“Yes! his countryman, Master Händel, says there is something great in him.”
“Pah! get away with your Master Händel! he is always your authority! What is he to us, now that it is all over with him in the favor of His Majesty! While he could go in and out of Carlton House daily, I would have cared for his good word; but now that he is banished thence for his highflown insolent conduct, what is he, but an ordinary vagabond musician?”
“Hold your tongue!” cried John Farren, now really moved; “and hold Master Händel in honor! If he gives Joseph his good word, by my troth I have ground whereon I can build. Do you understand, Mistress Bett?”
The “good woman” seemed as though she would have replied at length; but before she could speak, the door opened, and two men of respectable appearance entered. Tom, the waiter, snatched up a porter-mug, filled and placed it on the round table in the middle of the room, and stood ready for further service; while Mistress Bett, flinging a scowl at both the visitors, silently left the apartment.
“Well,” cried the eldest of the two—a colossal figure, with a handsome and expressive countenance, and large flashing eyes—“well, Master John, how goes it?”
“So, so, Master Händel,” was the reply, “the better that you are just come in time to silence my good woman.”
Händel gave his hat and stick to the boy, and turned to his companion, a man about the middle height, simple and plain in his exterior; only in the corner of his laughing eye could the observer detect a world of shrewdness and waggery. His name was William Hogarth; and he was well esteemed as a portrait painter.
“You think, then,” asked Händel, keenly regarding his companion—“you think, then, Bedford would do something for my Messiah, if I got the right side of him?”
“You shall not trouble yourself to get the right side of him,” exclaimed Hogarth eagerly; “that I ask not of you; no honorable man would ask it. Speak to the point at once with him; and be sure, he will use all his influence to have your work suitably represented.”
“But is it not too bad,” cried Händel, “that I must flatter such a shallow-pate as his Grace the Duke of Bedford, to get my best (Heaven knows, William, my best) work brought before the public? If his Grace but comprehended a note of it! but he knows no more of music than that lout of a linen-weaver in Yorkshire, who spoiled my Saul in such a manner, that I corrected him with my fist.”