Adventures Of The Ambassador, Mr. Macshane
If we had not been obliged to follow history in all respects, it is probable that we should
have left out the last adventure of Mrs. Catherine and her husband, at the inn at
Worcester, altogether; for, in truth, very little came of it, and it is not very romantic or
striking. But we are bound to stick closely, above all, by THE TRUTH--the truth, though
it be not particularly pleasant to read of or to tell. As anybody may read in the "Newgate
Calendar," Mr. and Mrs. Hayes were taken at an inn at Worcester; were confined there;
were swindled by persons who pretended to impress the bridegroom for military service.
What is one to do after that? Had we been writing novels instead of authentic histories,
we might have carried them anywhere else we chose: and we had a great mind to make
Hayes philosophising with Bolingbroke, like a certain Devereux; and Mrs. Catherine
maitresse en titre to Mr. Alexander Pope, Doctor Sacheverel, Sir John Reade the
oculist, Dean Swift, or Marshal Tallard; as the very commonest romancer would under
such circumstances. But alas and alas! truth must be spoken, whatever else is in the
wind; and the excellent "Newgate Calendar," which contains the biographies and
thanatographies of Hayes and his wife, does not say a word of their connections with
any of the leading literary or military heroes of the time of Her Majesty Queen Anne. The
"Calendar" says, in so many words, that Hayes was obliged to send to his father in
Warwickshire for money to get him out of the scrape, and that the old gentleman came
down to his aid. By this truth must we stick; and not for the sake of the most brilliant
episode,--no, not for a bribe of twenty extra guineas per sheet, would we depart from it.
Mr. Brock's account of his adventure in London has given the reader some short notice
of his friend, Mr Macshane. Neither the wits nor the principles of that worthy Ensign
were particularly firm: for drink, poverty, and a crack on the skull at the battle of
Steenkirk had served to injure the former; and the Ensign was not in his best days
possessed of any share of the latter. He had really, at one period, held such a rank in
the army, but pawned his half-pay for drink and play; and for many years past had lived,
one of the hundred thousand miracles of our city, upon nothing that anybody knew of, or
of which he himself could give any account. Who has not a catalogue of these men in
his list? who can tell whence comes the occasional clean shirt, who supplies the
continual means of drunkenness, who wards off the daily-impending starvation? Their
life is a wonder from day to day: their breakfast a wonder; their dinner a miracle; their
bed an interposition of Providence. If you and I, my dear sir, want a shilling tomorrow,
who will give it us? Will OUR butchers give us mutton-chops? will OUR laundresses
clothe us in clean linen?--not a bone or a rag. Standing as we do (may it be ever so)
somewhat removed from want,* is there one of us who does not shudder at the thought
of descending into the lists to combat with it, and expect anything but to be utterly
crushed in the encounter?
* The author, it must be remembered, has his lodgings and food provided for him by the
government of his country.
