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 (W
 
 TELL-TALE SOPHAS, 
 
 AN ECLECTIC FABLE, 
 
 IN THREE VOLUMES. 
 
 FOUNDED ON ANECDOTES, 
 
 BY JOHN BATTERSBY. 
 
 Men — some to Business, some to Pleasure take ; 
 But every Woman is at heart a Rake. 
 
 Pope. 
 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 Printed by JOSEPH MALLETT, 59, Wardour Street, 
 AND SOLD BY 
 
 J. WALLIS, NO, 7, PRINCES STREET, SOHO. 
 
 1826.
 
 
 CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME. 
 
 A Soul without a Body. 
 
 The Invisible Traveller; or, a Peep into 
 
 Bond-street, 
 bopha in a Lady's Chamber; or. The 
 
 Temptation, 
 Sophjt in a Fashionable Square ; or. School 
 
 for Mothers. 
 Sopha in St. Jameses-street ; or. New 
 
 Blocks for Old Wigs, 
 Sopha in a Demirep's Tent ; or. Right 
 
 Honourable Aberrations, 
 Sopha in a Blaze; or, Snakes in the Grass* 
 Sopha on the Banks of the Thames ; or. 
 
 Wanderings of the Heart.
 
 TELL-TALE SOPH AS. 
 
 A SOUL WITHOUT A BODY. 
 
 1 HAVE taken advantage of the Hin- 
 du belief in the metempsychosis, and 
 have ventured to suppose it may be 
 the ORDEAL through which Bra3IA* 
 ordains rewards and punishments. 
 
 * Brama is the first person of the Hindu 
 Triad; and is designated in the Hindu Pan- 
 theon, as bearing Bull's horns, with the Sun's 
 disk in his drapery : nor is the head of the 
 Equator Bird omitted ; for which reason, Brama 
 is compared to Fire and Water. 
 
 VOL. I. B
 
 The soul, now transmigrated, origi- 
 nally inhabited the body of an eastern 
 Prince, of vast riches, with extensive 
 power. He ascended the rtiusnud of 
 his ancestors at the early age of fifteen ; 
 and being naturally of an etfeniinate 
 mind, he gave the reins of government 
 into the hands of his ministers, who, 
 like ministers in general, studied, only, 
 their own private interests, and in- 
 volved the kingdom in civil and poh- 
 tical anarchy. 
 
 Meanwhile the young Prince, un- 
 restrained by a single moral virtue, 
 was deaf to the miseries of his people, 
 and devoted altogether to his personal 
 enjoyments.
 
 3 
 
 He considered the creation as an 
 object subordinate to his pleasures. 
 His seraglio contained five hundred 
 females of extraordinary beauty, who 
 had been educated with all those lux- 
 urious blandishments, that, artificially, 
 provoke the enervated passions. 
 
 This sanctum-sanctorum of all that 
 was viciously voluptuous, was distant 
 three miles from his capital. It was 
 built on an immensely high rock, the 
 base of which was on one side washed 
 by the sea, and on the other encom- 
 passed by a wide moat; so that it was 
 inaccessible, save by a draw-bridge, 
 guarded by one hundred eunuchs, 
 B 2
 
 His approach was always by night ; 
 and the splendour of his train was 
 ahnost incredible. Three hundred 
 elephants preceded his march ; and 
 as each animal advanced his ponderous 
 foot, a grand display of fire- works 
 blazed from the caverns of the earth 
 with a brilliancy that almost mocked 
 the splendour of meridian day. Ele- 
 vated theatres moved as it were by 
 magic before him ; and on these pro- 
 fessional girls and boys, of a certain 
 age, enacted the most lascivious pan- 
 tomimes. 
 
 Brama, to mock the impotency of 
 human power, sentenced this Princess 
 Soul to wander through the ^lobe,
 
 from one sopha to another, till obser- 
 vation and reflection should have pu- 
 rified his principles. 
 
 The Soul, thus penanced, was sin- 
 gularly endowed : it had the faculties 
 of seeing, hearing, and reflecting; 
 together with that of divining the 
 thoughts and dispositions of all who 
 came within the limits of its observa- 
 tion. To whatever country it was 
 doomed — it carried with it an intuitive 
 knowledge of the language, character, 
 and general habits of that country : — 
 so that, by experience, it might even- 
 tually work its own release and re- 
 formation, 
 
 B 8
 
 6 
 
 After a variety of adventures, the 
 Prince was restored ; and, impressed 
 with the excellence of the lesson he 
 had acquired bj long suffering, he 
 composed a " Narrative of his Tra- 
 VELS,^^ in the Hindu language : from 
 which, it is to be presumed, the follow- 
 ing is a faithful translation.
 
 AN INVISIBLE TRAVELLER, 
 
 OR 
 
 PEEP INTO BOND STREET. 
 
 Recovering from the shock my 
 Soul sustained in parting from my 
 body, I found all that was left of self 
 floating above a fanciful variety of 
 costly furniture, in a celebmted fash- 
 ionable Magazine in Bond Street. 
 
 At first I could have imagined my- 
 self on a hunting party in my native 
 country ; for I was surrounded by 
 B 4
 
 8 
 
 lions, tigers, and a variety of wild 
 beasts in every direction : but I soon 
 discovered that appearances were de- 
 ceptive. 
 
 The lion crouched beneath a lady's 
 dressing table — the tiger supported the 
 billet doux repository of beauty — the 
 camel kneeled to receive an embroi- 
 dered music stool upon his hump — and 
 the proboscis of an elephant grasped 
 a small Grecian lamp. 
 
 1 was filled with wonder, as I con- 
 templated those gigantic ornaments; 
 but England is the residence of Arts 
 and Sciences, and its taste must be, 
 classically, correct !
 
 As my Soul made this short reflec- 
 tion, it gradually sank into a Grecian 
 couchjhighly finished in white and gold. 
 
 The hour of fashionable lounge was 
 arrived, and groupes of beautiful fe- 
 males dispersed about the rooms. 
 
 Now I was in a state of enchant- 
 ment. I could have fancied myself 
 translated to Mahomed^s Paradise, and 
 that I mingled with Houris: but how 
 much disappointment did I suffer, in 
 witnessing the manners of this refined 
 metropolis ! 
 
 Instead of beholding the men kneel- 
 ing before and worshipping these di- 
 b5
 
 10 
 
 vinities, I discovered a total want of 
 polish in their manners — a rude indif- 
 ference even when the lips of beauty 
 sued for their attention ; as well as a 
 decided neglect to form — decency — 
 and good breeding — pervading the 
 whole of their unnatural demeanor. 
 
 My surprise increased, as I under- 
 stood the rank of the personages around 
 me : and 1 mentally said — " Can 
 these people be the associates, by birth 
 and education, of the most dignified 
 and best-bred Man in the universe ? — 
 the courteous, the polished, the accom- 
 plished Prince Regent of these happy 
 realms! — a Prince, who fosters the 
 arts he scientifically enjoys ! — a Prince,
 
 11 
 
 who is at once an exemplary patriot — 
 a profound statesman — and an honest 
 man !^^ 
 
 My reverie was, abruptly, disturbed 
 by two ladies, who sat down on the 
 sopha I occupied. 
 
 "Lord, ray dear!" — said one — 
 have you seen the Book ?" 
 
 " The Book, my love — what Book?" 
 
 ^' Why — THE Book! Don*t you 
 know, that the P ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ is the 
 vilest fellow that ever breathed ; and 
 the dear charming P^^^^^^jf^^ 
 the most virtuous and most injured 
 b6
 
 12 
 
 creature in the whole world : — such a 
 scene of iniquity unfolded ! — but step 
 into my carriage, and I will show it to 
 you." 
 
 I was confounded at this enigmatical 
 conversation ; and, I began to think — 
 for my principles were already waver- 
 ing — that it were better a man should 
 want grace in his bow, than in his 
 moral rectitude. But I was a young 
 Traveller — the world was wide ; and, 
 I had a great deal to learn. 
 
 Shortly after, two gentlemen took 
 their seats beside me. One of them 
 was an Ex-M *****♦♦ ; and the 
 other a very noted Contractor ; they
 
 13 
 
 were, finally, arranging the price for a 
 Borough inP********* . 
 
 The next — was an untitled youth, 
 highly connected, who was about to 
 marry a rich heiress : he was showing 
 his friend a check for one thousand 
 pounds, which the dear object of his 
 affections had, munificently, requested 
 him to present — as a farewell present 
 —to an interesting female with whom 
 he was connected. The amount, how- 
 ever, he, more wisely^ preferred sport- 
 ing in the evening at St. James's 
 Street. 
 
 The next — was a dashing youth, 
 seeking to borrow a hundred pounds
 
 14 
 
 from his Guardian, with whose daugh- 
 ter he was about to elope that very 
 evening. 
 
 The next party made an assignation 
 — the lady was sister to the gentleman's 
 wife ! 
 
 The next — spoke, as a great secret, 
 of a haul-ton crim, con. that would* 
 soon, make curious discoveries in 
 Westminster Hall. 
 
 The next — named a family, of 
 fashionable notoriety, who had just 
 taken a large house in Grosvenor 
 Square, and doubled their establish- 
 ment, to blind their trades-people.
 
 15 
 
 and to keep themselves out of the 
 King's Bench Prison. 
 
 The next — was the Signora Bra- 
 vura, who came to order a crimson 
 velvet cushion for her pet pug. The 
 instant She was seated, a crowd of 
 elegans pressed round her, to offer 
 their homage to her charms and ta- 
 lents : and the very men who, pre- 
 viously, had refused the common 
 courtesies of affability to women of the 
 first birth and beauty in the kingdom, 
 yere polite, affable, gracious, and 
 ^.^ndescending with a public singer. 
 Sh^ sat enthroned amid her vassals, 
 dispensing her smiles with her tickets ; 
 and charactei-s — ministerial and diplo-
 
 16 
 
 matic — accepted, with rapture, the 
 honour of her invitation to dinner ! ! ! 
 
 It was the middle of March — the 
 day was serenely beautiful, and a con- 
 stant change of company sauntered 
 through the rooms all the morning. 
 My wonder, however^ was inexpres- 
 sible. 
 
 Were these the lessons of purifica- 
 tion I was to learn ! 
 
 I had seen enough of depravity a^* 
 home ; but I conjectured, that f^n 
 Great Cities resembled each other j^ 
 sensual refinements ; and that those, 
 whose station in life would give ^clat
 
 17 
 
 to good example, possessed as little 
 real morality as their inferiors. 
 
 I was not allowed, however, to lin- 
 ger in this stage of my reflections — 
 towards evening 1 was removed, with 
 other furniture, toP******* 
 Place.
 
 SOPHA IN A LADY^S CHAMBER, 
 
 OR 
 
 THE TEMPTATION. 
 
 Doomed to obey the eventful revo- 
 lutions incident to my captivity, I 
 became the bed-chamber inmate of 
 Mrs. Bencoolen — a lady of high 
 fashion in P^^^^^^^^ Place. 
 The room was decorated with every 
 style of costly and unique meuble ; 
 and all that I beheld proclaimed 
 the pomp and power of excessive 
 wealth.
 
 20 
 
 My fair mistress was, in her features, 
 less beautiful than interesting; but 
 her person was extremely elegant and 
 graceful. She devoted a great portion 
 of her time to her toilet, which was 
 the whole morning crowded with ar- 
 tists of every description, to whom she, 
 almost indiscriminately, lavished her 
 orders. 
 
 This lady was just returned from 
 Bengal, where she married an old 
 withered Nabob, who had long held 
 the highest situations under the Go- 
 vernment of the Leadenhall-Street 
 Kings. He was the personification 
 of Jaundice, taking his last earthly 
 stroll along the avenues of Bristol Hut
 
 21 
 
 Wells ; and she was in all the luxuriant 
 bloom of nineteen. 
 
 The profusion, glitter, and incalcu- 
 lable expense of Mrs. Bencoolen^s en- 
 tertainments, enrolled her in the first 
 circle of the London beau-monde ; 
 and if the female nobility did not 
 come to admire — they, at all events, 
 came to envy and to stare. With the 
 men, however, she was a leading- star. 
 
 When she appeared, Dukes forgot 
 their losses at Brookes's, and their 
 running horses at Newmarket — Earls 
 forgot to take their accustomed lessons 
 from Jackson, their pugilistic friend 
 and ally — Barons forgot their engage-
 
 22 
 
 ments with the Four-in-hand Ckib — 
 and Right Honourables of celebrated 
 dash, without fortunes, forgot the 
 cheres amies^ whose purses kept them 
 moving round the ring of Fashion. 
 
 But Fame, as yet, had not embla- 
 zoned her reputation with any digni- 
 fied faux-pas. She either did not 
 like the ostler lounge — the coach- 
 man slang — the bang-up graces — 
 of a high-bred elegant^ or Virtue was 
 the cherished inmate of her lovely 
 bosom. 
 
 It is true, the Nabob was, himself, 
 her constant cicisbeo ; and followed 
 her, through all the meanderings of a
 
 23 
 
 crowded rout, with watchful but re- 
 spectful jealousy. Mistress of his 
 wealth, and without any favorite ob- 
 ject to pursue, she smiled indifference 
 at the constancy of her husband^s at- 
 tentions ; which, at all events, differed 
 from others, for they were polite and 
 gentlemanly. 
 
 Mr. Morden, the father of this lady, 
 was one of those dull, insipid mortals, 
 who seem formed for no end, but to 
 supply a blank in the Creation, and to 
 crawl about the face of the globe with- 
 out pursuit or motive. 
 
 Inoffensive — yet useless ; he cared 
 little about the world, and the world
 
 24 
 
 cared little about him. He had no- 
 thing to ask, and contented himself 
 by supinely sitting down, without any 
 exertion to benefit mankind. His pa- 
 trimony v/as not large ; but it exceeded 
 his expenses — and, in the course of 
 sixty-three years, which he had vege- 
 tated on earth, he never made one 
 single effort to improve his wealth. 
 
 Satisfied \Aith his own, he never 
 envied his neighbour's possessions ; 
 nor did he suffer himself, by compari- 
 son, to suppose another happier than 
 himself. He married late in life — and, 
 five years after, became a widower with 
 an only daughter, whom he soon after 
 confided to his sister — Mrs. Villars —
 
 25 
 
 who lived in an adjoining county, and 
 was mother of a young family. 
 
 Fanny Morden, with the early pro- 
 mise of beauty, possessed a good heart 
 — a disposition full of benevolence — 
 and an imagination warm, romantic, 
 and lively. In this family, where she 
 was universally beloved, she attached 
 herself to her cousin Henry, a fine 
 boy, one year younger than herself, 
 and they were constant play-fellows. 
 This childish love grew up with them. 
 They wept, heartily, as they separated 
 to go to school ; and anticipated, with 
 eager joy, the holidays that re-united 
 them. 
 
 VOL !. c
 
 26 
 
 At the age of fifteen, Fanny was sent 
 by her father to India, under circum- 
 stances peculiarly favorable to her 
 dehut in that country ; and, in a few 
 weeks, she was sacrificed to the 
 wealthy Mr. Bencoolen. 
 
 The parting, between Fanny and 
 her cousin Henry, was unaffectedly 
 tender. Viewing each other as brother 
 and sister, their emotions were pure, 
 and free from restraint. She treated 
 him as a boy, on whom she might 
 unreservedly bestow all the tenderness 
 of her disposition, nursed by the fond 
 remembrance of their infantine attach- 
 ment : and Henry returned her caresses
 
 27 
 
 with all the feelings of participating 
 regret. 
 
 At Mrs. Bencoolen^s arrival in Eng- 
 land, Henry was at Oxford, from 
 whence he wrote a congratulatory 
 letter to Mr. Bencoolen, and another 
 to his cousin. These letters were 
 politely answered ; but not attended 
 with any invitation, and the corres- 
 pondence dropped. 
 
 During the London winter, however, 
 Henry was recreating in town, where 
 he heard the name of his cousin buzzed 
 in every circle. The world spoke of 
 her as a beautiful young creature, con- 
 demned to the solitary torture of pining 
 c2
 
 28 
 
 away the most tempting youth under 
 the galling yoke of an impotent, mo- 
 rose, and jealous tyrant. 
 
 These reports revived Henry^s for- 
 mer affection for his cousin, and he 
 became impatient to visit her. He left 
 his cards atP******* Place, 
 and the civility was returned ; still — 
 no invitation. 
 
 At length, chance befriended his 
 wishes : they met at a party. He sa 
 luted her with well bred freedom, and 
 she received him with pleasure, not 
 however unmixed with a certain re- 
 serve. The Nabob was cold and 
 formal ; and the crowd soon separated 
 them.
 
 29 
 
 The surprise and embarrassment of 
 the cousins, at this unexpected meet- 
 ing, was mutual. Time had made 
 great changes in their persons — Henry 
 beheld the blooming girl, from whom 
 he had separated four years before, 
 now matured with the most attractive 
 graces and bewitching beauty. She, 
 on the other hand, gazed with delight 
 on her old play-fellow, modelled into a 
 robust youth. His limbs were finely 
 formed, and the height and vigor of 
 his person gave the appearance of 
 manhood to his teens. His counte- 
 nance was open, manly, expressive, 
 and flushed with health, animation, 
 and ingenuous cheerfulness. 
 c3
 
 30 
 
 Henry, at his return home, felt 
 strange sensations playing about his 
 heart, but he was equally unskilled 
 in the sciences of Love or Gallantry ; 
 and too inexperienced in the language 
 of the heart, to understand the positive 
 meaning of his feelings. He became 
 every day more and more anxious for 
 an interview with his lovely cousin, 
 and would readily have indulged his 
 wishes, had he known how: for, not- 
 withstanding their relationship, he 
 foresaw it could only be effected by 
 stratagem ; and he did not dare to 
 think Mrs. Bencoolen would consent to 
 a clandestine correspondence. 
 
 He was, however, mistaken. The
 
 31 
 
 impression on Mrs. Bencoolen^s mind 
 was not less ardent than his ; and, ere 
 a week had elapsed, the Two-Penny 
 Post — Lovers trusty messenger — as- 
 sured him of his cousin^s continued 
 regard. 
 
 For a short time, a regular corre- 
 spondence was maintained between 
 the parties ; he addressing his letters 
 under cover to his cousin's maid. 
 They planned interviews, but dismis- 
 sed them as improper or impossible — 
 till difficulty increased desire, and 
 Mrs. Bencoolen gave up her fame to 
 the custody of Jemima, her waiting 
 woman. The genius of two women 
 was now at work, and what cannot — 
 c4
 
 32 
 
 what will not — a determined woman 
 do ! 
 
 Henry su]>mitted to their general- 
 ship, and awaited the result with an 
 agony of impatience. It was, how- 
 ever, necessary, for the reputation of all 
 parties, to proceed with the nicest cau- 
 tion. They had to elude the jealousy 
 of Mr. Bencoolen — to save appear- 
 ances in the world — and to beware of 
 their own servants. But, ingeniously 
 bold, it was, finally, resolved to admit 
 Henry to his cousin^s chamber, after all 
 the household had retired to rest. 
 
 Mr. and Mrs. Bencoolen were too 
 fashionable to occupy the same room
 
 33 
 
 at night — but their apartments were 
 on tlie same floor, though divided by a 
 gallery at the head of the stairs. 
 
 In the morning of the appointed 
 interview, Mrs. Bencoolen found her- 
 self extremely ill ; and cards were 
 despatched to excuse her from a large 
 party that evening. She confined her- 
 self all day — and the house was shut 
 up at an early hour. 
 
 Every thing succeeded ; and the 
 parties met. 
 
 But it was a meeting rather of em- 
 barrassment than of rapture. Jemima 
 was present during the hour they 
 c5
 
 34 
 
 passed together ; and Mrs. Bencoolen 
 excused herself for the unprecedented 
 steps, the jealousy of her husband had 
 compelled her to adopt. Insensibly 
 they forgot their situation, and their 
 conversation became free and unre- 
 strained, but critically correct. At 
 parting, Henry kissed his cousin's fair 
 hand, and received permission to re- 
 new his visit. 
 
 To the second interview succeeded 
 a third ; and it became, at length, ab- 
 solutely necessary to their mutual feel- 
 ings that they should continue to see 
 each other. 
 
 It was towards the close of May,
 
 35 
 
 when Henry made one of his accus- 
 tomed midnight visits ; but what was 
 his consternation at beholding his cou- 
 sin bathed in teai^ ! He tenderly in- 
 quired the cause of her affliction, when 
 she replied^ — *' Forgive me, Henry ; 1 
 have strong forbodings that we have 
 met for the last time.^^ 
 
 While she spoke, she cast her mild 
 blue eyes downwards to the carpet, and 
 sighed. — It was a sigh, to steal upon 
 the senses ; and Henry^s sympathetic 
 heart echoed the plaintive murmur. — 
 For some moments both were silent. 
 
 " Henry P^ — said she, taking his 
 trembling hand — "dearest Henry! 
 c6
 
 36 
 
 we must part. I dare not continue 
 this stolen indulgence — take a last 
 farewell from your unhappy cousin !'^ 
 
 She kissed the hand she held ; and 
 the warmth of her glowing lips fired 
 his soul. Then, in accents modulated 
 by love, and harmonized by the graces, 
 she added, '^ Ask not the cause — 
 You — of all human beings — ought 
 never to know it/' 
 
 This language was so new, and so 
 little expected, that it produced sti*ange 
 revolutions in Henry's mind. 
 
 To listen at his age- — unmoved — 
 to the tenderest expressions that a sen-
 
 37 
 
 ti mental heart could breathe, softened 
 by the languors of \^eeping beauty, 
 would have been philosophy indeed ! 
 — and such philosophy, as he had not 
 been taught at Oxford. 
 
 At former interviews, the dress of 
 Mrs. Bencoolen had always been be- 
 comingly modest, and corresponding 
 with the delicacy of her behaviour. It 
 was still modest — but rather airy, for 
 the tender struggles of a parting 
 scene. 
 
 The night — it is true — m as sultry ; 
 and a white Indian robe, spun as it 
 were by a single silk- worm, folded 
 round the tempting person of the fair
 
 38 
 
 Bencoolen : it was transparent — and 
 her eloquent blood blushed all her ten- 
 der wishes. 
 
 Henry fell at her feet ; at the feet of 
 blooming — yielding- — ripened beauty. 
 
 He hid his burning cheek upon a 
 limb, moulded by desire, and polished 
 by the Queen of Love. 
 
 " We must part, Henry !^^ — re- 
 peated Mrs. Bencoolen — '^ Virtue 
 will have it so ! — Farewell, my be- 
 loved friend ! — Remember — this last 
 farewell !^^ 
 
 She raised him from the ground, to
 
 30 
 
 the sopha oil which she was sitting ; 
 and threw her beautiful white arms 
 around his neck — sobbing a reiterated 
 soft farewell. 
 
 A pearl cestus guarded the Ben- 
 coolen waist, and, alone, confined her 
 robe with an oriental topaz clasp. 
 
 During the mutual fervour of their 
 fond adieus, this clasp lost its hold, 
 and as Henry returned his cousin^s 
 amorous embrace, a full, firm, uncon- 
 fined, bosom, wildly panted on his 
 heart— communicating the most bliss- 
 ful impatience to his whole system. 
 
 Moving, as if to fly from danger.
 
 40 
 
 thus imperative, Mrs. Bencoolen so 
 changed her position, that Henry^s 
 hand riveted on her delicious breast. 
 
 At this critical moment, the cry of 
 fire, from the next room, restored the 
 cousins to their senses. Jemima, wlio 
 had previously withdrawn, rushed into 
 the chamber, the picture of terror ; 
 and the cry of fire was repeated. 
 
 Mrs. Bencoolen ^s dressing* room was 
 fitted up after the manner of a green- 
 house, where a perpetual Summer 
 bloomed throughout the year. Here 
 they hastily concealed poor Henry. 
 
 Upon inquiry, it was found, that
 
 41 
 
 the Nabob had dreamed his bed 
 room was on fire, and himself in dan- 
 ger of perishing in the flames. The 
 servants were, hastily, summoned to 
 his aid ; for Mr. Bencoolen's nerves 
 had suffered so severe a shock, he was 
 obliged to undergo a course of resto- 
 ratives, and to pass the remainder of 
 the night, more dead than alive, on the 
 sopha his wife had dedicated to a more 
 interesting scene. 
 
 Meanwhile, Henry was almost suf- 
 focated with the odours that sur- 
 rounded him : the window, however, 
 was happily open, and he had no 
 alternative, but that of remaining quiet 
 till morning ; yet, as he could not con-
 
 42 
 
 jecture how he was then to make his 
 escape, his feelings were by no raeans 
 enviable. 
 
 With the morrow, Mrs. Bencoolen 
 — who had paid the most affectionate 
 attention to her husband during his 
 malady — contrived to prevail with 
 him to remove to his own room ; and, 
 at about two o'clock, Henry, dressed 
 in woman's clothes, with a large poke 
 bonnet, and a band box, containing 
 his own paraphernalia, was conducted 
 to the hall by Jemima. A hackney 
 coach waited, at the next door, for the 
 pretty Milliner^ a Miss, and he was left 
 to his own ingenuity to change his 
 dress.
 
 43 
 
 This adventure, however, had by no 
 means come to a finale. The Nabob, 
 in the course of the morning, felt him- 
 self much worse ; his debilitated nerves 
 had received a shock too violent for 
 their remaining powers : the knocker 
 w£is muffled with half a dozen pairs 
 of French white kid gloves — the 
 whole of P******* Place was 
 laid over with straw — a consultation 
 of physicians was convened — and 
 every engine put in play to re-invigo- 
 rate the exhausted constitution of the 
 shrivelled Nabob. 
 
 But Nature had nearly ran its race. 
 Baths, warm from the cows, were 
 prepared to receive the remnant of his
 
 44 
 
 person : veal cutlets — almost alive — 
 were applied to his chest, and to the 
 soles of his feet ; and the richest jellies 
 were poured down his throat. Still, 
 he continued to decline in strength ; 
 and, on the morning- of the fifth day, 
 he was visited with a waking vision, 
 that hastened Iiis passport to the other 
 world. 
 
 For the first time since his fright, he 
 was lulled, by strong opiates, into a 
 calm sleep which lasted some hours. 
 Towards noon he awoke, with dreadful 
 horrors depicted on his ghastly counte- 
 nance. He imagined he saw his pil- 
 low encompassed by Murder, Rapine, 
 and a train of furies, who danced with
 
 45 
 
 hideous yellings in a circle round him. 
 At his feet lay the body of a strangled 
 Prince, with his wife and children 
 weeping over him. 
 
 Presently a youth, in royal robes, ap- 
 peared ; and, the next moment, all the 
 infants were bathed in blood. The 
 Usurper, making a foot-stool of the 
 body of the deceased, sprung into a 
 vacant throne— his countenance was 
 irradiated with joy : but, as he smiled 
 his triumph, he discovered that all his 
 teeth had been drawn, and that his 
 hands were bound behind him with a 
 golden chain. 
 
 The Nabob, gazing on this appalling
 
 46 
 
 vision with agony indescribable, at 
 length, gave a piercing groan — and 
 expired. 
 
 Now for a little peep behind the 
 curtain. 
 
 Previously to Mr. Bencoolen^s ar- 
 rival in England, he determined never 
 to admit Henry Villars within his 
 doors ; and this resolution was founded 
 in the affection which had grown up 
 between him and Mrs. Bencoolen. It 
 was a temptation to her virtue, and 
 might prove the bane of his future 
 happiness. 
 
 Mrs. Bencoolen did not chuse to
 
 47 
 
 dispute the point with her husband, 
 and trusted to chance for the pleasure 
 of seeing her old play-fellow. Not 
 that she felt any improper passion for 
 him ! hers was, then, the pure senti- 
 ment of childish love : but, when she 
 saw him afterwards in public, she was 
 conscious of a warmer, though not 
 a criminal, emotion towards him ; and 
 this sentiment increased to a degree 
 of painful anxiety, that led her, ulti- 
 mately, to place confidence in Jemima, 
 and to engage her aid to favour an 
 interview. 
 
 This was precisely the object of 
 Jemima^s ambition, who, hitherto, had 
 only lived in noble families, and well
 
 48 
 
 knew the value of a secret. From 
 practice she was no mean adept in the 
 science of Intrigue ; and, when she 
 had a point to carry, she stopped at 
 nothing. Her person was pretty and 
 genteel, and from associating with 
 high fashion, she had acquired agree- 
 able manners ; but, above all, she had 
 roguish, black, sparkling eyes, that she 
 always knew how to drill to her own 
 advantage. 
 
 As Mrs. Bencoolen was a novice, 
 she «did not chuse to instruct her in 
 the secret of certain Milliners certain 
 private apartments for the accommo- 
 dation of Ladies of Rank, and other 
 convenient privacies^ which abound in
 
 49 ^ 
 
 this great metropolis ; but she deter- 
 mined to plunge her lady at once into 
 the depth of embarrassment, that hers 
 might be the lucrative office of reliev- 
 ing her hereafter. 
 
 To this meritorious end, she applied 
 by distant hints, leers, and innuendo's, 
 to the Swiss porter, who always slept 
 in the great chair in the hall. Him she 
 must win to her purpose. 
 
 The Swiss, curling up his musta- 
 chios, told her, in broken English, 
 that he had more honour than to betray 
 his master for money, and never ac- 
 cepted any bribe from a lady, but her 
 person. 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 50 
 
 This was coming to the point at 
 once ; but Miss Jemima made a very 
 fine speech about virtue, and chastity, 
 and character, which, notwithstanding, 
 ended in a bashful acceptance of the 
 covenant, which she promised to seal 
 that very night. 
 
 Big with self-importance, she flew 
 up stairs, and bounced very uncere- 
 moniously into her lady's apartment. 
 It was before the usual hour of rising ; 
 but Jemima drew back the curtains, 
 and sitting herself down on the bed, 
 related the foregoing circumstances 
 with that easy familiarity, which a con- 
 fidante impudently assumes the mo- 
 ment she has her superior in her power.
 
 51 
 
 Mrs. Bencooleii, who had always 
 noticed an engaging, modest deport- 
 ment in her servant, was terrified at 
 this sudden change in her manners. 
 She had, however, gone too far to re- 
 cede; and, thinking it most prudent 
 to conceal the indignation she felt at 
 Jemima's conduct, she merely told her, 
 she would not be ungrateful. 
 
 When she arose, she put a fifty- 
 pound note into her woman ^s hand. 
 
 Jemima, who would have sold her 
 virtue, at any time, for a tythe of that 
 sum, was overjoyed to excess; and, 
 through her purchased zeal, everything 
 had succeeded fo her lady^s satisfac- 
 d2 
 
 U. OF ILL LIB.
 
 52 
 
 tion — or, rather, icould have succeeded, 
 but for the Nabob's dream . 
 
 As the dream, however, had released 
 Mrs. Bencoolen from bondage, she 
 calml\ subscribed to this adage — 
 " AlPs well that ends well.'' 
 
 To return to P ***^****t* 
 Place. 
 
 An undertaker was sent for, to whom 
 the Nabob's remains were unfeelin^jflv 
 but fashionably, consigned ; and every 
 preparation was made for a splendid 
 funeral. 
 
 Mrs. Bencoolen — to whom all the
 
 58 
 
 Nabob's fortune was bequeathed — 
 mourned like the Ephesian Matron. 
 Jemima favoured her lady's continued 
 correspondence with Henry Villars ; 
 and, very early in the morning after 
 the funeral, my lady and her maid, 
 muffled up, passed through the Mews 
 to a hackney coach, intended to con- 
 duct them to Shoreditch Church, where 
 Mrs. Bencoolen was to become — under 
 the Rose — Mrs. Villars. 
 
 It may be well to remark, that, as 
 my knowledge of events was confined 
 to persons only who came within my 
 observation, I have related this tale, 
 as 1 shall do others, methodically — 
 notwithstanding the materials, at the 
 d3
 
 S4 
 
 time, only reached me in a detached 
 way, and at intervals, just as my cu- 
 riosity might happen to be favoured 
 by circumstances. 
 
 For two days I remained shut up in 
 the deserted chamber — not without 
 my own reflections on the Nabob's 
 vision — and then ray soul passed to 
 new captivity.
 
 SOPHA 
 IN A FASHIONABLE SQUARE, 
 
 OE 
 
 SCHOOL FOR MOTHERS. 
 
 Ever changing, my Soul next re- 
 posed in a dining-room sopha, at a 
 house in ****** Square. The 
 profuse taste of my former mistress 
 was here contrasted by a pleasing- 
 union of simplicity with elegance. 
 
 The proprietor of this mansion — 
 the Honourable Frederick Basil — was 
 d4
 
 56 
 
 a Lieutenant-General in the service, 
 commanding on the Continent. His 
 lady lived in great retirement during 
 his absence, devoting herself to the 
 moral accomplishment of her two 
 daughters, who would be of an age to 
 be presented, at their father's return, 
 the following winter. 
 
 Mild, amiable, and unobtrusive, in 
 her own manners, Mrs. Basil sought 
 rather to make her daughters admira- 
 ble for their virtues, than for the bril- 
 liancy of their attainments. They were 
 fine girls, well read in the British Clas- 
 sics ; they danced with graceful mo- 
 desty — sung with taste — and touched 
 the harp and the piano with expres-
 
 57 
 
 sion : they read French and Italian, 
 but were not so fashionable as to un- 
 derstand German. 
 
 Their uncle, the Earl of F * * * * ? 
 lived in the same square, and kept up 
 a princely establishment. 
 
 The Earl had four daughters. The 
 elder, Lady Grace, had, the preceding 
 spring, bestowed her hand — with the 
 full approbation of her heart — on the 
 accomplished Marquis of PI * * * * . 
 This young nobleman, who came to 
 his title before he left College, was, 
 very deservedly^ a man of high noto- 
 riety in the fashionable world. His 
 stud was remarkable for blood, beauty, 
 d5
 
 58 
 
 and bone; and so assiduous was his 
 cultivation of his extraordinary talents, 
 that, at two-and-twenty, he was es- 
 teemed the best Amateur Whip in the 
 kingdom. And he had other rare 
 qualities: he had obtained a patent for 
 a harness bit ; and aided in his im- 
 provements by his dentist, the volun- 
 tary loss of a front tooth enabled him 
 to squirt his spittle as far, and as scien- 
 tifically, as any mail coachman on the 
 northern road. 
 
 In this dashing union, Lady Grace 
 found herself enviably happy. When 
 mounted on the box with her dear 
 lord, they were the gape — the gaze — 
 the wonder — of the dazzled crowd !
 
 59 
 
 besides, the two balls that ornamented 
 her coronet were ensigns grateful* to 
 her ambition. But as violent delights 
 have violent ends, in course of the 
 following winter, the Marchioness had 
 so devoted herself to the gaming table 
 — and with so much ill-success — that 
 she began to transfer her solicitudes 
 from her lord, to a certain gentleman^ 
 whose arms are, notoriously, embla- 
 zoned with Three Balls : and to 
 his protection she confided the custody 
 of her personal jewels, to preserve im- 
 maculate the more estimate jewel of 
 her honour. 
 
 Their vicinity to each other favoured 
 a familiar intercourse between the fa- 
 d6
 
 60 
 
 niilies in the Square; insomuch, that 
 scarcely a morning passed without a 
 " how d^ye do ^' visit from Lady Jane, 
 Lady Sophia, and Lady Barbara, to 
 the Basils. 
 
 These three unmarried Right Ho- 
 nourables resembled their cousins in 
 years and in loveliness ; but, otherwise, 
 they were as opposite as extremes. 
 The Misses Basil might be called 
 pearls of beauty : their titled relatives 
 were brilliants of the first water. They 
 had a Parisienne governess, and all 
 their masters were foreign. They 
 never touched any instrument save the 
 castanets and the tambourine: Atti- 
 tude and Grace were their idols ; and
 
 61 
 
 these amusements flattered both, by 
 displaying to great advantage the ad- 
 mirable tournure of their persons — 
 persons that disdained superfluous 
 clothing, and were, '^ when unadorned, 
 adorned the most." 
 
 They danced the Fandango and the 
 Bolero with appropriate national ges- 
 ture ; and could whirl round on one 
 leg, with the other horizontally ex- 
 tended, as rapidly and as repeatedly as 
 Angiolini. 
 
 They were, likewise, Virtuosi : they 
 exhibited models at Somerset House 
 of naked Cupids, delicately sculptured 
 by their own fair hands ; they would
 
 62 
 
 descant on the genus and property of 
 plants with surprising volubility and 
 technical correctness. They delighted 
 to expatiate on the innocent loves of 
 vegetable nature ; lingered, with en- 
 thusiasm, on the procreative powers 
 of the tenderly-cooing little grass ; 
 the sympathetic union of the anthers 
 with the stigmata; and the impreg- 
 nation of the pollen by the passing- 
 breeze. 
 
 Their privacy was devoted to the 
 study of German morality ; and they 
 doated on this species of refined phi- 
 losophy. When they read Goethe — 
 Lady Jane professed herself to be, 
 sentimentally, enamoured with the di-
 
 63 
 
 vine Werter — '' his passion was so 
 sublime !'' . 
 
 "More sublime than natural;'^ — 
 retorted Lady Sophia — " the man was 
 a fool ! '' 
 
 " I dare believe/^ — said Lady Bab, 
 with a softened sigh — " that Charlotte 
 would have forgiven him — I feel quite 
 sure that I should.'^ 
 
 These were the accomplished im- 
 pressions made by a fashionable edu- 
 cation on tbe minds of these beau- 
 tiful girls, who, left to the bias of 
 their own innately virtuous disposi- 
 tions, would have been an honour to
 
 64 
 
 their family, and an ornamehl to their 
 
 Sex! 
 
 But the Earl sought all his enjoy- 
 ments far away from the bosom of 
 his family ; and the Countess was a 
 Blue Stocking ! 
 
 She, poor weak woman, had taught 
 herself to believe, that it was more pa- 
 triotically noble to devote her time to 
 the Republic of Letters, than to the 
 instruction of her children : madly pur- 
 suing the public good, she totally de- 
 serted her private duties. 
 
 In her opinion, the female mind was 
 ennobled by soaring above common
 
 65 
 
 prejudice. To be the arbiter of all 
 works issuing from the press — to 
 bestow the Laurel and the Bays ou 
 titled merit ; and to silence, by malig- 
 nant criticism, every plebeian effort at 
 fame, was " the consummation de- 
 voutly to be wished ! ^^ 
 
 Mrs. Basil, with the amiable solici- 
 tudes of an exemplary mother, would 
 have shuddered with apprehension at 
 the dazzling example of her Right Ho- 
 nourable nieces so constantly exposed 
 to her own daughters, had she not felt 
 conscious that their minds were too 
 pure to be vitiated : she, therefore, 
 contented herself in cultivating the 
 virtues she had so assiduously en-
 
 66 
 
 grafted on their principles, and gave 
 a sigh of deep regret to the future 
 prospects in life of her misguided re- 
 lations. Thus meritoriously inspired, 
 and unceasingly awake to the eventual 
 welfare of her darling children — Mrs. 
 Basil had, latterly, devoted much of 
 her time to the completion of a little 
 work she was anxiously arranging for 
 their future guide. 
 
 Her daughters had attained that age 
 which was to mark their future cha- 
 racter. They were about to leave the 
 peaceful scenes of tranquil life, to 
 encounter the seductive tumults of 
 gaiety and dissipation. They stood 
 at the threshold of a world — new —
 
 67 
 
 full of gay delights — of smiling plea- 
 sures — and this was the moment to 
 fortify their minds with the shield 
 achieved by maternal solicitude and 
 atfection. 
 
 Religion had been invariably in- 
 stilled on their principles, as the ster- 
 ling basis of every virtue and of every 
 amiable qualification ; and to its sa- 
 cred truths, she had observed, with 
 ineffable delight, they assented with 
 warm and fervent hearts. But virtues, 
 equally fair in their early progress, 
 often languished in the vortex of fash- 
 ion, gaiety, and dissipation — where 
 almost every scene and every society 
 conspire to banish serious reflection —
 
 68 
 
 where the ill-natured sarcasm, or the 
 insidious jeer, is conveyed in the se- 
 ducing language of vivacity and wit — 
 where vice is not only extenuated, but 
 rendered amiable by false sophistry ; 
 and goodness is dressed up by ridicule 
 in the forbidding garb of sententious 
 morality. 
 
 In the performance of the task, how- 
 ever, Mrs. Basil avoided to terrify their 
 susceptible minds with a picture of 
 the world, so unlike that which fancy 
 and expectation naturally form. Her's 
 was the effort to warn them against 
 the contagion of bad example, without 
 wholly destroying the pleasing pros- 
 pects of the glowing imagination —
 
 69 
 
 reserving to herself a hope that their's 
 would be the lot to mingle in socie- 
 ties where a disposition to pleasure 
 and vivacity would not be gratified at 
 the expense of reason and of moral 
 duty. 
 
 Warm, open, and unsuspecting in 
 their dispositions, they might deride 
 the possibility of change in their ha- 
 bitually-cherished sentiments. She, 
 therefore, sought to impress them with 
 a conviction, that, in the varieties of 
 dissipation, deviation from rectitude 
 was almost imperceptible, and could 
 alone be guarded by stated periods of 
 devotional reflection. 
 
 As the young ladies were one eve^j.
 
 70 
 
 ing taking their kiss and blessing for 
 the night, Mrs. Basil presented them 
 with her manuscript, thus addressing 
 them : 
 
 " To offer you a picture of the sor- 
 rows and disappointments of life — my 
 beloved girls — where every scene re- 
 flects the imagery of increasing joys, 
 may, at fii'St perusal, appear to your 
 gay, eager, youthful hearts as the false 
 colouring of peevish age — pencilled 
 by the cold hand of Austerity. But, 
 alas ! very few years will convince you 
 that mine is a faithful portrait of the 
 world. Experience will teach you, 
 that the most favoured hope is too 
 often disappointed, and that pleasure 
 |s a fleeting enjoyment.
 
 71 
 
 " Patient endurance and pious re- 
 signation form the bulwark of our 
 sex^s happiness — for many are the 
 trials to which our weak nature is 
 exposed ; and those trials become 
 doubly painful when tenderness and 
 sensibility are our leading character- 
 istics. 
 
 " Were it possible that your pre- 
 sent dispositions were incapable of 
 change, I should leave you to your- 
 selves without the least shadow of ap- 
 prehension ; but it is the innocent and 
 amiable presumption of your hearts 
 that alarms my apprehensions ; and I 
 trust to yourselves to estimate, as it 
 deserves, this mark of my affectionate 
 solicitude.'^
 
 72 
 
 The young ladies received their 
 mother's present with filial reverence — 
 and, having pressed it to their hearts, 
 retired. It was to the following ex- 
 emplary and impressive effect : 
 
 '^ Vice would never be able to boast 
 such a numerous train of votaries, if 
 she could not clothe herself in the most 
 seducing apparel — assume the most 
 captivating form — and throw around 
 her every attraction to allure the pas- 
 sions, and to deceive our erring na- 
 ture. She strews her paths with flow- 
 ers, and gives such a gay and brilliant 
 colouring to her seductions, that the 
 youthful heart is too often irretrievably 
 involved in her snares, before it even 
 suspects danger.
 
 73 
 
 " To shine in the sphere of elegant 
 life, gratifies our fondest desires ; and 
 in order to shine, we must be accom- 
 plished : but accomplishments that do 
 not adorn more solid qualifications are 
 Hke beautiful flowers without fragrance ; 
 they may, for a time, amuse the giddy 
 crowd ; but, without worth to dignify 
 them, they will never make real friends ; 
 they will never atone for exiled reason ; 
 nor will they, alone, form those ties of 
 affection which are the charm — the 
 honour — and the consolation of life. 
 
 '* I appreciate as they deserve, how- 
 ever, the accomplishments you possess. 
 Music and drawing will solace you in 
 the hours of retirement. I invite yuu 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 74 
 
 to prize a cultivation of those delight- 
 ful resources against ennui; but wish 
 you to consider them merely amuse- 
 nients, and not the business of your 
 lives — remembering, that all the plea- 
 sure which harmony can afford the ear, 
 a painting can afford the eye, will not 
 atone for the absence of those social 
 virtues which can alone endear you 
 to your family, or insure your indi- 
 vidual happiness. 
 
 '' The first accomplishment to dig- 
 nify the female character, is a mild, 
 patient, gentle, and unassuming dis- 
 position: it is essential to our own 
 peace; and confirms the comforts of 
 those with whom we are connected.
 
 ?6 
 
 Nature has given you both a pleasing 
 softness of temper ; but it is study and 
 reflection that must preserve it from 
 degenerating into insipidity. Avoid, 
 however^ extremes : to dazzle is far 
 less desirable than to please. 
 
 " In your reading, select such au- 
 thors as appeal to the head as well as 
 to the heart : such as will give an 
 elevation of sentiment without leading 
 to abstruse or learned subjects: and 
 as strenuously avoid all such works as 
 tend to enervate the mind — soften the 
 heart — or inflame the passions. The 
 latter is an indulgence too habitual 
 with our sex ; and you deplore with 
 me its fatal effects in our own family. 
 £ 2
 
 76 
 
 Books have more influence on the 
 mind than is generally imagined ; and 
 a familiarity with those that adorn 
 the mind and improve the heart, are 
 an ultimate treasure, which will com- 
 pensate for the ravages of time, and 
 render you beloved, when your persons 
 shall have ceased to be lovely. 
 
 " Girls of your station in life view 
 the economy of their domestic con- 
 cerns as wholly beneath their notice. 
 They prefer to be indolently consi- 
 dered cyphers in their own families, 
 to a laudable attention to their house- 
 hold affairs. But an application to 
 these duties is, in every sense, your
 
 77 
 
 supreme interest. Divested even of 
 its other advantages, whatever is saved 
 from the uncontrolled extravagance of 
 your servants, will increase your means 
 of indulging your benevolence ; and 
 that, to a noble mind, is the highest 
 source of gratification. 
 
 " A sensible husband, however 
 highly he may estimate your more 
 elegant accomplishments, will be 
 greatly disappointed if you know not 
 how to accommodate youi*selves to the 
 inspection of those affairs he may com- 
 mit to your exclusive charge. If he 
 be tender and affectionate, he will be 
 anxious you should possess his entire 
 
 E 3
 
 78 
 
 confidence: in your society he will 
 wish to be unreserved in every com- 
 munication ; but how can he converse 
 on those necessary subjects which re- 
 late to the management of his fortune, 
 with her whose mind is totally es- 
 tranged from all domestic habits ? 
 The useful qualities of the female cha- 
 racter must harmonize with her more 
 imposing attractions ; and the man, 
 whose admiration has been first caught 
 by the brilliancy of the latter, will 
 eventually pay them a more sincere 
 homage when he finds them united 
 with the former. 
 
 '' Taste — a love of elegance — and 
 a disposition to refinement — lead to
 
 79 
 
 extravagance and dissipation, when 
 uncorrected by that love of home, 
 which springs from a knowledge of 
 its comforts and the discharge of its 
 cares. Your introduction into public 
 life, is a step necessary to form your 
 manners and to promote your future 
 establishment : it will, probably, teach 
 you that artificial polish — that fash- 
 ionable ceremony — those high-bred 
 distinctions — that are essential to the 
 customs of elegant society : but good 
 breeding is inspired by good temper; 
 and the politeness that never varies, 
 and the manners which are ever pleas- 
 ing, depend on principles rightly 
 formed, and a heart open to the im- 
 pressions of social affection. 
 E 4
 
 80 
 
 " Dress is a necessary, but usually 
 a tedious study. It engrosses too much 
 the attention of our sex. But I rely on 
 the purity of your minds for this con- 
 viction — that modesty and simplicity 
 must always unite with elegance, to 
 make our ornaments becoming. Wo- 
 men dress to please, and to be ad- 
 mired ; but a want of decency is a 
 want of sense — and fashion is ever in 
 extremes. 
 
 ** In speaking of manners, I would 
 willingly avoid a glance towards your 
 own cousins. Masculine habits and 
 bold opinions are inimical to decorum, 
 and foreign to that modesty which 
 ought to be the leading feature of
 
 SI 
 
 the female character. Mildness, grace, 
 and becoming dignity, are the na- 
 turally attractive charms of our sex. 
 A fashionable direliction from these 
 principles carries the married man to 
 the gaming table, and otherwise es- 
 tranges him from home. And how- 
 ever loudly people may declaim against 
 the want of true good breeding in 
 the men — the fault, depend on it, is 
 wholly ours : a reformation in female 
 manners would soon correct the im- 
 pudent familiarity, now so fashionable 
 in the other sex. 
 
 " On your entrance into the world, 
 the novelty of its pleasures will trans- 
 cend your warmest expectations. — 
 e5
 
 82 
 
 Admired and delighted, you will pro- 
 bably, for a time, remain unsusceptible 
 of any tender partialities : at least, of 
 any passion which will powerfully 
 affect your sensibilities. But, when 
 novelty shall have removed the fasci- 
 nations of gaiety, you will, almost 
 insensibly, turn your ideas towards 
 some plan of established happiness : 
 and, as an ingredient — if not as a 
 foundation — the romantic spirit of 
 young minds will readily suggest an 
 attachment. But beware of futile ex- 
 pectations, and of romantic dreams, 
 as certain weapons destructive of your 
 future peace. 
 
 ** A virtuous, well founded affection.
 
 83 
 
 however, is one of the sweetest re- 
 sources of earthly happiness ; and I 
 should be, indeed, lost to all feeling, 
 if 1 could attempt to lesson its influ- 
 ence : but females should ever endea- 
 vour to suppress a rising weakness, 
 and to acquire that fortitude, which 
 will not suffer a momentary impulse 
 to shelter under the name of Sensi- 
 bility. It is a fond allusion which fre- 
 quently leads to disappointment and 
 to unavailing repentance. Do not be 
 to easily allured by external qualifica- 
 tions, or allow the charms of wit, or 
 of insinuating manners, to prevent your 
 attention to qualities of far higher 
 estimation. Unequal matches should 
 likewise be carefully avoided : they 
 e6
 
 84 
 
 flatter the vanity and gratify the am- 
 bition, it is true ; but they seldom fail 
 to entaU eventual misery. 
 
 '* To suffer rank or wealth to dazzle 
 our better reason, is a most unpardon- 
 able error ; for it is a violation of the 
 best feelings of the heart ; and that 
 mind must be, indeed, mean and ab- 
 ject, that would sacrifice its purest af- 
 fections to the demon of wealth. 
 
 " It would be equally imprudent 
 to form an attachment beneath your 
 birth and justifiable expectations. Pe- 
 cuniary distresses are, of all others, 
 the least supportable to a refined dis- 
 position, and the most inimical to
 
 85 
 
 the lasting affections of a married 
 JiJe. The dream of happiness passes 
 away — and it is well if disgust and 
 hatred do not complete the measure 
 of misery. 
 
 " The woman is — in my opinion — 
 wicked, who gives her hand at the 
 altar without her heart. 1 do not 
 mean to infer, that it is requisite you 
 should feel a romantic attachment, al- 
 though it is sometimes thought inse- 
 parable from love. Esteem, founded 
 on a perfect knowledge of your lover's 
 character — gratitude for his decided 
 partiality and avowed preference — 
 will be sufficient to render you both 
 happy, as it will enable you to dis-
 
 86 
 
 charge your duty with alacrity and 
 with pleasure. 
 
 " Such a reasonable passion v;ill be 
 more consistent, and perhaps more 
 permanent, than a violent passion ; 
 because judgment and good sense will 
 influence your conduct, and time will 
 confirm and strengthen your affec- 
 tion. 
 
 '' The purity of the mind is far from 
 being an enemy to cheerfulness ; and 
 innocent pleasures disdain all affec- 
 tation of reserve or severity. But 
 gaiety, according to its fashionable 
 acceptation, is a life of dissipation — 
 equally destructive to moral excel-
 
 87 
 
 lence and to mental enjoyment. In 
 these scenes, our sacred duties are for- 
 gotten ; and the unguarded heart be- 
 comes susceptible of the most danger- 
 ous impressions. 
 
 '' Alas ! how miserably are they 
 mistaken, who court happiness in the 
 tumult of fashionable folly ! for the 
 libertine, even when He marries, seeks 
 domestic disposition, virtue, and har- 
 mony of temper, in the woman he has 
 chosen. 1 would not, however, be 
 understood, to restrain you from a 
 reasonable participation of rational 
 amusement^: they are equally proper 
 and suitable to youth.
 
 88 
 
 ** But the long pomp-^the midnight masque- 
 rade — 
 " With all the freaks of wanton wealth arrayed : 
 " In these, ere triilers half their wish obtain, 
 " The toiling pleasure sickens into pain ; 
 " And e'en while Fashion's brightest arts decoy, 
 " The heart — distrusting — asks, if this be joy?" 
 
 " Masquerades, and the gaining 
 table, are the Scylla and Cfiarybdis 
 that wreck female honour. Between 
 these rocks there is a dreadful gulf — 
 the passage is most critical — and the 
 blandishment of swarming sirens, nine 
 times out of ten, lures the presumptu- 
 ous adventurer to certain destruction. 
 
 '' To conclude: — Remember — m>
 
 89 
 
 beloved children — that there is a kind 
 of constitutional void in the soul unen- 
 slaved by dissipation, which religion 
 alone can fill up; so as to produce hap- 
 piness ; and the more powerful this 
 sentiment becomes, the more internal 
 comfort we shall possess. Devotion 
 does not consist in passing our life 
 upon our knees — but in a progressive 
 endeavour to fulfil the duties which 
 are required of us by our dependance 
 on our Maker. It is a sentiment that 
 alleviates our sorrows, and augments 
 our joys : it increases our tenderness 
 for those whom we love, and it ban- 
 ishes from our hearts every hai-sh, un- 
 friendly, and austere feeling.
 
 90 
 
 '* If it be your lot to pass much of 
 your time in the country — and pray 
 heaven it may ! — an occasional appli- 
 cation to the study of Natural History 
 will contribute to dispose your minds 
 to divine contemplations. 
 
 " This profitable amusement cannot 
 fail to elevate your thoughts to the 
 admirable harmony which is found in 
 every part of the world ; it is both 
 beautiful and sublime ! — it is a know- 
 ledge, which opens to our compre- 
 hension all the treasures of Nature, 
 and displays the wonderful wisdom 
 and unerring goodness of our Cre- 
 ator ! ''
 
 91 i 
 
 The presentation of this valuable ] 
 
 gift, was the immediate precursor of a | 
 
 journey to their family seat. i 
 
 It was still winter in London — the 
 
 first of June — and, greatly to my mor- \ 
 
 tification, the ladies, unfashionably, ] 
 
 left town. !
 
 SOPHA 
 IN SAINT JAMESES STREET, 
 
 OR 
 
 NEW BLOCKS FOR OLD WIGS. 
 
 Pleasingly impressed with the 
 manners, dispositions, and virtues of 
 the Basil family, my Soul would wil- 
 lingly have improved by their bright 
 example ; but Brama ordained it 
 otherwise; and I was translated to a 
 Sopha at a Subscription House in 
 Saint James's Street. 
 
 The apartment was spacious, and 
 was the exclusive louns^e of rank,
 
 94 
 
 wealth, and fashion. No one could 
 enter this penetralia of vice and dissi- 
 pation except by ballot. The morning 
 passed in a circulation of news, poli- 
 tics, and scandal — the evening, in a 
 circulation of bank notes. 
 
 A Subscription House is the imme- 
 diate threshold of fashionable noto- 
 riety; at which the young Heir, just 
 come into possession, presents himself 
 to acquire a name ; and when he is 
 plucked of all his superfluous feathers, 
 his dear-bought experience enables 
 him to confederate with the knowing 
 ones, in plucking the next wanton 
 pigeon that flutters into their dove- 
 cot.
 
 d5 
 
 Here Placemen — mingling with the 
 first nobility — waste the nights in the 
 complicated pleasures of the gaming 
 table ; beggaring each other out of 
 pure friendship. Official warrants — 
 involving perhaps the honour of the 
 country — are often signed at these 
 midnight orgies of jockey peers and 
 titled black-legs ; and, lest a precious 
 moment should be lost, the right hand 
 has been known to direct the pen, 
 while the left hand persisted in rattling 
 the dice box. 
 
 Faro, which was a few years since 
 imported from Spa, is a prevailing sci- 
 ence among gentlemen who attend 
 Parliament for amusement, and the
 
 96 
 
 Clubs for business. Banks are opened 
 under the firm of our first nobility ; 
 and the Croupier is usually allied to 
 the first families. The profits of a 
 bank have been estimated, at a mode- 
 rate computation, to exceed five per 
 cent, on the enormous sums nightly 
 played for ; and a high titled firm of 
 this description is believed to have 
 cleared thirty-seven thousand pounds 
 in one year, by a traffic unblushingly 
 carried on in the immediate circle of 
 the Royal Palace, and in open viola- 
 tion of the laws of the country. 
 
 As these extraordinary reflections 
 burst upon my mind, I became desi- 
 rous to study the characters, indivi-
 
 97 
 
 dually, of the persons arouad me ; and 
 I briefly sketch them. 
 
 One of them, a Senator from con- 
 venience, and a wit by nature, is a 
 glaring instance of brilliant talent per- 
 verted by habitual depravity. 
 
 In public he displays a redundancy 
 of eloquence characterized by happy 
 allusions — well chosen metaphors — 
 and elegandy turned periods — orna- 
 mented with epigrammatic point and 
 classical quotation. In private he is 
 without a domestic virtue : he is a ser- 
 vile and artful flatterer — a specious 
 
 VOL I. F
 
 98 
 
 friend — an insidious political ally. 
 But all these vices are the forced 
 growth — not of Nature, but of Am- 
 bition. In early life his associates were 
 men of talent, and dispositions corre- 
 sponding with his ovvn. With these 
 he lived in habits of social intimacy ; 
 and if their repast were homely, it was, 
 at all events, seasoned with mirth, 
 good humour, and wit. He married a 
 lady proverbial for personal and men- 
 tal fascination ; and w ith her, for some 
 time, he enjoyed a degree of happi- 
 ness which few minds are capable of 
 tasting, and which all must envy. From 
 the charms of this humble but happy 
 fire-side, he was, however, allured by 
 an offered seat in P . He was
 
 99 
 
 dazzled by th^ temptation, and entered, 
 as he imagined, the road to fame and 
 fortune. But the hour he entered the 
 
 H of C tolled the knell to 
 
 all his former virtues. The good-na- 
 tured cheerful man was lost in the su- 
 percilious Senator ; and his friend- 
 ships — his wife — and his best quali- 
 ties — were the early victims he sacri- 
 ficed to his ambition. He lives pro- 
 fusely without fortune — is unmoved 
 by embarrassment — and laughs at 
 the credulity of his deluded trades- 
 people. His person being secured by 
 privilege, he is indifferent to the bank- 
 ruptcy of those whom he has ruined, 
 and continues to riot in every species 
 of luxury. 
 
 f2
 
 100 
 
 The mind of his amiable wife, how- 
 ever, was of a texture too delicately 
 spun to combat with neglect, distress, 
 and insult. Her health rapidly de- 
 clined ; and she ascended to heaven 
 to receive the reward of her sufterings 
 on earth. 
 
 Hating the man under w hose banner 
 policy directs him to rank — the object 
 9f fear and jealousy to his patron — he 
 pursues a life of political slaver} — 
 admired for his talents, but despised 
 for his exercise of them. 
 
 Another was the son of a general 
 officer, who entered the armv in chace
 
 101 
 
 of the eventual emoluments of a regi- 
 ment. He troubled himself very little 
 about the laurels of Victory ; and hav- 
 ing gained his object, he sat quietly 
 at home projecting plans of future 
 aggrandizement, while his regiment 
 was exposed to incredible hardships 
 abroad. 
 
 The General commenced banker ; 
 and, by assiduous avarice, raised a 
 small fortune into twenty thousand a 
 year. The parsimony of the man. 
 however, yielded to the partiality of 
 the parent. To his son he g^ave an 
 expensive university education, and 
 a princely appointment on his making 
 the grand tour. At Paris, the taste of 
 f3
 
 102 
 
 the son eclipsed all competition. His 
 horses — his equipages — his intrigues 
 — were the theme of universal admi- 
 ration. At his return to England, 
 however, he gave up pleasure for po- 
 litics. His career through life has 
 been marked by many humane and 
 generous actions. 
 
 Another was a gentleman enabled 
 by fortune to vie with the first in the 
 kingdom in dissipation and pro<ii- 
 gality. His entree into life was dis- 
 tinguished by becoming d£ish and spirit 
 — disdaining all restraint, and sacri- 
 ficing alike to Bacchus and to Venus.
 
 103 
 
 The independence of his spirit, how- 
 ever, received a violent shock. His 
 Vanity having led him dishonourably 
 to boast his good fortune with a lady 
 of rank — celebrated for her vivacity 
 and the piquancy of her wit, but un- 
 impeachable in her moral conduct, the 
 scandal chanced to reach the injured 
 lady^s ear, who adopted a singular 
 revenge. 
 
 She chose a very inclement winter^s 
 day to send him a mysterious appoint- 
 ment for the evening to her villa in 
 the vicinity of town. When he ar- 
 rived, he found, to his great satisfac- 
 tion, his fair hostess perfectly alone ; 
 and his hopes were elated to the high- 
 f4
 
 104 
 
 est pitch, when she requested him to 
 dismiss his equipage and servants to a 
 very late hour. 
 
 An agreeable tete-a-tete ensued as 
 they waited for supper ; but my gen- 
 tleman was not a little alarmed by the 
 sudden intrusion of four athletic fel- 
 lows, to whom the lady formally in- 
 troduced him as personages to whom 
 she committed the pleasure of enter- 
 taining him while she retired. 
 
 A blanket was in a moment pro- 
 cured, and the unprincipled boaster 
 was repeatedly vaulted into the air 
 amid the scoffs and sarcasms of the 
 servants. Finally, he was turned out
 
 105 
 
 of the door ; and it being impossible 
 to procure any sort of conveyance, he 
 had the mortification to walk to town 
 in a violent tempest of wind and rain. 
 
 Another was the legitimate off- 
 spring of wit, humour, and every so- 
 cial quality to embellish society. As 
 a soldier he is the soul and spirit of 
 enterprize ; and his country has been 
 dignified by the rank it has conferred 
 upon him. With these shining quali- 
 ties, however, it is his boast, that he 
 has thrown the dice more frequently 
 than any man in England. 
 
 Still, his proficiency at the gaming- 
 f5
 
 106 
 
 table has not enlarged the fortune of a 
 younger brother, M'hich being soon ex- 
 hausted, he had recourse to icays and 
 means to raise the wind. His address 
 is admirable. In the morning, noon, 
 and evening of the same day, he mort- 
 gaged — to three different Jews in 
 Duke^s Place — a small but select col- 
 lection of pictures, which was his only 
 remaining property. He is constantly 
 embarrassed with executions — his per- 
 son being privileged — and he once 
 said to his friends, who were slow in 
 passing the claret at his own table — 
 " My dear fellows, push about the bot- 
 tle briskly — you are heartily welcome 
 — for the wine is as much yours as 
 mine.^^ But the joys of dice and of
 
 107 
 
 Burgundy have not been his sole pro- 
 pensities. He has been equally a vo- 
 tary to the God of Love. 
 
 Another was a Nobleman devoted 
 to play — not as a pastime, but as a 
 science. At Cambridge, his applica- 
 tion to Mathematics crowned him with 
 a Wrangler^s wreath : and he was es- 
 teemed the best Whist-player in Eng- 
 land. Before he- engaged at hazard, 
 therefore, he reduced the game by 
 calculation to system. He knew ex- 
 actly where the odds lay, and equally 
 understood all the chances of the 
 
 f6
 
 108 
 
 Inflamed by success, he enlarged his 
 plan of speculation, and purchased a 
 noble stud of horses. Newmarket re- 
 sounded with praises of his judgment 
 and address: but he was in the end 
 taught that there were secrets beyond 
 theory in a race course, to which 
 practice could alone initiate him. The 
 result was, that at a single match lie 
 lost fourfold all his former winnings. 
 Ihe revenue of a prince is inade- 
 quate to the rapacity of the knowing 
 ones : and his experiments carried his 
 lordship's signature into the monied 
 markets.
 
 109 
 
 Another was a Nobleman whose 
 dawn of life was marked by contradic- 
 tory reports. Some say he was origi- 
 nally articled to an attorney — others, 
 that he was bred at St. Omer^s. He 
 married a lady of very weak intellects, 
 but of very good landed property, at a 
 time his own fortune — very small — 
 was ruined by the loss of twenty thou- 
 sand pounds at one night's sitting'. 
 The lady has long been wholly de- 
 prived of the little reason she had. 
 His lordship's amours are extensive, 
 but not remarkable for any delicacy of 
 taste ; as he has been known to hire as 
 a menial servant the object whom he 
 had previously entertained as a mis- 
 tress. His thirst for public applause
 
 110 
 
 is parallel with his thirst for wine; and 
 his excess at a debauch can only be 
 equalled by the success of his politics, 
 M'hich gives him artificial popularity 
 with the multitude. 
 
 Another was the son of a success- 
 ful wine-merchant at Dublin, who left 
 him seven thousand per annum. I'his 
 fortune gave him eclat with one of 
 those prudent fathers, who prefer — 
 for a daughter — the splendour of an 
 alliance, although prophecy ing misery, 
 to a competency and happiness. 
 
 At the command of such a father,
 
 Ill 
 
 a beautiful, virtuous, and accomplished 
 young lady — who had avowedly a pre- 
 vious honourable attachment — was 
 compelled in tears, to ascend the bri- 
 dal bed of wealth wiih a man whom 
 she cordially detested and despised. 
 For several weeks she shrunk from the 
 marriage rites, although a disgraceful 
 compliance was ultimately extorted 
 from her. Time, instead of softening, 
 increased the invincibility of her aver- 
 sion ; and after dragging on four years 
 of matrimonial strife, she agreed to a 
 separation, and sought protection in 
 the arms of her former affianced lover. 
 
 Pity dropped a tear on this lady's 
 frailty, and contempt follows the man
 
 112 
 
 who compelled her to the legal prosti- 
 tution. 
 
 Anotiiek was a lenewed example of 
 extorting a hand in marriage where 
 the heart uas not to be given. The 
 Baronet, whose fortune was very large, 
 forgot awhile the charms of the racing 
 calendar to contemplate the more im- 
 perative charms of a D * * * 's 
 daughter. They married and were 
 soon divorced. The husband has ever 
 since dedicated his amours to farmers' 
 daughters — milliner's misses — and ser- 
 vant maids. 
 
 Strolling in his grounds one evening
 
 113 
 
 just as it grew dark, he chanced to 
 overhear an assignation between one 
 of his stable-helpers and the scullion. 
 The Baronet, suddenly inflamed, con- 
 ceived the whim of supplanting the 
 happy lover in the hay-loft. Return- 
 ing to the house, he called the boy, 
 whom he followed to the stable, and 
 waiting while he saddled a horse, des- 
 patched him with a message to a gen- 
 tleman who lived some miles distant. 
 
 Satisfied that no intelligence of this 
 event could possibly have reached the 
 scullion, he profited by his finesse. 
 Before the lovers parted, the girl pro- 
 mised to repair at the same hour to the 
 same spot on the evening following.
 
 114 
 
 The watchful Baronet, anxious for a 
 renewal of the intrigue, met the boy at 
 his return, and without. allowing him 
 to dismount, gave him a note to an- 
 other gentleman so distant, tliat he 
 could not possibly return to mar his 
 master^s amorous wishes. Fortune, 
 however, played the Baronet a jade^s 
 trick. The boy chanced to see the 
 gentleman to whom he had been dis- 
 patched, at an inn on the road, and 
 having fulfilled his orders he hastened 
 back. Arriving critically at the hour 
 of the former evening^s appointment, 
 he was seized with a desire to know 
 whether his inamorata was then in the 
 hay-loft ; and reserving to acquaint his 
 master with the result of his com mis-
 
 115 
 
 sion, he stole softly to the scene of 
 expectation. 
 
 All was dark — but, unfortunately, 
 he could distinguish the voice of his 
 favourite talking with a man. 
 
 Aroused by jealousy, the boy in- 
 stantly advanced, and began bela- 
 bouring the parties soundly with his 
 whip. The violent screams of the 
 girl, and the groans of the Baronet, 
 formed a most inharmonious concert ; 
 but the furious boy continued his chas- 
 tizement till the Baronet roared out 
 his name. 
 
 The consequence was, both were
 
 116 
 
 bribed to secrecy and discharged : but 
 it was too good a story to be kept — 
 and the next day it was in the mouth 
 of every gossip in the neighbouring 
 market town. 
 
 Another was one of that obsolete 
 species of soldiers who did their mili- 
 tary duty in parading Pall Mall and 
 Saint James's. 
 
 Early in life he married a do^^ager 
 of rank, from whom he afterwards se- 
 parated, and enjoys half her jointure. 
 
 The Captain, who is flippant with
 
 117 
 
 his pen, engaged himself as the cham- 
 pion of two titled sisters, who had a 
 paper war with a clergyman. His 
 wit, however, was answered by the 
 repartee of a horse-whip ; and the 
 hero brought his action against the 
 church militant. 
 
 An old woman was the principal 
 evidence. " I w ondered '^ — said she — 
 " to see a gentleman in black running 
 after and flogging a gentleman in red.^^ 
 
 This testimony was conclusive, and 
 the Jury found forty shillings da- 
 mages.
 
 118 
 
 Another was a gentleman whose 
 father had been the victim of an hy- 
 pochondriac imagination ; and when 
 he fancied the wind to be east, he 
 would confine liimself for weeks to his 
 bed, the prey of visionary indispo- 
 sition. Some of his companions kindly 
 undertook his cure, by fastening a 
 slender thread to the weathercock at 
 the western point. The invalid arose — 
 and notwithstanding the wind changed 
 to every point of the compass, he was 
 perfectly restored. 
 
 The son, however, did not derive his 
 wealth from the old gentleman, but 
 from the singular partiality of a lady 
 of most eccentric character.
 
 119 
 
 This lady had amassed great wealth, 
 with a penuriousness destructive to her 
 own comforts and disgraceful to her 
 rank in life. 
 
 Shortly before her death she was 
 tempted in her morning's walk, by the 
 cheapness of them, to buy a few pounds 
 of eels. Waving secured her purchase, 
 as she thought, in a common check 
 handkerchief, she lodged her bargain 
 in her pocket. 
 
 Thus freighted she called upon an 
 acquaintance — for sordid as her man- 
 ners were, her birth and opulence 
 associated her with the best com- 
 pany.
 
 120 
 
 She had not long been seated, when 
 tlie lady of the house was terrified hy 
 the appearance of something- gliding 
 along the carpet, which her fears in- 
 terpreted to be a snake. The lady 
 shrieked aloud — and rang the bell in 
 an agony of terror. The servants 
 rushed into the room; but the imagi- 
 nary snakes were by this time recog- 
 nized by the owner to be her cheap 
 eels ; and the servants having assisted 
 to collect them, they were once more 
 deposited in the check handkerchief 
 and carried triumphantly home, where 
 they were finally secured in a pie. 
 
 But such is the vanity of human na- 
 ture, the avarice of this lady yielded to
 
 121 
 
 her desire to perpetuate her name ; 
 and she transferred fifty thousand 
 pounds to her favorite during her life- 
 time, on his assuming her name and 
 arras, and bequeathed him two hun- 
 dred thousand more at her decease. 
 
 Another, was the son of a northern 
 Nobleman. During his father's life- 
 time, he purchased, for three thousand 
 
 pounds, a seat in P 
 
 from the D* * * of N 
 
 and in the agreement, the duration 
 of his seat was stipulated at seven 
 years without any proviso relating to 
 a previous dissolution of P . 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 122 
 
 It happened, however, that a dissolu- 
 tion did take place at the expiration 
 of four years. My Lord remained per- 
 fectly quiet, till he understood the 
 noble D* * # had filled his several 
 seats ; upon which, he waited upon 
 his G * * ♦ *, to desire he might be 
 returned as before. 
 
 The D » * * was extremely sorry 
 — but, he was so engaged, the thing 
 was impossible. 
 
 " How impossible, my Lord? is not 
 yourG* *■ * * engaged with me for 
 seven years ?^^ The D* * * pleaded 
 that seven vears meant nothing^ more 
 than the continuance of the existing
 
 123 
 
 p ; but my Lord retired with 
 
 threats of appealing to a court of jus- 
 tice. When he had left the house, 
 the D * * * immediately sent for his 
 confidential steward. The contract 
 was examined in every way ; but 
 the specific engagement, ''''for seven 
 years^' appeared in terrorem before 
 them. 
 
 The D * * * now wrote to the no- 
 ble E* * * , who replied— " it was 
 his son^s affair, and he could not in- 
 terfere.^' 
 
 Note after note was despatched to 
 the young Lord, who at length coi?^ 
 sented to an interview. 
 g2
 
 124 
 
 "This, my Lord/^ said hisG * * * ♦ 
 — *' is a most unpleasant embarrass- 
 ment. Permit me to return your mo- 
 ney, as the only alternative that is left 
 to me." 
 
 My Lord consented, and received a 
 checque for c;£3,500 — which he flew to 
 receive from the banker. When the 
 D » * * , however, recovered from the 
 perplexity of his negociation, he recol- 
 lected, that he had given his checque 
 for the sum last paid him for his seat, 
 which exceeded that formerly given by 
 my Lord, in the sum of ^£500. He, 
 therefore despatched a servant with a 
 note, to signify this mistake to his Lord- 
 ship, and to claim the overplus; but
 
 125 
 
 my Lord replied — '' Nothing could be 
 better than the arrangement made, it 
 required no alteration.'^ 
 
 Thus this northern Nobleman, after 
 enjoying his seat for four years, re- 
 tired ,£500 richer by the bargain. 
 
 But, economy must be constitu- 
 tional with some people. His Lord- 
 ship afterwards married a lady with 
 nearly one hundred thousand pounds 
 fortune, which gave additional charms 
 to her native attractions. They re- 
 sided chiefly at a country seat, not far 
 distant from the metropolis. His fa- 
 ther-in-law had a lame coach-horse, 
 vi^hich he sent to his Lordship's farm 
 g3
 
 126 
 
 for a run ; this horse was employed by 
 my Lord in running to town, in a light 
 cart ; with butter, eggs, and vegetables, 
 but when papa sent for his horse home, 
 the animal was returned with a bill of 
 costs for his keep. 
 
 Another, was a personage who had 
 raised himself to note and opulence by 
 persevering industry. Originally, he 
 was a petty household broker, sales- 
 man, and undertaker ; he supplied the 
 living with second-hand articles, and 
 the dead with the last of all conve- 
 niences — a coffin. By his obliging 
 manners, active turn of mind, and un-
 
 127 
 
 sullied reputation, he gradually be- 
 came an auctioneer of the first import- 
 ance ; and is universally employed to 
 sell the great estates, that luxury, folly, 
 caprice, or death, have brought to the 
 hammer. But, familiar as it might be 
 supposed this gentleman would be in 
 all professional transactions, he has 
 lately been the dupe of that specious 
 finesse, which almost ornaments vil- 
 lany, by the brilliant colouring it gives 
 to deception. 
 
 At a sumptuous dinner, seasoned by 
 wit and enlivened by the choicest 
 wines, he was prevailed with to ad- 
 vance a large sum of money upon 
 a collection of paintings — previously 
 g4
 
 128 
 
 disposed of — and for which the ori- 
 ginal seller had never been paid one 
 shilling. 
 
 Anotheu, was a senator of powerful 
 abilities, but degraded principles ; his 
 devotion for play constantly kept him 
 without a guinea, and he had recourse 
 to the most dishonorable expedients to 
 raise every new stake at the iiazard 
 table. His elder brother, who was his 
 constant companion, wanted money as 
 much as himself, but he was superior 
 to the idea of obtaining it unjustifiably. 
 
 Once — on a great emergency — the 
 brothers had agreed to raise a sum of
 
 129 
 
 money from a Jew ; and Moses had 
 agreed to the loan. The parties met 
 at a cotfee house, where they indulged 
 in a good dinner, — but the elder bro- 
 ther had an unconquerable lethargic 
 affection, which, in a degree hardly 
 credible, would at times set him fast 
 asleep with the cards or the dice-box in 
 his hand. 
 
 When the deeds were signed, and 
 the money on the table, the elder bro- 
 ther, who had eaten very heartily, 
 began to yawn. The younger, well 
 aware of the importance of the moment, 
 began to count the guineas, and the 
 elder began to snore. Moses was dis- 
 missed; and the younger, scrambling 
 g5
 
 180 
 
 the money into his pocket, hastened to 
 St. James's. 
 
 About midnight, the elder awoke ; 
 and comprehending why he was alone, 
 followed to the club. When he ar- 
 rived, he found his brother had lost all 
 the money ; and that his share — three 
 thousand pounds — was then the pro- 
 perty of fifty different people. 
 
 Another, was of the tribe of Levi 
 metamorphosed intoaChristian ; he had 
 amassed immense wealth by usury, and 
 was eminently skilled in the arts of pe- 
 cuniary negociation ; but he was once 
 duped in a most extraordinary way.
 
 131 
 
 It had been his custom to occupy a 
 particular seat at Jonathan's coffee 
 house, where he engaged largely in 
 the buying and selling annuities. At 
 his usual post, he was one morning 
 accosted by a young man, with dishe- 
 velled hair, swollen eyes, and slovenly 
 dress, whose general appearance bore 
 striking testimony of intemperance and 
 debauchery. 
 
 " Your name, I believe, is, * * *^' — 
 said the young man. — " The same, at 
 your service,^^ — replied the Jew. — 
 "You deal in annuities ?^^ — " I do, Sir." 
 — '' I wish to buy one of two hundred a 
 year ; what is the price ?'- — *' Two thou- 
 sand four hundred pounds.^^ — " That is 
 g6
 
 132 
 
 too much, I will give you two thousand/' 
 — '< Pray, Sir, be seated, and we will 
 talk the matter over if you please. 
 What will you like to drink, Sir]" — 
 *^ A glass of brandy, my old boy/^ 
 The brandy was brought. " Will you 
 please to take another glass. Sir ?^^ — 
 '' With all my heart, pour away.^^ 
 
 The Jew now thought himself sure 
 of his man, who seemed galloping to 
 the grave full tilt ; he therefore re- 
 ceived the two thousand pounds, and 
 granted the annuity, well pleased with 
 the morning^s job. 
 
 Six months after, the Jew was ac- 
 costed in the same spot by a wdl-
 
 133 
 
 dressed gentleman, who politely de- 
 manded his half year's annuity. The 
 Jew surveyed him with marks of pain- 
 ful astonishment: he wished to flatter 
 himself mistaken — but they soon came 
 to a positive understanding, and the 
 hundred pounds was regularly paid. 
 
 As the gentleman was retiring — the 
 Jew begged he would take a glass of 
 brandy. " I thank you. Sir : I never 
 drank but two glasses of brandy in my 
 life, and that was when I purchased 
 this annuity from you, and 1 will take 
 care how I ever drink another." 
 
 Another, was a frail instance of the
 
 134 
 
 ascendency of female blandishment and 
 artifice over a weak mind. He was 
 the son of a man, who though reputed 
 to possess an annual income of six 
 thousand pounds, had not for many 
 years exceeded three hundred. The 
 son at his outset in life had little im- 
 mediate expectation from his penurious 
 father; but his appetite for elegant ex- 
 pences was liberally indulged by other 
 relatives. 
 
 He married his cousin, a lady of 
 beauty, good sense, and discretion ; 
 but these united amiable qualities were 
 not sufficiently powerful to give do- 
 mestic enjoyments to an habitual li- 
 bertine.
 
 135 
 
 He was one evening enslaved at the 
 Opera by a vocal performer of exqui- 
 site talents and of great personal at- 
 traction. Chastity was not notoriously 
 among her endowments ; and she 
 soon became the acknowledged mis- 
 tress of Mr. * * * ; and, as if by 
 magic, established her supremacy in 
 his heart. 
 
 The meek, virtuous wife soon learn- 
 ed, from one of those obliging friends 
 — who are ever ready to give proofs of 
 their attachment, by wounding the 
 feelings and lacerating the hearts of 
 their intimates — the whole history of 
 the infidelity and fascination of her 
 husband. Too inobtrusive to com-
 
 136 
 
 plain, she concealed her sorrows in her 
 own bosom ; but the delicacy of her 
 mind was one day severely agonized 
 by an accident she little expected, and 
 was not proof against. 
 
 The servant, who had been adjusting 
 Mr. * ♦ *'s dressing room, brought 
 her the miniature of her master su- 
 perbly enriched with diamonds. 
 
 She took it up, and fondly gazed 
 upon it — till her tearful eyes refused 
 to recognize the object. Then with a 
 sigh drawn from the inmost recesses 
 of her heart — she said — "Take it 
 back, Betty, it never was intended for 
 me.^^
 
 137 
 
 This disgraceful servitude to the ar- 
 tifices of au abandoned woman pur- 
 sued its career, although once it was 
 nearly broken. 
 
 The siren — in the absence of Mr. 
 * * * 's wife, who was in the country 
 — came by invitation, to sup at his 
 town house. After the repast, she 
 proposed, with infamous effrontery, to 
 pass the night with him in the cham- 
 ber peculiarly appropriated to his wife. 
 But he, who had dared by neglect to 
 inflict the severest wounds on the heart 
 of a deserving woman, shrank from 
 the perpetration of an insult so barba- 
 rous and so wanton. A severe quar- 
 rel ensued between him and his mis-
 
 138 
 
 tress ; and the latter retired in a rage 
 to her own house. 
 
 Mr. « ♦ *^s feelings were so ho- 
 nourably aroused by this event, that at 
 his rising next morning, he sent his 
 confidential valet with a note to Mi's. 
 ♦ • * , to announce his resolution of 
 never seeing her again, as well as to 
 assure her of a liberal pension, in ad- 
 dition to her immense salary on the 
 stage. Mrs. ♦ * ♦, who expected ab- 
 ject submission from her slave, was 
 alarmed at the misfortune that awaited 
 her. A personal attachment had no 
 influence on her feelings. Artifice soon 
 suggested to her the means of restor- 
 ing herself to favour. She bribed the
 
 139 
 
 valet, who, at his return to his master, 
 reported that he had left the lady in 
 strong" convulsions. 
 
 While Mr. * * * was combatting 
 with his agitated feelings, Mrs. ♦ * * 
 came to his house — burst into his dress- 
 ing room — fell at his feet — embraced 
 his knees — and sued forgiveness. The 
 farce succeeded : she was restored to 
 her empire over his heart, and himself 
 reduced to a still more abject submis- 
 sion ; insomuch, that at his own en- 
 treaty, her wishes of the preceding 
 nigrht were realized. 
 
 He afterwards accompanied this wo- 
 man to Italy, under the pretence of ill-
 
 140 
 
 health. Since his return, he divides 
 his days between " iMusic^' and the 
 *' Ruffian ; " except when he saun- 
 ters down to the House, to say — 
 *' Aye," — or '' Nay " — and his nights 
 linger at the gaming table. 
 
 The morning passed in the en- 
 trances and exits of the various mem- 
 bers of the club ; but as it grew late, 
 the room emptied ; and shortly after 1 
 had perused the character of the fore- 
 going gentleman, who had been read- 
 ing a dozen newspapers, he gave a 
 lengthened y — a — w — n ; and left me 
 to solitary meditation.
 
 141 
 
 The sports of the evening were in 
 the rooms above — I heard a constant 
 noise and rattling of the dice box, but 
 at the peep of day I was removed ; 
 leaving behind me numbers of these 
 Right Honourable Amateurs still at 
 their diversion.
 
 SOPHA 
 IN A DEMIREPS TENT, 
 
 OE 
 
 RIGHT HONORABLE ABERRATIONS. 
 
 From the enlightened society of 
 gambling peers, senators, and other 
 fashionables, I was transported to the 
 residence of a celebrated denairep. My 
 Soul sank on a Turkish ottoman, 
 crowded with the softest pillows of 
 every possible dimension : for sj ex- 
 quisitely refined was the construction 
 of this sopha, you might have reposed
 
 144 
 
 a nerve upon it without interfering 
 with any other part of the body. 
 
 This apartment communicated thro' 
 a conservaton* with the back drawing 
 room — it was in form of an oval, prin- 
 cipally imitating a Turkish tent. A su- 
 perb globular vase depended from the 
 centre: which, when illuminated, de- 
 scribed in brilliant colours the secret 
 of this privacy. It represented the 
 descent of Jupiter in a shower of gold. 
 The attitude and lan^our of the Danae 
 were feelingly voluptuous ; and she 
 wore an armlet thus emblamatically 
 inscribed : 
 
 Uon fait noces ici.
 
 145 
 
 Mirrors from the carpet upwards, 
 surrounded the ottoman ; and in this 
 delicious retirement my mistress held 
 her ttte-d-tcit. evening party. The 
 amusements ahvays bes'an with pic- 
 quet ; and as the Lady played with 
 marked cards, she did not often los-e. 
 
 This tent cost nne t-housand guineas; 
 but the expence had heen repaid in 
 toll many fold. In truth, however, 
 it did not cost the Lady a single shil- 
 ling" : for some two or three years be- 
 fore, she conceived the — tchinuical^ 
 she called it — idea of making a collec- 
 tion of half-cro^ui pieces ; and to this 
 end she worried all who approached ; 
 so that it was impossible to purchase 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 146 
 
 her smiles at tlie Opera, without fil- 
 hng- her lap with half-crowns. — Her 
 history is short 
 
 Every age has its peculiar Diction- 
 ary ; and as the polishing hand of 
 time continues to refine upon refine- 
 ment, Vice is softened into thought- 
 lessness ; and Profligacy is called Vi- 
 vacity. 
 
 In the last century, the marriage of 
 a young man of high rank, easy inde- 
 pendance, and handsome person, with 
 a battered prostitute, would have been 
 ascribed to witchcraft — now, it is sim- 
 ply termed — " a folly."
 
 147 
 
 My Lady — for she is really the wife 
 of a Nobleman — was the daughter of 
 tradespeople in moderate circum- 
 stances, whose foolish fondness, be- 
 cause, forsooth, she was a pretty smart 
 girl, gave her an education far above 
 her ^.ation, in hopes of a hocus pocus 
 elevation by marriage. The vanity in- 
 separable from female beauty taught 
 the young lady^ as she entered her 
 teens, to look with contempt on all 
 her equals ; and at fifteen she dashed 
 from home, in a barouche and four, 
 with a young heir just come into pos- 
 session of the family lands, heredita- 
 ments, and tenements. 
 
 The glitter of a glow-worm is not 
 h2
 
 148 
 
 less short-lived, than the splendors of 
 a kept mistress. The caprice of a mo- 
 ment transfers her, with all her beauty 
 and attraction, from the highly varnish- 
 ed vis-a-vis, to a garret in some obscure 
 court — if not to an hospital. An<] this 
 truth was partially verified by t*he de- 
 graded object of this memoir. 
 
 Her seducer soon left her exposed 
 to want; her next resource was the 
 Theatre, where she picked up a pro- 
 miscuous livelihood. Verging gradu- 
 ally towards decline — for her heart 
 was then less corrupted than her per- 
 son — it was her singular lot to attract 
 the attention of a Noble D* * ♦ , as 
 she sauntered one morning through
 
 149 
 
 the Park. The legal partner of this 
 Nobleman^s bed, had proved her infi- 
 delity, and he wanted a play-thing for 
 his leisure hours. 
 
 My Lady now shone with redoubled 
 splendor — the acknowledged chere 
 amie of the M r. Universal ad- 
 miration fluttered in her train ; and 
 the poor abject creature, to whom Sen- 
 suality a few weeks before, refused a 
 oi*e pound note, was tormented with 
 offers of the profusest gallantry. But 
 experience had taught her how to play 
 her cards. 
 
 A second matrimonial engagement 
 detached her from the protection of the 
 h3
 
 150 
 
 M r ; but gave her at the sairre 
 
 time to the arms of another D* » « . 
 With this Nobleman she made the 
 tour of Europe ; and returned to her 
 native country with those imposing al- 
 lurements of attraction, that enabled 
 her legally to secure the hand of a Peer 
 of the realm. 
 
 A taste for intrigue, however, soon 
 dissolved those bonds which she had 
 embraced at the altar. A third D* * ♦ 
 sighed at her feet, and his noble-minded 
 love was not unmixed with certain 
 particles of prudence ; he wished to 
 indulge his passion without expence, 
 and crim. con, damages he knew would 
 be precluded by my Lady's former
 
 151 
 
 habits. His G « » « * , was the most 
 intimate friend of her Lord ; so that 
 their opportunities were frequent, and 
 caution for awhile presided at the ban- 
 quet of love : but an old family servant 
 of my Lord^s having seen this Noble^ 
 man — very mysteriously, and at a very 
 unseasonable hour — descend the back 
 stairs at the country seat, when his 
 Lord was in town, the faithful creature 
 wrote a letter to his master, communi- 
 cative of his suspicions. HisG* * ♦ » , 
 however, had a foreign valet — in the 
 secret — who instantly put his master 
 on his guard. 
 
 This was plot and counterplot. Fe- 
 male artifice was summoned to the 
 u4
 
 152 
 
 council ; and my Lady at breakfast 
 sent off her letter to London. It com- 
 municated to her dear Lord, that his 
 G ♦ ♦ ♦ * , the night before, had in a 
 fit of intoxication, attempted to enter 
 her chamber ; that the door was se- 
 curely locked and bolted ; and she 
 had some difficulty in persuading him 
 — through the key hole — to retire: that 
 his G* « 4t ♦ mistook his way to his 
 own chamber, and blundered down 
 the back staircase : that under the 
 apprehension lest the awkward acci- 
 dent might have a singular appearance 
 with the servants, she begged to con- 
 sult her dear Lord on the propriety 
 of her removal from under the same 
 roof with his G « • » «.
 
 153 
 
 The two letters reached my Lord 
 by the same post, and produced two 
 immediate answers : one to his heart's 
 best treasure, treating his G» » » ^s 
 visit as a matter of ridiculous plea- 
 santry, and entreating she would con- 
 tinue to entertain his bosom friend 
 with her accustomed elegant hospitality 
 till he returned — which he hoped to 
 do in course of the week ; the other, 
 was a severe reprimand to the officious 
 domestic, accompanied by an assur- 
 ance that any repetition of a similar 
 insinuation would provoke his imme- 
 diate discharge. 
 
 Thus ended an adventure which be- 
 gan under very unfavourable auspices. 
 h6
 
 154 
 
 Time, however, satisfied his Lord- 
 ship that he was another Acteon, and 
 in a fair way of being devoured by his 
 own hounds. The expenses of his 
 hunting establishment had seriously 
 injured his income ; but his nohle 
 friend the D# * ♦ hastened to his reHef. 
 An estate his Lordship held in * # ♦ 
 shire was ample security, and his 
 G# ♦ • » advanced his friend the sum 
 he wanted. I'his disinterested loan 
 was preceded by two singular stipula- 
 tions — usurious interest, and a free 
 right of cuisage et jambage in her 
 Ladyship's boudoir. 
 
 At length the parties becoming mu- 
 tually disgusted, a total dissolution took
 
 165 
 
 place ; and they have since respectively 
 traded on their own bottoms. 
 
 My Lady's house was the rendez- 
 vous of persons of the first distinction ; 
 and, as her Ladyship was not di- 
 vorced, many right honourable ladies 
 frequented her parties. 
 
 During the morning, her Ladyship 
 received innumerable cards of inquiry, 
 but never admitted any male visitor. 
 — Her private evenings passed, as 1 
 have stated, at piquet in the Turkish 
 tent. 
 
 The favoured lover, at this time, was 
 a Creole, just launched, with a ship 
 h6
 
 156 
 
 load of his own Muscovado sugar. 
 He was a mau of thirty thousand a 
 year — had a fine family hy a deceased 
 wife, who possessed all the virtues 
 that adorn human nature. This fa- 
 mily, however, occupied little of his 
 solicitude — benevolence, still less — 
 but extravagance and profusion in his 
 OWN selfish enjoyments was the ulti- 
 matum of his narrow-hearted ambi- 
 tion. 
 
 Her Ladyship first attracted this 
 gentleman's attention at the Opera- 
 House. He became her shadow ; but 
 having no acquaintance in her sphere 
 of life, he might have long languished 
 in tedious expectation, had not her
 
 157 
 
 Ladyship facilitated his wishes as soon 
 as she understood his fortune and dis- 
 position. 
 
 He made love like another Jupiter. 
 At his invitation she consented to an 
 airing in his splendid equipage, to 
 view a little bijou he had just pur- 
 chased in the cottage style, and to con- 
 sult her taste on the furniture. Two 
 hours took them to the scene of en- 
 chantment, that only wanted a Circe 
 to make it fabulous. On their arri- 
 val, they were served by Cupids with a 
 sumptuous dejeune — the Graces stood 
 behind her Ladyship's choir — and 
 an invisible chair breathed harmony 
 around them.
 
 158 
 
 The day was beautiful ; and the ena- 
 moured Creole entreated his fair guest 
 to visit the grounds ; where, in a small 
 compass, nature and art appeared to 
 have exhausted their stores. They en- 
 tered a honey-suckle bower, entwined 
 with jessamine and other odorous vines, 
 and seated themselves on a luxurious 
 bank of turf. 
 
 Presently a group of village mai- 
 dens, preceded by the pipe and tabor, 
 modestly approached to give them wel- 
 come. They were dressed in white, 
 with garlands of the choicest flowers, 
 lightly thrown across the shoulder, 
 and fancifully adjusted round the fore- 
 head.
 
 159 
 
 Having chaunted an ode in com- 
 plinnient to their fair visitor, the eldest 
 of the ru*?tics advanced, and on her 
 knees presented her Ladyship with se- 
 veral keys on a silver salver. There 
 was a novelty and pleasantry in this 
 scene of badinage that was very ac- 
 ceptable to the object complimented, 
 which she evinced by the vivacity and 
 charms of her conversation. 
 
 Her Ladyship returned the salver 
 and the keys, accompanied with her 
 purse, to the pretty rustic ; and, pre- 
 ceded by their lovely train, they re- 
 turned to the cottage. 
 
 Viewing the apartments, which were
 
 160 
 
 small and few in number, her Lady- 
 ship expressed her delight at the rural 
 simplicity with which they were ar- 
 ranged — but the Creole leading her 
 to one side of the drawing room, pre- 
 sented her with a gilded key ; at the 
 same time touching a concealed spring, 
 they discovered a gilded lock. 
 
 Her ladyship opened the door, and 
 stood motionless with surprise. 
 
 It was a small closet, fitted up with 
 two large mirrors, and a library that 
 completely filled the other compart- 
 ments. But the object of attraction 
 was the ceiling, finely painted by an 
 Italian artist in chiaro oscuro clouds.
 
 J61 
 
 in the centre of which, a melting lo 
 languished in the glowing embraces of 
 the God of Thunder. 
 
 In this new Olympus, the Creole 
 presented her Ladyship with the title- 
 deeds of the cottage and the grounds, 
 and her gratitude was — mutely — ex- 
 pressive. 
 
 The Creole was now an avowed fa- 
 vourite ; but her Ladyship's avarice 
 surpasssd even his profusion ; for hav- 
 ing one morning sent his Jeweller to 
 her with a double set of brilliant ear- 
 rings and necklace, that she might 
 take her choice^ she very civilly kept 
 both — returning for answer, ** they
 
 162 
 
 were so very beautiful, it was impos- 
 sible to give a preference. ^^ 
 
 Her Ladyship boasts two confidential 
 friends and companions, both titled. 
 
 The one is of excessive corpulence, 
 who, notwithstanding, exposes all her 
 full blown charms to the amorous 
 breeze. In her youth she had been 
 the votary of Venus — next, she became 
 the votary of Plutus. A public faro 
 bank used to be kept at her house 
 twice a week, where youth, inexpe- 
 rience, and dissipation sacrificed to the 
 avaricious god ; and enabled her to 
 keep up an establishment appropriate 
 to her rank.
 
 163 
 
 Public readings were another of her 
 pastimes, and the subjects not always 
 complimentary to delicacy. Yet, she 
 had daughters at this time lovely, mar- 
 riageable, and virtuous, notwithstand- 
 the contaminating example of their 
 mother's drawing room. 
 
 Now, that her person is bloated by 
 excesses and pimpled by luxurious liv- 
 ing, she courts notoriety by the no- 
 velty of her entertainments, which she 
 gives alfresco^ under unique, foreign 
 designations. 
 
 Her other bosom friend was of an- 
 other disposition, who, although her 
 rank in life commanded her doors to
 
 164 
 
 open to the fashionable world, pos- 
 sessed a peculiar address in managing 
 her expenses. 
 
 The servants supplied cards, rout 
 cakes, and lemonade; for which they 
 were reimbursed by the money de- 
 posited under the candlesticks ; but 
 the pieces of wax were too great per- 
 quisites to be given away. These her 
 Ladyship very prudently reserved to 
 burn in the family. 
 
 With all her precaution, however, 
 the footmen often contrived to en- 
 croach upon her treasure. 
 
 One night, after the crowd had sepa-
 
 165 
 
 rated earlier than usual, and the doors 
 were closed, imagining her house- 
 hold to be all asleep, she arose — in 
 her chemise — to collect the candles. 
 
 Just as her Ladyship was retiring 
 with the pieces huddled in the fore- 
 part of the only garment she wore, a 
 luckless footman stole into the drawing 
 room, tip toe, on the same errand. 
 
 They jostled each other at the door : 
 and John, supposing it to be one of the 
 maid servants who was trespassing on 
 his rights, seized her in his arms — 
 " And so, my dear/Vsaid he, you want 
 the candles, do you ? but I will make 
 you pay for this."
 
 166 
 
 John^s speech was followed by ac- 
 tion sufficiently indicative of the mode 
 in which he meant to be revenged ; 
 and her Ladyship had no alternative 
 to save her modesty, but that of be- 
 traying her meanness. She declared 
 her name — and the terrified footman, in 
 his eagerness to esca[)e, fell from the 
 top to the bottom of the stone staircase. 
 
 As soon as her Ladyship was released 
 — \^ ithout paying the least attention 
 to the servant, who might have broken 
 his neck — it was her first care to feel 
 about for the wax pieces that had 
 eloped from her chemise during her 
 gallant rencounter with John ; having 
 succeeded, she retired to bed.
 
 167 
 
 Let not '* Ambition mock this use- 
 ful toiP' — or Ridicule presume to sati- 
 rize the littleness of her Ladyship's 
 economy. 
 
 Are not " candle ends '' among the 
 tit- bit gleanings of a M 1 har- 
 vest HOME ? — Nor should the pilfering 
 chemise of a female Right Honourable 
 be scoffed at, since the equally imma- 
 culate shift of a male Right Honour- 
 able, to STOWE away his stationery 
 perquisites, is indulgently smiled at 
 
 by the nation's R s, as a virgin 
 
 aberration ! ! ! 
 
 This was the cabinet council, from 
 whose intermediate chit-chat I had col-
 
 168 
 
 lected all my intelligence ; for when 
 any two were secretly closeted, the 
 third was swe to be anatomised by his 
 bosom friends. They had all three 
 assembled in close and solemn divan a 
 few mornings after the necklace and 
 ear-ring scene, to determine what was 
 to be done about the Creole, whose 
 visits appeared to be dropped. 
 
 " Leave him to his o\ui insignifi- 
 cance,'^ said Lady « * « ^ ; ''a poor, 
 paltry ephemera, who, having lived 
 his hour, \vill die as he was born — 
 unknown/' 
 
 *' But he is so rich !" — said Lady 
 • « ♦ * ; — ''and when a plebeian will
 
 169 
 
 fancy he may mix with nobility — why 
 he must pay for it to be sure ! " 
 
 " Besides '^ — said my Lady — '' where 
 shall I find such another fool ? A 
 Creole is of all human beings the best 
 subject for female artifice to work upon. 
 He is by nature liberal and unsuspect- 
 ing ; by habit thoughtless and ex- 
 travagant ; by climate amorous ; in 
 folly, boundless — I cannot part with 
 him.^^ 
 
 V 
 
 At the breaking up of the debate, it 
 was resolved, nem. con. that a letter 
 
 be written to Mr. ^ inviting him 
 
 to cards and supper on the following 
 evening. 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 170 
 
 But the servant returned to say tlie 
 gentleman was gone on a tour to the 
 Lakes, and would not return to town 
 till winter. 
 
 Never at a loss, my Lady directed 
 her smiles to a young Banker, who 
 pranced about the stones at the west- 
 end, on a stately grey charger — looking 
 very much like King Charles on horse- 
 back at Charing Cross. 
 
 He was invited ; and received into 
 the tent. 
 
 It happened — carelessly enough — 
 that, as he sat at piquet, playing five- 
 guinea-points, picque, repicque, and
 
 171 
 
 capot — he had lost his thirty guineas 
 — to begin with — and found onl) a 
 twenty-pound note in his purse. He 
 wished to apologize ; but my Lady re- 
 lieved his embarrassment by saying, 
 " Oh ! a checque on your house will 
 do quite as well.^^ 
 
 " No !''— he replied—'^ I will not 
 give you a checque, but we will com- 
 pound. Take this note with a lottery 
 ticket I bought the other day — who 
 knows but you may get a valuable 
 prize! I will tell you of a curious love 
 adventure, that some time since hap- 
 pened with a lottery ticket to a Bristol 
 merchant.^'
 
 172 
 
 It was during the general election 
 that iVJr. * * * * , having pressing 
 business in town, was detained at 
 Marlborough till the next turn of 
 horses should come in, feed, and rest 
 an hour, before they could be put to 
 his carriage. As he stood gaping at 
 the window, for want of something 
 better to do, he saw a smart pretty 
 woman alight, quite alone, from a hack 
 chaise. 
 
 Ringing for the landlord, he in- 
 quired who the lady was. Mr. Boni- 
 face could not tell — she >vanted horses 
 to go on, and was likely to pass the 
 day there.
 
 173 
 
 With the true spirit of Bristol gal- 
 lantry^ Mr. * * » * sent his name and 
 compliments, to beg the lady would 
 do him the honour to partake of a 
 broiled chicken, which was just com- 
 ing up, and to accept a seat in his car- 
 riage to the next post town. 
 
 The lady accepted this polite in- 
 vitation ; and, briefly, they arrived in 
 town together. Some condescensions 
 on the part of the lady aroused in the 
 Bristol merchant's heart a kind of 
 feeling that it would be generous — 
 not JUST — to make her a handsome 
 present; but notwithstanding he was 
 rich enough to pay like a prince, pru- 
 dence kept his purse-strings close ; he 
 I 3
 
 174 
 
 however, hit on a bright expedient 
 to save his credit, as well as his notes. 
 He had purchased a lottery ticket at 
 Bristol, the number of which was a 
 profound secret in his family, and he 
 proposed — enbadinant — to give the 
 lady half of it. The present was ac- 
 cepted ; and the ticket cut in twain. 
 
 During the fortnight the Bristol 
 merchant was detained in town, his 
 visits were familiarly received by the 
 fair partner of his journey, who thought 
 no more of the ticket. 
 
 The lottery, however, was drawn in 
 two days during that period ; and the 
 Bristol merchant came to her one
 
 175 
 
 morning with a smile of congratula- 
 tion, to announce their number as a 
 five hundred pound prize. 
 
 The lady was delighted with her 
 good fortune. 
 
 " Give me," said he, '^ your half; 
 and as 1 go into the City, I will re- 
 ceive the money, and bring you two 
 hundred and fifty pounds.^^ 
 
 The lady, perfectly disposed, went 
 to her secretaire: but could not find 
 her keys. She rang for the servant — 
 Mary was gone out ; the Bristol mer- 
 chant could not stay — he had pressing 
 engagements to the moment to fulfil ; 
 I 4
 
 176 
 
 and he took his departure, desiring' 
 she would send the half ticket by a 
 porter, addressed to him at the Ja- 
 maica Coffee House. 
 
 While the lady was indulging the 
 pleasing caprice of fortune that had 
 befallen her, in came Mary. 
 
 With breathless anxiety, the girl 
 danced into the room. 
 
 '* Oh ! ma'am, as sure as two and two 
 make four, your ticket's a prize ! " — 
 '*Yes, Mary, of five hundred pounds, and 
 you shall have a new gown out of it.^' 
 
 " Lauk, ma'am ! — (i\e hundred
 
 177 
 
 pounrls ? — what does a five and three 
 O's stand for?'' 
 
 The lady was dumb with astonish- 
 ment ; the girl persisted ; and she 
 called for her bonnet to go out and 
 satisfy herself. 
 
 It was five and three O's. — The 
 meanness of the intended fraud now 
 struck forcibly on her mind ; and with 
 the first impulse of contempt, she 
 ordered her door to be closed against 
 the Bristol merchant. Reflection, how- 
 ever, led her to adopt another conduct ; 
 and she desired her maid to say nothing 
 about the ticket when Mr. ♦ * * * 
 called. 
 
 i5
 
 178 
 
 About four o'clock he was an- 
 nounced. — '* I have not received the 
 ticket ! ^^ — said he — entering the room 
 — " give it to me now, and I will 
 get the money ; I have a hack wait- 
 ing.^' 
 
 *' Humph !" — she replied. 
 
 The Bristol merchant found him- 
 self betrayed ; but as finesse in money 
 matters never causes those gentlemen 
 to blush, he attempted to pass it off as 
 a pleasant joke, that he might have 
 had the pleasure to surprise her with 
 good fortune. He then repeated his 
 wish to have her half, and he would 
 bring her the amount.
 
 179 
 
 " I will go with you/' — said she — 
 *^ that will save trouble/' A contest 
 ensued, which more and more con- 
 vinced the lady she would still be the 
 dupe of any confidence she might place 
 in this rich man ; and she very spirit- 
 edly told him, she would throw her 
 half into the fire, and expose him in 
 every daily paper. 
 
 Expose a Bristol merchant ! — but 
 the hitherto mild, yielding, and com- 
 plaisant female was aroused by a keen 
 sense of her wrongs, to a bold and 
 fearless daring — the half ticket was 
 resolutely doomed to the flames. 
 
 The Bristol merchant, knowing 
 1 6
 
 180 
 
 there was a three-legged stool at home, 
 and trembling for his fame on the 
 Exchange, became a suppliant to the 
 lady, whom he entreated on his knees 
 to accept his share of the ticket, and 
 to be pacified. 
 
 He thought now all danger was over, 
 and returned home. 
 
 But the instant he arrived, all the 
 family gathered round him to felicitate 
 his good luck. The elder misses would 
 have handsome presents ; the younger 
 would have wax dolls with moving 
 eyes and gold watches round their 
 necks — and a fine boy, just breeched, 
 would have a cropped donkey to ride 
 on Clifton Downs.
 
 181 
 
 " Good Heavens !'^ — exclaimed the 
 Bristol merchant — " is Hell broke 
 loose !" — and he ran out of the house 
 like a madman. 
 
 It seems female curiosity had pryed 
 into his pocket book, and the secret 
 number was known in his family. 
 
 A hearty laugh succeeded the de- 
 tail of this adventure, and the curtain 
 dropped for the evening. 
 
 This anecdote awakened my reflec- 
 tion to a new species of gaming. 
 
 Lottery is a public game at hazard, 
 of acknowledged practice, as far back
 
 182 
 
 as the ancient Romans. It is a mode 
 of raising money on easy terms for the 
 service of the State. All commercial 
 and political writers have condemned 
 lotteries as impolitic and highly detri- 
 mental to trade ; divines and moralists 
 maintain that they uphold a spirit of 
 gaming in the nation at large, and 
 occasion a general depravity of morals, 
 by corrupting and vitiating the minds 
 of the lower class of society ; who, 
 allured by a hope of becoming spee- 
 dily rich, and the example of some 
 who have really been so, are se- 
 duced from hard labour and indus- 
 trious habits to turn sharpers and 
 adventurers: they lose thtir time in 
 watching Fate — they pawn their ne-
 
 183 
 
 cessaries to indulge the phantom of 
 hope — they consult fortune-tellers — 
 and shortly are reduced to poverty and 
 indigence. Occasional bankruptcies 
 and subordinate failures among petty 
 tradespeople, are the fatal result ; for 
 they indulge the expectation of be- 
 coming speedily rich, and purpose to 
 pay all their debts at once by obtaining 
 the capital prize. 
 
 The world of fashion now rushed 
 like a torrent to Brighton ; and those 
 whose purses were unequal to follow 
 the stream, shut up the front windows 
 of their houses, and sent in their 
 names to the Morning Post, to be
 
 184 
 
 inserted among ^' Fashionable Dh- 
 
 My Lady left to^n in a few days, 
 and my Lord travelled into the coun- 
 try.
 
 SOPHA IN A BLAZE, 
 
 CASTLE IN AN UPROAR. 
 
 This mansion, gentle Reader ! was 
 not in a blaze of fire, but in a 
 BLAZE of WEALTH ! nor was the up- 
 roar a tumultuous thanksgiving from 
 the fervent gratitude of succoured 
 misery — it was a paradoxical uproar 
 — mute, yet violent — the uproar of 
 
 an AROUSED CONSCIENCE !
 
 186 
 
 My Soul occupied a red morocco 
 sopha in a handsome library, con- 
 taining a classical assemblage of the 
 best authors in sumptuous bindings. 
 But I soon found this was the mere 
 show of learning: one only book was 
 read in this fiimily ; it was an heir- 
 loom, carefully preserved, and regu- 
 larly worshipped — it was the birth, 
 parentage, and education, and (in these 
 people^s belief) the last dying speech 
 of Wisdom, briefly entitled, 
 
 '' The Akt of Compound Interest. " 
 
 It will be, therefore, readily con- 
 jectured, that the lord of this proud 
 domain was a creature of wealth : his
 
 187 
 
 attendants were, pride and meanness — 
 avarice and profusion — calumny and 
 falsehood — insolence and cowardice — 
 under a major domo, impiously deno- 
 minated — Religio?^ ! 
 
 What is wealth ? 
 
 It is the confederate of Power ; and 
 their united influence is the grand 
 corrupter, the petrifier of the human 
 heart ; it hardens the natural feelings 
 of the possessor ; and, if not the posi- 
 tive, it is the negative source of all 
 the misery and wretchedness with 
 which humanity abounds. It must be 
 obvious to the observant mind, that 
 many persons, who, under the cloud
 
 188 
 
 of adversity, have appeared to possess 
 the very milk of human kindness — 
 who, with the frowns of the world 
 upon them, have regarded money as 
 the most contemptihle dross — who, 
 sympathising* with misfortune, were 
 happy to divide their slender pittance 
 with the children of Adversity — suffer 
 a complete metamorphosis of the heart, 
 when suddenly or unexpectedly raised 
 to a state of Prosperity. 
 
 When the blessings of fortune 
 shower down upon them, the feelings 
 change with the situation : the com- 
 panions of their former affections are 
 forgotten or despised ; and adamant is 
 ess susceptible of impression, than
 
 189 
 
 the soul THUS inexorably steeled 
 against the generous feelings of phi- 
 lanthropy. 
 
 If accidental riches will so corrupt 
 an originally amiable nature, what 
 must be the anticipated operation of 
 wealth, — avariciously created by a 
 mechanical, studious, and laborious 
 research, — to mask original meanness 
 under its glittering robes ? 
 
 Look into the hearts of hungry, hy- 
 pocritical, rapacious, adventurers — 
 blood-suckers, wallowing in their 
 half-millions, and still panting for 
 more — are their hearts softened by 
 acquired possession ? Is one five hun-
 
 190 
 
 dred thousandth part of it devoted to 
 any liberal or beneficial purpose 
 
 ? 
 
 No ! — Avarice keeps pace with 
 Wealth ; and all their thoughts are 
 engrossed in forming new prospects of 
 further accumulation. 
 
 But if the affluent, gratefully ap- 
 preciating* the blessings of Providence, 
 would feelingly and faithfully dis- 
 charge the duties of humanity, prisons 
 would cease to be crowded with the 
 forlorn wives and infants of unfor- 
 tunate debtors — poor houses would 
 no longer be the asylum of innume- 
 rable outcast victims, exposed to 
 every worst species of tyranny and
 
 191 
 
 cruelty — nor would the public streets 
 groan with starving beggars, whose 
 hideous conditions harrow up every 
 faculty of Sensibility ! 
 
 These were my reflections in the 
 immediate neighbourhood of a vast 
 commercial city, renowned for its cre- 
 ative wealth — a city, that, from indi- 
 vidual feeling, rarely wipes one tear 
 from the eye of innocence, or gives the 
 balm of pity to merit in distress. 
 
 And yet, what are often the crimes 
 of the poor? First, the instigations 
 of want; secondly, the temptation, 
 encouraged by the luxurious example
 
 192 
 
 and seductive blandishments of luxury 
 and wealth. 
 
 Even the rigid Moralist will look 
 down with compassion on persons 
 launched into the wide world, friend- 
 less and forlorn, exposed to all the 
 allurements of temptation ; but the 
 aullen apathy of more plentiful opu- 
 lence, in the midst of all the super- 
 fluities of studied enjoyments, can 
 pass a fellow-creature in the street — 
 naked — perishing with cold and hun- 
 ger — without feeling to administer one 
 single drop of pity to comfort the 
 miserable outcast; or, if an arrogant 
 impulse of what they call Charity,
 
 193 
 
 should direct the unwilling hand to 
 their well-filled purse, this mite is 
 usually accompanied hy insult or re- 
 buke. 
 
 And such was the philosophy of my 
 present master, a Being so completely 
 wrapped up in schemes of further ag- 
 grandizement and avarice, so steeled 
 by prosperity, that he grants not a 
 moment^s consideration to any subject 
 that does not, either directly or indi- 
 rectly, augur a prospect of self-in- 
 terest. 
 
 He is bold enough to insult the 
 misery he refuses to alleviate, be- 
 cause he is dastardly enough to be 
 
 VOL I. K
 
 194 
 
 callous to chastisement ; and, intrench- 
 ed under the ramparts of worldly pros- 
 perity, he laughs at the impotent rage 
 his inhumanity provokes. 
 
 When I had been some da3S taking 
 a portrait of the characters around me, 
 an event happened to confirm my for- 
 mer observations, and to increase my 
 contempt for the splendid owners of 
 this splendid castle. 
 
 Master Abraham, the second son 
 of the proprietor, was lolling su- 
 pinely in the library, when a livery 
 servant delivered him letters from the 
 post. The following is a copy of the 
 first he chanced to open, and will in
 
 195 
 
 itself convey a general idea of its ob- 
 ject ♦. 
 
 August I9thf 1813. 
 
 Sir, 
 
 I MUST beg to apologize 
 
 for my long apparent inattention to 
 
 the letter you honoured me with on 
 
 the 18th of June last; but my silence 
 
 has been compelled by two motives — 
 
 the one was my imprisonment; the 
 
 other, a point of delicacy towards a 
 
 lady to whom I owe my respect and 
 
 gratitude. 
 
 * This is no Jiction : the letter was actually 
 written and received by the parties respec- 
 tively. 
 
 k2
 
 196 
 
 Considering myself, however, now 
 at liberty to indulge my own wishes, 
 I am eager to thank you for address- 
 ing me in the behalf of your father ; 
 as I am thereby permitted to address 
 him through you ; and I apprehend 
 you and I may best understand this 
 letter, which is not intended to be a 
 secret. 
 
 I, Sir, am heir at law to the late 
 
 Mr. B ; and notwithstanding the 
 
 little care 1 took of my own fortunes 
 might have determined that Gentle- 
 man not to trust me with his, I had 
 the happiness to be on the best footing 
 with him for the last five or six years 
 of his life — to receive the warmest re-
 
 197 
 
 peated assurances of his perfect friend- 
 ship, protection, and interest ; and, 
 finally, to be taught to hope through 
 him for a comfortable independence ; 
 and that so lately eis the latter end of 
 1811, — almost immediately before he 
 made his will. 
 
 As he exactly knew all my em- 
 barrassments, and was satisfied by 
 the late Mr. A. H. of the strict pro- 
 priety of my conduct under them (not- 
 withstanding the insidious tales some 
 interested people poured into his ear), 
 I am convinced he most conscien- 
 tiously intended all he promised ; 
 and I do, and always shall, revere his 
 memory. 
 
 k3
 
 198 
 
 What I assert, I can maintain by a 
 variety of Mr. B/s letters ; and I can 
 likewise maintain, by Mr. A. H/s let- 
 ters, that he, who scrupulously studied 
 my character at the express wish of 
 Mr. B. applauded it, and was my 
 zealous advocate. Unhappily for me, 
 his death preceded Mr. B/s, or I 
 should not have been limited to <£100 
 per annum. 
 
 A letter from me to Mr. B. arrived 
 at B^ ^ ^ Square a day or two after 
 Mr. B.^s death, of which event I was 
 at the time unconscious. I do not 
 know whether your father read it ; but 
 it was seen by some of the executors. 
 That letter was intended to inform
 
 199 
 
 Mr. B. thai my struggles were all 
 over. I had been compelled to resign 
 my office for the want of a very few 
 pounds to protect my person ; and 
 the Law had most completely beg- 
 gared me. 
 
 In the midst of this distress, I re- 
 ceived c£20 from the bounty of Mrs. 
 B. to pay for my mourning. 1 had 
 three infants at that moment on the 
 point of w^anting food, and I gave the 
 <;£20 to continue them at the school, 
 from which they were dismissed for 
 nonpayment of their last quarter. The 
 sudden loss of a benefactor, who oc- 
 casionally helped me, and always flat- 
 k4
 
 200 
 
 teied my hopes — my agony of mind 
 at discovering the failure of my justi- 
 fiable expectations — together with se- 
 vere personal privations — involved me 
 in a twelvemonth's illness, from which 
 1 was not expected to recover. I 
 however returned from Somersetshire 
 in April last, with improved health, 
 and was soon after arrested for the 
 mourning I had thus (dishonestly your 
 humane father says) omitted to pay 
 for. 
 
 My first impulse at the spunging- 
 house was to inform your father, who 
 1 really imagined would be delighted 
 to offer such a compliment to Mr. B.^s
 
 201 
 
 memory, as to rescue his immediate 
 representative, on such an account^ 
 from going to prison. 
 
 But how little, Sir, did I know the 
 rich Mr. H * * * . To my most re- 
 spectful letter he replied to me, iyi 
 Newgate^ with all the cold-blooded 
 arrogance of supercilious wealth ; 
 and although he had not soul to 
 assist me, instead of a gentlemanly 
 negative, he was mean enough, 
 and impudent enough, to upbraid 
 me. 
 
 Now, Sir, as your father has ven- 
 tured his calumnies personally to my- 
 self, am 1 not authorized to believe 
 k5
 
 202 
 
 that he h^s practised them with Mr. B. 
 fatally to my interests? 
 
 For, notwithstanding Mr. B, had 
 several of the most respectable au- 
 thorities to satisfy his mind (and it 
 was, indeed, strongly prejudiced) that 
 my career of folly had been maiked 
 only by folly, and was never stained 
 by a dishonourable action ; still there 
 are moments, when the most upright 
 mind may be unnerved, and suscep- 
 tible of impressions artfully moulded ; 
 and to these moments, do I owe all my 
 present wants. 
 
 Your father writes to me, that I am 
 extravagant, and that experience (in
 
 203 
 
 Newgate) was the best school to learn 
 wisdom. 
 
 Did your father suppose, Sir, that 
 his gold was his apology for an illiberal 
 untruth? That it privileged him to 
 forget he was addressing a Gentleman, 
 at least his equal by birth, education, 
 accomplishments, and the station he 
 had honorably filled, both in public 
 and in private life ? 
 
 It is true, Sir, your father may teach 
 me Cocker's Arithmetic, but I could 
 teach him, if he had sensibility to ap- 
 preciate the lesson, that passive virtues 
 are often little better than masked 
 vices; and that he is merely the Al- 
 k6
 
 204 
 
 mighty's steward on earth, and must 
 eventually give a correct account of 
 his appropriation of that wealth which 
 is his idol, however otherwise he may 
 chuse to preach or to pray before the 
 multitude. But poor as I am, (and, 
 God knows, likely to remain so,) I 
 would not, by my hopes of salvation, 
 (and I have religious hopes, though I 
 do not parade them,) exchange my 
 feelings or my principles for those 
 which vegetate at * * * Castle, even 
 if your father's splendid revenues at- 
 tached to the unnatural metamorpho- 
 sis. I would not, at any price, become 
 a gaudy automaton, richly carved and 
 gilt — much less would I sink into a 
 human being, whose very instinct, the
 
 205 
 
 pure gift of all -bountiful Nature, has 
 been adulterated by a selfish and con- 
 tracted heart. But more remains to 
 be recorded, and it deserves to be re- 
 corded in large letters of brass on the 
 public Exchange of B » * ♦. The 
 following are your father's words to 
 me : — 
 
 " The late Mr. B. only left me a 
 " trifling legacy, by way of remem- 
 " brance, although I was as near a re- 
 '* lation as any he had.'' 
 
 Good God ! is this Mr. J. S. H/s 
 gratitude to the memory of a man, who 
 has entailed a handsome fortune on all
 
 206 
 
 his younger sons ! Is this Religion, 
 or Principle ? Is it Honesty ? 
 
 No, Sir, it is morally a falsehood — 
 although it may be, jesuitically, a truth. 
 But in B * * *, this identical Mr. H. 
 is a thrifty citizen — a virtuous man — 
 a pious Christian ! — and so, possibly, 
 filial veneration may one day dignify 
 his tomb. 
 
 You will perceive, Sir, that 1 have 
 borrowed the freedom with which 
 your father addressed me, to reply to 
 him— and I beg you seriously to re- 
 flect, that your anger towards me will 
 be a strongly implied censure on the
 
 207 
 
 conduct of your father, whose peculiar 
 style in addressing a Gentleman, I con- 
 fess myself, indeed, very humbly to 
 imitate. But as I never offer offence, 
 whatever the provocation, without of- 
 fering atonement, I would not write 
 my mind to you from Newgate, but 
 reserved it till I could say — Invite me, 
 if it be your pleasure, to B * * * , and 
 I will hasten to the Talbot Inn. 
 
 " I have the honour to be, &c. &c. 
 
 u F n >^ 
 
 E.B/ 
 
 A. G. H. Esq. 
 &c. &c.
 
 208 
 
 In reading the letter, Master Abra- 
 ham, who by the bye ought to have 
 been IMaster Isaac — cunnino; little Mas- 
 ter Isaac — suffered a variety of emo- 
 tion ; for Conscience is an uninvited 
 guest and an impressive orator. 
 
 His might f/ soul at first was full of 
 daring revenge ; but his fever cooled, 
 and his noble spirit dissolved in co- 
 pious perspirations. He planned and 
 resolved — resolved and planned; but 
 his genius not being very fertile, he 
 left the room to consult with his dear 
 papa. 
 
 This was the letter that occasioned 
 the UPROAR at the castle. It came
 
 209 
 
 from a Gentleman, languishing- in the 
 depth of difficulties, and conveyed 
 the just reproofs of wantonly insulted 
 misery. 
 
 As 1 had a subsequent opportunity 
 of becoming acquainted with the writer 
 of the foregoing letter, I shall fill up 
 this detail with the knowledge I there- 
 by acquired of his injuries and mis- 
 fortunes. 
 
 Nursed in the immediate lap of lux- 
 ury and indulgence, it was his serious 
 misfortune to lose his father before he 
 
 attained his seventh vear. 
 
 %i 
 
 Educated with expensive habits —
 
 210 
 
 associated in families of vast opulence 
 — uncontrolled in his own gay, thought- 
 less, and ardent passions, nearly the 
 first forty years of his life passed in 
 the most marked and equally censu- 
 rable extravagance. 
 
 But to counterbalance those days of 
 false joys and deceptive pleasures, the 
 succeeding twelve years have been 
 one uninterrupted chain of miseries — 
 so complex and so destructive, that it 
 is scarcely credible human nature 
 could have sustained the mighty bur- 
 den. 
 
 The last, now, of his maternal fa- 
 mily name, he had been repeatedly
 
 211 j 
 
 taught to hope, by his deceased rela- \ 
 tive Mr. B. for at least a competency 
 to cheer hi& journey through the vale 
 
 of life, in case of survivorship, and in | 
 compliment to the name that would 
 
 die with him. j 
 
 It was a long time, and an arduously \ 
 
 persevering task on the part of this | 
 
 i 
 
 suffering Gentleman^s friends, before i 
 
 Mr. B. (so strongly had interested per^ ] 
 
 sons perverted the natural benevolence 
 
 of the old Gentleman^s mind) would 
 
 consent to become his friend and 
 
 patron. When he had so consented, j 
 
 so wary were his intended bounties, he \ 
 
 set a centinel on his relation's actions ; j 
 
 till at length his scruples being by con- \
 
 212 
 
 viction subdued, he unequivocally 
 gave him his friendship — and used 
 every effort for some years to establish 
 his fortunes. 
 
 Mr. B. lived, however, without re- 
 alizing this deluded Gentleman^s in- 
 terests, and died without confirming 
 them. 
 
 That Mr. B. formerly had no views 
 to leave his fortune as he has done, was 
 most evident ; as he, about seventeen 
 years ago, wrote abroad to enquire after 
 his family, with whom he had not kept 
 up a correspondence ; assigning as a 
 reason for such enquiry, that he had 
 no more immediate heir.
 
 213 
 
 Almost at the very moment of Mr. 
 B/s death, his unfortunate relative was 
 obliged to resign his respectable situa- 
 tion in a public office, for want of a 
 FEW POUNDS to save his person, after 
 the law had deprived him of every va- 
 luable he possessed on the face of the 
 creation. 
 
 With three children starving around 
 him, he appropriated the twenty pounds 
 sent him for his mourning, to replace 
 them at school, and was rapidly ad- 
 vancing to a decline, in the midst of 
 every possible privation. 
 
 From a premature grave, however, 
 he was rescued by an invitation to a
 
 214 
 
 friend's house, where regular food 
 and benevolent kindness partially re- 
 stored his body as well as hir^ mind. 
 This delusive calm, however, uas 
 succeeded by a dreadful rheumatic 
 affection, that confined him the whole 
 winter; and just as his pains were 
 wearing off with the approach of sum- 
 mer, he was taken to Newgate for his 
 
 He suffered nine weeks' confine- 
 ment, Kithout any provision hut the 
 jail ailohcance, and has since been, 
 for upwards of two months, almost 
 without food — quite without firing — 
 tormented end sued for petty debts ; 
 vet with a broken constitution — ago-
 
 215 
 
 nized heart — extreme weak health — 
 and almost deprived of sight — has he, 
 STARVING and shivering, been labour- 
 ing for his daily bread — and that, in 
 the strictest sense of the word. 
 
 The letters he possesses on the sub- 
 ject of tlje hopes he was fatally and 
 continually taught to indulge, are vo- 
 luminous, and as strong as expression 
 could make them. But respect for the 
 parlies living, and gratitude to those 
 departed, have withheld him from their 
 publication. 
 
 Independently of the other munifi- 
 ceot provisions of Mr. B/s will, nearly 
 
 THIRTY THOUSAND POUNDS will gO
 
 216 
 
 into the family of one of the richest 
 men of B ♦ * » ; who, on this occa- 
 sion, and probably on many others, 
 has shewn himself so unworthy the 
 bounties of Providence. 
 
 But the fact is, that the whole has 
 been the diabolical contrivance — some- 
 where — of knavery the most profli- 
 gate ; for Mr. B. was the most con- 
 scientious man in existence to make 
 a pledge, and the most honourable in 
 redeeming it when made. 
 
 The worst part of the story perhaps 
 is, that the unfortunate Gentleman, ex- 
 posed as he was at a public office, suf- 
 fered repeated arrests for small sums,
 
 217 
 
 on which he often eventually paid 
 sixty shillings in the pound. He there- 
 fore proposed quitting his office four 
 -or five years ago. '' You had better/' 
 said Mr. A. H. (the friend Mr. B. 
 had entreated to report his conduct), 
 " throw yourself from Westminster- 
 bridge into the Thames; for if you 
 quit your office you are ruined/^ 
 
 Extraordinary means, therefore, were 
 adopted to prop him in his embarrassed 
 seat, which, had justice been done him, 
 would have been fully sanctioned by 
 the policy of circumstances ; but which 
 may now be harshly constructed al- 
 most to his dishonour. 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 218 
 
 Were the rich inheritors of Mr. B/s 
 largfe property persons requiring such 
 an income to support the splendour of 
 their establishment, it would be well 
 they should presei-ve for personal in- 
 dulgence the whole adviintages of their 
 
 good fortune. 
 
 » 
 
 But that is not the case ; for his 
 amiable widow, who delights in cha- 
 rity, dispenses freely around her the 
 great superfluity of the blessing she 
 enjoys ; and by a fatality, scarcely to 
 be reconciled with the all-merciful dis- 
 pensations of Providence, shuts her 
 ears alone to the prayers of him who 
 most wants, and would most gratefully/
 
 219 
 
 appreciate her effectual benevolence ; 
 or rather, her dependants prevent this 
 tale of misery from reaching her know- 
 ledge, by intercepting all letters on the 
 subject. 
 
 And God knows, the conclusive re- 
 lief he prays for, is but small. Yet, 
 the father of this adventitious heir, 
 who is come out with the 7iew~coined 
 name of B * * *, previously wallow- 
 ing in riches, derives, from this be- 
 quest of nearly thirty thousand pounds, 
 a thirty thousand fold of purse-proud 
 contemptibility — for he has wantonly 
 insulted the sufferings of him, through 
 whose disinherited rights his family 
 is to prosper. 
 
 l2
 
 220 
 
 From tliis castle, the revelation of 
 the parable of Dives and Lazarus, 
 my Soul panted to depart, I will not 
 blot my paper with other anecdotes. 1 
 have been sufficiently illustrative! and 
 happy was I when Br am a chang^ed mj 
 painful confinement.
 
 SOPHA 
 
 ON ] 
 
 THE BANKS OF THE THAMES, 
 
 OB \ 
 
 WANDERINGS OF THE HEART. ! 
 
 Invited as it were by the cheering 
 smiles of a fine summer's day, my Soul 
 wafted to a Sopha, the familiar lounge 
 of the most accomplished woman in 
 the kingdom. 
 
 This Lady was a high titled Dowa- 
 ger,, beyond the meridian blaze of 
 l3
 
 222 
 
 beauty, but highly gifted with the 
 softened charms of intellectual endow- 
 ments. 
 
 Her cottage was small — with a 
 stuccoM front, shaded by light veran- 
 dahs — and looked over an extensive 
 meadow on the variegated scenery of 
 the winding Thames. 
 
 But if this little spot were beautiful 
 when enriched with Nature's full blown 
 treasures, how much more so is it in 
 the depths of dreary winter, when the 
 doors are crowded with destitute half 
 famished women and children, receiv- 
 ing food and raiment from its benevo- 
 lent mistress !
 
 223 
 
 At the early age of seventeeu, her 
 Ladyship was sacrificed to a man of 
 large fortune, but of most eontempti* 
 ble talents. Warm, susceptible, al- 
 most enthusiastic in herself, the na- 
 tive superiority of her mind revolted 
 at such connubial vassalage ; and ere 
 she passed her teens, she eloped to the 
 continent. 
 
 There, crowned heads submitted to 
 her chains, and rival Princes contended 
 for her smiles ; but her's was a yield- 
 ing — not an obsequious heart. Her 
 vanity and love of admiration certainly 
 were gratified by this homage ; but her 
 sensibility was untouched. 
 
 L 4
 
 224 
 
 She played the very tyrant with her 
 lovers; whim, ridicule, and caprice were 
 the habitual return she made to their 
 amorous suit ; nor did she suffer the 
 numbers of her train to diminish. It was 
 her passion to inspire love ; and then 
 to laugh at it as a sentimental folly. 
 
 At length she wandered towards the 
 delicious provinces of Italy, whose 
 blissful climate awakened congenial 
 emotions, and her susceptible bosom 
 acknowledged the delicate impression 
 of the softer passion. 
 
 Our fair Voluptuary — lovely in per- 
 son — in the delicious bloom of tempt- 
 ing youth — and with a witchery of
 
 225 
 
 manners to ornament frailty — did not 
 depend solely on these attractions to 
 merit admiration. She cultivated the 
 sciences, and had began to acquire an 
 exquisite taste for music, painting, and 
 the fine arts, which she has since ma- 
 tured by improved refinement of classi- 
 cal study. 
 
 Surrounded by enchantment — her- 
 self a sorceress — adored — worshipped 
 — wherever she appeared, she taught 
 a lesson to the Italian Nobility on the 
 powers of love, which their sensual 
 habits had never conceived. 
 
 In Italy, an amour is an intimate 
 union of the sexts equally devoid of 
 l5
 
 226 
 
 love and delicacy : persons guided by 
 the senses to the same point : voluptu- 
 ous, not tender ; eager, not impas- 
 sioned ; youth and constitution make 
 up the sum of their desires. 
 
 But her's was a superior penchant. 
 Her heart was formed for exquisite 
 pleasures, and shrank from those 
 light, fantastic, capricious engage- 
 ments, which, being never felt, can 
 never be enjoyed. She had reduced 
 love to system, and this was her ar- 
 gument : 
 
 Possession is the tomb of love, be- 
 cause few know how to keep alive the 
 blessing: and the more violent the af-
 
 227 
 
 fections, the sooner they die. When 
 the heart has nothiug more to ask, and 
 the person nothing more to give — fa- 
 cihty and repetition soon leave a void 
 in the bosom, which nothing but va- 
 riety can fill up. Whereas, if posses- 
 sion were moderate, delicate, tender, 
 and apprehensive, love might bloom 
 for ever. Sentiment is prophaned by 
 voluptuous enjoyment — for it is soft, 
 timid, and respectful : it bears no sort 
 of resemblance to the passions flowing 
 from a heated imagination. The lat- 
 ter depraves the heart, to prepare it 
 for enjoyment : but pure love is the 
 most chaste of all existing pleasures: 
 It is a divine influence, that detaches 
 l6
 
 228 
 
 the mind from surrounding objects, 
 and concentrates all our wishes. 
 
 To ordinary women, every man is a 
 man ; but to a heart in love, there is 
 but one man in (he world ; and that 
 man is the object of its affections. 
 
 With this feeling, a woman does not 
 desire — she loves. The heart does net 
 obey the senses — it directs them : it 
 throws a delicious veil over the deli- 
 rium of the soul : it is ever modest — it 
 does not violate — it steals with timidity 
 on its wishes. Mystery, silence, and 
 bashfulness, conceal the tumult of its 
 softest transports, purify its caresses, 
 and insinuate every nerve into the
 
 229 
 
 very bosom of enjoyment — giving all 
 to desire, and taking nothing from 
 modesty. 
 
 It will be conceived, therefore, that 
 the errors of this fair Voluptuary were 
 essentially ''Hes Egarements du Cceur ;'^ 
 and she possessed the grand secret of 
 giving refined variety to possession. 
 She was perfectly a Calypso ; her smiles 
 were a mine of seduction ; the united 
 powers of nature and of art to enslave 
 the senses, were committed by Venus 
 to her care. Her circling arms were 
 an eternity of sweets, and her expres- 
 sive form spoke a peculiar language to 
 the heart : her's was a perpetual in- 
 toxication, arising from the charms of
 
 230 
 
 ever-varying" novelty : a succession of 
 luxury — a renewal of delights — a di- 
 vine philosophy of the passions. 
 
 Let us examine our own hearts. 
 What is desire? — Nothing but curio- 
 sity. It is an imperative inclination, 
 which, when gratified, loses its ener-* 
 gies. 
 
 Those therefore, who would give 
 durability to love, must keep it con- 
 stantly in expectation. One novelty 
 will beget the expectation of an- 
 other ; and variety will give fidelity to 
 love. 
 
 The surrender of love may be com-
 
 231 
 
 pared with the surrender of a strong gar- 
 rison ; which is frequently more easily 
 conquered than maintained. But un- 
 fortunately with women, the more diffi- 
 cult their primary defeat, the less guard- 
 ed their subsequent bounties. They 
 usually surfeit possession with facility of 
 enjoyment ; whereas it is the province 
 of a woman to be entreated — that of a 
 man to supplicate. But that species 
 of fond complaisance which leaves the 
 lover nothing to desire, takes from 
 beauty all its seduction, and even cloys 
 the object it is intended to bless. 
 
 With these principles she gave her 
 youth to perfect enjoyment: and as 
 the joys which crowd upon meridian
 
 232 
 
 loveliness, languish under the influence 
 of an aiitunanal sky, her Ladyship's 
 intellectual resources now compensate 
 for the loss of those admirers who once 
 so eagerly kneeled at the feet of per- 
 sonal beauty. 
 
 In retirement, therefore, devoted to 
 select society, she is the charm and tlie 
 delight of those m ho approach her ; 
 and the blessings of the poor exalt her 
 chasacter more than her distinguished 
 rank. But although admiration cele- 
 brates her virtues — compassion weeps 
 over her frailties. 
 
 While her Ladyship shone forth a 
 brilliant constellation in the hemis-
 
 233 
 
 phere of fashion, she contracted an in- 
 tinjacy on the continent with an Eng- 
 lish Lacly of distinction, which was as 
 lasting as it was sincere. A simila- 
 rity of fate and sentiment first intro- 
 duced them to each other's esteem : 
 and a congenial and beautiful simpli- 
 city of nature, embellished by the ju- 
 dicious polish of art, confirmed their 
 attachment. 
 
 The object of her Ladyship's affec- 
 tionate regards began an early career 
 of fashionable dissipation — her rank, 
 her youth, her beauty, her accomplish- 
 ments gave eclat to every action of her 
 life ; and if to be admired is to be en-
 
 234 
 
 vied — she certainly must have been the 
 object of universal envy. 
 
 But in the vortex of folly — surround- 
 ed by flatterers — idolized by syco- 
 phants — and seduced by example — her 
 Ladyship never neglected the offices of 
 humanity. Generous to profusion, and 
 little skilled in domestic economy, she 
 acknowledged no duty but the pure 
 dictates of her heart, which were those 
 of charity and universal love. 
 
 She employed agents both in toNvn 
 and country to ferret out the haunts of 
 misery, and her munificent spirit flew 
 to relieve human sufferings. Nor was
 
 235 
 
 her liberality confined to acts of pri- 
 vate benevolence : with genius to dis- 
 cern and liberality to reward, she fos- 
 tered indigent merit in its arduous 
 struggles through life, by patronizing 
 genius in a garret, and transplanting 
 talent into a genial soil, where she 
 assisted it to flourish. 
 
 A mind like her's was not made 
 for dissipation ; nor could it long as- 
 sociate with its unnatural follies. Be- 
 fore her twentieth year, she became a 
 Mother and a Nurse; for her heart, 
 awakened to the delights of her ma- 
 ternal duties, spurned at fashionable 
 prejudices, and shone superior to ex- 
 ample.
 
 236 
 
 With a hiiililv cultivated under- 
 standing, and a soul capable of the 
 tenderest sympathies of ftehng* and 
 benevolence, she had a help-mate, the 
 reverse of all her active virtues; but 
 her heart was ardent, and could not 
 pant in solitude. She gave to friend- 
 ship what was denied to love ; and 
 the sincerity of her attachments have 
 afforded transcendent proofs of her 
 domestic virtues. Liberal in her ser- 
 vices, it was her joy to give ; and the 
 gift was always enhanced by the un- 
 assuming benevolence that accompa- 
 nied it. 
 
 » 
 
 AVit, sensibility, gaiety, and every 
 social quality of the mind, united with
 
 237 
 
 infinite vivacity and a poetic imagi- 
 nation, preserved her Ladyship from 
 the approach of that monster — yclept 
 Ennui — who haunts the fashionable 
 world ; and her valuable accomplish- 
 ments gave charm and variety to her 
 most retired moments. 
 
 But the uncontrolled indulgence of 
 a liberal spirit brought on difficulties; 
 and the constitutional phlegm of an 
 easy, worthy man, could not keep pace 
 with the efforts of uncontrolled sen- 
 sibility, A tour to the continent was 
 therefore projected, as a plan of ne- 
 cessary retrenchment. — Here these La- 
 dies met, — ^^and death only dissolved 
 their friendship.
 
 238 
 
 At her return to England, however, 
 her Ladysbip^s difficulties, always ex- 
 aggerated by the princely munificence 
 of her spirit, brought on extraordinary 
 embarrassments ; and these she sought 
 to relieve by extraordinary resources. 
 Her signature was hawked about the 
 the City by a tribe of Moneylenders, 
 and her valuables disappeared to raise 
 momentary supplies. In the progress 
 of this degrading system, Scandal be- 
 gan to be busy ; and a variety of anec- 
 dotes were circulated to her Ladyship's 
 prejudice. 
 
 A needy weaver of fashionable no- 
 vels caught at this scandal, and cruelly 
 trampling upon all her virtues, made
 
 239 
 
 her venial failings a prominent feature 
 in a projected work just ready for the 
 press. 
 
 Armed with this manuscript, he one 
 morning presented himself at her Lady- 
 ship's door ; where he left it with his 
 card, and a message that he would 
 return on a certain day. When he 
 called, he was ushered into her Lady- 
 ship's presence, who thanked him for 
 the perusal of his manuscript with 
 her usual benignity of complaisance ; 
 and asked him what he might expect 
 to realize by the publication of it ? 
 He replied, three hundred pounds. 
 She returned the work, accompanied
 
 240 
 
 by that sum, and wished him good 
 morning-. 
 
 Not long after, this author repeated 
 his visit ; which he attempted to sanc- 
 tion, by describing the pressure of his 
 domestic miseries. She begged him 
 to accept another hundred pounds. He 
 retired full of expressions of thanks- 
 giving ; but afterwards made a third 
 appeal. 
 
 Her Ladyship, indignant at his ava- 
 rice and want of gratitude, told him 
 her resources were exhausted, and he 
 miglit act just as he thought proper. 
 The result was, he published the work
 
 241 
 
 which he had received four hundred 
 pounds to destroy. 
 
 This act of deliberate, systematic 
 perfidy preyed on her spirits and des- 
 troyed her peace. 
 
 Let those '* whose clay cold heads 
 and lukewarm hearts can argue down 
 and mask their passions^* — rail and 
 indulge their splenetic malignities 
 against the atoned errors of these lovely 
 Penitents ! 
 
 Let the Female Moralist, severe in 
 accidental chastity — and let the Prude, 
 proud in a long catalogue of neg-ative 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 242 
 
 virtues — look with contempt upon the 
 excellence that courts their envy, and 
 mocks their censure ! 
 
 Let them, however, learn — that 
 great virtues are ever contrasted with 
 casual failings ; that frailty is the lot 
 of humanity ; and that it is not a so- 
 litary specific error that stamps the 
 character with ignominy, hut a for- 
 bearance to do good. Let (hem learn 
 that the absence of sensibility is of- 
 ten called chastity by knaves and 
 hypocrites ; and that the repulsive 
 qualities of deformity and disgust are 
 too apt to arrogate the attributes of 
 virtue.
 
 243 
 
 But virtue must pass the ordeal of 
 temptation, before it is substantiated. 
 And let those, secure in the cestus 
 of constitutional apathy, blazon the 
 warmth of their more exemplary feel- 
 ings: but let them beware that, in 
 their hearts, benevolence is not a blank ; 
 and that one virtue stands there instead 
 of every other. 
 
 Deluded fools ! h^ee from the actual 
 commission of a crime, they fancy 
 themselves strictly virtuous : but free- 
 dom from guilt is not virtue. 
 
 And, lastly, let the fair Platonist, 
 blooming in the full ripeness of eighteen 
 maturing summers — for such there no- 
 M 2
 
 244 
 
 minally are — the Victims of EducatioQ 
 — raise her mild blue eyes to heaven, 
 and bless her guardian stars, that she 
 was never tempted to the seductions 
 of the Italian shores. Let her tongue 
 proclaim — even during the revolution 
 of her panting heart — that in dreams 
 of fane f/, there is more reality — a more 
 positive incentive to good — a more ex- 
 tended prospect of delight — a more 
 productive source of absokite content 
 and happiness, than in all the grati- 
 fications artificially borrowed from 
 the indulgence of the senses : — that 
 the philosophy of Plato is, in itself, 
 80 excellent — so flattering to mortal 
 pride — -so congenial with our fondest 
 wishes — so gratifying to our secret
 
 245 
 
 inclinations — that it impresses the ] 
 mind with a perfect persuasion of its 
 truth : — and that, conclusively, the ] 
 noblest inspirations of the heart act 
 in conformity with all that is wild 
 and romantic. j 
 
 But, when arrogantly presumptuous, 
 she has played with Nature till Na- 
 ture asserts its rights, then will hey 
 philosophy vanish like a cloud before ; 
 the sun of truth ; and her fond, palpi- 
 tating, delighted heart will rapturously j 
 confess, that a woman is more deified | 
 by the caresses of the man she loves, i 
 than she would have been in all the 
 
 subhmity of intellectual love — by the | 
 M 3
 
 246 
 
 absolute theophany of every godhead 
 in Olympus ! 
 
 Let those who wish to be really vir- 
 tuous, become so from education. Let 
 them cease, by extraordinary opinions, 
 to be the flattered idols of fools and 
 the victims of artful coxcombs. Let 
 tfiem remember, that they will no 
 longer dazzle in the crowd, with all 
 their imposing sophistry, than novelty 
 lends them charms — that when a few 
 years are gone, without one active vir- 
 tue to cheer the mind, or consoling 
 reflection to chase away despair, all 
 will be a dreary void within their bo- 
 soms ; no act of benevolence will cheer
 
 247 
 
 their soul ; no animating reflection, 
 drawn from religion, will console them ; 
 and they will sink into the grave — 
 unmourned — unregretted ! 
 
 The popularity of a fashionable toast 
 is like a prosperous gale at sea, flutter- 
 ing round the confiding bark, that 
 trusts an open bosom to its fickle flat- 
 tery. At length the winds veer their 
 course — now speciously deceiving with 
 a steady breeze — now lowering with 
 the gloomy aspect of an approaching 
 storm — now howling with the terrific 
 horrors of despair and desolation ! 
 
 Ye beauteous Fair — ^on whom Hea- 
 ven has bestowed its best gift — the 
 M 4
 
 248 
 
 gift of pleasing — ye who are made to 
 promote our happiness — consider well 
 your own ! 
 
 Remember, that the consciousness 
 of innate innocence is not sufficiently 
 powerful to limit the encroaching pro- 
 gress of perfidious love. May female 
 purity be exempt from a too implicit 
 confidence in its own strength ! and 
 may those moments of delicious sus- 
 ceptibility, in which they contemplate 
 the raptures they are formed to in- 
 spire, be free from a too generous 
 weakness! May Prudence ever whis- 
 per to the female heart, that no man 
 breathing has merit enough to deserve 
 the completion of his wishes, at the 
 price of a woman^sfuture peace of mind 1
 
 249 
 
 Having, in this little anecdote, al- 
 most given embellishment to error, I 
 will close with the portrait of a strictly 
 virtuous woman, which I picked up, 
 with others, from the occasional morn- 
 ing chit-chat of lounging visitors. 
 
 This Lady, whose pulse never beats 
 at fever heat, although untitled, is 
 placed by wealth in the foremost rank 
 of life ; and by sympathetic virtues is 
 frequently admitted into the circle of 
 ^* * * * . 
 
 In the true benevolence of her heart, 
 divested of every ostentatious senti- 
 ment, Mrs. * * * became the phi- 
 lanthropic patroness of a Sunday
 
 250 
 
 School in the little village adjacent to 
 her domain. For a time, she reigned 
 Lady Patroness of this institution ; 
 but as human grandeur is but a base- 
 less fabric, it often falls to the ground 
 when least expected. It happened, 
 that a Lady of superior rank came into 
 the neighbourhood ; and, anxious to 
 shew her charitable disposition, libe- 
 rally subscribed to the Sunday School. 
 Precedency, of course, placed her 
 Ladyship's name before that of the 
 benevolent Mrs. » * » ; upon which 
 the latter instantly removed her pro- 
 tection and subscription ; and, amiably 
 obedient to the further impulses of 
 virtue and charity, she set afloat a petty 
 meeting among the villagers against
 
 251 
 
 the Curate — a gentleman, whose modest 
 and moral conduct had hitherto entitled 
 him to universal respect. 
 
 In consequence of the licence thus 
 given by the rich to the poor, the 
 Curate was hooted retiring from 
 church ; and his clerk became so in- 
 solent, that he found it absolutely neces- 
 sary to dismiss him, and to appoint 
 another. But Mrs. * * * swore the 
 clerk should not be dismissed; and 
 on the Sunday following, the rival 
 Amens appeared in church. 
 
 At first, they contented themselves 
 with endeavouring to silence each other 
 by the clamour with which they re-
 
 252 
 
 spectively said and sang the responses : 
 but this kind of noble emulation in- 
 sensibly warmed their passions, till 
 they began to quarrel, and eventually 
 to fight it out. 
 
 Mrs. » • • ^s nerves were much 
 affected, and her morality extremely 
 shocked at this disgraceful scene. She 
 arose, inviting the parishioners to leave 
 the church ; herself vowing she would 
 in future go to Meeting. 
 
 The Curate upon this resigned his 
 situation ; and Mrs. » » • was heard 
 piously to express her joy thereat ; and 
 charitably to hope that it was ali he 
 had to depend on»
 
 253 
 
 This anecdote might be enlarged; 
 but as it was in forwardness to appear 
 before a court of justice, this Lady^s 
 charity has no doubt embellished the 
 pages of the daily news, to exalt, as it 
 deserves, her character. 
 
 Virtues like these, however, are not 
 without their parallel in moral worth. 
 A Lady, whose Lord has the rank and 
 revenues of a Prince, is so much af- 
 fected by his Lordship's extravagance, 
 in cliana-ino' his linen three times a 
 week^ that she most rationally con- 
 verts his shirts, afier \:i\e\ have done 
 their day duty, into niglit dresses for 
 her own sroeet peison. She likewise 
 divides the poultry which slie receives
 
 254 
 
 171 presents from the country, roasting 
 the one half as to-day, and reserving 
 the other half for to-morn ;w ; and if 
 by accident any person should un- 
 expectedly intrude to dini.er — and it 
 has so happened — when a half-fowl is 
 roasting at the fire, her ladyship very 
 notably unites the divided bird with 
 a needle and thread, and it is then 
 served whoie to table. 
 
 My Lord, in his official capacity,. 
 passes much of his time seated ; in 
 consequence of \\hich the derrier of 
 his right honorable indispensabies wears 
 out sooner than the other parts: with 
 these her ladyship makes all her black 
 velvet spencers !
 
 255 
 
 And this rare economy is by no 
 means offensive to the natural dispo- 
 sition of her Lord, who having one day 
 invited a gentleman to a tete-a-tete 
 dinner, gave him a miserable repast : 
 it was removed, and not followed by 
 either dessert or wines. 
 
 They chatted — in about half an hour 
 my Lord said, '^ God bless me, I beg 
 your pardon, Mr. * * * , perhaps you 
 would like a glass of wine ?^' — " I 
 have no objection, my Lord.^^ — "White 
 or red?'^ — On its being named, the 
 bell was rang, and the servant was 
 ordered to bring m '' a glass^' of port, 
 la another Lah iiour a second glass
 
 256 
 
 was introduced with the same cere- 
 monies ; when, the evening being tine, 
 my Lord proposed a walk, which closed 
 his hospitable entertainment — One 
 little bonne bouclie more. 
 
 At a celebrated tavern in the City 
 of London, an annual feast is held, 
 Qstensibljf^ to promote Charily^ but in 
 reality to gorge gluttony. 
 
 At this exemplary repast, a certain 
 A • * *, who, by never spending an 
 unnecessary farthing, has amassed vast 
 riches, after enjoying himself at the 
 expense of the poor, by some accident, 
 shifted the leg of a turkey into his coat
 
 257 
 
 pocket. It was discovered by the 
 projection of the claw, and displayed 
 in terrorem over the thrifty A * « •^s 
 head, before he was aware of the pur- 
 loinment. 
 
 An universal shriek of laughter from 
 every other person at table convinced 
 the good citizen he was the butt of the 
 company ; and his hand mechanically 
 strayed to his pocket, which revealed 
 his secret. 
 
 For some moments he was dumb : 
 at length rising, he said, or rather 
 stammered — " Gemmen ! I vows to
 
 258 
 
 God, I ham has hinnocent has ha hin- 
 fant hunborn/^ 
 
 His oratory could go no further ; and 
 it passed off as the quiz of one of the 
 company. He was, however, so much 
 ashamed, he walked away with a small 
 share only of the poor's claret, re- 
 solving never to repeat the experi- 
 ment. 
 
 But this is the age of the amiable 
 melting, and weeping virtues ! when 
 moralists, like Sterne, will sentiment- 
 ally give macaroons to an ass, while 
 they withhold the comforts of
 
 259 
 
 life from indigent merit, even at their 
 own fire-sides. 
 
 I could have dwelt for ever in this 
 sweet retirement; but in a few days 
 my Soul was removed. 
 
 END OF THE FIRST VOLUME. ] 
 
 Printed by Joseph JMallett, 59, Wardour Street, Soho.
 
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