Chapter 47
carissa howe volume three by samuel richardson letter forty seven to robert lovelace esq his honour saturday april fifteenth may it please your honour this is to let your honour know as how i have been employed in a business i would have been excused from if so be i could for it is to get evidence from a young man who has of late come out to be my cousin by my grandmother's side and but lately come to live in these parts about a very vile thing as young master calls it relating to your honour god forbid i should call it so without your relief it is not for so plain a man as i be to tax my betters it is concerning one miss batterton of nottingham a very pretty creature belike your honour got her away it seems by a false letter to her i can believe as how her she cousin that she dearly loved was coming to see her and was tacking ill upon the road and so miss batterton set out in a chaise and one servant to fet her cousin from the inn where she lay sick as she thought and the servant was tricked and brought back the chaise
but Miss Batterson was not our love for a month or so, and when it came to pass that her friends found her out and would have prosecuted your honour, your honour was gone abroad, and so she was brought to bed,
as one may say, before your honour's return, and she got cold and her lying in and languished and soon died. And the child is living, but your honour never troubles your honour's head about it. in the least and this and some other matters of very bad report squire solmes was to tell my young lady of if so be she would have heard him speak before we lost her sweet company as i may say from here
your honour helped me to many ugly stories to tell against your honour to my young master and young mistress but did not tell me about this i most umbelly beseech your honour to be good and kind and fitful to my dearest young lady now you have her or i shall break my heart for having done some deeds that have helped to bring things to this pass pray your dear good honour be just pray ye do as god shall love ye pray ye do i cannot write no more for this present for very fear and grief but now i am come to my writing again will your honour be pleased to tell me if as how there be any danger to your honour's life from this business for my cousin is actyle hired to go down to miss batterton's friends to see if they will stir in it for you must know your honour as how he lived in the batterton family at the time and could be a good evidence and all that I hope it was not so very bad as Titus says it was.
For he says as how there was a rape in the case betwixt you at first, and please your honour, and my cousin Titus is a very honest young man as ever broke bread. This is his character, and this made me willinger to own him for my relation when he came to talk. If there should be danger of your honour's life, I hope your honour will not be hanged
like as one of us common men. Only have your head cut off, or so, and yet it is pit such a head should be lost. But if as how it should be prosecuted to that fur, which God forbid, be pleased, nay the less, to think of your faithful Joseph Lehmann, before your head be condemned, for after condemnation, as I have been told, all will be the kings or the shreves. I thought as how it was best to acquaint your honour of this, and for you to let me know if I could do anything to sarve your honour, and prevent mischief with my cousin Titus, on his coming back from Nottingham, before he makes his report.
I have gine him a hint already, for what, as I said to him, cousin Titus, signifies stirring up the coals and mackin' of strife, to make rich gentlefolks live at variance, and to be cuttin' of throats and such like. Very true, said little Titus And this, and please your honour Gis me hope of him If so be your honour gis me direction
Saying, as God knows I have a poor, a very poor invention Only a willing mind to prevent mischief That is the chief of my aim And always was, I bless my God
Else I could have made much mischief in my time As indeed any servant may Your Honor, nevertheless, praises my invention every now and then. Alas, and please, Your Honor, what invention should such a plain man as I have? But when Your Honor sets me a-going by your fine invention, I can do well enough,
and I am sure I have a hearty good will to deserve Your Honor's favour, if I mow. Two days, as I may say, off and on, have I been writing this long letter, and yet I have not said all I would say for be it known unto your honour as how I do not like that Captain Singleton
which I told you of in my last two letters he is always laying his head and my young master's head together and I suspect much if so be some mischief is not going on between them
and still the more as because my eldest young lady seems to be joined to them sometimes Last week my young master set before my face. My heart's blood boils over, Captain Singleton, for revenge upon this.
And he called your honour by a name. It is not for such a one as me to say what. Captain Singleton whispered my young master, being I was by. So young master said, You may say anything before Joseph. For although he looks so silly,
he has as good a heart and as good a head as any servant in the world need to have my conscience touched me just then but why should it when all i do is to prevent mischief and seeing your honour has so much patience which young master has not so am not afeard of telling your honour anything whatsomever and furthermore i have such a desire to deserve your honour's bounty to me as makes me let nothing pass i can tell you of to prevent harm and too besides your honour's goodness about the blue boar which i have so good an account of i am sure i shall be bounden to bless your honour the longest day i have to live and then the blue boar is not all neither send and please your honour the pretty sow god forgive me for jesting in so serious a matter runs in my head likewise i believe i shall love her mayhap more than your honour would have me for she begins to be kind and good-humoured and listens and please your honour like as if she was among beings when i talk about the blue boar and all that
pray your honour forgive the jesting of a poor plain man we common folks have our joys and please your honour thick as our betters have and if we be sometimes snubbed we can find our underlings to snub them again and if not we can get a wife mayhap and snub her so our masters somehow or other ourselves but how i try your honour's patience servants will show their joyful hearts though oft but in partenance when encouraged be pleased from the premises to let me know if as how i can be put upon any service to sarve your honour and to sorve my dearest young lady which god grant for i begin to be afeard for her hearing what people talk to be sure your honour will not do her no harm as a man may say but i know your honour must be good to so wondrous a young lady how can you help it but here my conscience smites me that but for some of my stories which your honour doped me my old master and my old lady and the two old squires would not have been able to be half so hard-hearted as they be for all my young master and young mistress says
and here is the sad thing they cannot come to clear up matters with my dearest young lady because as your honour has ordered it they have these stories as if bribed by me out of your honour's sarvant which must not be known for fear you should kill un and me too and blacken the briber ah your honour i doubt as tha i am a very vile fellow lord bless my soul i pray god and did not intend it but if my dearest young lady shall come to arm and please your honour the horse-bond at the blue boar but lord preserve us all from all bad mischief and all bad ends i pray the lord for though if your honour is kind to me in worldly pelf yet what shall a man get to lose his soul as holy scritter says and please your honour but natheless i am in hope of repentance hereafter being a young man if i do wrong through ignorance your honour being a great man and a grave wit and i a poor creature not worthy otis and your honour able to answer for all but howsoever i am
your honor's faithful sarvant in all duty joseph demon april fifteenth and sixteenth letter forty seven
