to Ensign William Newall
from Charles Newall
Marischal College, Aberdeen.
5th October 1760
". . . 'a night with a whore is cheaper than a night in an inn, besides being healthful exercise.' -- these were your words, William, your very words. Well they cost me dear, so it is to you that I now must look for support for I am here in Aberdeen without a boddle to my name and if my fees and keep for the Martinmas Term had not already been paid, I must needs beg my way back home to Kirkcudbright.
On your advice William, I got off the coach at Dundee last night and gave the potboy at the inn (a knowing rogue) a copper for directions to a cleanly Cyprian -- or as you soldiers would say, whore -- of the town. I was directed to a most respectable house in the Nethergate where I made a satisfactory bargain for a night's entertainment at bed and board with Betty, as handsome a bawd as you could wish. However, and to cut this wretched story short, we were scarce started on our 'healthful exercise' when there came a mighty thundering at the door, and in burst a Constable of the Watch, shouting about bye-laws and fornication and such like, and marches us off (me with my breeches flapping round my arse, and my cock standing up like a maypole) to the Town House where I was cuffed up the stairs and thrown into a filthy cell.
So there was I, who had expected to enjoy the comforts of Betty in the clean sheets and soft bed for which I had paid, left to the discomforts of a cell which I was to share with a drunken sailor. There was but a single mangy blanket, fairly jumping with fleas, but when I complained of the quarters, the Constable said I was lucky to be there, for in the old days prisoners were kept in the Tollbooth where one unlucky wretch was killed and eaten by the rats.
After I had been there for upwards of an hour, shivering with cold, for my snorting sailor had rolled himself in the blanket and had gone to sleep, I heard the Watch again and hollo'd until he came, damning me for a noisy rogue. I told him that I was heartily sorry for my wickedness, and in a desperate plight, for my coach would depart for Aberdeen in the morning, and how was I to get on it? He said I must be taken before the Magistrate to answer charges of lewd and libidinous behaviour offensive to the lieges, and I pleaded my youth and inexperience. In the end he took pity on me and for a fee he agreed to take me before a Bailie who might be persuaded to attend to my case early in the morning. And so it proved, for the Bailie grunting and slobbering over his porridge called me a desperate rogue, whoremaster etc., fined me heavily, and with severe warnings had me run through the streets and thrown on to my coach by the Constable. . .
*
to Charles Newall, Esq
from Ensign William Newall
83rd Regiment of Foot
Co. Monaghan, Ireland
9th October 1970
My poor simple brother, you have been plucked like a pigeon. Small wonder they say the fool of the family is sent into the ministry. Do you not see, man, that the Bailie, the Bulkie and Betty the whore -- aye, and the potboy too -- were leagued together to rob you? You should have paid off the constable and whore, cutting out the magistrate, who always takes the lion's share. Go back to Dundee and I'll warrant you will find your Betty still plying her trade in the Nethergate, when she should have been whipped from the town.
I would not advise you to go back to her, though, for you will surely be cozened again. If you must continue your education, seek out a sporting woman next time, and propose a game of Put-and-Take. This is where you put five shillings (as it might be) under her pillow for a start, then you put in another shilling each time that you spend, and take one out every time that she is fetched. Ply yourself manfully, and you may have cheap accommodation indeed! In any event, she will have no reason to call in her bully.
