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|---|---|---|---|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Many loved truth and lavished life's best oil Amid the dust of books to find her, Content at last for guerdon of their toil With the cast mantle she had left behind her. Many in sad faith sought for her, Many with crossed hands sighed for her, But these our brothers fought for her, At life's dear peril wrought for her, So loved her that they died for her."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Wherein could I have assisted Luther if I had declared myself for him, and shared the danger along with him? Only thus far, that, instead of one man, two would have perished. I cannot conceive what he means by writing with such a spirit (so fearlessly); one thing I know too well, that he hath brought a great odium upon the lovers of literature. It is true that he hath given us many wholesome doctrines and many good counsels, and I wish he had not defeated the effect of them by his intolerable faults. But if he had written everything in the most unexceptionable manner I had no inclination to die for the sake of truth. Every man has not the courage requisite to make a martyr; and I am afraid, that if I were put to the trial, I should imitate St. Peter."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You must go to her and excuse my shyness on the ground that I cannot tolerate explaining my difficulties in person. Tell her the need I am in. That Italy is the place to get a degree; explain to her how much more honour I am likely to do her than those theologians she keeps about her. They give forth mere commonplaces. I write what will last for ever. Tell her that fellows like them are to be met with everywhere--the like of me only appears in the course of many ages--_i.e._ if you don't mind drawing the long-bow in the cause of friendship. What a discredit it would be to her should St. Jerome --whose works he was preparing--"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Omne majus continent in se minus ("
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The greater includes the less"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A scholar of great acquirements and of no mean genius; hardy and inventive, eloquent and witty; he might have been an ornament to literature, which he made ridiculous; and the pride of the pulpit which he so egregiously disgraced; but having blunted and worn out that interior feeling which is the instinct of the good man, and the wisdom of the wise, there was no balance in his passions, and the decorum of life was sacrificed to its selfishness. He condescended to live on the follies of the people, and his sordid nature had changed him till he crept, 'licking the dust with the serpent.'"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I've brought your wig home, sir."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, ah, replied the doctor;"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, I can't leave it, sir--that is, without the money."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, very well, then. I'll try it on."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "This article has been bought and delivered; if you dare to touch it, I will prosecute you for robbery."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all --a passage gratifying to the feelings of an audience including many of his creditors. He dwelt at considerable length on the blessings and duty of patience, till it was time to close, and then said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Now, brethren, I am come to the second part of my discourse, which is, 'And I will pay ye all,' _but that I shall defer to a future opportunity_."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Count Haines. It is said that he was arrested one morning by two bailiffs for a debt of £20, when he saw a bishop, to whom he was related, passing along in his coach. With ready resource he immediately saw a loophole for escape, and, turning to the men he said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Let me speak to his lordship, to whom I am well known, and he will pay the debt and your charges into the bargain."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You two men come to me to-morrow morning, and I will satisfy you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, my men, what are these scruples of conscience?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Scruples? replied one of them,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sun, a tavern in Clare Market, he threw himself out of the coach window and through the open window of the tavern parlour, just as the driver was about to draw up. The man then descended from the box, touched his hat, and stood waiting for his passenger to alight. Finding at length there was no one visible he besought a few blessings on the scoundrel who had imposed upon him, remounted his box, and was about to drive off, when Rich, who had been watching, vaulted back into the vehicle, and, putting his head out, asked,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Almost paralyzed with fear the driver got down again, but could not be persuaded to take his fare, though he was offered a shilling for himself, exclaiming,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No no, that won't do. I know you too well for all your shoes; and so Mr. Devil, for once you're outwitted."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What do you say to dining with me to-day? Lord This, and Sir So-and-so That (mentioning several celebrities),"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You see that stout, goodtempered-looking man in such and such a box?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes, sir."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Immediately the act-drop is down go to him; have a boy who can bow gracefully precede you with a pair of wax candles. Open the box-door, and in a voice loud enough to be heard by everyone, say, 'Mr. Sheridan requests the pleasure of a private interview with you, sir.' Treat him with the greatest attention, and see that a bottle of the best port and a couple of wine-glasses are placed in my study. These directions were all carried out, and when the manager was alone with his visitor, after expressing the great pleasure he always experienced in seeing any one from Staffordshire, he said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I think you told me you came to London twice a year."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, was the reply,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "January and June, to receive my dividends. I have been to the bank to-day and got my £600."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah you are in Consols, whilst I, alas, am Reduced and can get nothing till April, when you know the interest is paid, and till then I shall be in great distress."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, said his constituent,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": ""
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Only a real friend, said Sheridan,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The £300 duly changed hands, and when April came the power of attorney was handed to Sheridan to sign,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I never spoke of Consols in Reduced, said he,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I only spoke of my Consols being reduced. Unhappy is the man who cannot understand the weight of prepositions. The Stafford man went to Sheridan in a fearful rage, but the latter was as cool as a cucumber. He made a clean breast of it, and told all."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But, he said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The creditor was delighted. He shook Sherry by the hand, exclaiming,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I forgive you, never mention the debt again, to which Sheridan readily assented, and we may be sure kept his word for once. The carriage came, into which both entered, but when it arrived at Carlton House Sheridan alighted, closed the door, and told the coachman to drive the gentleman to his hotel. The Stafford man expostulated that he understood he was going into Carlton House, when Sheridan calmly told him,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That's another mistake of yours,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "that of a schemer. He lived in an atmosphere of duns, but such a thorough master was he of the subject that it was the tradesmen who eventually were"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "by him. It was customary for them to assemble early in the morning to catch him before he went out, and when informed"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mr. Sheridan is not down yet, sir, they were shown into the rooms on each side of the entrance-hall. When he had finished his breakfast he would say,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Are those doors all shut, John?"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah, that is the only man I ever envied. When at school in this town, we were candidates for a chorister's place and he obtained it. When seventeen, there was no prospect for the clever youth but the drudgery of trade, and on this becoming known in the school there was a general wish expressed that his perseverance and ability should be rewarded. To private generosity he was indebted for his outfit, the trustees conferring a small exhibition upon him, and adding a pittance which enabled him to live, with rigid economy, until he took his B.A. degree. When asked by Mr. Lamont, the father of the lady to whom he was engaged, what means he had to maintain a wife, he replied,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The books in this room and two pupils in the next."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What a country is this we live in! In other parts of the world there is no chance except for men of high birth and aristocratic connections, but here genius and industry are sure to be rewarded. You see before you the example of myself, the chief magistrate of the metropolis of this great empire, with the Chief Justice of England sitting at my right hand, both now in the highest offices of the State, and both sprung from the very dregs of the people."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Charles, you see this little shop. I have brought you here on purpose to show it you. In that shop your grandfather used to shave for a penny. That is the proudest reflection of my life. While you live never forget that, my dear Charles,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then that's the man I'll have for my counsel!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "As Erskine walked along the hall after the rising of the judges, attorneys flocked around him with their briefs. When asked how he had the courage to stand up so boldly against Lord Mansfield, he replied that he fancied he could feel his little children plucking at his robe, and that he heard them saying,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "employed in conveying coals in barges from the pits to the different ports on the Tyne, John Scott was born at Newcastle on the 4th June, 1751, and after being educated at the Grammar School in the town would have been apprenticed to his father's business but for the remonstrances of his brother William (afterwards Lord Stowell), who had obtained an Oxford scholarship, and subsequently a fellowship at the University. The success of the one son induced the father to send John also to college, where he at first studied for the church. While at Oxford he made a runaway match with Miss Bessy Surtees, the daughter of a Newcastle banker. The young couple went to the Queen's Head, at Morpeth, but on the third morning of their married life their funds were exhausted, and they had no home to go to. Mrs. Scott was naturally very much upset at the predicament in which they were placed, but while lamenting it she suddenly caught sight of a fine wolf-dog belonging to the family, called Loup, whose presence at Morpeth was to her the joyous sign that help was at hand. In a few moments Mr. Henry Scott, her husband's brother, entered the room. John Scott had written a repentant letter from Morpeth to his father, which had the desired effect, and the younger brother had been sent to announce pardon to the offending couple, and to invite them to take up their abode under the parental roof. The year of grace allowed for retaining a fellowship after marriage having elapsed, Mr. Scott abandoned the thought of taking holy orders and studied law. He was called to the bar in 1776, when he says,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Bessy and I thought all our troubles were over, and we were to be rich almost immediately. This golden dream was however speedily dissipated, for during the first year the total amount of his professional income was ten shillings and sixpence. But when Lord Chancellor, and living in a magnificent mansion in the vicinity of Hyde Park, he often referred to this period of poverty as the happiest time of his life, for then, he maintained, his wife, to whom he was always passionately attached, was able to show him attentions never so freely bestowed when Society asserted its claims on them. Like Lord Tenterden he gloried in the obstacles he had overcome, and used to point to a small house in Cursitor Street, saying"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "There was my first perch; many a time have I run down to Fleet Market to buy sixpennyworth of sprats for supper."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Dunning and myself were generous for we gave the girl who waited on us a penny a piece, but Kenyon rewarded her with a halfpenny, and sometimes with only a promise."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "At a later period of my life--after a success at the bar which my wildest and most sanguine dreams had never painted to me--when I was gaining an income of £8000 or £9000 a year--I have often reflected how all that prosperity had arisen out of the pecuniary difficulties and confined circumstances of my father."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "My dear brother,--I live very economically; I dine at home for a shilling, go to the coffee-house once a day, 4_d._, to the theatre once a week, 3_s._ 6_d._ My pen will keep me in pocket-money. I this day begin a job which I must finish in a fortnight, and for which I am promised two guineas, but alas! Willy Thompson paymaster. He owes me divers yellow-boys already. I go no farther than write the history of the last war in India for him till he pays me all."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ever since I can remember, he writes,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have had a taste for mechanics, but the best mechanician wants materials and materials cost money,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Hot cross buns! Hot cross buns! One a penny, two a penny, hot cross buns, Sugar 'em, and butter 'em, and clap 'em in your muns, one a penny, two a penny, hot cross buns."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "and had to return for more to the wholesale establishment, the difference in this case between buying and selling being, as is usual, very well worth the trouble. When the family lived at Hill Top, his mother presented Rowland with a portion of the garden for his own use, covered with horehound, which he was about to root out to make way for his flowers, when he was given to understand that the horehound possessed a monetary value. Immediately on discovering this, he cut it up carefully, tied it in bundles, and borrowing a basket from his mother started off to the market-place, where he took up his position with all the air of a regular trader, but was saved the bother of retail dealing by disposing of his entire stock for eightpence to a woman standing near, who he presumed made a hundred per cent. by the transaction, though with true business tact she complained of her purchase, and told him to tell his mother,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Of what use is it? To which he replied,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is the use of a child? It may become a man."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I learned grammar, he says,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You have forgotten me, Mr. Burritt?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, said he,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I'm the boy to whom you gave the watch. I'm now a student of Harvard College."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I should like to have that watch back again."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You shall, said the student."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I sold it, but I know where it is."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am, sir, Your obedient, humble servant,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "H. DAVY."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "His work excites admiration, but contact with him warms and elevates the heart. Here, surely, is a strong man. I love strength, but let me not forget its union with modesty, tenderness, and sweetness in the character of Faraday.... Taking the duration of his life into account, this son of a blacksmith and apprentice to a bookbinder had to decide between a fortune of £150,000 on the one side, and his unendowed science on the other. He chose the latter, and died a poor man. But his was the glory of holding aloft among the nations the scientific name of England for a period of forty years. In 1835, when Sir Robert Peel retired from office, he recommended Faraday to William IV. for a pension of £300. The minute was placed in the hands of Lord Melbourne, Peel's successor, who saw Faraday, and involved him in religious and political discussion, wanting to entrap the philosopher into a promise to support the Government. Failing in this, Lord Melbourne said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I look upon the whole system of giving pensions to literary and scientific people as a piece of gross humbug. To which Faraday replied,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "After this, my lord, I see that my business with you is ended. I wish you good morning."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "M. FARADAY."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "When they came to London in the autumn of 1751 the fashionable world went mad after"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "--it is believed he wrote for the magazines, etc., as a means of support--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I rise at half-past four. I have contrived a machine after the manner of an hour-glass, which wakens me regularly at that hour. Exactly over my head I have suspended two vessels of tin, one above the other. When I go to bed, which is always at ten, I pour a bottle of water into the upper vessel, in the bottom of which is a hole of such a size as to let the water pass through so as to make the inferior reservoir overflow in six hours and a half;"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I then lived said he,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "as having to tear up the floor of a dwelling, most other instances might be expected to appear more or less tame; but the experiences of William Thom, the Inverary poet, are scarcely inferior in intensity. This untutored, but extremely sweet songster, whose first poem, 'Blind Boys' Pranks,' appeared in the _Edinburgh Herald_, was a hand-loom weaver, who was deprived of his occupation by the failure of certain American firms, and compelled to tramp the country as a pedlar. Before resorting to that line of life, and when in the receipt of the sum of five shillings weekly, he relates how on a memorable spring morning, he anxiously awaited the arrival of this small amount: and though the clock had struck eleven, the windows of the room were still curtained, in order that the four sleeping children, who were bound to be hungry when awake, might be deluded into believing that it was still night, for the only food in their parents' possession was one handful of meal saved from the previous day. The mother with the tenderest anxiety sat by the babes' bedside lulling them off to sleep as soon as they exhibited the least sign of wakefulness, and speaking to her husband in whispers as to the cooking of the little meal remaining, for the youngest child could no longer be kept asleep, and by its whimpering woke the others. Face after face sprang up, each little one exclaiming,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, mither, mither, give me a piece; and says the poor fellow,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The word sorrow was too weak to apply to the feelings of myself and wife during the remainder of that long and dreary forenoon."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I have known both hunger and nakedness to the utmost extremity of human endurance. I have known what it is to have food given me as charity to a madman, and I have at times been obliged to shelter myself under the miseries of that character to avoid a heavier calamity. My distresses have been greater than I have ever owned, or will own to any man. Such evils are terrible to bear, but they never yet had power to turn me from my purpose."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "An old fox broad sword, and a good black gown, And thus old Henry came to London Town."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It must have been a rare time for clergymen of the Church of England when a navy chaplain is found on such intimate terms with"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No. 1 round the corner, but that circumstance is accounted for by the fact that the Rev. Mr. Tevuge is spoken of as having"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "which I have included in the present portion of the subject; amongst others being the incident of Dr. Johnson dining with his publisher, and being so shabby that, as there was a third person present, he hid behind a screen. This happened soon after the publication of the lexicographer's 'Life of Savage,' which was written anonymously, and though the circumstance of the hiding must have been rather humiliating to the mighty Samuel, yet the attendant consequences were pleasant. The visitor who was dining with Harte, the publisher, was Cave, who, in course of conversation, referred to 'Savage's Life,' and spoke of the work in the most flattering terms. The next day, when they met again, Harte said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You made a man very happy yesterday by your encomiums on a certain book."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I did? replied Cave."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, how could that be; there was no one present but you and I?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You might have observed, explained Harte,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Lord Rivers, it is alleged, looked on the boy as his own, but his mother seems always to have disliked him; and the fact that Lady Mason, the mother of the countess, looked after the child's education, and had him put to a Grammar School at St. Albans, certainly favours the view of his aristocratic parentage. He was subsequently apprenticed to a shoemaker, but discovering the secret, or the supposed secret, of his birth, for not a few discredit his story, he cut leather for literature, and appealed to his mother for assistance. His habit was to walk of an evening before her door in the hope of seeing her, and making an appeal; but his efforts were in vain, he could neither open her heart nor her purse. He was befriended by many, notably by Steele, Wilks the actor, and Mrs. Oldfield, a"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "To Young Men, inviting all spirited young fellows to make their fortunes as common soldiers in the East India Company's Service. After reading it over a second time he determined without hesitation to hasten off and enroll himself in that honourable corps, when he met with a person he had known at a sporting club he had been in the habit of frequenting. His companion seeing his bundle and rueful face, asked him where he was going, to which Holcroft replied that had he enquired five minutes before he could not have told him, but that now he was"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "At this his friend appeared greatly surprised, and told him he thought he could put him up to something better than that. Macklin, the famous London actor, was going over to play in Dublin, and had asked him if he happened to be acquainted with a young fellow who had a turn for the stage, and, said his friend,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I should be happy to introduce you. The offer was gladly accepted, and when the introduction had been managed Holcroft was asked by Macklin"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "to which he replied,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He had taken it into his head to suppose it was genius, but that it was very possible he might be mistaken."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear, A stifled, drowsy, unimpassioned grief, Which finds no natural outlet, no relief, In word, or sigh, or tear."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have all my life had a violent antipathy to soldiers and horses, and the sooner I can cure myself of such absurd prejudices the better, he went to the enlisting-station, where the sergeant finding that Coleridge had not been in bed all night, made him have some breakfast and rest himself. Afterwards, he told him to cheer up, to well consider the step he was about to take, and suggested that he had better have half-a-guinea, go to the play, shake off his melancholy and not return. Coleridge went to the theatre, but afterwards resought the sergeant, who was extremely sorry to see him, and saying with evident emotion,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then it must be so,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What's your name?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Comberback!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What do you come here for, sir?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "For what most other persons come, to be made a soldier!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do you think you can run a Frenchman through the body, sir?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I do not know, said Coleridge,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That will do,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "One who has whistled at the plough."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "But there was a hitch, two shillings were requisite to enlist two recruits, and there was only one shilling. We proposed that he should enlist one of us with it, and that this one should then lend it to him to enlist the other. But his wife would not have the enlistment done in that way. She said 'That would not be _law_: and a bonny thing it would be to do it without it being law. Na na,' she continued, 'it maun be done as the law directs.' The corporal made a movement as if he would take us out with him to some place where he could get another shilling but she thought it possible that another of the recruiting party might share the prize with him--take one of us or both: so she detained him, shut the door on us, locked it, took the key with her and went in search of the King's requisite coin. Meanwhile as my friend was impatient I allowed him to take precedence of me, and have the ceremony performed with the shilling then present. On the return of the corporal's wife, who though younger than he in years seemed to be an 'older soldier,' I also became the King's man."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "so the only thing to be done was to invite the bailiff to join them at dinner. After the repast was concluded the party repaired to Sloman's, a notorious spunging-house in Cursitor Street, Chancery Lane, when just as Jay was taking leave of Loder the latter remembered having something in his pocket which might be turned to account. It was a song by Samuel Lover."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Goodbye, old fellow, said Loder."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Come to-morrow morning, and see what I shall have ready."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, I really don't give myself the credit of being so irresistible as you have fancied me. There is one thing, though, which I think I _am_ able to do. Whenever I am arrested I can always persuade the sheriff's officer to bail me."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Orators in May 1762. In this he gave musical imitations, but the performances taking place in the mornings, his convivial habits over night precluded him from shining as he might have done; a fact which was noticed by Foote, the manager. To this Bannister replied,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I knew it would be so; I am all right at night, but neither I, nor my voice, can _get up_ in the morning. He was invariably in difficulties: on the death of Sir Theodosius Boughton, the topic of the hour in 1781, as he was said to have been poisoned by laurel water, Bannister, said"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Pooh! Don't tell me of your laurel leaves; I fear none but a bay-leaf (bailiff). Once when returning from Epsom to town in a gig, accompanied by a friend, they were unable to pay the toll at Kennington Gate, and the man would not let them pass. Bannister immediately offered to sing a song, and struck up 'The Tempest of War.' His voice was heard afar, the gate being soon thronged by voters returning from Brentford, who encored his effort, and the turnpike-man, calling him a noble fellow, expressed his willingness to pay"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Flaxman is ruined for an artist! But his mistake was soon made manifest. When Mrs. Flaxman heard of the remark, she said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Let us work and economize. It shall never be said that Ann Denham ruined John Flaxman as an artist;"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Pray stay, said he, as he laid down the silver tweezers with which he had just removed a straggling hair,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "and many other dainties that he enumerated with becoming gastronomic fervour, but which failed to overcome the scruples of the young men, who went away enchanted with Brummell's politeness and hospitality, one of the trio afterwards remarking that"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well I think I shall dine there too,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But you haven't an invitation, have you?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No, was the reply;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But I did not see the pie on the table."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "True, explained Brummell;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I know it never made its appearance. It was a splendid pie--a _chef-d'oeuvre_, and I felt deeply interested in its fate. When going away I inquired what had been done with the pie. The cook said, 'Master had kept it for Master Harry's birthday.' To be the 'cut and come again' of a nursery dinner. To be the prey of the little Joneses and their nurses was atrocious. It was an insult to me and my pie! 'Go,' I said, 'to your kitchen; I particularly want to see the _pâté de foie gras_.' Feeling that it would have been a sin to leave it with such people, I took it away. It was not honest, but as I cut into it this morning I almost felt justified, for I never inserted a knife into such another."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "There's a divinity doth shape our ends, rough-hew them how we will, admits that"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "There is a tide in the affairs of men, which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune, which certainly looks as if we had something to do with the matter."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Man, it has been said,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The journey, effected with a horse and cart, had been extremely trying, because across the road they had travelled ran a small rivulet, which was frozen, and a passage through which had to be made for the horse, the driver standing upon the shafts across the back of the horse, while the showman waded through the water nearly up to his waist, a state of discomfort enhanced by the plunging of the horse and the shrieks of the children. When the party arrived at the public-house (where there was a large room which was occasionally let for entertainments, &c.), they were nearly frozen, and proceeded to warm themselves by the kitchen fire. After calling for a quart of ale, and paying for it with the solitary sixpence in his possession, the showman proceeded to look after his properties, and found that the man with the cart, being anxious to get back, had unloaded the luggage at the door. Enquiring of the landlady if he could engage the large room for a few nights for a very superior exhibition, the itinerant performer was informed by her,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I can't tell, but I think not. The last people who were here didn't pay the rent. However, the landlord is not at home, and I can say nothing about it."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The expression on my wife's face seemed to say, 'Are you mad--where will you get the money to pay for it?' I paid no attention, however, to her look: the tea was got ready, and we sat down and made a hearty meal--at least, the children and I did. As to my wife, she was alarmed at my conduct, and was too frightened to eat, although she had tasted nothing since breakfast."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Certainly not, here's a shilling; pay me in the morning. He accepted the proffered coin, threw the dice, and won the watch, which he sold for a sovereign. He then gave an exhibition of his skill with sleight of hand tricks, to the great delight of the customers, and was informed by the landlord before he went to bed that he could have the big room for a night or two. To this he replied,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will think it over, and joined his wife, whom he found in a state of the greatest trepidation at the thought of their not having the money to pay for their board and lodging. He set her fears literally at rest, by showing her the proceeds of the watch he had sold. The next and two following evenings he gave three most successful performances in the big room, and finally left the village with flying colours, _en route_ for Carlisle. His good fortune, as in the case of Incledon, being fairly attributable to the singing of a song; which savours strongly to my mind of what is generally understood by the term"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "In the year 1851 his health gave way while he was pursuing the avocation of an engraver. The acids used in engraving so affecting his eyes that for a time he was quite blind, and loss of eyesight meant loss of work, and loss of work involved loss of income. The poverty he suffered at this time must have been of the direst; but though he had lost almost everything else, he never apparently quite lost heart, and when his sight improved he dashed off an article called"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The Key of the Street,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I envy him fiercely, as he goes out, though, God wot, his bedchamber may be but a squalid attic, and his bed a tattered hop-sack, with a slop great-coat from the emporium of Messrs. Melchisedek & Son, and which he had been working at all day, for a coverlid. I envy his children (I am sure he has a frouzy, ragged brood of them) _for they have at least somewhere to sleep. I haven't_."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "of cleanliness), all the personages met with, and the occurrences witnessed being described with a freshness and fidelity that stamped the author as a descriptive writer of uncommon power. Charles Dickens at once forwarded a cheque for the contribution named, and, in the words of Oliver Twist,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I know I have enemies in this country, but (here she cast herself on her knees, raising her clenched hand aloft),"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "TATE WILKINSON."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "E. KNIGHT."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "TATE WILKINSON."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If you could write like that, I could soon find you an engagement."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "At last he became so necessitous that he petitioned James the First for a licence to collect alms for himself,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "--which petition was granted by letters patent under the Great Seal, permitting him to seek assistance from all well-disposed people within this realm of England. The terms in which this permit was set forth ("
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": ") were scarcely correct; that is to say,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Some parsons would halloo enough to raise the whole house and home of the domestics to raise a poor crown; at last all that flutter ends in sending Jack or Tom out to change a guinea, and then 'tis reckoned over half-a-dozen times before the fatal crown can be picked out, which must be taken as it is given, with all the parade of almsgiving [Davies, be it remembered, was a Welsh divine], and so to be received with all the active and passive ceremonial of mendication and alms-receiving, as if the books, printing, and paper were worth nothing at all, and as if it were the greatest charity for them to touch them, or let them be in the house. 'For I shall never read them,' says one of the five-shilling chaps. 'I have no time to look into them,' says a third. ''Tis so much money lost,' says a grave dean. 'My eyes being so bad,' said a bishop, 'that I can scarce read at all.' 'What do you want with me?' said another. 'Sir, I presented you the other day with my 'Athenæ Britannicæ,' being the last part published.' 'I don't want books, take them again; I don't understand what they mean.' 'The title is very plain,' said I, 'and they are writ mostly in English.' 'I'll give you a crown for both the volumes.' 'They stand me, sir, in more than that, and 'tis for a bare subsistence I present or sell them; how shall I live?' 'I care not a farthing for that--live or die, 'tis all one to me.' 'Damn my master,' said Jack, ''twas but last night he was commending your books and your learning to the skies, and now he would not care if you were starving before his eyes; nay, he often makes game at your clothes, though he thinks you the greatest scholar in England.'"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Grub Street pamphleteers, but not a few notable names in the world of letters can be found to verify the gloomy picture. Nathaniel, or"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Nat Lee, as he is more often called, was one of those who failed to find fortune, but it must be admitted his"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What! all this for a song? Whereupon the Queen replied,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then give him what is reason."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I was promised on a time, To have reason for my rime; (_sic_) From that time unto this season I received nor rime nor reason"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Full little knowest thou, that hast not try'd What hell it is in suing long to bide: To lose good days that might be better spent, To wast long nights in pensive discontent: To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow, To feed on hope, to pine with fear and sorrow: To have thy Prince's grace, yet want her peers, To have thy asking, yet wait many years: To fret thy soul with crosses and with cares, To eat thy heart with comfortless despairs: To fawn, to crouch, to wait, to ride, to run, To spend, to give, to want, to be undone"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Despair in that canto, and betrayed an unusual kind of transport on the discovery of so new and uncommon a genius. After he had read some verses he called his steward, and bade him give the person who brought those verses £50; but upon reading the next stanza, he ordered the sum to be doubled. The steward was as much surprised as his master, and thought it his duty to make some delay in executing so sudden and lavish a bounty; but upon reading one stanza more, Sir Philip raised his gratuity to £200, and commanded the steward to give it immediately, lest, as he read farther, he might be tempted to give away his whole estate. Unfortunately this generous patron was killed at the early age of thirty-two, and it was after his decease that Spenser for a time was under a cloud. Subsequently he was befriended by the Earl of Leicester, and upon the appointment of Lord Grey of Wilton to be Lord Deputy of Ireland, the poet became his secretary, and was rewarded by a grant from the Queen of three thousand acres. This he was not destined to enjoy very long, for in the rebellion of Tyrone he was plundered, and deprived of his estate, and when he arrived in England he was heart-broken by his misfortunes. He died in the greatest distress on the 16th January, 1599, and though interred in Westminster Abbey at the expense of the Earl of Essex, his death according to Ben Jonson was actually occasioned by"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "for those whose troubles are the outcome of self-indulgence and dissipation."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "A fellow-feeling makes us wondrous kind, and only those who have been the victims of that enslaving mania for drink, which has blasted so many bright lives will have compassion for such a man as Samuel Boyce. This misguided mortal, the son of a dissenting minister, was born at Dublin in the year 1708, and when eighteen was sent to the Glasgow University, his father having designed him for the ministry. He married when he had been at college little more than a year, and soon developed habits of indulgence and extravagance, which effectually ruined him, in spite of much assistance received from the nobility and others. In the year 1731 he published a volume of poems, to which is subjoined the"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Tablature of Cebes,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am every moment threatened to be turned out here, because I have not money to pay for my bed two nights past, which is usually paid beforehand; and I am loth to go into the Compter, till I can see if my affairs can possibly be made up. I hope, therefore, you will have the humanity to send me half-a-guinea for support till I finish your papers in my hands. I humbly entreat your answer, not having tasted anything since Tuesday evening I came here; and my coat will be taken off my back for the charge of the bed, so that I must go into prison naked, which is too shocking for me to think of."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "though in one sense it certainly is curious that their wants should not have been recognised. Men like Henry Carey or Cary, the author of 'Sally in our Alley,' and said by some to be the composer of the National Anthem, who was considered by all authorities to be a true son of the Muses, have been driven to desperation through want. It is said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "At the time that this poet could neither walk the streets nor be seated at the convivial board without listening to his own songs and his own music--for in truth the whole nation was echoing his verse, and crowded theatres were applauding his wit and humour; while this very man himself, urged by his strong humanity, founded a 'Fund for Decayed Musicians'--he was so broken-hearted, and his own common comforts so utterly neglected, that in despair, not waiting for nature to relieve him from the burden of existence, he laid violent hands on himself; and when found dead _had only a halfpenny in his pocket_."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Far, far away then chase the harlot Muse, Nor let her thus thy noon of life abuse; Mix with the common crowd, unheard, unseen, And if again thou tempt'st the vulgar praise, May'st thou be crown'd with birch instead of bays!"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Just or unjust, the world has never forgiven Horace Walpole for Chatterton's misery. His indifference has been contrasted with the generosity of Edmund Burke to Crabbe, a generosity to which we owe 'The Village,' 'The Borough,' and to which Crabbe owed his peaceful old age, and almost his existance. The cases were different, but Crabbe had his faults, and Chatterton was worth saving. It is well for genius that there are souls in the world more sympathising, less worldly, and more indulgent, than those of such men as Horace Walpole."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Mrs. Clarke sat on a broken chair by a little scrap of fire, and the visitors were accommodated with a rickety deal board. A half-starved dog lay at the authoress's feet; a cat sat on one hob, and a monkey on the other; while a magpie perched on the back of its mistress's chair. A worn-out pair of bellows served for a writing-desk, and a broken cup for an inkstand; these were matched by the pen, which was worn down to the stump, and was the only one on the premises. The lady asked thirty guineas for the copyright. The bookseller offered five, but was at length induced by his friend to give ten, on condition that Mr. Whyte (the friend) would pay a moiety and take half the risk of the novel."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "As I am entirely dependent on chance for a subsistence, and am desirous of getting into business, I hope the town will favour me on the occasion, which, added to the rest of their indulgence, will ever be gratefully acknowledged by their truly obliged, and obedient servant, CHARLOTTE CLARKE."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Gentlemen, said he to the creditors,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The redemption referred to his property, all of which he gave up, retiring into modest lodgings, where he zealously set to work to accomplish the Herculean task of writing off the gigantic sum named. 'Woodstock,' which realised £8228, was the first novel after his misfortune, and that occupied him only three months; but it was as, he said,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Peace! There was not peace even in death, and the creditor pursued him even into the 'waste wide,' even to the coffin. He was lying in state, when a gentleman in the deepest mourning called, it is said, at the house, and introducing himself as an old and much-attached friend of the deceased, begged to be allowed to look upon his face. The tears which rose in his eyes, the tremulousness of his quiet voice, the pallor of his mournful face, deceived the unsuspecting servant, who accompanied him to the chamber of death, removed the lid of the coffin, turned down the shroud, and revealed features which had once been handsome, but long since rendered almost hideous by drinking. The stranger gazed with profound emotion, while he quietly drew from his pocket a bailiff's wand, and touching the corpse's face with it, suddenly altered his manner to one of considerable glee, and informed the servant that he had arrested the corpse in the King's name for a debt of £500. It was the morning of the funeral, which was to be attended by half the grandees of England, and in a few minutes the mourners began to arrive. But the corpse was the bailiff's property till his claim was paid, and nought but the money would soften the iron capturer. Canning and Lord Sidmouth agreed to settle the matter, and over the coffin the debt was paid."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, it sickens the heart to see bosoms so hollow, And friendship so false in the great and high-born, To think what a long line of titles may follow, The relics of him who died friendless and lorn! How proud they can press to the funeral array Of him whom they shunned in his sickness and sorrow, How bailiffs may seize his last blanket to-day, Whose pall shall be held up by nobles to-morrow!"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "which assertion can be supported by the accepted axiom"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Jewing the Jew. The case involved an indictment brought by one omnibus company against another for"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "(that is, too closely following one another for the purpose of driving the rival off the road), and the trial lasted over three days. For this brief, which was an important one, he had received a disgracefully small fee, which he could not decline on account of his necessitous condition; but he determined, if he could get a chance, to be equal with his parsimonious employer, and on the last day of the trial the opportunity came. The attorney was most anxious that Phillips himself should examine a noted Paddington driver, who was a most important witness, and early on the morning he accosted the barrister, saying:"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What an interesting day this will be in Court. You have to examine the Paddington coachman. The Court is crowded with conductors and drivers from all parts."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Indeed, said Phillips,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I feel no interest in it. The trial has lasted three days, and look at my miserable fee. Now you _must_ give me ten guineas, or I won't examine him."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "All right, replied the bailiff;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The messenger, who was an actor thoroughly accustomed to"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and the manager consequently open to discuss any scheme for pulling up the business. In a moment Philippe saw his opportunity, and suggested that two or three special performances should be given, at which every person paying for admission should have with his check a packet of confectionery given to him, and a ticket entitling the holder to a chance in a prize of the value of £15. The suggestion was acted upon, the bait took, and the result was a succession of crowded houses, whereby Talon cleared off all his stock of sweets, netting a sufficient sum to enable him to purchase conjuring apparatus, which enabled him to give a series of entertainments with great success; the same that were subsequently represented with such profit in England, France, Austria, and elsewhere. Talon, or Philippe, as he was known to the entertaining public, was the first to perform with bare arms, and was one of the first to introduce the"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "description of examples is found connected with the theatrical experience of Mr. C. W. Montague, who for years was a very well-known circus-manager, having been connected at one time or another with the equestrian establishments of Messrs. Sanger, Bell, F. Ginnetts, Myers, Newsome, and George Ginnett. Some years ago, when he joined the circus owned by the last-named at Greenwich, he found that business was in a most melancholy condition; the show, although a very good one, failed to fetch the people in, and the receipts, not sufficient to pay expenses, were getting worse and worse. This dismal state of things was most disheartening to Montague, who was at his wits' end to know what to do, when one day, while he was being shaved, the barber noticing some one who had just passed the shop, said:"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "There goes poor Townsend."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And who might he be? asked the manager; being told in reply that the gentleman referred to had originally represented Greenwich in Parliament, but owing to great pecuniary difficulties had been obliged to resign. It also transpired that the late M.P. was a most excellent actor, the barber having seen him enact Richard III."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "In addition, Mr. Townsend had been deservedly popular in the district, and especially in Deptford; for he had been the means, when in the House of Commons, of getting dockyard labourers' wages considerably advanced. These two facts, combined with the broken-down appearance of the gentleman spoken of, immediately presented themselves to Mr. Montague in a business light. What a capital idea it would be if he could manage to get the ex-M.P. to appear in the circus! So popular a man would be a tremendous draw! With this object in view, he waited upon Mr. Townsend the next morning, and put the proposition to him, but without success. The unfortunate gentleman admitted that his circumstances were such that the prospect of making money by the venture was most tempting; but his pride would not admit of his accepting the offer. The idea of appearing as a paid performer in a circus in the very place where he had been regarded with such respect was repugnant to his feelings, and he felt that he could not consent to the sacrifice of dignity. Away from Greenwich he would not have minded; but this arrangement of course would have been no good to Mr. Montague. Nothing daunted by the refusal, the theatrical man of business determined not to give up the idea, but on several subsequent occasions pressed him hard, using such powerful arguments in favour of the scheme that at last Mr. Townsend consented to appear as Richard"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "His first berth of any consequence was a clerkship in a general store, at which time he was"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "but, says he,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I determined to have some money. Consequently, impelled by impecuniosity, he speedily became ingenious. One day, when left in charge of the business, a pedlar called with a waggon full of common green glass bottles, varying in size from half a pint to half a gallon. The store was what was called a barter store. A number of hat manufacturers traded there, paying in hats, and giving store orders to many of their _employés_, and other firms did likewise, so that the business boasted an immense number of small customers. The pedlar was anxious to do business, and Barnum knew that his employers had a quantity of goods that were regarded as unsaleable stock. Upon these he put inordinately high prices, and then expressed his willingness to barter some goods for the whole lot of bottles. The pedlar was only too glad, never dreaming of disposing of all his load, and the exchange was effected. Shortly after, Mr. Keeler, one of the firm, returned, and, on beholding the place crowded with the bottles, asked in amazement,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What _have_ you been doing?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Trading goods for bottles, replied Barnum; to which his employer made the unpalatable rejoinder,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You are a fool; adding,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You have bottles enough for twenty years."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Twenty-five dollars for fifty cents; over 500 prizes."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Now, said Winde,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I am a ruined man, and unless I have your word of honour that the debts shall be paid, I will instantly throw myself over."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What is to become of me?"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Impossible to get rid of them? asked his friends."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What do you mean?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, simply that these lordly retainers are bailiffs with an execution, replied Steele, adding that"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah! said the watchmaker,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I was at the theatre a little while ago, and he was in a terrible rage with you--said he had been waiting for you since one."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Indeed, said Sheridan;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Harris is going to present Bate Dudley with a gold watch, was the reply;"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "My dear Harris, began the incorrigible one,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well, replied the manager,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "By the way, I suppose you have some money with you? But he had reckoned without his host."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not a sixpence--not a sou, was the reply, the last turnpike having taken his friend's last coin. Both were considerably crestfallen, for it was getting late, and the drive had made them remarkably hungry. What was to be done? Presently they passed an exceedingly pretty residence."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Stay, said Hook,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": ""
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Do you know the owner? asked the friend."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not the least in the world, laughed Hook."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I know his name. He is the celebrated chronometer-maker. The man who got £10,000 premium from Government, and then wound up his affairs and his watches. Without another word they drove up to the door, asked for the proprietor, and were ushered into the worthy tradesman's presence."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, sir, said Hook,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and refused, unless he had something to show that he would get his money's worth, or at any rate a portion of it. Thereupon Hook went home, sat up all night, wrote an introduction to a novel"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "funny, being connected with a once well-known theologian--Dr. John Brown of Haddington. This famous Biblical commentator, who flourished from 1784 to 1858, was anything but rich in this world's goods; and so poor when staying at Dunse, that he went into a shop and asked to be accommodated with a halfpennyworth of cheese. The shopman, awfully disgusted with the meanness of the order, remarked haughtily, that"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "such small quantities; upon which the doctor asked,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then what's the least you can sell?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A penn'orth, was the reply. On the divine saying"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Very well, the man proceeded to weigh that quantity, and then placed it on the counter, anticipating to be paid for it."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Now, said Dr. Brown,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will show you how to sell a halfpennyworth of cheese;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "looked so unlike what one soliciting alms should, that the man of letters said to him,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "My good friend, strong and stout as you are, it is a great shame that you do not go to work; when he was met with the reply,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Ah, master, if you did but know how lazy I am! for which amazing audacity, he was rewarded by Marivaux, who said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, I see thou are an honest fellow. Here's a piece of money for you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What is God best pleased with? What is the Devil best pleased with? What is the World best pleased with? and what am I best pleased with?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "God is best pleased when men forsake their sin. The devil is best pleased when they persist therein. The world's best pleased when thou dost sell good wine, And thou'rt best pleased when I do pay for mine."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I might relate a thousand stories of my hair-breadth 'scapes and adventures, with a class of persons wholly unknown, happily, to a large portion of the population, and whose names inspire terror to those who do not know them;--officers of the Jewish persuasion, who are supposed to represent the majesty of the law in its most forbidding aspect, but to whom I have been indebted for so many acts of kindness, that I have frequently blessed my stars that they were interposed between me and the tomahawking Christians by whom they were employed, and from whom no mercy could have been extracted. I have had two of those functionaries in adjacent rooms, and _have borrowed the money from one to pay out the other_, with many such like incidents."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Bedford: where, as the wine began to take effect, his unclad condition began to be perceivable, and he was questioned as to"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": ""
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why, said Foote--the stockingless Foote--"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I never wear any at this time of the year, till I am going to dress for the evening, and you see --pulling his purchase out of his pocket, and silencing the laugh and suspicion of his friends--"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I am always provided with a pair for the occasion."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Seemingly much struck by the advice, he said he would come again, and on his second visit, retold his story, with the addition that nothing at the time of the interview had turned up; when he was met with the same counsel as before, and enjoined to"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Somewhat chapfallen at the failure of his visit, he went away, but after a few days again presented himself to the abbé, whom he thanked effusively for his good advice on the two previous occasions, and then begged the pleasure of his company to dinner at a well-known fashionable restaurant. The invitation was accepted, and the two sat down to a most sumptuous repast, the delicacy of the viands being only surpassed by the choiceness of the wine. When the meal was concluded the bill was handed to Talbot, who said that his purse was quite empty, and had been so for a long time, but that he thought he could not do better than follow his confessor's advice and"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "which request was granted. She then took a house in Nelson Square, and became a reigning queen of pleasure, her Thursday evening _réunions_ being deemed so delightful, that invitations for them were most eagerly sought for. Her admirers were legion (that is of the male sex), one at last being successful in obtaining her coveted hand, and the marriage took place in due course. When the happy pair returned to Nelson Square after the ceremony, the tipstaves, who had become acquainted with the affair, put in an appearance as the newly married couple were about to start on their honeymoon, informing the lady that they would arrest her, and take her to the Bench, if she attempted to leave"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Nothing disconcerted by this apparent stopper to her happiness, she calmly, but majestically exclaimed,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Indeed! You forget there is no such person as the lady named in your warrant. I am no longer Mrs. A., but Mrs. B. There is my husband, and he is responsible for my debts."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Then, sir, said the tipstaff,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I must arrest you."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I think it will be time enough to arrest my husband when you have served him with a writ. If you have one, produce it; if not, kindly stand aside, and allow us to enter the coach. The officers could but comply, for they saw they had been outwitted, and were compelled to stand meekly by, while the clever widow, observing"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Now, my love, let us be off,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "and says"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "From this and many similar allusions we glean that actors were not in the infancy of our English dramatic art the shabby impecunious class they afterwards became. They were on the whole well to do, and highly respectable men of college education, who were in most cases poets as well as players, patronised and encouraged by all classes, except those who were so bitterly jealous of their extraordinary influence--the clergy. A special Act of Parliament was passed in the reign of Queen Elizabeth for their encouragement and protection, and they had that which many of the well-born and wealthy envied them--the right of wearing the badges of royal and noble families, ensuring them respect, hospitality, and protection, wherever they went. The profession of the player was not then open to all comers, and those who dared to adopt it without licence from"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "were"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "prison and the whipping-post, or cart-tail, stocks, and the pillory, being but the milder forms of that treatment promised them in the often quoted, commonly misrepresented, Act of"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Trueman. 'Most of 'em, except Lown, Taylor, and Pollard, who were superannuated, went into the King's army, and, like good men and true, served their old master, though in a different, yet more honourable, capacity. Robinson was killed at the taking of a place (I think Basing House) by Harrison (he that was after hanged at Charing Cross), who refused him quarter, and shot him in the head after he had laid down his arms, abusing Scripture at the same time in saying, Cursed is he that doeth the work of the Lord negligently."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Red Bull,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Honest Joe, described as a person of"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "On one occasion, driven, we presume, by impecuniosity, Joe volunteered as a seaman, and served under the Duke of York. This was just before the memorable sea-fight between the duke and the Dutch admiral, Van Tromp, in which Joe took part, as he confessed, with great fear, which was not, you may be sure, decreased when one of the sailors, grimly preparing for the strife, said to him"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Now, master play-actor, you're a-going to take part in one of the deepest and bloodiest tragedies you ever heard of."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Lady Macbeth"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "By dint of piecing out the skirt of one dress it was made to answer for an under-skirt, and then another dress was taken in in every direction to do duty as an over-dress, and so make up the costume. And thus I essayed for the first time the part of Lady Macbeth."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "How the clerk should designate him?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Call me, replied the actor,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Charles Macklin, a vagabond by Act of Parliament"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Considering the strong vernacular accent with which Mr. Macklin (then MacLaughlin) spoke, the reader would be at a loss to account for the applause which he met with on his first appearance, if he was not told that Bristol has always been so much inhabited by the Irish that their tones in speaking have become familiar there."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "to use his fist, which he did with great skill and strength, when the vulgar rustic audiences were disturbed by the quarrelsome, or were rude and coarsely offensive to his professional sisters and brethren. Kirkman says,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "His circle of acting was more enlarged than Garrick's; for in one night he played Antonia, and Belvidera in 'Venice Preserved,' harlequin in the interlude, or entertainment, sang three comic songs between the acts, and between the play and the entertainment indulged the audience with an Irish jig"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "After supping with 'Lady Hawley,' Macklin made his bow and retired to the room where the luggage was stored. Here he undressed himself and adopted the following humorous expedient: He instantly arrayed himself in the dress of Emilia in the 'Moor of Venice' (a part he occasionally played), tied up a small bundle in a handkerchief and slipped out of the house unperceived. In about a quarter of an hour he returned, apparently much fatigued, and addressing the landlady in the most piteous terms, recounted a variety of misfortunes that had befallen 'her,' and concluded the speech with a heart-moving request that 'she' might have shelter for the night, as 'she' was a total stranger in that part of the country. The supposed young woman was informed by the unsuspecting landlady that all her beds were full, but that in pity for her distressed condition some contrivance would be made to let her have part of a bed. Charles now hugged himself at the success of his scheme, and, after he had partaken of some refreshment, was, to his great astonishment, conducted by the servant to the bedroom of the landlady herself, where he was left alone to undress. In this dilemma he scarcely knew how to act. To retreat he knew not how without risking discovery. However, into bed he went, convulsed with silent laughter. He had not been in bed many minutes before Mrs. 'Boniface,' who was upwards of sixty years, but completely the character in size and shape, made her appearance. Charles struggled hard with himself for some moments, but the comic scene had such an effect on him at last that he could contain himself no longer, and at the instant the old lady got into bed burst into a fit of laughter."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Hallo, guv'nor, said he;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Wat's yer been a doin' on? Run away from home?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I've got no home now."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Where do you come from?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Not very far."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Where are you going to?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Don't know."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Have you got any money?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "None."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Where's your father and mother?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Father's dead."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "And yer mother? Can't she keep yer? Ain't she got no home neither?"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "You've come from a long way off, young un--ain't yer?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yer seems awfully tired. Why I do b'lieve as yer a crying. Wot's the matter?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I've no home, and no relatives or friends to go to; and I don't know what to do."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "My lodgin's in Clerkenwell, not so very far from here; the bed 'ull 'old two. Come home and sleep with me; and we'll take in a couple of black puddin's, or a faggot, or something nice an' 'ot for supper. Come along."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If you like, said he,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I'll take you to the super-master; he lives close by in Hatton Garden, all amongst the Italians on the Hill."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What's your name, my man?"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I shall not forget it. It's the name of the first super I ever saw with brains."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He has an impediment in his speech,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "and costume, one being a comic nigger with songs. Miss Glover had taken the theatre under the pressure of impecuniosity, trusting to the chance of success for the payment of her company. At the end of the first week she paid half salaries, at the end of the second and third weeks no salaries, or, in the parlance of the initiated,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sir! said she,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I was never so insulted in all my life!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What's wrong, madam? Who has insulted you?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Who has insulted me, sir! Why you have!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I, madam! How?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Look at your gloves, sir!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, madam, they are clean, I washed them myself."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But, sir! Berlin gloves! It's monstrous! I was never so treated before in all my life! Paltry cotton. You ought to be ashamed of yourself--a leading character too. I never played with a gentleman before in your part who did not wear new white kids!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I laughed, said my friend."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It was rude, I know, but for the life of me I couldn't help it. Here was my employer living in comparative luxury at first-class lodgings in a fashionable town, abusing a poor devil whom she had cheated and half-starved, because, in a back-street garret with scarcely a penny in his pocket, he did not wear nightly, as he otherwise would have done, a new pair of white kid gloves!"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have heard Mr. Mathews say that he has gone to the theatre at night without having tasted anything since a meagre breakfast, determined to refuse to go on the stage unless some portion of his arrears was first paid. When, however, he entered the green-room his spirits were so cheered by the attention of his brethren, and the _éclat_ of his reception that his fainting resolution was restored, all his discontent utterly banished for the time, and he was again reconciled to starvation: nay, he even felt afraid of offending the unfeeling manager, and returned home silent upon the subject of his claims."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "One morning before the rehearsal commenced, I was crossing the stage, when my attention was attracted by the sounds of loud applause issuing from the direction of the green-room. I enquired the cause, and was told that it was only little Kean reciting 'Richard III.' My informant said that he was very clever. I went into the green-room and saw the little fellow facing an admiring group, and reciting lustily."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Selections from 'Hamlet,' 'Richard III.,' and 'Jane Shore,' with a series of acrobatic performances, and some exquisite singing, and all by Master Carey, of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "one evening before an audience at Sadler's Wells, a country manager, then present, was so much impressed by the declamation of the lad, that young Kean received an offer to play leading characters for twenty nights at the York Theatre. The offer was accepted, he was highly successful, and for many years from the time of that York engagement, the future tragedian of Drury Lane underwent the vicissitudes peculiar to the life of the old-fashioned stroller. It was not long ere he encountered the famous showman, Richardson, who speedily made terms with the precocious and versatile youth. It turned out that Anne Carey was in the company. She proposed that her son should join with her in her labours, and that she should receive his earnings. But they did not long labour together, and parted, not to meet again till Kean made his great success in 1814 at Drury Lane. While with a manager named Butler, at Northampton, Kean played walking gentlemen, Harlequin, and sang comic songs for a salary of fifteen shillings a week. While attached to Butler's company, he enacted the character of Octavian, in the 'Mountaineers' with such ability, that a gentleman connected with the Haymarket, who saw the performance, undertook to procure the young tragedian an engagement, provided that he could reach London to appear at a specified time. Kean, being without money, could only have travelled on foot, and the journey to London by such means would have taken up so much time, that he despairingly saw that the engagement must remain unfulfilled. Butler, with the greatest good nature, said"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Kean, overcome with emotion, exclaimed,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "If ever fortune smiles upon my efforts, I will not forget you."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and criticising his enaction in Otway's pathetic drama said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "He plays the part very, very well, but there is too little of him wherewith to make a great actor."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Rolla, before the Braintree audience. While performing he fainted, and an illness of fever and ague was the consequence of his swimming expedition. On recovering he tramped all the way to Swansea, and played in that town. He was then in his twentieth year. Proceeding to Gloucester, he became a member of Beverley's company, and was advertised to play Young Rapid. The usual means had been taken to attract an audience, but at the time for the rising of the curtain there were only two persons in the auditorium; so the eighteenpence taken at the doors were returned to the couple of playgoers, and the theatre lights extinguished. A few nights Kean performed with a lady who had left the scholastic profession for that of the stage, and this lady, Miss Chambers, afterwards became Mrs. Kean. When at Stroud, Master Betty was announced to perform Hamlet and Norval; Kean found himself cast for Laertes and Glenalvon. The actor could not brook what he deemed an indignity,--that of playing secondary characters to a mere boy; and for three days and three nights, he was away from the theatre, every individual connected with it being ignorant of his whereabouts. On reappearing he said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I have been in the fields, in the woods, I am starved; I have eaten nothing but turnips and cabbages since I've been out; but I'll go again, and as often as I see myself put in such characters. I won't play second to any man living, except to John Kemble."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I played the part finely, and yet they would not applaud me! The actor grew moody, splenetic, and gave way to insobriety. A son born to him at this period he named Howard; and it was soon after the birth of the child that the Keans left Swansea, with Cherry, for other towns in the principality, and subsequently they crossed over to Ireland. At Waterford, Kean played tragedy, and in addition for his benefit, gave an exhibition of pugilism, tight-rope dancing, singing, and wound up by playing the Chimpanzee in the piece called 'La Perouse.' It was at Waterford that Edmund Kean's second son, Charles, was born. Beaching Scotland, so exhausted were the funds of the actor, that at Dumfries he got up an entertainment at a tavern, and the only patron was a shoe-maker, who paid sixpence for admission. At Carlisle Kean appealed to the barristers on Assize, asking for their presence, when he would deliver a series of recitations, his reward to be at their discretion; but the appeal was made in vain. In the autumn of 1811, the family in the most miserable condition arrived in York, and from the ball-room, Minster Yard, Kean issued a circular announcing,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "an entertainment comprising recitals, dramatic selections, imitations of actors, and singing by himself, assisted by his wife; but the scheme ended with anything but a prosperous result. Under their struggles, husband and wife broke into a wail of grief, as they contemplated their innocent and unfortunate babes. The mother on her knees, supplicated for spiritual influence to annihilate their sufferings by death, but the fiery-willed player still kept courage,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will go on, I will hope against hope!! They got to London, where, at Sadler's Wells, Kean had a short engagement at two pounds a week, and then he had engagements at Weymouth and Exeter; in which latter place he played for a salary of one pound a week. Through the influence of an old friend, Dr. Drury, Kean at length obtained an engagement at Drury Lane. But ere his triumph on the London boards was effected, the child, Howard, died, an event to which the actor never alluded without feelings of grief. While Kean was concluding his Exeter performances, his wife and child were desolate in the garret of a house in Cecil Street, Strand; and they would have starved, but that the liberality of Dr. Drury succoured them. Even on the eve of his Drury Lane success, Kean underwent many trials and sufferings. Save Dr. Drury he was without a friend. On his _début_, that memorable evening at Drury Lane, 26th January, 1814, the directors of the establishment denied him everything calculated to awaken hope and courage. Kean went to the dressing-room, and from the dressing-room to the stage, conscious that he had been treated with superciliousness, apathy, and injustice. Under such treatment, and with all his previous trials, it was only a perfect knowledge of his own transcendent powers, that carried him through the ordeal. The effect of his triumph in Shylock, may best be described in the words of his late biographer."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "In an almost phrenzied ecstasy he rushed through the wet to his humble lodging, sprang up the stairs, and threw open the door. His wife ran to meet him; no words were required, his radiant countenance told all--and they mingled together the first tears of true happiness they had as yet experienced. He told her of his proud achievement, and in a burst of exultation exclaimed, 'Mary, you shall ride in your carriage, and, Charley my boy,' taking the child from the cradle and kissing him, 'you shall go to Eton, and'--a sad reminiscence crossed his mind, his joy was overshadowed, and he murmured in broken accents, 'Oh that Howard had lived to see it! But he is better where he is.' Pity that so fine a nature as Edmund Kean's, with his genius, and generous sympathies, should have struck on the rock of self-indulgence. But in any estimate of his moral shortcomings, the evil influence around his early life, and the effect of his early privation, should be steadfastly, and charitably, borne in mind. When we remember the conditions under which the actor pursues his calling, it is scarcely surprising that the term"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "should have become proverbial. The victims of a social ban, originating in the bigotry of church and conventicle; following a profession, perhaps of all professions the most scouted by smooth, smug respectability, and certainly of all professions the most liable to fluctuations of success from the caprices, whims and"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The first venture was profitable, and the showman went on making money, and saved it. He then set up a show theatre, succeeded so well that year after year he had to enlarge it, and at last it became the largest in the kingdom. Richardson likewise established a character for honesty, and all that is summed up in the words"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What's up now, boys?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Money, money. It's a swindle!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Hark at 'em now. Murder and Moses! there's broths of boys for yer. Money's just what I want myself. Think of your Cathedral ground; who lies in it? My sainted wife, Norah; poor soul! she loved Exeter so that she would come here to be buried among ye. We all love ye! myself and little Pat. Aisy now, I'll give you a thrate. To-morrow night's my benefit, make me a thumping house; Norah won't forget you in heaven. Behave like gentlemen, come early to-morrow night. Good luck to ye!"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Arrested on a Saturday night, they had to remain in the"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "throughout Sunday. On Monday morning they were taken up before the magistrates, and arraigned upon a somewhat extraordinary charge. An inhabitant of Whitehaven, a person to whom credit was given by his acquaintances for sanity and truthfulness, appeared in open court to denounce the strollers, not only as a curse to society generally, but to his town in particular. It was declared by this individual that"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "In spite of reference to sundry tomes of jurisprudence, and notwithstanding consultation with the town-clerk, the magistrates could not pronounce a verdict. However they prohibited the reopening of the theatre, and the sons of the"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What, sir! Bring your beggarly actors into this town to demoralize the people? No, sir. I'll have no such profligacy in Romford; poor people shall not be wheedled out of their money by your tomfooleries. The first player that comes here I'll clap in the stocks as a rogue and a vagabond. Good morning, sir."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "White Hart"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Kind-hearted considerate Ben, writes his remembrancer,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Red Cow, where they announced"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A London company for two nights, with 'Pizarro,' as played at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane; elaborate scenery and heart-rending effects. Pit, one shilling; boxes, two; and standing room, sixpence. Seats booked at the 'Red Cow' daily from 10 till 4. Schools and children half-price."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Lydia Languish by a young lady, her first appearance."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Thomas Coutts, Esq., to Miss Harriet Mellon, of Holly Lodge, Highgate."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "ranted and strutted, and in the tent scene, after,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Richard's himself again, on the entrance of Catesby, the tailor in answer to Richard's"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Who's there? halted, and stuttered"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The audience roared; but after silence came, the tailor merely repeated the words just as before; upon which Cooke unable to keep his gravity or restrain his temper, roared out,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Then why the devil don't you crow?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "If you don't give me your honour, sir, that you'll pay me the arrears this night before I go home, I'll let you drop about the boards. Mossop alarmed said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Don't talk to me now."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I will, said Kent,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I will; adding,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Down you go."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Spranger Barry."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The first character I saw Barry in was Jaffier, Mossop Pierre, and Mrs. Dancer the Belvidera. According to the usual compliment of assisting a dead tragic hero to get upon his legs, after the dropping of the curtain, two very curt persons walked on the stage to where Barry (the Jaffier) lay dead, and, stooping over him with great politeness and attention, helped him to rise. All three thus standing one of them said: 'I have an action, sir, against you,' and touched him on the shoulder. 'Indeed' replied Barry. 'This is rather a piece of treachery; at whose suit?' The plaintiff was named and Barry had no alternative but to walk off the stage, and was going out of the theatre in their custody. At that moment some scene-shifters and carpenters who had been observing the proceedings, and knew the situation of Barry, went off and returned almost immediately, dragging with them a huge piece of wood, in the rear of which was a bold and ferocious looking property-man who grasped a hatchet. Barry said, 'What are you about?' 'Sir,' said one, 'we are only preparing the altar of Merope, for we are going to make a sacrifice.' The speaker having concluded, grasped his hatchet and sternly eyed the bailiffs. 'Be quiet, you foolish fellows,' remonstrated the tragedian, who began to think the business serious. The minions of the law also grew apprehensive as the sacrificators looked on with fixed and stony eyes. Barry noticing the bailiffs beckon, went to them, and drawing him aside they said they would quit him if he would give his word of honour that the debt should be settled next day."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Bob, on one occasion said Macklin,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I intend to have you arrested for the debt you owe me, but I am considering whether I shall arrest you before or after your benefit."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh, said Mahon,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": ""
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Yes, yes, Bob, you know I must; to prison you will have to go."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "There's no occasion."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Oh yes, there is."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well then, sir, if you must, wait till my benefit is over."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "No! Bob, then you take the money and knock it about no one knows how nor where, and I shall never get a shilling of it; but if I arrest you before your benefit, some of those lords that you sing for in clubs and taverns and jovial bouts may come forward and pay this money for you. No, no, I'll have you touched on the shoulder before your benefit."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Full,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Can I get in for 'little business,' and utility?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Full."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Is there any chance for harlequin, and dancing?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I don't do pantomime or ballets; besides, I don't like male dancers; their legs are no draw."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Could you give me a berth in the orchestra?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, said Beverley, in his peculiar manner, and with a strong word, which need not be repeated,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why, just now you were a walking gentleman!"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "So I am, sir; but I have had a musical education, and necessity sometimes compels me to turn it to account."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well! what's your instrument?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Violin, tenor, violoncello, double bass, and double drum."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Well! by Nero! (he played the fiddle you know) here, Harry (calling his son), bring the double--no, I mean a violin out of the orchestra."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That had a storm of gold fallen on him it could not have delighted Semele more than it did himself. He felt himself plucked out of the slough of despond. Webster had others to support, had to board himself, and in addition he resolved to get out of debt. To successfully carry out such arrangements the young professional had to practise considerable self-denial, walking to Croydon, ten miles every day, for rehearsal, and back to Shoreditch, on twopence--one penny for oatmeal, and the other for milk; and he did it for six weeks, Sundays excepted, when he luxuriated on shin of beef and cheek. While Webster was at Croydon, the gallery used to pelt the gentlemen of the orchestra with mutton pies. Indignation at first was uppermost, but on reflection, the assailed musicians made a virtue of necessity, collecting the fragments of not over-light pastry, ate them under the stage, and whatever might have been their composition, considered them as"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Monday: 'Widow of Palermo'--Jeremy (with a handful of snuff and a glass of water thrown in his face), 10-1/2_d._; 'Is he Jealous?'--Belmour, 9-1/2_d._; 'Young Widow'--Splash, 1_s._ 1-1/2_d._ Tuesday: 'Englishman in France; or, Why Didn't I Kill Myself Yesterday?'--James, 9-1/2_d._; 'Mrs. White'--Peter White (with a medley duet, and mock gavotte, that caused a stiffness in the joints for three days), 1_s._ 1-1/2_d._; 'Secret' (without a panel in the scene)--Thomas, 10-1/2_d._ Wednesday: 'Carlitz and Christine'--Carlitz, very cheap, 7-1/2_d._; 'Two Gregories'--Gregory, without goose or ship, 10_d._; song, 'What's a Woman like?' 1-3/4_d._; 'Fortune's Frolic'--Robin, the talk of the town, 1_s._ 2-1/4_d._ Thursday: fully prepared with tools and syllables for three pieces, but the theatre was closed, 2_s._ 9-1/2_d._ Friday: 'Review'--Caleb Quotem, with two songs, 10-3/4_d._; 'Our Mary Ann'--Jonathan Junks, 9-1/2_d._; 'Loan Me a Crown'--Lightfoot, fifteen lengths, 7-1/4_d._; 'Captain's not Amiss'--John Stock, with clean shirt, the part requiring the actor to take off coat and waistcoat, 6_d._; walking over to next town on managerial business, 1/2_d._ Total, 14_s._"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "and then, affirms the disappointed comedian,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "During the absence of Mr. and Mrs. Mathews for their American engagement the Olympic was kept open under the direction of a manager appointed by them, and on their return they found the finances in a very crippled state; a large amount of debt having been incurred, despite the large sums of money Mathews had transmitted across the Atlantic. In the hope of extricating himself from his great liabilities he took Covent Garden, never calculating the dangers of the perilous and uncertain sea on which he was about floating the bark of his fortunes."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Money, he says,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Why pay Jenkins? Why not pay me? You've used me shamefully, and you must take the consequences."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Ah, Mr. Mathews! how d'ye do? Glad to see you. Have a glass of sherry."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "No, thank you. I want a couple of hundred pounds to-morrow."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Certainly, with pleasure. How long do you want it for? Have a glass of sherry?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Say three months."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "What security?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "None."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Very good--I must have a warrant of attorney."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Of course."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "All right, Mr. Mathews; look in at twelve o'clock to-morrow, and I'll have it ready. Do have a glass of sherry!"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Well, Mr. Mathews, I find I can't manage the £200. I can only let you have £150. I had no idea I was so short at my bankers. Amount actually overdrawn. But I've got a friend to do it for you; it's all the same. He'll be here directly. Bless me, how long he is. Have a glass of sherry? Are you going back to the theatre? I'll bring him with me in half-an-hour."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Didn't come till too late; but all right--you don't want it till to-morrow, you know. What's your treasury hour?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Two."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Be here at twelve and it shall be ready."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "All right. Have a glass of sherry? My nephew Dick has gone to the city for the cheque."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But the time is getting on."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Never mind. I'll be with you as the clock strikes two."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Such a job Dick's had for you, Mr. Matthews! But here I am with the money. My friend disappointed me, but I managed without him. My nephew will read over the warrant of attorney."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "But I'm just going on the stage; there's no time now."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Won't take five minutes. Dick, read the warrant. Now, here is the money. Let's see, £15 left off the old account."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Oh, pray don't deduct that now."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Better, Mr. Mathews, keeps all square. That's £15, then the interest three months, £17 10_s._, and £15, £32 10_s._ Warrant of Attorney £7 10_s._, that's £40. Then my nephew's fee, £1 1_s._, and my trouble, say £1, £42 10_s._ Here's 15_s._, that's £42 16_s._ Dick, have you got 4_s._?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I've got 3_s._ 6_d._"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That will do; I've got 6_d._, that's £43; and £7 cash makes the £50."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Yes; but I only get £7 odd."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Never mind, keeps all square. Now the £100. Here is a cheque of Gribble and Co. on Lloyd's for £25 10_s._"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "What's the use of a cheque at this time of night?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Good as the bank, good as the money; you can pay it as money. Fifty sovereigns makes £75 10_s._, and a ten-pound note makes £85 10_s._--stay, it ought to be £95 10_s._ Here's another ten pound note. I forgot--there you are, £95 10_s._--only wants £4 10_s._ to make up the £100. You haven't got £4 10_s._ about you, have you Mr. Mathews, you could lend me till the morning, just to get it straight, you know."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I believe I have; there are four sovereigns and ten shillings in silver."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "That's all right; £4 makes £99 10_s._ and 10_s._--stop, let's count them--count after your own father, as the saying is--four and five's nine, and three fourpenny pieces; all right. Stop--one's a threepenny. Got a penny, or a post-office stamp? Never mind, I won't be hard upon you for the penny. There you are, all comfortable. Good evening."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Not paid! Gribble's cheque not paid--some mistake--it's as good as the Bank. Here, give it to me, I'll get it for you in five minutes. How long shall you be here?"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "An hour."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I'll be back in twenty minutes."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I'm sorry to trouble you, he quietly said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Quite impossible, said Mathews,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Excuse me, said the sheriff's officer,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "It can't be done,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Why didn't you get him to renew the bill?"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He wouldn't renew it; nothing would induce him."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Nonsense, said he,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Agreed,"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Stop, said Mathews,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "It means that I paid your debt as I knew you couldn't, and now you owe it me instead. Be punctual, and I'll do as much again."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "In a word, said Mathews,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I really could not afford the price of cabs."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I should have thought that cabs were more economical than a private carriage,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Not at all, said Mathews."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Cabs take ready money, a precious article, to be carefully treasured and only parted with under absolute necessity, but a brougham can always be hired on credit."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "We shall not look upon his like again;"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Precisely in the degree in which any painter possesses original genius, is at present the increase of moral certainty that during his early years he will have a hard battle to fight: and that just at the time when his conceptions ought to be full and happy, his temper gentle, and his hopes enthusiastic--just at that most critical period, his heart is full of anxieties and household cares: he is chilled by disappointments, and vexed by injustice, he becomes obstinate in his errors, no less than in his virtues, and the arrows of his aim are blunted, as the reeds of his trust are broken.... You may be fed with the fruit and fulness of his old age, but you were as the nipping blight in his blossoming, and your praise is only as the warm winds of autumn to the dying branches.... You feed him in his tender youth with ashes and dishonour: and then you come to him, obsequious but too late, with your sharp laurel crown, the dew all dried from off its leaves: and you thrust it into his languid hand, and he looks at you wistfully. What shall he do with it? What can he do, but go and lay it on his mother's grave."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "You cannot consider, for you cannot conceive, the sickness of heart with which a young painter of deep feeling toils through his first obscurity--his sense of the strong voice within him which you will not hear, his vain, fond, wondering witness to the things you will not see--his far-away perception of things that he could accomplish if he had but peace and time, all unapproachable and vanishing from him, because no one will leave him peace or grant him time: all his friends falling back from him: those whom he would most reverently obey rebuking and paralyzing him: and last and worst of all, those who believe in him most faithfully, suffering by him the most bitterly. The wife's eyes, in their sweet ambition, shining brighter as the cheek wastes away: and the little lips at his side parched and pale, which one day, he knows, although he may never see it, will quiver so proudly when they name his name, calling him 'Our father.'"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The genius of painting, sculpture, and architecture relieving the distressed;"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Behold, reader, the united claims of virtue, old age, and professional merit, and filial and parental suffering. It also expressed a not unreasonable hope that"
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "and afterwards devoted himself to engraving on copper coats of arms and ornamental headings for shop bills, creeping upwards from such"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "to more ambitious efforts, until at last he made a hit by illustrating 'Hudibras,' the commission for which, it is said, he owed to that successful caricature of his landlady to which I have previously referred. There were then in all London but two print-shops, and they dealt principally in foreign productions; so that it can be easily understood how, to eke out the shortcomings of his graver, Hogarth taught himself painting. Speaking long afterwards of this portion of his career, he said,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "I could do little more than maintain myself till I was near thirty; and added,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "I remember the time when I have gone moping into the city with scarce a shilling, but as soon as I had obtained ten guineas there for a plate, I have returned home, put on my sword, and sallied forth again, with all the confidence of a man who had thousands in his pocket."
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The Harlot's Progress and"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "The Rake's Progress selling at from fourteen to twenty-two guineas each picture, and"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "The Strolling Players bought by Francis Beckford, Esq., for £27 6_s._: but as he afterwards complained of that price as much too high, Hogarth took it back, and resold it for the same amount."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "Marriage à la Mode, after the artist had published engravings from the set of six paintings so called, realised £19 6_s._ In 1797 they were sold for £1381, and now form part of our national collection through the bequest of Mr. Angerstein. Another of his famous works,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "March of the Guards to Finchley, was more satisfactorily disposed of by lottery, and it was this fact that Hogarth referred to when he said,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "A lottery is the only chance a living painter has of being paid for his time."
}
]
|
38439 | Unknown Title | Unknown Author | [
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Its first and great fault is its being too new, and having too great a resemblance to the objects it represents; if this appears a paradox, you ought to take particular care in confessing it. This picture has too much of the lustre, of that despicable freshness which we discover in nature, and which is never seen in the cabinets of the curious. Time has not obscured it with that venerable smoke, that sacred cloud which will one day conceal it from the profane eye of the vulgar, so that its beauties may only be seen by those who are initiated into the mysteries of art: these are almost its only faults."
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "at the Bedford Arms, near Covent Garden, attacked him with the bitterest scorn and hatred. Hogarth was then growing old and feeble, his health was bad, and he was melancholy and depressed by the fact that Sir Robert Grosvenor, having commissioned him to paint a picture ("
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "Sigismunda ), had refused to pay for it when finished. At this juncture the mistress of Churchill told the poet that he had given Hogarth his death-blow; whereupon he unfeelingly remarked,"
},
{
"from": "gpt",
"value": "How sweet is flattery from the woman we love, adding,"
},
{
"from": "human",
"value": "He has broken into the pale of my private life, and has set the example of illiberality, _which I wanted_, and as he is dying from the effects of my former chastisement I will hasten his death by writing his elegy."
}
]
|
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