The Adventures of Roderick Random

When Marmozet returns to London, he treats Melopoyn with great courtesy, invites him to his lodgings to share his critical notes, and after a debate where Melopoyn answers his objections, Marmozet claims to fully approve the play, advising Melopoyn to apply directly to Earl Sheerwit for a formal message of support to Mr. Vandal, which Marmozet promises to second. Melopoyn secures a promise of the earl’s message, provided Marmozet can confirm Vandal has no other engagements; shortly after, however, Melopoyn learns from the same channel that Marmozet told Earl Sheerwit the play was unfit for the stage. Melopoyn chooses to ignore this intelligence, and when Marmozet tells him Vandal is free of engagements, Melopoyn delivers the play to Vandal, who claims Marmozet never mentioned Earl Sheerwit’s name, but agrees to read the play immediately, saying he would not dare reject a work approved by the earl. Melopoyn is intoxicated with hope, but three days later, Vandal rejects the play as improper for the stage, offering vague, unintelligible objections that Melopoyn is convinced Vandal never read, likely prompted by Marmozet’s hidden influence. Melopoyn later learns Vandal’s judgment was clouded by superstition, a tyrannical wife, and fear of hellfire.

Ruined by the failure of his play, Melopoyn resolves to find mean work to support himself, but his landlord, who had expected to be paid from the play’s third-night profits, uses his influence to get a message from a lady of fashion to Mr. Brayer, demanding Brayer produce the play. Brayer agrees, but claims he must read it again (as his memory retains nothing from the first reading) and demands further alterations, promising to produce it the next winter if Melopoyn delivers the revised copy before the end of April. Melopoyn complies, but before he can claim performance, Mr. Marmozet has become joint patentee with Brayer, who now claims he cannot produce the play without Marmozet’s consent, as Marmozet is pre-engaged to another author. Melopoyn’s final hope is crushed when his landlord dies, his executors seize his meagre effects, turn him out into the streets naked, where he is arrested for debt and thrown into debtors’ prison, where he has survived five weeks on the charity of fellow prisoners until Roderick Random’s small acts of kindness ease his suffering.

CHAPTER LXV picks up after Melopoyn’s story concludes, with Roderick plunged into deep melancholy by the tale of the playwright’s exploitation, neglectful of his own appearance for three months, until his long-lost uncle Mr. Bowling finds him in prison and pays off his debt to free him. Bowling, now a successful privateer captain who has made a small fortune capturing French privateers and merchant ships, proposes Roderick sail with him as the ship’s surgeon on a lucrative voyage, offering him a share of his profits and promising to leave him his entire estate if he survives him. Roderick is torn, as he still pines for Narcissa, the gentlewoman he was separated from by her controlling squire brother, but Bowling dismisses his romantic feelings as idle, a burden only for those with nothing else to occupy their time. Stung by the rebuke, Roderick accepts the offer; his loyal valet Strap insists on accompanying him, and is made the ship’s steward by Bowling, who gives him a loan to purchase trade goods for the voyage. Before the ship sets sail, Roderick implements a plan he devised while in prison: he asks Bowling for leave for himself and Strap to stay on shore while the ship waits for dispatches in the Downs, hires horses, and rides to Sussex to see Narcissa one last time before he leaves the kingdom.

Roderick hides his horses five miles from Narcissa’s squire brother’s estate, waits for nightfall, then goes to the cottage of Mrs. Sagely, the old woman who had previously aided his and Narcissa’s secret meetings. Mrs. Sagely tells him Narcissa is now more strictly confined than ever, after a servant betrayed that she had mailed a letter to Roderick, so the only way to see her is to sneak into the squire’s walled garden and hide in the thicket near the alcove where Narcissa and her maid Miss Williams take their daily air. Against Mrs. Sagely’s and Strap’s protests, Roderick arms himself with pistols and a hanger, sneaks over the garden wall at dawn, and hides in the thicket until six in the evening, when Narcissa and Miss Williams arrive at the alcove. Roderick has left a miniature portrait of himself, painted while he was in London, on the alcove table; when Narcissa picks it up, she is startled by the likeness, kisses it, and declares it the dearest object she owns, at which point Roderick steps out of hiding. Narcissa shrieks and faints in Miss Williams’ arms, but Roderick revives her with his kisses, and the two spend an hour lamenting their forced separation, repeating their vows of eternal constancy, before Miss Williams reminds them Roderick must leave immediately to avoid being caught by the squire’s armed servants. Roderick returns to Mrs. Sagely’s cottage, gives her 20 guineas in gratitude for her aid, then rides back to Deal, where he finds Bowling is anxious about his absence, as the ship has received its dispatches and must sail immediately.

The next day, a brisk easterly wind springs up, and the ship sets sail, clearing the English Channel in 48 hours. Once they are 200 leagues west of Land’s End, Bowling takes Roderick aside and reveals the voyage’s true destination, which he had been ordered to keep secret until they were far from English waters: they are bound for the coast of Guinea, where they will trade part of their cargo for enslaved people and gold dust, then transport the enslaved people to Buenos Ayres in Paraguay, where they will sell them and their remaining goods for silver, using passports from the British and Spanish courts to avoid legal interference. Roderick studies Spanish during the voyage, and leads the crew in bloodletting and purging to prevent the dangerous tropical fevers that afflict northern sailors in hot climates, a precaution that proves successful, as only one sailor dies on the passage to Guinea. Five weeks into the voyage, they spot a large ship bearing down on them with all sail; Bowling prepares for battle, ordering the crew to quarters, and delivers a rousing speech promising to compensate any sailor who is maimed out of his own pocket, as his cargo is fully insured, which boosts the crew’s flagging morale. At the last minute, however, the pursuing ship hauls down French colours, hoists English ones, and reveals herself to be an English man-of-war commanded by an old messmate of Bowling’s, who had disguised his ship with French fleurs-de-lis to lure enemy privateers. The two ships sail together for four days before parting, their courses diverging.