The Strange Adventures of Captain Dangerous Volume II Part 5

which was his general reply when he was puzzled in the Foreign Lingos.

Then the old Lord, with a very sharp voice and in French, tells him that he has no Business there, and bids him begone. Mr. Pinchin could understand French, though he spoke it but indifferently; but he, being fairly Primed, and in one of his Obstinate Moods, musters up his best parleyvoo, and tells the Ancient with the Golden Key (and I saw that he had another one hung round his neck by a parcel chain, and conjectured him to be a High Chamberlain at least) to go to the Devil. (I ask pardon for this word.) Hereupon my Lord with the Sheep's countenance collars him, runs his white stick into his visage, so that the key nearly puts his eye out, and roars for the Guard. Then Mr. Pinchin, according to his custom when he has gotten himself into a pother, begins to squeal for Me, and the Chaplain, and his Mamma, to help him out of it. My blood was up in a moment; I had not had a Tussle with any one for a long time.

"Shall I who have brained an English Grenadier sneak off before a rabble-rout of Sauerkraut Soldiers?" I asked myself, remembering how much Stronger and Older I had grown since that night. "Here goes, Jack Dangerous!" and away I went into the throng, wrenched the white staff from the old Lord's hand, made him unhand my Master, and drawing his Sword for him (he being too terrified to draw it himself), grasped him firmly by the arm, and was preparing to cut a way back for both of us through the crowd. But 'twas a mad attempt. Up came the Guard, every man of them Six Foot high, and for all they were Sauerkraut Soldiers, pestilent Veterans who knew what Fighting meant. When I saw their fixed Bayonets, and their Mustachios curling with rage, I remembered a certain Scar I had left on me after a memorable night in Charlwood Chase. We were far from our own country, and there was no Demijohn of Brandy by; so, though it went sore against my Stomach, there was no help for it but to surrender ourselves at once Prisoners of War. Prisoners of War, forsooth! They treated us worse than Galley Slaves. Our hands were bound behind us with cords, Halters were put about our necks, and, the Grenadiers prodding us behind with their bayonets,--the Dastards, so to p.r.i.c.k Unarmed Men!--we were conducted in ignominy through the rascal Crowd, which made a Grinning, Jeering, Hooting lane for us to pa.s.s to the Guardhouse at the Entrance of the Gardens. The Officer of the Guard was at first for having both of us strapped down to a Bench as a preliminary measure to receive two hundred Blows apiece with Willow Rods in the small of our backs, which is their usual way of commencing Judicial proceedings, when up comes the old Lord in a Monstrous Puff and Flurry, and says that by the Empress's command no present Harm is to be done us; but that we are to be removed to the Town Gaol till the Caesar's pleasure respecting us shall be known. Her Majesty, however, forgot to enjoin that we were not to be fettered; so the Captain of the Guard he claps on us the heaviest Irons that ever Mutineers howled in; and we, being flung into a kind of Brewer's Dray, and accompanied by a Strong Guard of Horse and Foot, were conveyed to Vienna, and locked up in the Town Gaol.

Luckily Mr. Hodge speedily got wind of our misfortune, and hied him to the British Amba.s.sador, who, being fond of a Pleasant Story, laughed heartily at the recital. He promised to get my Master off on payment of a Fine or something of that sort; and as for me, he was good enough to opine that I might think myself Lucky if I escaped with a sound dose of the Bastinado once a week for three months, and a couple of years or so in Irons. The Chaplain pleaded for me as well as for my Master as hard as he could; and his Excellency frowned and said, that the Diversions of a Gentleman might run a little wild sometimes and no harm done, but that the Insolence of Servants (which was a growing evil) must be restrained.

"At all events, I'll see what I can do," he condescended to explain.

"Come what may, the Fellow can't fare very badly for a sound Beating, and perhaps they will let him off when he has had cudgelling enough." So he calls for his Coach, and goes off to Court.

FOOTNOTES:

[E] Had Captain Dangerous written his memoirs a few years later, he might have found cause to alter his opinion respecting the wisdom of George III. in refusing to grant the American demands.

[F] And yet Captain Dangerous is a stanch opponent of Reform.--ED.

CHAPTER THE SIXTH.

OF PARIS (BY THE WAY OF THE PRISON AT VIENNA), AND OF MY COMING BACK FOR A SEASON TO MY OWN COUNTRY, WHERE MY MASTER, THE CHAPLAIN, AND I PART COMPANY.

THE Fox in the Fable, so my Grannum (who had a ready Memory for those Tales) used to tell me, when he first saw the Lion was half dead with Fright. The Second View only a little Dashed him with Tremour; at the Third he durst salute him Boldly; and at the Fourth Rencounter Monsieur Reynard steals a s.h.i.+n Bone of Beef from under the old Roarer's Nose, and laughs at his Beard. This Fable came back to me, as with a Shrug and a Grin (somewhat of the ruefullest) I found myself again (and for no Base Action I aver) in a Prison Hold. I remembered what a dreadful Sickness and Soul-sinking I had felt when doors of Oak clamped with Iron had first clanged upon me; when I first saw the Blessed Sun made into a Quince Tart by the cross-bars over his Golden face; when I first heard that clas.h.i.+ng of Gyves together which is the Death Rattle of a man's Liberty. But now! Gaols and I were old Acquaintances. Had I not lain long in the dismal Dungeon at Aylesbury? Had I not sweltered in the Hold of a Transport s.h.i.+p? I was but a Youth; but I felt myself by this time a Parcel Philosopher. The first thing a man should do when he gets into Gaol, is to ask himself whether there is any chance of his being Hanged.

If he have no Sand Blindness, or Gossamer dancing of Threepenny cord before his eyes, why then he had e'en better eat and drink, and Thank G.o.d, and hope for the Best. "They won't Hang me," I said cheerfully enough to myself, when I was well laid up in Limbo. The Empress is well known to be a merciful Lady, and will cast the ermine of Mercy over the Scarlet Robe of Stern Authority. Perhaps I shall get my Ribs basted.

What of that? Flesh is flesh, and will Heal. They cannot beat me so sorely as I have seen done (but never of myself Ordered but when I was compelled) to Negro Slaves. If they fine me, my Master must Pay. Here I am by the Heels, and until I get out again what use is there in Fretting? Lady Fortune has played me a scurvy trick; but may she not to-morrow play as roguish a one to the Sheepfaced old Chamber Lord with the golden Key, or any other smart Pink-an-eye Dandiprat that hangs about the Court? The Spoke which now is highest in her Wheel may, when she gives it the next good Twist, be undermost as Nock. So I took Courage, and bade Despair go Swing for a dried Yeoman Sprat as he is.

I being a Servant, and so unjustly accounted of Base Degree by these Sour-Cabbage gorging and Sourer-Beer swilling High Dutch Bed-Pressers, was put into the Common Ward with the Raff; while my Master was suffered, on Payment of Fees, to have better lodgings. Gaolers are Gaolers all over the world, and Golden Fetters are always the lightsomest. We were some Sixty Rascals (that is to say, Fifty-nine scoundrels, with one Honest Youth, your Humble Servant) in the Common Room, with but one Bed between us; this being, indeed, but a Raised Wooden Platform, like that you see in a Soldiers' Guard Room. They brought us some Straw every day, and littered us down Dog Fas.h.i.+on, and that was all we had for Lodging Gear. It mattered little. There was a Roof to the Gaol that was weather-tight, and what more could a Man want?--until things got better at least.

Which they speedily did; and neither Master nor Man came to any very great harm. 'Twas a near touch, though; and the safety of Jack Dangerous's bones hung for days, so I was afterwards told, by the merest thread. They deliberated long and earnestly about my case among themselves. It was even, I believe, brought before the Aulic Council; but, after about a week's confinement, and much going to and fro between the English Emba.s.sador and the Great ones of the Court, Mr.

Pinchin had signified to him that he might procure his Enlargement by paying a Fine of Eight Hundred Florins, which was reckoned remarkably cheap, considering his outrageous behaviour at the Shooting match. Some days longer they thought fit to detain Me; but My Master, after he regained his liberty, came to see me once and sometimes twice a day; and through his and Mr. Hodge's kindness, I was supplied with as good Victuals and Drink as I had heretofore been accustomed to. Indeed, such abundant fare was there provided for me, that I had always a superfluity, and I was enabled to relieve the necessities and fill the bellies of many poor Miserable Hungry creatures who otherwise must have starved; for 'twas the custom of the Crown only to allow their Captives a few Kreutzers, amounting to some twopence-farthing a day English, for their subsistence. The Oldest Prisoner in the Ward, whom they called Father of the Room, would on this Bare Pittance take t.i.the and toll, often in a most Extortionate manner. Then these Gaol birds would fall to thieving from one another, even as they slept; and if a man was weak of Arm and Feeble of Heart, he might go for a week without touching a doit of his allowance, and so might Die of Famine, unless he could manage to beg a little filthy Cabbage Soup, or a lump of Black Bread, from some one not wholly without Bowels of Compa.s.sion.

But I had not been here more than a month when the instances of my master at length prevailed, and I too was Enlarged; only some Fifty Florins being laid upon me by way of fine. This mulct was paid perforce by Mr. Pinchin; for as 'twas through his mad folly, and no fault of my own, that I had come to Sorrow, he was in all Justice and Equity bound to bear me harmless in the Consequences. He was fain, however, to make some Demur, and to Complain, in his usual piteous manner, of being so amerced.

"Suppose you had been sentenced to Five Hundred Blows of a Stick, sirrah,"--'twas thus he put the case to me, logically enough,--"would you have expected me to pay for thee in carcase, as now I am paying for thee in Purse?"

"Circ.u.mstances alter cases," interposes Mr. Hodge in my behalf. "Here is luckily no question of Stripes at all. John may bless his Stars that he hath gotten off without a Rib-Roasting; and to your Wors.h.i.+p, after the Tune they have made you dance to, and the Piper you have paid, what is this miserable little Fine of Fifty Florins?" So my Master paid; and Leaving another Ten Florins for the poor Losels in the Gaol to drink his health in, we departed from that place of Durance, thinking ourselves, and with reason, very well out of it.

Servants are not always so lucky when they too implicitly obey the behests of their Masters, or, in a hot fever of Fidelity, stand up for them in Times of Danger or Desperate Affrays. Has there not ever been brought under your notice that famous French Law Case, of the Court Lady,--the Dame de Liancourt, I think she was called,--against whom another Dame had a Spite, either for her Beauty, or her Wit, or her Riches' sake? She, riding one day in her Coach-and-Six by a cross-road, comes upon the Dame de Liancourt, likewise in her Coach-and-Six, both ladies having the ordinary complement of Running Footmen. My Lady who had a Spite against her of Liancourt whispers to her Lacqueys; and these poor Faithful Rogues, too eager to obey their Mistress's commands, ran to the other coach-door, pulled out that unlucky Dame de Liancourt, and then and there inflicted on her that shameful chastis.e.m.e.nt which jealous Venus, as the Poetry books say, did, once upon a time, order to poor Psyche; and which, even in our own times, so I have heard, Madame du Barry, the last French King's Favourite, did cause Four Chambermaids to inflict on some Lady about Versailles with whom she had cause of Anger.

At any rate, the cruel and Disgraceful thing was done, the Dame sitting in her coach meanwhile clapping her hands. O! 'twas a scandalous thing.

The poor Dame de Liancourt goes, Burning with Rage and Shame, to the Chief Town of the Province, to lodge her complaint. The matter is brought before the Parliament, and in due time it goes to Paris, and is heard and re-heard, the Judges all making a Mighty to-do about it; and at last, after some two years and a half's litigation, is settled in this wise. My Lady pays a Fine and the Costs, and begs the Dame de Liancourt's pardon. But what, think you, becomes of the two poor Lacqueys that had been rash enough to execute her Revengeful Orders?

Why, at first they are haled about from one gaol to another for Thirty Months in succession, and then they are subjected to the question, Ordinary and Extraordinary--that is to say, to the Torture; and at last, when my Lady is paying her fine of 10,000 livres, I think, or about Four Hundred Pounds of our Money, the Judges at Paris p.r.o.nounce against these two poor Devils of Footmen,--that were as innocent of any Malice in the Matter as the Babe that is unborn, and only Did what they were Told,--that one is to be Hanged in the Place de Greve, and the other banished to the Galleys, there to be chained to the Oar for life. A fine Encouragement truly for those who think that, for good Victuals and a Fine Livery, they are bound to obey all the Humours and Caprices, even to the most Unreasonable and most Arbitrary, of their Masters and Mistresses.

We were in no great Mood, after this Affair was over, to remain in Vienna. Mr. Pinchin did at first purpose journeying through the Province of Styria by Gratz, to a little town on the sea-coast, called Trieste,--that has much grown in importance during these latter days,--and so crossing the Gulf to Venice; but he abandoned this Scheme.

His health was visibly breaking; his Funds, he said, were running low; he was more anxious about his Mamma than ever; and 'twas easy to see that he was half-weary and half-afraid of the Chaplain and Myself, and that he desired nothing Half so Much as to get Rid of us Both. So we packed up, and resumed our Wanderings, but in Retreat instead of Advance. We pa.s.sed, coming back, through Dresden, where there are some fine History Pictures, and close to which the Saxon Elector had set up a great Factory for the making of painted Pottery Ware: not after the monstrous Chinese Fas.h.i.+on, but rather after the Mode practised with great Success at our own Chelsea. The manner of making this Pottery was, however, kept a high State Secret by the government of the then Saxon Elector; and no strangers were, on any pretence, admitted to the place where the Works were carried on; so of this we saw nothing: and not Sorry was I of the privation, being utterly Wearied and palled with much gadding about and Sight-seeing. So post to Frankfort, where there were a many Jews; and thence to Mayence; and from thence down the grand old River Rhine to the City of Cologne; whence, by the most lagging stages I did ever know, to Bruxelles. But we stayed not here to see the sights--not even the droll little statue of the Mannikin (at the corner of a street, in a most improper att.i.tude; and there is a Group quite as unseemly in one of the Markets, so I was told, although at that time we were fain to pa.s.s them by), which Mannikin the burgesses of Bruxelles regard as a kind of tutelary Divinity, and set much greater store by than do we by our London Stone, or Little Naked Boy in Panyer Alley. But it is curious to mark what strange fanteagues these Foreigners run mad after.

At Bruxelles my Master buys an old Post Carriage--cost him Two Hundred and Fifty Livres, which was not dear; and the wretched horses of the country being harnessed thereto, we made Paris in about a week afterwards. We alighted at a decent enough kind of Inn, in the Place named after Lewis the Great (an eight-sided s.p.a.ce, and the houses handsome, though not so large as Golden Square). There was a great sight the day after our coming, which we could not well avoid seeing. This was the Burial of a certain great n.o.bleman, a Duke and Marshal of France, and at the time of his Decease Governor of the City of Paris. I have forgotten his name; but it does not so much matter at this time of day, his Grace and Governors.h.i.+p being as dead as Queen Anne. It began (the Burial), on foot, from his house, which was next door but one to our Inn, and went first to his Parish Church, and thence, in coaches, right to the other end of Paris, to a Monastery where his Lords.h.i.+p's Family Vault was. There was a prodigious long procession of Flambeaux; Friars, white, black, and gray, very trumpery, and marvellous foul-looking; no plumes, banners, scutcheons, led horses, or open chariots,--altogether most mean obsequies. The march began at eight in the evening, and did not end till four o'clock the next morning, for at each church they pa.s.sed they stopped for a Hymn and Holy Water. And, by the way, we were told that one of these same choice Friars, who had been set to watching the body while it lay in state, fell asleep one night, and let the Tapers catch fire of the rich Velvet Mantle, lined with Ermine and powdered over with gold Flower-de-Luces, which melted all the candles, and burnt off one of the feet of the Departed, before it wakened the watcher.

It was afterwards my fortune to know Paris very well; but I cannot say that I thought much of the place on first coming to it. Dirt there was everywhere, and the most villanous smells that could be imagined. A great deal of Show, but a vein of Rascal manners running through it all.

Nothing neat or handsomely ordered. Where my Master stood to see the Burial Procession, the balcony was hung with Crimson Damask and Gold; but the windows behind him were patched in half-a-dozen places with oiled paper. At Dinner they gave you at least Three Courses; but a third of the Repast was patched up with Sallets, b.u.t.ter, Puff-paste, or some such miscarriages of Dishes. Nothing like good, wholesome, substantial Belly-Timber. None but Germans, and other Strangers, wore fine clothes; the French people mainly in rags, but powdered up to their eyebrows.

Their coaches miserably horsed, and rope-harnessed; yet, in the way of Allegories on the panels, all tawdry enough for the Wedding of Cupid and Psyche. Their shop-signs extremely laughable. Here some living at the Y Gue; some at Venus's Toilette; and others at the Sucking Cat.

Their notions of Honour most preposterous. It was thought mighty dishonourable for any that was a Born Gentleman not to be in the Army, or in the King's Service, but no dishonour at all to keep Public Gaming Houses; there being at least five hundred persons of the first Quality in Paris living by it. You might go to their Houses at all Hours of the Night, and find Hazard, Pharaoh, &c. The men who kept the gaming-tables at the Duke of Gesvres' paid him twelve guineas a night for the privilege. Even the Princesses of the Blood were mean enough to go snacks in the profits of the banks kept in their palaces. I will say nothing more of Paris in this place, save that it was the fas.h.i.+on of the Ladies to wear Red Hair of a very deep hue; these said Princesses of the Blood being consumedly carroty. And I do think that if a Princess of the Blood was born with a Tail, and chose to show it, tied up with Pea-Green Ribbon, through the Placket-hole of her Gown, the Ladies, not only in France, but all over the World, would be proud to sport Tails with Pea-Green Ribbons,--or any other colour that was the mode,--whether they were Born with 'em or not.

Nothing more that is worthy of Mention took place until our leaving Paris. We came away in a calash, that is, my Master and the Chaplain, riding at their Ease in that vehicle, while I trotted behind on a little Bidet, and posted it through St. Denis to Beauvais. So on to Abbeville, where they had the Impudence to charge us Ten Livres for three Dishes of Coffee, and some of the nastiest Eau de Vie that ever I tasted; excusing themselves, the Rogues, on the score that Englishmen were scarce nowadays. And to our great Relief, we at last arrived at Calais, where we had comfortable Lodgings, and good fare, at a not too exorbitant rate. Here we had to wait four days for a favourable Wind; and even then we found the Packet Boat all taken up for Pa.s.sengers, and not a place on board to be had either for Love or Money. As Mr. Pinchin was desperately pressed to reach his Native Land, to wait for the next boat seemed utterly intolerable to him; so, all in a Hurry, and being cheated, as folks when they are in a Hurry must needs be, we bargained for a Private Yatch to take us to Dover. The Master would hear of nothing less than five-and-twenty guineas for the voyage, which, with many Sighs and almost Weeping, my poor Little Master agrees to give. He might have recouped himself ten guineas of the money; for there was a Great Italian Singing Woman, with her Chambermaid, her Valet de Chambre, a Black Boy, and a Monkey, bound for the King's Opera House in the Haymarket, very anxious to reach England, and willing to pay Handsomely--out of English pockets in the long-run--for the accommodation we had to give; but my capricious Master flies into a Tiff, and vows that he will have no Foreign Squallers on board his Yatch with him. So the poor Signora--who was not at all a Bad-looking woman, although mighty Brown of visage--was fain to wait for the next Packet; and we went off in very great state, but still having to Pay with needless heaviness for our Whistle. And, of course, all the way there was nothing but whining and grumbling on his Wors.h.i.+p's part, that so short a trip should have cost him Twenty-five Guineas. The little Brute was never satisfied; and when I remembered the Life I had led with him, despite abundant Victuals, good Clothes, and decent Wages, I confess that I felt half-inclined to pitch him over the Taffrail, and make an End of him, for good and all.

The villanous Tub which the Rascals who manned it called a Yatch was not Seaworthy, wouldn't answer her Helm, and floundered about in the Trough of the Sea for a day and a half; and even then we did not make Dover, but were obliged to beat up for Ramsgate. We had been fools enough to pay the Fare beforehand; and these Channel Pirates were unconscionable enough to demand Ten Guineas more, swearing that they would have us up before the Mayor--who, I believe, was in league with 'em--if we did not disburse. Then the Master of the Port came upon us for Dues and Light Tolls; and a Revenue Pink boarded us, the Crew getting Half-drunk at our Expense, under pretence of searching for contraband, and sticking to us till we had given the Mids.h.i.+pman a guinea, and another guinea to the Crew, to drink our Healths.

CHAPTER THE SEVENTH.

OF CERTAIN TICKLISH UPS AND DOWNS IN MY LIFE: AMONGST OTHERS OF MY BEING PRESSED FOR SERVICE IN THE FLEET.

THE best of Friends, says the Proverb, must part, and so must the worst, or the most indifferent of companions. By this time, I apprehend,--that is to say, the year 1728, Messieurs Pinchin, Hodge, and Dangerous had had quite enough of each other's company, and 'twas ripe Time for 'em to Part. Not but what there were some difficulties in the way. 'Twas not to be denied that my little Master was a parcel curmudgeon, very vain and conceited, very difficult of management in his Everlasting Tempers, and a trifle Mad, besides; but his service--apart from the inconvenience of bearing with a tetchy, half Lunatic Ape of Quality, was light and easy; the victuals were abundant and the Wages were comfortable. There must be two parties to make a quarrel, and when Master and servant propose to part, there should be a perfect agreement between them as to the manner of their going asunder. A Hundred times, vexed by the follies and exactions of the little man, I had sworn that I would doff his livery, and have nothing more to do with him; but then came the Reflection of the certain Bite and Sup, and I withheld my abandonment of Service. It may be that the Chaplain, Mr. Hodge, was very much of the same mind as your Humble. He said often, that he had been bearleader quite long enough to this young Cub, and was sick alike of his savage hugs, and uncouth gestures, when he had a mind to dance. Yet was he wise enough in his generation to acknowledge the commodity of a fat Pasty and a full Flask every day in the year, and of a neverfailing crown piece in the pouch in the morning for a draught to cool one's throat, when the bottle had been pushed about pretty briskly overnight. Parson Hodge was a philosopher. "I don't like the kicks," quoth he; "but when halfpence come along with 'em, they cease to be intolerable."

However, all our nice weighings of Pros and Cons were brought to a very abrupt standstill upon our arrival at Dover (having taken a post chariot from Ramsgate) by the Inconceivable Behaviour of Mr. Pinchin. This young Gentleman, utterly forgetting the claims of Duty, of Honour, of Honesty, and of Grat.i.tude, fairly Ran away from us, his faithful and Attached Domestics. Without with your leave or by your leave he showed us a clean pair of Heels. He left a very cool Letter for the Chaplain in the hands of the master of the Inn where we put up, in which he repeated his old uncivil Accusation, that we had eaten him out of House and Home, that we were Leeches, Pirates, bloodsucking vampires, and the like--myself he even did the honour to call a Designing c.o.c.katrice--and that he had fled from us to save the small remains of his Fortune from being Devoured, and intended to rejoin his long-neglected Mamma. Mr. Hodge read me this letter with a very long face, and asked me what I intended to do. I answered that I should be better able to tell him when he had read me the Postscript to the letter, for that I hardly fancied that Squire Pinchin would behave in so Base and Mean a manner as to run away without paying his Body Servant's wages. Upon this the Reverend Gentleman hems and ha's somewhat, and gave me to understand that Mr. Pinchin had enclosed a draft upon a Goldsmith in Change Alley in part disburs.e.m.e.nt of his debt to him, Mr. Hodge, and that out of that--although no special provision had been made for me by Mr. Pinchin--he thought he could spare me a matter of Ten Pound. Now as he kept the letter very tight in his hand, and was, withal, a Strong Man, who would have resisted any attempt of mine to wrest it from him, I was fain to take his statement for granted, and in a very Sulky manner agreed to accept the Ten Pound in full of all demands, stipulating only that my Travelling charges to London should be defrayed. This Mr. Hodge boggled at for awhile; but, seeing me Resolute he gave way, and at last said that there was no need for me to trouble with going to the Goldsmith in London to get the Draft changed--"If, indeed," says he, "the unhappy young spendthrift be not proclaimed a Bankrupt before I get this slip of paper cashed;" and that having a small store of Gold by him, he would give me the Ten Pound down, together with a couple of Pieces to bear my Expenses to the Town.

To this I agreed; and his Reverence handing me over the ready, we cried Quits.

"And now, Sir," says I, "as you are no longer a Led-Parson, and I am no longer a Lacquey, we are both, till we get Fresh Places, Gentlemen at large, and Jack is as good as his Master, I shall be happy to crack a bottle of Lisbon with you, and whether you pay or I pay shall be decided by the flinging up of a Jacobus."

He declared that I was an Impudent young Fellow, with more Wickednesses in my Heart than I had hairs in my Head; but he accepted my Invitation to crack the bottle of Lisbon very readily, and won the Toss of me with much Affability. So, after a joyous Rouse (which my young Head could then stand, but I am a sad Skinker at the bottle now), the Landlord standing in, we drank Mr. Pinchin's health and better manners to him; and his Reverence dismissed me with a Buss and his Benediction.

"When you reach London, which is a wicked place," says he; "I prithee get you to Highgate, and without more ado cause yourself to be sworn upon the Horns there, never to drink Small Ale when you can get Strong, and never to Kiss the Maid when you can Kiss the Mistress. After that, with your Face, and your Figure, and your Foreign Travel, to say nothing of your Amazing Impudence, and your Incorrigible habit of Lying, I think you will do pretty well. Go thy ways, my son, and if ever you come to be hanged, send for Parson Hodge, and he will (with the Ordinary's permission) do everything for you in the cart that a True Blue Church and State Man can wish. _Vale_: that is to say, get off, you vagabond,"

with which in his merry way he half pushes me out of the room at the Inn, and I dare say that he had given a sufficiently liberal construction to Mr. Pinchin's postscript as to cheat me out of Twenty Pound.

And now on this worthy I must bestow a brace of Paragraphs ere I dismiss him for good and all, premising that the knowledge of what I am about to set down did not come upon me at this period of my History, but was gathered up, in Odds and Ends in subsequent epochs of my career:--some of it, indeed, many years afterwards. Parson Hodge had managed--all losses allowed for--to feather his nest pretty well out of his attendance on Squire Bartholomew Pinchin, and the ten or twelve pound he doled out to me (whether the story about the draft on the Goldsmith was a c.o.c.k and Bull one or not) must have been but a mere fleabite to him. I heard that he went down to the Bath, and dropping his Clerical Dignity for awhile, set up for a fas.h.i.+onable Physician of High Dutch extraction that was to cure all ailments. Doctor Von Hoogius I think he called himself; and his travelling about with my little Master had given him just such a smattering of Tongues as to enable him to speak Broken English with just so much of a foreign accent as to make it unlike a Brogue or a Burr. The guineas came in pretty quickly, and I believe that he cured several people of the Quinsy with pills made of dough, hogslard, cinnamon, and turmeric, and that he was highly successful in ridding ladies of fas.h.i.+on of the vapours by means of his Royal Arabian Electuary, which was nothing more than white Jamaica Rum coloured pink and with a flavouring of Almonds. The regular Pract.i.tioners, however, grew jealous of him, and beginning to ask him impertinent questions about his Diploma, he was fain to give up Legitimate practice, and to pick up a dirty Living as a mere Quack, and Vendor of Pills, Potions, Salves, Balsams, and Elixirs of Life. Then he came down in the world, owing to a Waiting Gentlewoman whose fortune he must needs tell, and whom, 'tis said, he cozened out of three quarters' wages; so, for fear of being committed by the justices as a Rogue and Vagabond, he then kept a Herb Shop for some time, with great success, until he got into trouble about a Horse, and being clearly Tart of that crime, very wisely s.h.i.+fted his quarters to the Kingdom of Ireland. I have heard that by turns he was, in his New Sphere, a Player at the Dublin Theatre, a Drawer at a Usquebaugh Shop in Cork, a hedge-schoolmaster among the Bogtrotters--a wild, savage kind of People, that infest the Southern parts of that fertile but distracted kingdom--a teacher of the Mathematics in Belfast, and a fiddler going about to wakes and weddings in the county of Galway.

'Twas whilst pursuing this last and jovial vocation that he was fortunate enough to run away with an Heiress of considerable Fortune. He managed it by a sort of Rough and Ready process they call over there an Abduction, two or three of the Wild Irishes being killed while he was getting the young lady on the car to take her away to be married; and she, happening to be a Ward in Chancery, he fell into Contempt, and was committed to Newgate in the City of Dublin, where he might have lain till his heels rotted off, but for the Favourable Renown into which he grew by his Bold and Gallant Feat of Abduction, and which brought him into such sympathetic notice, that interest was made with the Chancellor to purge him of his contempt, and he was honourably Discharged therefrom by means of escaping from Newgate at night by means of a Silver Key agreed upon betwixt him and the Warden. By the way, he had the sagacity at this time to conceal his being an Englishman, and pa.s.sed very easily by the name of O'Hagan. A subscription was made for him among the Quality after his Enlargement, and he was charitably advised to push his fortune among the Saxons in England, his good friends little suspecting that he had already pushed his Fortune there, at different times, to a very pretty tune. But for his unfortunate--or rather fortunate, for him--collision with justice, he might have obtained employment as a t.i.the Proctor with some of the dignified and non-resident Established Clergy in Ireland, who were very anxious to have able and Unscrupulous Men to collect their Dues for 'em; but the Sister Isle being, on several accounts, too hot for Mr. Hodge, Von Hoogius, O'Hagan, he took s.h.i.+pping with a purse full of guineas, collected for him by his kind friends, for Liverpool in Lancas.h.i.+re. Here he prospered indifferently for a time, now as a Schoolmaster, now as a Quack Doctor, under his old High Dutch alias, and now as an Agent for the crimping of children for the West India plantations, which last traffic I have ever held, for reasons personal, to be utterly Indefensible and Abominable. A Bill of Indictment before the Grand Jury speedily, however, put an end to the chaplain's dealings in flesh and blood; so he made what haste he could to town, where squandering what means he had with him in Riot and Unthrift, and being unluckily recognised by an old acquaintance in the Tailoring line, he was arrested on civil process, and clapped into the Fleet Prison. But here his ever-soaring genius took a new Flight. Those half surrept.i.tious and wholly scandalous Nuptials known as Fleet Marriages, were then very rife, and the adventurer had wit enough to discover that it was to his interest to resume his ca.s.sock and bands, and to become the Reverend Mr. Hodge once more. Not much was wanted to set him up in business. Canonicals were to be had cheap enough in Rag Fair for the sending for 'em; a greasy Common Prayer Book and a chandler's-shop ledger to serve as a Register, did not cost much; so with these, and an inimitably Brazen face, behold our worthy equipped as a perfect Fleet Parson. He had to maintain at first a ragged regiment of cads and Runners to tout for him and bring him customers, but he soon became notorious, and formed a very fine connexion. Judgements by the score had been obtained, and Detainers lodged against him at the gate, since his incarceration at the suit of his acquaintance, the Tailor; but 'twas not long ere he contrived, by the easy process of joining people's hands, to gain enough to pay all the claims against him, and by permission of the Warden of the Fleet, to set up a Chapel and Liquor Shop within the rules of the prison. Punch, Geneva, poisonous wine, brandy, bitters, Rum, and Tobacco, were sold below stairs, and the Order for the Solemnization of Matrimony was performed on the first floor. It became quite a fas.h.i.+onable thing to go and be married by Parson Hodge, and at last it would be said of him, that if he extorted money from you beforehand, he did not pick your pocket afterwards, as too many of the Fleet Parsons in those shameful days were in the habit of doing. He continued at this merry game for many years, being in his way quite as popular as Orator Henley, and coining a great deal more money than that crack-brained Fanatic--for I have always been at pains to discover whether Henley was more Rogue or Fool--till at last his lucrative but unholy trade was put an end to by an Act of Parliament, called for by the righteous indignation of all peaceable and loyal subjects of the King, who did not desire to be married in haste and to repent at leisure. I believe that Parson Hodge retired with a comfortable fortune, and, going down into Somersets.h.i.+re, purchased a small estate there, and died, much respected, in the odour of many pigs, and in the Commission of the Peace.

As for poor little Bartholomew Pinchin, his career was not nearly so prosperous, nor his end so happy. You will learn, a little further on, what scurvy tricks Fortune played him, and how at last his poor little brains succ.u.mbed to the rough toasting of that graceless jade. I had always thought him Mad, and Mad, indeed, as a March hare he proved to be in the long run.

And now as to Myself, for it is surely fitting that a proper young Fellow, such as I was now, stout and vigorous, and going for nineteen years of age, should no longer remain in the Background. First I hied me to London by the waggon, where, after four days' journey--for it was ill travelling in those days, between London and Dover--I arrived without any misadventure. I was my own Master, I had Ten Pound in my pocket (the two additional Pieces being now spent), and I did not know one single soul in a city of eight hundred thousand inhabitants. Is it to be wondered at, under these premises, that before I fixed upon any decided line of life, I went, first of all, to the Deuce. It took me but a woundily short time to reach that Goal. For ten pounds you may reckon, we will say--if you put up at a small alehouse in the Borough--upon about ten friends who shall be very fond of you for a couple of days. I think, at the beginning of the third, I had just three and sixpence left wherewith to buy a razor to cut my throat withal. "Stuff and nonsense!"

cried the last of the fleeting friends who had abided with me. "Three and sixpence for a razor, forsooth! why, a yard of good new cord, quite strong enough to bear your weight, can be bought in any shop in Tooley-street for a penny. You have just three and fivepence left, brother, to make yourself merry for the day, and, please the pigs, we will be merry as grigs upon it until Sundown (for I took a fancy to you the first minute I set eyes upon you), and even then there are two ways out of the hobble, without twisting your weasand. I have a pair of pistols, and as I love you like a brother, will share anything with you; and we will pad the hoof betwixt this and Deptford, and see whether we can meet any fat Kentish hop-grower on his way to the Borough Market with more money than wit--a capital plan, any way, seeing that if you fail, the Sheriff will hang you for nothing, and you can keep your penny for drink, or else you can list for a soldier, as many a tall and pretty fellow in the like straits has done before."

I civilly declined this amicable and philosophical advice, for it had suddenly become apparent to me that my new friend was a confirmed Rogue.

For opening of the Eyes there is nothing like having spent all your money. I gave him a s.h.i.+lling, however, out of my three and sixpence, and crossed London Bridge to see if I could find better luck on the Middles.e.x side, determined, if nothing offered itself during the day, to ask my way to the Barracks at the Savoy and list for a Soldier. I amused myself as I walked, with the thought that chance might so bring it about for the Sergeant who would give me the King's s.h.i.+lling to be the selfsame grenadier whose sconce I had broken years agone in Charlwood Chase with the Demijohn of Brandy.

I had heard, as most Ignoramuses have done, I suppose, that London Streets are paved with Gold; and I found 'em as Muddy, as Stony, and as Hardhearted as I dare say they have been discovered by ten thousand Ignoramuses before my time to be. I was quite dazed and stupified with the noise and uproar of the Great City, the more perplexing to me as I was not only a Stranger, but almost a Foreigner and Outlandish Man in Great Britain. I could speak my own tongue well enough with Parson Hodge and Mr. Pinchin, but when it came to be clamoured all around me by innumerable voices, I a'most lost heart, and gave up the notion that I was an Englishman at all. It must be confessed, that half a century since we English were a very Blackguard People, and that London was about the most disreputable city in all Europe. There were few public buildings of any great note or of Majestic Proportions, save St. Paul's Cathedral, the Monument, and the Banqueting House at Whitehall. The Mansion House and the Bank of England were not yet built, and between them and the Royal Exchange (the which, n.o.ble enough in itself, was girt about, and choked up with Shops and Tenements exceeding mean and shabby), was a nasty, rubbis.h.i.+ng, faint-smelling place, full of fruiterers and herbalists, called the Stocks Market. The crazy and rotten City Gates blocked up the chief thoroughfares, and across the bottom of Ludgate Hill yawned a marvellous foul and filthy open sewer, rich in dead dogs and cats, called the Fleet Ditch. This street was fair enough, and full of commodious houses and wealthy shops, but all about Temple Bar was a vile and horrid labyrinth of lanes and alleys, the chief and the most villanous of which was a place full of tripe shops and low taverns, called Butcher Row, leading from the Bar down to the Churchyard of St. Clement's Danes. The Strand was broad and fair enough to view as far as the New Exchange; but in lieu of that magnificent structure which Sir William Chambers, the Swedish architect, has built for Government offices, and where the Royal Academy of Arts and the Learned Societies have their apartments (when I first came to town there was no Royal Academy at all, only a Mean School for painting from the Life and drawing from Bustos in St. Martin's Lane; the Royal Society held their sittings in a court off Fleet Street; the College of Physicians was chock-a-block among the butchers in Warwick Lane, Newgate Market, where it still, to the scandal of Science, remains; and Surgeon's Hall, where malefactors were anatomised after execution--a Sanguinary but Salutary custom--was in the Old Bailey, over against the leads of the Sessions House)--in place, then, of what we now call Somerset House, albeit it has lost all connexion with the proud Duke of that name, there stood the Old Palace of the Queens of England, a remarkable tumbledown barn of a place, hideous in its ugliness towards the Strand, but having some stately edifices at the back, built by that Famous Engineer, Mr. Inigo Jones. Here sometimes Queens were lodged, and sometimes Emba.s.sadors--'twas the Venetian Envoy, I think, that had his rooms in Somerset House when I first knew it,--and sometimes Masquerades were given. A company of Soldiers was kept on guard in the precincts, not so much for ornament as for use, for they had hard work every night in the week in quelling the pottle-pot brawls and brabbling among the Rogues, Thieves, Besognosos, Beggars, Ribbibes, Bidstands, and Clapper-dudgeons, male and female, who infested the outskirts of the Old Palace, or had Impudently Squatted within its very walls, and had made of the Place a very Alsatia, now that Scamp's Paradise in Whitefriars had been put down by Act of Parliament. Here they burrowed like so many Grice, till the shoulder-tapping Pilchers of the Compter came a badger-drawing with their bludgeons. 'Twas a perfect chaos of clap-dishes, skeldering, cranion-legged Impostors, fittous cripples, and gambling bullies, for ever roaring over Post and Pair, or Dust Point, or throwing their Highmen, or barbing gold, or yelling profane songs and catches. A man was killed here about every other day in some Callet and c.o.c.koloch squabble, and there was a broil about twice in every hour. Of course there were Patricos here, who only wanted Fas.h.i.+onable Encouragement to rival the Feet Parsons in the trade of f.a.ggot-weddings.

There were philosophers who devised schemes for paying off the National Debt, or for making roast ribs of beef out of brickbats. Here were swept the last pillings and frayings of the South Sea Bubble, in the shape of divers Speculators and Directors who had absconded from their Creditors, and were here pretty safe from arrest, for although not legally a sanctuary, it was as chancy to cop a man here on a capias as to put one's naked hand into a bag full of rats.

I dined this day at a sixpenny ordinary in the New Exchange, and after that asked my way to the Savoy, which I found to be close by. So I walked down to the old Tower, and pa.s.sed the time of day to the Sergeant of the Guard, who was for having me empty a can of ale with him on the spot, but I would not then, and concealed my intention, being minded to defer the execution of it till sunset. I don't know what Vain and Foolish Hope possessed me that something might yet turn up which might save me from the sad necessity of listing for a soldier, to the which vocation, mindful of my early experiences among the Blacks in Charlwood Chase, I entertained a very sincere Abhorrence. So I wandered up and down the Streets, asking from time to time where I was, and being (as is usual with the People of England in their intercourse with strangers) cursed or laughed at for a fool or a b.u.mpkin. Half a dozen times I felt that some rogue was trying my pocket; but I knew I had no money to be robbed of, and kept my kerchief in my hat; only the bare endeavour made me mad, and the next time one of my gentleman nick-skins made a dive into my pouch, I turned round and hit him a crack over the head with a short k.n.o.bbed-stick I carried, which, I warrant, made him repent of his Temerity.

I had gotten into St. James's Park about four o'clock in the afternoon, and was walking very moodily by the side of the long water trench called Rosamond's Pond, when at once a desire seized hold of me to behold the Tower of London. Whether in my fantastic Imagination I deemed that I might find Tower Hill paved with gold, or pick up some Profitable Acquaintance there, it is fruitless as this distance of time to inquire.

But I must needs see the Tower, and was as eager for a view of that famous Fortress as though I had been the veriest holiday-making and sight-seeing Country Cousin. I made my way into the Birdcage walk, and so through Palace-yard down to the stairs at the foot of where they were driving the first piles of that great structure which is now called Westminster Bridge. Here a Waterman agreed to take me to the Tower stairs for a s.h.i.+lling, which was not above thrice his legal fare, but yokels and simpletons are common prey in this great village of London. I observed more than once as he rowed me down stream that we were followed by a heavy wherry, manned by stout, smart fellows in frocks of blue duck, who kept stroke remarkably well together, and whose c.o.xswain eyed me very narrowly. As we were shooting one of the narrow arches of London Bridge--(then covered with shops and houses, with barbicans, and traitors' heads spiked upon 'em at each end, and I have heard old people say that many a time they have fished for perch and grayling standing on the starlings of the Bridge)--this wherry fouled our craft, and my waterman burst into a volley of horrible ribald abuse, till he who was c.o.xswain among the blue-frocked gentry spake some words to him in a low voice, at which he touched his cap, and became quite Meek and Humble. I caught him eyeing me, quite as narrowly as the steersman of the wherry had done, and when I asked him what ailed him, he stuck his Tongue in his cheek and grinned audaciously.

"Who were those rough fellows in the wherry, yonder, that fouled us?" I asked.

"Bluebottles," says he, with another grin.

"What d'ye mean, fellow?" I continued.