He up, and welcomed me with the most cordial | The new performer advanced at last; and let hospitality. Nor could they forbear smiling, parents think of my sensations by their own, upon being informed of the nature of my pre-when I found it was my unfortunate son. sent visit: but the unfortunate builer, whom they at first seemed disposed to turn away, was at my intercession forgiven, was going to begin, when, turning his eyes upon the audience, he perceived Miss Wilmot and me, and stood at once speechless and immoveable. The actors behind the scene, who ascribed this pause to his natural timidity, attempted to encourage him; but instead of going on, he burst into a flood of tears, and retired off the stage. I don't know what were my feelings on this occasion, for they succeeded with too much rapidity for description; but I was soon awaked from this disagreeable reverie by Miss Wilmot, who, pale, and with a trembling voice desired me to conduct her back to her uncle's. When got home, Mr Aruold, who was as yet a stranger to our extraordinary behaviour, being informed that the new performer was my son, sent his coach and an invitation for him; and as he persisted in his refusal to appear again upon the stage, the players put another in his place, and we soon had hin with us. Mr Arnold gave him the kindest reception, and I received him with my usual transport; for I could never counterfeit false resentment.-Miss Wilmot's reception was mixed with seeming neglect, and yet I could perceive she acted a studied part. The tumult in her mind seemed not yet abated: she said twenty giddy things that looked like joy, and then laughed loud at her own want of meaning. At intervals she would take a sly peep at the glass, as if happy in the consciousless of irresistible beauty, and often would ask questions without giving any manner of attention to the answers. Mr Arnold and his lady, to whom the house belonged, now insisted upon having the pleasure of my stay for some days; and as their niece, my charming pupil, whose mind in some measure had been formed under my own instructions, joined in their entreaties, I complied. That night I was shown to a magnificent chamber, and the next morning early Miss Wilmot desired to walk with me in the garden, which was decorated in the modern manner. After some time spent in pointing out the beauties of the place, she inquired with seeming unconcern, when last I had heard from my son George?" Alas! madam," cried I, "he has now been nearly three years absent, with out ever writing to his friends or me. Where be is I know not; perhaps I shall never see him or happiness more. No, my dear Madam, we shall never more see such pleasing hours as were once spent by our fire-side at Wakefield. My little family are now dispersing very fast, and poverty has brought not only want, but infamy upon us." The good-natured girl let fall a tear at this account; but as I saw her possessed of too much sensibility, I forebore a more minute detail of our sufferings. It was, however, some consolation to me, to find that time had made no alteration in her affections, and that she had rejected several offers that had been made her, since our leaving her part of the country. She led me round all the extensive improvements of the place, pointing to the several walks and arbours, and at the same time catching from every object a hint for some new question relative to my son. In this manner we spent the forenoon, till the bell summoned us in to dinner, where we found the manager of the strolling company that I mentioned before, who was come to dispose of tickets for the Fair Penitent, which was to be AFTER We had supped, Mrs Arnold politely acted that evening, the part of Horatio by a offered to send a couple of her footmen for young gentleman who had never appeared on my son's baggage, which he at first seemed to any stage. He seemed to be very warm in decline; but upon her pressing the request, he the praises of the new performer, and averred was obliged to inform her, that a suck and that he never saw any who bid so fair for ex-wallet were all the moveable things upon this cellence. Acting, he observed, was not learned earth that he could boast of. Why, ay, my in a day; "but this gentleman," continued he, son," cried I, "you left me but poor, and poor "seems born to tread the stage. His voice, I find you are come back; and yet I make no his figure, and attitudes, are all admirable. doubt you have seen a great deal of the world." We caught him up accidentally in our journey down." This account, in some measure, excited our curiosity, and, at the entreaty of the ladies, I was prevailed upon to accompany them to the play-house, which was no other than a barn. As the company with which I went was incontestibly the chief of the place, we were received with the greatest respect, and placed in the front seat of the theatre; where we sat for some time with no small impatience to see Horatio make his appearance. CHAPTER XX. THE HISTORY OF A PHILOSOPHIC VAGABOND, 66 "Yes, Sir," replied my son, "but travelling after fortune is not the way to secure her; and indeed of late I have desisted from the pursuit."-"I fancy, Sir," cried Mrs Arnold "that the account of your adventures would be amusing: the first part of them I have often heard from my niece: but could the company prevail for the rest, it would be an additional obligation."-" Madam," replied my son, "I promise you the pleasure you have in hearing will not be half so great as my vanity in repeat Dryden and Otway trod before me. I considered the goddess of this region as the parent of excellence; and however an intercourse with the world might give us good sense, the poverty she entailed I supposed to be the nurse of genius! Big with these reflections, I sat down, and finding that the best things remained to be said on the wrong side, I resolved to write a book that should be wholly new. I therefore drest up three paradoxes with some ingenuity. They were false, indeed, but they were new. The jewels of truth have been so often imported by others, that nothing was left for me to import but some splendid things that at a distance looked every bit as well. Witness, ye powers, what fancied im ing them; yet in the whole narrative I can | scarcely promise you one adventure, as my account is rather of what I saw than what I did. The first misfortune of my life, which you all know, was great; but though it distressed, it could not sink me. No person ever had a better nack at hoping than I. The less kind I found fortune at one time, the more I expected from her another, and being now at the bottom of her wheel, every new revolution might lift, but could not depress me. I proceeded, therefore, towards London in a fine morning, no way uneasy about to-morrow, but cheerful as the birds that carolled by the road, and comforted myself with reflecting, that London was the mart where abilities of every kind were sure of meeting distinction and re-portance sat perched upon my quill while I ward. "Upon my arrival in town, Sir, my first care was to deliver your letter of recommendation to our cousin, who was himself in little better circumstances than I. My first scheme, you know, Sir, was to be usher at an academy, and I asked his advice on the affair. Our cousin received the proposal with a true Sardonic grin. Ay, cried he, this is indeed a very pretty career that has been chalked out for you. I have been an usher at a boarding school myself; and may I die by an anodyne necklace, but I had rather be an under-turnkey in Newgate. I was up early and late: I was browbeat by the master, hated for my ugly face by the mistress, worried by the boys within, and never permitted to stir out to meet civility abroad. But are you sure you are fit for a school? Let me examine you a little. Have you been bred an apprentice to the business? No. Then you won't do for a school. Can you dress the boys' hair? No. Then you won't do for a school. Have you had the small-pox? No. Then you won't do for a school. Can you lie three in a bed? No. Then you will never do for a school. Have you got a good stomach? Yes. Then you will by no means do for a school. No, Sir, if you are for a genteel easy profession, bind yourself seven years an apprentice to turn a cutler's wheel; but avoid a school by any means. Yet come, continued he, I see you are a lad of spirit and some learning, what do you think of commencing author, like me? You have read in books, no doubt, of men of genius starving at the trade. At present I'll show you forty very dull fellows about town that live by it in opulence; all honest jog-trot men, who go on smoothly and dully, and write history and politics, and are praised: men, Sir, who had they been bred cobblers, would all their lives have only mended shoes, but never made them. "Finding that there was no great degree of gentility affixed to the character of an usher, I resolved to accept his proposals; and having the highest respect for literature, hailed the antiqua mater of Grub-street with reverence. I thought it my glory to pursue a track which was writing! The whole learned world, I made no doubt, would rise to oppose my systems; but then I was prepared to oppose the whole learned world. Like the porcupine, I sat self-collected, with a quill pointed against every opposer." "Well said, my boy," cried I, "and what subject did you treat upon? I hope you did not pass over the importance of monogamy. But I interrupt; go on: you published your paradoxes; well, and what did the learned world say to your paradoxes? "Sir," replied my son, the "learned world said nothing to my paradoxes; nothing at all, Sir. Every man of them was employed in praising his friends and himself, or condemning his enemies; and unfortunately, as I had neither, I suffered the cruellest mortification, neglect. "As I was meditating one day in a coffeehouse on the fate of my paradoxes, a little man happening to enter the room, placed him. self in the box before me, and after some preliminary discourse, finding me to be a scholar, drew out a bundle of proposals, begging me to subcribe to a new edition he was going to give to the world of Propertius with notes. This demand necessarily produced a reply that I had no money; and that concession led him to inquire into the nature of my expectations. Finding that my expectations were just as great as my purse, I see, cried he, you are unacquainted with the town; I'll teach you a part of it. Look at these proposals,-upon these very proposals I have subsisted very comfortably for twelve years. The moment a nobleman returns from his travels, a Creolian arrives from Jamaica, or a dowager from her country-seat, I strike for a subscription. 1 first besiege their bearts with flattery, and then pour in my proposals at the breach. If they subscribe readily the first time, I renew my request to beg a dedication fee. If they let me have that, I smite them once more for engraving their coat of arms at the top. Thus, continued he, I live by vanity and laugh at it. But between ourselves, I am now too well known: I should be glad to borrow your face a bit; a nobleman of distinction has just return ed from Italy; my face is familiar to his porter; but if you bring this copy of verses, my life for it you succeed, and we divide the spoil." "Bless us, George," cried I, "and is this the employment of poets now! Do men of their exalted talents thus stoop to beggary! Can they so far disgrace their calling, as to make a vile traffic of praise for bread?" "Bless me," cried Mrs Arnold, "is Mr Thornhill so near a neighbour of yours? He has long been a friend to our family, and we expect a visit from him shortly." "My friend's first care," continued my son, "was to alter my appearance by a very fine suit of his own clothes, and then I was admitted to his table, upon the footing of half friend, half underling. My business was to attend him at auctions, to put him in spirits when he sat for his picture, to take the left hand in his chariot when not filled by another, and to as "O no, Sir," returned he, "a true poet can never be so base; for wherever there is genius, there is pride. The creatures I now describe are only beggars in rhyme. The real poet, assist at tattering a kip, as the phrase was, when he braves every hardship for fame, so he is equally a coward to contempt; and none but those who are unworthy protection, condescend to solicit it. "Having a mind too proud to stoop to such indignities, and yet a fortune too humble to hazard a second attempt for fame, I was now obliged to take a middle course, and write for bread. But I was unqualified for a profession where mere industry alone was to ensure success. I could not suppress my lurking passion for applause; but usually consumed that time in efforts after excellence which takes up but little room, when it should have been more advantageously employed in the diffusive productions of fruitful mediocrity. My little piece would therefore come forth in the midst of periodical publications, unnoticed and unknown. The public were more importantly employed than to observe the easy simplicity of my style, or the harmony of my periods. Sheet after sheet was thrown off to oblivion. My essays were buried among the essays upon liberty, eastern tales, and cures for the bite of a mad dog; while Philautos, Philalethes, Philelutheros, and Philanthropos all wrote better, because they wrote faster than I. "Now, therefore, I began to associate with none but disappointed authors like myself, who praised, deplored, and despised each other. The satisfaction we found in every celebrated writer's attempts, was inversely as their merits. I found that no genius in another could please me. My unfortunate paradoxes had entirely dried up that source of comfort. I could neither read nor write with satisfaction; for excellence in another was my aversion, and writing was my trade. In the midst of these gloomy reflections, as I was one day sitting on a bench in St James's park, a young gentleman of distinction, who had been my intimate acquaintance at the university, approached me. We saluted each other with some hesitation; he almost ashamed of being known to one who made so shabby an appearance, and I afraid of a repulse. But my suspicions soon vanished; for Ned Thornhill was at the bottom a very good natured fellow." "What did you say, George !" interrupted I,-" Thornbill, was not that his name? It can certainly be no other than my landlord." he had a mind for a frolic. Besides this, I had twenty other little employments in the family. I was to do many small things without bidding; to carry the corkscrew; to stand godfather to all the butler's children; to sing when I was bid; to be never out of humour; ways to be humble, and if I could, to be very happy. "In this honourable post, however, I was not without a rival. A captain of marines, who was formed for the place by nature, opposed me in my patron's affections. His mother had been laundress to a man of quality, and thus he early acquired a taste for pimping and pedigree. As this gentleman made it the study of his life to be acquainted with lords, though he was dismissed from several for his stupidity, yet he found many of them who were as dull as himself, that permitted his assiduities. As flattery was his trade, he practised it with the easiest address imaginable; but it came awkward and stiff from me and as every day my patron's desire of flattery increased, so every hour being better acquainted with his defects I became more unwilling to give it. Thus I was once more fairly going to give up the field to the captain, when my friend found occasion for my assistance. This was nothing less than to fight a duel for him, with a gentleman whose sister it was pretended he had used ill. I readily complied with his request, and though I see you are displeased with my conduct, yet, as it was a debt indispensably due to friendship, I could not refuse. I undertook the affair, disarmed my antagonist, and soon after had the pleasure of finding that the lady was only a woman of the town, and the fellow her bully and a sharper. This piece of service was repaid with the warmest professions of gratitude; but as my friend was to leave town in a few days, he knew no other method of serving me, but by recommending me to his uncle Sir William Thornhill, and another nobleman of great distinction who enjoyed a post under the government. When he was gone, my first care was to carry his recommendatory letter to his uncle, a man whose character for every virtue was universal, yet just. I was received by his servants with the most hospitable smiles; for the looks of the domestic ever transmit their master's benevolence. Being shown into a grand apartment, where Sir William soon came to me, I deli vered my message, and letter, which he read, | vile things that nature designed should be and after pausing some minutes, Pray, Sir, thrown by into her lumber-room, there to cried he, inform me what you have done for perish in obscurity. I bad still, however, my kinsman to deserve this warm recommen- half a guinea left, and of that I thought fordation But I suppose, Sir, I guess your tune herself should not deprive me; but in merits; you have fought for him; and so you order to be sure of this, I was resolved to go would expect a reward from me for being the instantly and spend it, while I had it, and instrument of his vices. I wish, sincerely then trust to occurrences for the rest. As I wish, that my present refusal may be some was going along with this resolution, it happunishment for your guilt; but still more, pened that Mr Crispe's office seemed invitthat it may be some inducement to your ingly open to give me a welcome reception. repentance. The severity of this rebuke I In this office Mr Crispe kindly offers all bis bore patiently, because I knew it was just. Majesty's subjects a generous promise of £30 My whole expectations now, therefore, lay in a year, for which promise all they give in return my letter to the great man. As the doors of is their liberty for life, and permission to let the nobility are almost ever beset with beg him transport them to America as slaves. I gars, all ready to thrust in some sly petition, I was happy at finding a place, where I could found it no easy matter to gain admittance. lose my fears in desperation, and entered this However, after bribing the servants with half cell (for it had the appearance of one) with my worldly fortune, I was at last shown into the devotion of a monastic. Here I found a a spacious apartment, my letter being previ- number of poor creatures, all in circumstances ously sent up for his lordship's inspection. like myself, expecting the arrival of Mr Crispe, During this anxious interval I had full time to presenting a true epitome of English impalook round me. Every thing was grand and tience. Each untractable soul at variance of happy contrivance; the paintings, the fur with fortune, wreaked her injuries on their niture, the gildings, petrified me with awe, and own hearts: but Mr Crispe at last came raised my idea of the owner. Ah, thought I down, and all our murmurs were hushed. He to myself, how very great must the possessor deigned to regard me with an air of peculiar of all these things be, who carries in his head approbation, and indeed he was the first man the business of the state, and whose house dis- who for a month past had talked to me with plays half the wealth of a kingdom; sure his smiles. After a few questions, he found I genius must be unfathomable!--During these was fit for every thing in the world. He awful reflections, I heard a step come heavily paused awhile upon the properest means of forward. Ah, this is the great man himself! | providing for me, and slapping his forehead as No, it was only a chambermaid. Another if he had found it, assured me, that there was foot was heard soon after. This must be he! at that time an embassy talked of from the No, it was only the great man's valet de cham-synod of Pennsylvania to the Chickasaw bre. At last his lordship actually made his appearance. Are you, cried he, the bearer of this here letter? I answered with a bow. I learn by this, continued he, as how that-But just at that instant a servant delivered him a card, and without taking farther notice, he went out of the room, and left me to digest my own happiness at leisure; I saw no more of him, till told by a footman that his lordship was going to his coach at the door.-Down I "As I was going out with that resolution, immediately followed, and joined my voice to I was met at the door by the captain of a ship that of three or four more, who came, like me, with whom I had formerly some little acquainto petition for favours. His lordship, how-tance, and he agreed to be my companion over ever, went too fast for us, and was gaining his chariot door with large strides, when I hallooed out to know if I was to have any reply. He was by this time got in, and muttered an answer, half of which only I heard, the other half was lost in the rattling of his chariot wheels. I stood for some time with my neck stretched out, in the posture of one that was listening to catch the glorious sounds, till looking round me, I found myself alone at his lordship's gate. My patience," continued my son, "was now quite exhausted: stung with the thousand indignities I had met with, I was willing to cast myself away, and only wanted the gulf to receive me. I regarded myself as one of those Indians, and that he would use his interest to get me made secretary. I knew in my own heart that the fellow lied, and yet his promise gave me pleasure, there was something so magnificent in the sound. I fairly therefore divided my half guinea, one half of which went to be added to his thirty thousand pounds, and with the other half I resolved to go to the next tavern, to be there more happy than he. a bowl of punch. As I never choose to make a secret of my circumstances, he assured me that I was upon the very point of ruin, in listening to the office-keeper's promises: for that he only designed to sell me to the plantations. But, continued he, I fancy you might, by a much shorter voyage, be very easily put into a genteel way of bread. Take my advice. My ship sails to-morrow for Amsterdam. What if you go in her as a passenger? The moment you land, all you have to do is to teach the Dutchmen English,and I'll warrant you'll get pupils and money enough. I suppose you understand English,added be, by this time, or the deuce is in it. I confidently assured him of that: but expressed a doubt whether the Dutch would ders, and among such of the French as were poor enough to be very merry; for I ever found them sprightly in proportion to their wants. Whenever I approached a peasant's house towards nightfall, I played one of my most merry tunes, and that procured me not he willing to learn English. He affirmed with an oath that they were fond of it to distraction; and upon that affirmation I agreed with his proposal, and embarked the next day to teach the Dutch English in Holland. The wind was fair, our voyage short, and after having paid my passage with half my move-only a lodging, but subsistence for the next ables, I found myself, fallen as from the skies, a stranger in one of the principal streets of Amsterdam. In this situation I was unwilling to let any time pass unemployed in teaching. 1 addressed myself therefore to two or three of those I met, whose appearance seemed most promising; but it was impossible to make ourselves mutually understood. It was not till this very moment I recollected, that in order to teach the Dutchmen English, it was necessary that they should first teach me Dutch. How I came to overlook so obvious an objection is to me amazing; but certain it is I overlooked it. "This scheme thus blown up, I had some thoughts of fairly shipping back to England again; but falling into company with an Irish student who was returning from Louvain our conversation turning upon topics of literature, (for by the way it may be observed, that I always forgot the meanness of my circumstances when I could converse upon such subjects,) from him I learned that there were not two men in his whole university who understood Greek. This amazed me. I instantly resolved to travel to Louvain, and there live by teaching Greek; and in this design I was heartened by my brother student, who threw out some hints that a fortune might be got by it. "I set boldly forward the next morning. Every day lessened the burden of my moveables, like sop and his basket of bread; for I paid them for my lodgings to the Dutch as I travelled on. When I came to Louvain, I was resolved not to go sneaking to the lower professors, but openly tendered my talents to the principal himself. I went, had admittance,and offered him my service as a master of the Greek language, which I had been told was a desideratum in his university. The principal seemed at first to doubt of my abilities; but of these I offered to convince him by turning a part of any Greek author he should fix upon into Latin. Finding me perfectly earnest in my proposal, he addressed me thus; You see me, young man : I never learned Greek, and I don't find that I have ever missed it. I have had a doctor's cap and gown without Greek; I have ten thousand florins a-year without Greek; I eat heartily without Greek; and in short continued be, as I don't know Greek, I do not believe there is any good in it. "I was now too far from home to think of returning; so I resolved to go forward. I had some knowledge of music, with a tolerable voice, and now turned what was my amusement into a present means of subsistence. I passed among the harmless peasants of Flan day. I once or twice attempted to play for people of fashion; but they always thought my performance odious, and never rewarded me even with a trifle. This was to me more extraordinary, as whenever I used in better days to play for company, when playing was my amusement, my music never failed to throw them into raptures, and the ladies especially ; but as it was now my only means, it was received with contempt-a proof how ready the world is to underrate those talents by which a man is supported. "In this manner I proceeded to Paris, with no design but just to look about me, and then to go forward. The people of Paris are much fonder of strangers that have money than those that have wit. As I could not boast much of either, I was no great favourite. After walking about the town four or five days, and secing the outsides of the best houses, I was preparing to leave this retreat of venal hospitality, when passing through one of the principal streets, whom should I meet but our cousin, to whom you first recommended me. This meeting was very agreeable to me, and I believe not displeasing to him. He inquired into the nature of my journey to Paris, and informed me of his own business there, which was to collect pictures, medals, intaglios, and antiques of all kinds for a gentleman in London, who had just stept into taste, and a large fortune. I was the more surprised at seeing our cousin pitched upon for this office, as he himself had often assured me he knew nothing of the matter. Upon asking how he had been taught the art of a cognoscento so very suddenly, he assured me that nothing was more easy. The whole secret consisted in a strict adherence to two rules: the one, always to observe the picture might have been better if the painter had taken more pains; and the other, to praise the works of Pietro Perugino. But, says he, as I once taught you how to be an author in London, I'll now undertake to instruct you in the art of picture-buying at Paris. "With this proposal I very readily closed, as it was living, and now all my ambition was to live. I went therefore to his lodgings, improved my dress by his assistance, and after some time accompanied him to auctions of pictures, where the English gentry were expected to be purchasers. I was not a little surprised at his intimacy with people of the best of fashion, who referred themselves to his judgment upon every picture or medal, as to an unerring standard of taste. He made very good use of my assistance upon these occasions; for when asked his opinion, he would gravely |