suppose, to the end. And now let's go to business, gentlemen, and
excuse this sermon."
After giving an account of all I knew, which was very little, other
gents who were employed in the concern were examined; and I went
back to prison, with my poor little wife on my arm. We had to pass
through the crowd in the rooms, and my heart bled as I saw, amongst
a score of others, poor Gates, Brough's porter, who had advanced
every shilling to his master, and was now, with ten children,
houseless and penniless in his old age. Captain Sparr was in this
neighbourhood, but by no means so friendly disposed; for while
Gates touched his hat, as if I had been a lord, the little Captain
came forward threatening with his bamboo-cane and swearing with
great oaths that I was an accomplice of Brough. "Curse you for a
smooth-faced scoundrel!" says he. "What business have you to ruin
an English gentleman, as you have me?" And again he advanced with
his stick. But this time, officer as he was, Gus took him by the
collar, and shoved him back, and said, "Look at the lady, you
brute, and hold your tongue!" And when he looked at my wife's
situation, Captain Sparr became redder for shame than he had before
been for anger. "I'm sorry she's married to such a good-for-
nothing," muttered he, and fell back; and my poor wife and I walked
out of the court, and back to our dismal room in the prison.
It was a hard place for a gentle creature like her to be confined
in; and I longed to have some of my relatives with her when her
time should come. But her grandmother could not leave the old
lieutenant; and my mother had written to say that, as Mrs. Hoggarty
was with us, she was quite as well at home with her children.
"What a blessing it is for you, under your misfortunes," continued
the good soul, "to have the generous purse of your aunt for
succour!" Generous purse of my aunt, indeed! Where could Mrs.
Hoggarty be? It was evident that she had not written to any of her
friends in the country, nor gone thither, as she threatened.
But as my mother had already lost so much money through my
unfortunate luck, and as she had enough to do with her little
pittance to keep my sisters at home; and as, on hearing of my
condition, she would infallibly have sold her last gown to bring me
aid, Mary and I agreed that we would not let her know what our real
condition was--bad enough! Heaven knows, and sad and cheerless.
Old Lieutenant Smith had likewise nothing but his half-pay and his
rheumatism; so we were, in fact, quite friendless.
That period of my life, and that horrible prison, seem to me like
recollections of some fever. What an awful place!--not for the
sadness, strangely enough, as I thought, but for the gaiety of it;
for the long prison galleries were, I remember, full of life and a
sort of grave bustle. All day and all night doors were clapping to
and fro; and you heard loud voices, oaths, footsteps, and laughter.
Next door to our room was one where a man sold gin, under the name
of TAPE; and here, from morning till night, the people kept up a
horrible revelry;--and sang--sad songs some of them: but my dear
little girl was, thank God! unable to understand the most part of
their ribaldry. She never used to go out till nightfall; and all
day she sat working at a little store of caps and dresses for the
expected stranger--and not, she says to this day, unhappy. But the
confinement sickened her, who had been used to happy country air,
and she grew daily paler and paler.
The Fives Court was opposite our window; and here I used, very
unwillingly at first, but afterwards, I do confess, with much
eagerness, to take a couple of hours' daily sport. Ah! it was a
strange place. There was an aristocracy there as elsewhere,--
amongst other gents, a son of my Lord Deuce-ace; and many of the
men in the prison were as eager to walk with him, and talked of his
family as knowingly, as if they were Bond Street bucks. Poor Tidd,
especially, was one of these. Of all his fortune he had nothing
left but a dressing-case and a flowered dressing-gown; and to these
possessions he added a fine pair of moustaches, with which the poor
creature strutted about; and though cursing his ill fortune, was, I
do believe, as happy whenever his friends brought him a guinea, as
he had been during his brief career as a gentleman on town. I have
seen sauntering dandies in watering-places ogling the women,
watching eagerly for steamboats and stage-coaches as if their lives
depended upon them, and strutting all day in jackets up and down
the public walks. Well, there are such fellows in prison: quite
as dandified and foolish, only a little more shabby--dandies with
dirty beards and holes at their elbows.
I did not go near what is called the poor side of the prison--I
DARED not, that was the fact. But our little stock of money was
running low; and my heart sickened to think what might be my dear
wife's fate, and on what sort of a couch our child might be born.
But Heaven spared me that pang,--Heaven, and my dear good friend,
Gus Hoskins.
The attorneys to whom Mr. Smithers recommended me, told me that I
could get leave to live in the rules of the Fleet, could I procure
sureties to the marshal of the prison for the amount of the
detainer lodged against me; but though I looked Mr. Blatherwick
hard in the face, he never offered to give the bail for me, and I
knew no housekeeper in London who would procure it. There was,
however, one whom I did not know,--and that was old Mr. Hoskins,
the leatherseller of Skinner Street, a kind fat gentleman, who
brought his fat wife to see Mrs. Titmarsh; and though the lady gave
herself rather patronising airs (her husband being free of the
Skinners' Company, and bidding fair to be Alderman, nay, Lord Mayor
of the first city in the world), she seemed heartily to sympathise
with us; and her husband stirred and bustled about until the
requisite leave was obtained, and I was allowed comparative
liberty.
As for lodgings, they were soon had. My old landlady, Mrs. Stokes,
sent her Jemima to say that her first floor was at our service; and
when we had taken possession of it, and I offered at the end of the
week to pay her bill, the good soul, with tears in her eyes, told
me that she did not want for money now, and that she knew I had
enough to do with what I had. I did not refuse her kindness; for,
indeed, I had but five guineas left, and ought not by rights to
have thought of such expensive apartments as hers; but my wife's
time was very near, and I could not bear to think that she should
want for any comfort in her lying-in.
The admirable woman, with whom the Misses Hoskins came every day to
keep company--and very nice, kind ladies they are--recovered her
health a good deal, now she was out of the odious prison and was
enabled to take exercise. How gaily did we pace up and down Bridge
Street and Chatham Place, to be sure! and yet, in
truth, I was a
beggar, and felt sometimes ashamed of being so happy.
With regard to the liabilities of the Company my mind was now made
quite easy; for the creditors could only come upon our directors,
and these it was rather difficult to find. Mr. Brough was across
the water; and I must say, to the credit of that gentleman, that
while everybody thought he had run away with hundreds of thousands
of pounds, he was in a garret at Boulogne, with scarce a shilling
in his pocket, and his fortune to make afresh. Mrs. Brough, like a
good brave woman, remained faithful to him, and only left Fulham
with the gown on her back; and Miss Belinda, though grumbling and
sadly out of temper, was no better off. For the other directors,--
when they came to inquire at Edinburgh for Mr. Mull, W. S., it
appeared there WAS a gentleman of that name, who had practised in
Edinburgh with good reputation until 1800, since when he had
retired to the Isle of Skye; and on being applied to, knew no more
of the West Diddlesex Association than Queen Anne did. General Sir
Dionysius O'Halloran had abruptly quitted Dublin, and returned to
the republic of Guatemala. Mr. Shirk went into the Gazette. Mr.
Macraw, M.P. and King's Counsel, had not a single guinea in the
world but what he received for attending our board; and the only
man seizable was Mr. Manstraw, a wealthy navy contractor, as we
understood, at Chatham. He turned out to be a small dealer in
marine stores, and his whole stock in trade was not worth 10L. Mr.
Abednego was the other director, and we have already seen what
became of HIM.
"Why, as there is no danger from the West Diddlesex," suggested Mr.
Hoskins, senior, "should you not now endeavour to make an
arrangement with your creditors; and who can make a better bargain
with them than pretty Mrs. Titmarsh here, whose sweet eyes would
soften the hardest-hearted tailor or milliner that ever lived?"
Accordingly my dear girl, one bright day in February, shook me by
the hand, and bidding me be of good cheer, set forth with Gus in a
coach, to pay a visit to those persons. Little did I think a year
before, that the daughter of the gallant Smith should ever be
compelled to be a suppliant to tailors and haberdashers; but SHE,
Heaven bless her! felt none of the shame which oppressed me--or
SAID she felt none--and went away, nothing doubting, on her errand.
In the evening she came back, and my heart thumped to know the
news. I saw it was bad by her face. For some time she did not
speak, but looked as pale as death, and wept as she kissed me.
"YOU speak, Mr. Augustus," at last said she, sobbing; and so Gus
told me the circumstances of that dismal day.
"What do you think, Sam?" says he; "that infernal aunt of yours, at
whose command you had the things, has written to the tradesmen to
say that you are a swindler and impostor; that you give out that
SHE ordered the goods; that she is ready to drop down dead, and to
take her bible-oath she never did any such thing, and that they
must look to you alone for payment. Not one of them would hear of
letting you out; and as for Mantalini, the scoundrel was so
insolent that I gave him a box on the ear, and would have half-
killed him, only poor Mary--Mrs. Titmarsh I mean--screamed and
fainted: and I brought her away, and here she is, as ill as can
be."
That night, the indefatigable Gus was obliged to run post-haste for
Doctor Salts, and next morning a little boy was born. I did not
know whether to be sad or happy, as they showed me the little
weakly thing; but Mary was the happiest woman, she declared, in the
world, and forgot all her sorrows in nursing the poor baby; she
went bravely through her time, and vowed that it was the loveliest
child in the world; and that though Lady Tiptoff, whose confinement
we read of as having taken place the same day, might have a silk
bed and a fine house in Grosvenor Square, she never never could
have such a beautiful child as our dear little Gus: for after whom
should we have named the boy, if not after our good kind friend?
We had a little party at the christening, and I assure you were
very merry over our tea.
The mother, thank Heaven! was very well, and it did one's heart
good to see her in that attitude in which I think every woman, be
she ever so plain, looks beautiful--with her baby at her bosom.
The child was sickly, but she did not see it; we were very poor,
but what cared she? She had no leisure to be sorrowful as I was:
I had my last guinea now in my pocket; and when THAT was gone--ah!
my heart sickened to think of what was to come, and I prayed for
strength and guidance, and in the midst of my perplexities felt yet
thankful that the danger of the confinement was over; and that for
the worst fortune which was to befall us, my dear wife was at least
prepared, and strong in health.
I told Mrs. Stokes that she must let us have a cheaper room--a
garret that should cost but a few shillings; and though the good
woman bade me remain in the apartments we occupied, yet, now that
my wife was well, I felt it would be a crime to deprive my kind
landlady of her chief means of livelihood; and at length she
promised to get me a garret as I wanted, and to make it as
comfortable as might be; and little Jemima declared that she would
be glad beyond measure to wait on the mother and the child.
The room, then, was made ready; and though I took some pains not to
speak of the arrangement too suddenly to Mary, yet there was no
need of disguise or hesitation; for when at last I told her--"Is
that all?" said she, and took my hand with one of her blessed
smiles, and vowed that she and Jemima would keep the room as pretty
and neat as possible. "And I will cook your dinners," added she;
"for you know you said I make the best roly-poly puddings in the
world." God bless her! I do think some women almost love poverty:
but I did not tell Mary how poor I was, nor had she any idea how
lawyers', and prison's, and doctors' fees had diminished the sum of
money which she brought me when we came to the Fleet.
It was not, however, destined that she and her child should inhabit
that little garret. We were to leave our lodgings on Monday
morning; but on Saturday evening the child was seized with
convulsions, and all Sunday the mother watched and prayed for it:
but it pleased God to take the innocent infant from us, and on
Sunday, at midnight, it lay a corpse in its mother's bosom. Amen.
We have other children, happy and well, now round about us, and
from the father's heart the memory of this little thing has almost
faded; but I do believe that every day of her life the mother
thinks of the firstborn that was with her for so short a while:
many and many a time has she taken her daughters to the grave, in
Saint Bride's, where he lies buried; and she wears still at her
neck a little little lock of gold hair, which she took from the
head of the infant as
he lay smiling in his coffin. It has
happened to me to forget the child's birthday, but to her never;
and often in the midst of common talk comes something that shows
she is thinking of the child still,--some simple allusion that is
to me inexpressibly affecting.
I shall not try to describe her grief, for such things are sacred
and secret; and a man has no business to place them on paper for
all the world to read. Nor should I have mentioned the child's
loss at all, but that even that loss was the means of a great
worldly blessing to us; as my wife has often with tears and thanks
acknowledged.
While my wife was weeping over her child, I am ashamed to say I was
distracted with other feelings besides those of grief for its loss;
and I have often since thought what a master--nay, destroyer--of
the affections want is, and have learned from experience to be
thankful for DAILY BREAD. That acknowledgment of weakness which we
make in imploring to be relieved from hunger and from temptation,
is surely wisely put in our daily prayer. Think of it you who are
rich, and take heed how you turn a beggar away.
The child lay there in its wicker cradle, with its sweet fixed
smile in its face (I think the angels in heaven must have been glad
to welcome that pretty innocent smile); and it was only the next
day, after my wife had gone to lie down, and I sat keeping watch by
it, that I remembered the condition of its parents, and thought, I
can't tell with what a pang, that I had not money left to bury the
little thing, and wept bitter tears of despair. Now, at last, I
thought I must apply to my poor mother, for this was a sacred
necessity; and I took paper, and wrote her a letter at the baby's
side, and told her of our condition. But, thank Heaven! I never
sent the letter; for as I went to the desk to get sealing-wax and
seal that dismal letter, my eyes fell upon the diamond pin that I
had quite forgotten, and that was lying in the drawer of the desk.
I looked into the bedroom,--my poor wife was asleep; she had been
watching for three nights and days, and had fallen asleep from
sheer fatigue; and I ran out to a pawnbroker's with the diamond,
and received seven guineas for it, and coming back put the money
into the landlady's hand, and told her to get what was needful. My
wife was still asleep when I came back; and when she woke, we
persuaded her to go downstairs to the landlady's parlour; and
meanwhile the necessary preparations were made, and the poor child
consigned to its coffin.
The next day, after all was over, Mrs. Stokes gave me back three
out of the seven guineas; and then I could not help sobbing out to
her my doubts and wretchedness, telling her that this was the last
money I had; and when that was gone I knew not what was to become
of the best wife that ever a man was blest with.
My wife was downstairs with the woman. Poor Gus, who was with me,
and quite as much affected as any of the party, took me by the arm,
and led me downstairs; and we quite forgot all about the prison and
the rules, and walked a long long way across Blackfriars Bridge,
the kind fellow striving as much as possible to console me.
When we came back, it was in the evening. The first person who met
me in the house was my kind mother, who fell into my arms with many
tears, and who rebuked me tenderly for not having told her of my
necessities. She never should have known of them, she said; but
she had not heard from me since I wrote announcing the birth of the
child, and she felt uneasy about my silence; and meeting Mr.
Smithers in the street, asked from him news concerning me:
whereupon that gentleman, with some little show of alarm, told her
that he thought her daughter-in-law was confined in an
uncomfortable place; that Mrs. Hoggarty had left us; finally, that
I was in prison. This news at once despatched my poor mother on
her travels, and she had only just come from the prison, where she
learned my address.
I asked her whether she had seen my wife, and how she found her.