twenty yards of satin, he declined a sale until there should be forthcoming better assurance than Bardolph; and when in plain terms he declared pointblank that he would not take Sir John's bond on the assurance of another by Bardolph; for he liked not the security. Sir Moth Interest, in Ben Jonson's comedy, being arrested by a serjeant at the suit of Master Compass, and receiving for answer to all his appeals, that he must to prison unless he can find bail his creditor likes,-protests that he would fain find it, would they show him where. Captain Ironsides thereupon interposes a friendly intervention : Faith, I will bail him at my own apperil. Varlet, begone; I'll once have the reputation To be security for such a sum the sum in question being stated by the officer as five hundred thousand pounds. Ironsides' offer draws this comment from one of the bystanders, Doctor Rut: He is not worth the buckles About his belt, and yet this Ironsides clashes. In another of Rare Ben's later and least successful comedies, there is a citable passage of colloquy between old Pennyboy, the usurer, on the one part, and on the other, Fitton, Almanack, Shunfield, and Madrigal, rogues all. Are they come to jeer him ? for "jeerers" they are, as specially designated in Jonson's list of characters. No, says Almanack, not to jeer him, but to give him some good security. Pen. What is't? Fit. Ourselves. Alm. We'll be bound for another. Fit. This noble doctor here [meaning Almanack]. Fit. This man of war, he was our muster-master. (At this stage of the negociation old Pennyboy holds up his nose-in a manner that betokens he liked not the security.) Shun. You snuff the air now; has the scent displeased you? Alm. And season'd too, since he took salt at sea. Shun. Would I had one good fresh man in for all ;} For truth is, you three stink. You are a rogue. Pen. I think I am; but I will lend no money On that security, captain. Pierre, in Otway's tragedy, likes not the security of Jaffier's oath, after so recently finding Jaffier a perjured accomplice: Jaff. By all that's just Swear by some other power, For thou hast broke that sacred oath too lately. (And Jaffier, taking him at his word, does swear by some other power, quite another, the very opposite power to all that's just.) As sure's deeth is a Scottish adage in high repute with the homely; and 18 VOL. I. thereby hangs a tale. The Earl of Eglintoun one day found a boy climbing up a tree on his estate, and called to him to come down. To this the boy demurred, urging, as his motive plea, that the Earl would thrash him as soon as he landed. His lordship pledged his honour that he would do nothing of the kind: Says the sweet little cherub that sits up aloft, "I dinna ken onything aboot your honour, but if ye say As sure's deeth, I'll come doun." A tradition current at Slateford, near Edinburgh, relates, that on Prince Charlie's men bivouacking for the night there, in a field of peas nearly ripe, the owner of the ground applied for some indemnification for the loss of his crop, and was asked if he would take the Prince Regent's bill for the sum, to be paid when the troubles of the country should be concluded, and the king should enjoy his own again. "The man hesitated at the name of the Prince Regent, and said he would prefer a bill from some person whom he knew. Charles smiled at his caution, and asked if he would take the name of the Duke of Perth, who was his countryman." And to that security the rustic would not say nay. Among the anecdotes relating to Rob Roy, collected by Sir Walter Scott in the diffuse introduction to his novel bearing that name, is one about two Lowlanders, father and son, whose cattle had been swept away by Highland thieves, and whom Rob (for a consideration) put in the way of recovering their property. Hardly, however, in so safe and sure a manner as the Lowlanders could have wished; for while Rob with his party of seven or eight armed men lay couched in the heather where it was thickest, he bade the two applicants go seek their cattle amid a herd of others in a glen not far off, and to tell any one who might turn up there and threaten them, that he was close at hand, with twenty men to back him. "But what if they abuse us, or kill us?" said the elder Lowlander, by no means delighted at finding the embassy imposed upon him and his son. "If they do you any wrong," said Rob, "I will never forgive them so long as I live." The security was but little to the other's mind; but he must put up with that, or do without. Even Master Dumbleton, had he already parted with the satin, would not perhaps have given a flat No to Bardolph's bond. When Mascarille, passing himself off as a Marquis, introduces his fellow-lackey Jodelet as a Viscount, to that pretty and credulous pair of précieuses, Mesdemoiselles Cathos and Madelon, he assures them of the Viscount's being worthy of that honour, upon his own. "Mesdames, agréez que je vous présente ce gentilhomme-ci: sur ma parole, il est digne d'être connu de vous." The fair cousins. were too far gone in their craze to like not the security. On the other hand, when a real Marquis in another play of Molière's—real enough in title, but a sorry coxcomb for all that offers a like guarantee on a disputed question of literary taste, Dorante is entirely of Master Dumbleton's mind, and thinks the security questionable :— Le Marquis. Quoi! chevalier, est-ce que tu prétends soutenir ce pièce ? Dorante. Oui, je prétends le soutenir. Le Marquis. Parbleu! je la garantis détestable. by which façon de parler, borrowed from juris- Mais enfin je sais bien que je n'ai jamais rien vu de si méchant et Dorilas, contre qui j'étais, a été de mon avis. Dorante. L'autorité est belle, et te voilâ bien appuyé. Dorante is another Dumbleton in his panoply of impenetrable distrust. Not impertinent as an illustration of the subject is a certain pensée or maxime of Chamfort's :"Ceux qui ne donnent que leur parole pour garant d'une assertion qui reçoit sa force de ses preuves, ressemblent à cet homme qui disait : J'ai l'honneur de vous assurer que la terre tourne autour du soleil." Hazlitt, in his celebrated essay on a prize-fight, has an amusing story of his hearing "Mr. James Simpkins, hosier in the Strand, one day when the character of the Hole in the Wall was brought in question, observe: The house is a very good house, and the company quite genteel: I have been there myself." " Fastidious indeed must Mr. Simkins have thought the critic who liked not that security. |