The Adventures of a Rake
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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"There is, I believe, no person, however insignificant in the world, but, if an account of his life and adventures were committed to paper, would be entertaining in some degree: the follies of our own life, and those we are liable to be drawn into by others, will constantly afford matter for serious reflection. Those which are innocent (as there are harmless follies) will be most entertaining ; and those of a vicious kind, may, if properly related, deter others from pursuing the same path." --The Adventures of a Rake described in Ashbee's Catena Librorum Tacendorum |
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The Adventures of a Rake Containing A Variety of entertaining Particulars and Curiosities, in the Cabinet of Venus·
Privately Printed. London : 1881.
Originally printed as The Pleasures of Love
The truth of the above platitude [see inset], with which the volume before us opens, was never less forcibly exemplified than in the flimsily written narrative entitled The Pleasures of Love. The hero, son of a gentleman of fortune, tells his own story. He is sent to reside with an uncle in the country, where he becomes enamoured of a farmer's daughter, whom he wishes to marry. The union being disapproved by the friends on both sides, the love-sick youth elopes with his darling Betsy. His uncle has him pursued, and forcibly carried off, not however before he has obtained the last favour from the willing fair one. He is carried to London, and articled to an attorney. Neither his master nor the study of the law is to his taste ; and his vexation, augmented by regret at the loss of his intended wife, drives him into dissipation. Although his father, whom he accidentally meets when at the end of his resources, pays his debts, finds him a new master, and pardons him, he soon falls back into his old courses, until, reduced to the verge of penury, he accepts service as a footman to a lady in the country. On arriving at his place he finds that his duties to his mistress are to be of a personal and most familiar kind. She is however a woman in the prime of life, he is nothing loth, and gives such substantial satisfaction that he becomes her major-domo. Similar services are accorded to the cook and housemaid, so that his energies are kept well employed. This lady having gone to London for a change sends home a new chambermaid, who, to our hero's astonishment and delight, turns out to be no other than his beloved Betsy, of whom ever since he was forced away from her he has been unable to obtain any trace. A newspaper, in which Betsy has wrapped up some of the trinkets he gave her, informs him at the same time of the death of his father, through which occurence he has become master of the paternal estate. He now weds Betsy, and goes with her to her home, where they discover that she is not the daughter of a farmer, but of a man of wealth, and is in fact entitled to no less a sum than £20,000.
"I could not," observes the narrator in conclusion, "help acknowledging the hand of Providence, in thus bringing about things by so uncommon a series of chequered circumstances."
The tale is padded with the adventures of two London strumpets with whom our rake sleeps ; and mention is made of " that school of Venus, Bob Derry's," and "the Golden Lion in the Strand, well known by the name of "The Cat."
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