Familiar Colloquies/The Rich Miser
THE RICH MISER.
James and Gilbert.
Ja. How comes it about that you are so lean and meagre ? You look as if you had lived upon dew with the grasshopper ; you seem to be nothing but a mere skeleton. Gi. In the regions below the ghosts feed upon leeks and mallows; but I have been these ten months where I could not come at so much as them. Ja. Where is that, prithee I What, have you been in the galleys? Gi. No, I have been at Synodium. Ja. What, starved to death almost in so plentiful a country ] Gi. It is true as I tell you. Ja. What was the occasion of it ? what, had you no money 1 Gi. I neither wanted money nor friends. Ja. What the mischief was the matter then 1 Gi. Why, you must know I boarded with Antronius. Ja. What, with that rich old cuff 1 ? Gi. Yes, with that sordid hunks. Ja. It is very strange, methinks. Gi. Not strange at all; for by this sordid way of living they that have little or nothing to begin the world with scrape together so much wealth. Ja. But how came you to take a fancy to live so many months with such a landlord ? Gi. There was a certain affair that obliged me to it, and I had a fancy so to do likewise. Ja. But, prithee, tell me after what manner he lives.
Gi. I will tell you, since it is a pleasure to recount the hardships one has sustained. Ja. It will certainly be a pleasure to me to hear it. Gi. Providence so ordered it that the wind sat full north for three months together, only it did not blow from the same point above eight days together; but I cannot tell the reason of it. Ja. How then could it blow north for three months together 1 ? Gi. Why, upon the eighth day, as if by agreement, it shifted its station ; where, after it had continued some seven or eight hours, then it veered to the old point again. Ja. In such a place as that your callico body had need have a good fire to keep it warm. Gi. We had had fire enough if we had but had wood enough. But our landlord Antronius, to save charges, used to grub up old stumps of trees in the common, that nobody thoiight worth while to get but himself, and would get them by night. And of these, green as they were, our fire was commonly made, which used to smoke plentifully, but would not flame out ; so that though it did not warm us at all, yet we could not say there was no fire. One of these fires would last us a whole day, they burnt so deliberately.
Ja. This was a bad place for a man to pass the winter in. Gi. It was so ; but it was a great deal worse to pass a summer in. Ja. Why so ? Gi. Because there was such a multitude of fleas and bugs that there was no being quiet in the day-time, nor sleeping in the night. Ja. What a wretched wealth was here? Gi. Few were wealthier in this sort of cattle. Ja. Sure your women were lazy sluts. Gi. They were mewed up in an apartment by themselves, and seldom came among the men ; so that you have nothing of them but the name of women ; and the men are forced to go without those services which properly belong to that sex in other families. Ja. But how could Antronius away with all this nastiness ? Gi. Pshaw, he was used to it from his cradle, and minded nothing in the world but getting of money. He loved to be anywhere but at home, and traded in every- thing you can think of. You know that city is a great town of the greatest commerce and business, What is his name, the famous painter, who thought that day was lost wherein he did not employ his pencil ; and our Antronius looked upon himself undone if one single day passed over his head without some profit. And if such a disaster happened to him, he did not fail one way or other to make it up at home.
Ja. What did he do 1 Gi. Why, he had a cistern of water in the house, as most people in that city have, whence he used to draw so many buckets of water, and put into his hogsheads of wine. This was a most certain profit. Ja. I suppose the wine was something of the strongest then 1 Gi. Far from that, for it was as dead as ditch water; for he never bought any but what was decayed to his hand, that he might buy it at an easier rate. And that he might not lose a drop of this, he used to mix and jumble the grounds of at least ten years standing, and set them a fermenting, that it might pass for new wine upon the lees, and would not lose a drop of the dregs neither. Ja. If we may believe the physicians, such wine will certainly breed the stone. Gi. There were no doctors there, I will assure you ; and in the most healthful years two or three at least of the family died of that distemper ; but he never troubled his head about that, how many burials went out of the house. Ja. No ! Gi. He made a penny even of the dead. And there was no gain he was ashamed to take, though it was never so small. Ja. Under your favour, that was downright theft though. Gi. Your merchants term it turning an honest penny.
Ja. But what sort of liquor did Antronius drink all the while 1
Gi. Almost the very same nectar that I told you of. Ja. Did he find no harm by it Gi. He was as hard as a flint, he could have lived ipon chopped hay ; and, as I told you before, he had been used to fare hard from his infancy. And he looked upon this dashing and brewing to be a certain pi'ofit to him, Ja. How so, I beseech you 1 Gi. If you reckon his wife, his sons, his daughters, his son-in-law, his men-servants, and his maid-servants, he had about thirty-three mouths in the family to feed. Now the more he corrected his wine with water the less of it was drunk, and the longer it was drawing off; so then if you compute a large bucket of water thrown in every day it will amount to no small sum, let me tell you, at the year's end. Ja. A sordid fellow ! Gi. This was not all, he made the same advantage of his bread too. Ja. How could he do that? Gi. He bought musty wheat, such as nobody else would buy but himself. Now, in the first place, here was a pre- sent gain, because he bought it so much cheaper, and then he had an art to cure the mustiness. Ja. But, prithee, how did he do that 1 Gi. There is a sort of chalk, not altogether unlike to corn, which you may see horses are delighted with when they gnaw it out of the walls, and drink more freely out of that pond-water where this chalk is to be found. He mixed one-third part at least of this earth with his bread.
Ja. And do you call this curing of it 1
Gi. This is certain, that it made the mustiness of the corn be not altogether so perceivable ; and now, was not this a considerable profit 1 He had another sti-atagem besides that, for he baked his own bread at home, which, in the very midst of summer, he never did oftener than twice in a month. Ja. Sure it must be more like stones than bread for hardness. Gi. Nay, harder than a stone, if possible ; but we had a remedy for that too. Ja. What was that ? Gi. We used to soak slices of this bread in bowls of wine. Ja. The devil a barrel the better herring. But how did the servants like this treatment 1 Gi. I will first tell you how the top folks of the family were served, and then you may easily guess how the servants fared. Ja. I long to hear it. Gi. There was not a word to be mentioned about breakfast, and as for dinner that was generally deferred till one o'clock in the after- noon. Ja. Why so 1 Gi. We waited for the master of the family's coming home, and then we seldom went to supper before ten. Ja. But how did you bear it 1 you used to be very impatient for your victuals. Gi. I called ever and anon upon Orthrogonus, our landlord's son-in-law, who lay upon the same floor with myself : Soho, monsieur, said I, do you make no dining to-day at Synodium 1 He answered, Antronius will be here in a minute. Then finding not the least motion towards dinner, and my guts very mutinous, Hark you, Orthrogonus, said I, do you design to starve us to-day ! Then he would persuade me it was not so late, or put me off with some such pretence. Then, not being able to bear the bawling my bowels made, I interrupted him again : What, do you mean, said I, to starve us to death 1 When he found he had no more excuses to make, he went down to the servants and ordered them to lay the cloth. But at last, when no Antronius came, and dinner seemed to be as far off as ever, Orthrogonus, wearied with the noise I made in his ears, went to the apartment where his wife, and mother, and children were, bidding them get dinner ready.
Ja. Well, now I expect to hear of the dinner. Gi. Pray do not be so hasty. Then there came a lame fellow, just such another as Vulcan, who laid the cloth, for that it seems was his province ; this was the first hope we had of dinner ; and at last, after I had bawled a long time, a glass bottle of fair water is brought in. Ja. Well, now there is more hope. Gi. But I tell you, do not be too hasty. Again, not without a great deal of knocking and calling, in comes a bottle of the wine I spoke of, as thick with dregs as puddle-water. Ja. That is well, however. Gi. But not a bit of bread came along with it, though there was no great danger we should touch it, for scarce anybody would had they been ever so hungry. Then I fell to calling till I was hoarse again ; and at last the bread comes, but such as a bear could scarce bite of. Ja. Well, now there was no danger of starving.
Gi. Late in the aftei-noon home conies Antronius, and generally with this unlucky pretence, that his belly ached. Ja. But what was that to you? Gi. This much, that we were to go suppei'less to bed, for what could you expect when the master of the house is out of order ?
Ja. But was he sick in good earnest? Gi. So sick that he would have devoured your three capons to his own share, if you would have treated him. Ja. I am impatient to hear your bill of fare. Gi. First of all there is a plateful of grey peas brought in, such as old women cry aboxit the streets, and this was for our landlord's own eating ; he pretended that this was his remedy against all diseases. Ja. How many guests were there of you at table? Gi. Sometimes eight or nine ; among whom was one Verpius, a learned gentleman, to whose character I suppose you are no stranger, and our landlord's eldest son. Ja. What was their mess? Gi. Why, the same that Melchisedek offered to Abraham, after he had conquered the five kings; and was not that enough for any reasonable man ?
Ja. But was there no meat? Gi. There was meat, but there was but a very little of it. Ja. What was it? Gi. I remember we were once nine of us at table, when there were no more than seven small lettuce leaves swimming in vinegar, but not a drop of oil to make them slip down. Ja. But did your landlord eat all his grey peas himself? Gi. You must know there was scarce a farthingworth of them ; how- ever, he did not absolutely forbid those that sat next him to taste them, but it looked uncivil to rob a sick man of his victuals. Ja. But were not your lettuce leaves split to make the greater show ? Gi. Why, truly, they were not ', but when those that sat at the upper end of the table had eaten up the leaves, the rest sopped their bread in the vinegar.
Ja. But what, I pray, came after these lettuce leaves? Gi. What ! what should come but cheese, the last dish at dinner?
Ja. But was this your daily fare ? Gi. Generally speaking, it was; but now and then, if the old gentleman had the good luck to get money in the way of trade that day, he would be a little more generous. Ja. How did you fare then ? Gi. Why, then he would send out to buy a pennyworth of fresh grapes, at nine bunches a penny; this made the whole family sing O be joyful. Ja. Why not? Gi. But then you must understand too, that this was never but when grapes were dog-cheap. Ja. What, then, did he never launch oiit but in autumn ? Gi. Yes, he will thus launch out at some other times too ; for you must know that there are fellows that catch a small sort of shell-fish most commonly on the shores, and cry them about the streets, and he would now and then buy an halfpennyworth of these ; then you would swear there had been a wedding-dinner in the family. There vas a fire made in the kitchen, though not very much of it neither, for these do not ask much boiling ; and these dainties come always after the cheese instead of a dessert. Ja. A very fine dessert, indeed ! But do you never use to have any flesh or fish 1
Gi. At last the old gentleman being overcome by my clamouring, began to live a little more nobly ; and whenever he had a mind to shew his generosity in good earnest, this was our bill of fare. Ja. I long to hear what that is. Gi. Imprimis, we had a dish of soup which they call a service, but I do not know why. Ja. A very rich one, I suppose. Gi. Very high seasoned with the following spices : They took you a large kettle of water, and set it over the fire ; into this they fling a good quantity of skimmed-milk cheese, grown as hard as a brickbat, that you can scarce cut it with a hatchet ; and when these fragments of cheese grow a little softer by soaking and seething, they alter the property of the liquor that it is not then fair water. Now this soup is served in as a preparative for the stomach. Ja. This was a soup for saws. Gi, And the next course is a piece of stale tripe that has been boiled a fortnight. Ja. Why, then, it must needs stink. Gi. It does stink, but they have a remedy for that too. Ja. What is that, pray ? Gi. I would tell you, but I am afraid you will put it into practice. Ja,. Ay, marry, sir ! Gi. They would take an egg and beat it up in warm water, and daub the tripe over with the liquor ; and so they put the cheat upon the eye, indeed, but cannot cheat the nose, for the stink will force its way through all. If it hap- pened to be a fish-day, we had sometimes three whitings, and but small ones neither, although there were seven or eight of us at table. Ja. What, nothing else 1 Gi. Nothing bvit that cheese as hard as a stone.
Ja. The oddest epicure I ever heard of. But how could so slender provision be enough for so many guests of you, and especially not hav- ing ate any breakfast 1 Gi. Well, to satisfy you, I tell you that the remainder fed the mother-in-law, the daughter-in-law, the youngest son, a servant-maid, and a litter of children. Ja. Nay, now instead of lessening, you have heightened my admiration. Gi. It is scarce pos- sible for me to explain this difficulty to you, unless I first represent to you in what order we sat at table. Ja. Pray, represent it then. Gi. Antronius, he sat at the upper end of the table, and I sat at his right hand, as being principal guest; over against Antronius sat Orthrogonus; next Orthrogonus, Yerpius ; next to Yerpius, Strategus, a Grecian ; Antronius's eldest son sat at his left hand. If any stranger came to dine with us, he was placed according to his quality. As for the soup, there was no great danger of its being eaten up, nor no great difference in the messes, but only that in the dishes of the principal guests there were some bits of this cheese floating up and down. And besides, there was a sort of barricade made betwixt this soup by bottles of Avine and water, that none but three, before whom the dish stood, could participate, unless he would be impudent indeed, and go beyond his bounds. Nor did this dish stay long there, but was soon taken away, that something might be left for the family.
Ja. What did the rest eat all this while 1 Gi. They regaled themselves after their own fashion. Ja. How was that 1 ? Gi. Why they sopped the chalky bread in that sour, dreggy wine. Ja. Sure your dinner used to be over in a minute. Gi. It oftentimes held above an hour. Ja. How could it be 1 Gi. The soup being taken away, which, as I told you before, might have stood without any great danger, cheese was brought to table, and that ran no great risk, for it was so hard it would bid defiance to a carving-knife. Every man's portion of that dreggy wine and bread stood before him still ; and over these dainties they diverted themselves with telling stories, and in the mean- time the women eat their dinner. Ja. But how did the servants fare in the meantime? Gi. They had nothing in common with us, but dined and supped at their own hours. But this I can tell you, they scarce spent half an hour's time in a whole day at victuals. Ja. But what sort of provision had they ? Gi. You may easily guess that Ja. Your Germans think an hour little enough to breakfast in, and they commonly take as much time to their beaver, an hour and a half at their dinner, and at least two hours at supper ; and unless their bellies are well filled with good wine, flesh, and fish, they run away from their masters, and go into the army.
Gi. Every nation has its peculiar customs ; the Italians lay out but very little upon their bellies ; they love money better than plea- sure ; and this temperance they owe rather to nature than custom. Ja. Now, truly, I do not wonder you are come home so lean, but rather that you are come home alive, especially since you were so used to capons, partridges, pigeons, and pheasants. Gi. Why, in truth, I had very fairly trooped off, unless I had found me out a remedy. Ja. It is but poor living where such frequent recourse must be had to reme- dies. Gi. I brought matters about so that I had the fourth part of a boiled pullet allowed to every meal, to keep up my languishing spirits. Ja, Ay, marry, now you begin to live ! Gi. Not altogether so well as you imagine ; for old Gripe bought the least he could lay his hands on, to save expenses, such that six of them would not serve a Polander of a tolerable stomach for a breakfast ; and when he had bought them, he would give them no corn, because he would not put himself to extraordinary charges ; so a wing or a leg of the fowl that was half starved before it was put into the pot, was boiled for my dinner, and the liver always went to Orthrogonus's little son ; and as for the broth, the women were perpetually lapping it up, and every now and then they put in fresh water ; so that by that time it came to me it was as dry as a chip, and no more taste in it than the foot of a joint-stool. And as for the broth, it was nothing but a little water bewitched. Ja. And yet I hear tha,t you have all sorts of fowl there in great plenty, very good and very cheap. Gi. They are so, but money is hard to cOme by. Ja. You have done penance enough, one would think, if you had murdered the pope, or pissed against St. Peter's tomb-stone.
Gi. But hear the rest of the farce out. You know there are five days in a week that we may eat flesh on. Ja. What then 1 Gi. He only bought two pullets for the whole week. On Thursday he would pretend he forgot to go to market, lest I should either have a whole pullet on that day, or any should be left. Ja. In shoi't, I think your landlord was a greater miser than Eulio in Plautus. But what course did you take to keep yourself alive upon fish-days 1 Gi. I employed a certain friend to buy me every day three eggs with my own money two for my dinner, and one for my supper. But here also the women put their tricks upon me ; for instead of my new-laid eggs that I paid a good price for, they would give me rotten ones, that 1 thought I came well off if one of my three eggs proved eatable. I also at last got a small cask of good wine bought for my own drinking, but the women broke open my cellar-door, and in a few days di*ank it all up, and my landlord, Antronius, did not seem to be much displeased at the matter.
Ja. But was there nobody in the family that took pity on you ? Gi. Take pity on me, say you ? No; they thought me a glutton and a cormorant, who by myself devoured so much victuals. And upon that account Orthrogonus would ever and anon give me good advice, that I should consider the climate where I lived, and therefore have regard to myself; telling me of several of my countrymen who had by their over-eating in that country either procured their own deaths, or brought upon themselves very dangerous distempers. But when he found me supporting my outward tabernacle, that was fatigued, starved, and dis- tempered, with some knick-knacks that were sold at the confectioners, he sets a physician, a friend and acquaintance of mine, to persuade me to live moderately. The doctor took a great deal of pains with me. I soon perceived he had been set on to do it, so I made him not a word of answer ?
But when he was still urging me very hard, and was always harp- ing on the same string, I said to him, Worthy doctor, pray tell me, are you in jest or in earnest ? Oh, in earnest, said he. Well then, replied I, what would you have me to do 1 Why, to leave off suppers for good and all, and to mix at least one-half water with your wine. I could not forbear laughing at this excellent advice, and said to him, If you want to see me decently laid in a churchyard, you propose a ready way for it ; for I am sure it would be present death to me, in the circum- stances of this poor, lean, dispirited body, to leave off suppers ; and I have tried that so often, that in short I have no mind to make the experiment again. What, pray, do you think would become of me, if, after such dinners as we have here I should go supperless to bed ? And then to bid me mingle water with such weak insipid wine ! pray, tell me, is it not much better to drink clear water from the spring than to debauch it with this sour dreggy stuff? I do not doubt but Orthrogonus put you upon giving me this advice.
At this the doctor smiled, and allowed me better terms. Most learned Gilbert, said he, I did not say this to you, that you should totally leave off eating suppers ; you may eat an egg and drink a glass of wine, for this is my own manner of living. I have an egg boiled for my supper one-half of the yolk I eat myself, and give the other half to my son; then I drink half a glass of wine, and by the help of this refreshment I study till late in the night. Ja. But did this doctor speak the truth 1 Gi. Yes, the very truth ; for as I was once coming home from church, a gentleman that bore me company told me the doctor dwelt there ; I had a mind to see his quarters, so I knocked at the door, and in I went. I remember it was on a Sunday; I found the doctor, his son, and servant at dinner ; the bill of fare was a couple of eggs, and nothing at all else. Ja. Why, sure they must be mere skele- tons. Gi. No ; really they were both plump and in good liking, fresh coloured, their eyes brisk and lively. Ja. I can scarce believe it. Gi. I tell you nothing but what I know to be true. Nay, he is not the only man that lives after this manner, but many others, men of fashion and substance in the world, do the same. Take my word for it, much eat- ing and drinking is rather an effect of custom than that of nature. If a person acciistom himself by little and little, he may come in time to do as much as Milo to eat up an ox in a day's time. Ja. Good God ! if it be possible for a man to preserve his health with so little susten- ance, what a great deal of unnecessary expense are the Germans, English, Danes, and Poles at upon their bellies 1 Gi. A great deal without doubt, and that to the apparent prejudice of their health and understanding.
Ja. But what is the matter that you could not content yourself with that way of living ] Gi. Because I had accustomed myself to another mannei*, and it was too late to alter my way of living then. But besides, I did not so much dislike the quantity of our provision as the quality of it. Two eggs had been enough for a meal for me, if they had been fresh-laid ; one glass of wine had been enough, if we had not had nasty lees given us instead of wine ; half the bread would have served me, if it had not been mixed with chalk. Ja. Lord ! that Antronius should be such a sordid wretch amidst so much wealth ! Gi. I believe verily he was worth 80,000 ducats ; and to speak within compass, he never got less than 1000 ducats a year besides. Ja. But did those young sparks for whom he scraped all this together live at the same sparing rate 1 Gi. Yes, at home they did, but it was only there ; for when they g6t abroad they would eat, drink, whore, and game notably ; and while their old father thought much to spend six- pence at home to treat the best friend he had, these sparks would make nothing to lose sixty ducats in a night at gaming. Ja. This is the usual fate of estates that are got by miserly living ; they are commonly thus spent. But now you are got safe out of these great difficulties, whither are you steering your course ? Gi. I -am going to an old club of merry cocks, to endeavour to fetch up what I have lost.