The Fortunes of Nigel | Page 4

the shame of his villainies, and
affect to triumph in their consequences, so long as they were personally
advantageous to his own pleasures or profit.
Alsatia is elsewhere explained as a cant name for Whitefriars, which,
possessing certain privileges of sanctuary, became for that reason a nest
of those mischievous characters who were generally obnoxious to the
law. These privileges were derived from its having been an
establishment of the Carmelites, or White Friars, founded says Stow, in
his Survey of London, by Sir Patrick Grey, in 1241. Edward I. gave
them a plot of ground in Fleet Street, to build their church upon. The
edifice then erected was rebuilt by Courtney, Earl of Devonshire, in the
reign of Edward. In the time of the Reformation the place retained its
immunities as a sanctuary, and James I. confirmed and added to them
by a charter in 1608. Shadwell was the first author who made some
literary use of Whitefriars, in his play of the Squire of Alsatia, which
turns upon the plot of the Adelphi of Terence.
In this old play, two men of fortune, brothers, educate two young men,

(sons to the one and nephews to the other,) each under his own separate
system of rigour and indulgence. The elder of the subjects of this
experiment, who has been very rigidly brought up, falls at once into all
the vices of the town, is debauched by the cheats and bullies of
Whitefriars, and, in a word, becomes the Squire of Alsatia. The poet
gives, as the natural and congenial inhabitants of the place, such
characters as the reader will find in the note. [Footnote: "Cheatly, a
rascal, who by reason of debts dares not stir out of Whitefriars, but
there inveigles young heirs of entail, and helps them to goods and
money upon great disadvantages, is bound for them, and shares with
them till he undoes them. A lewd, impudent, debauched fellow, very
expert in the cant about town.
"Shamwell, cousin to the Belfords, who, being ruined by Cheatly, is
made a decoy-duck for others, not daring to stir out of Alsatia, where
he lives. Is bound with Cheatly for heirs, and lives upon them a
dissolute debauched life.
"Captain Hackum, a blockheaded bully of Alsatia, a cowardly,
impudent, blustering fellow, formerly a sergeant in Flanders, who has
run from his colours, and retreated into Whitefriars for a very small
debt, where by the Alsatians he is dubb'd a captain, marries one that
lets lodgings, sells cherry-brandy, and is a bawd.
"Scrapeall a hypocritical, repeating, praying, psalm-singing, precise
fellow, pretending to great piety; a godly knave, who joins with
Cheatly, and supplies young heirs with goods, and money."--Dramatis
Personae to the Squire of Alsatia, SHADWELL'S Works, vol. iv.] The
play, as we learn from the dedication to the Earl of Dorset and
Middlesex, was successful above the author's expectations, "no comedy
these many years having filled the theatre so long together. And I had
the great honour," continues Shadwell, "to find so many friends, that
the house was never so full since it was built as upon the third day of
this play, and vast numbers went away that could not be admitted."
[Footnote: Dedication to the Squire of Alsatia, Shadwell's Works, vol.
iv.] From the Squire of Alsatia the author derived some few hints, and
learned the footing on which the bullies and thieves of the Sanctuary
stood with their neighbours, the fiery young students of the Temple, of
which some intimation is given in the dramatic piece.
Such are the materials to which the author stands indebted for the

composition of the Fortunes of Nigel, a novel, which may be perhaps
one of those that are more amusing on a second perusal, than when read
a first time for the sake of the story, the incidents of which are few and
meagre.
The Introductory Epistle is written, in Lucio's phrase, "according to the
trick," and would never have appeared had the writer meditated making
his avowal of the work. As it is the privilege of a masque or incognito
to speak in a feigned voice and assumed character, the author attempted,
while in disguise, some liberties of the same sort; and while he
continues to plead upon the various excuses which the introduction
contains, the present acknowledgment must serve as an apology for a
species of "hoity toity, whisky frisky" pertness of manner, which, in his
avowed character, the author should have considered as a departure
from the rules of civility and good taste.
ABBOTSFORD. 1st July, 1831.

INTRODUCTORY EPISTLE
CAPTAIN CLUTTERBUCK TO THE REVEREND DR.
DRYASDUST
DEAR SIR,
I readily accept of, and reply to the civilities with which you have been
pleased to honour me in your obliging letter, and entirely agree with
your quotation, of