Chapter 2

"REMEMBER YOUR DEBTS"

In 1866 Posh became the owner of a very old deep-sea lugger named the _William Tell_, and, to enable him to acquire the nets and gear necessary for her complete equipment as a North Sea herring boat, he borrowed a sum of 50 pounds from Tom Newson, and a further sum of 50 pounds from Edward FitzGerald. FitzGerald thought that Newson should have security for his loan (vide _Two Suffolk Friends_, p. 104), but Newson refused to accept any such thing. He, too, seems to have been under the influence of Posh's fascination. On October 7th, 1866, FitzGerald wrote (_Two Suffolk Friends_, p. 105): "I am amused to see Newson's _devotion_ to his young Friend. . . . He declined having any Bill of Sale on Posh's Goods for Money lent; old as he is (enough to distrust all Mankind) . . . has perfect reliance on his Honour, Industry, Skill and Luck."

About this time FitzGerald must have written the following fragment, in which he refers to Newson's loan:--

"You must pay him his Interest on it when you can, and then I will take the Debt from him, adding it to the 50 pounds I lent you, and letting all that stand over for another time.

"My dear Posh, I write all this to you, knowing you are as honest a fellow as lives: but I never cease hammering into everybody's head Remember your Debts, Remember your Debts. I have scarcely ever [known?] _any one_ that was not more or less the worse for getting into Debt: which is one reason why I have scarce ever lent money to any one. I should not have lent it to _you_ unless I had confidence in you: and I speak to you plainly now in order that my confidence may not diminish by your forgetting _one farthing_ that you owe any man.

"The other day an old Friend sent me 10 pounds, which was one half of what he said he had borrowed of me _thirty years ago_! I told him that, on my honour, I wholly forgot ever having lent him any money. I could only remember once _refusing_ to lend him some. So here is _one_ man who remembered his Debts better than his Creditor did.

"I will ask Newson about the Cork Jacket. You know that I proposed to give you each one: but your Mate told me that no one would wear them.

"Yesterday I lost my purse. I did not know where: but Jack had seen me slip into a Ditch at the Ferry, and there he went and found it. So is this Jack's Luck, or mine, eh, Mr. Posh?

"E. FG."

The debt to Newson was subsequently taken over by FitzGerald, and a new arrangement made on the building of the _Meum and Tuum_ in the following year. But this fragment is important, in that it strikes a note of warning, which had to be repeated again and again during the partnership between the poet and the fisherman. Posh was happy-go-lucky in his accounts. I believe he was perfectly honest in intention, but he did not understand the scrupulosity in book-keeping which his partner thought essential to any business concern.

FitzGerald himself was very far from being meticulous where debts due to him were concerned. Dr. Aldis Wright can remember more than one instance in which FitzGerald tore up an acknowledgment of a loan after two or three years' interest had been paid. "I think you've paid enough," or "I think he's paid enough," would be his bland dismissal of the debt due to him. Many Woodbridge people had good cause to know the generosity of the man as well as ever Posh had cause to know it. FitzGerald may not have opened his heart to his Woodbridge acquaintance so freely as he did to Posh, but he was always ready to loosen his purse-strings.

The cork jackets were afterwards supplied to the crew of the _Meum and Tuum_, as will be apparent in the letters.

"Jack," who found the purse, was Jack Newson, Tom Newson's nephew, and the "crew" of the _Scandal_.