Part 3

I kept repeating the word “starve,” because I saw it made my respectable opponent wince. “Well, then, just listen to me. I know that in the happy state of our equity law, Chancery can’t help my client; but I have another plan; I shall go hence to my office, issue a writ, and take your client’s husband in execution—as soon as he is lodged in jail, I shall file his schedule in the Insolvent Court, and when he comes up for his discharge, I shall put you in the witness-box, and examine you on oath, ‘touching any property of which you know the insolvent to be possessed,’ and where will be your privileged communications then?”

The respectable Leasem’s face lengthened in a twinkling, his comfortable confident air vanished, he ceased twiddling his gold chain, and at length he muttered, “Suppose we pay the debt?”

“Why then, I’ll arrest him the day after for another.”

“But, my dear Mr. Discount, surely such conduct would not be quite respectable?”

“That’s my business; my client has been wronged, I am determined to right him, and when the aristocratic firm of Leasem and Fashun takes refuge according to the custom of respectable repudiators, in the cool arbours of the Court of Chancery, why, a mere bill-discounting attorney like David Discount need not hesitate about cutting a bludgeon out of the Insolvent Court.”

“Well, well, Mr. D., you are so warm—so fiery; we must deliberate, we must consult. You will give me until the day after to-morrow, and then we’ll write you our final determination; in the mean time, send us copy of your authority to act for Mr. Molinos Fitz-Roy.”

Of course I lost no time in getting the gentleman beggar to sign a proper letter.

On the appointed day came a communication with the L. and F. seal, which I opened not without unprofessional eagerness. It was as follows:

“_In re Molinos Fitz-Roy and Another._

“Sir,—In answer to your application on behalf of Mr. Molinos Fitz-Roy, we beg to inform you that under the administration of a paternal aunt who died intestate, your client is entitled to two thousand five hundred pounds eight shillings and sixpence, Three per Cents.; one thousand five hundred pounds nineteen shillings and fourpence, Three per Cents. Reduced; one thousand pounds, Long Annuities; five hundred pounds, Bank Stock; three thousand five hundred pounds, India Stock, besides other securities, making up about ten thousand pounds, which we are prepared to transfer over to Mr. Molinos Fitz-Roy’s direction forthwith.”

Here was a windfall! It quite took away my breath.

At dusk came my gentleman beggar, and what puzzled me was how to break the news to him. Being very much overwhelmed with business that day, I had not much time for consideration. He came in rather better dressed than when I first saw him, with only a week’s beard on his chin; but, as usual, not quite sober. Six weeks had elapsed since our first interview. He was still the humble, trembling, low-voiced creature, I first knew him.

After a prelude, I said, “I find, Mr. F., you are entitled to something; pray, what do you mean to give me in addition to my bill, for obtaining it?” He answered rapidly, “Oh, take half: if there is one hundred pounds, take half: if there is five hundred pounds, take half.”

“No, no; Mr. F., I don’t do business in that way, I shall be satisfied with ten per cent.”

It was so settled. I then led him out into the street, impelled to tell him the news, yet dreading the effect; not daring to make the revelation in my office, for fear of a scene.

I began hesitatingly, “Mr. Fitz-Roy I am happy to say that I find you are entitled to ... ten thousand pounds!”

“Ten thousand pounds!” he echoed. “Ten thousand pounds!” he shrieked. “Ten thousand pounds!” he yelled; seizing my arm violently. “You are a brick,——Here, cab! cab!” Several drove up—the shout might have been heard a mile off. He jumped in the first.

“Where to?” said the driver.

“To a tailor’s, you rascal!”

“Ten thousand pounds! ha, ha, ha!” he repeated hysterically, when in the cab; and every moment grasping my arm. Presently he subsided, looked me straight in the face, and muttered with agonising fervour, “What a jolly brick you are!”

The tailor, the hosier, the bootmaker, the hairdresser, were in turn visited by this poor pagan of externals. As by degrees under their hands he emerged from the beggar to the gentleman, his spirits rose; his eyes brightened; he walked erect, but always nervously grasping my arm; fearing, apparently, to lose sight of me for a moment, lest his fortune should vanish with me. The impatient pride with which he gave his orders to the astonished tradesman for the finest and best of everything, and the amazed air of the fashionable hairdresser when he presented his matted locks and stubble chin, to be “cut and shaved,” may be _acted_—it cannot be described.

By the time the external transformation was complete, and I sat down in a _Café_ in the Haymarket opposite a haggard but handsome thoroughbred-looking man, whose air, with the exception of the wild eyes and deeply browned face, did not differ from the stereotyped men about town sitting around us, Mr. Molinos Fitz-Roy had already almost forgotten the past; he bullied the waiter, and criticised the wine, as if he had done nothing else but dine and drink and scold there all the days of his life.

Once he wished to drink my health, and would have proclaimed his whole story to the coffee-room assembly, in a raving style. When I left he almost wept in terror at the idea of losing sight of me. But, allowing for these ebullitions—the natural result of such a whirl of events—he was wonderfully calm and self-possessed.

The next day, his first care was to distribute fifty pounds among his friends the cadgers, at a house of call in Westminster, and formally to dissolve his connection with them; those present undertaking for the “fraternity,” that for the future he should never be noticed by them in public or private.

I cannot follow his career much further. Adversity had taught him nothing. He was soon again surrounded by the well-bred vampires who had forgotten him when penniless; but they amused him, and that was enough. The ten thousand pounds were rapidly melting when he invited me to a grand dinner at Richmond, which included a dozen of the most agreeable, good-looking, well-dressed dandies of London, interspersed with a display of pretty butterfly bonnets. We dined deliciously, and drank as men do of iced wines in the dog-days—looking down from Richmond Hill.

One of the pink bonnets crowned Fitz-Roy with a wreath of flowers; he looked—less the intellect—as handsome as Alcibiades. Intensely excited and flushed, he rose with a champagne glass in his hand to propose my health.

The oratorical powers of his father had not descended on him. Jerking out sentences by spasms, at length he said, “I was a beggar—I am a gentleman—thanks to this——”

Here he leaned on my shoulder heavily a moment, and then fell back. We raised him, loosened his neckcloth—

“Fainted!” said the ladies—

“Drunk!” said the gentlemen—

He was _dead_!

CHIPS.

FAMILY COLONISATION LOAN SOCIETY.

If on any Saturday you should chance to find your way to Charlton Crescent, an obscure thoroughfare lying between the road from Islington to Holloway and the New River, not far from the Angel, you will see several men and women dropping into a small house, the parlour window of which contains a printed bill with the above words. The callers are chiefly of the decent mechanic class, and not a few travellers from the country,—pilgrims in search of truth about emigration. Saturday is the day on which the subscriptions of emigrants desiring to avail themselves of the Family Colonisation Loan Society are received.

And what is the Colonisation Loan Society? The question is worth asking.

It is an association—devised by Mrs. Chisholm, and to be speedily carried out extensively with the aid of several philanthropists, and the advice of two eminent actuaries—for establishing a self-supporting system of emigration, for assisting industrious people, and for promoting practically the spread of sound moral principles in a much neglected colony.

Persons desirous of emigrating form themselves into “groups,” after being mutually satisfied of their respective suitability and respectability. Each intending emigrant pays, either in one sum or by weekly instalments, as much as will amount to half the passage money to Australia. The philanthropists of the society lend the other half to be repaid by four annual instalments,—each family becoming jointly bound for the sums lent to each member of that family, and each group being publicly pledged to assist in enforcing punctual repayments.

The details for securing repayment of the loans have been arranged by Mrs. Chisholm, and are the result of her large practical experience. Each emigrant, when he has paid back his loan, will have the privilege of nominating a relation or friend to be assisted in emigrating with the same amount of money. Thus, the original charitable fund will work in a circle of colonisation, at the mere sacrifice of annual interest. That emigrants among the humble classes are willing to remit for the purpose of assisting their friends and relations to follow them, is proved by the fact that, within the last three years, upwards of one million sterling has been remitted by the Irish emigrants from the United States alone, in small sums, to pay the passage of parents, brothers, sisters, wives, or sweethearts in Ireland. Australia, in proportion to its population, affords even greater opportunities of earning money wages than the United States.

Mrs. Chisholm’s plan offers several advantages of an important character. It will enable many to emigrate who, though frugal and industrious, are not only unable to raise _the whole_ passage money; but, during temporary trade-depressions, would be consuming their savings. It will keep families united, and cherish an honourable, independent spirit. It will secure a class of emigrants calculated to improve the moral tone of the colony; for, as the character of each emigrant will be investigated by his fellows, there will be no room for the deceptions practised on the wealthy charitable. The certificate of shop-mates with whom a man has worked, is more to be trusted than that of the clergyman who has only seen him in his Sunday clothes. It will afford the best kind of protection for young girls or single women desirous of joining friends in Australia, because each ship will be filled with “groups” previously acquainted and mutually _sifted_. Among minor advantages, the cost of passage and outfit, by the aid of co-operation and communication, will be much diminished.

The two following instances will display the practical working of Mrs. Chisholm’s plan. Among the applicants to join the Society (for already the working-classes are prepared to subscribe two thousand pounds) was an artisan in the North, belonging to a trade which “strikes” periodically. When contemplating these “strikes,” the leaders of the trade base their financial arrangements for supporting the body while out of work, upon the savings made by the more frugal of their associates. The artisan in question being a Teetotaller and skilful, had three times been able to save from fifteen to twenty pounds, with the express design of emigrating; but twice his stock of cash had been melted in the common treasury during strikes. With the assistance of a loan from the Society, he will now be able to emigrate. There can be no fear of such a man not repaying it honourably. Had he been able to emigrate a few years ago, he must have been wealthy by this time, and in a position to help all his relatives to join him.

Again, a benevolent Dowager Countess has subscribed two hundred and twenty-five pounds to this Society; a sum which has been appropriated to assisting the following parties in making up their passage money to Australia. Let us see what this money will do:—

It will send three wives with nine children, out to join husbands in Australia.

Two aged widows who have children there.

Ditto a man and wife, who have children there.

M. and wife, with five children.

H. and wife.

P. and wife, with three children.

L. and wife, with seven children. (This man has received the insufficient sum of fifty pounds to pay his passage from a brother in Australia.)

W. and wife, with four children (have received twenty-five pounds from Australia for same purpose).

Five young men, of whom three have relations in the Colony.

Nine friendless young women, of whom four have relations there.

Thus it will be seen this two hundred and twenty-five pound loan affords

A passage, to Adults 31 Children 28 —— Total 59

At the end of the first year after the arrival of these persons, there will be available for assisting other friends and relatives of this batch of fifty-nine to join them, about forty pounds; at the end of the second year, about sixty pounds; third year, about eighty pounds; fourth year, about one hundred and twenty pounds.

This system sacrifices no independence; incurs scarcely any weight of obligation. It affords the best possible kind of assistance; for it helps those who help themselves, and puts it in their power to help their fellows.

THE STRANGERS’ LEAF FOR 1851.

Among the myriads of products of art, science, and manufactures, to be congregated under Mr. Paxton’s great glass house in Hyde Park next year, it is to be hoped that the newspaper press will not be unrepresented. We do not mean model morning papers, displaying several square acres of advertisements, or news conveyed from the other hemisphere, by steam and electricity, since the previous morning; but a modest sheet, in the humble guise of a miniature Morning Post (like the Morning Post of old), for the registry of the names and “up-puttings” of the tens of thousands of strangers who will inevitably be thrusting themselves into London, like needles in bundles of hay, where nobody can find them. Such a humble record as we propose already exists, and we will describe it:—

About three years since, a brother of the well-known German philosopher, Heine, established a paper in Vienna, called the “_Fremden Blatt_,” or “Strangers’ Leaf.” One of its chief objects is to give the names and residences of such strangers as arrive daily in the capital, and the dates of their departure. It is printed on a sheet about the size of a lady’s pocket-handkerchief. It costs rather less than a penny; the expenses of conducting it are trifling, and its circulation is very extensive. There is not an hotel or coffee-house, not a lounge, or a pastry-cook’s shop (the chief place of resort in Vienna), which does not take it in, and indeed, among the idlers and triflers—a very large class of every population—it is the only paper read at all.

It will, perhaps, however, give a better idea of it to analyse the contents of the number for July 31st, 1850, now before us. The first column, and two-thirds of the second, is devoted to intelligence connected with Austria and the provinces; all short paragraphs, most of them of only three or four lines. Their matter concerns the movements of persons of note, and such military and civil appointments, promotions, and retirements, as are likely to be of general interest. If they touch upon any other news, the bare fact is related without comment of any kind. In the next column, Foreign news—including the exciting intelligence from Schleswig Holstein—are disposed of in a dozen paragraphs, containing, however, quite as much as it is necessary to know to be on equal terms with one’s friends after dinner. Then come the domestic _on dits_ of Vienna with the current topics of conversation and a spice or two of scandal; by no means to be imitated here, or anywhere else. Births, deaths, marriages, accidents and offences, follow. All this is, however, merely the prelude. The rise and fall of nations, the mere change of a dynasty, or the details of an earthquake, are but accessories to the grand aim, end, and purpose of the Fremden Blatt’s existence. As Sarah Battle relaxed from the serious business of whist, to unbend over a book, so the editor of the Strangers’ Leaf dallies with the great globe itself and its most terrific catastrophes to recreate the minds of his readers previous to the study of—“arrivals and departures.” Upon these the editor fastens all his care—all his genius. They are alphabetically arranged with great precision. They are his leading article. Should a mistake occur in geography, or should he be a few thousands out in his statistics, it is nothing; but the accidental mis-spelling of a title of ten syllables; if he happen to leave out a “z” in the name of Count Sczorowszantzski; he inserts, next morning, an apologetic “erratum” of great length.

The utility of such a register in London, at the approaching Industrial Fair, as we presume to call it, is easily seen. Let us suppose Count Smorltork arriving in England with the intention of writing an account of the Exposition. He has only a few days to make his observations; and it is not till he has driven half over London, that he discovers of Lord Tomnoddy and Sir Carnaby Jenks—from whom he expects to derive his chief information—that one is at Leamington, and the other in Scotland. Or we may imagine Dr. Dommheit, with the grave Senor Eriganados, and their volatile coadjutor, M. de Tête-vide, arriving in our capital on a scientific excursion. It costs them a month’s income in messengers and cab-fares, and a week’s waiting while their strangely spelt letters are decyphered at the Post-Office, before they learn that Mr. Crypt is off with Lord Rhomboid and the Chrononhotonthologos Society, somewhere in the provinces; Dr. Dryasdust is looking for antiquities in the Hebrides; and the oracle of their tribe, Earl Everlasting—having been left alone with the secretary and the porter at the sixth hour of the reading of his paper on the antediluvian organisms of a piece of slate—has gone down to his “place” in Dorsetshire in a huff. On the other hand, the famous Dr. Ledern Langweile, Monsieur de Papillon-Sauvage, and the great Condé Hermosa-Muchacha-Quieres, are going crazy because they cannot find each other; yet all are perhaps dwelling within a stone’s throw of each other; perhaps in the same street or square—most probably Leicester Square, which they have been given to understand is the most fashionable quarter of the town. This is exactly the condition of things which may be expected without such a register of names and addresses as we suggest.

To our own men about town, also, or to “ladies of condition,” as Addison’s Spectator has it, the Strangers’ Leaf will be invaluable. None have so little time as the idle; and how severely Indolence will have to work for the benefit of its foreign and provincial friends in 1851, it must tremble to anticipate. To relieve it a little, some such means as we suggest should be adopted, for allowing Indolence to find out easily those strangers who have been recommended to his attention and good offices. One glance at a list of “arrivals” would save it a world of trouble.

The duties of the editor of the “London Strangers’ Leaf” would not be very onerous. The names and intended addresses of every individual coming from abroad it will not be difficult to obtain. To reach us Islanders every visitor must arrive by sea, and at each port we are blessed with a customhouse. The captain of every steamer is bound for customhouse purposes to have the name of each of his passengers set down in a sort of Way-bill; and, for a slight consideration, the person who performs that office (generally the steward), would doubtless learn and add the address to which each of the passengers is going in London. An arrangement with a customhouse clerk at each of the ports could be made for forwarding daily a copy of the list. Thus a complete record of arrivals from abroad could be obtained with little trouble. The names and lodgings of persons from the provinces would be more difficult of access; but a good understanding with hotel-keepers, and some assistance from the “Lodging-house Committee” (for of course there will be one,) of the Executive of the Great Congress, would insure the editor a tolerably complete “List of the Company” who assemble, even from the country. The “Strangers’ Leaf” might be published early each afternoon so as to give the arrivals of the morning.

It is not to be doubted that at the essentially Industrial Meeting of 1851, the _Chevaliers d’Industrie_ of all nations will make it their especial business to attend in large numbers. _Their_ names, personal appearance, addresses, and achievements, it would be very useful to record in “the Strangers’ Leaf.” To our excellent friends the Detectives the benefit would be great and reciprocal: for they would not only derive, but contribute much useful information. As a kind of “Hue and Cry,” of a more refined and fashionable kind, the proposed sheet would be invaluable.

Should any enterprising gentleman, literary or otherwise, make the experiment, it may possibly turn out not only useful but profitable. Should such a speculation be deemed too undignified, we would silence the objection with a remark from Macaulay’s Essay on the life of Bacon, to the effect that Nothing is too insignificant for the attention of the wisest, which may be of advantage to the smallest in the community.

NO HOSPITAL FOR INCURABLES.

It is an extraordinary fact that among the innumerable medical charities with which this country abounds, there is not one for the help of those who of all others most require succour, and who must die, and do die in thousands, neglected, unaided. There are hospitals for the cure of every possible ailment or disease known to suffering humanity, but not one for the reception of persons past cure. There are, indeed, small charities for incurables scattered over the country—like the asylum for a few females afflicted with incurable diseases, at Leith, which was built, and solely supported by Miss Gladstone; and a few hospital wards, like the Cancer ward of Middlesex, and the ward for seven incurable patients in the Westminster; but a large hospital for incurables, does not exist.

The case of a poor servant girl which lately came to our knowledge, is the case of thousands. She was afflicted with a disease to which the domestics of the middle classes, especially, are very liable—white swelling of the knee. On presenting herself at the hospitals, it was found that an operation would be certain death; and that, in short, being incurable, she could not be admitted. She had no relations; and crawling back to a miserable lodging, she lay helpless till her small savings were exhausted. Privations of the severest kind followed; and despite the assistance of some benevolent persons who learnt her condition when it was too late, she died a painful and wretched death.

It is indeed a marvellous oversight of benevolence that sympathy should have been so long withheld from precisely the sufferers who most need it. Hopeless pain, allied to hopeless poverty, is a condition of existence not to be thought of without a shudder. It is a slow journey through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, from which we save even the greatest criminals.

When the law deems it necessary to deprive a human being of life, the anguish, though sharp, is short. We do not doom him to the lingering agony with which innocent misfortune is allowed to make its slow descent into the grave.

SORROWS AND JOYS.

Bury thy sorrows, and they shall rise As souls to the immortal skies, And then look down like mothers’ eyes.