An Account of the Conference between Mrs. Bull and Don Diego.** A Tory nobleman who, by his influence upon the House of Commons, endeavoured to stop the Treaty.
The lawyers, as their last effort to put off the composition, sent Don Diego to John. Don Diego was a very worthy gentleman, a friend to John, his mother, and present wife, and, therefore, supposed to have some influence over her. He had been ill used himself by John's lawyers, but because of some animosity to Sir Roger was against the composition. The conference between him and Mrs. Bull was word for word as follows:--DON DIEGO.--Is it possible, cousin Bull, that you can forget the honourable maxims of the family you are come of, and break your word with three of the honestest, best-meaning persons in the world--Esquires South, Frog, and Hocus--that have sacrificed their interests to yours? It is base to take advantage of their simplicity and credulity, and leave them in the lurch at last.
MRS. BULL--I am sure they have left my family in a bad condition, we have hardly money to go to market; and nobody will take our words for sixpence. A very fine spark this Esquire South! My husband took him in, a dirty boy. It was the business of half the servants to attend him.* The rogue did bawl and make such a noise: sometimes he fell in the fire and burnt his face, sometimes broke his shins clambering over the benches, and always came in so dirty, as if he had been dragged through the kennel at a boarding-school.
He lost his money at chuck-farthing, shuffle-cap, and all-fours;sold his books, pawned his linen, which we were always forced to redeem. Then the whole generation of him are so in love with bagpipes and puppet-shows! I wish you knew what my husband has paid at the pastry-cook's and confectioner's for Naples biscuits, tarts, custards, and sweetmeats. All this while my husband considered him as a gentleman of a good family that had fallen into decay, gave him good education, and has settled him in a good creditable way of living--having procured him, by his interest, one of the best places of the country. And what return, think you, does this fine gentleman make us? he will hardly give me or my husband a good word, or a civil expression. Instead of Sir and Madam (which, though Isay it, is our due), he calls us "goody " and "gaffer" such-a-one;says he did us a great deal of honour to board with us; huffs and dings at such a rate, because we will not spend the little we have left to get him the title and estate of Lord Strutt; and then forsooth, we shall have the honour to be his woollen-drapers.**Besides, Esquire South will be Esquire South still; fickle, proud, and ungrateful. If he behaves himself so when he depends on us for his daily bread, can any man say what he will do when he is got above the world?
* Something relating to the manners of a great prince, superstition, love of operas, shows, etc.
** Something relating to forms and titles.
D. DIEGO.--And would you lose the honour of so noble and generous an undertaking? Would you rather accept this scandalous composition, and trust that old rogue, Lewis Baboon?
MRS. BULL.--Look you, Friend Diego, if we law it on till Lewis turns honest, I am afraid our credit will run low at Blackwell Hall. Iwish every man had his own; but I still say, that Lord Strutt's money shines as bright and chinks as well as Esquire South's. Idon't know any other hold that we tradesmen have of these great folks but their interest: buy dear and sell cheap, and I warrant ye you will keep your customer. The worst is, that Lord Strutt's servants have got such a haunt about that old rogue's shop, that it will cost us many a firkin of strong beer to bring them back again;and the longer they are in a bad road, the harder it will be to get them out of it.
D. DIEGO.--But poor Frog, what has he done! On my conscience, if there be an honest, sincere man in the world, it is that Frog.
MRS. BULL.--I think I need not tell you how much Frog has been obliged to our family from his childhood; he carries his head high now, but he had never been the man he is without our help.* Ever since the commencement of this lawsuit, it has been the business of Hocus, in sharing out expenses, to plead for Frog. "Poor Frog,"says he, "is in hard circumstances, he has a numerous family, and lives from hand to mouth; his children don't eat a bit of good victuals from one year's end to the other, but live upon salt herring, sour curd, and borecole. He does his utmost, poor fellow, to keep things even in the world, and has exerted himself beyond his ability in this lawsuit; but he really has not wherewithal to go on.
What signifies this hundred pounds? place it upon your side of the account; it is a great deal to poor Frog, and a trifle to you."This has been Hocus's constant language, and I am sure he has had obligations enough to us to have acted another part.
* Complaints of the House of Commons of the unequal burden of the war.
D. DIEGO.--No doubt Hocus meant all this for the best, but he is a tender-hearted, charitable man; Frog is indeed in hard circumstances.
MRS. BULL--Hard circumstances! I swear this is provoking to the last degree. All the time of the lawsuit, as fast as I have mortgaged, Frog has purchased: from a plain tradesman, with a shop, warehouse, and a country hut with a dirty fish-pond at the end of it, he is now grown a very rich country gentleman, with a noble landed estate, noble palaces, manors, parks, gardens, and farms, finer than any we were ever master of.* Is it not strange, when my husband disbursed great sums every term, Frog should be purchasing some new farm or manor? so that if this lawsuit lasts, he will be far the richest man in his country. What is worse than all this, he steals away my customers every day; twelve of the richest and the best have left my shop by his persuasion, and whom, to my certain knowledge, he has under bonds never to return again: judge you if this be neighbourly dealing.
* The Dutch acquisitions in Flanders.
