness to those boys as were the children of wealthy parents, who have it frequently in their power to recommend others, it is, that men establish a school sooner than by any other method. Indeed, I found it was his invariable practice to wink at the faults of the boys of opulent, parents, and keep up the strictest discipline with others it being necessary to punish some as an example to the rest: when a poor man's son, charged, perhaps, with robbing the garden, has endeavoured to exculpate himself, by discovering the offender, and laying the blame, justly, on his more wealthy, but guilty schoolmate, I have known the Doctor exclaim,
It is a barefaced lie,—Master Goldwire is the son of a
gentleman,
and above a base act, and I'll punish you for the false assertion.
—Then, as to the annual price of schooling; twenty pounds a year, the Doctor told me, (which, indeed, was the price he had with
his
scholars) was but small pay; however, what with the profits derived from selling the children toys, fruit, pens, paper, and other articles, at two hundred per cent. gain, getting from each boy half a guinea or a guinea at Christmas, under the idea of presents to the servants, taking their pocket money on their return from the holidays, under a pretence of keeping it for them, and giving them only part of it again; charging in their bills occasionally a pair of shoes, a copy-book, and the like, more than they have had; by such sundry emoluments he made out pretty well. And on my seeming to disapprove of such conduct by my looks, he told me, there was no doing otherwise. It was the annual price of board and schooling to which parents chiefly attended. To be asked thirty pounds a year would frighten them, but under a notion of paying but twenty, the considerations he had mentioned, would draw and additional twenty from them without a murmur: then says he again, we can get a guinea a quarter for dancing, as much for drawing, and fifteen shillings, perhaps, for writing, when in fact we pay to the different masters only half the price we charge. If it was not for these arts and contrivances, a school master had better be a hackney coachman, and drive mules rather than boys. In short, I found from the doctrine of the pedlar, the stage-coachman, and this
worthy
friend of mine, that to live in the world a man must not be
too
honest. On the same plan of reasoning, the doctor would have kept me for his assistant; for he expected as much of me, as if he had paid me a salary of thirty pounds a year. I was determined, however, to get from this place as soon as I could; for my remaining stock would not admit of my paying fifteen shillings a week for my board. I had been now a fortnight in the family before I thought of removing, and to do justice to Mrs. Slashem and her daughter, they did every thing in their power to make my time pass agreeably. The mother, in order to have my company abroad, would frequently desire the Doctor to spare me, as it was proper where she was going to have an escort, and miss would frequently steal up into my room when I was alone, play about me, and entertain me with the secret anecdotes of the family; from her I learned that her papa was no doctor, but had assumed the title in order to give credit to the school; that her mama had constantly a gentleman came to see her at school hours, when her papa was at the top of the house with the boys: in short, she told me how much her mama hated her papa, and how much she detested them both, and that she would give the world if any one would take her out of the house; that she did not care where she went, if she was but from home; that her mama treated her as a girl, when she knew she was as much a woman as herself, and that she was going in eighteen, and was determined not to be a great while longer in leading strings. The assiduous attention of the mother would perhaps have been far from disagreeable to me, if miss had been out of my reach; but Mrs. Slashem had insisted, a day or two after my arrival, that I should be made free of the village we lived in, according to the ancient ceremonial of the place; which was, to be sworn upon the horns, not to eat brown bread if I could get white, unless I liked brown better; not to put up with the maid when I could h
e the mistress, unless I liked the maid better, and so on: and as oaths are not merely confined to the
letter,
but extend to the
spirit
of them, I conceived I was equally sworn not to put up with the mother, if I could have the daughter, unless I liked the mother better. Indeed, such was the favour I was in with both, that I was scarcely left to my choice, and a dread of the chapter of accidents, was one principal motive for my wishing myself away. The censorious reader may perhaps suppose, that, as a young man bordering upon twenty, I was no anchorite, and that I was not sufficient master of philosophy, to withstand a temptation thrown industriously in my way; in short, he may suppose—what he will,—and as I profess myself a member of the reformed church, and the necessity of auricular confession to be no part of my faith, I shall take the liberty to leave him to his conjectures, and only say, that for more reasons than one, I wished myself in any situation but where I was. I had an opportunity of seeing the newspapers, and I looked carefully to the advertisements, hoping to meet with something that might suit me. My circumstances would not admit of my being very nice in my choice, for though I had near nineteen pounds in my pocket on my arrival at Highgate, after I had paid the coachman and the expences of the last day's journey; that nineteen, from a triffling present or two to Miss, a few out-door treats to her mother in our afternoon walks, and what I should have to pay for my board and washing, go as soon as I would, would be reduced to little more than ten pounds. This, and a wish for an easy place, determined me, if I could not do better, even to put on a livery, rather than run myself into difficulties, and to wait for a turn of fortune to befriend me. I did not communicate my design to the family, as circumstances had made it necessary to conceal myself from them, but told them I had a friend in London who promised to look out for a situation to place me in; and under a pretence of going to this friend, I had an opportunity of applying, as many advertisements directed me. To a
Wanted a smart young man to attend in the shop of an apothecary,
I applied, and found it was to open and sweep the shop, pound in the mortar, carry out medicines, and apply glisters; this would not do; it was a
laborious
employ, and to labour I had not been accustomed. The next advertisement that struck me was,
Wanted a man of good figure, in an easy genteel office, with good encouragement:
here I enquired, and found there had been a variety of applicants, most men wishing for easy places and good pay. This was no other than to stand all day at the door of one of those auctioneers, who are constantly selling things made up purposely to take in the ignorant and incautious, and with a vociferous voice to call out to every person that passes,
Walk in, Sir, walk in gentlemen—selling by auction.
The abilities for this office were little more than a good pair of lungs, and the pay was two shillings a day; as the situation, however, was by no means a concealed one, I readily declined it. The next was more likely to answer my purpose:
Wanted a person of good address and gentleman-like appearance, to attend a few hours a day in a respectable employ, for which a good salary would be given.
The reader will naturally say, I had no small share of vanity, to attend only to such advertisements as required
smartness, good-figure, address,
and
gentlemanlike
appearance; but when he is told that both Mrs. Slashem and Miss had constantly given me to understand, that I was possessed of those qualities, he will not wonder at my believing it. This advertisement succeeded; it was not to stand at the door of one of these auctions, but to act as a decoy during the time of selling, and lead persons on to bid their money. I was to attend from eleven to three in the week days, and my pay was to be eighteen shillings a week. I accepted the place and was to be initiated into my office the week following. Accordingly, I took a lodging in the neighbourhood, a two pair of stairs room in the shop of a tradesman, for which I was to pay six shillings a week, and I was determined to make the remaining twelve answer every other purpose. Happy in this engagement, I acquainted the Doctor, that I should now be no longer troublesome to him, that I was going to America in a merchan'ts family, as tutor to his son, a lad of twelve years of age, for which I was to have a handsome salary. Though I had not been six weeks with the Doctor, I found it difficult to get away. He had conceived an
affection
for me, and rather than part with me, would take half a guinea a week. Mrs. Slashem used all her rhetoric to persuade me to continue, and Miss Slashem all her charms; but nothing would do. I had my private reasons for leaving them, and on my promise to correspond with Miss, as occasion should offer, I was suffered to depart in peace. I had been brought up with proper notions of right and wrong, and could scarce reconcile this deception to my way of thinking, but when I considered the plea of necessity, and that self-preservation was the first law of nature, I was easily led to justify the proceeding. I was master of my own actions, and had not by a promise, made to any of the parties, forfeited a right of disposing of myself as I thought proper.
CHAP. IV.
MY new employer was not a little pleased with my figure, he could only have wished I was a few years older;—that was easily remedied by my mode of dress, and we contrived it between us, that I wore the appearance of forty. As the office I was to enter on required a few instructions, the following were the chief maxims he gave me:
Always to watch
his
eyes, and when he looked full in my face, bid something more than the last bidder.
Never to see a flaw, or an imperfection in any thing selling.
And to find out beauties, if possible, even where there are none.
To pretend to know the value of every thing, and assert in a confidential manner to bidders, that the article selling was worth double the money bid for it.
These were the instructions I was to follow, and I reconciled them to myself under the following reasoning: that bidders at an auction buy upon their own judgment, and if they buy too dear, it is their own faults; that auctioneers are forbidden to bid themselves, and that, of course, if they had not some friend to bid for them occasionally, articles at times would not fetch half their value; that deception runs through trade in general, no tradesman being condemnable for not pointing out the imperfections of his goods. As to any other artifices made use of in the profession, I was to have no concern with. The auctioneer, as things were not sold by a catalogue, was at liberty to offer any article for sale that he pleased; so that if a countryman came in, we were sure to have a silver watch put up; or if a lady, some pieces of china, or a set of silver-handled knives and forks, and so on; the one; I would whisper was old china, and the other, had
town-made
blades with the handles of
solid
silver, and no lie neither. In short, I discharged my duty so well as to give my employer satisfaction, and often procured him a better price for his goods than the first cost. Our plan was not a little forwarded by the
touter
Touter
is a nickname given to those who stand a shop-doors, and entice in customers, as butchers that cry out,
What do you buy, Sir?
Old cloaths men in Monmouth-street, &c.
See, what you want, Sir;
and men at auctions,
Walk in gentlemen, Selling by auction, &c.
at the door, calling out,
Selling by auction under a judgment.
Must be sold, Gentlemen, without reserve, to release a man from prison,
&c. It is unknown the numbers such declarations draw in to buy, under an idea of getting things at half their value; and if they are taken in, by the law of retaliation, they richly deserve it. Sometimes our sale, indeed, has been interrupted by a person contradicting the auctioneer flatly, and declaring aloud, that the article was not what he represented it; in this case, I was immediately directed to bid, and I became the buyer. This done, the company are dismissed with,
Gentlemen, I am much obliged to you, we have done selling for to-day.
The company of course withdraw, the obnoxious person gone, the street door is shut for five minutes, and then re-opened with a
Walk in, Gentlemen, selling by auction,
and the room is presently filled again with fresh company; for these sales are always held in some very public thoroughfare.
INDEED, there is scarce an auction of any denomination, without its impositions. In sales of linen and other drapery goods, they will put seven or eight yards of silk, worth about six shillings a yard, into the same lot with a roll of course dowlas worth seven-pence, and sell the two together at so much per yard. If you ask how many yards in the roll, they will tell you about thirty; you make your calculation accordingly, and perhaps buy the whole at one shilling and six-pence a yard, thinking thus to give about two pounds five shillings for the lot, which, at six-pence per yard for the dowlas, would give you the silk for four shillings; but after having paid down the earnest, and the lot is to be delivered, the roll of linen shall contain sixty yards instead of thirty, in which case you pay eight shillings and six-pence a yard for the silk, and are encumbered with more dowlas than you know what to do with. So again in auctions of furniture: the auctioneer, in order to have his sales well attended, finds it necessary, not only to treat the brokers with a dinner, but to give each of them a lot at their own price, so that at auctions in and near London, where there are plenty of brokers, if twenty are present, you are sure to have twenty lots (and perhaps the best of your furniture) given away. The brokers, on the other hand, have their arts of imposing, if you appoint one to purchase certain lots for you at certain prices, under an idea, that the will buy them cheaper, you are sure to be charged pretty near the price you fixed, though perhaps they purchased them for half the money.
I WAS in this employ upwards of two months, when an accident happened that lost me my place. During the selling of a plated cruet-stand, worth about thirty shillings, who should come in but Dr. Slashem? As I was disguised, he could not possibly know me, except I had opened my mouth, which I took care not to do. He bid a guinea and a half for it; which my master did not think enough; I was called upon by his looks to bid against him; I did it by a nod, but as the Doctor did not see it, he asserted he was the last bidder, the auctioneer appealed to me, but I was mute as a fish, and Slashem was the buyer; the company were dismissed, and I was immediately discharged. But his anger did not cease here, whilst in his service, I had sold my own watch, and bought rather a better, and had also purchased a pair of pistols: the watch, which was a metal one, had been brought to him, requesting him to sell it, which he refused, I therefore purchased it for fifty shillings, and sold my own for pretty nearly the same sum. This watch was a stolen one, and was advertised, and my quondam master, the auctioneer, carried his resentment so far, as to lay an information before a magistrate, that he had seen such a watch in my possession: a warrant was accordingly issued, and one evening, about ten o'clock, as I was going to bed at my lodging, I heard a great noise below, and a fellow with a hoarse voice inquiring for one Gabriel Outcast. Conscious of having done no wrong, I went down stairs, and was immediately taken into custody, charged with a highway robbery. All I could say had but little effect. The warrant was to be executed, the watch was taken out of my pocket, my room was searched and the pistols, which lay upon my table, seized. The little money I was possessed of I put into my pocket, and I was thence hurried to the parish round-house, where, under lock and key, I passed a very uneasy night. The next morning I was taken before a trading magistrate, and charged with robbing a man in the Five Fields Chelsea of his watch, the Friday evening before, and though I protested my innocence in the strongest terms, and made out a very good story, yet, being confronted with the prosecutor, who swore to his property, and the identical watch being found upon me, and the pistols in my room; circumstances were too much against me to get off: the only thing in my favour was, that the prosecutor could not swear to my person, as I appeared to be a younger man than the one who robbed him; for I was not now in my auction dress; but then, on the other hand, the master of the house, where I lodged, deposing, that I went abroad every day in a disguise, which gave me the appearance of an elderly man, corroborated the suspicion. I had sent to the auctioneer, who could prove that the watch had been offered to him for sale, and whose evidence would, of course, have operated in my favour; but he was industriously out of the way, and as I could not procure bail, I was committed to Bridewell till the next week, when I was to be brought before the justice again.
In the course of my examination, his worship bawled out,
hand over that there watch,
which on looking at, he put into his pocket with a
this must be produced upon the trial.
—
Constable, see what money the prisoner has about him.
I had two guineas and a few shillings in my pocket, which he directed to be handed over likewise, and on the prosecutor's saying he had lost some gold, but could not swear to the money.— "I don't know how you should," replies the justice,
one guinea is too like another for that; it looks however, like money dishonestly come by, and so—
putting it into his pocket
it shall go with the watch
I
humbly conceive,
said I, addressing myself to him,
that as the money is not sworn to, it ought to be returned me.
Stop that fellow's mouth,
roared out his worship,
and give me his mittimus to sign,
and in an accent lower, "damn your humble conceptions!" —I deemed it fortunate that I had secreted a ten pound note, all the money I had left, in my fob; where these grasping fangs of the law, had no idea of looking.
Whilst I was in prison, I met with a man who had been confined forty seven years. He was shut up on execution, at the suit of the crown, for a heavy fine imposed on him, for having in his possession some exciseable goods that had not paid the duty; of course no insolvent act could discharge him. This man, bating his imprudence that brought him there, was not without his virtues. He was the oracle and chaplain of the jail; and being a man of good sense, was often a real comfort and assistance to the unhappy. He had outlived all his friends and connections, and had nothing to subsist on, but the allowance of the prison, the scanty sparings of his fellow-prisoners, almost as poor and wretched as himself, and the benevolence of a few out-door neighbours, who occasionally sent him a dinner, or an old coat to cover him: stockings he wore none, and perhaps, the only useless part of his dress, was a woollen night cap that covered his bald head, being grown grey within the walls. The little hair he had was wiry; for affliction, when it does not kill, proceeds to harden. Though covered with the rust of a jail and offensive through want of cleanliness, this old man approached me in so modest and decent a manner, that I could not but be pleased with him. He had acquired a degree of philosophy since his confinement, (for what patience will not a prison teach?) and seemed so reconciled to his situation, as not to wish for liberty.
To be abroad again in the world,
he said,
to
him,
at his time of life, would be irksome; he had not a friend alive, and without money, could only fly to the shelter of a workhouse.
He observed.
that though a prison affords no comfort, yet, there the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor: and having proportioned his appetite to the quantity of food he could get, and contracted his wants within very small limits, he was far from being wretched. Should it please God to take him from the world, he was perfectly resigned; but, to remove him from these walls, except in his coffin and to his grave, would be only to hasten his dissolution, and put an abrupt period to his existence.
And indeed, so much did he speak the sentiments of his soul, that upon an enquiry three or four years afterwards, I was informed, that the Chief Justice having, from the representation of the keeper, and a mistaken humanity, ordered him to be released, he became truly miserable.
He was no sooner at liberty and without the prison wicket, than he stopped short, wild as it were and lost. The broad sun-shine was painful to him. His eyes were fixed, but he could not weep. Stupefied at his change of situation, his legs, in spite of him, became as immoveable as his tongue.
CONDUCTED by a charitable hand, he enquired the way to the place where once he lived. His house was there no more; a public building was erected on the spot. He knew neither the street, the town, nor the objects. The adjoining houses to his own had taken a new form. He endeavoured to recollect them, but he had lived twenty years to long.
Startled; he stopped and sighed; and for the first time felt the comfort of a jail,
where the wicked cease from troubling, and where the weary are at rest.
Every face was new, and every thing about him strange. The only person he could find, of whom he had the least recollection, was a tottering old man, who formerly had been his servant; he found him in a garret, living on charity, and from having been confined to his room eighteen years, had strength only to pull the cord that opened his door.
THIS poor creature could not recollect his master, whose face, time and afflictions had so much furrowed; and the only comfort his master drew, was, by a participation of his grief, and from a conviction, that he was not the most miserable of beings. This old domestic, entertained him only with his sorrows; told him that his wife was dead; that he had experienced thirty years of wretchedness; that his children were in some distant parts of the world unknown to him, and that every friend he had was gone.
At this the master sighed, and sighed alone; for the other was habituated to distress. Broke down with grief, he returns to his prison, and solicits a re-admission. It was refused him. And he experienced the force of woe, now more than ever. To have outlived all his relations, his friends, nay, a whole generation. To want a shelter, or money to procure one,—to be destitute of food and cloaths and every necessary article.—These were thoughts that racked him; but his greatest disquiet was, to be sensible, that a whole generation of men was at once lost to
him,
which by daily deaths the mass of mankind do not miss.
Separated as it were, from society, I am alive,
alone.
"Death" says he,
may be terrible, but to die the last is more so. Glad shall I be, when I can find the grave!
As a bird that has been long confined, will hover round its cage, uneasy at its liberty, so was this man daily at the prison wicket, importuning for admission; and finding none, he pined gradually away. Grief wore him to the bone, and he fell a martyr to a broken heart. —And all this perhaps, for having in his house a few pounds of tea, or a cannister of unroasted coffee!
To this man I was not a little obliged. He gave me the character of Justice Fleece'em, for that was the magistrate's name by whom I was committed, and told me that
he had formerly been and old cloaths man, and knew the value of money too well not to accept a bribe, if offered through the medium of his clerk; that though he had received his education in Rag Fair, he did not want for abilities, and had a wonderful presence of mind on certain occasions, of which the following anecdote is a proof. When business at his office is slack, he sends the high constable round the purlieus of Drury, to pick up all the straggling women he can find and bring them before him; at these times they have been brought by scores. Such as can make a golden interest with his clerk, are generally dismissed with a reprimand; but such as cannot command half a guinea upon the occasion, are sure to be sent to Bridewell. It happened that his worship had intrigued with one of these girls at a time and place when he little expected to have been known, and had probably bilked her of her fee; she, unable, for want of money, to make that prevailing application which some others had done, begged, before she was taken away, that his worship would permit her to speak to him privately, as she had something of the utmost importance to communicate. Curiosity led him to hear her, and she was brought within the bar; she accordingly reminded him in his ear, of a former
tete-a-tete
that had passed between them,
(which, as his worship was rather deaf, was overheard by a person next them,)
and as he was in her debt, she hoped, it would plead as powerfully for her as any present she could make to his clerk.
And so woman,
bawls out his worship,
that honest man was your father?—Well!—You are a graceless hussey; but on
his
account, I will this time forgive you; and I hope it will be a warning to you, to behave better for the future.
The situation of these unhappy girls is truly deplorable. Betrayed perhaps, by the man on whom she fondly doated; and giving too much way to the propensity of nature, the deluded female sacrifices her honour to her love, and for this indiscretion, is turned into the street, moneyless and friendless; here she becomes a slave to disease and infamy, and a prey to those who are far more depraved than herself. Having nothing to support her, she has no alternative but theft or prostitution; and of these two evils, she thinks it better to injure herself than others. But this profession requires dress, and there are not wanting women to furnish it, for which they make these girls pay three or four shillings a day; but where a girl has a good face and but little credit, lest she should decamp with her hired cloaths, a woman is appointed to follow her in her nightly round; who never loses sight of her till she is picked up and taken to a public house; there she waits her coming out, and takes from her two thirds of her ill gotten pay. One of these women was quarrelling with a girl of the town, one evening as I passed along the Strand, and would have proceeded to blows, had she not been attending upon another. "Bl-st your eyes," says she,
let me put up my whore and I'll box your for a crown.
—It is to be regretted, gretted, that our police is not better regulated; but whilst our magistrates are so indolent and ignorant, there is little expectation of its being done.
ON my expressing to this old man my astonishment at the various ways of getting money in the metropolis, and how sorry I was to observe, that even justice was put up to sale; he gave me to understand, that Justice Fleece'em had acquired a fortune by his practice; that he was up almost to any villainy; but that, as from his officious industry, he was a terror to felons, and brought many scoundrels to punishment who would otherwise escape, the law had winked at his conduct, and had even countenanced it by a pension.
"THE state" continued he,
having allotted a reward of forty pounds for the apprehending of house-breakers, highway robbers, and the like, it is unknown the sums of money he picks up this way. He has a gang in pay, which is always upon the scout, and the half of every forty pounds he this way gets, he
generously
divides among them, keeping the remainder to himself. And what is the consequence?—That none but such villains as the law allows that sum for apprehending, are apprehended. An acquaintance of mine,
says he,
told me the other day, that, being on business, at a night cellar in Cow Lane, whilst he was standing at the bar, there came in a young fellow returned from transportation, who addressed himself to the woman within, with a 'How are you mistress?' 'Aye Jack,' says she, 'is it you?'
Yes,— it is
I,
replies he,
make me a sneaker of gin punch.
—
Not a drop shall you have here.
—
Why not?
I expect,
says she,
Justice Fleece'em's men here every instant, and I would not have you taken in my house for the world!
Pshaw!
says Jack,
they wont meddle O'
me.
—They'll get nothing by taking of
me.
And hardly had he uttered the words, but Baildock, the justice's man, and two of his mirmidons entered. Baildock slapped him on the shoulder, with
So Jack, you're
soon
returned?— The country, I suppose was too hot to hold you?
—
Aye, Master Baildock,
replies he,
nothing like old England for me.
Come, will you take a sup of punch?
They drank together and parted; for, continued my friend, as government allows but little reward for apprehending such as return from transportation, this gang of Justice Fleece|'em's has it in orders, not to interrupt such, but keep them in view, waiting till they resort to their old practices; and then to lay hold of them; by which conduct the apprehenders gain an ample reward.
WITH these, and such like anecdotes, was this man amusing me on the first day of my arrival within the castle, for so did the prisoners call their place of confinement, when the keeper brought me word that Lawyer Grind wanted to speak to me. "By
no
means see him," says he,
he is one of those pettyfogging rascals, that prey upon the wretched, and live upon the miseries of the unfortunate.
I'll tell you a story of him,
continues he,
that fell within my own knowledge, and upon the truth of which you may rely. A man of tolerable good connexions was brought in here for a highway robbery. This fellow applied to him, and amused him with hopes of escape. As a drowning man will, to save himself, even catch at straws, so this unhappy culprit listened to his deceitful adviser. He gave him to understand, that if he could furnish him with ten guineas, he would procure a copy of the indictment, and had no doubt of discovering some error in it, that would instantly quash it. The ten guineas were given, but on a second visit he was told, that counsel had examined the indictment, and not the shadow of a flaw could be found: but, that he was convinced, from the account he had received of the prosecutor, that he might be bought off, and of the evidence, that they might be softened for about twenty pound. He possessed that twenty pounds. It was given; and a third visit told him, that the prosecutor had been applied to, and was found incorruptible, and the evidence too respectable to be influenced; that the cash had been expended in bribing those, who were supposed to have some weight with the evidence, but they could not succeed.
However,
says Grind,
as I have always people ready to prove an
alibi
This is to prove, that the prisoner was in some other place, than the place alledged, when the fact for which he is arraigned, was committed.
, if you can raise thirty pounds more, there is no doubt of success. The poor wretch applies to his friends, and these thirty pounds were raised; but they turned out as ineffectual as the last. The trial came on, the
alibi
was overthrown, and the poor devil convicted. Could nothing more be done?—Yes, for ten more, he would move an arrest of judgment, for the proceedings had been illegal. Here he was foiled again; counsel had exerted themselves, but the attempt was over-ruled.—There was, however, another step, in which he flattered himself he should be more successful. This was by a proper application of thirty guineas, to bring over the Recorder to make a favourable report.—This sum was also got, but the means equally unsuccessful. In this hopeless situation, the attorney addresses him again.
If he could any ways contrive, through his friends, to raise twenty pounds more, a petition should be presented to the throne, and care should be taken to get it well backed at the council board, and he might
rely
on a pardon. He usually contrived the matter to end, long before it got so far, but your case,
says he,
is an uncommon one, which has hitherto baffled all my endeavours, but in this final step, I
never
fail.
Encouraged by this declaration, every friend, as for life, was importuned, and this last twenty pounds procured, but all to no purpose. The death warrant was signed, and an order came down for execution. In a distracted state of mind, the poor wretch sends for his lawyer again, reminds him of the many promises he had made, the many great sums he had received, and asked him, 'if there were no hopes after
all?
' 'Hopes,' says he, to be sure there are. The petition is so strongly worded, and so powerfully backed, that take my word for it, they
cannot
hang you—they
dare
not hang you,— and there was not the least doubt but he would be left out of the death warrant.
—'Aye, Sir,' returns the despairing criminal,
it was on this account I sent for you. The death warrant
is
signed,—
I
am
in
that warrant, and an order is come down for execution on Wednesday morning.
This the attorney
could
not stand;
—
Execution!
exclaimed he,
Execution!—Well—
let
'em hang you, —
let
'em hang you, and d—n
me,
if it shall not be the worst job they ever did in their lives!
—
At this, he turned upon his heel, and left his deluded client to his fate.
THIS story determined me not to see Mr. Grind; I sent him word my case was of a nature not to need his assistance, and therefore I would not trouble him; I thanked my friend for his admonition, and resolved to trust to myself. Not knowing the nature of a night-cellar, which had been dropped in conversation, I wished for some account of one, and requested my adviser to make me acquainted with what he knew of them. He gave me the following account:
A NIGHT-CELLAR is an alehouse under ground, in some populous, but secret part of the town, which is kept open all night, for the resort of whores and rogues, and all such persons, whose actions will not bear the test of day-light. In some of these places of rendezvous, villains of note are generally to be found, and through the treachery of gangs in general, that of Justice Fleece'em's becomes well-acquainted with their persons. There is seldom a daring robbery or burglary committed, but Baildock and his crew get some intelligence of it; and though they are not able immediately to fix it on any particular man, they will soon trace it out, and take the offender into custody. Daring as these scoundrels are, there is an unaccountable infatuation in most of them, that will lead them to surrender themselves to Fleec'em's men, without violence. Baildock has many a time searched these night-cellars alone, without fear or danger. As madmen will, in their raving intervals, cease raving at sight of their keeper, and submit quietly to him, so will most of these villains yield, without resistance, to the mandates of Baildock. Whether they are awed by his undaunted resolution, or dismayed by conscience, or any other motive, I cannot say; but Baildock has been known to carry off from these places, the man he looked for, and without the least opposition.
Master Baildock,
says one of these fellows, as he approached him in one of his midnight searches,
I hope you are not come for I?
No, Tom,
says he,
it is not
you
I want, but Dick Hounslow, and I see him yonder. Come, Dick, you must go with me.
—
D—n me,
says Dick,
if I did not dream as much a day or two ago;
then addressing himself to his company,
well, gentlemen,
says he,
God bless you—this sessions will be the end of
me
—may
you
outlive many of them!
—and walked off with Baildock, as quietly as if in irons.
WAS I to relate to the reader, all the information I picked up during the time I was in this prison, it would fill a volume; and amusing as it might have been at any other time, I was too much taken up with my own affairs to attend much to it. I was to prepare for a second examination. A magistrate has certainly no authority to bring up prisoners before him to a second, or a third examination; if there is sufficient charge against them for commitment, they are to be committed for trial; if not, he is to discharge them; but Justice Fleece'em made a trade of his profession, and his house was a kind of petty court of judicature, where prisoners went, as it were, through a formal trial. It was so far of use indeed, that to a villain it was a good preparatory to his arraignment at the Old Bailey, and was frequently a means of his finding methods to get off.
THOUGH appearances were strong against me, being wrapt up in conscious innocence, I was convinced that the arrows of malevolence could not hurt me. I was not without money, and I set about collecting the evidence in my favour. I recollected that a porter at the auctioneer's was present when I bought the watch; and that on the evening when the prosecutor was robbed, I kept my room with a cold, and had at that time a neighbouring apothecary to attend me; these people, I was persuaded, would justify my innocence, if the auctioneer was so relentless, as not to appear in my behalf. Indeed, I had little favour to expect from him; for such is the strange conduct of mankind, that whilst a man, who knows you, has reason to think he is well with you, he will do you no open injury, but, if convenience, or any circumstance has once led him to treat you ill, by his sacrificing your interest to his, so that he despairs of your ever forgiving him, he becomes the most inveterate enemy you have; and, though you have never given him the least offence, it is all the fame, he acts and speaks of you in future, as if you had been a thorn in his side ever since he had any knowledge of you. It was not so, however, with this man; though, as I since learned from his porter, he was the means of my being apprehended, by a false insinuation; even this man, thinking he had punished me sufficiently, thought proper, on application, to appear in my favour; of course, notwithstanding, on my second examination, the prosecutor was not present; I was acquitted, with the loss only of the watch I had purchased, and the expence of a few pounds in messengers, fees and other contingencies. Before, however, I left the Justice, I took the liberty to ask for my watch, which as I had fairly purchased, I thought myself entitled to, when all the satisfaction I could get was,
The first of James the first, chapter twenty-one, says, The sale of goods in London, wrongfully come by, shall not alter the property; of course it belongs to the
prosecutor.
And I was afterwards told, upon inquiry, that on the prosecutor's demanding his watch, he could obtain no other answer than,
The law says, Goods sold in open market shall be the property of the buyer; now, all London is an open market, and every day, except Sunday, market-day in London; therefore, it belongs to the
prisoner.
I thought little, however, about the watch, or my money, happy to owe my acquittal to my innocence; indeed, my watch was an expence to me which I could not well afford; for as it was frequently out of order, whenever I carried it to a watchmaker I was sure to have six or seven shillings to pay. This is one of their modes of getting money; though little or nothing is the matter with a watch, they will pretend it requires repair, which you cannot contradict, and make you pay accordingly.
CHAP. V.
BEING now out of employ, I offered my service to the printer of a morning newspaper, and wished to be engaged in any way he thought I might be useful to him. "What is your fort?" says he,
can you pen a good parliamentary debate, or bespatter a character?
I told him,
I was blessed with a happy memory, and was persuaded I could bring away a speech nearly as it was delivered.
—
Delivered! Phu,
—replies he,
we don't want a
verbatim
and
literatim
reporter;—can you twist an argument so as to give it a sense different from the obvious one? Our paper is a party print, and every line in politics must carry the sense we wish it. If a speech is vehement in opposition to our principles, where the sense of the speaker's arguments cannot be wrested to answer our purpose, they must, by pointing the passages, and giving certain words in Italics, be made to resemble irony; it is our business to write down an enemy, and to do this, we must impute his assertions to sinister views, and give a false colouring to his best actions and intentions. Next,
says he,
as to bespattering a character; if you are clever at this I can employ you.
I gave him to understand, that I thought I should succeed best in this department, for that I was so determined an enemy to vice and imposition in general, that I must drag it forth, wherever I found it lurking.
That wont do, friend,
says he,
you mistake my meaning.
Vice and imposition in general,
we have nothing to do with; we do'nt set up as correctors of morals; our plan is to write a character into disrepute that opposes our party; for this purpose, we must hold him forth as the worst of men, and attribute to him vices that he never was possessed of.
But this,
replied I,
is an act of cruelty and wickedness.
It is neither
cruelty
nor
wickedness,
says he,
any means are justifiable to stop a fool's mouth, or interrupt an officious medler; even to put him out of the world would be an act of charity to mankind —and as to
wickedness,
if we now and then make a virtuous man vicious we as often make a vicious man virtuous; and of course, he who does as much good as harm, in the scale of morality, cannot be a wicked man. Besides,
says he,
we could not live without scandal; the more we please the people, the more papers we sell, and as the virtuous of mankind are but
few,
our business is to write for, and gratify the
many.
A man in a croud will endeavour to lift himself above the rest, though it be on the shoulders of another; so it is in society, we labour to get on and become conspicuous, not by any merits of our own, but by depreciating the characters of others, of course most men like to see their acquaintances traduced; as officers, in time of service, who now and then suffer by a random shot, are willing to run that hazard, with the hopes of many of their friends dropping, and making way for their promotion; so, in civil life, men are not much hurt by an oblique stroke thrown out in a newspaper against themselves, provided they are laid on pretty thick upon others.
WHILST we were in this conversation, a poor wretch of a paragraph collector came into the office, and demanded one shilling for the following paragraphs:
A STORY is abroad that one of the E. of S's. footmen was discovered stealing out of Lady Betty W's bedchamber yesterday morning, at four o'clock, but that the news has not yet reached her father.
IT is confidentially asserted, that the Minister holds a secret correspondence with Monsieur de Sartine at Paris.
"HERE, fellow" says the printer,
take away your d—n'd inuendo's—do you think we can pay six-pence a paragraph for such uncertain intelligence as this?— Make them matters of fact, and we shall not grudge the money.
THIS business being dispatched, he resumed his conversation with me; "You see, friend," says he,
what we want; you may try your hand, and if you can furnish us with the private intrigues of respectable families, you may be constantly employed.
I told him,
I would take care to throw dirt enough, and of course some of it
would
stick
—and left him.
HAVING been used to disguises, I made an engagement with an old cloaths man in Monmouth-street, to equip me with such as I had occasion for; sometimes I was a footman, sometimes an officer, sometimes a clergyman, and sometimes a blackguard. As a footman, I mixed with the knights of the rainbow in the lobbies of the Opera-house and houses of Parliament, and by inventing a number of stories of families where I had lived, and the participation of a pint or two of porter, I frequently sucked their brains, and got acquainted with a number of private and entertaining anecdotes. As an officer, I was at the Bedford, the Smyrna, George's, and other coffee-houses of repute, and by joining in conversation with industrious and attentive ears, I picked up a variety of intelligence respecting statesmen, general officers, theatres and players. As a clergyman, I got access at St. James's, gave the king, when, talking with certain persons, a pleasant countenance or a sour one, according as I wished,—entered into the characters of individuals, according to their looks in the drawing room; and when I wanted a a little better information than I could pick up at coffee-houses, I appeared at court in regimentals; and there I could have filled a newspaper at any time with the scandal I heard. As a blackguard, I made my way into all city, and other meetings of the people, and what I could not collect with my ears, I made up with invention: in short, I became so useful to a newspaper, that I was constantly employed. But their pay was poor, not more than six-pence for a common paragraph, a shilling for a matter of fact or scandal, and half a crown for the death of a king. I was at last thought worthy to be admitted into their cabinet of literary men, who met on a Sunday evening, the only leisure day in the week, where Dreadnought, our editor, presided; from him we received our instructions for the six days following.— He was a desperate man, capable of undertaking any thing, and was placed in this department, not for possessing any literary talents, but for being adequate to fighting his way through any dirty work that was expected of him. A clergyman was once proposed to fill this office, but as clergymen cannot, or must not fight, and, as the argument of a proprietor on this proposal had weight, namely,
if you employ an ecclesiastic—what is to become of your
duels?
Dreadnought was appointed; it being found necessary, as the editor was the ostensible man, that he should be one that was not easily to be frightened. And as the occasional account of a duel, between the editor and a person held forth to the public in an infamous light, generally increased the sale of the paper for some time afterwards, great pains were taken to bring matters to such a
fortunate
issue. But these men are generally well paid in the end, for the party they espouse seldom fails to reward them.
I CONTINUED in this employ some time, but my career was interrupted, through the ungenerousness of my employer. I had, in order to obtain his favour, charged a respectable person, of great rank, with high-treason; a prosecution was commenced against the printer, and nothing could atone for the offence but giving up the author; and as Jonathan Wild would, at any time, impeach his whole gang to save himself, so this multiplier of daily scandal, thought proper to give in my name to the prosecutor, and I was obliged to secrete myself.—I lay hid some time, and the matter blew over. However, as I observed the pay being poor, the service dangerous, and the employ such as did not agree with my feelings, I looked abroad for some other. It gave me, indeed, an insight into the arcana of a newspaper, and if I suffered in reputation, I improved in worldly knowledge. I there found, that, like the generality of mankind, nothing came amiss to them. They would frequently abuse a character, and promise a continuance of such abuse, merely to draw from that party hush money: if any sum was offered for the non-insertion of a paragraph, and a greater sum was tendered for its insertion, it was sure to be in, and
vice versa.
Far be it from me to include every proprietor of a public print under this general censure; there is scarce a newspaper printed, but what has many proprietors who reside in different parts of the kingdom, and whose opinion, with respect to its conduct, is too often over-ruled by the acting partners; of course, they cannot be responsible for its contents; but this does not alter the in case general.
CHAP. VI.
THE next place I got, and this through the means of an acquaintance, was that of an amanuensis to a clergyman. He was a man of some fortune, and like most clergymen of fortune, too indolent to write his own sermons. So he was in possession of the church, he cared little what became of the congregation. He was the younger son of a good family, had a chapel in London, a fellowship at Cambridge, and an annuity of 200
l.
a year; sufficient together to enable him to keep a pair of horses. When in town he wore a large grizzel wig, a pair of square-toed shoes, in short dressed like, and had all the formality of, a Presbyterian; though a young man, he screwed up his face into a primitive form, and would scarce suffer a smile upon his countenance; and there was such an affected severity in his manner, that you would have taken him for a saint; but when in the country, he was a buck of the first head, wore a smart bob wig, leather breeches, and was always in boots: he had but a small stock of sermons, and I was engaged, for a few months, to provide him with a greater. Having purchased a set of manuscripts, which he could not well read, my business was to transcribe them, and now and then throw in a passage or two which he occasionally penned on a slip of paper, as his leisure moments from hunting, drinking, and the card-table would admit. Indeed, I frequently helped him out, very often adding some passages of my own; so that he would often say I should make a very good parson. He was once, when at Cambridge, called upon to preach in the morning at St. Mary's, before the university, and not having a proper sermon upon the occasion, nor being able to compose or to compile one, was under a thousand anxieties; for he studied appearances more than most young men in the church. At last a circumstance happened, that relieved him from his pain. While in Cambridge, we dwelt in college; and it so happened, that a fellow of the same community who lived in the adjoining rooms, was appointed to preach at the same church in the afternoon. This young gentleman, who was a very good writer, and who took a great deal more pains than my master, delivered his sermon aloud every morning before his glass in his own room, in order to acquit himself well on the day of exhibition; and as the partition between the two apartments was only a wainscot, I could distinctly hear every word: accordingly, with my master's consent, I took down his sermon
verbatim,
and he preached it in the morning. This being unknown to the other gentleman, the same discourse was delivered in the afternoon. Though he who penned it laboured to have it believed that he was the author of it, it did not avail, the mystery was not unravelled, my master had all the credit, and the afternoon preacher was considered only as a purloiner of the copy.
HAVING furnished my master with about four dozen of sermons, which he called a pretty good stock, he proposed to discharge me, and took some pains to recommend me to a friend, as a very useful hand in the divinity way; but his friend was of another cast, he always composed his sermons himself; persuaded no one could do them so well, though when composed, few could understand them, from the variety of new words he used, and much fewer liked them. He used to console himself however with observing, that he really pitied his congregation for the vexation they must feel, at hearing so many fine things of which they were neither the writer nor the speaker. It is said, that those who are bit by a mad animal partake of its nature and insanity. If this be the case, I am persuaded this friend of my master's had been bit by a bookworm, for he was literally literary mad. See him when you would, he was never without a book, and when at home was almost overwhelmed with them. Every new publication he purchased, it be in what language it would; for though he was master of but one, he fancied himself well read in all, and always prided himself in having had the first copy
wet
from the press. Oft have I seen him in his study, almost buried in volumes. They lay all round him and his table, piled high upon the floor, and as he would never suffer a servant to dust them, for fear of derangement, and was too much occupied in
little
thoughts to do it himself, they were covered with dust. Here he would sometimes bury himself whole days in little more than re-arranging them, and would be almost lost in a cloud of dust. He said, that in the English language there was a
paucity
of expression that required to be
abundified,
and he laboured to repair this defect. He called himself a
nealogist,
or a former of new words. Whenever he received a present, he returned his
civilities
and thanked his friend for his
prevenient
politeness; and when he sent his old black waistcoat to be new dipped, he requested the dyer to
re-nigrisy
it. There was not an author abroad with whom he did not court a correspondence, nor any scribbler at home whom he did not pester with his visits. He would shew a card from Rousseau, and a letter from Voltaire, as a medallist would exhibit a Cromwell's
silver penny,
or an
Otho.
As I shall have occasion to speak of this man again, I shall drop the subject now, with saying, that, as during my stay with my master, I found out the art of making sermons, and as no enquiry is ever made before a man officiates as a clergyman, whether he be really in orders or not; flattering myself I should make as conscientious a priest as the generality of parsons are; and being so little of a Roman catholic, as not to conceive, that the laying on of hands by a bishop, can confer grace, any more than that a few words mumbled over a piece of bread, can make any alteration in its nature, I determined to take no other place, but to start forward in the profession myself; and, as this thought struck me soon after I commenced an amanuensis, I wrote two copies of every sermon I was directed to transcribe, and kept one for my own use. These amounted in the end to some dozens; accordingly, being furnished with all the requisites of a modern parson, namely, a few sermons, an iron grey suit, and a stock of impudence; as soon as I quitted my master, I applied to Mr. Snuffle, in Paternoster Row, for employ.
THIS
gentleman
was formerly a parish clerk, but growing tired with saying amen for twenty pounds a year, he has found out a new method of being serviceable to himself, under the idea of being useful to the clergy. As there are register offices for a variety of respectable wants, for houses, servants, whores, &c, so this is a register office for parsons, a kind of
divinity-shop
in the city of London for hiring of preachers, readers, and so on, by the day or the week as occasion requires. For this purpose, he keeps a list of unemployed clergy, of all ages and characters, to suit certain congregations; some for example, attend much to the voice and to the action, and as they never take their eyes from the preacher during the whole sermon, they wish for something tolerable to look at. These he would furnish with a smart prig preacher of twenty-five, who would keep them awake by an exertion of the voice, and a display of the arms; to others, who do not like to be taught by boys, and had rather doze away a heavy hour or two, which the law will not suffer them to employ in their respective occupations, and who go to church more to keep up appearances, than from any spirit of devotion, he would provide a monotonist of sixty. For such men, like the tale-tellers in Scotland, have a happy knack of composing a congregation into a comfortable nap.
FROM this list he selects his preachers, and lets them out for a stipulated sum, according to the duty they are to perform, taking for himself as agent, ten per cent. and one shilling extra for those he accommodates with a gown and cassack. The following is a copy of his printed list of prices.
 
s.
d.
For reading and preaching on Sundays, morning or evening
10
6
For preaching only.
7
6
For reading prayers only
5
0
For administering the sacrament
5
0
For assisting at ditto
1
0
For reading prayers on a week day, morning or evening
1
0
For ditto on a Litany day
1
6
For ditto on a festival
2
6
For burying a corpse, christening a child, or praying by a sick person
1
0
For churching a woman during service
 
6
I THINK I cannot explain the nature of this undertaking better, than by giving my readers te substance of a dialogue between Mr. Snuffle and a very ingenious friend of mine, who once applied to him, and which on his death bed he thought proper to leave to the world.
"MR. Snuffle your servant."
"Doctor, your's."
I suppose, Mr. Snuffle, you can guess my errand. I am going out of town to-morrow, for a fortnight, and shall want a supply, and at the same time, Master Snuffle, I come to inform you, I shall from this day commence
agent
and
patient,
and intend to hire and be hired; so, as I am likely to be a pretty considerable dealer, and am, besides, an old acquaintance, hope you will give me the turn of the scale. So put me down in your list immediately.
(pulling out his list).
IT shall be done, Sir. And a most respectable list it is, I assure you; I have just got a fresh cargo of Scotch divines, piping hot from Edinburgh, besides the old corps—my collection ends with, —let me see—fourteen school-masters, five doctors of divinity, two of them justices of the peace, two reviewers, three political writers, two bible-makers, (mind the climax—) and a king's chaplain.
All men of erudition, I suppose?
Excellent scholars,—charming preachers, I assure you, but—
entre nous,
not one of them worth a six-pence in the world.—But to your business—
Aye, Mr Snuffle,—I must have a good voice for
Wednesdays
and
Fridays,
and one of your best orators for
Sunday next:
you know my congregation is a little delicate.
Then you must have a
young
man. My young gentlemen, I assure you, are all cushion-thumpers—none of your dreaming chaps—if there's the least grain of dust in a pulpit cushion, I'll be sworn they'll beat it out
—
(looking over his list)
here's Parson
Rawbones,
one of my
athletic,
able-bodied divines; it is not long since he knocked down a clerk in the desk, for interrupting him in the middle of a collect (and it was only for telling him he was reading the wrong one) this you know shewed him to be a man of spirit, and kept up the dignity of the cloth. No parson, let me tell you, is respected now, that is not a
boxing
one. But I doubt whether he will do for you, for he is a
north countryman,
and has got a
burr
in his throat; he'll never pass at your end of the town: I shall sport him, however, at a
day lecture,
or an
early sacrament.
You are so facetious, Mr. Snuffle. But pray find me somebody, for I am in haste.
If you had wanted a whiner or bawler for a charity sermon, I could help you to the best
beggar
in England, an arrant pickpocket for the
middle aisle.
Beats your M—r's, and your H—n's, our of the pit, a doctor of divinity too, and a justice of the peace; but he wont do for
you,
for the dog's over head and ears in debt, and daren't stir out on a week-day for fear of the bailiffs;—but here—I have him for you, Young Gallop, the quickest reader in London. He'll give Dr.
Drawl
to the
Te deum,
and overtake him before he comes to the thanksgiving!—A very proper man for this season of the year!—an excellent reader for a cold day!— and a
rare hand
at a collect!— But you must tip him more than half a guinea for the morning's duty.—Let me tell you, Sir, I am a good friend to the inferior clergy, and have done more for them (and that's a bold word) than the whole bench of bishops. I believe I may safely say, I have raised the price of
lungs
at least
cent per cent;
I knew the time, and so did you, when a well-cassocked divine was glad to read prayers on a holliday for a shilling; old C—never had more in his life; now, Sir, I never let a
tit
go out
my
stable (you will pardon my jocularity) upon such an occasion, under half a crown.
IT is to these, and such like indignities, to which the clergy are obliged to submit, that the function owes it's degradation. Having received the best of educations, and flattering myself I had equal abilities in compiling and delivering a discourse with the best of them, I persuaded myself that, whilst I kept my own secret, I could do no great harm. I could pass an examination; and of course, could have taken orders if I pleased, and, as a late Bishop of Chester would never ordain a man till be had officiated as a deacon for three years, to see how he took to the profession, I conceived there could be no harm in my putting myself upon a similar trial.
HAVING then applied to this same Mr Snuffle, he soon found me employ, and as I acquitted myself to his satisfaction, and in a manner that did him credit, I never was idle; but an ill-judged parsimony of mine overturned the bucket presently. I was employed to read prayers on a week-day in a large parish, for which I had my shilling, but being called, at that time, on more important business, to the other end of the town, I appointed a deputy, and gave him half my fees, but he was so out of spirits at being obliged to officiate, at a price so degrading to the profession, and so derogatory to the
honour
of the
cloth,
that he did not exert himself sufficiently to be heard, and on the clerk's hinting to him, after service, that he feared the congregation did not hear him, his answer was,
How do you think, friend, I am paid?
I presume,
replies the clerk,
the usual compliment.
"Not so, Sir," returns the parson,
I am paid but
half price,
and I therefore only read my
half-best.
This story was carried to Mr. Snuffle; and, for attempting to take the bread out of his mouth, I was immediately struck off his list.
I, AT this time, got intelligence, that a certain Viscount in the west, having married a woman of low family, who had a maiden sister, proposed to give any clergyman, that would take her to wife, a living in his disposal, then vacant, of five hundred pounds a year. I determined to look after this living, for though I was not in orders, as I have observed before, being sufficiently qualified, I could easily have been ordained; the necessary testimonials I made no doubt of procuring. This lady lived at a market town in the neighbourhood of Oxford: I accordingly inquired of the man who drove the stage-coach between that town and London, whether there was an assembly at that place, he told me there was, and promised to bring me word, the next time he came up, on what day the next assembly was to be. This information being procured, I hired an elegant post-chaise for the journey, and took a friend with me, for whom I borrowed a smart livery, and who followed as my servant on horseback. I let this friend into my scheme, and promising him a reward if I succeeded, gave him his instructions; which were, to pass me for a man of good family and fortune. Thus, with two of my best sermons in my pocket, I set off for the place I was bound to, and arrived there on a Friday evening, five days, as the coachman told me, before the assembly day. Having sent for the landlord of the house where I was, I inquired, who served the church? he told me,
a young gentleman from Oxford.
My reason, friend,
says I,
for asking, is, that I am a clergyman, and mean to pass a few days here, and, if I thought it would be agreeable to your minister, I would ease him of his duty on Sunday.
His reply was:
I have no doubt Sir, but he would he very glad of the offer; it is a long way to Oxford, and the roads, from the late rains, very bad. To-morrow is market day there, and as several of our farmers will be going, if you think proper to write a letter, I will send it.
This letter was written, and the answer, such as I wished. On Sunday I preached; and, from the great attention that was paid me on all sides, I conceive that I acquitted myself with eclat; but the object of my journey, however, was, unfortunately for me, not at church. As I came down from the pulpit, an elderly lady, after paying me some compliments on my sermon, asked me, if I made nay stay in that town? On my answering in the affirmative, she told me her name, and requested my company to dinner. I waited on her, and found her the gossip of the place. From her I acquired every information I wished, and might, if I pleased, have learned the history of every family in the neighbourhood. Among other information, however, I found to my mortification, that the assembly was not to be so soon as I expected, by a fortnight.
ON my return to my quarters, I begged the landlord's company, and among other things, asked him, who was mayor of the town, and what kind of a man he was; he informed me, that he was a respectable tradesman, a person of property, and a good-natured well-bred man. This account so met my wishes, that I called for paper, and wrote the following card, to be dispatched the next morning.
THE gentleman who preached yesterday, presents his compliments to Mr. Mayor, and, if he will give him leave, will do himself the honour to drink tea with him this afternoon.
THE answer returned was:
MR. Mayor's compliments to the gentleman who preached, and shall be proud of the honour of his company.
WHEN evening came, I ordered my carriage, (for this, and the tongue of my servant gave me no small credit) waited on the Mayor, and was politely received. His house was full of well-dressed men and women, collected, no doubt, for the pleasure of reconnoitering me. Conceiving some apology necessary for this self-invitation, I addressed him thus before all the company:
This abrupt introduction of myself, Mr. Mayor, may require some apology; I am here upon a little excursion, and as being at an inn is irksome, where I have not the happiness of being acquainted, I make it a rule to introduce myself, as I have done here, to the politest families in the town where I am.
The gentlemen smiled applause, the ladies tittered behind their fans; but I had the satisfaction to find myself very well-received. Indeed, I wanted no further introduction any where; when the company present found I came down for the assembly, and had an intention of staying some little time, invitations passed regularly round; one engaged me to dinner the next day, another the day following, and so on, but in all these parties I met not with the lady I wished to see; she being considered as beneath the company I was then in. The Mayor, I found, was a pleasant man, and Jack among the maids. He was pleased to say, that
as I had come down to honour their assembly, of which he was the founder, he was truly concerned to think the day was so far distant, as to fear the losing me; in order, therefore, that I might not be disappointed, he would convene the ladies, and have a dance at the inn where I was.
He returned my visit, however, the next morning, and with a melancholy countenance, told me,
the girls were of late grown so squeamish, that they objected to dancing at a public house; and that, as their assembly was in its infancy, he could not permit them the use of the town hall, left the neighbouring gentry should, on hearing of this dance, be displeased that they had not notice of it; but that if I would do them the honour to stay over the next Sunday, he would advertise it in the Oxford Gazette on the ensuing Saturday, and, on my account, would fix the assembly on the Thursday following, which was a week sooner than the stated time.
I of course acknowledged myself obliged, and agreed to it. Not having yet met, nor being likely to meet, in the company I was with, the lady I was in search of, I excused myself from a party one afternoon, purposely to wait upon her. She lived with her mother, a widow; determining, therefore, to introduce myself, I wrote a card to the mother, similar to the one I sent to the Mayor, and she returned he compliments, saying,
as she presumed I had some business with her, she should be glad to see me.
I went there in my carriage, and saw the old lady, but Miss was not with her; however, she made her appearance with the tea-table, and expressed a concern that she was not at church last Sunday, as she should have heard, by all accounts, a very excellent sermon, and very gracefully delivered. I entered into the chit-chat of the town, the proposed dance, and the politeness of the Mayor; told her, the assembly was to be the Thursday following, and hoped she would be there; her reply was,
She never had been at the assembly, nor did she know she should be admitted, for the ladies of that place did not think her good enough to mix with them.
At this the mother fired, and said,
her daughter was as good as the best, and she was a fool to keep away;
I favoured the idea, and encouraged her to go, and told her,
that if she would do me the honour to dance with me, I should be proud of her as a partner, and would conduct her there and back. Should I go,
says she,
I shall have no objections to dance with you, but that is uncertain.
So far introduced, I improved the acquaintance; called on her a day or two before the assembly; prevailed on her to accompany me there, and danced with her; and, we became so familiar before the close of the evening, that I told her I was enamoured with her, and solicited permission to pay my addresses to her. With a great deal of candour and good-nature, she acknowledged herself obliged to me for the preference I had shewn to her before other ladies, but assured me, she was engaged, and to a brother clergyman; to whom she is since married.
FINDING my plan here abortive, I quitted the place, and returned to London, having been absent from it near three weeks; and, being in daily apprehension of its being found out that I was not in orders, and dreading the demand of the man of whom I had the carriage and horses, which amounted to near twenty pounds, and which I was unable to pay, I retired from my profession, and concealed myself under a different character.
WHEN I reflected upon my conduct, and the deceptions I used, I held myself in detestation; but I soon reconciled it to myself by the plea of necessity, and the collateral one of meaning well; for had I obtained that young lady's consent, and had a promise of the living as a portion, I would have embraced a clerical life, and, I am bold to say, would have acted in that life with honour and probity. As it is, I was reserved for a different situation. There is a fatality, I am convinced, in the lives of all men, that worketh wonderfully for their good; and, unless it be constantly counteracted, will gain ground gradually to its consummation.
AS I set out with making useful remarks on the various passages in my life, for the improvement and entertainment of my readers; I cannot omit dwelling a little longer on the clerical profession, and observing, that though it's followers draw the many indignities they meet with too often upon themselves, yet their poverty and distressed situation, are frequently the occasions of it. The idea of bringing up a son a gentleman has spoiled many a good tradesman, and has thrown many upon the church whom she is unable to maintain. Lectureships have been considered as a tolerable provision for those who are not provided with livings or curacies; but the establishment of lectureships, if we believe the same ingenious gentleman, who has favoured the world with his conference with Mr. Snuffle,
has contributed in a great measure to bring upon the whole body of the clergy, that contempt into which they are now fallen. The choice of a lecturer is generally vested in the parishioners at large, as they are paid by a voluntary contribution. These parishioners for the most part, consist of ordinary tradesmen, sometimes very low mechanics, persons not always of the most refined manners, or most delicate sensations. I had not been three weeks in London,
says this gentleman,
but strolling one Sunday afternoon into a church in the city, I heard the clerk, after service, by order of the vestry, declare the lectureship vacant, and invite the clergy, however dignified or distinguished, to be candidates for it, and to give in their names by the ensuing Sunday. Having no clerical provision, I no sooner heard this
church-serjeant
beating up for recruits, than I immediately resolved to
enlist;
and accordingly waited on the worshipful
Stentor
above-mentioned, who took down my name and place of abode. On my desiring him, at the same time, to acquaint me with the best method of proceeding, which I was an utter stranger to, he advised me, as a
friend,
to apply, as speedily as possible, to Mr.
Bluemould,
a cheesemonger in
Rotten Lane,
who was then first church-warden, a leading man in the vestry, and a person, he assured me, on whom the election would, in a great measure, depend. I took honest
Amen's
advice, and by nine the next morning (not, I must own, without some reluctance), dressed myself as well as I could, and waited on Mr. Churchwarden. As soon as he saw me enter the shop in my canonicals (for I had hired an excellent new gown and cassock, behind St. Clement's, on the occasion) he made me a low bow, gave me the title of
Doctor,
and, imagining, no doubt, that I was come to bespeak cheeses for the country, begged to know my
honour's
commands; to which I replied, in an humble tone, and looking extremely disconcerted, that I came to wait on him on account of the lectureship of the parish, and begged the favour of his vote and interest. You would have smiled to have seen the sudden alteration of his features and behaviour: he dropped all the tradesman's obsequiousness, and in a moment assumed the magisterial air and dignity of the churchwarden; turned aside to a woman who was just then asking for a pound of Cheshire cheese, and, without addressing himself to me, cried out, 'This is the fourth parson I have had with me to-day upon the same errand;' then staring me full in the face, Well, young man,' says he, 'you intend to be a candidate for this same lecture; you are all to mount the
nostrum
I suppose, and merit will carry it; for my part, I promise nobody; but remember, I tell you before hand, I am for
voice
and
action,
so mind your hits.' When he had said this, he immediately turned upon his heel, and went into the counting-house. I took my leave in an awkward manner, as you may suppose, being not a little chagrined at his insolence, and as I went out of the shop, overheard his lady observing, from behind the counter, that I was a pretty
sprig of divinity,
but looked a little
sheepish,
and had not half the courage of the gentleman that had been recommended to her husband by Mr.
Squintum.
THESE are some of the mortifications lectures are subject to; and then as to their pay, and the manner in which they are paid, it adds still further to the contempt they lie under. The church-wardens of a parish once waited on a quaker, a tin-man within their limits, with the lecturer's book, and solicited his contribution towards the support of the afternoon sermon. "Thou knowest, friend," says he,
that we give nothing to thy clergy.
'I admit that,' returns one of the church-wardens,
but he is a worthy gentleman, and a good preacher, and you would say so if you heard him; I hope, therefore, as our parish is small, and we cannot make up any great sum, that you will add to it for the sake of your neighbours.
The quaker repeated his words as before, and they were leaving his shop when he called them back, with
Hark'ye, friend; though I told thee we quakers never give any thing towards the support of thy clergy, yet, as mayhap he may want
light,
—I'll gee'un a
lantern.
"The lecturer's box," continues my friend,
generally goes about with the rest of the parish beggars, a little before Christmas, and every body throws in their charity (for it is always considered in that light) as they think proper. Were I to mention how many paltry excuses are made to evade this little annual tribute, by the mean and sordid; how very little is given even by the most generous, and what an inconsiderable sum the whole generally amounts to, the recital would not afford my readers much entertainment, and for aught I know, might give them some real concern.
A lecturer, 'tis true, is licensed by the bishop, and of course cannot be removed; but notwithstanding this, he is far from independent: if he shews any marks of displeasure, or does not please his congregation, he feels it at the next collection; and when they are tired of him, they withhold their subscriptions, and (as they call it) starve him out.
"You cannot imagine" proceeds my friend,
with what an envious eye we poor lecturers have often looked over a waiter's book at a coffee-house, where I have seen such a collection of
guineas
and
half-guineas,
as made my mouth water. To give less than a crown would be to the last degree ungenteel, for the immense trouble of handing a dish of coffee, or a newspaper; whilst the poor divine, who has toiled in the ministry for a twelvemonth, and half worn out a pair of excellent lungs in the unprofitable service, shall think himself well rewarded with the noble donation of
half a crown.
I know a little too much of the world, to expect that a parson should be paid like a first-rate player, a pimp, or a lord of the treasury, whose incomes I believe are nearly equal, but I cannot help thinking, that a
labourer in the vineyard
is as well worthy his hire, as a journeyman carpenter or mason, and has as good a right to two pound two, on a
Sunday,
as they have on a Saturday night; and yet not one in an hundred is paid in that proportion.
To illustrate my subject, I will give my readers another story; there is nothing like a little painting from the life on these occasions. Suppose yourself then an eye-witness of the following scene, which passed not long since in the neighbourhood of Covent-Garden.
Enter
Twist
the church-warden, accompanied by the overseer, into the shop of Mr.
Prim
the mercer.
Well Mr
Twist,
what are your commands with me?
We are come to wait on your honor with the lecturer's book; Sir,
(reads)
a voluntary contribution of the inhabitants of the parish of St. Paul, Covent-Garden— for the support of —.
Well well, you need not read any farther; what is it?
"Whatever you please, Sir.
Aye, here's another load, another burden; dy'e think I am made of gold? There's the poor's rate, the doctor's rate, the window rates, the devil's in the rates I think!—However, I can't refuse
you;
—but I'll not give another year.—Here,
Buckram,
reach me half a crown out of the till. Your servant, Madam.—
(a lady comes out of the back parlour, walks through the shop, and gets into a chair)
—Aye, there's another tax, a guinea for two box tickets, as sure as the benefit comes round, for my wife and daughter, besides chair hire.
(shaking his head).
O Master Prim, Master Prim! Had not you better now have given us a guinea for the Doctor and his four children, and reserved your half-crown for the lady, who, if I may judge from her garb, does not want it half so much as the poor parson? But you will be in the fashion, so give us your mite. Set down Mr. Prim two shillings and six-pence.
SUCH is the force of example, the influence of fashion, that a constant church-goer, and one perhaps who fancies himself a very good christian, shall throw away
one pound one,
with all the pleasure imaginable for an evening's entertainment at the theatre, and at the same time grudge
half a crown
for two and fifty discourses from the
pulpit;
which, if he turns to his arithmetic book, he will see amounts to about three farthings a sermon—and a
sober
citizen too,—as Lady Townly says,—Fye, Fye!
IN short, such are the mortifications, to which the inferior clergy are exposed, that if I had a son to bring up, and could not give him either a fortune or a good living, I would sooner make a
coal-heaver
of him than a
parson.
CHAP. VII.
I WAS now once more master of myself, and had an employment to seek; but was very low in cash, so low, that I could not remain long out of place. I had recourse again to the newspapers, and applied as the following advertisement directed me:
Wanted a smart young man as footman to a lady.
She lived in a well-furnished house, in a genteel street at the west end of the town; I went in the morning, and was introduced to her whilst at her breakfast. A
I was pretty well dressed, and came into the room perhaps in a manner different from what footmen in general do, she rose from her seat, and when I told her I waited on her in consequence of her advertisement, she seemed rather confused, and said,
She presumed, that either I did not apply for myself, or that her place would be below my acceptance, for that
her
servant must wear a livery.
I told her,
an overthrow in life had humbled my mind, and reconciled it to any situation that was not dishonest or laborious, and that as to wearing the livery of a lady, it was what my superiors would be proud of.
She seemed to smile at my answer, and doubt my sincerity, and
freely acknowledged that my manner and language would do credit to a gentleman.
She asked me if I had ever lived in the capacity of a servant? I told her,
I had, and should be happy to be her's.
A very few words further passed between us, she condescended to say,
She was so pleased with my appearance that she should inquire no further about me, I carried too much honesty in my face to need any other recommendation.
She said,
she had engaged a servant, but that she would put him off, and take me in his stead; that her place was not a fatiguing one, it was little more than to wait upon herself, and that if I would accept of it with eighteen guineas a year, and a livery, I might come as soon as I pleased.
I bowed an assent, and told her,
I would attend her the Monday following.
She gave me a direction to her taylor, in order to get a new livery, and desired I would make my first appearance in it.— The livery was white, faced and lined with pale blue, silver buttons and epaulet, with a waistcoat of the colour of the facings, laced with silver, blue plush breeches, and silver laced hat; and the taylor having made it smart, and to fit me exactly, paid me the compliment to say, that
I
rather graced the livery, than the livery
me,
and among all the servants he had dressed, he had never seen one that became his cloaths so well.
It is rather an awkward task to be under the necessity of sounding one's own praise, but as the reader can hear nothing of one who writes his own life, but from the mouth of him who guides the pen, and as he may wish to have some little description of my person, the following is the simplest account I can give. I was, at the time I am now speaking of, a strait well-made man, five feet nine inches high, of a middling size, neither too corpulent nor too thin, just turned of twenty, dark hair, and a great deal of it, had a good set of teeth, and if glasses told truth, a speaking countenance, and a penetrating eye. I was given to understand, that I had a graceful figure, an insinuating address, and the manner of a gentleman; with these perfections and accomplishments, and the education I had received, with a good flow of spirits, and sanguine health, it must have been wonderful had I not pushed on through life as well as I have done. I must own that whenever I fell, it was through the impetuosity of passions, the heedlessness of youth, or want of worldly knowledge. I set out with very few expectations, and fewer friends; but I had philosophy enough to acquire a certain degree of fortitude, and was determined to be a cosmopolite, and take the world as it goes.
HAVING arranged my little matters at the house where I lodged, I dressed my hair in the most fashionable manner, which from custom I was expert at, put on a ruffled shirt, silk stockings, and a pair of Artois buckles; and when I surveyed myself in the glass, dressed as I was in my new cloaths, I thought myself a complete coxcomb: however, as I flattered myself, from the livery my mistress gave, and her being pleased with my appearance, she would not like me the worse for that; I sent my trunk to her house by a porter on the Monday I had promised to go, and followed it soon after myself.
MY lady was a woman about forty years of age, that seemed to have been handsome in her youth; her figure was rather
em bon point,
and she passed for a widow under the name of Duplex. On my coming to her house, she sent for me up stairs, and I could perceive, was not a little pleased with the figure I made. She told me that I became my livery exceedingly well, that she kept a boy to clean shoes and knives, and that all she expected of me, was to wait at table, and attend upon
her.
Having inquired my name, "Gabriel," says she,
you seem to be a young man of uncommon good sense, I presume I need not tell you, that servants should carry nothing out of the families they live with, nor see any thing they ought not to see. If you attend to this, and are industrious and civil, you will find me exceedingly good to you.
I HAD not been a fortnight in this house before I discovered that my mistress was one of those convenient
obliging
women, who administered to the pleasures of others. She was not, is the true sense of the word, a procuress, nor did she keep ladies of easy virtue under the roof with her; but her house was rather in the stile of a private bagnio, where men of fortune might find an asylum with their ladies, for an hour, a night, or a week, as it suited them. She had not the least conception of my finding this out, the parties that came, having always passed for her friends, and my fellow-servants, who had not
my
penetration, were kept in the dark. I might, if I pleased, have continued long in the service of this woman, had not an event taken place which gave birth to a variety of future embarrassments in the course of my life. My mistress was particularly kind to me, and would familiarly converse with me all the time I was waiting on her. She took some pains to draw me aside from the narrow path of rectitude, and gave me many broad hints of the favours she had in store for me. She would frequently ring the bell and call me to her toilet, even before she had well adjusted her dress; ask my opinion of female beauty, and often desire me to tell her, whether her handkerchief was put on to advantage. "Gabriel," says she one day to me, leering under her hat,—
You cannot have been in many places; pretty young fellows like you, are soon taken out of servitude. You shan't wear a livery long, but shall be groom of my bedchamber.
—
What say you Gabriel? Should you like such an office?
—I plainly saw at what she directed her artillery; but she was a woman that did not please me, and I will be honest enough to own, that aversion had more weight with me than principle. She was at all times very inquisitive about my family and connexions, and was very importunate to know where I acquired those accomplishments, she was pleased to say I possessed; but, as I did not mean to continue longer with her than I could help, I was reserved in my answers, and respectful, though very distant, in my replies.
She told me, she expected a young lady from the country in a day or two, to be with her some time; that a family difference would oblige her to leave home, and that her being with her was to be a secret; of course, if I could keep a close mouth, I should be amply rewarded; and that I was by no means to communicate to my fellow-servants, any thing I might hear or see above stairs.
I replied,
that she might rely on my fidelity,
with which she seemed satisfied. I was the more displeased with my mistress, as I conceived her to be of a profession, the most destructive to female virtue, and the greatest bane to domestic happiness of any existing. The pride of many an honest family had been overthrown, I understood, by her; and many a virtuous girl had owed her ruin to her officiousness. That there are many of her stamp in the great metropolis is too evident to be doubted, and that they are not made public examples of, is very much to be lamented! The young lady my mistress mentioned, was brought to our house one morning, by a gentleman in a hackney coach. She appeared to be about seventeen, and was one of the prettiest young women, I think, I ever beheld; with such a sweetness of expression and such a virgin modesty about her, as attracted all my attention, and made me instantly conceive something treacherous in her story. The gentleman that accompanied her, seemed to be a man of fashion about thirty years of age, and I could see, that on his introducing her to my mistress, she had never seen her before. The affair appeared to me mysterious, I felt myself, some how or other interested in her cause, and was determined, if she was incautiously seduced into this house, to watch her virtue with as much care and assiduity, as if she had been my sister. The gentleman dined with her, staid the greatest part of the day, but left her in the evening. He continued his visits, in like manner, the next day and the day after, and during the times I was waiting on them, I could discover nothing more than that industrious attention, which polite men generally pay to the object of their affections. She seemed to take a more than common notice of me, and observed to my mistress, which I overheard, when in the next room, that she was persuaded from my manner, that I must have been brought up a gentleman. Things went on pretty smooth for two or three days, when my mistress took an opportunity to go out, and left them to themselves. They drank tea alone, and I waited at tea, and nothing happened to increase my suspicions till about nine in the evening, when I heard a clattering of the chairs, and their voices rather louder than ordinary. This put me upon the watch, and presently I heard her scream with all her powers. I instantly flew up stairs, darted into the room, and found her fainting on the sopha, and he in a situation better conceived than described, but very declaratory of his wicked intentions. On seeing me enter the room, he seized me by the collar, with
Rascal, who sent for
you?
Get out of the room this instant or I'll be the death of you;
catching hold of his sword, which he drew.
I told him the lady seemed to need protection, and I would defend her with my life.
The poor young creature, that moment recovering her senses, begged of me,
for God's sake, to continue with her, and save her from ruin.
The gentleman, on the other hand, in the utmost rage and pushing me from him, insisted on my leaving the room or he'd run me through the body; and finding me determined not to obey his injunctions, unarmed as I was, he made a lunge at me, which having parried with my hand, I closed in upon him and disarmed him. The young lady screamed and fainted again, and her ravisher took up his hat, hurried down stairs, and made the best of his way out of the house. He was no sooner gone, than I assisted her with some hartshorn, which I found on the mantle-piece, and brought her to her speech. Seeing herself free from her violator, she called me, her deliverer, thanked me, in the warmest terms, for standing forth in her defence, and hoped I was not hurt; for when she saw him draw his sword, she expected nothing less than my murder. I told her I was no way hurt but to see her so ill-treated, that he had endeavoured to run his sword through me, but, that from some knowledge I had of the use of that weapon, I had escaped the threatened mischief, and had disarmed him; that he had left me in possession of his sword and was gone, and that I esteemed myself singularly happy in having been her protector. She rose from the sopha, walked across the room to a chair, and begged me by no means to leave her, but to sit down and concert some means with her, of getting her out of that house, which, from many circumstances she suspected to be of no reputation.
She told me, that she was the daughter of a private gentleman of good family and fortune, that her name was Wildman, that the person who had so treated her, was a man of rank who had solicited her hand in marriage; but his father being alive, and he not being able to make a sufficient settlement on her, her father had opposed the match; that this gentleman, however, having gained her affections, she had been so imprudent as to leave her home, and come here with him, as into the house of a friend; where they were privately to be married and wait the reconciliation of her father; that under a variety of frivolous pretences he had delayed the ceremony and she now saw the drift of his base intentions; that his conduct had at once obliterated every spark of her attachment, and that, if possible, she now hated him more than ever she loved him.
This being her story,
she asked me what I thought she had best do?
I told her frankly, that I thought the sooner she was out of this house the better, for reasons, if she pleased, I would hereafter give her; that as she seemed determined not to pursue the motives that led her to leave her father's house, namely, that of giving her hand to a man who had such designing views upon her honour, I would by all means advise her to return, acknowledge her indiscretion to her father, and as he would now, from what had passed, have no reason to dread her elopement with the same person in future, I flattered myself he would readily forgive her.
This advice she immediately closed with, and was anxious to leave the house before my mistress returned; I encouraged the step, told her,
if she thought proper, I would fetch a coach from the stand, at the end of the street, and attend her home.
She agreed to this; I called a coach, handed her into it, in the presence of two of the maid-servants who were standing in the passage, and having privately told the coachman, to drive to Berkley-square where her father lived; I got up behind and the coach drove from the door.
WHEN we were got two or three streets length from the house, she stopped the coach, and begged to speak to me. It was to direct me to knock but a single rap at the door, and to tell the servant that opened it, that she wished her father not to know of her return, till she had seen her mother. When we reached the house, I obeyed her directions; she parted with me at the door, but desired me not to say who she was, nor where I had left her; and if I could get out in the morning, that I would be with her between eleven and twelve. On my return home I found my mistress was above, and that she was extremely angry with the steps I had taken. As soon as she heard I was in the house, the bell was rung, and I appeared before her. "Gabriel," says she, with warmth,
what is this you have done?— Where have you left Miss?
I gave her a particular account of every thing that I knew had happened in her absence; and as I had determined to quit her service, I gave her to understand, that she had a great deal to answer for; that from the story she had told me, prior to the young lady's coming to her house, I was convinced that she was privy to the scheme laid for her destruction, and that I esteemed myself particularly fortunate in being the cause of its prevention.
Where have you carried her to?
says she.—
That Ma'am,
replied I,
I am not at liberty to divulge; she is, I trust, in safe hands, and out of the way of any similar danger.
Harkye, Gabriel,
says she,
you may possibly think yourself exceedingly clever, but I must tell you that you are a very impudent fellow, to take any such liberties in a house where you are only a servant. But I deserve it, in taking you without a character; the only thing that vexes me is, that I should have been at any expence for so worthless a scoundrel. However, strip and turn out, you shall not lay another night under my roof.
Madam,
replied I,
was you to reflect a moment, you would be careful not to irritate one that has you so much in his power; if it was not for the means it has afforded me of rescuing a deluded young lady from the violence of a ravisher, I should regret the hour of coming within your doors; as it is, Madam, I esteem myself happy in having entered your service, and shall think myself equally so, in quitting it. I am directed to ask you for the small trunk belonging to the lady, which if you think proper to deliver, it may save a further enquiry into your conduct, and I shall then leave
your
cloaths and take my own.
Oh! I might have it,
she said,
She wanted nothing belonging to the minx, nor ever desired to hear of either of us again!
Accordingly having got her trunk, I called a coach, put off her finery, dressed myself in my own cloaths, took leave of my fellow-servants and made the best of my way to my former lodging, where, though late at night, I found an admission.
THE next morning I waited on Miss Wildman, at the appointed time, who, appearing in a morning dress, seemed lovely in the extreme; and I had the pleasure to receive, from her angelic tongue, her grateful thanks, for her miraculous preservation. She told me, she was
still more obliged to me for the advice I had given her, which had reconciled her to the best of parents, and without which she should have forfeited that love she never was so sensible of till now. She asked me "what reception I had met with from my mistress on my return?"
I related every particular, and told her
I had brought away her trunk: and though I had lost my place, I did not fear getting another, having done no otherwise than as justice and duty had compelled me.
She gave me to understand that
her father wished to see me, and begged I would stay in the servants hall, till he had an opportuity of speaking with me.
I was no sooner at liberty, but the servants flocked about me, and thanked me by their looks, as well as words, for restoring to them their lost young lady; they told me how much she was beloved by the whole family and how much they feared their master would never more have received her; but they were joyfully disappointed; that her contrition for her conduct, had wrought her reconciliation so effectually, that they believed her father and mother loved her now more affectionately than ever.
Mr. Wildman soon sent for me up, and with tears in his eyes, thanked me for having been the deliverer of his child; he said,
she had seen, he believed, her indiscretion, had repented of her conduct, and of course, was more endeared to him than ever:
he told me,
she had acquainted him with so much of the story, as her senses permitted her to be witness of; and he would be glad to hear the remainder from
me.
I related it to him in the manner it happened, and when I had finished the tale, he, with a degree of enraptured enthusiasm, flew to me and embraced me; blubbered out the sentiments of a grateful heart for the kindness I had done both him and her, and assured me he would be a friend to me for ever.
There was a gallantry,
he said,
and greatness in my conduct, that would do honour to the first of characters, and as he heard I had lost my place in the cause, he would take me into his service, and I should be immediately about his person.
He put into my hand a fifty pound bank-note and told me he would give me one every year, whilst I thought proper to continue with him. Poor as I was, I modestly refused the note, saying,
I was amply gratified in having merited his good wishes and his daughter's:
but he replied,
fifty pounds he hoped would not hurt me,
and insisted on my taking it. He then told me, he could employ his present valet, at an estate he had in the country, and I might come to him when I thought proper; I accepted his proposal, and replied, that,
if agreeable to him, I would attend him the next day.
Matters being thus adjusted, I returned to my lodging, and prepared to removemy little baggage the next morning; but curiosity leading me to enquire at Mrs. Duplex's, whether the gentleman had called or sent for his sword, or whether my fellow-servants had heard their mistress say any thing concerning me, I called there in the evening, under a pretence of returning a cork-screw I had inadvertently taken away in my pocket, and was admitted privately into the kitchen; where I was soon told, that the gentleman had been there for his sword, and that both he and my mistress had vowed vengeance against me, whenever they could find me. I smiled at their menaces and left the house as secretly as I entered it.
CHAP VIII.
THE next day put me in possession of my new place, to which I was the more eager to go, as it would give me an opportunity of occasionally seeing Miss Wildman, an attachment to whom, I found,
maugre
the great distance between us, grew insensibly upon me; and dangerous and fruitless as the thought might be, I could not but indulge it. I called to my remembrance, that, in the course of my reading, far more unlikely things had come to pass than what I coveted. She had now no
penchant
for any man; the late object of her affections, from his villainous conduct, was become odious to her; she had noticed me, even before the late accident happened, in a very favourable light;—she seemed endowed with an uncommon share of sensibility:—she owed me attention—she owed me
gratitude;
—and she called me her pròtector and deliverer.— On the other hand,—I was conscious in having been bred up a gentleman—of having had a liberal education —of having good connexions and being allied to a good family and fortune; for my father's uncle, though he would do nothing for me, was possessed of an estate of four thousand pounds a year, and there were only two persons, the children of my father's elder brother, between me and that estate, and these persons unmarried.—With such chimerical, such fugitive notions, did I now and then amuse myself. I was determined, however, not to offend the family I was in; but to watch and wait patiently for that critical moment, if ever it should arrive, that might give a more favourable turn to my pretensions. Our family consisted of my master, my mistress, and their daughter, who were Roman Catholics, and of a great num-of servants; and it seemed a very happy one, when I first became a part of it; but, as I was a favourite up stairs, I soon became obnoxious below. I studied, all I could, to conciliate the affections of my fellow-servants, but that demon Jealousy, which seldom takes possession of the human mind, but it makes it see things through a false medium, and gives a different colour to transactions, than what they naturally bear; this jealousy poisoned all their tempers, and every thing they did for me was more than I deserved: my shoes and buckles were not half cleaned; the knife I was to eat with did not cut; the bread I was helped to, was dry; the bear flat, and as I was generally attending upon my master, at the usual time of breakfast, in the house-keeper's room; when I came down to eat mine, the muffins were gone, the water was cold, and the cream was slopped. In short, there seemed to be a conspiracy against me, and for no fault of mine that I was conscious of; I was too much of a gentleman for a servant; I wanted two or three to wait upon me, and I studied nothing but dress, affected airs and fine language. —I bore all this very patiently, for what will not a person bear with a favourite object in view? I imputed their conduct to ignorance and low-breeding, and prided myself in returning good for evil. My master, who ufed always to converse with me, when I was dressing, would treat me more as a friend than as a servant, and with a degree of concern, would often complain to me of the conduct of his people below; at which times I always took pains to excuse their faults, and explain away their errors; but this availed me but little, they were not sensible of my good wishes towards them; and hated, me merely because I was beloved by their master and mistress. All I could do, in the present situation of things, was to make a friend of Miss Wildman's maid, and which I aimed at for more reasons than one; as it would facilitate my intercourse with her mistress, and she was disposed to get me my breakfast, which was my best meal, in her own room. She was a good-natured woman, about thirty years of age, and greatly in her young lady's favour. Through her, I learned that Miss Wildman had expressed the highest regard for me, and wished for an opportunity of being of use to me: she had frequently observed to her maid, as she had done to Mrs. Duplex, that I had the manner of a gentleman, and was sure, though in the situation of a servant, I had received a gentleman's education, and that her father and mother were of the same opinion; for that they had never remarked in any servant they had men with, that good sense, that gallantry, that respectful attention, and that insinuating address that marked my character; and that she was anxious to know my history. Through this same channel I made her acquainted with every thing concerning me; of which the reader is too well informed to need a repetition here; and as far as I dared to do, I made Charlotte understand, which was the name of Miss Wildman's maid, that though I ventured my life in the defence of her mistress, and was too much her friend, to wish her in any perilous situation again, yet I should rejoice in a second opportunity of convincing her how much I had her safety at heart. This I foresaw would be carried to Miss Wildman, for Charlotte had too much of the waiting-maid about her, not to take pleasure in carrying tales backwards and forwards. Had I been butler in the family, I should have had frequent opportunities of being in her presence; but, in the capacity of her father's valet, I seldom could see her. Now and then she would come into her maid's room, whilst we were at breakfast, and sit and chat with us. The first time I saw her upon this occasion, I rose respectfully from my seat, at which she seemed hurt. "Gabriel," says she,
I am much obliged to Charlotte for her Attention to
you;
any respect she shews you will be gratefully acknowledged by
me;
for to you I am indebted for every thing.
I humbly told her
she rated my services too high; for, independent of any protection due to suffering innocence, such merits as Miss Wildman could boast of, laid the strongest claim to every necessary interference.
She told me,
that she frequently came into her maid's room to speak with her; but, if it disturbed me, or put me the least out of my way, she would never enter it again: and it was her request in future, that I should not notice her coming in.
I replied, that
as a command of her's, I should obey it.
At these occasional interviews, she would be affable and familiar, and once she condescended to tell me,
that Lord B. who was the son of the Earl of A. and who had treated her so ill, had made several applications for leave to renew his addresses to her; but she was determined never to listen to him more. Her heart,
she said,
was her own again, and she hoped, she should have sufficient discernment and resolution never to bestow it more upon a worthless objects.
Charlotte,
says she,
one day, to her maid,
(for Charlotte told it me again)
was I mistress of my own fortune, I don't know but I would bestow it upon Gabriel: he appears to be a young man of such nice honour, and such virtuous sentiments, as would be an ornament to any line of life, he may be thrown into.
I assure you, Miss, says, Charlotte, it would not be ill bestowed, for Gabriel is the son of a gentleman, has had the best of educations, and, though now in the capacity of a servant, has an estate of four thousand pounds a year in expectation.
In short, she made her mistress acquainted with many parts of my history, such as I had let her into.
IT was a practice with me in every scene of life into which I was thrown, to acquire all the information I could, respecting that scene; here then I learned the fatigue and absurdity of a fashionable life, and the tiresome round of dissipation attending it. My master, in one of his conversable moments, told me, there was no satisfaction in the visits men of fashion paid to each other, and that he had
cut
Cut
is a fashionable term for, given it up.
it long since.
Visits among the great,
he said,
were merely ceremonial, and rather troublesome than otherwise; he had visited a man for seven years together, and never once had seen him.
Indeed, I heard myself, a gentleman once say to a lady, who rated him for not calling oftener to see her,
It is your ladyship's fault entirely.—I would come oftener, if you would not let me in.
Nay, visiting is allowed to be so much a ceremony, that I have been told of a lady, who, having omitted to tell her porter, that she did not chuse to be seen, put her head out of window, and called out to her visitant, on knocking at the door, "I am not at home." Frequently has my master told me, that in the younger part of his life, he and his lady received so many invitations on the same day, that they have been obliged to divide themselves, and go from one house to another, shewing themselves each at two or three places on the same evening; and on my asking whether it would not have been better to have omitted going to more places than one? He replied,
No, nothing but illness (if in town) is an excuse for non-attendance; if an invitation is once or twice unaccepted, party will be asked no more,
John, our porter, has entertained me, frequently for a long time together, with visiting relations. He told me, when ladies have so many visits to return, that they cannot personally pay them, it is not an unusual thing to send the empty chair, which stopping at the end of the street, the footman steps forward to the house, knocks gently at the door, and asks the porter confidentially, if his lady sees company; if answered in the negative, he knocks hard, beckons to the chairmen to come up and leaves a card; if answered in the affirmative, no notice is taken, but they proceed to another house. To avoid, however, this troublesome piece of business; gentlemen will now leave their names at the door, without enquiring for the master, or attempting to go in; and ladies will send their servants to do the same; and the delivery of such card shall be construed as a visit made and returned. And what is all this but farce and tiresome ceremony? the end of visiting is social intercourse and friendly converse; but this mode of visiting, destroys that end. A modern visitant seems to dread the meeting of a private friend, as if he was fearful his conduct should be enquired into and censured; and, as if he abhorred the necessity of saying a civil thing to his acquaintance. Whatever these people may think, such conduct is disgraceful, and must arise from want of abilities to join in general topics, or from fearing reflection, as owls fear the day-light.
END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.