Didactic fiction; Domestic fiction; England -- Fiction; Married women -- Fiction
and whither am I to go with you?” “O, anywhere: where your honour
pleases,” cries the bailiff. “Then suppose we go to Brown’s
coffee-house,” said the prisoner. “No,” answered the bailiff, “that will
not do; that’s in the verge of the court.” “Why then, to the nearest
tavern,” said Booth. “No, not to a tavern,” cries the other, “that is
not a place of security; and you know, captain, your honour is a shy
cock; I have been after your honour these three months. Come, sir,
you must go to my house, if you please.” “With all my heart,” answered
Booth, “if it be anywhere hereabouts.” “Oh, it is but a little ways
off,” replied the bailiff; “it is only in Gray’s-inn-lane, just by
almost.” He then called a coach, and desired his prisoner to walk in.
Booth entered the coach without any resistance, which, had he been
inclined to make, he must have plainly perceived would have been
ineffectual, as the bailiff appeared to have several followers at hand,
two of whom, beside the commander in chief, mounted with him into the
coach. As Booth was a sweet-tempered man, as well as somewhat of a
philosopher, he behaved with all the good-humour imaginable, and indeed,
with more than his companions; who, however, shewed him what they call
civility, that is, they neither struck him nor spit in his face.
Notwithstanding the pleasantry which Booth endeavoured to preserve, he
in reality envied every labourer whom he saw pass by him in his way. The
charms of liberty, against his will, rushed on his mind; and he could
not avoid suggesting to himself how much more happy was the poorest
wretch who, without controul, could repair to his homely habitation
and to his family, compared to him, who was thus violently, and yet
lawfully, torn away from the company of his wife and children. And their
condition, especially that of his Amelia, gave his heart many a severe
and bitter pang.
At length he arrived at the bailiff’s mansion, and was ushered into
a room in which were several persons. Booth desired to be alone; upon
which the bailiff waited on him up-stairs into an apartment, the windows
of which were well fortified with iron bars, but the walls had not the
least outwork raised before them; they were, indeed, what is generally
called naked; the bricks having been only covered with a thin plaster,
which in many places was mouldered away.
The first demand made upon Booth was for coach-hire, which amounted
to two shillings, according to the bailiff’s account; that being just
double the legal fare. He was then asked if he did not chuse a bowl of
punch? to which he having answered in the negative, the bailiff replied,
“Nay, sir, just as you please. I don’t ask you to drink, if you don’t
chuse it; but certainly you know the custom; the house is full of
prisoners, and I can’t afford gentlemen a room to themselves for
nothing.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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