But once let him commence the practice of running up bills—one at the tailor's, another at the dressmaker's and milliner's, another at the butcher's, another at the grocer's, and so on,—and he never knows how he stands. He is deceived into debt; the road is made smooth and pleasant for him; things flow into the house, for which he does not seem to pay. But they are all set down against him; and at the year's end, when the bills come in, he is ready to lift up his hands in dismay. Then he finds that the sweet of the honey will not repay for the smart of the sting.
It is the same as respects the poorer classes. Not many years since, Parliament passed a law facilitating the establishment of Small Loan Societies, for the purpose of helping small tradesmen and poor people generally to raise money on an emergency. The law was at once pounced upon by the numerous race of Graballs, as a means of putting money in their purse. They gave the working classes facilities for running into debt, and for mortgaging their future industry. A few men, desirous of making money, would form themselves into a Loan Club, and offer sums of money ostensibly at five per cent, interest, repayable in weekly instalments. The labouring people eagerly availed themselves of the facility for getting into debt. One wanted money for a "spree," another wanted money for a suit of clothes, a third for an eight-day clock, and so on; and instead of saving the money beforehand, they preferred getting the money from the Club, keeping themselves in difficulties and poverty until the debt was paid off. Such a practice is worse than living from hand to mouth: it is living upon one's own vitals.
It is easy to understand how the partners in the Loan Club made money. Suppose that they advanced ten pounds for three months at five per cent. It is repayable in weekly instalments at ten shillings a week,—the repayments commencing the very first week after the advance has been made. But though ten shillings are repaid weekly until the debt is wiped off, interest at five per cent, is charged upon the whole amount until the last instalment is paid off. So that, though the nominal interest is five per cent., it goes on increasing until, during the last week, it reaches the enormous rate of one hundred per cent.! This is what is called "eating the calf in the cow's belly."
Men of genius are equally facile in running into debt. Genius has no necessary connection with prudence or self-restraint, nor does it exercise any influence over the common rules of arithmetic, which are rigid and inflexible. Men of genius are often superior to what Bacon calls "the wisdom of business." Yet Bacon himself did not follow his own advice, but was ruined by his improvidence. He was in straits and difficulties when a youth, and in still greater straits and difficulties when a man. His life was splendid; but his excessive expenditure involved him in debts which created a perpetual craving for money. One day, in passing out to his antechambers, where his followers waited for his appearance, he said, "Be seated, my masters; your rise has been my fall." To supply his wants, Bacon took bribes, and was thereupon beset by his enemies, convicted, degraded, and ruined.
Even men with a special genius for finance on a grand scale, may completely break down in the management of their own private affairs. Pitt managed the national finances during a period of unexampled difficulty, yet was himself always plunged in debt. Lord Carrington, the ex-banker, once or twice, at Mr. Pitt's request, examined his household accounts, and found the quantity of butcher's meat charged in the bills was one hundredweight a week. The charge for servants' wages, board wages, living, and household bills, exceeded £2,300 a year. At Pitt's death, the nation voted £40,000 to satisfy the demands of his creditors; yet his income had never been less than £6,000 a year; and at one time, with the Wardenship of the Cinque Ports, it was nearly £4,000 a year more. Macaulay truly says that "the character of Pitt would have stood higher if, with the disinterestedness of Pericles and De Witt, he had united their dignified frugality."
But Pitt by no means stood alone. Lord Melville was as unthrifty in the management of his own affairs, as he was of the money of the public. Fox was an enormous ower, his financial maxim being that a man need never want money if he was willing to pay enough for it. Fox called the outer room at Almack's, where he borrowed on occasions from Jew lenders at exorbitant premiums, his "Jerusalem Chamber." Passion for play was his great vice, and at a very early age it involved him in debt to an enormous amount. It is stated by Gibbon that on one occasion Fox sat playing at hazard for twenty hours in succession, losing £11,000. But deep play was the vice of high life in those days, and cheating was not unknown. Selwyn, alluding to Fox's losses at play, called him Charles the Martyr.
Sheridan was the hero of debt. He lived on it. Though he received large sums of money in one way or another, no one knew what became of it, for he paid nobody. It seemed to melt away in his hands like snow in summer. He spent his first wife's fortune of £1,600 in a six weeks' jaunt to Bath. Necessity drove him to literature, and perhaps to the stimulus of poverty we owe "The Rivals," and the dramas which succeeded it. With his second wife he obtained a fortune of £5,000, and with £15,000 which he realized by the sale of Drury Lane shares, he bought an estate in Surrey, from which he was driven by debt and duns. The remainder of his life was a series of shifts, sometimes brilliant, but oftener degrading, to raise money and evade creditors. Taylor, of the Opera-house, used to say that if he took off his hat to Sheridan in the street, it would cost him fifty pounds; but if he stopped to speak to him, it would cost a hundred.
One of Sheridan's creditors came for his money on horseback." That is a nice mare," said Sheridan. "Do you think so?" "Yes, indeed;—how does she trot?" The creditor, flattered, told him he should see, and immediately put the mare at full trotting pace, on which Sheridan took the opportunity of trotting round the nearest corner. His duns would come in numbers each morning, to catch him before he went out. They were shown into the rooms on each side of the entrance hall. When Sheridan had breakfasted, he would come down, and ask, "Are those doors all shut, John?" and on being assured that they were, he marched out deliberately between them.
He was in debt all round—to his milkman, his grocer, his baker, and his butcher. Sometimes Mrs. Sheridan would be kept waiting for an hour or more while the servants were beating up the neighbourhood for coffee, butter, eggs, and rolls. While Sheridan was Paymaster of the Navy, a butcher one day brought a leg of mutton to the kitchen. The cook took it and clapped it in the pot to boil, and went upstairs for the money; but not returning, the butcher coolly removed the pot lid, took out the mutton, and walked away with it in his tray.[1] Yet, while living in these straits, Sheridan, when invited with his son into the country, usually went in two chaises and four—he in one, and his son Tom following in the other.
[Footnote 1: Haydon—Autobiography, vol. ii., p. 104.]