Debt, Imprisonment for -- Fiction; London (England) -- History -- 18th century -- Fiction
"Then," the young woman went on, "tell your man to drive you down
Ludgate Hill and up the Fleet Market on the prison side; he may stop at
the next house to the third Pen and Hand. You will find the doctor's
name written on a card in the window."
We thanked her, and got into the coach. When we told the coachman where
to go, he smacked his leg with his hand, and burst out laughing.
"I thought as much," cried the impudent rascal. "Ah, Mother Slylips!
wouldn't the doctor serve your turn, but you must needs look out for
one in the Coffee-house? I warrant the doctor is good enough for the
likes of you!"
He cracked his whip, and we drove off slowly.
Now, which was really extraordinary, all the reverend gentlemen of the
coffee-room had left their places and were crowded round the door,
some of them almost pushing their wigs into the coach windows in their
eagerness to look at us. This seemed most unseemly conduct on the
part of a collection of divines; nor did I imagine that curiosity so
undignified, and so unworthy a sacred profession, could be called forth
by the simple appearance of a young girl in the coffee-room.
The faces formed a curious picture. Some of the clergymen were
stooping, some standing, some mounting on chairs, the better to see, so
that the doorway of the Coffee-house seemed a pyramid of faces. They
were old, young, fat, thin, red, pale, of every appearance and every
age; they were mostly disagreeable to look at, because their possessors
were men who had been unsuccessful, either through misfortune or
through fault; and they all wore, as they stared, a look of delighted
curiosity, as if here was something, indeed, to make Londoners
talk--nothing less, if you please, than a girl of seventeen, just come
up from the country.
"Bless us!" cried Mrs. Gambit, "are the men gone mad? London is a
wicked place indeed, when even clergymen come trooping out merely to
see a pretty girl! Fie for shame, sir, and be off with you!"
These last words were addressed to one old clergyman with an immense
wig, who was actually thrusting his face through the coach window. He
drew it back on this reprimand, and we went on our way.
I looked round once more. The young woman of the counter was still in
the doorway, and with her William, with the scrubby wig and the red
nose; round them were the clergymen, and they were all talking about
me, and looking after me. Some of them wagged their heads, some shook
theirs, some nodded, some were holding their heads on one side, and
some were hanging theirs. Some were laughing, some smiling, some were
grave. What did it mean?
"If," said Mrs. Gambit, "they were not clergymen, I should say they
were all tomfools. And this for a pretty girl--for you are pretty,
Miss Kitty, with your rosy cheeks and the bright eyes which were never
yet spoiled by the London smoke. But there must be plenty other pretty
girls in London. And them to call themselves clergymen!"
"Perhaps they were looking at you, Mrs. Gambit."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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