lows. As for Suicide, I do condemn it,
and abhor it utterly, as the most cowardly, Dishonest, and unworthy
Method to which a Man can resort that he may rid himself of his
Difficulties. To make a loathsome unhandsome corpse of yourself, and
deny yourself Christian Burial, nay, run the risk of crowner's quest,
and interment at the meeting of four cross-roads with a Stake driven
through your Heart. Oh, 'tis shameful! Hang yourself, forsooth! why
should you spend money in threepenny cord, when Jack Ketch, if you
deserve it, will hang you for nothing, and the County find the rope?
Take poison! why, you are squeamish at accepting physic from the doctor,
which may possibly do you good. Why, then, should you swallow a vile
mess which you are _certain_ must do you harm? Fall upon your sword, as
Tully--I mean Brutus--or some of those old Romans, were wont to do when
the Game was up! In the first place, I should like to see the man,
howsoever expert a fencer, who could so tumble on his own blade and kill
himself. 'Tis easier to swallow a sword than to fall upon one, and the
first is quite as much a Mountebank's Trick as t'other. Blow your brains
out! A mighty fine climax truly, to make a Horrible Mess all over the
floor, and frighten the neighbours out of their wits, besides, as a
waggish friend of mine has it, rendering yourself stone-deaf for life.
If it comes to powder and ball, why, a Man of courage would much sooner
blow out somebody else's Brains instead of his own.

I did not, I am thankful to say, want Bread during this my time of ill
luck; and I never parted with my sword; but sure it is that Jack
Dangerous was woundily pushed, and had to adopt many extraordinary
shifts for a livelihood. _Item:_ I engaged myself to one Mr. O'Teague,
an Irishman, that had been a pupil of the famous Mr. Figg, Master of the
Noble Art of Self-Defence, at his Theatre of Arms, on the right hand
side of the Oxford Road, near Adam and Eve Court. Mr. Figg was, as is
well known, the very Atlas of the Sword; and Mr. O'Teague's body was a
very Mass of Scars and Cicatrices gotten in hand-to-hand conflicts with
the broadsword on the public stage. He had once presumed to rival Mr.
Figg, whence arose a cant saying of the time, "A fig for the Irish;" but
having been honourably vanquished by him, even to the slicing of his
nose in two pieces, the cracking of his crown in sundry places, and the
scoring of his body as though it had been a Loin of Pork for the