The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle | Page 4

it amounted to a plum, conjuring his son, as he respected the last
injunction of a parent, to imitate his industry, and adhere to his maxims,
until he should have made up the deficiency, which was a sum
considerably less than fifteen thousand pounds.
This pathetic remonstrance had the desired effect upon his
representative, who spared no pains to fulfil the request of the deceased:
but exerted all the capacity with which nature had endowed him, in a
series of efforts, which, however, did not succeed; for by the time he

bad been fifteen years in trade, he found himself five thousand pounds
worse than he was when he first took possession of his father's effects;
a circumstance that affected him so nearly, as to detach his inclinations
from business, and induce him to retire from the world to some place
where he might at leisure deplore his misfortunes, and, by frugality,
secure himself from want, and the apprehensions of a jail, with which
his imagination was incessantly haunted. He was often heard to express
his fears of coming upon the parish; and to bless God, that, on account
of his having been so long a housekeeper, he was entitled to that
provision. In short, his talents were not naturally active, and there was a
sort of inconsistency in his character; for, with all the desire of
amassing which any citizen could possibly entertain, he was
encumbered by a certain indolence and sluggishness that prevailed over
every interested consideration, and even hindered him from profiting
by that singleness of apprehension, and moderation of appetites, which
have so frequently conduced to the acquisition of immense fortunes;
qualities which he possessed in a very remarkable degree. Nature, in all
probability, had mixed little or nothing inflammable in his composition;
or, whatever seeds of excess she might have sown within him, were
effectually stifled and destroyed by the austerity of his education.
The sallies of his youth, far from being inordinate or criminal, never
exceeded the bounds of that decent jollity which an extraordinary pot,
on extraordinary occasions, may be supposed to have produced in a
club of sedate book-keepers, whose imaginations were neither very
warm nor luxuriant. Little subject to refined sensations, he was scarce
ever disturbed with violent emotions of any kind. The passion of love
never interrupted his tranquility; and if, as Mr. Creech says, after
Horace,
Not to admire is all the art I know; To make men happy, and to keep
them so;
Mr. Pickle was undoubtedly possessed of that invaluable secret; at least,
he was never known to betray the faintest symptom of transport, except
one evening at the club, where he observed, with some demonstrations
of vivacity, that he had dined upon a delicate loin of veal.

Notwithstanding this appearance of phlegm, he could not help feeling
his disappointments in trade; and upon the failure of a certain
underwriter, by which he lost five hundred pounds, declared his design
of relinquishing business, and retiring to the country. In this resolution
he was comforted and encouraged by his only sister, Mrs. Grizzle, who
had managed his family since the death of his father, and was now in
the thirtieth year of her maidenhood, with a fortune of five thousand
pounds, and a large stock of economy and devotion.
These qualifications, one would think, might have been the means of
abridging the term of her celibacy, as she never expressed any aversion
to wedlock; but, it seems, she was too delicate in her choice, to find a
mate to her inclination in the city: for I cannot suppose that she
remained so long unsolicited; though the charms of her person were not
altogether enchanting, nor her manner over and above agreeable.
Exclusive of a very wan (not to call it sallow) complexion, which,
perhaps, was the effects of her virginity and mortification, she had a
cast in her eyes that was not at all engaging; and such an extent of
mouth, as no art or affectation could contract into any proportionable
dimension; then her piety was rather peevish than resigned, and did not
in the least diminish a certain stateliness in her demeanour and
conversation, that delighted in communicating the importance and
honour of her family, which, by the bye, was not to be traced two
generations back by all the power of heraldry or tradition.
She seemed to have renounced all the ideas she had acquired before her
father served the office of sheriff; and the eye which regulated the dates
of all her observation, was the mayoralty of her papa. Nay, so solicitous
was this good lady for the support and propagation of the family name,
that, suppressing every selfish motive, she actually prevailed upon her
brother to combat with his own disposition, and even surmount it so