CHAP. XII.

How John grew angry, and resolved to accept a Composition ;* and what Methods were practised by the Lawyers for keeping him from it.

WELL might the learned Daniel Burgess† say, that a lawsuit is a suit for life. He that sows his grain upon marble, will have many a hungry belly before harvest.

When at length peace was thought to be eligible upon more moderate terms, a treaty was entered into.

+ This celebrated non-conforming divine was the son of a clergyman at Collenburn-Ducis, Wilts, where he was born in 1645. Mr Burgess went to Ireland, under the protection of Lord Orrery, the Lord President of Munster, where he taught a school at Charleville; but returning to England at the restoration, he became a non-conformist, though not a puritan; for he was as facetious as his merry monarch. His jokes were in the Latimer style, and adapted to the seventeenth century: indeed, a pamphlet might be formed of his puns and jests. Preaching of Job's robe of righteousness,' “ if,” said he, " any of you would have a suit for a twelvemonth, let him repair to Monmouth-Street; if for his lifetime, let him apply to the Court of Chancery; and, if for all eternity, let him put on righteousness." Observing but a small congregation one day, in his sermon, he suddenly called out, " Fire! fire!" The affrighted audience exclaimed, "Where? where? where? where?"—" In hell, to burn such wretches as regard not the glad tidings of the gospel." Burgess assigned a curious motive for the Hebrews being called Israelites : “The reason is, because God ever hated Jacobites; and, therefore, Jacob's sons were not so called, but Israelites." His vein of mirth did not forsake him to the last, nor was his waggery confined to the meeting-house. He published many works, a catalogue of which is added to his funeral sermon, from his Golden Snuffers, to his Latin defence of Non-conformity.-He was buried, Jan. 31, 1723.— Noble's Continuation of Granger, vol. II. p. 159.

This John felt by woeful experience. John's cause was a good milch-cow, and many a man subsisted his family out of it. However, John began to think it high time to look about him. He had a cousin in the country, one Sir Roger Bold,* whose predecessors had been bred up to the law, and knew as much of it as anybody; but having left off the profession for some time, they took great pleasure in compounding lawsuits among their neighbours, for which they were the aversion of the gentlemen of the long robe, and at perpetual war with all the country attorneys. John put his cause in Sir Roger's hands, desiring him to make the best of it: the news had no sooner reached the ears of the lawyers, but they were all in an uproar. They brought all the rest of the tradesmen upon John: 'Squire South swore he was betrayed, that he would starve before he compounded; Frog said he was highly wronged; even lying Ned the chimney-sweeper, and Tom the dustman, complained that their interest was sacrificed. The lawyers, solicitors, Hocus, and his clerks, were all up in arms, at the news of the composition; they abused him and his wife most shamefully. "You silly, awkward, ill-bred, country sow," quoth one, "have you no more manners than to rail at Hocus, that has saved that clodpated numskull'd ninnyhammer of yours from ruin, and all his family? It is well known, how he has risen

* Robert Harley, descended from warlike ancestors, though himself of a civil profession, was made treasurer in the stead of Lord Godolphin, and there was now not only a new Parliament but a new ministry.

+ The measure was opposed by the Allies and the General.

ness.

The House of Commons was censured as totally ignorant of busi

early and sat up late to make him easy, when he was sotting at every alehouse in town. I knew his last wife; she was a woman of breeding, good humour, and complaisance; knew how to live in the world: as for you, you look like a puppet moved by clockwork: your clothes hang upon you, as they were upon tenter-hooks, and you come into a room as you were going to steal away a piss-pot: get you gone into the country to look after your mother's poultry, to milk the cows, churn the butter, and dress up nosegays for a holiday,* and not meddle with matters, which you know no more of, than the sign-post before your door: it is well known, that Hocus had an established reputation; he never swore an oath, nor told a lie in all his life; he is grateful to his benefactors, faithful to his friends, liberal to his dependants, and dutiful to his superiors; he values not your money more than the dust under his feet, but he hates to be abused. Once for all, Mrs Mynx, leave off talking of Hocus, or I will pull out those saucer eyes of yours, and make that red-streak country face look as raw as an ox cheek upon a butcher's stall: remember, I say, that there are pillories and ducking-stools." With this away they flung, leaving Mrs Bull no time to reply. No stone was left unturned to fright John from his composition: sometimes they spread reports at coffeehouses, that John and his wife were run mad; that they intended to give up house, and make over all their estate to Lewis Baboon;† that John had been often

* Let it be remembered, that it was the country interest which formed the majority in the House of Commons when the peace was made.

+ It was said, that the nation would at last be sacrificed to the ambition of France.

heard talking to himself, and seen in the streets without shoes or stockings; that he did nothing from morning till night but beat his servants, after having been the best master alive: as for his wife, she was a mere natural. Sometimes John's house was beset with a whole regiment of attorneys' clerks, bailiffs, and bailiffs' followers, and other small retainers of the law, who threw stones at his windows, and dirt at himself, as he went along the street. When John complained of want of ready money to carry on his suit, they advised him to pawn his plate and jewels, and that Mrs Bull should sell her linen and wearing-clothes.*

* The first edition introduces the following chapter, afterwards omitted, because the Earl of Nottingham, here called Don Diego Dismallo, was introduced in a different manner. See page 35.

How the Lawyers agreed to send Don Diego Dismallo, the Conjuror, to John Bull, to dissuade him from making an end of his Lawsuit: and what passed between them.

Bull. How does my good friend Don Diego?

Don. Never worse. Who can be easy when their friends are playing the fool?

Bull. But then you may be easy, for I am resolved to play the fool no longer: I wish I had hearkened to your advice, and compounded this lawsuit sooner.

Don. It is true; I was then against the ruinous ways of this lawsuit, but looking over my scheme since, I find there is an error in my calculation. Sol and Jupiter were in a wrong house, but I have now discovered their true places; I find that the stars are unanimously of opinion, that you will be successful in this cause: that Lewis will come to an untimely end, and Strutt will be turned out of doors by his wife and children.

Then he went on with a torrent of ecliptics, cycles, epicycles, ascendants, trines, quadrants, conjunctions, bulls, bears, goats, and rams, and abundance of hard words, which, being put together, signified nothing. John all this while stood gaping and staring, like a man in a trance.

LAW IS A BOTTOMLESS PIT;

OR, THE

HISTORY

OF

JOHN BULL.

PART SECOND.

FIRST PUBLISHED IN 1712.

CHAP. I.

Mrs Bull's Vindication of the indispensable Duty of Cuckoldom, incumbent upon Wives in case of the tyranny, infidelity, or insufficiency of Husbands : being a full Answer to the Doctor's Sermon against Adultery.

JOHN found daily fresh proofs of the infidelity and bad designs of his deceased wife; among other things, one day looking over his cabinet, he found the following paper.*

IT is evident that matrimony is founded upon an original contract, whereby the wife makes over the right

* It is a parody upon the whiggish doctrines of a social contract between the rulers and the people, and of the inherent right of resistance.