第5章 PACOLET.(2)
He allowed,indeed,that Flora had a little beauty,and a great deal of wit;but then she was so ungainly in her behaviour,and such a laughing hoyden!Pastorella had with him the allowance of being blameless;but what was that towards being praiseworthy?To be only innocent is not to be virtuous!He afterwards spoke so much against Mrs.Dipple's forehead,Mrs.Prim's mouth,Mrs.Dentifrice's teeth,and Mrs.Fidget's cheeks that she grew downright in love with him;for it is always to be understood that a lady takes all you detract from the rest of her sex to be a gift to her.In a word,things went so far that I was dismissed.The next,as I said,I went to was a common swearer.Never was a creature so puzzled as myself when I came first to view his brain;half of it was worn out,and filled up with mere expletives that had nothing to do with any other parts of the texture;therefore,when he called for his clothes in a morning,he would cry,'John!'John does not answer.'What a plague!nobody there?What the devil,and rot me,John,for a lazy dog as you are!'I knew no way to cure him but by writing down all he said one morning as he was dressing,and laying it before him on the toilet when he came to pick his teeth.The last recital I gave him of what he said for half an hour before was,'What,the devil!
where is the washball?call the chairmen!d--n them,I warrant they are at the alehouse already!zounds!and confound them!'When he came to the glass he takes up my note--'Ha!this fellow is worse than me:what,does he swear with pen and ink?'But,reading on,he found them to be his own words.The stratagem had so good an effect upon him that he grew immediately a new man,and is learning to speak without an oath;which makes him extremely short in his phrases;for,as I observed before,a common swearer has a brain without any idea on the swearing side;therefore my ward has yet mighty little to say,and is forced to substitute some other vehicle of nonsense to supply the defect of his usual expletives.When Ileft him,he made use of 'Odsbodikins!Oh me!and Never stir alive!'and so forth;which gave me hopes of his recovery.So Iwent to the next I told you of,the gamester.When we first take our place about a man,the receptacles of the pericranium are immediately searched.In his I found no one ordinary trace of thinking;but strong passion,violent desires,and a continued series of different changes had torn it to pieces.There appeared no middle condition;the triumph of a prince,or the misery of a beggar,were his alternate states.I was with him no longer than one day,which was yesterday.In the morning at twelve we were worth four thousand pounds;at three,we were arrived at six thousand;half an hour after,we were reduced to one thousand;at four of the clock,we were down to two hundred;at five,to fifty;at six,to five;at seven,to one guinea;the next bet to nothing.
This morning he borrowed half a crown of the maid who cleans his shoes,and is now gaming in Lincoln's Inn Fields among the boys for farthings and oranges,till he has made up three pieces,and then he returns to White's into the best company in town."Thus ended our first discourse;and it is hoped that you will forgive me that I have picked so little out of my companion at our first interview.In the next it is possible he may tell me more pleasing incidents;for though he is a familiar,he is not an evil,spirit.