The Last Man | Page 4

by this last calm before the storm to save himself, he sought to forget
anticipated evil by making still greater sacrifices to the deity of pleasure, deceitful and
cruel arbiter of his destiny.
The king, who was a man of excellent dispositions, but easily led, had now become a
willing disciple of his imperious consort. He was induced to look with extreme
disapprobation, and at last with distaste, on my father's imprudence and follies. It is true
that his presence dissipated these clouds; his warm-hearted frankness, brilliant sallies,
and confiding demeanour were irresistible: it was only when at a distance, while still
renewed tales of his errors were poured into his royal friend's ear, that he lost his
influence. The queen's dextrous management was employed to prolong these absences,
and gather together accusations. At length the king was brought to see in him a source of
perpetual disquiet, knowing that he should pay for the short-lived pleasure of his society
by tedious homilies, and more painful narrations of excesses, the truth of which he could

not disprove. The result was, that he would make one more attempt to reclaim him, and in
case of ill success, cast him off for ever.
Such a scene must have been one of deepest interest and high-wrought passion. A
powerful king, conspicuous for a goodness which had heretofore made him meek, and
now lofty in his admonitions, with alternate entreaty and reproof, besought his friend to
attend to his real interests, resolutely to avoid those fascinations which in fact were fast
deserting him, and to spend his great powers on a worthy field, in which he, his sovereign,
would be his prop, his stay, and his pioneer. My father felt this kindness; for a moment
ambitious dreams floated before him; and he thought that it would be well to exchange
his present pursuits for nobler duties. With sincerity and fervour he gave the required
promise: as a pledge of continued favour, he received from his royal master a sum of
money to defray pressing debts, and enable him to enter under good auspices his new
career. That very night, while yet full of gratitude and good resolves, this whole sum, and
its amount doubled, was lost at the gaming-table. In his desire to repair his first losses,
my father risked double stakes, and thus incurred a debt of honour he was wholly unable
to pay. Ashamed to apply again to the king, he turned his back upon London, its false
delights and clinging miseries; and, with poverty for his sole companion, buried himself
in solitude among the hills and lakes of Cumberland. His wit, his bon mots, the record of
his personal attractions, fascinating manners, and social talents, were long remembered
and repeated from mouth to mouth. Ask where now was this favourite of fashion, this
companion of the noble, this excelling beam, which gilt with alien splendour the
assemblies of the courtly and the gay--you heard that he was under a cloud, a lost man;
not one thought it belonged to him to repay pleasure by real services, or that his long
reign of brilliant wit deserved a pension on retiring. The king lamented his absence; he
loved to repeat his sayings, relate the adventures they had had together, and exalt his
talents--but here ended his reminiscence.
Meanwhile my father, forgotten, could not forget. He repined for the loss of what was
more necessary to him than air or food--the excitements of pleasure, the admiration of the
noble, the luxurious and polished living of the great. A nervous fever was the
consequence; during which he was nursed by the daughter of a poor cottager, under
whose roof he lodged. She was lovely, gentle, and, above all, kind to him; nor can it
afford astonishment, that the late idol of high-bred beauty should, even in a fallen state,
appear a being of an elevated and wondrous nature to the lowly cottage-girl. The
attachment between them led to the ill-fated marriage, of which I was the offspring.
Notwithstanding the tenderness and sweetness of my mother, her husband still deplored
his degraded state. Unaccustomed to industry, he knew not in what way to contribute to
the support of his increasing family. Sometimes he thought of applying to the king; pride
and shame for a while withheld him; and, before his necessities became so imperious as
to compel him to some kind of exertion, he died. For one brief interval before this
catastrophe, he looked forward to the future, and contemplated with anguish the desolate
situation in which his wife and children would be left. His last effort was a letter to the
king, full of touching eloquence, and of occasional flashes of that brilliant spirit which
was an integral part of him. He bequeathed his widow and