Ups and Downs in the Life of a Distressed Gentleman Part 8

CHAPTER XVI.

THE END OF THIS EVENTFUL HISTORY.

O matrimony! thou art like To Jeremiah's figs;-- The good were very good;--the bad-- Too sour to give the pigs.--_Old Saw._

"Slender, I broke your head--what matter have you against me?"--_Shakspeare._

One of the most amusing, and, indeed, one of the best pictures of Sir Joshua Reynolds, is that of Garrick, between comedy and tragedy. On the one side, with her mask in hand, stood the presiding divinity of comic poetry, coaxing the immortal hero of the sock and buskin with her archest smiles; while on the other stood Melpomene, rapt in solemn thought, and with eyes upraised in gloomy grandeur, pointing the actor to a loftier walk than that of her witching sister Thalia. The situation of poor Garrick is most embarra.s.sing--and appears the more so from the powers of face at his command, as delineated by the artist, whereby he is represented as doubting to which invitation he should yield, while with one half of his face he looks the deepest tragedy, and with the other, the merriest comedy.

Very much in the situation of Garrick, as thus described, does the biographer find himself at the threshhold of this concluding chapter.

It is not his fault, however, that comic or rather farcical incidents must follow so closely upon the pathetic. But "the course of true love never did run smooth"--a fact of which, as the reader has already seen, my unfortunate friend Wheelwright had had some knowledge, early in his wedded life--and of which he was convinced over again, soon after the events recorded in the last two chapters.

It was on a clear frosty morning in March, that one of the watchful guardians of the peace and quiet of the city, connected with the police establishment, did me the unexpected honor of a visit. He stated that a poor but very decent sort of a man had fallen into the hands of the watch during the preceding night, and had been committed to Bridewell by the sitting magistrate, on a charge of a.s.sault and battery.

According to the report of Dogberry, the man was "quite down-in-the-mouth about it, and," (he added,) "he contests that he is entirely hinnocent. He also says he is acquainted with you, and he thinks if you would be good enough to come up to the hall and see him, no doubt that you would bail him out."

"How is that, my friend? A man taken up in a night-row, and now in Bridewell, and says he is an acquaintance of mine--eh?"

"So he says, and he looks as though he might have seen better days. We have to deal with many such--but then he don't act as though he was often in such sc.r.a.pes, no how."

"His name?"

"Doctor--Wheel--Wheelwright, I think they call him."

"O--ah--yes:" another incident, thinks-I-to-myself, in the chequered life of my unhappy friend.

"And a _striking_ incident, too, according to the account of the Irish woman who lodged the complaint."

"An _Irish_ woman! Mischief in her proper shape again. But, my word for it, if it is my quondam friend Wheelwright, who is in the sc.r.a.pe, he has not struck any body or thing--man, woman, or child."

"'Zactly so: that's just what he says; and as he has no friends, he thinks you might stand by him in a pinch, if you knew as how he has been in the lock-up half the night, and has now been walked off to Bridewell."

This was a far less agreeable call upon my attention and services than I had ever had the honor of receiving from him before; but still, knowing the honesty of the man, and his pacific character, and fully believing in his representations of innocence, I at once determined to inquire into the circ.u.mstances of the case, and, if necessary, make another effort in his behalf.

The investigation resulted as I had antic.i.p.ated. The unfortunate husband now opened his heart, and poured out all his domestic sorrows and tribulations before me. He needed not to tell me that he had not married a fortune, as he had supposed, when I first saw him in the hey-day of his honey-moon; but from the simple tale now unfolded, it seemed that, on the contrary, he had been wedded to Mis-fortune, and all her progeny. The rather turbulent lady of Socrates--(unless Mrs.

Xantippe was scandalized by her neighbors)--was a sweet-tempered dame, and "gentle as a sucking dove," in comparison with the vixen who had been hara.s.sing his life and soul away for years. The only peaceable hours of his existence were those in which she was too much fatigued with liquor to annoy him. When awake and sober, her temper was little better, and her tormenting tongue seemed to have been hung in the middle, so that it might run at both ends. It is related of Foote, the comedian, that when once suffering from the tongue of a shrew, he replied--"I have heard of _Tartars_, and _Brimstones_, madam; and by Jove you are the _cream_ of the one, and the _flour_ of the other." And next to the Grecian lady above mentioned, the Tartar who bearded Foote, seemed, in my view, to be the only parallel of Mistress Wheelwright, of which the books give any account.

How few can bear prosperity! Indeed, although we all covet it so much, the examples of those ruined by sudden reverses of fortune, would probably present a greater number of those who have been raised from poverty to wealth, than of those who have been cast down from a state of affluence to that of penury. An ill.u.s.tration of this proposition was afforded in the family of Mr. Wheelwright. It appeared that after the change recorded in the last chapter, from a condition of the most abject misery, to that of comparative comfort, the Doctor's lady, elated by her prosperity, began to take airs upon herself, and her carriage was such as to excite the jealousy of her neighbors up stairs.

The consequences were a speedy and open rupture, so that occasional hostilities were waged between them; and the civil dudgeon ran so high that all attempts of poor Wheelwright to keep the peace were abortive.

At last, on the night of my friend's arrest, one of the ladies from above, remarkable for the dimensions of her facial organ, descended to his apartment in a tempest, and insulted his wife. Like a true Amazon as she was, the latter repelled the invader, pursued her in her flight, and like Scipio carried the war into Africa. The tenants above made common cause with Mistress Judy Pett.i.t, and the gentle lady of Mr.

Wheelwright was in turn discomfitted, and compelled to descend headlong down stairs, in rather too quick time for her comfort, with a cataract of Irish women tumbling after her. Wheelwright ran to the rescue of his help-meet, and pulling her through the door, endeavored to shut it on the instant, to keep out the foe; in doing which the proboscis of Mistress Pett.i.t, which was truly of the Strasburgh order, was unhappily and literally caught in the door crack, and beyond all question somewhat injured thereby. In the language of the trumpeter's wife in Tristram Shandy, it was truly "a n.o.ble nose," and the pinch it endured, though transient, it must be confessed, was rather severe and biting.

Its fair possessor therefore ran into the street, smarting from the pain, and vociferating alternately for the "watch," and "Och murther!

I'm kilt, I'm kilt," so pertinaciously and so obstreperously withal, as to wake up several of the guardians of the night, who made a rally, and carried the whole party to the watch-house, including an Irishman who happened to be on a visit up stairs, by the name of Timothy Martin.

From all account, the morning examination before the sitting magistrate must have afforded one of the most amusing scenes for the fancy that have recently occurred this side of Bow-street. It was difficult to say which of the ladies was the most clamorous, Mistress Pett.i.t, the complainant, or Mistress Wheelwright, or whether other females of the party did not talk as loud and as fast as either. Mistress Pett.i.t gave an account of their neighborhood concerns for some time previous.

"Fait, your worship," says she, "we was always afther being kind to them, when they had not a f.a.ggot to warm them, or a paratoe to ate; and then she'd come to me sometime, and bring the childer, says she, for she'd two of them at that same time--bad luck to her--and this, your honor, is one of them," (for the eldest of Wheelwright's children had been brought up in the medley;) "and says I to Mistress Wheelwright, says I, plase your worship, you may come with your childer and warm ye, and here's a drop of the crathur that Tim Martin brought to me. And then whin she wint off a-begging as no dacent woman would, bekase I pitied the childer, I tould Mrs. Wheelwright, says I, that they might stay with me till ye come back yourself--and may-be ye'll come the sooner, Mrs. Wheelwright, says I. And come she wouldn't by no manes, but was out all night sometimes."

"Och deevil burn ye," interrupted Mistress Wheelwright, "if ye go on at that rate, I'll tell his honor of the pig ye stole,--you and Tim Martin, ye did."

"Och Murther," cried Mistress Pett.i.t, "that a dacent woman like I should be charged with staling along with such a spalpeen as Tim Martin, your honor."

Whereupon up started Tim Martin, exclaiming--

"Botheration, and that's what I get for kindness," says he, "there's grathitude your worship!--And fait, I'll tell his honor of the money ye stole in the strong box that I left," says Tim Martin, says he.

"Yes," interposed Mistress Wheelwright, "when word com'd that she'd gone off with a man that she had, and left her own childer for me to care for, bad luck to her."

"Och!" Mistress Wheelwright, says Mistress Pett.i.t, says she; "and you and Tim Martin's lies will be the death of me, and he's selling whiskey without a license, yer honor, that's Tim Martin, he is!"

But it is impossible to follow these precious parties through the particulars of their examination disclosing the miseries of their neighborhood, and in their own words, when they all talked together. I must therefore content myself by informing the reader, that the magistrate interposed as soon as he could, by stating that he did not sit there to hear about their squabbles with each other and Tim Martin, but to hear what they had to say against the accused.

Poor Wheelwright! During the whole of the scene just described, he sat upon one of the benches, his eyes cast upon the floor, without uttering a word. When called upon, however, to answer to the charge, he could only deny, and try to explain--but Mistress Pett.i.t and her a.s.sociates were too much for him. And besides, deny having molested her nose, as he might, the aspect of the member itself bore abundant testimony of rough usage and a narrow escape--to say nothing of the crimson drops, that seemed to have oozed therefrom, and fallen upon good Mistress Pett.i.t's neck-handkerchief. The consequence was, that the magistrate could do no less than commit him, although from Wheelwright's subdued demeanor, he had strong doubts as to his intentional delinquencies.

Under these circ.u.mstances, I found but little difficulty, from my own knowledge of the man, in persuading the magistrate to release him on his own recognizance.

In a few weeks afterward, Wheelwright ascertained that the always equivocal virtue of his wife had become of so little consequence in her own eyes, as to release him from any farther obligation, in honor or in law, to stand any longer as its nominal guardian and protector. He divided the children, giving her the one to which she had a fair t.i.tle before he courted her fortune,--but which, poor thing!--proved to be all she had,--and took the only one now living, which bore his own name, to himself. He also at length a.s.sumed sufficient energy to divide the house between them--giving her the _out_-side and retaining the _in_-side for himself. Thus ends the history of Doctor Daniel Wheelwright in New-York.

"It is the end," says the Bard of Avon, "that crowns all;" and bringing these "pa.s.sages" in the life of my friend to a close, from the position in which I shall leave him, the reader may perhaps agree with the same ill.u.s.trious poet:--

"More are men's ends mark'd than their lives before."

At all events, we will "let the end try the man." The latest intelligence which I can furnish the reader respecting him, however, is this. Having recently made a flying excursion through the valley of the Mohawk--visited the old baronial castle of Sir William Johnson, and from thence struck across to the south through the Schoharie-kill valley, to explore the wonders of the great cavern of the Helderbergs, an accident to the light vehicle drawn by my coal-black steed, on my return, obliged me to call upon a coachmaker in the first city west of Albany. On arriving at the shop, and inquiring for the princ.i.p.al of the establishment, I was directed to an athletic man engaged with his whole attention, in giving the finishing strokes to a substantial coach-wheel. Judge of my astonishment, as he looked up, on beholding none other than the hero of the present memoir, in his own proper person! His sleeves were rolled up to his shoulders; his complexion was ruddy; and a cheerful smile lighted up his countenance, such as I had not seen playing there for many a year--never, in fact, since he became acquainted with "that woman there." Every thing about him bore the marks of industry and consequent thrift. "Ah, Mr. Doolittle! is that you?" he exclaimed, as he wiped away the large drops of perspiration that stood upon his face. Indeed, he was quite glad to see me; and after interchanging a few remarks of mutual surprise at such an unexpected though agreeable meeting, and after briefly relating what had been his personal history since I had last seen him under the cloud, he observed,--"You see I have gone clean round 'THE CIRCLE,' and am at the old spot again--my father's shop. I have always told you that 'THE WORLD OWED ME A LIVING.' But the mischief on't was, I always went the wrong way to work to obtain it. I believe, however, that I have got about right at last."

The reader of the preceding narrative, may perhaps suppose that the materials of which it is framed, are such unsubstantial stuff as dreams are made of. I beg leave, however, at the close, to a.s.sure him of his error. With the single abatement that names are changed, and places are not precisely designated, every essential incident that I have recorded, actually occurred, much as I have related it, to a person who, if not now living, certainly was once, and most of them under my own observation. As Scott remarks, at the close of the Bride of Lammermoor, "it is AN OWER TRUE TALE."

The moral is briefly told. Let the young man remember that it requires not actual vice to expose him to all that is humiliating and painful in poverty. He may be a.s.sured of misery enough, if he merely neglects the advantages which a kind Providence has placed within his power.

Let the parent learn, before he resolves to educate his son, the importance of ascertaining whether his son was ever designed for professional life. The weak vanity of a parent has frequently ruined his son, and brought down his own gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.

THE END.

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