The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle

by T. Smollett

“Lord A—, after the birth of his son, who was sent to nurse in the neighbourhood, according to the custom of the country, where people of the highest distinction put their children out to nurse into farmhouses and cabins, lived in harmony with his lady for the space of two years. But having, by his folly and extravagance, reduced himself to great difficulties, he demanded the remainder of her fortune from her father, the duke of B—, who absolutely refused to part with a shilling until a proper settlement should be made on his daughter, which, by that time, he had put out of his own power to make, by his folly and extravagance.

“As her ladyship, by her endeavours to reform the economy of her house, had incurred the displeasure of some idle profligate fellows, who had fastened themselves upon her husband, and helped to consume his substance, they seized this opportunity of the duke's refusal; and, in order to be revenged upon the innocent lady, persuaded Lord A—, that the only means of extracting money from his grace, would be to turn her away, on pretence of infidelity to his bed, for which they hinted there was but too much foundation. At their suggestions, a most infamous plan was projected; in the execution of which, one P—, a poor, unbred, simple country booby, whom they had decoyed into a snare, lost one of his ears, and the injured lady retired that same day to New-R—, where she continued several years. She did not, however, leave the house, without struggling hard to carry her child along with her; but far from enjoying such indulgence, strict orders were given, that the boy should not, for the future, be brought within her sight. This base, inhuman treatment, instead of answering the end proposed, produced such a contrary effect, that the duke of B—, by a codicil to his will, in which he reflects upon Lord A—'s evil temper, directed his executors to pay to his daughter an annuity of one hundred pounds, while her lord and she should continue to live separate; and this allowance was to cease on Lord A—'s death.

“While she remained in this solitary situation, the child was universally known and received as the legitimate son and heir of her lord, whose affection for the boy was so conspicuous, that, in the midst of his own necessities, he never failed to maintain him in the dress and equipage of a young nobleman. In the course of his infancy, his father having often changed his place of residence, the child was put under the instructions of a great many different schoolmasters, so that he was perfectly well known in a great many different parts of the kingdom; and his mother seized all opportunities, which were but rare, on account of his father's orders to the contrary, of seeing and giving him proofs of her maternal tenderness, until she set out for England, after having been long in a declining state of health, by a paralytical disorder; upon the consequence of which, such dependence was placed by her inconsiderate husband, who was by this time reduced to extreme poverty, that he actually married a woman whom he had long kept as a mistress. This creature no sooner understood that Lady A— was departed from Ireland, than she openly avowed her marriage, and went about publicly with Lord A—, visiting his acquaintances in the character of his wife.

“From this era may be dated the beginning of Mr. A—'s misfortune. This artful woman, who had formerly treated the child with an appearance of fondness, in order to ingratiate herself with the father, now looking upon herself as sufficiently established in the family, thought it was high time to alter her behaviour with regard to the unfortunate boy; and accordingly, for obvious reasons, employed a thousand artifices to alienate the heart of the weak father from his unhappy offspring. Yet, notwithstanding all her insinuations, nature still maintained her influence in his heart; and though she often found means to irritate him by artful and malicious accusations, his resentment never extended farther than fatherly correction. She would have found it impossible to accomplish his ruin, had not her efforts been reinforced by a new auxiliary, who was no other than his uncle, the present usurper of his title and estate; yet even this confederacy was overawed, in some measure, by the fear of alarming the unfortunate mother, until her distemper increased to a most deplorable degree of the dead palsy, and the death of her father had reduced her to a most forlorn and abject state of distress. Then they ventured upon the execution of their projects; and, though their aims were widely different, concurred in their endeavours to remove the hapless boy, as the common obstacle to both.

“Lord A— who, as I have already observed, was a man of weak intellects, and utterly void of any fixed principle of action, being by this time reduced to such a pitch of misery, that he was often obliged to pawn his wearing apparel in order to procure the common necessaries of life; and having no other fund remaining, with which he could relieve his present necessities, except a sale of the reversion of the A— estate, to which the nonage of his son was an effectual bar, he was advised by his virtuous brother, and the rest of his counsellors, to surmount this difficulty, by secreting his son, and spreading a report of his death. This honest project he the more readily embraced, because he knew that no act of his could frustrate the child's succession. Accordingly, the boy was removed from the school at which he was then boarded, to the house of one K—, an agent and accomplice of the present earl of A—, where he was kept for several months closely confined; and, in the meantime, it was industriously reported that he was dead.

“This previous measure being taken, Lord A— published advertisements in the gazettes, offering reversions of the A— estate to sale; and emissaries of various kinds were employed to inveigle such as were ignorant of the nature of the settlement of these estates, or strangers to the affairs of his family. Some people, imposed upon by the report of the child's death, were drawn in to purchase, thinking themselves safe in the concurrence of his lordship's brother, upon presumption that he was next in remainder to the succession; others, tempted by the smallness of the price, which rarely exceeded half a year's purchase, as appears by many deeds, though they doubted the truth of the boy's being dead, ran small risks, on the contingency of his dying before he should be of age, or in hopes of his being prevailed upon to confirm the grants of his father; and many more were treating with him on the same notions, when their transactions were suddenly interrupted, and the scheme of raising more money for the present, defeated by the unexpected appearance of the boy, who, being naturally sprightly and impatient of restraint, had found means to break from his confinement, and wandered up and down the streets of Dublin, avoiding his father's house, and choosing to encounter all sorts of distress, rather than subject himself again to the cruelty and malice of the woman who supplied his mother's place. Thus debarred his father's protection, and destitute of any fixed habitation, he herded with all the loose, idle, and disorderly youths in Dublin, skulking chiefly about the college, several members and students of which, taking pity on his misfortunes, supplied him at different times with clothes and money. In this unsettled and uncomfortable way of life did he remain, from the year 1725 to the latter end of November, 1727; at which time his father died, so miserably poor, that he was actually buried at the public expense.

“This unfortunate nobleman was no sooner dead, than his brother Richard, now earl of A—, taking advantage of the nonage and helpless situation of his nephew, seized upon all the papers of the defunct, and afterwards usurped the title of Lord A—, to the surprise of the servants, and others who were acquainted with the affairs of the family. This usurpation, bold as it was, produced no other effect than that of his being insulted by the populace as he went through the streets, and the refusal of the king-at-arms to enrol the certificate of his brother's having died without issue. The first of these inconveniences he bore without any sense of shame, though not without repining, conscious that it would gradually vanish with the novelty of his invasion; and as to the last, he conquered it by means well known and obvious.

“Nor will it seem strange, that he should thus invade the rights of an orphan with impunity, if people will consider, that the late Lord A— had not only squandered away his fortune with the most ridiculous extravagance, but also associated himself with low company, so that he was little known, and less regarded, by persons of any rank and figure in life; and his child, of consequence, debarred of the advantages which might have accrued from valuable connections. And though it was universally known, that Lady A— had a son in Ireland, such was the obscurity in which the father had lived, during the last years of his life, that few of the nobility could be supposed to be acquainted with the particular circumstances of a transaction in which they had no concern, and which had happened at the distance of twelve years before the date of this usurpation. Moreover, as their first information was no other than common fame, the public clamour occasioned by the separation might inspire such as were strangers to the family affairs with a mistaken notion of the child's having been born about or after the time of that event. The hurry and bustle occasioned by the arrival of the lord-lieutenant about this period, the reports industriously propagated of the claimant's death, the obscurity and concealment in which the boy was obliged to live, in order to elude the wicked attempts of his uncle, might also contribute to his peaceable enjoyment of an empty title. And lastly, Lord Chancellor W—, whose immediate province it was to issue writs for parliament, was an utter stranger in Ireland, unacquainted with the descents of families, and consequently did not examine farther than the certificate enrolled in the books of the king-at-arms. Over and above these circumstances, which naturally account for the success of the imposture, it may be observed, that the hapless youth had not one relation alive, on the side of his father, whose interest it was not to forward or connive at his destruction; that his grandfather, the duke of B—, was dead; and that his mother was then in England, in a forlorn, destitute, dying condition, secreted from the world, and even from her own relations, by her woman Mary H—, who had a particular interest to secrete her, and altogether dependent upon a miserable and precarious allowance from the duchess of B—, to whose caprice she was moreover a most wretched slave.

“Notwithstanding these concurring circumstances in favour of the usurper, he did not think himself secure while the orphan had any chance of finding a friend who would undertake his cause; and therefore laid a plan for his being kidnapped, and sent to America as a slave. His coadjutor in this inhuman scheme was a person who carried on the trade of transporting servants to our plantations, and was deeply interested on this occasion, having, for a mere trifle, purchased of the late Lord A—, the reversion of a considerable part of the A— estate, which shameful bargain was confirmed by the brother, but could never take place, unless the boy could be effectually removed.

“Everything being settled with this auxiliary, several ruffians were employed in search of the unhappy victim; and the first attempt that was made upon him, in which his uncle personally assisted, happening near one of the great markets of the city of Dublin, an honest butcher, with the assistance of his neighbours, rescued him by force from their cruel hands. This, however, was but a short respite; for, though warned by this adventure, the boy seldom crept out of his lurking-places, without the most cautious circumspection, he was, in March, 1727, discovered by the diligence of his persecutors, and forcibly dragged on board of a ship bound for Newcastle, on Delaware river in America, where he was sold as a slave, and kept to hard labour, much above his age or strength, for the space of thirteen years, during which he was transferred from one person to another.