Chaucer meets him in one of our coffee-houses, and after the usual ceremonies were over between two strangers of their wit and learning, thus accosts him. Sir, cries Chaucer, you have done me a wonderful honour to furbish up some of my old musty tales, and bestow modern garniture upon them, and I look upon myself much obliged to you for so undeserved a favour; however, Sir, I must take the freedom to tell you, that you over-strain’d matters a little, when you liken’d me to Ovid, as to our wit and manner of versification. Why, Sir, says Mr. Dryden, I maintain it, and who then dares be so saucy as to oppose me? But under favour, Sir, cries the other, I think I should know Ovid pretty well, having now convers’d with him almost three hundred years, and the devil’s in it if I don’t know my own talent, and therefore tho’ you pass a mighty compliment upon me in drawing this parallel between us, yet I tell you there is no more resemblance between us, as to our manner of writing, than there is between a jolly well-complexion’d Englishman and a black-hair’d thin-gutted Italian. Lord, Sir, says Dryden to him, I tell you that you’re mistaken, and your two styles are as like one another as two Exchequer tallies. But I, who should know it better, says Chaucer, tell you the contrary. And I, say Mr. Bays, who know these things better than you, and all the men in the world, will stand by what I have affirm’d, and upon that gave him the lye. Rhadamanthus, who is one of Pluto’s oldest judges and a severe regulator of good manners and conversation, immediately sent for our friend John to appear in court; and after he had severely reprimanded him for using such insufferable language upon no provocation; for your punishment, says he, I command you to get Sir Richard Blackmore’s translation of Job by heart, and to repeat ten pages of it to our friend the author of the Rehearsal every morning. Poor Bays desired his lordship to mitigate so rash a sentence, and by way of commutation frankly offer’d to drink so many quarts of liquid sulphur every morning. No, says my lord judge, tho’ they commute penances in Doctors-Commons, yet we are not such rogues to commute them in hell, and so I expect to be obey’d.
Thus Gentlemen, you see we observe a severe justice among us, and indeed to deliver my thoughts impartially, I must needs say, that equity is administer’d after a fairer and more compendious manner in these dominions, than either in your Westminster-Hall, or your palace at Paris, where Astræa pretends to carry all before her, yet has as little to do in either of those two places, as a farrier at Venice. A signal instance of this we have had in a late famous tryal. A foot-soldier of the first regiment of guards, and a Drury-lane whore, were summon’d to appear before judge Minos, who after he had, with a great deal of patience, heard the crimes that were alledg’d against them, asked them what they had to offer in favour of themselves, why sentence of damnation should not pass? the young harlot, either replying upon the merits of her face, which she foolishly imagin’d would bring her off here, as it had often done in your world, or else being naturally furnish’d with a greater stock of impudence than the soldier, broke thro’ the crowd, and thus address’d herself to the court: I hope your lordship, says she, will take no advantage of a poor woman’s ignorance, who ought to have learned counsel to plead for her; however, I depend so much upon the justice of my cause, that I will undertake it my self. The chief argument I insist upon, my lord, is this: I think it highly unreasonable that I should suffer a-new for my crimes in this world, having done sufficient penance for them in the other. By my aunt’s consent and privity, I was sold to an old libidinous lord, and debauch’d by him before I was fourteen; the noble peer kept me some four months; then took occasion to pick a quarrel with me, and set me a drift in the wide world, to steer my course as fortune should direct me. In this exigence I was forc’d to apply my self to a venerable old matron, who finding me young and handsome, took me into her service, shamm’d me upon her customers for a baronet’s daughter of the North, and much I was made of, and courted like a little queen; but, my lord, our profession is directly opposite to all others, for too much custom breaks us. In short, an officer in the army, whom Pluto rewarded for his pains, taught me what Fortune de la guerre meant, so that I was very fairly salivated before fifteen. Having got a little knowledge of the world under this old matron’s directions, who went more than halves with me in every bargain, I thought it high time to trade for my self, and told her one morning, that I was resolved to expose myself no longer in her house. What you please as for that, replies this antient gentlewoman, but first, my dear child, let us come to a fair account to see how the land lies between us. Then stepping into the next room she shew’d me a deal-board all be-scrawl’d with round o’s and cart-wheels in ungodly chalk; then clapping on her spectacles, let me see, cries she, for lodging, diet, washing, cloaths, linen, physick, &c. you owe me ten pounds, (which came up within a few transitory shillings of what I had earned in her house) and this you must pay, sweetheart, before you talk of parting. ’Twas in vain to complain of her extortion, for besides that she pleaded perscription for it, her arithmetick was infallible, and she judg’d for her self en dernier ressort. Thus I was turn’d out of doors, but having in the interim, while I stay’d here, contracted a small acquaintance with a sister of the quill that lodg’d in Covent-Garden, I repaired to her quarters, and continu’d with her. Between us, my lord, we acted the story of Castor and Pollux, that is, we were never visible together, but when she appeared above the horizon, ’twas bed-time with me; and when she kept her bed, ’twas my time to shine at the play-house. When either of us went abroad, we made a fine show enough, but then we gratify’d our backs at the expence of our bellies; cow-heel, tripe, a few eggs, or sprats, were our constant regale at home, and upon holidays a chop of mutton roasted upon a packthread in the chimney; and many a time when my sister and I wore silver-lac’d shoes our stockings wanted feet. I should trespass too much upon your lordship’s patience, to tell you how I have been forc’d to shift my name as well as my quarters, to submit to the nauseous embraces of every drunken tobacco-taking sot, that had half a crown in his pocket to purchase me; and when I have been arrested for a milk-score not exceeding the terrible sum of four shillings, to let an ill-look’d dog of a Moabite enjoy me upon a founder’d chair in a spunging-house to procure my liberty. To this I should add, what unmerciful contributions I was forc’d out of my small revenue to pay to the conniving justices clerks, the constable, the beadle, the tallyman, but especially to those rascals the Reformers, whose business is not to convert, but only lay a heavier tax upon poor sinners, and make iniquity shift its habitation oftener than otherwise it would, I should never have done. In short, our condition, my lord is like a frontier people that live between two mighty monarchies, oppress’d, squeez’d, and plunder’d on all sides. By that time I was one and twenty, I could number more diseases than years, smoak and swear like a grenadier; and last Bartholomew fair, having made a debauch in stumm’d claret and Dr. Stevens’s water, with an attorney’s clerk, a fever seiz’d me next morning, and tript up my heels in three days. How I was buried, that is to say, whether by the contributions of the sister-hood or at the charge of the parish, I cannot tell; but this, my lord, is a short and faithful account of my life, and now I submit myself to the justice of this honourable court. I will not pretend to vindicate my profession, but this I may venture to affirm, that the world cannot live without us, and that a whore in the business of love, is like farthings in the business of trade, which (tho’ they are not the legal coin of the nation) ought to be allow’d and tolerated, if it were only for the conveniency of ready change. Well, says my lord, since ’tis so, and your calling expos’d you to so much suffering, I hope you made your gallants pay for it? That you may be sure I did, answers our damsel, I sold my maidenhead to fifteen several customers, by the same token seven of them were Jews, and it pleases me to think how I cheated those loggerheads in their own Mosaical indications. I never parted with any of my favours, nay, not so much as a clap gratis, except a lieutenant and ensign whom once I admitted upon trust, by the same token they built a sconce, and left me in the lurch. I always took care to secure my money first; tho’ those ungracious vipers of the army would rifle me now and then in spite of all my precaution: for my lord, we whores are like the sea, what we gain in one place we lose in another. Take her away, says my lord Minos, take her away, see her fairly dipt every morning for this twelvemonth over head and ears in good wholesome brimstone: to be both merchant and merchandize, to sell her self for money and yet expect pleasure for it, is worse exaction than was ever practised in Lombard-street or Cornhil.
Our Drury-lane nymph was no sooner carried off, but the soldier advanced forward, and thus told his tale: My lord, you are not to expect a fine speech from me, I am a soldier, and we soldiers are men of action, and not of words. I was a barber’s prentice in the strand, liv’d with him five years, got his maid with child, beat his wife for pretending to reprove me, had run on score at all the painted lattices in the neighbour-hood, and my circumstances being such, was easily persuaded to turn gentleman-soldier. My captain promis’d to make me a serjeant the very moment after I was listed, but he serv’d me just as he did his creditors, whom, to my certain knowledge, he left in the lurch. Well, my lord, I follow’d him to Flanders, where I stood buff to death and damnation four campaigns, sometimes for a groat, sometimes for nothing a-day. Had I more sins to answer for than either the colonel or agent of our regiment, I have bustled thro’ misery enough to wipe out all my scores, curtail’d of my pay to keep a double-chinn’d chaplain, who never preach’d among us, and maintain an hospital, where I could never expect to be admitted without bribery; forc’d for want of subsistence to steal offal, which an hungry dog would piss upon, and if discover’d sure to be rewarded with the wooden-horse, and lest the unweildy beast shou’d throw me, secur’d by a brace of musquets dangling on my heels; to lie up to the chin in water for preventing of rheumatisms, and smoak wholesome dock-leaves to prevent being dunn’d by my stomach; drubb’d and can’d without any provocation, by a smooth-fac’d prig, who t’other day was a pimp, or something worse to a nobleman; never sure of one hour’s rest in the night, never certain of a meal’s meat in the day; harass’d with perpetual marches and counter marches; roasted all the summer, and frozen all the winter; cheated by my officer, cuckolded by my comrades. These, my lord, were the blessings of my life, and if ever I could muster up pence enough to purchase a single pint of Geneva, I thought myself in my kingdom. Last summer I was one of the noble adventurers that went in the expedition to Cadiz, and having secur’d a little linen to myself at Fort St. Mary’s in order to make me a few shirts when I came home, and rubb’d off with two insignificant silver puppets (I think they call them saints) out of a church, the superior commander seiz’d upon them for his own private use, in her majesty’s name, and legally plunder’d me of what I had as legally stolen from the enemy. This and a thousand other disappointments, together with change of climates and other inconveniences, threw such a damp upon my spirits, that within three days after I landed at Portsmouth, I fell ill, and was glad to part with a wretched life, which had given me so much vexation and so little satisfaction. Thus my lord, I have honestly laid all before you, so let the court sentence me as they please. Why really, says the judge, thy case is hard enough, and I must needs say thou dost not want any new weight to be laid upon thee; and so immediately acquitted him, ordering him to be set at liberty without paying of fees.
Finding justice impartially administered in Hell, you may perhaps have the curiosity, gentlemen, to enquire what sort of reception my lord Double of Turn-about-hall found among us upon his arrival into these dominions. I must tell you then, that to the universal admiration of our infernal world, my lord is become Pluto’s great favourite, so that nothing almost is transacted here without his advice and direction. Every body indeed expected, that his lordship who changed his religion on purpose to delude the unhappy prince, whose prime confident he was, and at the same time kept a private correspondence with his enemy in Holland, would have found an entertainment suitable to his deserts, been loaded with chains, and regaled with liquid sulphur; but hitherto he has either had the good luck, or management, to avoid it. A sudden gust of wind had blown away the fan from the top of Pluto’s kitchin, that very afternoon he came here. Our monarch was first in the mind to clap his lordship’s breech upon the iron-spike, and make a weathercock of him (the only thing he was fit for) that with every whiff of brimstone he might tell where damnation sate. Soon after he was of opinion to make a light-match of him to use upon occasion, whenever he had any empire or kingdom to blow up. But at last carefully considering his face, and the majesty of his gate, he made him his taylor, and to say the truth, nobody knows the dimensions of his Luciferian majesty better than his lordship: and as it often happens in your world for noblemen to be govern’d by their taylors or peruke-makers, so my lord in his present capacity of taylor orders every thing at court, puts in and displaces whom he pleases, and possesses Pluto’s ear to that degree, that happening to be in company last week with Aaron Smith, Col. Wildman, Slingsby Bethel, C—rn—sh, and others of the same kidney, who heartily wish the prosperity of old Hell, they gravely shook their heads, and said they were afraid their master Pluto’s government would not long continue, since he had got a viper in his bosom, and a traytor in his cabinet, who would not fail to conjure up some neighbouring prince against him to dispossess him of his antient throne. Indeed ’tis prodigious to consider how this dissembler has wriggled himself into the good opinion not only of our sovereign, but even of queen Proserpine. About a month ago he had interest enough to get my late lord Sh—ft—ry, released out of the dungeon, where he has been confined ever since his coming here, and made him administrator of the Clyster-Pipe to Pluto, for this merry reason, because he had always a good hand at striking at fundamentals. That old libidinous civilian of the Commons, Dr. Littleton, he has made judge admiral of the Stygian lake, and the famous Mr. Alsop, who wished in his address to king James, that the dissenters had casements to their breasts, he has got to be the devil’s glazier; nay, what will more surprize you, he has procur’d the reversion of master of Pluto’s rough game, when it falls, for Dr. Oates; and obtain’d a promise of candle-snuffer-general to all the gaming-houses in these quarters, for honest George Porter the evidence.
The Remainder of my Catalogue of Cures.
TImothy Addlepate, of Cheapside, Milliner, was so wonderfully afflicted with the Zelotypia Italica, that he constantly lock’d up his simpering red-hair’d spouse, when business call’d him abroad, and would hardly trust her with her aunt or grandmother. By rectifying his constitution with my true Covent-Garden Elixir, he is so intirely cured of the Icterus Martialis, or his old yellow distemper that now of his own accord he carries her to the play-house, sends her to all the balls, masquerades, and merry meetings in town; nay, trusts her alone at Epsom-Wells and Richmond, and will let her sit a whole afternoon with a gay smooth-fac’d officer of the guards at the tavern, and is never disturbed at it.
Jethro Lumm, at the sign of the Blue-ball and Spotted-horse, between a Cheesemonger’s and Perfumer’s shops in Ratcliff-high-way, by taking a few doses of my Pulvis Vermifugus, or my Antiverminous Powder, voided above 30000 worms of all sorts, as your Ascarides, Teretes, Hirudines, and so forth, in the space of 12 hours, one of which, by modest computation, was supposed long enough to reach from St. Leonard’s Shoreditch, to Tottenham high cross. I confess my medicine is a little bitter; but what says the learned Arabian philosopher Hamet Ben Hamet Ben Haddu Albumazar, A diadem will not cure the Apoplexy, nor a velvet slipper the Gout: And are not all the Antients as well as Neotorics agreed, that raro corpus sine vermibus. Therefore, my good friends, be advis’d in time.
Ezekiel Driver of Puddle-dock, Carman, having disordered his Pia mater with too plentiful a morning’s draught of three-threads and old Pharaoh, had the misfortune to have his car run over him. The whole street concluded him as good as dead, and the over-forward clerk of the parish had already set him down in the weekly-bills. Two applications of my Unguentum Traumaticum set him immediately to rights, and now he is coachman in ordinary to a Tallyman’s fat widow in Soho. Witness his hand E. D.
Elnathan Ogle, Anabaptist-teacher in Morefields over-against the Grasshopper and Greyhound, for want of being carefully rubb’d down by the pious females after his sudorifick exercise, had got the grease in his heels, and was so violently troubled with rheumatical pains, that he was no longer able to lay out himself for the benefit of his congregation. My Emplastrum Anodynum so effectually reliev’d him by twice using of it, that he has since shifted his profession, teaches the youth of Finsbury-fields to play at back-sword and quarter-staff, and has turn’d his conventicle in-for a fencing-school.
Marmaduke Thummington, at the Red-cow and 3 Travellers in Barbican, was possess’d with an obstreperous ill condition’d devil of a wife, whose everlasting clack incessantly thundering in his ears, had made him as deaf as a drum. His case was so lamentable, that a demiculverin shot over his head affected him no more than it would a man 20 miles off; he was insensible to all the betting and swearing of the loudest cock-match, that ever was fought by two contending counties; nay, at one of Mr. Bays’s fighting plays, would sit you as unconcern’d, as if he had been at a Quakers silent meeting. After all your Elmys, and other pretenders had despair’d of him, I undertook his cure, and with a few of my Otacoustical drops have so intirely recover’d him, that the society of Reformers have made him their chief director, and his hearing is so strangely improved, that at an eaves-dropping at a window, he can hear oaths that were never sworn, and bawdy that was never spoke.