The History and Remarkable Life of the Truly Honourable Colonel Jacque, Commonly called Colonel Jack. Defoe Daniel
The History and Remarkable Life of the Truly Honourable Colonel Jacque, Commonly called Colonel Jack
I heard of his misfortune, and the major and I went to see him; for this was the first news we heard of what became of him.
The very day that we went he was called out to be corrected, as they called it, according to his sentence; and as it was ordered to be done soundly, so indeed they were true to the sentence; for the alderman who was the president of Bridewell, and whom I think they called Sir William Turner, held preaching to him about how young he was, and what pity it was such a youth should come to be hanged, and a great deal more; how he should take warning by it, and how wicked a thing it was that they should steal away poor innocent children, and the like; and all this while the man with a blue badge on lashed him most unmercifully, for he was not to leave off till Sir William knocked with a little hammer on the table.
The poor captain stamped and danced, and roared out like a mad boy; and I must confess I was frighted almost to death; for though I could not come near enough, being but a poor boy, to see how he was handled, yet I saw him afterwards with his back all wealed with the lashes, and in several places bloody, and thought I should have died with the sight of it; but I grew better acquainted with those things afterwards.
I did what I could to comfort the poor captain when I got leave to come to him. But the worst was not over with him, for he was to have two more such whippings before they had done with him; and indeed they scourged him so severely that they made him sick of the kidnapping trade for a great while; but he fell in among them again, and kept among them as long as that trade lasted, for it ceased in a few years afterwards.
The major and I, though very young, had sensible impressions made upon us for some time by the severe usage of the captain, and it might be very well said we were corrected as well as he, though not concerned in the crime; but it was within the year that the major, a good-conditioned, easy boy, was wheedled away by a couple of young rogues that frequented the glass-house apartments, to take a walk with them, as they were pleased to call it. The gentlemen were very well matched; the major was about twelve years old, and the oldest of the two that led him out was not above fourteen. The business was to go to Bartholomew Fair, and the end of going to Bartholomew Fair was, in short, to pick pockets.
The major knew nothing of the trade, and therefore was to do nothing; but they promised him a share with them for all that, as if he had been as expert as themselves. So away they went. The two dexterous young rogues managed it so well that by eight o'clock at night they came back to our dusty quarters at the glass-house, and, sitting them down in a corner, they began to share their spoil, by the light of the glass-house fire. The major lugged out the goods, for as fast as they made any purchase they unloaded themselves, and gave all to him, that, if they had been taken, nothing might be found about them.
It was a devilish lucky day to them, the devil certainly assisting them to find their prey, that he might draw in a young gamester, and encourage him to the undertaking, who had been made backward before by the misfortune of the captain. The list of their purchase the first night was as follows: -
1. A white handkerchief from a country wench, as she was staring up at a jack-pudding; there was 3s. 6d. and a row of pins tied up in one end of it.
2. A coloured handkerchief, out of a young country fellow's pocket as he was buying a china orange.
3. A riband purse with 11s. 3d. and a silver thimble in it, out of a young woman's pocket, just as a fellow offered to pick her up.
N.B. – She missed her purse presently, but, not seeing the thief, charged the man with it that would have picked her up, and cried out, "A pickpocket!" and he fell into the hands of the mob, but, being known in the street, he got off with great difficulty.
4. A knife and fork, that a couple of boys had just bought and were going home with; the young rogue that took it got it within the minute after the boy had put it in his pocket.
5. A little silver box with 7s. in it, all in small silver, 1d., 2d., 3d., 4d. pieces.
N.B. – This, it seems, a maid pulled out of her pocket, to pay at her going into the booth to see a show, and the little rogue got his hand in and fetched it off, just as she put it up again.
6. Another silk handkerchief, out of a gentleman's pocket.
7. Another.
8. A jointed baby and a little looking-glass, stolen off a toy-seller's stall in the fair.
All this cargo to be brought home clear in one afternoon, or evening rather, and by only two little rogues so young, was, it must be confessed, extraordinary; and the major was elevated the next day to a strange degree.
He came very early to me, who lay not far from him, and said to me, "Colonel Jacque, I want to speak with you." "Well," said I, "what do you say?" "Nay," said he, "it is business of consequence; I cannot talk here;" so we walked out. As soon as we were come out into a narrow lane by the glass-house, "Look here," says he, and pulls out his little hand almost full of money.
I was surprised at the sight, when he puts it up again, and, bringing his hand out, "Here," says he, "you shall have some of it;" and gives me a sixpence and a shilling's worth of the small silver pieces. This was very welcome to me, who, as much as I was of a gentleman, and as much as I thought of myself upon that account, never had a shilling of money together before in all my life, not that I could call my own.
I was very earnest then to know how he came by this wealth, for he had for his share 7s. 6d. in money, the silver thimble, and a silk handkerchief, which was, in short, an estate to him, that never had, as I said of myself, a shilling together in his life.
"And what will you do with it now, Jacque?" said I. "I do?" says he. "The first thing I do I'll go into Rag Fair and buy me a pair of shoes and stockings." "That's right," says I, "and so will I too;" so away we went together, and we bought each of us a pair of Rag Fair stockings in the first place for fivepence; not fivepence a pair, but fivepence together; and good stockings they were too, much above our wear, I assure you.
We found it more difficult to fit ourselves with shoes; but at last, having looked a great while before we could find any good enough for us, we found a shop very well stored, and of these we bought two pair for sixteenpence.
We put them on immediately, to our great comfort, for we had neither of us had any stockings to our legs that had any feet to them for a long time. I found myself so refreshed with having a pair of warm stockings on, and a pair of dry shoes-things, I say, which I had not been acquainted with a great while-that I began to call to my mind my being a gentleman, and now I thought it began to come to pass. When we had thus fitted ourselves I said, "Hark ye, Major Jacque, you and I never had any money in our lives before, and we never had a good dinner in all our lives. What if we should go somewhere and get some victuals? I am very hungry."
"So we will, then," says the major; "I am hungry too." So we went to a boiling cook's in Rosemary Lane, where we treated ourselves nobly, and, as I thought with myself, we began to live like gentlemen, for we had three pennyworth of boiled beef, two pennyworth of pudding, a penny brick (as they call it, or loaf), and a whole pint of strong beer, which was sevenpence in all.
N.B. – We had each of us a good mess of charming beef-broth into the bargain; and, which cheered my heart wonderfully, all the while we were at dinner, the maid and the boy in the house, every time they passed by the open box where we sat at our dinner, would look in and cry, "Gentlemen, do you call?" and "Do ye call, gentlemen?" I say, this was as good to me as all my dinner.
Not the best housekeeper in Stepney parish, not my Lord Mayor of London, no, not the greatest man on earth, could be more happy in their own imagination, and with less mixture of grief or reflection, than I was at this new piece of felicity; though mine was but a small part of it, for Major Jacque had an estate compared to me, as I had an estate compared to what I had before; in a word, nothing but an utter ignorance of greater felicity, which was my case, could make anybody think himself so exalted as I did, though I had no share of this booty but eighteenpence.
That night the major and I triumphed in our new enjoyment, and slept with an undisturbed repose in the usual place, surrounded with the warmth of the glass-house fires above, which was a full amends for all the ashes and cinders which we rolled in below.
Those who know the position of the