Young Maclaine, the instant his father’s breath was out of his body, proceeded to take possession and to dispose of his father’s substance; and treated with perfect contempt the remonstrances of his friends and relations, and the exhortations of his aunt, who, finding all her entreaties ineffectual, took his only sister into her charge, and left him to pursue what course he pleased.
Thus left to himself, Maclaine forgot altogether the projected Dutch counting-house, and equipping himself in the gayest apparel that part of the country could afford, and purchasing a gelding, set up fine gentleman at once, and in a twelvemonth dissipated almost the whole of his property. During his extravagances, however, his ear had been frequently troubled with the remonstrances of his aunt and his other relations, which at length he found so disagreeable, that he was fain to set out for Dublin without communicating his intention to any one. It was here, it appears, that he first conceived the notion of making his fortune by marriage; and having no disagreeable person, he gratuitously gave himself credit for many more excellencies than, unfortunately, other people could discover in him. The demands for the maintenance of such an appearance as would realize his hopes of a rich marriage, soon swept away the small remainder of his property; and he had now full time to reflect on his folly and vanity, and to regret not a little having despised the advice of his relations, who had for some time turned a deaf ear to his entreaties by letter for a supply of money. But upon them, nevertheless, he felt was now his sole dependence. He had long spent his all—he was an entire stranger to a single individual of worth or substance in the place, and his credit and clothes, even to the last shirt, were gone. Selling his sword, therefore, the last piece of splendor that remained to him, he raised as much as would bear his charges on foot, and with a heavy heart set out to return to Monaghan, his native place.
Not a hand was outstretched to welcome the prodigal home again; his aunt refused to see him, all his other relations followed her example, and the companions of his former riots not only refused him relief, but rendered him the sport and ridicule of the town. His sister, however, sometimes contrived to see him by stealth to give him her pocket money, but that could not long support him. Here, then, he must inevitably have starved, had not a gentleman on his way to England, passing through the town, compassionately offered him the place of a servant who had recently died. Want, and the dread of starving, had by this time entirely banished all unnecessary or superfluous pride, and our young gentleman accepted the offer with joy. But, unhappily, the extreme pressure of want once removed, old thoughts return, old vanities are renewed; and so it was with Mr. Maclaine. His master’s commands, though uniformly softened by good-nature and benevolence, appeared to him as so many insults offered to his birth and breeding; it is no wonder, therefore, that in a few months he was discharged from his service. Depending on his sister, who was about to be married to a man of some wealth, he set out once more for Ireland, to endeavor to obtain enough from his relations to fit him out for America, or the West Indies; but here again he was doomed to disappointment. His sister’s marriage had been broken off—she was unable to do anything for him;—and his other relations, deeming themselves scandalized by his having been a footman, were even less tractable than before, treated him with great indignity, and finally refused all manner of assistance.
Again reduced to starvation, he was obliged to think of service as his only resource. With much difficulty he obtained a situation as butler to a gentleman near Cork, with whom he did not live long, being discharged for some breach of trust. Here he remained for many months out of place, wandering about, without any settled abode or means of subsistence, except occasional remittances from his elder brother, a pastor of the English congregation at the Hague, whose friendly assistance was less relished, because it was accompanied by warm remonstrances on the past, and wholesome advice on the future conduct of his life.
Fortune was at length favorable; his old master, though he refused him a character to another family, generously paid his passage to England, and allowed him, for a limited period after his landing, a shilling a day for subsistence.
Once again on this side of the water, his notions of gentility returned; he scorned being a menial servant; and valuing the minimum of his ambition at a pair of colors, he actually had the impudence to attempt to borrow the purchase money on the bond he had obtained from his master. This absurd scheme failing, he threw up his shilling a day in disgust, and heroically cast himself for support on a celebrated courtesan, a countrywoman of his own, who maintained him for some months in great magnificence, and enabled him to attend the public places with something like splendor.
But having disgusted this lady by his pusillanimous conduct in a rencontre with a certain peer,—who bestowed upon him a severe castigation, and very nearly ran him through the body, though he was much stronger, and as well armed as the nobleman,—he was once more without resources. His grandeur now suffered an eclipse for two or three months, and his last suit had been laid by in lavender, or, in other words, pawned, when he inspired the regard of a lady of quality, the consequence of which was that for five or six months longer he flourished away as an idle fellow in all the public places.
But Maclaine inwardly was not idle. He was extremely anxious for an independent settlement, and the thought of inveigling some woman of fortune by the charms of his person was still uppermost in his mind. Among other schemes to this end, there was none he built so much upon as a very hopeful and grateful plot he had laid for the daughter of his patroness and benefactress, who had a considerable fortune. But the young lady’s waiting-maid, who had either more honesty than abigails in general are furnished with, or had not received the price with which they are usually rewarded, discovered the affair to the old lady, who forthwith dismissed Maclaine from her service: but when, in a few months after, he was much reduced, she privately bestowed upon him fifty pounds in order to fit him out for Jamaica, where he had proposed to go and seek his fortune, and where the lady was willing enough that he should retire, that she might be free from fears on her daughter’s account.
But Maclaine was no sooner possessed of this sum than he forgot his Jamaica expedition, and returned to his favorite scheme of fortune-hunting; for he never could rid himself of the idea that one day or other he should succeed in the main object of his existence. He released, therefore, his best clothes from the durance vile in which they had been plunged, and after various treaties with match-makers and chambermaids, relating to ladies of great reputed fortune, all which treaties ended in disappointment, he reluctantly contracted his ambition, and made suit to the daughter of a considerable innkeeper and dealer in horses, with whom he was fortunate enough to succeed, and whom he married with her parents’ consent and five hundred pounds.
Here it would seem that Maclaine had laid aside all thoughts of the fine gentleman, and had really determined to make the most of his wife’s fortune by industry and diligence. He took a house in Welbeck street, and set up a grocer’s and chandler’s shop; was very obliging to his customers, punctual in his dealings, and while his wife lived, was esteemed by his neighbors a careful and industrious man. However, though at times, and while he was in his shop, he appeared to like his business, yet in parties of pleasure, which he made but too often, and on holydays, he affected the dress of a gentleman, and thus created expenses which only a gradual encroachment on his capital enabled him to meet; insomuch that when his wife died, which was about three years after their marriage, he resolved to leave off business, and converted his furniture and goods into the miserable sum of eighty-five pounds, which, perhaps, with frugality, might have supported him in business, but which was at all times too small a sum for Mr. Maclaine.