“Mr. Gresham is unceasing and indefatigable in his kindness to me. I consider it as an instance of this kindness that he has found employment for my poor friend, O’Brien; has made him his porter—a pleasanter place than he had with the painter that pleased nobody: O’Brien sees me almost every day, and rejoices in what he calls my prosperity.
“‘Heaven for ever prosper your honour’ is the beginning and end of all he says, and, I believe, of all he thinks. Is not it singular, that my first step towards getting into practice should have been prepared by that which seemed to threaten my ruin—the quarrel with Frumpton about O’Brien and the hospital?
“A delicacy strikes me, and begins at this moment, in the midst of my prosperity, to make my pride uneasy.
“I am afraid that my father should say Erasmus gets on by patronage, after all—by the patronage of a poor Irish porter and a rich English merchant.
“Adieu, my dear friends; you must not expect such long letters from me now that I am becoming a busy man. Alfred and I see but little of one another, we live at such a distance, and we are both so gloriously industrious. But we have holiday minutes, when we meet and talk more in the same space of time than any two wise men—I did not say, women—that you ever saw.
“Yours, affectionately,
“ERASMUS PERCY.
“P.S. I have just recollected that I forgot to answer your question about Mr. Henry. I do see him whenever I have time to go, and whenever he will come to Mr. Gresham’s, which is very seldom. Mr. Gresham has begged him repeatedly to come to his house every Sunday, when Henry must undoubtedly be at leisure; yet Mr. Henry has been there but seldom since the first six weeks after he came to London. I cannot yet understand whether this arises from pride, or from some better motive. Mr. Gresham says he likes what he has seen of him, and well observes, that a young officer, who has lived a gay life in the army, must have great power over his own habits, and something uncommon in his character, to be both willing and able thus suddenly and completely to change his mode of life, and to conform to all the restraints and disagreeable circumstances of his new situation.”
EXTRACT OF A LETTER FROM MR. PERCY TO ERASMUS PERCY.
“... Let me take the opportunity of your playful allusion to your present patrons, a porter and a hypochondriac, seriously to explain to you my principles about patronage—I never had any idea that you ought not to be assisted by friends: friends which have been made for you by your parents I consider as part of your patrimony. I inherited many from my father, for which I respect and bless his name. During the course of my life, I have had the happiness of gaining the regard of some persons of talents and virtue, some of them in high station; this regard will extend to my children while I live, and descend to them when I am no more. I never cultivated them with a view to advancing my family, but I make no doubt that their friendship will assist my sons in their progress through their several professions. I hold it to be just and right that friends should give, and that young men should gratefully accept, all the means and opportunities of bringing professional acquirements and abilities into notice. Afterwards, the merit of the candidate, and his fitness for any given situation, ought, and probably will, ultimately decide whether the assistance has been properly or improperly given. If family friends procure for any young man a reward of any kind which he has not merited, I should object to that as much as if the place or the reward had been bestowed by a professed patron from political or other interested motives. If my friends were to assist you merely because you were my sons, bore my name, or represented the Percy estate, I should not think this just or honourable; but they know the principles which have been instilled into you, and the education you have received: from these they can form a judgment of what you are likely to be, and for what situations you are qualified; therefore it is but reasonable that they should recommend you preferably to strangers, even of equal ability. Every young man has friends, and they will do all they can to assist him: if they do so according to his merits, they do well; if in spite of his demerits, they do ill; but whilst nothing is practised to prevent the course of free competition, there can be no evil to the community, and there is no injurious patronage. So much for family friends. Now as to friends of your own making, they are as much your own earning, and all the advantage they can be of to you is as honourably yours, as your fees. Whatever assistance you may receive from Mr. Gresham I consider in this light. As to gratitude—I acknowledge that in some cases gratitude might be guilty of partial patronage.