Home > Authors Index > William L. Stone > Ups and Downs in the Life of a Distressed Gentleman > This page
Ups and Downs in the Life of a Distressed Gentleman, a novel by William L. Stone |
||
Chapter 14. Things Prove Worse Than Was Expected |
||
| < Previous |
Table of content |
Next > |
|
________________________________________________
_ CHAPTER XIV. THINGS PROVE WORSE THAN WAS EXPECTED "And euery ioye hym is delaied, "Ah, little think the gay, licentious proud, Never in my life, in any place, or under any circumstances, had I before entered a human abode of such perfect and entire destitution as that of poor Wheelwright! It was a wretched apology for a house, at best, containing two stories, of two rooms upon a floor each. The upper apartments were occupied by several poor Irish families. The front room below had been Wheelwright's workshop, and the family lived in the room back of it. Both looked as though they had been swept and garnished by the hand of Famine herself. Not a single article of furniture, of any description, was left! Crouched over two short brands,--the remains of a couple of sticks of wood which a poor neighbor had given them the day before,--were Wheelwright and his wife, shivering with cold. In one corner of the room lay two or three bushels of chopped straw, in which they slept. Not a bed, nor a blanket, nor a chair, nor any article or utensil of furniture whatsoever, had been left; all, all, was in the hands of the remorseless pawn-brokers, as the sufferers showed me by their certificates--pawned, too, for such pitiful sums as at once attested the oppressive and disgraceful system of avarice upon which those establishments are conducted. The storm yet howled fearfully without, and the hard particles of indurated snow were sifting through the interstices of the crazy building. The eye of man has seldom rested upon such a scene of stern and unmitigated poverty. Shylock or Sir Giles Overreach--aye!--any body but a pawn-broker--would have melted into tears at the spectacle. The children, almost naked, had just been taken to the fire-side of a poor Irish neighbor, to keep their benumbed bodies from freezing to the heart. I was appalled for the moment, as I gazed about upon this unexampled picture of destitution. Before me, seated on his haunches upon the hearth, was poor Wheelwright, resting his chin upon his hand,--and "the woman"--unfortunately his wife--by his side. He was moody--broken--crushed! "Well!" he exclaimed, as I approached the forlorn couple--"you see what I have come to!" I saw the state of the case--the cause, and the effect--at a glance--"THAT WOMAN!"--as he had denominated her with such emphasis in the morning. In good sooth, I liked her not. She looked hale and hearty, notwithstanding their destitution--was ragged, and none of the neatest in her person. I entered into conversation with her, and soon discovered that she had both a sharp, and, if necessary, an artful tongue of her own. I remarked that she appeared to be in good health, and might, I should have supposed, do something with her needle toward the supply of their pressing necessities. But her excuses were many, and were uttered with genuine Irish eloquence and volubility. The principal of these, however, were, that, what with taking care of her poor dear husband's wounded hand, and looking after the childer, she had not time, and could get nothing to do besides. "Indeed, your honor," said she, "and sure we had everything that was dacent about us, and were quite happy and comfortable, considering, until my poor dear husband--God bless him, your worship!--kilt his hand, and I don't know where is like to be the end of it." "But," I remarked, "surely, Mrs. Wheelwright, you could have found time to do a little something--if no more than to buy a loaf of bread and a few coals now and then, to mitigate your sufferings." "Fait, your honor"--for if the woman had ever lost any portion of the peculiar patois of her own country, while living in Paris as a femme de chambre, or with Capt. Scarlett as a mistress, it had all returned with her more recent associations, and she was now a pure Emerald--"fait, your honor," said she, "and how could I be afther laving the poor body in his distress to go out afther work, when I love him above the world and all that's in it? And then, your worship, I'd no clothes that was dacent to go out in, and to go to jontlemen's houses with such tatters as these, Mr. Wheelwright, says I, it would not do by any manner of means, says I. And that's the rights of it from end to end, if your worship will ounly hear to me." Wheelwright himself was evidently bowed down by the severity of his wants and the depth of his degradation. If moral energy had ever been one of his characteristics, it was quite clear that its fire had long since been extinguished; and more than all, it was equally evident that he was the object of domestic tyranny. But he uttered no complaint, and indeed scarcely opened his lips, unless in reply to the interrogations put to him. My first business was to rescue the unhappy sufferers from immediate want. Had the woman alone been concerned, my solicitude would have been hardly discernible. But whatever had been the defects in the character of Wheelwright, or the errors which, for the most part, were the consequence, the wide contrast between his present and past condition was truly affecting. For his indiscretions, never involving moral obliquity, he had most grievously answered. And, besides, was he not "a man and a brother!" There is no more charitable people in the world than those of New-York. Let any case of distress be presented--any call of real suffering--which has actually been ascertained, and is vouched for by a respectable citizen, the hearts of the New-Yorkers will instantly respond to the appeal. Two or three hours of active exertion, therefore, enabled me to obtain the means, and procure all the supplies actually necessary; and in three days' time Wheelwright and his family were comfortably furnished with bedding, clothing, fuel, and provisions for the residue of the season of snows. The next measure resolved upon, was the redemption of Wheelwright's tools and other articles of furniture, clothing, &c., from the hands of the pawn-brokers, for which purpose he accompanied me. The object was accomplished after no little trouble, in visiting the principal establishments doing business under the beautiful sign of the three golden balls, in Chatham-street, and redeeming one or two articles here, another there, and a third or fourth somewhere else. But although this part of the labor was an irksome job, attended by scenes and objects of a description exceedingly painful, yet I was enabled to read some dark pages in the book of human nature, which will never be forgotten. I had previously imbibed a strong prejudice against those receptacles of the goods, new and old, of the poor, the miserable, and the vicious. I had been told of the system of universal cheatery upon which they practised, and the enormous exactions made in grinding the faces of the poor. I had heard described their dexterity in the substitution of colored glass and crystals, for gems, while pretending to examine articles of the latter description brought for pledges, and was prepared to encounter all that was sinister and heartless. But the one-half had not been told me, and I soon found that my previous conceptions fell far short of the reality. As I have already remarked, I had occasion to visit several of them, and was detained at each, by the delays in finding the articles of which I was in search, and for which the holders had doubtless flattered themselves no inquiries would ever be made. The press of business at all, was another cause of delay. It really seemed in my eyes the most fraudulent and oppressive business in which man could engage. As I recovered Wheelwright's articles, one by one, it appeared at once that the most outrageous system of extortion had been practised in every instance. The sums advanced had been pitiful in amount, and the rates of interest charged exorbitant beyond belief. O how does avarice harden the heart, and dry up the current of human sympathy! How lamentable this accursed thirst for gold!
But my visits to these establishments were fruitful of incidents, the recollection of which is too vivid to be passed lightly over. And as the present chapter is already of sufficient length, it is proposed to appropriate a separate one as a record of some of those reminiscences--one of which may better suffice as a temperance lecture, than a sermon, while another may perhaps interest the reader from its aspect of romance. If the reader chooses, he can pass it over altogether. _ |
||