L. _Ful_. Not at his Uncle’s in _Northamptonshire_?
_Bred_. Your Ladyship was wont to credit me.
L. _Ful_. Forgive me--you went to a Black-Smith’s--
_Bred_. Yes, Madam; and at the door encountred the beastly thing he
calls a Landlady; who lookt as if she had been of her own Husband’s
making, compos’d of moulded Smith’s Dust. I ask’d for Mr. _Wasteall_,
and she began to open--and did so rail at him, that what with her
_Billinsgate_, and her Husband’s hammers, I was both deaf and dumb--at
last the hammers ceas’d, and she grew weary, and call’d down Mr.
_Wasteall_; but he not answering--I was sent up a Ladder rather than a
pair of Stairs; at last I scal’d the top, and enter’d the inchanted
Castle; there did I find him, spite of the noise below, drowning his
Cares in Sleep.
L. _Ful_. Whom foundst thou? _Gayman_?
_Bred_. He, Madam, whom I waked--and seeing me, Heavens, what Confusion
seiz’d him! which nothing but my own Surprize could equal. Asham’d--he
wou’d have turn’d away;
But when he saw, by my dejected Eyes, I knew him,
He sigh’d, and blusht, and heard me tell my Business:
Then beg’d I wou’d be secret; for he vow’d his whole
Repose and Life depended on my silence. Nor had I told it now,
But that your Ladyship may find some speedy means to draw him from
this desperate Condition.
L. _Ful_. Heavens, is’t possible?
_Bred_. He’s driven to the last degree of Poverty--
Had you but seen his Lodgings, Madam!
L. _Ful_. What were they?
_Bred_. ‘Tis a pretty convenient Tub, Madam. He may lie a long in’t,
there’s just room for an old join’d Stool besides the Bed, which one
cannot call a Cabin, about the largeness of a Pantry Bin, or a Usurer’s
Trunk; there had been Dornex Curtains to’t in the days of Yore; but they
were now annihilated, and nothing left to save his Eyes from the Light,
but my Landlady’s Blue Apron, ty’d by the strings before the Window, in
which stood a broken six-penny Looking-Glass, that shew’d as many Faces
as the Scene in _Henry_ the Eighth, which could but just stand upright,
and then the Comb-Case fill’d it.
L. _Ful_. What a leud Description hast thou made of his Chamber?
_Bred_. Then for his Equipage, ‘tis banisht to one small Monsieur, who
(saucy with his Master’s Poverty) is rather a Companion than a Footman.
L. _Ful_. But what said he to the Forfeiture of his Land?
_Bred_. He sigh’d and cry’d, Why, farewel dirty Acres; It shall not
trouble me, since ‘twas all but for Love!
L. _Ful_. How much redeems it?
_Bred_. Madam, five hundred Pounds.
L. _Ful_. Enough--you shall in some disguise convey this Money to him,
as from an unknown hand: I wou’d not have him think it comes from me,
for all the World: That Nicety and Virtue I’ve profest, I am resolved
to keep.
_Pert_. If I were your Ladyship, I wou’d make use of Sir _Cautious’s_
Cash: pay him in his own Coin.
_Bred_. Your Ladyship wou’d make no Scruple of it, if you knew how this
poor Gentleman has been us’d by my unmerciful Master.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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