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Amelia — Volume 1

by Henry Fielding · English · Gutenberg #6095 · 426,194 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Amelia — Volume 1

Author: Henry Fielding


        
Release date: July 1, 2004 [eBook #6095]
                Most recently updated: December 29, 2020

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/6095

Credits: Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMELIA — VOLUME 1 ***




Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.





THE WORKS OF HENRY FIELDING

EDITED BY
GEORGE SAINTSBURY

IN TWELVE VOLUMES
VOL. VII.

AMELIA
VOL. I.




AMELIA
BY
HENRY FIELDING ESQ.
[Illustration]

VOL. I.

EDITED BY GEORGE
SAINTSBURY WITH
ILLUSTRATIONS BY
HERBERT RAILTON
& E. J. WHEELER.

MDCCCXCIII



[Illustration]



CONTENTS OF VOL. I.


INTRODUCTION

DEDICATION TO RALPH ALLEN, ESQ


BOOK I.


CHAPTER I.
Containing the exordium, &c.

CHAPTER II.
The history sets out. Observations on the excellency of the English
constitution and curious examinations before a justice of peace

CHAPTER III.
Containing the inside of a prison

CHAPTER IV.
Disclosing further secrets of the prison-house

CHAPTER V.
Containing certain adventures which befel Mr. Booth in the
prison

CHAPTER VI.
Containing the extraordinary behaviour of Miss Matthews on her
meeting with Booth, and some endeavours to prove, by reason and
authority, that it is possible for a woman to appear to be what she
really is not

CHAPTER VII.
In which Miss Matthews begins her history

CHAPTER VIII.
The history of Miss Matthews continued

CHAPTER IX.
In which Miss Matthews concludes her relation

CHAPTER X.
Table-talk, consisting of a facetious discourse that passed in
the prison



BOOK II.


CHAPTER I.
In which Captain Booth begins to relate his history

CHAPTER II.
Mr. Booth continues his story. In this chapter there are some
passages that may serve as a kind of touchstone by which a young lady
may examine the heart of her lover. I would advise, therefore, that
every lover be obliged to read it over in the presence of his
mistress, and that she carefully watch his emotions while he is
reading

CHAPTER III.
The narrative continued. More of the touchstone

CHAPTER IV.
The story of Mr. Booth continued. In this chapter the reader will
perceive a glimpse of the character of a very good divine, with some
matters of a very tender kind

CHAPTER V.
Containing strange revolutions of fortune

CHAPTER VI.
Containing many surprising adventures

CHAPTER VII.
The story of Booth continued--More surprising adventures

CHAPTER VIII.
In which our readers will probably be divided in their opinion of
Mr. Booth's conduct

CHAPTER IX.
Containing a scene of a different kind from any of the preceding



BOOK III.


CHAPTER I.
In which Mr. Booth resumes his story

CHAPTER II.
Containing a scene of the tender kind

CHAPTER III.
In which Mr. Booth sets forward on his journey

CHAPTER IV
A sea piece

CHAPTER V.
The arrival of Booth at Gibraltar, with what there befel him

CHAPTER VI.
Containing matters which will please some readers

CHAPTER VII.
The captain, continuing his story, recounts some particulars which,
we doubt not, to many good people, will appear unnatural

CHAPTER VIII.
The story of Booth continued

CHAPTER IX.
Containing very extraordinary matters

CHAPTER X.
Containing a letter of a very curious kind

CHAPTER XI.
In which Mr. Booth relates his return to England

CHAPTER XII.
In which Mr. Booth concludes his story



BOOK IV.


CHAPTER I.
Containing very mysterious matter

CHAPTER II.
The latter part of which we expect will please our reader better
than the former

CHAPTER III.
Containing wise observations of the author, and other matters

CHAPTER IV.
In which Amelia appears in no unamiable light

CHAPTER V.
Containing an eulogium upon innocence, and other grave matters

CHAPTER VI.
In which may appear that violence is sometimes done to the name of
love

CHAPTER VII.
Containing a very extraordinary and pleasant incident

CHAPTER VIII.
Containing various matters

CHAPTER IX.
In which Amelia, with her friend, goes to the oratorio




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

FIELDING'S BIRTHPLACE, SHARPHAM PARK.  _Frontispiece_

SHE THEN GAVE A LOOSE TO HER PASSION

THEY OPENED THE HAMPER

HE SEIZED HIM BY THE COLLAR




INTRODUCTION.


Fielding's third great novel has been the subject of much more
discordant judgments than either of its forerunners. If we take the
period since its appearance as covering four generations, we find the
greatest authority in the earliest, Johnson, speaking of it with
something more nearly approaching to enthusiasm than he allowed
himself in reference to any other work of an author, to whom he was on
the whole so unjust. The greatest man of letters of the next
generation, Scott (whose attitude to Fielding was rather undecided,
and seems to speak a mixture of intellectual admiration and moral
dislike, or at least failure in sympathy), pronounces it "on the whole
unpleasing," and regards it chiefly as a sequel to _Tom Jones_,
showing what is to be expected of a libertine and thoughtless husband.
But he too is enthusiastic over the heroine. Thackeray (whom in this
special connection at any rate it is scarcely too much to call the
greatest man of the third generation) overflows with predilection for
it, but chiefly, as it would seem, because of his affection for Amelia
herself, in which he practically agrees with Scott and Johnson. It
would be invidious, and is noways needful, to single out any critic of
our own time to place beside these great men. But it cannot be denied
that the book, now as always, has incurred a considerable amount of
hinted fault and hesitated dislike. Even Mr. Dobson notes some things
in it as "unsatisfactory;" Mr. Gosse, with evident consciousness of
temerity, ventures to ask whether it is not "a little dull." The very
absence of episodes (on the ground that Miss Matthews's story is too
closely connected with the main action to be fairly called an episode)
and of introductory dissertations has been brought against it, as the
presence of these things was brought against its forerunners.

I have sometimes wondered whether _Amelia_ pays the penalty of an
audacity which, _a priori_, its most unfavourable critics would
indignantly deny to be a fault. It begins instead of ending with the
marriage-bells; and though critic after critic of novels has exhausted
his indignation and his satire over the folly of insisting on these as
a finale, I doubt whether the demand is not too deeply rooted in the
English, nay, in the human mind, to be safely neglected. The essence
of all romance is a quest; the quest most perennially and universally
interesting to man is the quest of a wife or a mistress; and the
chapters dealing with what comes later have an inevitable flavour of
tameness, and of the day after the feast. It is not common now-a-days
to meet anybody who thinks Tommy Moore a great poet; one has to
encounter either a suspicion of Philistinism or a suspicion of paradox
if one tries to vindicate for him even his due place in the poetical
hierarchy. Yet I suspect that no poet ever put into words a more
universal criticism of life than he did when he wrote "I saw from the
beach," with its moral of--

"Give me back, give me back, the wild freshness of morning--Her smiles
and her tears are worth evening's best light."

If we discard this fallacy boldly, and ask ourselves whether _Amelia_
is or is not as good as _Joseph Andrews_ or _Tom Jones_, we shall I
think be inclined to answer rather in the affirmative than in the
negative. It is perhaps a little more easy to find fault with its
characters than with theirs; or rather, though no one of these
characters has the defects of Blifil or of Allworthy, it is easy to
say that no one of them has the charm of the best personages of the
earlier books. The idolaters of Amelia would of course exclaim at this
sentence as it regards that amiable lady; and I am myself by no means
disposed to rank amiability low in the scale of things excellent in
woman. But though she is by no means what her namesake and spiritual
grand-daughter. Miss Sedley, must, I fear, be pronounced to be, an
amiable fool, there is really too much of the milk of human kindness,
unrefreshed and unrelieved of its mawkishness by the rum or whisky of
human frailty, in her. One could have better pardoned her forgiveness
of her husband if she had in the first place been a little more
conscious of what there was to forgive; and in the second, a little
more romantic in her attachment to him. As it is, he was _son homme_;
he was handsome; he had broad shoulders; he had a sweet temper; he was
the father of her children, and that was enough. At least we are
allowed to see in Mr. Booth no qualities other than these, and in her
no imagination even of any other qualities. To put what I mean out of
reach of cavil, compare Imogen and Amelia, and the difference will be
felt.

But Fielding was a prose writer, writing in London in the eighteenth
century, while Shakespeare was a poet writing in all time and all
space, so that the comparison is luminous in more ways than one. I do
not think that in the special scheme which the novelist set himself
here he can be accused of any failure. The life is as vivid as ever;
the minor sketches may be even called a little more vivid. Dr Harrison
is not perfect. I do not mean that he has ethical faults, for that is
a merit, not a defect; but he is not quite perfect in art. His
alternate persecution and patronage of Booth, though useful to the
story, repeat the earlier fault of Allworthy, and are something of a
blot. But he is individually much more natural than Allworthy, and
indeed is something like what Dr Johnson would have been if he had
been rather better bred, less crotchety, and blessed with more health.
Miss Matthews in her earlier scenes has touches of greatness which a
thousand French novelists lavishing "candour" and reckless of
exaggeration have not equalled; and I believe that Fielding kept her
at a distance during the later scenes of the story, because he could
not trust himself not to make her more interesting than Amelia. Of the
peers, more wicked and less wicked, there is indeed not much good to
be said. The peer of the eighteenth-century writers (even when, as in
Fielding's case, there was no reason why they should "mention him with
_Kor_," as Policeman X. has it) is almost always a faint type of
goodness or wickedness dressed out with stars and ribbons and coaches-
and-six. Only Swift, by combination of experience and genius, has
given us live lords in Lord Sparkish and Lord Smart. But Mrs. Ellison
and Mrs. Atkinson are very women, and the serjeant, though the touch
of "sensibility" is on him, is excellent; and Dr Harrison's country
friend and his prig of a son are capital; and Bondum, and "the
author," and Robinson, and all the minor characters, are as good as
they can be.

It is, however, usual to detect a lack of vivacity in the book, an
evidence of declining health and years. It may be so; it is at least
certain that Fielding, during the composition of _Amelia,_ had much
less time to bestow upon elaborating his work than he had previously
had, and that his health was breaking. But are we perfectly sure that
if the chronological order had been different we should have
pronounced the same verdict? Had _Amelia_ come between _Joseph_ and
_Tom,_ how many of us might have committed ourselves to some such
sentence as this: "In _Amelia_ we see the youthful exuberances of
_Joseph Andrews_ corrected by a higher art; the adjustment of plot and
character arranged with a fuller craftsmanship; the genius which was
to find its fullest exemplification in _Tom Jones_ already displaying
maturity"? And do we not too often forget that a very short time--in
fact, barely three years--passed between the appearance of _Tom Jones_
and the appearance of _Amelia?_ that although we do not know how long
the earlier work had been in preparation, it is extremely improbable
that a man of Fielding's temperament, of his wants, of his known
habits and history, would have kept it when once finished long in his
desk? and that consequently between some scenes of _Tom Jones_ and
some scenes of _Amelia_ it is not improbable that there was no more
than a few months' interval? I do not urge these things in mitigation
of any unfavourable judgment against the later novel. I only ask--How
much of that unfavourable judgment ought in justice to be set down to
the fallacies connected with an imperfect appreciation of facts?

To me it is not so much a question of deciding whether I like _Amelia_
less, and if so, how much less, than the others, as a question what
part of the general conception of this great writer it supplies? I do
not think that we could fully understand Fielding without it; I do not
think that we could derive the full quantity of pleasure from him
without it. The exuberant romantic faculty of Joseph Andrews and its
pleasant satire; the mighty craftsmanship and the vast science of life
of _Tom Jones;_ the ineffable irony and logical grasp of _Jonathan
Wild_, might have left us with a slight sense of hardness, a vague
desire for unction, if it had not been for this completion of the
picture. We should not have known (for in the other books, with the
possible exception of Mrs. Fitzpatrick, the characters are a little
too determinately goats and sheep) how Fielding could draw _nuances_,
how he could project a mixed personage on the screen, if we had not
had Miss Matthews and Mrs. Atkinson--the last especially a figure full
of the finest strokes, and, as a rule, insufficiently done justice to
by critics.

And I have purposely left to the last a group of personages about whom
indeed there has been little question, but who are among the triumphs
of Fielding's art--the two Colonels and their connecting-link, the
wife of the one and the sister of the other. Colonel Bath has
necessarily united all suffrages. He is of course a very little
stagey; he reminds us that his author had had a long theatrical
apprenticeship: he is something too much _d'une piece_. But as a study
of the brave man who is almost more braggart than brave, of the
generous man who will sacrifice not only generosity but bare justice
to "a hogo of honour," he is admirable, and up to his time almost
unique. Ordinary writers and ordinary readers have never been quite
content to admit that bravery and braggadocio can go together, that
the man of honour may be a selfish pedant. People have been unwilling
to tell and to hear the whole truth even about Wolfe and Nelson, who
were both favourable specimens of the type; but Fielding the
infallible saw that type in its quiddity, and knew it, and registered
it for ever.

Less amusing but more delicately faithful and true are Colonel James
and his wife. They are both very good sort of people in a way, who
live in a lax and frivolous age, who have plenty of money, no
particular principle, no strong affection for each other, and little
individual character. They might have been--Mrs. James to some extent
is--quite estimable and harmless; but even as it is, they are not to
be wholly ill spoken of. Being what they are, Fielding has taken them,
and, with a relentlessness which Swift could hardly have exceeded, and
a good-nature which Swift rarely or never attained, has held them up
to us as dissected preparations of half-innocent meanness,
scoundrelism, and vanity, such as are hardly anywhere else to be
found. I have used the word "preparations," and it in part indicates
Fielding's virtue, a virtue shown, I think, in this book as much as
anywhere. But it does not fully indicate it; for the preparation, wet
or dry, is a dead thing, and a museum is but a mortuary. Fielding's
men and women, once more let it be said, are all alive. The palace of
his work is the hall, not of Eblis, but of a quite beneficent
enchanter, who puts burning hearts into his subjects, not to torture
them, but only that they may light up for us their whole organisation
and being. They are not in the least the worse for it, and we are
infinitely the better.

[Illustration.]

[Illustration.]




DEDICATION.

To RALPH ALLEN, ESQ.

SIR,--The following book is sincerely designed to promote the cause of
virtue, and to expose some of the most glaring evils, as well public
as private, which at present infest the country; though there is
scarce, as I remember, a single stroke of satire aimed at any one
person throughout the whole.

The best man is the properest patron of such an attempt. This, I
believe, will be readily granted; nor will the public voice, I think,
be more divided to whom they shall give that appellation. Should a
letter, indeed, be thus inscribed, DETUR OPTIMO, there are few persons
who would think it wanted any other direction.

I will not trouble you with a preface concerning the work, nor
endeavour to obviate any criticisms which can be made on it. The good-
natured reader, if his heart should be here affected, will be inclined
to pardon many faults for the pleasure he will receive from a tender
sensation: and for readers of a different stamp, the more faults they
can discover, the more, I am convinced, they will be pleased.

Nor will I assume the fulsome stile of common dedicators. I have not
their usual design in this epistle, nor will I borrow their language.
Long, very long may it be before a most dreadful circumstance shall
make it possible for any pen to draw a just and true character of
yourself without incurring a suspicion of flattery in the bosoms of
the malignant. This task, therefore, I shall defer till that day (if I
should be so unfortunate as ever to see it) when every good man shall
pay a tear for the satisfaction of his curiosity; a day which, at
present, I believe, there is but one good man in the world who can
think of it with unconcern.

Accept then, sir, this small token of that love, that gratitude, and
that respect, with which I shall always esteem it my GREATEST HONOUR
to be,

      Sir,
Your most obliged,
    and most obedient
        humble servant,
      HENRY FIELDING.

_Bow Street, Dec. 2, 1751._


[Illustration.]





AMELIA.

BOOK I.

Chapter i.

_Containing the exordium, &c._


The various accidents which befel a very worthy couple after their
uniting in the state of matrimony will be the subject of the following
history. The distresses which they waded through were some of them so
exquisite, and the incidents which produced these so extraordinary,
that they seemed to require not only the utmost malice, but the utmost
invention, which superstition hath ever attributed to Fortune: though
whether any such being interfered in the case, or, indeed, whether
there be any such being in the universe, is a matter which I by no
means presume to determine in the affirmative. To speak a bold truth,
I am, after much mature deliberation, inclined to suspect that the
public voice hath, in all ages, done much injustice to Fortune, and
hath convicted her of many facts in which she had not the least
concern. I question much whether we may not, by natural means, account
for the success of knaves, the calamities of fools, with all the
miseries in which men of sense sometimes involve themselves, by
quitting the directions of Prudence, and following the blind guidance
of a predominant passion; in short, for all the ordinary phenomena
which are imputed to Fortune; whom, perhaps, men accuse with no less
absurdity in life, than a bad player complains of ill luck at the game
of chess.

But if men are sometimes guilty of laying improper blame on this
imaginary being, they are altogether as apt to make her amends by
ascribing to her honours which she as little deserves. To retrieve the
ill consequences of a foolish conduct, and by struggling manfully with
distress to subdue it, is one of the noblest efforts of wisdom and
virtue. Whoever, therefore, calls such a man fortunate, is guilty of
no less impropriety in speech than he would be who should call the
statuary or the poet fortunate who carved a Venus or who writ an
Iliad.

Life may as properly be called an art as any other; and the great
incidents in it are no more to be considered as mere accidents than
the several members of a fine statue or a noble poem. The critics in
all these are not content with seeing anything to be great without
knowing why and how it came to be so. By examining carefully the
several gradations which conduce to bring every model to perfection,
we learn truly to know that science in which the model is formed: as
histories of this kind, therefore, may properly be called models of
_human life_, so, by observing minutely the several incidents which
tend to the catastrophe or completion of the whole, and the minute
causes whence those incidents are produced, we shall best be
instructed in this most useful of all arts, which I call the _art
_ of _life_.




Chapter ii

_The history sets out. Observations on the excellency of the English
constitution and curious examinations before a justice of peace._


On the first of April, in the year ----, the watchmen of a certain
parish (I know not particularly which) within the liberty of
Westminster brought several persons whom they had apprehended the
preceding night before Jonathan Thrasher, Esq., one of the justices of
the peace for that liberty.

But here, reader, before we proceed to the trials of these offenders,
we shall, after our usual manner, premise some things which it may be
necessary for thee to know.

It hath been observed, I think, by many, as well as the celebrated
writer of three letters, that no human institution is capable of
consummate perfection. An observation which, perhaps, that writer at
least gathered from discovering some defects in the polity even of
this well-regulated nation. And, indeed, if there should be any such
defect in a constitution which my Lord Coke long ago told us "the
wisdom of all the wise men in the world, if they had all met together
at one time, could not have equalled," which some of our wisest men
who were met together long before said was too good to be altered in
any particular, and which, nevertheless, hath been mending ever since,
by a very great number of the said wise men: if, I say, this
constitution should be imperfect, we may be allowed, I think, to doubt
whether any such faultless model can be found among the institutions
of men.

It will probably be objected, that the small imperfections which I am
about to produce do not lie in the laws themselves, but in the ill
execution of them; but, with submission, this appears to me to be no
less an absurdity than to say of any machine that it is excellently
made, though incapable of performing its functions. Good laws should
execute themselves in a well-regulated state; at least, if the same
legislature which provides the laws doth not provide for the execution
of them, they act as Graham would do, if he should form all the parts
of a clock in the most exquisite manner, yet put them so together that
the clock could not go. In this case, surely, we might say that there
was a small defect in the constitution of the clock.

To say the truth, Graham would soon see the fault, and would easily
remedy it. The fault, indeed, could be no other than that the parts
were improperly disposed.

Perhaps, reader, I have another illustration which will set my
intention in still a clearer light before you. Figure to yourself then
a family, the master of which should dispose of the several economical
offices in the following manner; viz. should put his butler in the
coach-box, his steward behind his coach, his coachman in the butlery,
and his footman in the stewardship, and in the same ridiculous manner
should misemploy the talents of every other servant; it is easy to see
what a figure such a family must make in the world.

As ridiculous as this may seem, I have often considered some of the
lower officers in our civil government to be disposed in this very
manner. To begin, I think, as low as I well can, with the watchmen in
our metropolis, who, being to guard our streets by night from thieves
and robbers, an office which at least requires strength of body, are
chosen out of those poor old decrepit people who are, from their want
of bodily strength, rendered incapable of getting a livelihood by
work. These men, armed only with a pole, which some of them are scarce
able to lift, are to secure the persons and houses of his majesty's
subjects from the attacks of gangs of young, bold, stout, desperate,
and well-armed villains.

     Quae non viribus istis
     Munera conveniunt.

If the poor old fellows should run away from such enemies, no one I
think can wonder, unless it be that they were able to make their
escape.

The higher we proceed among our public officers and magistrates, the
less defects of this kind will, perhaps, be observable. Mr. Thrasher,
however, the justice before whom the prisoners above mentioned were
now brought, had some few imperfections in his magistratical capacity.
I own, I have been sometimes inclined to think that this office of a
justice of peace requires some knowledge of the law: for this simple
reason; because, in every case which comes before him, he is to judge
and act according to law. Again, as these laws are contained in a
great variety of books, the statutes which relate to the office of a
justice of peace making of themselves at least two large volumes in
folio; and that part of his jurisdiction which is founded on the
common law being dispersed in above a hundred volumes, I cannot
conceive how this knowledge should by acquired without reading; and
yet certain it is, Mr. Thrasher never read one syllable of the matter.

This, perhaps, was a defect; but this was not all: for where mere
ignorance is to decide a point between two litigants, it will always
be an even chance whether it decides right or wrong: but sorry am I to
say, right was often in a much worse situation than this, and wrong
hath often had five hundred to one on his side before that magistrate;
who, if he was ignorant of the law of England, was yet well versed in
the laws of nature. He perfectly well understood that fundamental
principle so strongly laid down in the institutes of the learned
Rochefoucault, by which the duty of self-love is so strongly enforced,
and every man is taught to consider himself as the centre of gravity,
and to attract all things thither. To speak the truth plainly, the
justice was never indifferent in a cause but when he could get nothing
on either side.

Such was the justice to whose tremendous bar Mr. Gotobed the
constable, on the day above mentioned, brought several delinquents,
who, as we have said, had been apprehended by the watch for diverse
outrages.

The first who came upon his trial was as bloody a spectre as ever the
imagination of a murderer or a tragic poet conceived. This poor wretch
was charged with a battery by a much stouter man than himself; indeed
the accused person bore about him some evidence that he had been in an
affray, his cloaths being very bloody, but certain open sluices on his
own head sufficiently shewed whence all the scarlet stream had issued:
whereas the accuser had not the least mark or appearance of any wound.
The justice asked the defendant, What he meant by breaking the king's
peace?----To which he answered----"Upon my shoul I do love the king
very well, and I have not been after breaking anything of his that I
do know; but upon my shoul this man hath brake my head, and my head
did brake his stick; that is all, gra." He then offered to produce
several witnesses against this improbable accusation; but the justice
presently interrupted him, saying, "Sirrah, your tongue betrays your
guilt. You are an Irishman, and that is always sufficient evidence
with me."

The second criminal was a poor woman, who was taken up by the watch as
a street-walker. It was alleged against her that she was found walking
the streets after twelve o'clock, and the watchman declared he
believed her to be a common strumpet. She pleaded in her defence (as
was really the truth) that she was a servant, and was sent by her
mistress, who was a little shopkeeper and upon the point of delivery,
to fetch a midwife; which she offered to prove by several of the
neighbours, if she was allowed to send for them. The justice asked her
why she had not done it before? to which she answered, she had no
money, and could get no messenger. The justice then called her several
scurrilous names, and, declaring she was guilty within the statute of
street-walking, ordered her to Bridewell for a month.

A genteel young man and woman were then set forward, and a very grave-
looking person swore he caught them in a situation which we cannot as
particularly describe here as he did before the magistrate; who,
having received a wink from his clerk, declared with much warmth that
the fact was incredible and impossible. He presently discharged the
accused parties, and was going, without any evidence, to commit the
accuser for perjury; but this the clerk dissuaded him from, saying he
doubted whether a justice of peace had any such power. The justice at
first differed in opinion, and said, "He had seen a man stand in the
pillory about perjury; nay, he had known a man in gaol for it too; and
how came he there if he was not committed thither?" "Why, that is
true, sir," answered the clerk; "and yet I have been told by a very
great lawyer that a man cannot be committed for perjury before he is
indicted; and the reason is, I believe, because it is not against the
peace before the indictment makes it so." "Why, that may be," cries
the justice, "and indeed perjury is but scandalous words, and I know a
man cannot have no warrant for those, unless you put for rioting
[Footnote: _Opus est interprete._ By the laws of England abusive words
are not punishable by the magistrate; some commissioners of the peace,
therefore, when one scold hath applied to them for a warrant against
another, from a too eager desire of doing justice, have construed a
little harmless scolding into a riot, which is in law an outrageous
breach of the peace committed by several persons, by three at the
least, nor can a less number be convicted of it. Under this word
rioting, or riotting (for I have seen it spelt both ways), many
thousands of old women have been arrested and put to expense,
sometimes in prison, for a little intemperate use of their tongues.
This practice began to decrease in the year 1749.] them into the
warrant."

The witness was now about to be discharged, when the lady whom he had
accused declared she would swear the peace against him, for that he
had called her a whore several times. "Oho! you will swear the peace,
madam, will you?" cries the justice: "Give her the peace, presently;
and pray, Mr. Constable, secure the prisoner, now we have him, while a
warrant is made to take him up." All which was immediately performed,
and the poor witness, for want of securities, was sent to prison.

A young fellow, whose name was Booth, was now charged with beating the
watchman in the execution of his office and breaking his lanthorn.
This was deposed by two witnesses; and the shattered remains of a
broken lanthorn, which had been long preserved for the sake of its
testimony, were produced to corroborate the evidence. The justice,
perceiving the criminal to be but shabbily drest, was going to commit
him without asking any further questions. At length, however, at the
earnest request of the accused, the worthy magistrate submitted to
hear his defence. The young man then alledged, as was in reality the
case, "That as he was walking home to his lodging he saw two men in
the street cruelly beating a third, upon which he had stopt and
endeavoured to assist the person who was so unequally attacked; that
the watch came up during the affray, and took them all four into
custody; that they were immediately carried to the round-house, where
the two original assailants, who appeared to be men of fortune, found
means to make up the matter, and were discharged by the constable, a
favour which he himself, having no money in his pocket, was unable to
obtain. He utterly denied having assaulted any of the watchmen, and
solemnly declared that he was offered his liberty at the price of half
a crown."

Though the bare word of an offender can never be taken against the
oath of his accuser, yet the matter of this defence was so pertinent,
and delivered with such an air of truth and sincerity, that, had the
magistrate been endued with much sagacity, or had he been very
moderately gifted with another quality very necessary to all who are
to administer justice, he would have employed some labour in cross-
examining the watchmen; at least he would have given the defendant the
time he desired to send for the other persons who were present at the
affray; neither of which he did. In short, the magistrate had too
great an honour for truth to suspect that she ever appeared in sordid
apparel; nor did he ever sully his sublime notions of that virtue by
uniting them with the mean ideas of poverty and distress.

There remained now only one prisoner, and that was the poor man
himself in whose defence the last-mentioned culprit was engaged. His
trial took but a very short time. A cause of battery and broken
lanthorn was instituted against him, and proved in the same manner;
nor would the justice hear one word in defence; but, though his
patience was exhausted, his breath was not; for against this last
wretch he poured forth a great many volleys of menaces and abuse.

The delinquents were then all dispatched to prison under a guard of
watchmen, and the justice and the constable adjourned to a
neighbouring alehouse to take their morning repast.




Chapter iii.

_Containing the inside of a prison._


Mr. Booth (for we shall not trouble you with the rest) was no sooner
arrived in the prison than a number of persons gathered round him, all
demanding garnish; to which Mr. Booth not making a ready answer, as
indeed he did not understand the word, some were going to lay hold of
him, when a person of apparent dignity came up and insisted that no
one should affront the gentleman. This person then, who was no less
than the master or keeper of the prison, turning towards Mr. Booth,
acquainted him that it was the custom of the place for every prisoner
upon his first arrival there to give something to the former prisoners
to make them drink. This, he said, was what they call garnish, and
concluded with advising his new customer to draw his purse upon the
present occasion. Mr. Booth answered that he would very readily comply
with this laudable custom, was it in his power; but that in reality he
had not a shilling in his pocket, and, what was worse, he had not a
shilling in the world.--"Oho! if that be the case," cries the keeper,
"it is another matter, and I have nothing to say." Upon which he
immediately departed, and left poor Booth to the mercy of his
companions, who without loss of time applied themselves to uncasing,
as they termed it, and with such dexterity, that his coat was not only
stript off, but out of sight in a minute.

Mr. Booth was too weak to resist and too wise to complain of this
usage. As soon, therefore, as he was at liberty, and declared free of
the place, he summoned his philosophy, of which he had no
inconsiderable share, to his assistance, and resolved to make himself
as easy as possible under his present circumstances.

Could his own thoughts indeed have suffered him a moment to forget
where he was, the dispositions of the other prisoners might have
induced him to believe that he had been in a happier place: for much
the greater part of his fellow-sufferers, instead of wailing and
repining at their condition, were laughing, singing, and diverting
themselves with various kinds of sports and gambols.

The first person v/ho accosted him was called Blear-eyed Moll, a woman
of no very comely appearance. Her eye (for she had but one), whence
she derived her nickname, was such as that nickname bespoke; besides
which, it had two remarkable qualities; for first, as if Nature had
been careful to provide for her own defect, it constantly looked
towards her blind side; and secondly, the ball consisted almost
entirely of white, or rather yellow, with a little grey spot in the
corner, so small that it was scarce discernible. Nose she had none;
for Venus, envious perhaps at her former charms, had carried off the
gristly part; and some earthly damsel, perhaps, from the same envy,
had levelled the bone with the rest of her face: indeed it was far
beneath the bones of her cheeks, which rose proportionally higher than
is usual. About half a dozen ebony teeth fortified that large and long
canal which nature had cut from ear to ear, at the bottom of which was
a chin preposterously short, nature having turned up the bottom,
instead of suffering it to grow to its due length.

Her body was well adapted to her face; she measured full as much round
the middle as from head to foot; for, besides the extreme breadth of
her back, her vast breasts had long since forsaken their native home,
and had settled themselves a little below the girdle.

I wish certain actresses on the stage, when they are to perform
characters of no amiable cast, would study to dress themselves with
the propriety with which Blear-eyed Moll was now arrayed. For the sake
of our squeamish reader, we shall not descend to particulars; let it
suffice to say, nothing more ragged or more dirty was ever emptied out
of the round-house at St Giles's.

We have taken the more pains to describe this person, for two
remarkable reasons; the one is, that this unlovely creature was taken
in the fact with a very pretty young fellow; the other, which is more
productive of moral lesson, is, that however wretched her fortune may
appear to the reader, she was one of the merriest persons in the whole
prison.

Blear-eyed Moll then came up to Mr. Booth with a smile, or rather
grin, on her countenance, and asked him for a dram of gin; and when
Booth assured her that he had not a penny of money, she replied--"D--n
your eyes, I thought by your look you had been a clever fellow, and
upon the snaffling lay [Footnote: A cant term for robbery on the
highway] at least; but, d--n your body and eyes, I find you are some
sneaking budge [Footnote: Another cant term for pilfering] rascal." She
then launched forth a volley of dreadful oaths, interlarded with some
language not proper to be repeated here, and was going to lay hold on
poor Booth, when a tall prisoner, who had been very earnestly eying
Booth for some time, came up, and, taking her by the shoulder, flung
her off at some distance, cursing her for a b--h, and bidding her let
the gentleman alone.

This person was not himself of the most inviting aspect. He was long-
visaged, and pale, with a red beard of above a fortnight's growth. He
was attired in a brownish-black coat, which would have shewed more
holes than it did, had not the linen, which appeared through it, been
entirely of the same colour with the cloth.

This gentleman, whose name was Robinson, addressed himself very
civilly to Mr. Booth, and told him he was sorry to see one of his
appearance in that place: "For as to your being without your coat,
sir," says he, "I can easily account for that; and, indeed, dress is
the least part which distinguishes a gentleman." At which words he
cast a significant look on his own coat, as if he desired they should
be applied to himself. He then proceeded in the following manner:

"I perceive, sir, you are but just arrived in this dismal place, which
is, indeed, rendered more detestable by the wretches who inhabit it
than by any other circumstance; but even these a wise man will soon
bring himself to bear with indifference; for what is, is; and what
must be, must be. The knowledge of this, which, simple as it appears,
is in truth the heighth of all philosophy, renders a wise man superior
to every evil which can befall him. I hope, sir, no very dreadful
accident is the cause of your coming hither; but, whatever it was, you
may be assured it could not be otherwise; for all things happen by an
inevitable fatality; and a man can no more resist the impulse of fate
than a wheelbarrow can the force of its driver."

Besides the obligation which Mr. Robinson had conferred on Mr. Booth
in delivering him from the insults of Blear-eyed Moll, there was
something in the manner of Robinson which, notwithstanding the
meanness of his dress, seemed to distinguish him from the crowd of
wretches who swarmed in those regions; and, above all, the sentiments
which he had just declared very nearly coincided with those of Mr.
Booth: this gentleman was what they call a freethinker; that is to
say, a deist, or, perhaps, an atheist; for, though he did not
absolutely deny the existence of a God, yet he entirely denied his
providence. A doctrine which, if it is not downright atheism, hath a
direct tendency towards it; and, as Dr Clarke observes, may soon be
driven into it. And as to Mr. Booth, though he was in his heart an
extreme well-wisher to religion (for he was an honest man), yet his
notions of it were very slight and uncertain. To say truth, he was in
the wavering condition so finely described by Claudian:

                          labefacta cadelat
     Religio, causaeque--viam non sponte sequebar
     Alterius; vacua quae currere semina motu
     Affirmat; magnumque novas fer inane figures
     Fortuna, non arte, regi; quae numina sensu
     Ambiguo, vel nulla futat, vel nescia nostri.

This way of thinking, or rather of doubting, he had contracted from
the same reasons which Claudian assigns, and which had induced Brutus
in his latter days to doubt the existence of that virtue which he had
all his life cultivated. In short, poor Booth imagined that a larger
share of misfortunes had fallen to his lot than he had merited; and
this led him, who (though a good classical scholar) was not deeply
learned in religious matters, into a disadvantageous opinion of
Providence. A dangerous way of reasoning, in which our conclusions are
not only too hasty, from an imperfect view of things, but we are
likewise liable to much error from partiality to ourselves; viewing
our virtues and vices as through a perspective, in which we turn the
glass always to our own advantage, so as to diminish the one, and as
greatly to magnify the other.

From the above reasons, it can be no wonder that Mr. Booth did not
decline the acquaintance of this person, in a place which could not
promise to afford him any better. He answered him, therefore, with
great courtesy, as indeed he was of a very good and gentle
disposition, and, after expressing a civil surprize at meeting him
there, declared himself to be of the same opinion with regard to the
necessity of human actions; adding, however, that he did not believe
men were under any blind impulse or direction of fate, but that every
man acted merely from the force of that passion which was uppermost in
his mind, and could do no otherwise.

A discourse now ensued between the two gentlemen on the necessity
arising from the impulse of fate, and the necessity arising from the
impulse of passion, which, as it will make a pretty pamphlet of
itself, we shall reserve for some future opportunity. When this was
ended they set forward to survey the gaol and the prisoners, with the
several cases of whom Mr. Robinson, who had been some time under
confinement, undertook to make Mr. Booth acquainted.




Chapter iv.

_Disclosing further secrets of the prison-house._


The first persons whom they passed by were three men in fetters, who
were enjoying themselves very merrily over a bottle of wine and a pipe
of tobacco. These, Mr. Robinson informed his friend, were three
street-robbers, and were all certain of being hanged the ensuing
sessions. So inconsiderable an object, said he, is misery to light
minds, when it is at any distance.

A little farther they beheld a man prostrate on the ground, whose
heavy groans and frantic actions plainly indicated the highest
disorder of mind. This person was, it seems, committed for a small
felony; and his wife, who then lay-in, upon hearing the news, had
thrown herself from a window two pair of stairs high, by which means
he had, in all probability, lost both her and his child.

A very pretty girl then advanced towards them, whose beauty Mr. Booth
could not help admiring the moment he saw her; declaring, at the same
time, he thought she had great innocence in her countenance. Robinson
said she was committed thither as an idle and disorderly person, and a
common street-walker. As she past by Mr. Booth, she damned his eyes,
and discharged a volley of words, every one of which was too indecent
to be repeated.

They now beheld a little creature sitting by herself in a corner, and
crying bitterly. This girl, Mr. Robinson said, was committed because
her father-in-law, who was in the grenadier guards, had sworn that he
was afraid of his life, or of some bodily harm which she would do him,
and she could get no sureties for keeping the peace; for which reason
justice Thrasher had committed her to prison.

A great noise now arose, occasioned by the prisoners all flocking to
see a fellow whipt for petty larceny, to which he was condemned by the
court of quarter-sessions; but this soon ended in the disappointment
of the spectators; for the fellow, after being stript, having advanced
another sixpence, was discharged untouched.

This was immediately followed by another bustle; Blear-eyed Moll, and
several of her companions, having got possession of a man who was
committed for certain odious unmanlike practices, not fit to be named,
were giving him various kinds of discipline, and would probably have
put an end to him, had he not been rescued out of their hands by
authority.

When this bustle was a little allayed, Mr. Booth took notice of a
young woman in rags sitting on the ground, and supporting the head of
an old man in her lap, who appeared to be giving up the ghost. These,
Mr. Robinson informed him, were father and daughter; that the latter
was committed for stealing a loaf, in order to support the former, and
the former for receiving it, knowing it to be stolen.

A well-drest man then walked surlily by them, whom Mr. Robinson
reported to have been committed on an indictment found against him for
a most horrid perjury; but, says he, we expect him to be bailed today.
"Good Heaven!" cries Booth, "can such villains find bail, and is no
person charitable enough to bail that poor father and daughter?" "Oh!
sir," answered Robinson, "the offence of the daughter, being felony,
is held not to be bailable in law; whereas perjury is a misdemeanor
only; and therefore persons who are even indicted for it are,
nevertheless, capable of being bailed. Nay, of all perjuries, that of
which this man is indicted is the worst; for it was with an intention
of taking away the life of an innocent person by form of law. As to
perjuries in civil matters, they are not so very criminal." "They are
not," said Booth; "and yet even these are a most flagitious offence,
and worthy the highest punishment." "Surely they ought to be
distinguished," answered Robinson, "from the others: for what is
taking away a little property from a man, compared to taking away his
life and his reputation, and ruining his family into the bargain?--I
hope there can be no comparison in the crimes, and I think there ought
to be none in the punishment. However, at present, the punishment of
all perjury is only pillory and transportation for seven years; and,
as it is a traversable and bailable offence, methods are found to
escape any punishment at all."[Footnote: By removing the indictment by
_certiorari_ into the King's Bench, the trial is so long postponed,
and the costs are so highly encreased, that prosecutors are often
tired out, and some incapacitated from pursuing. _Verbum sapienti._]

Booth exprest great astonishment at this, when his attention was
suddenly diverted by the most miserable object that he had yet seen.
This was a wretch almost naked, and who bore in his countenance,
joined to an appearance of honesty, the marks of poverty, hunger, and
disease. He had, moreover, a wooden leg, and two or three scars on his
forehead. "The case of this poor man is, indeed, unhappy enough," said
Robinson. "He hath served his country, lost his limb, and received
several wounds at the siege of Gibraltar. When he was discharged from
the hospital abroad he came over to get into that of Chelsea, but
could not immediately, as none of his officers were then in England.
In the mean time, he was one day apprehended and committed hither on
suspicion of stealing three herrings from a fishmonger. He was tried
several months ago for this offence, and acquitted; indeed, his
innocence manifestly appeared at the trial; but he was brought back
again for his fees, and here he hath lain ever since."

Booth exprest great horror at this account, and declared, if he had
only so much money in his pocket, he would pay his fees for him; but
added that he was not possessed of a single farthing in the world.

Robinson hesitated a moment, and then said, with a smile, "I am going
to make you, sir, a very odd proposal after your last declaration; but
what say you to a game at cards? it will serve to pass a tedious hour,
and may divert your thoughts from more unpleasant speculations."

I do not imagine Booth would have agreed to this; for, though some
love of gaming had been formerly amongst his faults, yet he was not so
egregiously addicted to that vice as to be tempted by the shabby
plight of Robinson, who had, if I may so express myself, no charms for
a gamester. If he had, however, any such inclinations, he had no
opportunity to follow them, for, before he could make any answer to
Robinson's proposal, a strapping wench came up to Booth, and, taking
hold of his arm, asked him to walk aside with her; saying, "What a
pox, are you such a fresh cull that you do not know this fellow? why,
he is a gambler, and committed for cheating at play. There is not such
a pickpocket in the whole quad."[Footnote: A cant word for a prison.]

A scene of altercation now ensued between Robinson and the lady, which
ended in a bout at fisticuffs, in which the lady was greatly superior
to the philosopher.

While the two combatants were engaged, a grave-looking man, rather
better drest than the majority of the company, came up to Mr. Booth,
and, taking him aside, said, "I am sorry, sir, to see a gentleman, as
you appear to be, in such intimacy with that rascal, who makes no
scruple of disowning all revealed religion. As for crimes, they are
human errors, and signify but little; nay, perhaps the worse a man is
by nature, the more room there is for grace. The spirit is active, and
loves best to inhabit those minds where it may meet with the most
work. Whatever your crime be, therefore I would not have you despair,
but rather rejoice at it; for perhaps it may be the means of your
being called." He ran on for a considerable time with this cant,
without waiting for an answer, and ended in declaring himself a
methodist.

Just as the methodist had finished his discourse, a beautiful young
woman was ushered into the gaol. She was genteel and well drest, and
did not in the least resemble those females whom Mr. Booth had
hitherto seen. The constable had no sooner delivered her at the gate
than she asked with a commanding voice for the keeper; and, when he
arrived, she said to him, "Well, sir, whither am I to be conducted? I
hope I am not to take up my lodging with these creatures." The keeper
answered, with a kind of surly respect, "Madam, we have rooms for
those who can afford to pay for them." At these words she pulled a
handsome purse from her pocket, in which many guineas chinked, saying,
with an air of indignation, "That she was not come thither on account
of poverty." The keeper no sooner viewed the purse than his features
became all softened in an instant; and, with all the courtesy of which
he was master, he desired the lady to walk with him, assuring her that
she should have the best apartment in his house.

Mr. Booth was now left alone; for the methodist had forsaken him,
having, as the phrase of the sect is, searched him to the bottom. In
fact, he had thoroughly examined every one of Mr. Booth's pockets;
from which he had conveyed away a penknife and an iron snuff-box,
these being all the moveables which were to be found.

Booth was standing near the gate of the prison when the young lady
above mentioned was introduced into the yard. He viewed her features
very attentively, and was persuaded that he knew her. She was indeed
so remarkably handsome, that it was hardly possible for any who had
ever seen her to forget her. He enquired of one of the underkeepers if
the name of the prisoner lately arrived was not Matthews; to which he
was answered that her name was not Matthews but Vincent, and that she
was committed for murder.

The latter part of this information made Mr. Booth suspect his memory
more than the former; for it was very possible that she might have
changed her name; but he hardly thought she could so far have changed
her nature as to be guilty of a crime so very incongruous with her
former gentle manners: for Miss Matthews had both the birth and
education of a gentlewoman. He concluded, therefore, that he was
certainly mistaken, and rested satisfied without any further enquiry.




Chapter v.

_Containing certain adventures which befel Mr. Booth in the prison._


The remainder of the day Mr. Booth spent in melancholy contemplation
on his present condition. He was destitute of the common necessaries
of life, and consequently unable to subsist where he was; nor was
there a single person in town to whom he could, with any reasonable
hope, apply for his delivery. Grief for some time banished the
thoughts of food from his mind; but in the morning nature began to
grow uneasy for want of her usual nourishment: for he had not eat a
morsel during the last forty hours. A penny loaf, which is, it seems,
the ordinary allowance to the prisoners in Bridewell, was now
delivered him; and while he was eating this a man brought him a little
packet sealed up, informing him that it came by a messenger, who said
it required no answer.

Mr. Booth now opened his packet, and, after unfolding several pieces
of blank paper successively, at last discovered a guinea, wrapt with
great care in the inmost paper. He was vastly surprized at this sight,
as he had few if any friends from whom he could expect such a favour,
slight as it was; and not one of his friends, as he was apprized, knew
of his confinement. As there was no direction to the packet, nor a
word of writing contained in it, he began to suspect that it was
delivered to the wrong person; and being one of the most untainted
honesty, he found out the man who gave it him, and again examined him
concerning the person who brought it, and the message delivered with
it. The man assured Booth that he had made no mistake; saying, "If
your name is Booth, sir, I am positive you are the gentleman to whom
the parcel I gave you belongs."

The most scrupulous honesty would, perhaps, in such a situation, have
been well enough satisfied in finding no owner for the guinea;
especially when proclamation had been made in the prison that Mr.
Booth had received a packet without any direction, to which, if any
person had any claim, and would discover the contents, he was ready to
deliver it to such claimant. No such claimant being found (I mean none
who knew the contents; for many swore that they expected just such a
packet, and believed it to be their property), Mr. Booth very calmly
resolved to apply the money to his own use.

The first thing after redemption of the coat, which Mr. Booth, hungry
as he was, thought of, was to supply himself with snuff, which he had
long, to his great sorrow, been without. On this occasion he presently
missed that iron box which the methodist had so dexterously conveyed
out of his pocket, as we mentioned in the last chapter.

He no sooner missed this box than he immediately suspected that the
gambler was the person who had stolen it; nay, so well was he assured
of this man's guilt, that it may, perhaps, be improper to say he
barely suspected it. Though Mr. Booth was, as we have hinted, a man of
a very sweet disposition, yet was he rather overwarm. Having,
therefore, no doubt concerning the person of the thief, he eagerly
sought him out, and very bluntly charged him with the fact.

The gambler, whom I think we should now call the philosopher, received
this charge without the least visible emotion either of mind or
muscle. After a short pause of a few moments, he answered, with great
solemnity, as follows: "Young man, I am entirely unconcerned at your
groundless suspicion. He that censures a stranger, as I am to you,
without any cause, makes a worse compliment to himself than to the
stranger. You know yourself, friend; you know not me. It is true,
indeed, you heard me accused of being a cheat and a gamester; but who
is my accuser? Look at my apparel, friend; do thieves and gamesters
wear such cloaths as these? play is my folly, not my vice; it is my
impulse, and I have been a martyr to it. Would a gamester have asked
another to play when he could have lost eighteen-pence and won
nothing? However, if you are not satisfied, you may search my pockets;
the outside of all but one will serve your turn, and in that one there
is the eighteen-pence I told you of." He then turned up his cloaths;
and his pockets entirely resembled the pitchers of the Belides.

Booth was a little staggered at this defence. He said the real value
of the iron box was too inconsiderable to mention; but that he had a
capricious value for it, for the sake of the person who gave it him;
"for, though it is not," said he, "worth sixpence, I would willingly
give a crown to any one who would bring it me again."

Robinson answered, "If that be the case, you have nothing more to do
but to signify your intention in the prison, and I am well convinced
you will not be long without regaining the possession of your snuff-
box."

This advice was immediately followed, and with success, the methodist
presently producing the box, which, he said, he had found, and should
have returned it before, had he known the person to whom it belonged;
adding, with uplifted eyes, that the spirit would not suffer him
knowingly to detain the goods of another, however inconsiderable the
value was. "Why so, friend?" said Robinson. "Have I not heard you
often say, the wickeder any man was the better, provided he was what
you call a believer?" "You mistake me," cries Cooper (for that was the
name of the methodist): "no man can be wicked after he is possessed by
the spirit. There is a wide difference between the days of sin and the
days of grace. I have been a sinner myself." "I believe thee," cries
Robinson, with a sneer. "I care not," answered the other, "what an
atheist believes. I suppose you would insinuate that I stole the
snuff-box; but I value not your malice; the Lord knows my innocence."
He then walked off with the reward; and Booth, turning to Robinson,
very earnestly asked pardon for his groundless suspicion; which the
other, without any hesitation, accorded him, saying, "You never
accused me, sir; you suspected some gambler, with whose character I
have no concern. I should be angry with a friend or acquaintance who
should give a hasty credit to any allegation against me; but I have no
reason to be offended with you for believing what the woman, and the
rascal who is just gone, and who is committed here for a pickpocket,
which you did not perhaps know, told you to my disadvantage. And if
you thought me to be a gambler you had just reason to suspect any ill
of me; for I myself am confined here by the perjury of one of those
villains, who, having cheated me of my money at play, and hearing that
I intended to apply to a magistrate against him, himself began the
attack, and obtained a warrant against me of Justice Thrasher, who,
without hearing one speech in my defence, committed me to this place."

Booth testified great compassion at this account; and, he having
invited Robinson to dinner, they spent that day together. In the
afternoon Booth indulged his friend with a game at cards; at first for
halfpence and afterwards for shillings, when fortune so favoured
Robinson that he did not leave the other a single shilling in his
pocket.

A surprizing run of luck in a gamester is often mistaken for somewhat
else by persons who are not over-zealous believers in the divinity of
fortune. I have known a stranger at Bath, who hath happened
fortunately (I might almost say unfortunately) to have four by honours
in his hand almost every time he dealt for a whole evening, shunned
universally by the whole company the next day. And certain it is, that
Mr. Booth, though of a temper very little inclined to suspicion, began
to waver in his opinion whether the character given by Mr. Robinson of
himself, or that which the others gave of him, was the truer.

In the morning hunger paid him a second visit, and found him again in
the same situation as before. After some deliberation, therefore, he
resolved to ask Robinson to lend him a shilling or two of that money
which was lately his own. And this experiments he thought, would
confirm him either in a good or evil opinion of that gentleman.

To this demand Robinson answered, with great alacrity, that he should
very gladly have complied, had not fortune played one of her jade
tricks with him: "for since my winning of you," said he, "I have been
stript not only of your money but my own." He was going to harangue
farther; but Booth, with great indignation, turned from him.

This poor gentleman had very little time to reflect on his own misery,
or the rascality, as it appeared to him, of the other, when the same
person who had the day before delivered him the guinea from the
unknown hand, again accosted him, and told him a lady in the house (so
he expressed himself) desired the favour of his company.

Mr. Booth immediately obeyed the message, and was conducted into a
room in the prison, where he was presently convinced that Mrs. Vincent
was no other than his old acquaintance Miss Matthews.




Chapter vi

_Containing the extraordinary behaviour of Miss Matthews on her
meeting with Booth, and some endeavours to prove, by reason and
authority, that it is possible for a woman to appear to be what she
really is not._


Eight or nine years had past since any interview between Mr. Booth and
Miss Matthews; and their meeting now in so extraordinary a place
affected both of them with an equal surprize.

After some immaterial ceremonies, the lady acquainted Mr. Booth that,
having heard there was a person in the prison who knew her by the name
of Matthews, she had great curiosity to inquire who he was, whereupon
he had been shewn to her from the window of the house; that she
immediately recollected him, and, being informed of his distressful
situation, for which she expressed great concern, she had sent him
that guinea which he had received the day before; and then proceeded
to excuse herself for not having desired to see him at that time, when
she was under the greatest disorder and hurry of spirits.

Booth made many handsome acknowledgments of her favour; and added that
he very little wondered at the disorder of her spirits, concluding
that he was heartily concerned at seeing her there; "but I hope,
madam," said he--

Here he hesitated; upon which, bursting into an agony of tears, she
cried out, "O captain! captain! many extraordinary things have passed
since last I saw you. O gracious heaven! did I ever expect that this
would be the next place of our meeting?"

She then flung herself into her chair, where she gave a loose to her
passion, whilst he, in the most affectionate and tender manner,
endeavoured to soothe and comfort her; but passion itself did probably
more for its own relief than all his friendly consolations. Having
vented this in a large flood of tears, she became pretty well
composed; but Booth unhappily mentioning her father, she again
relapsed into an agony, and cried out, "Why? why will you repeat the
name of that dear man? I have disgraced him, Mr. Booth, I am unworthy
the name of his daughter."--Here passion again stopped her words, and
discharged itself in tears.

After this second vent of sorrow or shame, or, if the reader pleases,
of rage, she once more recovered from her agonies. To say the truth,
these are, I believe, as critical discharges of nature as any of those
which are so called by the physicians, and do more effectually relieve
the mind than any remedies with which the whole materia medica of
philosophy can supply it.

When Mrs. Vincent had recovered her faculties, she perceived Booth
standing silent, with a mixture of concern and astonishment in his
countenance; then addressing herself to him with an air of most
bewitching softness, of which she was a perfect mistress, she said, "I
do not wonder at your amazement, Captain Booth, nor indeed at the
concern which you so plainly discover for me; for I well know the
goodness of your nature: but, O, Mr. Booth! believe me, when you know
what hath happened since our last meeting, your concern will be
raised, however your astonishment may cease. O, sir! you are a
stranger to the cause of my sorrows."

"I hope I am, madam," answered he; "for I cannot believe what I have
heard in the prison--surely murder"--at which words she started from
her chair, repeating, "Murder! oh! it is music in my ears!--You have
heard then the cause of my commitment, my glory, my delight, my
reparation! Yes, my old friend, this is the hand, this is the arm that
drove the penknife to his heart. Unkind fortune, that not one drop of
his blood reached my hand.--Indeed, sir, I would never have washed it
from it.--But, though I have not the happiness to see it on my hand, I
have the glorious satisfaction of remembering I saw it run in rivers
on the floor; I saw it forsake his cheeks, I saw him fall a martyr to
my revenge. And is the killing a villain to be called murder? perhaps
the law calls it so.--Let it call it what it will, or punish me as it
pleases.---Punish me!--no, no---that is not in the power of man--not
of that monster man, Mr. Booth. I am undone, am revenged, and have now
no more business for life; let them take it from me when they will."

Our poor gentleman turned pale with horror at this speech, and the
ejaculation of "Good heavens! what do I hear?" burst spontaneously
from his lips; nor can we wonder at this, though he was the bravest of
men; for her voice, her looks, her gestures, were properly adapted to
the sentiments she exprest. Such indeed was her image, that neither
could Shakspear describe, nor Hogarth paint, nor Clive act, a fury in
higher perfection.

[Illustration: She then gave a loose to her passions]

"What do you hear?" reiterated she. "You hear the resentment of the
most injured of women. You have heard, you say, of the murder; but do
you know the cause, Mr. Booth? Have you since your return to England
visited that country where we formerly knew one another? tell me, do
you know my wretched story? tell me that, my friend."

Booth hesitated for an answer; indeed, he had heard some imperfect
stories, not much to her advantage. She waited not till he had formed
a speech; but cried, "Whatever you may have heard, you cannot be
acquainted with all the strange accidents which have occasioned your
seeing me in a place which at our last parting was so unlikely that I
should ever have been found in; nor can you know the cause of all that
I have uttered, and which, I am convinced, you never expected to have
heard from my mouth. If these circumstances raise your curiosity, I
will satisfy it."

He answered, that curiosity was too mean a word to express his ardent
desire of knowing her story. Upon which, with very little previous
ceremony, she began to relate what is written in the following
chapter.

But before we put an end to this it may be necessary to whisper a word
or two to the critics, who have, perhaps, begun to express no less
astonishment than Mr. Booth, that a lady in whom we had remarked a
most extraordinary power of displaying softness should, the very next
moment after the words were out of her mouth, express sentiments
becoming the lips of a Dalila, Jezebel, Medea, Semiramis, Parysatis,
Tanaquil, Livilla, Messalina, Agrippina, Brunichilde, Elfrida, Lady
Macbeth, Joan of Naples, Christina of Sweden, Katharine Hays, Sarah
Malcolm, Con Philips,[Footnote: Though last not least.] or any other
heroine of the tender sex, which history, sacred or profane, ancient
or modern, false or true, hath recorded.

We desire such critics to remember that it is the same English
climate, in which, on the lovely 10th of June, under a serene sky, the
amorous Jacobite, kissing the odoriferous zephyr's breath, gathers a
nosegay of white roses to deck the whiter breast of Celia; and in
which, on the 11th of June, the very next day, the boisterous Boreas,
roused by the hollow thunder, rushes horrible through the air, and,
driving the wet tempest before him, levels the hope of the husbandman
with the earth, dreadful remembrance of the consequences of the
Revolution.

Again, let it be remembered that this is the selfsame Celia, all
tender, soft, and delicate, who with a voice, the sweetness of which
the Syrens might envy, warbles the harmonious song in praise of the
young adventurer; and again, the next day, or, perhaps the next hour,
with fiery eyes, wrinkled brows, and foaming lips, roars forth treason
and nonsense in a political argument with some fair one of a different
principle.

Or, if the critic be a Whig, and consequently dislikes such kind of
similes, as being too favourable to Jacobitism, let him be contented
with the following story:

I happened in my youth to sit behind two ladies in a side-box at a
play, where, in the balcony on the opposite side, was placed the
inimitable B---y C---s, in company with a young fellow of no very
formal, or indeed sober, appearance. One of the ladies, I remember,
said to the other--"Did you ever see anything look so modest and so
innocent as that girl over the way? what pity it is such a creature
should be in the way of ruin, as I am afraid she is, by her being
alone with that young fellow!" Now this lady was no bad physiognomist,
for it was impossible to conceive a greater appearance of modesty,
innocence, and simplicity, than what nature had displayed in the
countenance of that girl; and yet, all appearances notwithstanding, I
myself (remember, critic, it was in my youth) had a few mornings
before seen that very identical picture of all those engaging
qualities in bed with a rake at a bagnio, smoaking tobacco, drinking
punch, talking obscenity, and swearing and cursing with all the
impudence and impiety of the lowest and most abandoned trull of a
soldier.




Chapter vii.

_In which Miss Matthews begins her history._


Miss Matthews, having barred the door on the inside as securely as it
was before barred on the outside, proceeded as follows:

"You may imagine I am going to begin my history at the time when you
left the country; but I cannot help reminding you of something which
happened before. You will soon recollect the incident; but I believe
you little know the consequence either at that time or since. Alas! I
could keep a secret then! now I have no secrets; the world knows all;
and it is not worth my while to conceal anything. Well!--You will not
wonder, I believe.--I protest I can hardly tell it you, even now.---
But I am convinced you have too good an opinion of yourself to be
surprized at any conquest you may have made.---Few men want that good
opinion--and perhaps very few had ever more reason for it. Indeed,
Will, you was a charming fellow in those days; nay, you are not much
altered for the worse now, at least in the opinion of some women; for
your complexion and features are grown much more masculine than they
were." Here Booth made her a low bow, most probably with a compliment;
and after a little hesitation she again proceeded.---"Do you remember
a contest which happened at an assembly, betwixt myself and Miss
Johnson, about standing uppermost? you was then my partner; and young
Williams danced with the other lady. The particulars are not now worth
mentioning, though I suppose you have long since forgot them. Let it
suffice that you supported my claim, and Williams very sneakingly gave
up that of his partner, who was, with much difficulty, afterwards
prevailed to dance with him. You said--I am sure I repeat the words
exactly--that you would not for the world affront any lady there; but
that you thought you might, without any such danger declare, that
there was no assembly in which that lady, meaning your humble servant,
was not worthy of the uppermost place; 'nor will I,' said you,
'suffer, the first duke in England, when she is at the uppermost end
of the room, and hath called her dance, to lead his partner above
her.'

"What made this the more pleasing to me was, that I secretly hated
Miss Johnson. Will you have the reason? why, then, I will tell you
honestly, she was my rival. That word perhaps astonishes you, as you
never, I believe, heard of any one who made his addresses to me; and
indeed my heart was, till that night, entirely indifferent to all
mankind: I mean, then, that she was my rival for praise, for beauty,
for dress, for fortune, and consequently for admiration. My triumph on
this conquest is not to be expressed any more than my delight in the
person to whom I chiefly owed it. The former, I fancy, was visible to
the whole company; and I desired it should be so; but the latter was
so well concealed, that no one, I am confident, took any notice of it.
And yet you appeared to me that night to be an angel. You looked, you
danced, you spoke-everything charmed me."

"Good Heavens!" cries Booth, "is it possible you should do me so much
unmerited honour, and I should be dunce enough not to perceive the
least symptom?"

"I assure you," answered she, "I did all I could to prevent you; and
yet I almost hated you for not seeing through what I strove to hide.
Why, Mr. Booth, was you not more quick-sighted?--I will answer for
you--your affections were more happily disposed of to a much better
woman than myself, whom you married soon afterwards. I should ask you
for her, Mr. Booth; I should have asked you for her before; but I am
unworthy of asking for her, or of calling her my acquaintance."

Booth stopt her short, as she was running into another fit of passion,
and begged her to omit all former matters, and acquaint him with that
part of her history to which he was an entire stranger.

She then renewed her discourse as follows: "You know, Mr. Booth, I
soon afterwards left that town, upon the death of my grandmother, and
returned home to my father's house; where I had not been long arrived
before some troops of dragoons came to quarter in our neighbourhood.
Among the officers there was a cornet whose detested name was Hebbers,
a name I could scarce repeat, had I not at the same time the pleasure
to reflect that he is now no more. My father, you know, who is a
hearty well-wisher to the present government, used always to invite
the officers to his house; so did he these. Nor was it long before
this cornet in so particular a manner recommended himself to the poor
old gentleman (I cannot think of him without tears), that our house
became his principal habitation, and he was rarely at his quarters,
unless when his superior officers obliged him to be there. I shall say
nothing of his person, nor could that be any recommendation to a man;
it was such, however, as no woman could have made an objection to.
Nature had certainly wrapt up her odious work in a most beautiful
covering. To say the truth, he was the handsomest man, except one
only, that I ever saw--I assure you, I have seen a handsomer---but--
well.--He had, besides, all the qualifications of a gentleman; was
genteel and extremely polite; spoke French well, and danced to a
miracle; but what chiefly recommended him to my father was his skill
in music, of which you know that dear man was the most violent lover.
I wish he was not too susceptible of flattery on that head; for I have
heard Hebbers often greatly commend my father's performance, and have
observed that the good man was wonderfully pleased with such
commendations. To say the truth, it is the only way I can account for
the extraordinary friendship which my father conceived for this
person; such a friendship, that he at last became a part of our
family.

"This very circumstance, which, as I am convinced, strongly
recommended him to my father, had the very contrary effect with me: I
had never any delight in music, and it was not without much difficulty
I was prevailed on to learn to play on the harpsichord, in which I had
made a very slender progress. As this man, therefore, was frequently
the occasion of my being importuned to play against my will, I began
to entertain some dislike for him on that account; and as to his
person, I assure you, I long continued to look on it with great
indifference.

"How strange will the art of this man appear to you presently, who had
sufficient address to convert that very circumstance which had at
first occasioned my dislike into the first seeds of affection for him!

"You have often, I believe, heard my sister Betty play on the
harpsichord; she was, indeed, reputed the best performer in the whole
country.

"I was the farthest in the world from regarding this perfection of
hers with envy. In reality, perhaps, I despised all perfection of this
kind: at least, as I had neither skill nor ambition to excel this way,
I looked upon it as a matter of mere indifference.

"Hebbers first put this emulation in my head. He took great pains to
persuade me that I had much greater abilities of the musical kind than
my sister, and that I might with the greatest ease, if I pleased,
excel her; offering me, at the same time, his assistance if I would
resolve to undertake it.

"When he had sufficiently inflamed my ambition, in which, perhaps, he
found too little difficulty, the continual praises of my sister, which
before I had disregarded, became more and more nauseous in my ears;
and the rather, as, music being the favourite passion of my father, I
became apprehensive (not without frequent hints from Hebbers of that
nature) that she might gain too great a preference in his favour.

"To my harpsichord then I applied myself night and day, with such
industry and attention, that I soon began to perform in a tolerable
manner. I do not absolutely say I excelled my sister, for many were of
a different opinion; but, indeed, there might be some partiality in
all that.

"Hebbers, at least, declared himself on my side, and nobody could
doubt his judgment. He asserted openly that I played in the better
manner of the two; and one day, when I was playing to him alone, he
affected to burst into a rapture of admiration, and, squeezing me
gently by the hand, said, There, madam, I now declare you excel your
sister as much in music as, added he in a whispering sigh, you do her,
and all the world, in every other charm.

"No woman can bear any superiority in whatever thing she desires to
excel in. I now began to hate all the admirers of my sister, to be
uneasy at every commendation bestowed on her skill in music, and
consequently to love Hebbers for the preference which he gave to mine.

"It was now that I began to survey the handsome person of Hebbers with
pleasure. And here, Mr. Booth, I will betray to you the grand secret
of our sex.---Many women, I believe, do, with great innocence, and
even with great indifference, converse with men of the finest persons;
but this I am confident may be affirmed with truth, that, when once a
woman comes to ask this question of herself, Is the man whom I like
for some other reason, handsome? her fate and his too, very strongly
depend on her answering in the affirmative.

"Hebbers no sooner perceived that he had made an impression on my
heart, of which I am satisfied I gave him too undeniable tokens, than
he affected on a sudden to shun me in the most apparent manner. He
wore the most melancholy air in my presence, and, by his dejected
looks and sighs, firmly persuaded me that there was some secret sorrow
labouring in his bosom; nor will it be difficult for you to imagine to
what cause I imputed it.

"Whilst I was wishing for his declaration of a passion in which I
thought I could not be mistaken, and at the same time trembling
whenever we met with the apprehension of this very declaration, the
widow Carey came from London to make us a visit, intending to stay the
whole summer at our house.

"Those who know Mrs. Carey will scarce think I do her an injury in
saying she is far from being handsome; and yet she is as finished a
coquette as if she had the highest beauty to support that character.
But perhaps you have seen her; and if you have I am convinced you will
readily subscribe to my opinion."

Booth answered he had not; and then she proceeded as in the following
chapter.




Chapter VIII

_The history of Miss Matthews continued_.


"This young lady had not been three days with us before Hebbers grew
so particular with her, that it was generally observed; and my poor
father, who, I believe, loved the cornet as if he had been his son,
began to jest on the occasion, as one who would not be displeased at
throwing a good jointure into the arms of his friend.

"You will easily guess, sir, the disposition of my mind on this
occasion; but I was not permitted to suffer long under it; for one
day, when Hebbers was alone with me, he took an opportunity of
expressing his abhorrence at the thoughts of marrying for interest,
contrary to his inclinations. I was warm on the subject, and, I
believe, went so far as to say that none but fools and villains did
so. He replied, with a sigh, Yes, madam, but what would you think of a
man whose heart is all the while bleeding for another woman, to whom
he would willingly sacrifice the world; but, because he must sacrifice
her interest as well as his own, never durst even give her a hint of
that passion which was preying on his very vitals? 'Do you believe,
Miss Fanny, there is such a wretch on earth?' I answered, with an
assumed coldness, I did not believe there was. He then took me gently
by the hand, and, with a look so tender that I cannot describe it,
vowed he was himself that wretch. Then starting, as if conscious of an
error committed, he cried with a faltering voice, 'What am I saying?
Pardon me, Miss Fanny; since I beg only your pity, I never will ask
for more.--' At these words, hearing my father coming up, I betrayed
myself entirely, if, indeed, I had not done it before. I hastily
withdrew my hand, crying, Hush! for heaven's sake, my father is just
coming in; my blushes, my look, and my accent, telling him, I suppose,
all which he wished to know.

"A few days now brought matters to an eclaircissement between us; the
being undeceived in what had given me so much uneasiness gave me a
pleasure too sweet to be resisted. To triumph over the widow, for whom
I had in a very short time contracted a most inveterate hatred, was a
pride not to be described. Hebbers appeared to me to be the cause of
all this happiness. I doubted not but that he had the most
disinterested passion for me, and thought him every way worthy of its
return. I did return it, and accepted him as my lover.

"He declared the greatest apprehensions of my father's suspicion,
though I am convinced these were causeless had his designs been
honourable. To blind these, I consented that he should carry on sham
addresses to the widow, who was now a constant jest between us; and he
pretended from time to time to acquaint me faithfully with everything
that past at his interviews with her; nor was this faithless woman
wanting in her part of the deceit. She carried herself to me all the
while with a shew of affection, and pretended to have the utmost
friendship for me But such are the friendships of women!"

At this remark, Booth, though enough affected at some parts of the
story, had great difficulty to refrain from laughter; but, by good
luck, he escaped being perceived; and the lady went on without
interruption.

"I am come now to a part of my narrative in which it is impossible to
be particular without being tedious; for, as to the commerce between
lovers, it is, I believe, much the same in all cases; and there is,
perhaps, scarce a single phrase that hath not been repeated ten
millions of times.

"One thing, however, as I strongly remarked it then, so I will repeat
it to you now. In all our conversations, in moments when he fell into
the warmest raptures, and exprest the greatest uneasiness at the delay
of his joys, he seldom mentioned the word marriage; and never once
solicited a day for that purpose. Indeed, women cannot be cautioned
too much against such lovers; for though I have heard, and perhaps
truly, of some of our sex, of a virtue so exalted, that it is proof
against every temptation; yet the generality, I am afraid, are too
much in the power of a man to whom they have owned an affection. What
is called being upon a good footing is, perhaps, being upon a very
dangerous one; and a woman who hath given her consent to marry can
hardly be said to be safe till she is married.

"And now, sir, I hasten to the period of my ruin. We had a wedding in
our family; my musical sister was married to a young fellow as musical
as herself. Such a match, you may be sure, amongst other festivities,
must have a ball. Oh! Mr. Booth, shall modesty forbid me to remark to
you what past on that occasion? But why do I mention modesty, who have
no pretensions to it? Everything was said and practised on that
occasion, as if the purpose had been to inflame the mind of every
woman present. That effect, I freely own to you, it had with me.
Music, dancing, wine, and the most luscious conversation, in which my
poor dear father innocently joined, raised ideas in me of which I
shall for ever repent; and I wished (why should I deny it?) that it
had been my wedding instead of my sister's.

"The villain Hebbers danced with me that night, and he lost no
opportunity of improving the occasion. In short, the dreadful evening
came. My father, though it was a very unusual thing with him, grew
intoxicated with liquor; most of the men were in the same condition;
nay, I myself drank more than I was accustomed to, enough to inflame,
though not to disorder. I lost my former bed-fellow, my sister, and--
you may, I think, guess the rest--the villain found means to steal to
my chamber, and I was undone.

"Two months I passed in this detested commerce, buying, even then, my
guilty, half-tasted pleasures at too dear a rate, with continual
horror and apprehension; but what have I paid since--what do I pay
now, Mr. Booth? O may my fate be a warning to every woman to keep her
innocence, to resist every temptation, since she is certain to repent
of the foolish bargain. May it be a warning to her to deal with
mankind with care and caution; to shun the least approaches of
dishonour, and never to confide too much in the honesty of a man, nor
in her own strength, where she has so much at stake; let her remember
she walks on a precipice, and the bottomless pit is to receive her if
she slips; nay, if she makes but one false step.

"I ask your pardon, Mr. Booth; I might have spared these exhortations,
since no woman hears me; but you will not wonder at seeing me affected
on this occasion."

Booth declared he was much more surprised at her being able so well to
preserve her temper in recounting her story.

"O sir," answered she, "I am at length reconciled to my fate; and I
can now die with pleasure, since I die revenged. I am not one of those
mean wretches who can sit down and lament their misfortunes. If I ever
shed tears, they are the tears of indignation.--But I will proceed.

"It was my fate now to solicit marriage; and I failed not to do it in
the most earnest manner. He answered me at first with
procrastinations, declaring, from time to time, he would mention it to
my father; and still excusing himself for not doing it. At last he
thought on an expedient to obtain a longer reprieve. This was by
pretending that he should, in a very few weeks, be preferred to the
command of a troop; and then, he said, he could with some confidence
propose the match.

"In this delay I was persuaded to acquiesce, and was indeed pretty
easy, for I had not yet the least mistrust of his honour; but what
words can paint my sensations, when one morning he came into my room,
with all the marks of dejection in his countenance, and, throwing an
open letter on the table, said, 'There is news, madam, in that letter
which I am unable to tell you; nor can it give you more concern than
it hath given me.'

"This letter was from his captain, to acquaint him that the rout, as
they call it, was arrived, and that they were to march within two
days. And this, I am since convinced, was what he expected, instead of
the preferment which had been made the pretence of delaying our
marriage.

"The shock which I felt at reading this was inexpressible, occasioned
indeed principally by the departure of a villain whom I loved.
However, I soon acquired sufficient presence of mind to remember the
main point; and I now insisted peremptorily on his making me
immediately his wife, whatever might be the consequence.

"He seemed thunderstruck at this proposal, being, I suppose, destitute
of any excuse: but I was too impatient to wait for an answer, and
cried out with much eagerness, Sure you cannot hesitate a moment upon
this matter--'Hesitate! madam!' replied he--'what you ask is
impossible. Is this a time for me to mention a thing of this kind to
your father?'--My eyes were now opened all at once--I fell into a rage
little short of madness. Tell not me, I cried, of impossibilities, nor
times, nor of my father---my honour, my reputation, my all are at
stake.--I will have no excuse, no delay--make me your wife this
instant, or I will proclaim you over the face of the whole earth for
the greatest of villains. He answered, with a kind of sneer, 'What
will you proclaim, madam?--whose honour will you injure?' My tongue
faltered when I offered to reply, and I fell into a violent agony,
which ended in a fit; nor do I remember anything more that past till I
found myself in the arms of my poor affrighted father.

"O, Mr. Booth, what was then my situation! I tremble even now from the
reflection.--I must stop a moment. I can go no farther." Booth
attempted all in his power to soothe her; and she soon recovered her
powers, and proceeded in her story.




Chapter ix

_In which Miss Matthews concludes her relation_.


Before I had recovered my senses I had sufficiently betrayed myself to
the best of men, who, instead of upbraiding me, or exerting any anger,
endeavoured to comfort me all he could with assurances that all should
yet be well. This goodness of his affected me with inexpressible
sensations; I prostrated myself before him, embraced and kissed his
knees, and almost dissolved in tears, and a degree of tenderness
hardly to be conceived---But I am running into too minute
descriptions.

"Hebbers, seeing me in a fit, had left me, and sent one of the
servants to take care of me. He then ran away like a thief from the
house, without taking his leave of my father, or once thanking him for
all his civilities. He did not stop at his quarters, but made directly
to London, apprehensive, I believe, either of my father or brother's
resentment; for I am convinced he is a coward. Indeed his fear of my
brother was utterly groundless; for I believe he would rather have
thanked any man who had destroyed me; and I am sure I am not in the
least behindhand with him in good wishes.

"All his inveteracy to me had, however, no effect on my father, at
least at that time; for, though the good man took sufficient occasions
to reprimand me for my past offence, he could not be brought to
abandon me. A treaty of marriage was now set on foot, in which my
father himself offered me to Hebbers, with a fortune superior to that
which had been given with my sister; nor could all my brother's
remonstrances against it, as an act of the highest injustice, avail.

"Hebbers entered into the treaty, though not with much warmth. He had
even the assurance to make additional demands on my father, which
being complied with, everything was concluded, and the villain once
more received into the house. He soon found means to obtain my
forgiveness of his former behaviour; indeed, he convinced me, so
foolishly blind is female love, that he had never been to blame.

"When everything was ready for our nuptials, and the day of the
ceremony was to be appointed, in the midst of my happiness I received
a letter from an unknown hand, acquainting me (guess, Mr. Booth, how I
was shocked at receiving it) that Mr. Hebbers was already married to a
woman in a distant part of the kingdom.

"I will not tire you with all that past at our next interview. I
communicated the letter to Hebbers, who, after some little hesitation,
owned the fact, and not only owned it, but had the address to improve
it to his own advantage, to make it the means of satisfying me
concerning all his former delays; which, to say the truth, I was not
so much displeased at imputing to any degree of villany, as I should
have been to impute it to the want of a sufficient warmth of
affection, and though the disappointment of all my hopes, at the very
instant of their expected fruition, threw me into the most violent
disorders; yet, when I came a little to myself, he had no great
difficulty to persuade me that in every instance, with regard to me,
Hebbers had acted from no other motive than from the most ardent and
ungovernable love. And there is, I believe, no crime which a woman
will not forgive, when she can derive it from that fountain. In short,
I forgave him all, and am willing to persuade myself I am not weaker
than the rest of my sex. Indeed, Mr. Booth, he hath a bewitching
tongue, and is master of an address that no woman could resist. I do
assure you the charms of his person are his least perfection, at least
in my eye."

Here Booth smiled, but happily without her perceiving it.

"A fresh difficulty (continued she) now arose. This was to excuse the
delay of the ceremony to my father, who every day very earnestly urged
it. This made me so very uneasy, that I at last listened to a
proposal, which, if any one in the days of my innocence, or even a few
days before, had assured me I could have submitted to have thought of,
I should have treated the supposition with the highest contempt and
indignation; nay, I scarce reflect on it now with more horror than
astonishment. In short, I agreed to run away with him--to leave my
father, my reputation, everything which was or ought to have been dear
to me, and to live with this villain as a mistress, since I could not
be his wife.

"Was not this an obligation of the highest and tenderest kind, and had
I not reason to expect every return in the man's power on whom I had
conferred it? "I will make short of the remainder of my story, for
what is there of a woman worth relating, after what I have told you?

"Above a year I lived with this man in an obscure court in London,
during which time I had a child by him, whom Heaven, I thank it, hath
been pleased to take to itself.

"During many months he behaved to me with all the apparent tenderness
and even fondness imaginable; but, alas! how poor was my enjoyment of
this compared to what it would have been in another situation? When he
was present, life was barely tolerable: but, when he was absent,
nothing could equal the misery I endured. I past my hours almost
entirely alone; for no company but what I despised, would consort with
me. Abroad I scarce ever went, lest I should meet any of my former
acquaintance; for their sight would have plunged a thousand daggers in
my soul. My only diversion was going very seldom to a play, where I
hid myself in the gallery, with a daughter of the woman of the house.
A girl, indeed, of good sense and many good qualities; but how much
beneath me was it to be the companion of a creature so low! O heavens!
when I have seen my equals glittering in a side-box, how have the
thoughts of my lost honour torn my soul!"

"Pardon me, dear madam," cries Booth, "for interrupting you; but I am
under the utmost anxiety to know what became of your poor father, for
whom I have so great a respect, and who, I am convinced, must so
bitterly feel your loss."

"O Mr. Booth," answered she, "he was scarce ever out of my thoughts.
His dear image still obtruded itself in my mind, and I believe would
have broken my heart, had I not taken a very preposterous way to ease
myself. I am, indeed, almost ashamed to tell you; but necessity put it
in my head.--You will think the matter too trifling to have been
remembered, and so it surely was; nor should I have remembered it on
any other occasion. You must know then, sir, that my brother was
always my inveterate enemy and altogether as fond of my sister.--He
once prevailed with my father to let him take my sister with him in
the chariot, and by that means I was disappointed of going to a ball
which I had set my heart on. The disappointment, I assure you, was
great at the time; but I had long since forgotten it. I must have been
a very bad woman if I had not, for it was the only thing in which I
can remember that my father ever disobliged me. However, I now revived
this in my mind, which I artificially worked up into so high an
injury, that I assure you it afforded me no little comfort. When any
tender idea intruded into my bosom, I immediately raised this fantom
of an injury in my imagination, and it considerably lessened the fury
of that sorrow which I should have otherwise felt for the loss of so
good a father, who died within a few months of my departure from him.

"And now, sir, to draw to a conclusion. One night, as I was in the
gallery at Drury-lane playhouse, I saw below me in a side-box (she was
once below me in every place), that widow whom I mentioned to you
before. I had scarce cast my eyes on this woman before I was so
shocked with the sight that it almost deprived me of my senses; for
the villain Hebbers came presently in and seated himself behind her.

"He had been almost a month from me, and I believed him to be at his
quarters in Yorkshire. Guess what were my sensations when I beheld him
sitting by that base woman, and talking to her with the utmost
familiarity. I could not long endure this sight, and having acquainted
my companion that I was taken suddenly ill, I forced her to go home
with me at the end of the second act.

"After a restless and sleepless night, when I rose the next morning I
had the comfort to receive a visit from the woman of the house, who,
after a very short introduction, asked me when I had heard from the
captain, and when I expected to see him? I had not strength or spirits
to make her any answer, and she proceeded thus:--'Indeed I did not
think the captain would have used me so. My husband was an officer of
the army as well as himself; and if a body is a little low in the
world, I am sure that is no reason for folks to trample on a body. I
defy the world to say as I ever was guilty of an ill thing.' For
heaven's sake, madam, says I, what do you mean? 'Mean?' cries she; 'I
am sure, if I had not thought you had been Captain Hebbers' lady, his
lawful lady too, you should never have set footing in my house. I
would have Captain Hebbers know, that though I am reduced to let
lodgings, I never have entertained any but persons of character.'--In
this manner, sir, she ran on, saying many shocking things not worth
repeating, till my anger at last got the better of my patience as well
as my sorrow, and I pushed her out of the room.

"She had not been long gone before her daughter came to me, and, after
many expressions of tenderness and pity, acquainted me that her mother
had just found out, by means of the captain's servant, that the
captain was married to another lady; 'which, if you did not know
before, madam,' said she, 'I am sorry to be the messenger of such ill
news.'

"Think, Mr. Booth, what I must have endured to see myself humbled
before such a creature as this, the daughter of a woman who lets
lodgings! However, having recollected myself a little, I thought it
would be in vain to deny anything; so, knowing this to be one of the
best-natured and most sensible girls in the world, I resolved to tell
her my whole story, and for the future to make her my confidante. I
answered her, therefore, with a good deal of assurance, that she need
not regret telling me this piece of ill news, for I had known it
before I came to her house.

"'Pardon me, madam,' replied the girl, 'you cannot possibly have known
it so long, for he hath not been married above a week; last night was
the first time of his appearing in public with his wife at the play.
Indeed, I knew very well the cause of your uneasiness there; but would
not mention---'

"His wife at the play? answered I eagerly. What wife? whom do you
mean?

"'I mean the widow Carey, madam,' replied she, 'to whom the captain
was married a few days since. His servant was here last night to pay
for your lodging, and he told it my mother.'

"I know not what answer I made, or whether I made any. I presently
fell dead on the floor, and it was with great difficulty I was brought
back to life by the poor girl, for neither the mother nor the maid of
the house would lend me any assistance, both seeming to regard me
rather as a monster than a woman.

"Scarce had I recovered the use of my senses when I received a letter
from the villain, declaring he had not assurance to see my face, and
very kindly advising me to endeavour to reconcile myself to my family,
concluding with an offer, in case I did not succeed, to allow me
twenty pounds a-year to support me in some remote part of the kingdom.

"I need not mention my indignation at these proposals. In the highest
agony of rage, I went in a chair to the detested house, where I easily
got access to the wretch I had devoted to destruction, whom I no
sooner found within my reach than I plunged a drawn penknife, which I
had prepared in my pocket for the purpose, into his accursed heart.
For this fact I was immediately seized and soon after committed
hither; and for this fact I am ready to die, and shall with pleasure
receive the sentence of the law.

"Thus, sir," said she, "I have related to you my unhappy story, and if
I have tired your patience, by dwelling too long on those parts which
affected me the most, I ask your pardon."

Booth made a proper speech on this occasion, and, having exprest much
concern at her present situation, concluded that he hoped her sentence
would be milder than she seemed to expect.

Her reply to this was full of so much bitterness and indignation, that
we do not think proper to record the speech at length, in which having
vented her passion, she all at once put on a serene countenance, and
with an air of great complacency said, "Well, Mr. Booth, I think I
have now a right to satisfy my curiosity at the expense of your
breath. I may say it is not altogether a vain curiosity, for perhaps I
have had inclination enough to interest myself in whatever concerns
you; but no matter for that: those days (added she with a sigh) are
now over."

Booth, who was extremely good-natured and well-bred, told her that she
should not command him twice whatever was in his power; and then,
after the usual apology, was going to begin his history, when the
keeper arrived, and acquainted the lady that dinner was ready, at the
same time saying, "I suppose, madam, as the gentleman is an
acquaintance of yours, he must dine with us too."

Miss Matthews told the keeper that she had only one word to mention in
private to the gentleman, and that then they would both attend him.
She then pulled her purse from her pocket, in which were upwards of
twenty guineas, being the remainder of the money for which she had
sold a gold repeating watch, her father's present, with some other
trinkets, and desired Mr. Booth to take what he should have occasion
for, saying, "You know, I believe, dear Will, I never valued money;
and now I am sure I shall have very little use for it." Booth, with
much difficulty, accepted of two guineas, and then they both together
attended the keeper.




Chapter x

_Table-talk, consisting of a facetious discourse that passed in the
prison_.


There were assembled at the table the governor of these (not
improperly called infernal) regions; the lieutenant-governor, vulgarly
named the first turnkey; Miss Matthews, Mr. Booth, Mr. Robinson the
gambler, several other prisoners of both sexes, and one Murphy, an
attorney.

The governor took the first opportunity to bring the affair of Miss
Matthews upon the carpet, and then, turning to Murphy, he said, "It is
very lucky this gentleman happens to be present; I do assure you,
madam, your cause cannot be in abler hands. He is, I believe, the best
man in England at a defence; I have known him often succeed against
the most positive evidence."

"Fy, sir," answered Murphy; "you know I hate all this; but, if the
lady will trust me with her cause, I will do the best in my power.
Come, madam, do not be discouraged; a bit of manslaughter and cold
iron, I hope, will be the worst: or perhaps we may come off better
with a slice of chance-medley, or _se defendendo_"

"I am very ignorant of the law, sir," cries the lady.

"Yes, madam," answered Murphy; "it can't be expected you should
understand it. There are very few of us who profess it that understand
the whole, nor is it necessary we should. There is a great deal of
rubbish of little use, about indictments, and abatements, and bars,
and ejectments, and trovers, and such stuff, with which people cram
their heads to little purpose. The chapter of evidence is the main
business; that is the sheet-anchor; that is the rudder, which brings
the vessel safe _in portum_. Evidence is, indeed, the whole, the
_summa totidis_, for _de non apparentibus et non insistentibus eandem
est ratio_."

"If you address yourself to me, sir," said the lady, "you are much too
learned, I assure you, for my understanding."

"_Tace_, madam," answered Murphy, "is Latin for a candle: I commend
your prudence. I shall know the particulars of your case when we are
alone."

"I hope the lady," said Robinson, "hath no suspicion of any person
here. I hope we are all persons of honour at this table."

"D--n my eyes!" answered a well-dressed woman, "I can answer for
myself and the other ladies; though I never saw the lady in my life,
she need not be shy of us, d--n my eyes! I scorn to rap [Footnote: A
cant word, meaning to swear, or rather to perjure yourself] against
any lady."

"D--n me, madam!" cried another female, "I honour what you have done.
I once put a knife into a cull myself--so my service to you, madam,
and I wish you may come off with _se diffidendo_ with all my heart."

"I beg, good woman," said Miss Matthews, "you would talk on some other
subject, and give yourself no concern about my affairs."

"You see, ladies," cried Murphy, "the gentle-woman doth not care to
talk on this matter before company; so pray do not press her."

"Nay, I value the lady's acquaintance no more than she values mine,"
cries the first woman who spoke. "I have kept as good company as the
lady, I believe, every day in the week. Good woman! I don't use to be
so treated. If the lady says such another word to me, d--n me, I will
darken her daylights. Marry, come up! Good woman!--the lady's a whore
as well as myself! and, though I am sent hither to mill doll, d--n my
eyes, I have money enough to buy it off as well as the lady herself."

Action might perhaps soon have ensued this speech, had not the keeper
interposed his authority, and put an end to any further dispute. Soon
after which, the company broke up, and none but himself, Mr. Murphy,
Captain Booth, and Miss Matthews, remained together.

Miss Matthews then, at the entreaty of the keeper, began to open her
case to Mr. Murphy, whom she admitted to be her solicitor, though she
still declared she was indifferent as to the event of the trial.

Mr. Murphy, having heard all the particulars with which the reader is
already acquainted (as far as related to the murder), shook his head
and said, "There is but one circumstance, madam, which I wish was out
of the case; and that we must put out of it; I mean the carrying the
penknife drawn into the room with you; for that seems to imply malice
prepensive, as we call it in the law: this circumstance, therefore,
must not appear against you; and, if the servant who was in the room
observed this, he must be bought off at all hazards. All here you say
are friends; therefore I tell you openly, you must furnish me with
money sufficient for this purpose. Malice is all we have to guard
against."

"I would not presume, sir," cries Booth, "to inform you in the law;
but I have heard, in case of stabbing, a man may be indicted upon the
statute; and it is capital, though no malice appears."

"You say true, sir," answered Murphy; "a man may be indicted _contra
formam statutis;_ and that method, I allow you, requires no malice. I
presume you are a lawyer, sir?"

"No, indeed, sir," answered Booth, "I know nothing of the law."

"Then, sir, I will tell you--If a man be indicted _contra formam
tatutis_, as we say, no malice is necessary, because the form of the
statute makes malice; and then what we have to guard against is having
struck the first blow. Pox on't, it is unlucky this was done in a
room: if it had been in the street we could have had five or six
witnesses to have proved the first blow, cheaper than, I am afraid, we
shall get this one; for when a man knows, from the unhappy
circumstances of the case, that you can procure no other witness but
himself, he is always dear. It is so in all other ways of business. I
am very implicit, you see; but we are all among friends. The safest
way is to furnish me with money enough to offer him a good round sum
at once; and I think (it is for your good I speak) fifty pounds is the
least than can be offered him. I do assure you I would offer him no
less was it my own case."

"And do you think, sir," said she, "that I would save my life at the
expense of hiring another to perjure himself?"

"Ay, surely do I," cries Murphy; "for where is the fault, admitting
there is some fault in perjury, as you call it? and, to be sure, it is
such a matter as every man would rather wish to avoid than not: and
yet, as it may be managed, there is not so much as some people are apt
to imagine in it; for he need not kiss the book, and then pray where's
the perjury? but if the crier is sharper than ordinary, what is it he
kisses? is it anything but a bit of calf's-skin? I am sure a man must
be a very bad Christian himself who would not do so much as that to
save the life of any Christian whatever, much more of so pretty a
lady. Indeed, madam, if we can make out but a tolerable case, so much
beauty will go a great way with the judge and the jury too."

The latter part of this speech, notwithstanding the mouth it came
from, caused Miss Matthews to suppress much of the indignation which
began to arise at the former; and she answered with a smile, "Sir, you
are a great casuist in these matters; but we need argue no longer
concerning them; for, if fifty pounds would save my life, I assure you
I could not command that sum. The little money I have in my pocket is
all I can call my own; and I apprehend, in the situation I am in, I
shall have very little of that to spare."

"Come, come, madam," cries Murphy, "life is sweet, let me tell you,
and never sweeter than when we are near losing it. I have known many a
man very brave and undaunted at his first commitment, who, when
business began to thicken a little upon him, hath changed his note. It
is no time to be saving in your condition."

The keeper, who, after the liberality of Miss Matthews, and on seeing
a purse of guineas in her hand, had conceived a great opinion of her
wealth, no sooner heard that the sum which he had in intention
intirely confiscated for his own use was attempted to be broke in
upon, thought it high time to be upon his guard. "To be sure," cries
he, "Mr. Murphy, life is sweet, as you say, that must be acknowledged;
to be sure, life is sweet; but, sweet as it is, no persons can advance
more than they are worth to save it. And indeed, if the lady can
command no more money than that little she mentions, she is to be
commended for her unwillingness to part with any of it; for, to be
sure, as she says, she will want every farthing of that to live like a
gentlewoman till she comes to her trial. And, to be sure, as sweet as
life is, people ought to take care to be able to live sweetly while
they do live; besides, I cannot help saying the lady shews herself to
be what she is, by her abhorrence of perjury, which is certainly a
very dreadful crime. And, though the not kissing the book doth, as you
say, make a great deal of difference; and, if a man had a great while
to live and repent, perhaps he might swallow it well enough; yet, when
people comes to be near their end (as who can venture to foretel what
will be the lady's case?) they ought to take care not to overburthen
their conscience. I hope the lady's case will not be found murder; for
I am sure I always wish well to all my prisoners who shew themselves
to be gentlemen or gentlewomen; yet one should always fear the worst"

"Indeed, sir, you speak like an oracle," answered the lady; "and one
subornation of perjury would sit heavier on my conscience than twenty
such murders as I am guilty of."

"Nay, to be sure, madam," answered the keeper, "nobody can pretend to
tell what provocation you must have had; and certainly it can never be
imagined that a lady who behaves herself so handsomely as you have
done ever since you have been under my keys should be guilty of
killing a man without being very highly provoked to do it."

Mr. Murphy was, I believe, going to answer when he was called out of
the room; after which nothing passed between the remaining persons
worth relating, till Booth and the lady retired back again into the
lady's apartment.

Here they fell immediately to commenting on the foregoing discourse;
but, as their comments were, I believe, the same with what most
readers have made on the same occasion, we shall omit them. At last,
Miss Matthews reminding her companion of his promise of relating to
her what had befallen him since the interruption of their former
acquaintance, he began as is written in the next book of this history.




BOOK II.

Chapter i.

_In which Captain Booth begins to relate his history._


The tea-table being removed, and Mr. Booth and the lady left alone, he
proceeded as follows:

"Since you desire, madam, to know the particulars of my courtship to
that best and dearest of women whom I afterwards married, I will
endeavour to recollect them as well as I can, at least all those
incidents which are most worth relating to you.

"If the vulgar opinion of the fatality in marriage had ever any
foundation, it surely appeared in my marriage with my Amelia. I knew
her in the first dawn of her beauty; and, I believe, madam, she had as
much as ever fell to the share of a woman; but, though I always
admired her, it was long without any spark of love. Perhaps the
general admiration which at that time pursued her, the respect paid
her by persons of the highest rank, and the numberless addresses which
were made her by men of great fortune, prevented my aspiring at the
possession of those charms which seemed so absolutely out of my reach.
However it was, I assure you the accident which deprived her of the
admiration of others made the first great impression on my heart in
her favour. The injury done to her beauty by the overturning of a
chaise, by which, as you may well remember, her lovely nose was beat
all to pieces, gave me an assurance that the woman who had been so
much adored for the charms of her person deserved a much higher
adoration to be paid to her mind; for that she was in the latter
respect infinitely more superior to the rest of her sex than she had
ever been in the former."

"I admire your taste extremely," cried the lady; "I remember perfectly
well the great heroism with which your Amelia bore that misfortune."

"Good heavens! madam," answered he; "what a magnanimity of mind did
her behaviour demonstrate! If the world have extolled the firmness of
soul in a man who can support the loss of fortune; of a general who
can be composed after the loss of a victory; or of a king who can be
contented with the loss of a crown; with what astonishment ought we to
behold, with what praises to honour, a young lady, who can with
patience and resignation submit to the loss of exquisite beauty, in
other words to the loss of fortune, power, glory, everything which
human nature is apt to court and rejoice in! what must be the mind
which can bear to be deprived of all these in a moment, and by an
unfortunate trifling accident; which could support all this, together
with the most exquisite torments of body, and with dignity, with
resignation, without complaining, almost without a tear, undergo the
most painful and dreadful operations of surgery in such a situation!"
Here he stopt, and a torrent of tears gushed from his eyes; such tears
are apt to flow from a truly noble heart at the hearing of anything
surprisingly great and glorious. As soon as he was able he again
proceeded thus:

"Would you think, Miss Matthews, that the misfortune of my Amelia was
capable of any aggravation? I assure you, she hath often told me it
was aggravated with a circumstance which outweighed all the other
ingredients. This was the cruel insults she received from some of her
most intimate acquaintance, several of whom, after many distortions
and grimaces, have turned their heads aside, unable to support their
secret triumph, and burst into a loud laugh in her hearing."

"Good heavens!" cried Miss Matthews; "what detestable actions will
this contemptible passion of envy prevail on our sex to commit!"

"An occasion of this kind, as she hath since told me, made the first
impression on her gentle heart in my favour. I was one day in company
with several young ladies, or rather young devils, where poor Amelia's
accident was the subject of much mirth and pleasantry. One of these
said she hoped miss would not hold her head so high for the future.
Another answered, 'I do not know, madam, what she may do with her
head, but I am convinced she will never more turn up her nose at her
betters.' Another cried, 'What a very proper match might now be made
between Amelia and a certain captain,' who had unfortunately received
an injury in the same part, though from no shameful cause. Many other
sarcasms were thrown out, very unworthy to be repeated. I was hurt
with perceiving so much malice in human shape, and cried out very
bluntly, Indeed, ladies, you need not express such satisfaction at
poor Miss Emily's accident; for she will still be the handsomest woman
in England. This speech of mine was afterwards variously repeated, by
some to my honour, and by others represented in a contrary light;
indeed, it was often reported to be much ruder than it was. However,
it at length reached Amelia's ears. She said she was very much obliged
to me, since I could have so much compassion for her as to be rude to
a lady on her account.

"About a month after the accident, when Amelia began to see company in
a mask, I had the honour to drink tea with her. We were alone
together, and I begged her to indulge my curiosity by showing me her
face. She answered in a most obliging manner, 'Perhaps, Mr. Booth, you
will as little know me when my mask is off as when it is on;' and at
the same instant unmasked.--The surgeon's skill was the least I
considered. A thousand tender ideas rushed all at once on my mind. I
was unable to contain myself, and, eagerly kissing her hand, I cried--
Upon my soul, madam, you never appeared to me so lovely as at this
instant. Nothing more remarkable passed at this visit; but I sincerely
believe we were neither of us hereafter indifferent to each other.

"Many months, however, passed after this, before I ever thought
seriously of making her my wife. Not that I wanted sufficient love for
Amelia. Indeed it arose from the vast affection I bore her. I
considered my own as a desperate fortune, hers as entirely dependent
on her mother, who was a woman, you know, of violent passions, and
very unlikely to consent to a match so highly contrary to the interest
of her daughter. The more I loved Amelia, the more firmly I resolved
within myself never to propose love to her seriously. Such a dupe was
my understanding to my heart, and so foolishly did I imagine I could
be master of a flame to which I was every day adding fuel.

"O, Miss Matthews! we have heard of men entirely masters of their
passions, and of hearts which can carry this fire in them, and conceal
it at their pleasure. Perhaps there may be such: but, if there are,
those hearts may be compared, I believe, to damps, in which it is more
difficult to keep fire alive than to prevent its blazing: in mine it
was placed in the midst of combustible matter.

"After several visits, in which looks and sighs had been interchanged
on both sides, but without the least mention of passion in private,
one day the discourse between us when alone happened to turn on love;
I say happened, for I protest it was not designed on my side, and I am
as firmly convinced not on hers. I was now no longer master of myself;
I declared myself the most wretched of all martyrs to this tender
passion; that I had long concealed it from its object. At length,
after mentioning many particulars, suppressing, however, those which
must have necessarily brought it home to Amelia, I concluded with
begging her to be the confidante of my amour, and to give me her
advice on that occasion.

"Amelia (O, I shall never forget the dear perturbation!) appeared all
confusion at this instant. She trembled, turned pale, and discovered
how well she understood me, by a thousand more symptoms than I could
take notice of, in a state of mind so very little different from her
own. At last, with faltering accents, she said I had made a very ill
choice of a counsellor in a matter in which she was so ignorant.--
Adding, at last, 'I believe, Mr. Booth, you gentlemen want very little
advice in these affairs, which you all understand better than we do.'

"I will relate no more of our conversation at present; indeed I am
afraid I tire you with too many particulars."

"O, no!" answered she; "I should be glad to hear every step of an
amour which had so tender a beginning. Tell me everything you said or
did, if you can remember it."

He then proceeded, and so will we in the next chapter.




Chapter ii.

_Mr. Booth continues his story. In this chapter there are some
passages that may serve as a kind of touchstone by which a young lady
may examine the heart of her lover. I would advise, therefore, that
every lover be obliged to read it over in the presence of his
mistress, and that she carefully watch his emotions while he is
reading._


"I was under the utmost concern," cries Booth, "when I retired from my
visit, and had reflected coolly on what I had said. I now saw plainly
that I had made downright love to Amelia; and I feared, such was my
vanity, that I had already gone too far, and been too successful.
Feared! do I say? could I fear what I hoped? how shall I describe the
anxiety of my mind?"

"You need give yourself no great pain," cried Miss Matthews, "to
describe what I can so easily guess. To be honest with you, Mr. Booth,
I do not agree with your lady's opinion that the men have a superior
understanding in the matters of love. Men are often blind to the
passions of women: but every woman is as quick-sighted as a hawk on
these occasions; nor is there one article in the whole science which
is not understood by all our sex."

"However, madam," said Mr. Booth, "I now undertook to deceive Amelia.
I abstained three days from seeing her; to say the truth, I
endeavoured to work myself up to a resolution of leaving her for ever:
but when I could not so far subdue my passion---But why do I talk
nonsense of subduing passion?--I should say, when no other passion
could surmount my love, I returned to visit her; and now I attempted
the strangest project which ever entered into the silly head of a
lover. This was to persuade Amelia that I was really in love in
another place, and had literally expressed my meaning when I asked her
advice and desired her to be my confidante.

"I therefore forged a meeting to have been between me and my imaginary
mistress since I had last seen Amelia, and related the particulars, as
well as I could invent them, which had passed at our conversation.

"Poor Amelia presently swallowed this bait; and, as she hath told me
since, absolutely believed me to be in earnest. Poor dear love! how
should the sincerest of hearts have any idea of deceit? for, with all
her simplicity, I assure you she is the most sensible woman in the
world."

"It is highly generous and good in you," said Miss Matthews, with a
sly sneer, "to impute to honesty what others would, perhaps, call
credulity."

"I protest, madam," answered he, "I do her no more than justice. A
good heart will at all times betray the best head in the world.---
Well, madam, my angel was now, if possible, more confused than before.
She looked so silly, you can hardly believe it."

"Yes, yes, I can," answered the lady, with a laugh, "I can believe
it.--Well, well, go on."--"After some hesitation," cried he, "my
Amelia said faintly to me, 'Mr. Booth, you use me very ill; you desire
me to be your confidante, and conceal from me the name of your
mistress.'

"Is it possible then, madam," answered I, "that you cannot guess her,
when I tell you she is one of your acquaintance, and lives in this
town?"

"'My acquaintance!' said she: 'La! Mr. Booth--In this town! I--I--I
thought I could have guessed for once; but I have an ill talent that
way--I will never attempt to guess anything again.' Indeed I do her an
injury when I pretend to represent her manner. Her manner, look,
voice, everything was inimitable; such sweetness, softness, innocence,
modesty!--Upon my soul, if ever man could boast of his resolution, I
think I might now, that I abstained from falling prostrate at her
feet, and adoring her. However, I triumphed; pride, I believe,
triumphed, or perhaps love got the better of love. We once more
parted, and I promised, the next time I saw her, to reveal the name of
my mistress.

"I now had, I thought, gained a complete victory over myself; and no
small compliments did I pay to my own resolution. In short, I
triumphed as cowards and niggards do when they flatter themselves with
having given some supposed instance of courage or generosity; and my
triumph lasted as long; that is to say, till my ascendant passion had
a proper opportunity of displaying itself in its true and natural
colours.

"Having hitherto succeeded so well in my own opinion, and obtained
this mighty self-conquest, I now entertained a design of exerting the
most romantic generosity, and of curing that unhappy passion which I
perceived I had raised in Amelia.

"Among the ladies who had expressed the greatest satisfaction at my
Amelia's misfortune, Miss Osborne had distinguished herself in a very
eminent degree; she was, indeed, the next in beauty to my angel, nay,
she had disputed the preference, and had some among her admirers who
were blind enough to give it in her favour."

"Well," cries the lady, "I will allow you to call them blind; but Miss
Osborne was a charming girl."

"She certainly was handsome," answered he, "and a very considerable
fortune; so I thought my Amelia would have little difficulty in
believing me when I fixed on her as my mistress. And I concluded that
my thus placing my affections on her known enemy would be the surest
method of eradicating every tender idea with which I had been ever
honoured by Amelia.

"Well, then, to Amelia I went; she received me with more than usual
coldness and reserve; in which, to confess the truth, there appeared
to me more of anger than indifference, and more of dejection than of
either. After some short introduction, I revived the discourse of my
amour, and presently mentioned Miss Osborne as the lady whose name I
had concealed; adding, that the true reason why I did not mention her
before was, that I apprehended there was some little distance between
them, which I hoped to have the happiness of accommodating.

"Amelia answered with much gravity, 'If you know, sir, that there is
any distance between us, I suppose you know the reason of that
distance; and then, I think, I could not have expected to be affronted
by her name. I would not have you think, Mr. Booth, that I hate Miss
Osborne. No! Heaven is my witness, I despise her too much.--Indeed,
when I reflect how much I loved the woman who hath treated me so
cruelly, I own it gives me pain--when I lay, as I then imagined, and
as all about me believed, on my deathbed, in all the agonies of pain
and misery, to become the object of laughter to my dearest friend.--O,
Mr. Booth, it is a cruel reflection! and could I after this have
expected from you--but why not from you, to whom I am a person
entirely indifferent, if such a friend could treat me so barbarously?'

"During the greatest part of this speech the tears streamed from her
bright eyes. I could endure it no longer. I caught up the word
indifferent, and repeated it, saying, Do you think then, madam, that
Miss Emily is indifferent to me?

"'Yes, surely, I do,' answered she: 'I know I am; indeed, why should I
not be indifferent to you?'

"Have my eyes," said I, "then declared nothing?"

"'O! there is no need of your eyes' answered she; 'your tongue hath
declared that you have singled out of all womankind my greatest, I
will say, my basest enemy. I own I once thought that character would
have been no recommendation to you;--but why did I think so? I was
born to deceive myself.'

"I then fell on my knees before her; and, forcing her hand, cried out,
O, my Amelia! I can bear no longer. You are the only mistress of my
affections; you are the deity I adore. In this stile I ran on for
above two or three minutes, what it is impossible to repeat, till a
torrent of contending passions, together with the surprize,
overpowered her gentle spirits, and she fainted away in my arms.

"To describe my sensation till she returned to herself is not in my
power."--"You need not," cried Miss Matthews.--"Oh, happy Amelia! why
had I not been blest with such a passion?"--"I am convinced, madam,"
continued he, "you cannot expect all the particulars of the tender
scene which ensued. I was not enough in my senses to remember it all.
Let it suffice to say, that that behaviour with which Amelia, while
ignorant of its motive, had been so much displeased, when she became
sensible of that motive, proved the strongest recommendation to her
favour, and she was pleased to call it generous."

"Generous!" repeated the lady, "and so it was, almost beyond the reach
of humanity. I question whether you ever had an equal."

Perhaps the critical reader may have the same doubt with Miss
Matthews; and lest he should, we will here make a gap in our history,
to give him an opportunity of accurately considering whether this
conduct of Mr. Booth was natural or no; and consequently, whether we
have, in this place, maintained or deviated from that strict adherence
to universal truth which we profess above all other historians.




Chapter iii.

_The narrative continued. More of the touchstone._


Booth made a proper acknowledgment of Miss Matthew's civility, and
then renewed his story. "We were upon the footing of lovers; and
Amelia threw off her reserve more and more, till at length I found all
that return of my affection which the tenderest lover can require.

"My situation would now have been a paradise, had not my happiness
been interrupted with the same reflections I have already mentioned;
had I not, in short, concluded, that I must derive all my joys from
the almost certain ruin of that dear creature to whom I should owe
them.

"This thought haunted me night and day, till I at last grew unable to
support it: I therefore resolved in the strongest manner, to lay it
before Amelia.

"One evening then, after the highest professions of the most
disinterested love, in which Heaven knows my sincerity, I took an
occasion to speak to Amelia in the following manner:--

"Too true it is, I am afraid, my dearest creature, that the highest
human happiness is imperfect. How rich would be my cup, was it not for
one poisonous drop which embitters the whole! O, Amelia! what must be
the consequence of my ever having the honour to call you mine!--You
know my situation in life, and you know your own: I have nothing more
than the poor provision of an ensign's commission to depend on; your
sole dependence is on your mother; should any act of disobedience
defeat your expectations, how wretched must your lot be with me! O,
Amelia! how ghastly an object to my mind is the apprehension of your
distress! Can I bear to reflect a moment on the certainty of your
foregoing all the conveniences of life? on the possibility of your
suffering all its most dreadful inconveniencies? what must be my
misery, then, to see you in such a situation, and to upbraid myself
with being the accursed cause of bringing you to it? Suppose too in
such a season I should be summoned from you. Could I submit to see you
encounter all the hazards, the fatigues of war, with me? you could not
yourself, however willing, support them a single campaign. What then;
must I leave you to starve alone, deprived of the tenderness of a
husband, deprived too of the tenderness of the best of mothers,
through my means? a woman most dear to me, for being the parent, the
nurse, and the friend of my Amelia.---But oh! my sweet creature, carry
your thoughts a little further. Think of the tenderest consequences,
the dearest pledges of our love. Can I bear to think of entailing
beggary on the posterity of my Amelia? on our---Oh, Heavens!--on our
children!--On the other side, is it possible even to mention the word
--I will not, must not, cannot, cannot part with you.---What must we
do, Amelia? It is now I sincerely ask your advice."

"'What advice can I give you,' said she, 'in such an alternative?
Would to Heaven we had never met!'

"These words were accompanied with a sigh, and a look inexpressibly
tender, the tears at the same time overflowing all her lovely cheeks.
I was endeavouring to reply when I was interrupted by what soon put an
end to the scene.

"Our amour had already been buzzed all over the town; and it came at
last to the ears of Mrs. Harris: I had, indeed, observed of late a
great alteration in that lady's behaviour towards me whenever I
visited at the house; nor could I, for a long time before this
evening, ever obtain a private interview with Amelia; and now, it
seems, I owed it to her mother's intention of overhearing all that
passed between us.

"At the period then above mentioned, Mrs. Harris burst from the closet
where she had hid herself, and surprised her daughter, reclining on my
bosom in all that tender sorrow I have just described. I will not
attempt to paint the rage of the mother, or the daughter's confusion,
or my own. 'Here are very fine doings, indeed,' cries Mrs. Harris:
'you have made a noble use, Amelia, of my indulgence, and the trust I
reposed in you.--As for you, Mr. Booth, I will not accuse you; you
have used my child as I ought to have expected; I may thank myself for
what hath happened;' with much more of the same kind, before she would
suffer me to speak; but at last I obtained a hearing, and offered to
excuse my poor Amelia, who was ready to sink into the earth under the
oppression of grief, by taking as much blame as I could on myself.
Mrs. Harris answered, 'No, sir, I must say you are innocent in
comparison of her; nay, I can say I have heard you use dissuasive
arguments; and I promise you they are of weight. I have, I thank
Heaven, one dutiful child, and I shall henceforth think her my only
one.'--She then forced the poor, trembling, fainting Amelia out of the
room; which when she had done, she began very coolly to reason with me
on the folly, as well as iniquity, which I had been guilty of; and
repeated to me almost every word I had before urged to her daughter.
In fine, she at last obtained of me a promise that I would soon go to
my regiment, and submit to any misery rather than that of being the
ruin of Amelia.

"I now, for many days, endured the greatest torments which the human
mind is, I believe, capable of feeling; and I can honestly say I tried
all the means, and applied every argument which I could raise, to cure
me of my love. And to make these the more effectual, I spent every
night in walking backwards and forwards in the sight of Mrs. Harris's
house, where I never failed to find some object or other which raised
some tender idea of my lovely Amelia, and almost drove me to
distraction."

"And don't you think, sir," said Miss Matthews, "you took a most
preposterous method to cure yourself?"

"Alas, madam," answered he, "you cannot see it in a more absurd light
than I do; but those know little of real love or grief who do not know
how much we deceive ourselves when we pretend to aim at the cure of
either. It is with these, as it is with some distempers of the body,
nothing is in the least agreeable to us but what serves to heighten
the disease.

"At the end of a fortnight, when I was driven almost to the highest
degree of despair, and could contrive no method of conveying a letter
to Amelia, how was I surprised when Mrs. Harris's servant brought me a
card, with an invitation from the mother herself to drink tea that
evening at her house!

"You will easily believe, madam, that I did not fail so agreeable an
appointment: on my arrival I was introduced into a large company of
men and women, Mrs. Harris and my Amelia being part of the company.

"Amelia seemed in my eyes to look more beautiful than ever, and
behaved with all the gaiety imaginable. The old lady treated me with
much civility, but the young lady took little notice of me, and
addressed most of her discourse to another gentleman present. Indeed,
she now and then gave me a look of no discouraging kind, and I
observed her colour change more than once when her eyes met mine;
circumstances, which, perhaps, ought to have afforded me sufficient
comfort, but they could not allay the thousand doubts and fears with
which I was alarmed, for my anxious thoughts suggested no less to me
than that Amelia had made her peace with her mother at the price of
abandoning me forever, and of giving her ear to some other lover. All
my prudence now vanished at once; and I would that instant have gladly
run away with Amelia, and have married her without the least
consideration of any consequences.

"With such thoughts I had tormented myself for near two hours, till
most of the company had taken their leave. This I was myself incapable
of doing, nor do I know when I should have put an end to my visit, had
not Dr Harrison taken me away almost by force, telling me in a whisper
that he had something to say to me of great consequence.--You know the
doctor, madam--"

"Very well, sir," answered Miss Matthews, "and one of the best men in
the world he is, and an honour to the sacred order to which he
belongs."

"You will judge," replied Booth, "by the sequel, whether I have reason
to think him so."--He then proceeded as in the next chapter.




Chapter iv

_The story of Mr. Booth continued. In this chapter the reader will
perceive a glimpse of the character of a very good divine, with some
matters of a very tender kind._


"The doctor conducted me into his study, and I then, desiring me to
sit down, began, as near as I can remember, in these words, or at
least to this purpose:

"'You cannot imagine, young gentleman, that your love for Miss Emily
is any secret in this place; I have known it some time, and have been,
I assure you, very much your enemy in this affair.'

"I answered, that I was very much obliged to him.

"'Why, so you are,' replied he; 'and so, perhaps, you will think
yourself when you know all.--I went about a fortnight ago to Mrs.
Harris, to acquaint her with my apprehensions on her daughter's
account; for, though the matter was much talked of, I thought it might
possibly not have reached her ears. I will be very plain with you. I
advised her to take all possible care of the young lady, and even to
send her to some place, where she might be effectually kept out of
your reach while you remained in the town.'

"And do you think, sir, said I, that this was acting a kind part by
me? or do you expect that I should thank you on this occasion?

"'Young man,' answered he, 'I did not intend you any kindness, nor do
I desire any of your thanks. My intention was to preserve a worthy
lady from a young fellow of whom I had heard no good character, and
whom I imagined to have a design of stealing a human creature for the
sake of her fortune.'

"It was very kind of you, indeed, answered I, to entertain such an
opinion of me.

"'Why, sir,' replied the doctor, 'it is the opinion which, I believe,
most of you young gentlemen of the order of the rag deserve. I have
known some instances, and have heard of more, where such young fellows
have committed robbery under the name of marriage.'

"I was going to interrupt him with some anger when he desired me to
have a little patience, and then informed me that he had visited Mrs.
Harris with the above-mentioned design the evening after the discovery
I have related; that Mrs. Harris, without waiting for his information,
had recounted to him all which had happened the evening before; and,
indeed, she must have an excellent memory, for I think she repeated
every word I said, and added, that she had confined her daughter to
her chamber, where she kept her a close prisoner, and had not seen her
since.

"I cannot express, nor would modesty suffer me if I could, all that
now past. The doctor took me by the hand and burst forth into the
warmest commendations of the sense and generosity which he was pleased
to say discovered themselves in my speech. You know, madam, his strong
and singular way of expressing himself on all occasions, especially
when he is affected with anything. 'Sir,' said he, 'if I knew half a
dozen such instances in the army, the painter should put red liveries
upon all the saints in my closet.'

"From this instant, the doctor told me, he had become my friend and
zealous advocate with Mrs. Harris, on whom he had at last prevailed,
though not without the greatest difficulty, to consent to my marrying
Amelia, upon condition that I settled every penny which the mother
should lay down, and that she would retain a certain sum in her hands
which she would at any time deposit for my advancement in the army.

"You will, I hope, madam, conceive that I made no hesitation at these
conditions, nor need I mention the joy which I felt on this occasion,
or the acknowledgment I paid the doctor, who is, indeed, as you say,
one of the best of men.

"The next morning I had permission to visit Amelia, who received me in
such a manner, that I now concluded my happiness to be complete.

"Everything was now agreed on all sides, and lawyers employed to
prepare the writings, when an unexpected cloud arose suddenly in our
serene sky, and all our joys were obscured in a moment.

"When matters were, as I apprehended, drawing near a conclusion, I
received an express, that a sister whom I tenderly loved was seized
with a violent fever, and earnestly desired me to come to her. I
immediately obeyed the summons, and, as it was then about two in the
morning, without staying even to take leave of Amelia, for whom I left
a short billet, acquainting her with the reason of my absence.

"The gentleman's house where my sister then was stood at fifty miles'
distance, and, though I used the utmost expedition, the unmerciful
distemper had, before my arrival, entirely deprived the poor girl of
her senses, as it soon after did of her life.

"Not all the love I bore Amelia, nor the tumultuous delight with which
the approaching hour of possessing her filled my heart, could, for a
while, allay my grief at the loss of my beloved Nancy. Upon my soul, I
cannot yet mention her name without tears. Never brother and sister
had, I believe, a higher friendship for each other. Poor dear girl!
whilst I sat by her in her light-head fits, she repeated scarce any
other name but mine; and it plainly appeared that, when her dear
reason was ravished away from her, it had left my image on her fancy,
and that the last use she made of it was to think on me. 'Send for my
dear Billy immediately,' she cried; 'I know he will come to me in a
moment. Will nobody fetch him to me? pray don't kill me before I see
him once more. You durst not use me so if he was here.'--Every accent
still rings in my ears. Oh, heavens! to hear this, and at the same
time to see the poor delirious creature deriving the greatest horrors
from my sight, and mistaking me for a highwayman who had a little
before robbed her. But I ask your pardon; the sensations I felt are to
be known only from experience, and to you must appear dull and
insipid. At last, she seemed for a moment to know me, and cried, 'O
heavens! my dearest brother!' upon which she fell into immediate
convulsions, and died away in my arms."

Here Mr. Booth stopped a moment, and wiped his eyes; and Miss
Matthews, perhaps out of complaisance, wiped hers.




Chapter v.

_Containing strange revolutions of fortune_


Booth proceeded thus:

"This loss, perhaps, madam, you will think had made me miserable
enough; but Fortune did not think so; for, on the day when my Nancy
was to be buried, a courier arrived from Dr Harrison, with a letter,
in which the doctor acquainted me that he was just come from Mrs.
Harris when he despatched the express, and earnestly desired me to
return the very instant I received his letter, as I valued my Amelia.
'Though if the daughter,' added he, 'should take after her mother (as
most of them do) it will be, perhaps, wiser in you to stay away.'

"I presently sent for the messenger into my room, and with much
difficulty extorted from him that a great squire in his coach and six
was come to Mrs. Harris's, and that the whole town said he was shortly
to be married to Amelia.

"I now soon perceived how much superior my love for Amelia was to
every other passion; poor Nancy's idea disappeared in a moment; I
quitted the dear lifeless corpse, over which I had shed a thousand
tears, left the care of her funeral to others, and posted, I may
almost say flew, back to Amelia, and alighted at the doctor's house,
as he had desired me in his letter.

"The good man presently acquainted me with what had happened in my
absence. Mr. Winckworth had, it seems, arrived the very day of my
departure, with a grand equipage, and, without delay, had made formal
proposals to Mrs. Harris, offering to settle any part of his vast
estate, in whatever manner she pleased, on Amelia. These proposals the
old lady had, without any deliberation, accepted, and had insisted, in
the most violent manner, on her daughter's compliance, which Amelia
had as peremptorily refused to give; insisting, on her part, on the
consent which her mother had before given to our marriage, in which
she was heartily seconded by the doctor, who declared to her, as he
now did to me, 'that we ought as much to be esteemed man and wife as
if the ceremony had already past between us.'

"These remonstrances, the doctor told me, had worked no effect on Mrs.
Harris, who still persisted in her avowed resolution of marrying her
daughter to Winckworth, whom the doctor had likewise attacked, telling
him that he was paying his addresses to another man's wife; but all to
no purpose; the young gentleman was too much in love to hearken to any
dissuasives.

"We now entered into a consultation what means to employ. The doctor
earnestly protested against any violence to be offered to the person
of Winckworth, which, I believe, I had rashly threatened; declaring
that, if I made any attempt of that kind, he would for ever abandon my
cause. I made him a solemn promise of forbearance. At last he
determined to pay another visit to Mrs. Harris, and, if he found her
obdurate, he said he thought himself at liberty to join us together
without any further consent of the mother, which every parent, he
said, had a right to refuse, but not retract when given, unless the
party himself, by some conduct of his, gave a reason.

"The doctor having made his visit with no better success than before,
the matter now debated was, how to get possession of Amelia by
stratagem, for she was now a closer prisoner than ever; was her
mother's bedfellow by night, and never out of her sight by day.

"While we were deliberating on this point a wine-merchant of the town
came to visit the doctor, to inform him that he had just bottled off a
hogshead of excellent old port, of which he offered to spare him a
hamper, saying that he was that day to send in twelve dozen to Mrs.
Harris.

"The doctor now smiled at a conceit which came into his head; and,
taking me aside, asked me if I had love enough for the young lady to
venture into the house in a hamper. I joyfully leapt at the proposal,
to which the merchant, at the doctor's intercession, consented; for I
believe, madam, you know the great authority which that worthy mart
had over the whole town. The doctor, moreover, promised to procure a
license, and to perform the office for us at his house, if I could
find any means of conveying Amelia thither.

"In this hamper, then, I was carried to the house, and deposited in
the entry, where I had not lain long before I was again removed and
packed up in a cart in order to be sent five miles into the country;
for I heard the orders given as I lay in the entry; and there I
likewise heard that Amelia and her mother were to follow me the next
morning.

"I was unloaded from my cart, and set down with the rest of the lumber
in a great hall. Here I remained above three hours, impatiently
waiting for the evening, when I determined to quit a posture which was
become very uneasy, and break my prison; but Fortune contrived to
release me sooner, by the following means: The house where I now was
had been left in the care of one maid-servant. This faithful creature
came into the hall with the footman who had driven the cart. A scene
of the highest fondness having past between them, the fellow proposed,
and the maid consented, to open the hamper and drink a bottle
together, which, they agreed, their mistress would hardly miss in such
a quantity. They presently began to execute their purpose. They opened
the hamper, and, to their great surprise, discovered the contents.

"I took an immediate advantage of the consternation which appeared in
the countenances of both the servants, and had sufficient presence of
mind to improve the knowledge of those secrets to which I was privy. I
told them that it entirely depended on their behaviour to me whether
their mistress should ever be acquainted, either with what they had
done or with what they had intended to do; for that if they would keep
my secret I would reciprocally keep theirs. I then acquainted them
with my purpose of lying concealed in the house, in order to watch an
opportunity of obtaining a private interview with Amelia.

[Illustration: They opened The Hamper]

"In the situation in which these two delinquents stood, you may be
assured it was not difficult for me to seal up their lips. In short,
they agreed to whatever I proposed. I lay that evening in my dear
Amelia's bedchamber, and was in the morning conveyed into an old
lumber-garret, where I was to wait till Amelia (whom the maid
promised, on her arrival, to inform of my place of concealment) could
find some opportunity of seeing me."

"I ask pardon for interrupting you," cries Miss Matthews, "but you
bring to my remembrance a foolish story which I heard at that time,
though at a great distance from you: That an officer had, in
confederacy with Miss Harris, broke open her mother's cellar and stole
away a great quantity of her wine. I mention it only to shew you what
sort of foundations most stories have."

Booth told her he had heard some such thing himself, and then
continued his story as in the next chapter.




Chapter vi.

_Containing many surprising adventures._


"There," continued he, "I remained the whole day in hopes of a
happiness, the expected approach of which gave me such a delight that
I would not have exchanged my poor lodgings for the finest palace in
the universe.

"A little after it was dark Mrs. Harris arrived, together with Amelia
and her sister. I cannot express how much my heart now began to
flutter; for, as my hopes every moment encreased, strange fears, which
I had not felt before, began now to intermingle with them.

"When I had continued full two hours in these circumstances, I heard a
woman's step tripping upstairs, which I fondly hoped was my Amelia;
but all on a sudden the door flew open, and Mrs. Harris herself
appeared at it, with a countenance pale as death, her whole body
trembling, I suppose with anger; she fell upon me in the most bitter
language. It is not necessary to repeat what she said, nor indeed can
I, I was so shocked and confounded on this occasion. In a word, the
scene ended with my departure without seeing Amelia."

"And pray," cries Miss Matthews, "how happened this unfortunate
discovery?"

Booth answered, That the lady at supper ordered a bottle of wine,
"which neither myself," says he, "nor the servants had presence of
mind to provide. Being told there was none in the house, though she
had been before informed that the things came all safe, she had sent
for the maid, who, being unable to devise any excuse, had fallen on
her knees, and, after confessing her design of opening a bottle, which
she imputed to the fellow, betrayed poor me to her mistress.

"Well, madam, after a lecture of about a quarter of an hour's duration
from Mrs. Harris, I suffered her to conduct me to the outward gate of
her court-yard, whence I set forward in a disconsolate condition of
mind towards my lodgings. I had five miles to walkin a dark and rainy
night: but how can I mention these trifling circumstances as any
aggravation of my disappointment!"

"How was it possible," cried Miss Matthews, "that you could be got out
of the house without seeing Miss Harris?"

"I assure you, madam," answered Booth, "I have often wondered at it
myself; but my spirits were so much sunk at the sight of her mother,
that no man was ever a greater coward than I was at that instant.
Indeed, I believe my tender concern for the terrors of Amelia were the
principal cause of my submission. However it was, I left the house,
and walked about a hundred yards, when, at the corner of the garden-
wall, a female voice, in a whisper, cried out, 'Mr. Booth.' The person
was extremely near me, but it was so dark I could scarce see her; nor
did I, in the confusion I was in, immediately recognize the voice. I
answered in a line of Congreve's, which burst from my lips
spontaneously; for I am sure I had no intention to quote plays at that
time.

"'Who calls the wretched thing that was Alphonso?'

"Upon which a woman leapt into my arms, crying out--'O! it is indeed
my Alphonso, my only Alphonso!'--O Miss Matthews! guess what I felt
when I found I had my Amelia in my arms. I embraced her with an
ecstasy not to be described, at the same instant pouring a thousand
tendernesses into her ears; at least, if I could express so many to
her in a minute, for in that time the alarm began at the house; Mrs.
Harris had mist her daughter, and the court was presently full of
lights and noises of all kinds.

"I now lifted Amelia over a gate, and, jumping after, we crept along
together by the side of a hedge, a different way from what led to the
town, as I imagined that would be the road through which they would
pursue us. In this opinion I was right; for we heard them pass along
that road, and the voice of Mrs. Harris herself, who ran with the
rest, notwithstanding the darkness and the rain. By these means we
luckily made our escape, and clambring over hedge and ditch, my Amelia
performing the part of a heroine all the way, we at length arrived at
a little green lane, where stood a vast spreading oak, under which we
sheltered ourselves from a violent storm.

"When this was over and the moon began to appear, Amelia declared she
knew very well where she was; and, a little farther striking into
another lane to the right, she said that would lead us to a house
where we should be both safe and unsuspected. I followed her
directions, and we at length came to a little cottage about three
miles distant from Mrs. Harris's house.

"As it now rained very violently, we entered this cottage, in which we
espied a light, without any ceremony. Here we found an elderly woman
sitting by herself at a little fire, who had no sooner viewed us than
she instantly sprung from her seat, and starting back gave the
strongest tokens of amazement; upon which Amelia said, 'Be not
surprised, nurse, though you see me in a strange pickle, I own.' The
old woman, after having several times blessed herself, and expressed
the most tender concern for the lady who stood dripping before her,
began to bestir herself in making up the fire; at the same time
entreating Amelia that she might be permitted to furnish her with some
cloaths, which, she said, though not fine, were clean and wholesome
and much dryer than her own. I seconded this motion so vehemently,
that Amelia, though she declared herself under no apprehension of
catching cold (she hath indeed the best constitution in the world), at
last consented, and I retired without doors under a shed, to give my
angel an opportunity of dressing herself in the only room which the
cottage afforded belowstairs.

"At my return into the room, Amelia insisted on my exchanging my coat
for one which belonged to the old woman's son." "I am very glad,"
cried Miss Matthews, "to find she did not forget you. I own I thought
it somewhat cruel to turn you out into the rain."--"O, Miss Matthews!"
continued he, taking no notice of her observation, "I had now an
opportunity of contemplating the vast power of exquisite beauty, which
nothing almost can add to or diminish. Amelia, in the poor rags of her
old nurse, looked scarce less beautiful than I have seen her appear at
a ball or an assembly." "Well, well," cries Miss Matthews, "to be sure
she did; but pray go on with your story."

"The old woman," continued he, "after having equipped us as well as
she could, and placed our wet cloaths before the fire, began to grow
inquisitive; and, after some ejaculations, she cried--'O, my dear
young madam! my mind misgives me hugeously; and pray who is this fine
young gentleman? Oh! Miss Emmy, Miss Emmy, I am afraid madam knows
nothing of all this matter.' 'Suppose he should be my husband, nurse,'
answered Amelia. 'Oh! good! and if he be,' replies the nurse, 'I hope
he is some great gentleman or other, with a vast estate and a coach
and six: for to be sure, if an he was the greatest lord in the land,
you would deserve it all.' But why do I attempt to mimic the honest
creature? In short, she discovered the greatest affection for my
Amelia; with which I was much more delighted than I was offended at
the suspicions she shewed of me, or the many bitter curses which she
denounced against me, if I ever proved a bad husband to so sweet a
young lady.

"I so well improved the hint given me by Amelia, that the old woman
had no doubt of our being really married; and, comforting herself
that, if it was not as well as it might have been, yet madam had
enough for us both, and that happiness did not always depend on great
riches, she began to rail at the old lady for having turned us out of
doors, which I scarce told an untruth in asserting. And when Amelia
said, 'She hoped her nurse would not betray her,' the good woman
answered with much warmth--'Betray you, my dear young madam! no, that
I would not, if the king would give me all that he is worth: no, not
if madam herself would give me the great house, and the whole farm
belonging to it.'

"The good woman then went out and fetched a chicken from the roost,
which she killed, and began to pick, without asking any questions.
Then, summoning her son, who was in bed, to her assistance, she began
to prepare this chicken for our supper. This she afterwards set before
us in so neat, I may almost say elegant, a manner, that whoever would
have disdained it either doth not know the sensation of hunger, or
doth not deserve to have it gratified. Our food was attended with some
ale, which our kind hostess said she intended not to have tapped till
Christmas; 'but,' added she, 'I little thought ever to have the honour
of seeing my dear honoured lady in this poor place.'

"For my own part, no human being was then an object of envy to me, and
even Amelia seemed to be in pretty good spirits; she softly whispered
to me that she perceived there might be happiness in a cottage."

"A cottage!" cries Miss Matthews, sighing, "a cottage, with the man
one loves, is a palace."

"When supper was ended," continued Booth, "the good woman began to
think of our further wants, and very earnestly recommended her bed to
us, saying, it was a very neat, though homely one, and that she could
furnish us with a pair of clean sheets. She added some persuasives
which painted my angel all over with vermilion. As for myself, I
behaved so awkwardly and foolishly, and so readily agreed to Amelia's
resolution of sitting up all night, that, if it did not give the nurse
any suspicion of our marriage, it ought to have inspired her with the
utmost contempt for me.

"We both endeavoured to prevail with nurse to retire to her own bed,
but found it utterly impossible to succeed; she thanked Heaven she
understood breeding better than that. And so well bred was the good
woman, that we could scarce get her out of the room the whole night.
Luckily for us, we both understood French, by means of which we
consulted together, even in her presence, upon the measures we were to
take in our present exigency. At length it was resolved that I should
send a letter by this young lad, whom I have just before mentioned, to
our worthy friend the doctor, desiring his company at our hut, since
we thought it utterly unsafe to venture to the town, which we knew
would be in an uproar on our account before the morning."

Here Booth made a full stop, smiled, and then said he was going to
mention so ridiculous a distress, that he could scarce think of it
without laughing. What this was the reader shall know in the next
chapter.




Chapter vii.

_The story of Booth continued.--More surprising adventures._


From what trifles, dear Miss Matthews," cried Booth, "may some of our
greatest distresses arise! Do you not perceive I am going to tell you
we had neither pen, ink, nor paper, in our present exigency?

"A verbal message was now our only resource; however, we contrived to
deliver it in such terms, that neither nurse nor her son could
possibly conceive any suspicion from it of the present situation of
our affairs. Indeed, Amelia whispered me, I might safely place any
degree of confidence in the lad; for he had been her foster-brother,
and she had a great opinion of his integrity. He was in truth a boy of
very good natural parts; and Dr Harrison, who had received him into
his family, at Amelia's recommendation, had bred him up to write and
read very well, and had taken some pains to infuse into him the
principles of honesty and religion. He was not, indeed, even now
discharged from the doctor's service, but had been at home with his
mother for some time, on account of the small-pox, from which he was
lately recovered.

"I have said so much," continued Booth, "of the boy's character, that
you may not be surprised at some stories which I shall tell you of him
hereafter.

"I am going now, madam, to relate to you one of those strange
accidents which are produced by such a train of circumstances, that
mere chance hath been thought incapable of bringing them together; and
which have therefore given birth, in superstitious minds, to Fortune,
and to several other imaginary beings.

"We were now impatiently expecting the arrival of the doctor; our
messenger had been gone much more than a sufficient time, which to us,
you may be assured, appeared not at all shorter than it was, when
nurse, who had gone out of doors on some errand, came running hastily
to us, crying out, 'O my dear young madam, her ladyship's coach is
just at the door!' Amelia turned pale as death at these words; indeed,
I feared she would have fainted, if I could be said to fear, who had
scarce any of my senses left, and was in a condition little better
than my angel's.

"While we were both in this dreadful situation, Amelia fallen back in
her chair with the countenance in which ghosts are painted, myself at
her feet, with a complexion of no very different colour, and nurse
screaming out and throwing water in Amelia's face, Mrs. Harris entered
the room. At the sight of this scene she threw herself likewise into a
chair, and called immediately for a glass of water, which Miss Betty
her daughter supplied her with; for, as to nurse, nothing was capable
of making any impression on her whilst she apprehended her young
mistress to be in danger.

"The doctor had now entered the room, and, coming immediately up to
Amelia, after some expressions of surprize, he took her by the hand,
called her his little sugar-plum, and assured her there were none but
friends present. He then led her tottering across the room to Mrs.
Harris. Amelia then fell upon her knees before her mother; but the
doctor caught her up, saying, 'Use that posture, child, only to the
Almighty!' but I need not mention this singularity of his to you who
know him so well, and must have heard him often dispute against
addressing ourselves to man in the humblest posture which we use
towards the Supreme Being.

"I will tire you with no more particulars: we were soon satisfied that
the doctor had reconciled us and our affairs to Mrs. Harris; and we
now proceeded directly to church, the doctor having before provided a
licence for us."

"But where is the strange accident?" cries Miss Matthews; "sure you
have raised more curiosity than you have satisfied."

"Indeed, madam," answered he, "your reproof is just; I had like to
have forgotten it; but you cannot wonder at me when you reflect on
that interesting part of my story which I am now relating.--But before
I mention this accident I must tell you what happened after Amelia's
escape from her mother's house. Mrs. Harris at first ran out into the
lane among her servants, and pursued us (so she imagined) along the
road leading to the town; but that being very dirty, and a violent
storm of rain coming, she took shelter in an alehouse about half a
mile from her own house, whither she sent for her coach; she then
drove, together with her daughter, to town, where, soon after her
arrival, she sent for the doctor, her usual privy counsellor in all
her affairs. They sat up all night together, the doctor endeavouring,
by arguments and persuasions, to bring Mrs. Harris to reason; but all
to no purpose, though, as he hath informed me, Miss Betty seconded him
with the warmest entreaties."

Here Miss Matthews laughed; of which Booth begged to know the reason:
she, at last, after many apologies, said, "It was the first good thing
she ever heard of Miss Betty; nay," said she, "and asking your pardon
for my opinion of your sister, since you will have it, I always
conceived her to be the deepest of hypocrites."

Booth fetched a sigh, and said he was afraid she had not always acted
so kindly;--and then, after a little hesitation, proceeded:

"You will be pleased, madam, to remember the lad was sent with a
verbal message to the doctor: which message was no more than to
acquaint him where we were, and to desire the favour of his company,
or that he would send a coach to bring us to whatever place he would
please to meet us at. This message was to be delivered to the doctor
himself, and the messenger was ordered, if he found him not at home,
to go to him wherever he was. He fulfilled his orders and told it to
the doctor in the presence of Mrs. Harris."

"Oh, the idiot!" cries Miss Matthews. "Not at all," answered Booth:
"he is a very sensible fellow, as you will, perhaps, say hereafter. He
had not the least reason to suspect that any secrecy was necessary;
for we took the utmost care he should not suspect it.--Well, madam,
this accident, which appeared so unfortunate, turned in the highest
degree to our advantage. Mrs. Harris no sooner heard the message
delivered than she fell into the most violent passion imaginable, and
accused the doctor of being in the plot, and of having confederated
with me in the design of carrying off her daughter.

"The doctor, who had hitherto used only soothing methods, now talked
in a different strain. He confessed the accusation and justified his
conduct. He said he was no meddler in the family affairs of others,
nor should he have concerned himself with hers, but at her own
request; but that, since Mrs. Harris herself had made him an agent in
this matter, he would take care to acquit himself with honour, and
above all things to preserve a young lady for whom he had the highest
esteem; 'for she is,' cries he, and, by heavens, he said true, 'the
most worthy, generous, and noble of all human beings. You have
yourself, madam,' said he, 'consented to the match. I have, at your
request, made the match;' and then he added some particulars relating
to his opinion of me, which my modesty forbids me to repeat."--"Nay,
but," cries Miss Matthews, "I insist on your conquest of that modesty
for once. We women do not love to hear one another's praises, and I
will be made amends by hearing the praises of a man, and of a man
whom, perhaps," added she with a leer, "I shall not think much the
better of upon that account."--"In obedience to your commands, then,
madam," continued he, "the doctor was so kind to say he had enquired
into my character and found that I had been a dutiful son and an
affectionate brother. Relations, said he, in which whoever discharges
his duty well, gives us a well-grounded hope that he will behave as
properly in all the rest. He concluded with saying that Amelia's
happiness, her heart, nay, her very reputation, were all concerned in
this matter, to which, as he had been made instrumental, he was
resolved to carry her through it; and then, taking the licence from
his pocket, declared to Mrs. Harris that he would go that instant and
marry her daughter wherever he found her. This speech, the doctor's
voice, his look, and his behaviour, all which are sufficiently
calculated to inspire awe, and even terror, when he pleases,
frightened poor Mrs. Harris, and wrought a more sensible effect than
it was in his power to produce by all his arguments and entreaties;
and I have already related what followed.

"Thus the strange accident of our wanting pen, ink, and paper, and our
not trusting the boy with our secret, occasioned the discovery to Mrs.
Harris; that discovery put the doctor upon his metal, and produced
that blessed event which I have recounted to you, and which, as my
mother hath since confessed, nothing but the spirit which he had
exerted after the discovery could have brought about.

"Well, madam, you now see me married to Amelia; in which situation you
will, perhaps, think my happiness incapable of addition. Perhaps it
was so; and yet I can with truth say that the love which I then bore
Amelia was not comparable to what I bear her now." "Happy Amelia!"
cried Miss Matthews. "If all men were like you, all women would be
blessed; nay, the whole world would be so in a great measure; for,
upon my soul, I believe that from the damned inconstancy of your sex
to ours proceeds half the miseries of mankind."

That we may give the reader leisure to consider well the foregoing
sentiment, we will here put an end to this chapter.




Chapter viii.

_In which our readers will probably be divided in their opinion of
Mr. Booth's conduct._


Booth proceeded as follows:--

"The first months of our marriage produced nothing remarkable enough
to mention. I am sure I need not tell Miss Matthews that I found in my
Amelia every perfection of human nature. Mrs. Harris at first gave us
some little uneasiness. She had rather yielded to the doctor than
given a willing consent to the match; however, by degrees, she became
more and more satisfied, and at last seemed perfectly reconciled. This
we ascribed a good deal to the kind offices of Miss Betty, who had
always appeared to be my friend. She had been greatly assisting to
Amelia in making her escape, which I had no opportunity of mentioning
to you before, and in all things behaved so well, outwardly at least,
to myself as well as her sister, that we regarded her as our sincerest
friend.

"About half a year after our marriage two additional companies were
added to our regiment, in one of which I was preferred to the command
of a lieutenant. Upon this occasion Miss Betty gave the first
intimation of a disposition which we have since too severely
experienced."

"Your servant, sir," says Miss Matthews; "then I find I was not
mistaken in my opinion of the lady.--No, no, shew me any goodness in a
censorious prude, and--"

As Miss Matthews hesitated for a simile or an execration, Booth
proceeded: "You will please to remember, madam, there was formerly an
agreement between myself and Mrs. Harris that I should settle all my
Amelia's fortune on her, except a certain sum, which was to be laid
out in my advancement in the army; but, as our marriage was carried on
in the manner you have heard, no such agreement was ever executed. And
since I was become Amelia's husband not a word of this matter was ever
mentioned by the old lady; and as for myself, I declare I had not yet
awakened from that delicious dream of bliss in which the possession of
Amelia had lulled me."

Here Miss Matthews sighed, and cast the tenderest of looks on Booth,
who thus continued his story:--

"Soon after my promotion Mrs. Harris one morning took an occasion to
speak to me on this affair. She said, that, as I had been promoted
gratis to a lieutenancy, she would assist me with money to carry me
yet a step higher; and, if more was required than was formerly
mentioned, it should not be wanting, since she was so perfectly
satisfied with my behaviour to her daughter. Adding that she hoped I
had still the same inclination to settle on my wife the remainder of
her fortune.

"I answered with very warm acknowledgments of my mother's goodness,
and declared, if I had the world, I was ready to lay it at my Amelia's
feet.--And so, Heaven knows, I would ten thousand worlds.

"Mrs. Harris seemed pleased with the warmth of my sentiments, and said
she would immediately send to her lawyer and give him the necessary
orders; and thus ended our conversation on this subject.

"From this time there was a very visible alteration in Miss Betty's
behaviour. She grew reserved to her sister as well as to me. She was
fretful and captious on the slightest occasion; nay, she affected much
to talk on the ill consequences of an imprudent marriage, especially
before her mother; and if ever any little tenderness or endearments
escaped me in public towards Amelia, she never failed to make some
malicious remark on the short duration of violent passions; and, when
I have expressed a fond sentiment for my wife, her sister would kindly
wish she might hear as much seven years hence.

"All these matters have been since suggested to us by reflection; for,
while they actually past, both Amelia and myself had our thoughts too
happily engaged to take notice of what discovered itself in the mind
of any other person.

"Unfortunately for us, Mrs. Harris's lawyer happened at this time to
be at London, where business detained him upwards of a month, and, as
Mrs. Harris would on no occasion employ any other, our affair was
under an entire suspension till his return.

"Amelia, who was now big with child, had often expressed the deepest
concern at her apprehensions of my being some time commanded abroad; a
circumstance, which she declared if it should ever happen to her, even
though she should not then be in the same situation as at present,
would infallibly break her heart. These remonstrances were made with
such tenderness, and so much affected me, that, to avoid any
probability of such an event, I endeavoured to get an exchange into
the horse-guards, a body of troops which very rarely goes abroad,
unless where the king himself commands in person. I soon found an
officer for my purpose, the terms were agreed on, and Mrs. Harris had
ordered the money which I was to pay to be ready, notwithstanding the
opposition made by Miss Betty, who openly dissuaded her mother from
it; alledging that the exchange was highly to my disadvantage; that I
could never hope to rise in the army after it; not forgetting, at the
same time, some insinuations very prejudicial to my reputation as a
soldier.

"When everything was agreed on, and the two commissions were actually
made out, but not signed by the king, one day, at my return from
hunting, Amelia flew to me, and eagerly embracing me, cried out, 'O
Billy, I have news for you which delights my soul. Nothing sure was
ever so fortunate as the exchange you have made. The regiment you was
formerly in is ordered for Gibraltar.'

"I received this news with far less transport than it was delivered. I
answered coldly, since the case was so, I heartily hoped the
commissions might be both signed. 'What do you say?' replied Amelia
eagerly; 'sure you told me everything was entirely settled. That look
of yours frightens me to death.'--But I am running into too minute
particulars. In short, I received a letter by that very post from the
officer with whom I had exchanged, insisting that, though his majesty
had not signed the commissions, that still the bargain was valid,
partly urging it as a right, and partly desiring it as a favour, that
he might go to Gibraltar in my room.

"This letter convinced me in every point. I was now informed that the
commissions were not signed, and consequently that the exchange was
not compleated; of consequence the other could have no right to insist
on going; and, as for granting him such a favour, I too clearly saw I
must do it at the expense of my honour. I was now reduced to a
dilemma, the most dreadful which I think any man can experience; in
which, I am not ashamed to own, I found love was not so overmatched by
honour as he ought to have been. The thoughts of leaving Amelia in her
present condition to misery, perhaps to death or madness, were
insupportable; nor could any other consideration but that which now
tormented me on the other side have combated them a moment."

"No woman upon earth," cries Miss Matthews, "can despise want of
spirit in a man more than myself; and yet I cannot help thinking you
was rather too nice on this occasion."

"You will allow, madam," answered Booth, "that whoever offends against
the laws of honour in the least instance is treated as the highest
delinquent. Here is no excuse, no pardon; and he doth nothing who
leaves anything undone. But if the conflict was so terrible with
myself alone, what was my situation in the presence of Amelia? how
could I support her sighs, her tears, her agonies, her despair? could
I bear to think myself the cruel cause of her sufferings? for so I
was: could I endure the thought of having it in my power to give her
instant relief, for so it was, and refuse it her?

"Miss Betty was now again become my friend. She had scarce been civil
to me for a fortnight last past, yet now she commended me to the
skies, and as severely blamed her sister, whom she arraigned of the
most contemptible weakness in preferring my safety to my honour: she
said many ill-natured things on the occasion, which I shall not now
repeat.

"In the midst of this hurricane the good doctor came to dine with Mrs.
Harris, and at my desire delivered his opinion on the matter."

Here Mr. Booth was interrupted in his narrative by the arrival of a
person whom we shall introduce in the next chapter.




Chapter ix.

_Containing a scene of a different kind from any of the preceding._


The gentleman who now arrived was the keeper; or, if you please (for
so he pleased to call himself), the governor of the prison.

He used so little ceremony at his approach, that the bolt, which was
very slight on the inside, gave way, and the door immediately flew
open. He had no sooner entered the room than he acquainted Miss
Matthews that he had brought her very good news, for which he demanded
a bottle of wine as his due.

This demand being complied with, he acquainted Miss Matthews that the
wounded gentleman was not dead, nor was his wound thought to be
mortal: that loss of blood, and perhaps his fright, had occasioned his
fainting away; "but I believe, madam," said he, "if you take the
proper measures you may be bailed to-morrow. I expect the lawyer here
this evening, and if you put the business into his hands I warrant it
will be done. Money to be sure must be parted with, that's to be sure.
People to be sure will expect to touch a little in such cases. For my
own part, I never desire to keep a prisoner longer than the law
allows, not I; I always inform them they can be bailed as soon as I
know it; I never make any bargain, not I; I always love to leave those
things to the gentlemen and ladies themselves. I never suspect
gentlemen and ladies of wanting generosity."

Miss Matthews made a very slight answer to all these friendly
professions. She said she had done nothing she repented of, and was
indifferent as to the event. "All I can say," cries she, "is, that if
the wretch is alive there is no greater villain in life than himself;"
and, instead of mentioning anything of the bail, she begged the keeper
to leave her again alone with Mr. Booth. The keeper replied, "Nay,
madam, perhaps it may be better to stay a little longer here, if you
have not bail ready, than to buy them too dear. Besides, a day or two
hence, when the gentleman is past all danger of recovery, to be sure
some folks that would expect an extraordinary fee now cannot expect to
touch anything. And to be sure you shall want nothing here. The best
of all things are to be had here for money, both eatable and
drinkable: though I say it, I shan't turn my back to any of the
taverns for either eatables or wind. The captain there need not have
been so shy of owning himself when he first came in; we have had
captains and other great gentlemen here before now; and no shame to
them, though I say it. Many a great gentleman is sometimes found in
places that don't become them half so well, let me tell them that,
Captain Booth, let me tell them that."

"I see, sir," answered Booth, a little discomposed, "that you are
acquainted with my title as well as my name."

"Ay, sir," cries the keeper, "and I honour you the more for it. I love
the gentlemen of the army. I was in the army myself formerly; in the
Lord of Oxford's horse. It is true I rode private; but I had money
enough to have bought in quarter-master, when I took it into my head
to marry, and my wife she did not like that I should continue a
soldier, she was all for a private life; and so I came to this
business."

"Upon my word, sir," answered Booth, "you consulted your wife's
inclinations very notably; but pray will you satisfy my curiosity in
telling me how you became acquainted that I was in the army? for my
dress I think could not betray me."

"Betray!" replied the keeper; "there is no betraying here, I hope--I
am not a person to betray people.--But you are so shy and peery, you
would almost make one suspect there was more in the matter. And if
there be, I promise you, you need not be afraid of telling it me. You
will excuse me giving you a hint; but the sooner the better, that's
all. Others may be beforehand with you, and first come first served on
these occasions, that's all. Informers are odious, there's no doubt of
that, and no one would care to be an informer if he could help it,
because of the ill-usage they always receive from the mob: yet it is
dangerous to trust too much; and when safety and a good part of the
reward too are on one side and the gallows on the other--I know which
a wise man would chuse."

"What the devil do you mean by all this?" cries Booth.

"No offence, I hope," answered the keeper: "I speak for your good; and
if you have been upon the snaffling lay--you understand me, I am
sure."

"Not I," answered Booth, "upon my honour."

"Nay, nay," replied the keeper, with a contemptuous sneer, "if you are
so peery as that comes to, you must take the consequence.--But for my
part, I know I would not trust Robinson with twopence untold."

"What do you mean?" cries Booth; "who is Robinson?"

"And you don't know Robinson?" answered the keeper with great emotion.
To which Booth replying in the negative, the keeper, after some tokens
of amazement, cried out, "Well, captain, I must say you are the best
at it of all the gentlemen I ever saw. However, I will tell you this:
the lawyer and Mr. Robinson have been laying their heads together
about you above half an hour this afternoon. I overheard them mention
Captain Booth several times, and, for my part, I would not answer that
Mr. Murphy is not now gone about the business; but if you will impeach
any to me of the road, or anything else, I will step away to his
worship Thrasher this instant, and I am sure I have interest enough
with him to get you admitted an evidence."

"And so," cries Booth, "you really take me for a highwayman?"

"No offence, captain, I hope," said the keeper; "as times go, there
are many worse men in the world than those. Gentlemen may be driven to
distress, and when they are, I know no more genteeler way than the
road. It hath been many a brave man's case, to my knowledge, and men
of as much honour too as any in the world."

"Well, sir," said Booth, "I assure you I am not that gentleman of
honour you imagine me."

Miss Matthews, who had long understood the keeper no better than Mr.
Booth, no sooner heard his meaning explained than she was fired with
greater indignation than the gentleman had expressed. "How dare you,
sir," said she to the keeper, "insult a man of fashion, and who hath
had the honour to bear his majesty's commission in the army? as you
yourself own you know. If his misfortunes have sent him hither, sure
we have no laws that will protect such a fellow as you in insulting
him." "Fellow!" muttered the keeper--"I would not advise you, madam,
to use such language to me."--"Do you dare threaten me?" replied Miss
Matthews in a rage. "Venture in the least instance to exceed your
authority with regard to me, and I will prosecute you with the utmost
vengeance."

A scene of very high altercation now ensued, till Booth interposed and
quieted the keeper, who was, perhaps, enough inclined to an
accommodation; for, in truth, he waged unequal war. He was besides
unwilling to incense Miss Matthews, whom he expected to be bailed out
the next day, and who had more money left than he intended she should
carry out of the prison with her; and as for any violent or
unjustifiable methods, the lady had discovered much too great a spirit
to be in danger of them. The governor, therefore, in a very gentle
tone, declared that, if he had given any offence to the gentleman, he
heartily asked his pardon; that, if he had known him to be really a
captain, he should not have entertained any such suspicions; but the
captain was a very common title in that place, and belonged to several
gentlemen that had never been in the army, or, at most, had rid
private like himself. "To be sure, captain," said he, "as you yourself
own, your dress is not very military" (for he had on a plain fustian
suit); "and besides, as the lawyer says, _noscitur a sosir_, is a very
good rule. And I don't believe there is a greater rascal upon earth
than that same Robinson that I was talking of. Nay, I assure you, I
wish there may be no mischief hatching against you. But if there is I
will do all I can with the lawyer to prevent it. To be sure, Mr.
Murphy is one of the cleverest men in the world at the law; that even
his enemies must own, and as I recommend him to all the business I can
(and it is not a little to be sure that arises in this place), why one
good turn deserves another. And I may expect that he will not be
concerned in any plot to ruin any friend of mine, at least when I
desire him not. I am sure he could not be an honest man if he would."

Booth was then satisfied that Mr. Robinson, whom he did not yet know
by name, was the gamester who had won his money at play. And now Miss
Matthews, who had very impatiently borne this long interruption,
prevailed on the keeper to withdraw. As soon as he was gone Mr. Booth
began to felicitate her upon the news of the wounded gentleman being
in a fair likelihood of recovery. To which, after a short silence, she
answered, "There is something, perhaps, which you will not easily
guess, that makes your congratulations more agreeable to me than the
first account I heard of the villain's having escaped the fate he
deserves; for I do assure you, at first, it did not make me amends for
the interruption of my curiosity. Now I hope we shall be disturbed no
more till you have finished your whole story.--You left off, I think,
somewhere in the struggle about leaving Amelia--the happy Amelia."
"And can you call her happy at such a period?" cries Booth. "Happy,
ay, happy, in any situation," answered Miss Matthews, "with such a
husband. I, at least, may well think so, who have experienced the very
reverse of her fortune; but I was not born to be happy. I may say with
the poet,

    "The blackest ink of fate was sure my lot,
     And when fate writ my name, it made a blot."

"Nay, nay, dear Miss Matthews," answered Booth, "you must and shall
banish such gloomy thoughts. Fate hath, I hope, many happy days in
store for you."--"Do you believe it, Mr. Booth?" replied she; "indeed
you know the contrary--you must know--for you can't have forgot. No
Amelia in the world can have quite obliterated--forgetfulness is not
in our own power. If it was, indeed, I have reason to think--but I
know not what I am saying.--Pray do proceed in that story."

Booth so immediately complied with this request that it is possible he
was pleased with it. To say the truth, if all which unwittingly dropt
from Miss Matthews was put together, some conclusions might, it seems,
be drawn from the whole, which could not convey a very agreeable idea
to a constant husband. Booth, therefore, proceeded to relate what is
written in the third book of this history.




BOOK III.

Chapter i.

_In which Mr. Booth resumes his story._


"If I am not mistaken, madam," continued Booth, "I was just going to
acquaint you with the doctor's opinion when we were interrupted by the
keeper.

"The doctor, having heard counsel on both sides, that is to say, Mrs.
Harris for my staying, and Miss Betty for my going, at last delivered
his own sentiments. As for Amelia, she sat silent, drowned in her
tears; nor was I myself in a much better situation.

"'As the commissions are not signed,' said the doctor, 'I think you
may be said to remain in your former regiment; and therefore I think
you ought to go on this expedition; your duty to your king and
country, whose bread you have eaten, requires it; and this is a duty
of too high a nature to admit the least deficiency. Regard to your
character, likewise, requires you to go; for the world, which might
justly blame your staying at home if the case was even fairly stated,
will not deal so honestly by you: you must expect to have every
circumstance against you heightened, and most of what makes for your
defence omitted; and thus you will be stigmatized as a coward without
any palliation. As the malicious disposition of mankind is too well
known, and the cruel pleasure which they take in destroying the
reputations of others, the use we are to make of this knowledge is to
afford no handle to reproach; for, bad as the world is, it seldom
falls on any man who hath not given some slight cause for censure,
though this, perhaps, is often aggravated ten thousand-fold; and, when
we blame the malice of the aggravation we ought not to forget our own
imprudence in giving the occasion. Remember, my boy, your honour is at
stake; and you know how nice the honour of a soldier is in these
cases. This is a treasure which he must be your enemy, indeed, who
would attempt to rob you of. Therefore, you ought to consider every
one as your enemy who, by desiring you to stay, would rob you of your
honour.'

"'Do you hear that, sister?' cries Miss Betty.--'Yes, I do hear it'
answered Amelia, with more spirit than I ever saw her exert before,
and would preserve his honour at the expense of my life. 'I will
preserve it if it should be at that expense; and since it is Dr
Harrison's opinion that he ought to go, I give my consent. Go, my dear
husband,' cried she, falling upon her knees: 'may every angel of
heaven guard and preserve you!'--I cannot repeat her words without
being affected," said he, wiping his eyes, "the excellence of that
woman no words can paint: Miss Matthews, she hath every perfection in
human nature.

"I will not tire you with the repetition of any more that past on that
occasion, nor with the quarrel that ensued between Mrs. Harris and the
doctor; for the old lady could not submit to my leaving her daughter
in her present condition. She fell severely on the army, and cursed
the day in which her daughter was married to a soldier, not sparing
the doctor for having had some share in the match. I will omit,
likewise, the tender scene which past between Amelia and myself
previous to my departure." "Indeed, I beg you would not," cries Miss
Matthews; "nothing delights me more than scenes of tenderness. I
should be glad to know, if possible, every syllable which was uttered
on both sides."

"I will indulge you then," cries Booth, "as far as is in my power.
Indeed, I believe I am able to recollect much the greatest part; for
the impression is never to be effaced from my memory."

He then proceeded as Miss Matthews desired; but, lest all our readers
should not be of her opinion, we will, according to our usual custom,
endeavour to accommodate ourselves to every taste, and shall,
therefore, place this scene in a chapter by itself, which we desire
all our readers who do not love, or who, perhaps, do not know the
pleasure of tenderness, to pass over; since they may do this without
any prejudice to the thread of the narrative.




Chapter ii.

_Containing a scene of the tender kind._


"The doctor, madam," continued Booth, "spent his evening at Mrs.
Harris's house, where I sat with him whilst he smoaked his pillow
pipe, as his phrase is. Amelia was retired about half an hour to her
chamber before I went to her. At my entrance I found her on her knees,
a posture in which I never disturbed her. In a few minutes she arose,
came to me, and embracing me, said she had been praying for resolution
to support the cruellest moment she had ever undergone or could
possibly undergo. I reminded her how much more bitter a farewel would
be on a death-bed, when we never could meet, in this world at least,
again. I then endeavoured to lessen all those objects which alarmed
her most, and particularly the danger I was to encounter, upon which
head I seemed a little to comfort her; but the probable length of my
absence and the certain length of my voyage were circumstances which
no oratory of mine could even palliate. 'O heavens!' said she,
bursting into tears, 'can I bear to think that hundreds, thousands for
aught I know, of miles or leagues, that lands and seas are between us?
What is the prospect from that mount in our garden where I have sat so
many happy hours with my Billy? what is the distance between that and
the farthest hill which we see from thence compared to the distance
which will be between us? You cannot wonder at this idea; you must
remember, my Billy, at this place, this very thought came formerly
into my foreboding mind. I then begged you to leave the army. Why
would you not comply?--did I not tell you then that the smallest
cottage we could survey from the mount would be, with you, a paradise
to me? it would be so still--why can't my Billy think so? am I so much
his superior in love? where is the dishonour, Billy? or, if there be
any, will it reach our ears in our little hut? are glory and fame, and
not his Amelia, the happiness of my husband? go then, purchase them at
my expence. You will pay a few sighs, perhaps a few tears, at parting,
and then new scenes will drive away the thoughts of poor Amelia from
your bosom; but what assistance shall I have in my affliction? not
that any change of scene could drive you one moment from my
remembrance; yet here every object I behold will place your loved idea
in the liveliest manner before my eyes. This is the bed in which you
have reposed; that is the chair on which you sat. Upon these boards
you have stood. These books you have read to me. Can I walk among our
beds of flowers without viewing your favourites, nay, those which you
have planted with your own hands? can I see one beauty from our
beloved mount which you have not pointed out to me?'--Thus she went
on, the woman, madam, you see, still prevailing."--"Since you mention
it," says Miss Matthews, with a smile, "I own the same observation
occurred to me. It is too natural to us to consider ourselves only,
Mr. Booth."--"You shall hear," he cried. "At last the thoughts of her
present condition suggested themselves.--' But if,' said she, 'my
situation, even in health, will be so intolerable, how shall I, in the
danger and agonies of childbirth, support your absence?'--Here she
stopt, and, looking on me with all the tenderness imaginable, cried
out, 'And am I then such a wretch to wish for your presence at such a
season? ought I not to rejoice that you are out of the hearing of my
cries or the knowledge of my pains? if I die, will you not have
esca

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