The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. I | Page 6

declares that if she did not so well
know the justness of her cause and complaint, she would be stark wild
with her hard treatment. Scott, she adds, will soon be free.[13] Even
this final appeal obtained no response, and at length-- well nigh
desperate-- Mrs. Behn negotiated in England, from a certain Edward
Butler, a private loan of some £150 which enabled her to settle her
affairs and start for home in January, 1667.
[Footnote 12: There do not appear to be any grounds for the
oft-repeated assertions that Mrs. Behn communicated the intelligence
when the Dutch were planning an attack (afterwards carried out) on the
Thames and Medway squadrons, and that her warning was scoffed at.]
[Footnote 13: Had he been imprisoned for political reasons it is
impossible that there should have been so speedy a prospect of release.]
But the chapter of her troubles was by no means ended. Debt weighed
like a millstone round her neck. As the weary months went by and
Aphra was begging in vain for her salary, long overdue, to be paid,
Butler, a harsh, dour man with heart of stone, became impatient and
resorted to drastic measures, eventually flinging her into a debtor's
prison. There are extant three petitions, undated indeed, but which must
be referred to the early autumn of 1668, from Mrs. Behn to Charles II.
Sadly complaining of two years' bitter sufferings, she prays for an order
to Mr. May[14] or Mr. Chiffinch[15] to satisfy Butler, who declares he
will stop at nothing if he is not paid within a week. In a second
document she sets out the reasons for her urgent claim of £150. Both
Mr. Halsall and Mr. Killigrew know how justly it is her due, and she is
hourly threatened with an execution. To this is annexed a letter from
the poor distracted woman to Killigrew, which runs as follows:--

Sr.
if you could guess at the affliction of my soule you would I am sure
Pity me 'tis to morrow that I must submitt my self to a Prison the time
being expird & though I indeauerd all day yesterday to get a ffew days
more I can not because they say they see I am dallied w{th} all & so
they say I shall be for euer: so I can not reuoke my doome I haue cryd
myself dead & could find in my hart to break through all & get to y{e}
king & neuer rise till he weare pleasd to pay this; but I am sick &
weake & vnfitt for yt; or a Prison; I shall go to morrow: But I will send
my mother to y{e} king w{th} a Pitition for I see euery body are words:
& I will not perish in a Prison from whence he swears I shall not stirr
till y{e} uttmost farthing be payd: & oh god, who considers my misery
& charge too, this is my reward for all my great promises, & my
indeauers. Sr if I have not the money to night you must send me som
thing to keepe me in Prison for I will not starue.
A. Behn.
Endorsed:
For Mr. Killigrew this.
[Footnote 14: Baptist May, Esq. (1629-98), Keeper of the Privy Purse.]
[Footnote 15: William Chiffinch, confidential attendant and pimp to
Charles II.]
[Illustration: (Letter transcribed in body text)]
There was no immediate response however, even to this pathetic and
heart-broken appeal, and in yet a third petition she pleads that she may
not be left to suffer, but that the £150 be sent forthwith to Edward
Butler, who on Lord Arlington's declaring that neither order nor money
had been transmitted, threw her straightway into gaol.
It does not seem, however, that her imprisonment was long. Whether
Killigrew, of whom later she spoke in warm and admiring terms,

touched at last, bestirred himself on her behalf and rescued her from
want and woe, whether Mrs. Amy Amis won a way to the King,
whether help came by some other path, is all uncertain. In any case the
debt was duly paid, and Aphra Behn not improbably received in
addition some compensation for the hardships she had undergone.
'The rest of her Life was entirely dedicated to Pleasure and Poetry; the
Success in which gain'd her the Acquaintance and Friendship of the
most Sensible Men of the Age, and the Love of not a few of different
Characters; for tho' a Sot have no Portion of Wit of his own, he yet, like
old Age, covets what he cannot enjoy.'
More than dubious and idly romancing as the early Memoirs are,
nevertheless this one sentence seems to sum up the situation
thenceforth pretty aptly, if in altogether too general terms. Once
extricated from these main difficulties Mrs. Behn no