The Adventures of Roderick Random

Selling Rich Clothes for Money

With hope restored regarding his uncle’s possible return, Roderick consults Banter about immediate subsistence. Banter advises liquidating several rich suits of clothes by selling them at half-price to a salesman on Monmouth Street, promising that in a few months Roderick can satisfy all debts. Though Roderick initially hesitates, fearing fraud, he is persuaded by the honesty of his intention and the urgency of his need. He learns that his uncle’s ship has not yet arrived, puts Banter’s scheme into practice, and raises twenty-five guineas, repaying the old debt of five guineas for Banter’s advice.

KAPITEL LXI.

The chapter relates the narrator’s imprisonment in the Marshalsea following his arrest for a tailor’s debt, his reunion with the old acquaintance Jackson who shares his own misadventures, the introduction to the imprisoned poet Melopoyn whose elegy deepens the narrator’s melancholy, and Strap’s practical resolution to hire himself as a barber to support his master during confinement.

The Arrest

The narrator is arrested by his tailor for a bill of fifty pounds after a player reveals the narrator’s whereabouts by wearing one of the suits he had sold. Refusing to be taken to a sponging-house, he is conveyed to the Marshalsea prison, where he secures a small bed-chamber for a crown a week and dispatches a message to his servant Strap.

Meeting Jackson in Jail

While awaiting Strap’s arrival, the narrator receives a visit from Jackson, an old acquaintance from his earlier memoirs. The two men greet each other warmly, and the narrator repays a loan he had previously received from Jackson while inquiring into the internal economy and regulations of the Marshalsea.

Jackson’s Adventures

Jackson narrates his adventures since their last meeting: deceived into marrying a lady of supposed fortune who proved to be a common woman of the town, he fled to Portsmouth and entered the navy as a surgeon’s mate, subsequently becoming surgeon of a sloop. Upon returning to London, he was arrested within a week for his wife’s debts and has remained in prison since.

Strap’s Arrival

Strap arrives at the prison exhibiting extreme grief at his master’s misfortune. Jackson’s lighthearted unconcern and joviality gradually dissipate Strap’s distress, restoring his composure. The trio shares a meal of boiled beef and greens from a neighbouring cook’s shop, accompanied by a bottle of wine that elevates their spirits.

The Poet Melopoyn

Jackson presents the narrator to Mr. Melopoyn, a destitute but highly educated poet resident in the prison. Melopoyn delivers erudite lectures on genius and taste to the assembled prisoners, receiving voluntary contributions averaging eighteen pence weekly, though his auditors comprehend little of his discourse. He has also composed a tragedy of acknowledged merit and is characterized by infinite learning, impeccable morals, and invincible modesty.

The Elegy

The narrator requests to examine Melopoyn’s poetical works and is profoundly affected by an elegy composed in imitation of Tibullus, addressed to Monimia. The poem’s despondent tone mirrors the narrator’s own romantic disappointments, causing him to identify the subject with Narcissa and plunge into such deep melancholy that he resorts to wine to secure sleep.

Strap’s Resolution

Strap announces that he has engaged himself as a journeyman barber, a measure designed to economise on the narrator’s expenses during his imprisonment and to earn a subsistence for them both should the narrator’s funds be exhausted before relief arrives.

KAPITEL LXII.

The narrator reads Melopoyn’s tragedy with great admiration, judging it by the classical rules of Aristotle and Horace, finding the plot well-constructed, the characters strongly contrasted, and the diction appropriately poetic. Melopoyn then recounts his life story: the son of a country curate who educated him in the classics, he planned his tragedy while young but his father’s death left him poor, and after his mother’s death he journeyed to London with high hopes of theatrical fame. He obtained a recommendation from a Catholic priest to the manager Mr. Supple, but faced repeated delays; when he finally called on Supple, the manager claimed his son had destroyed the manuscript by using it as waste paper in the kitchen. Melopoyn rewrote the entire play from memory, only to be told the season had passed and he must wait until the next year, by which time he had nearly exhausted his money. Facing destitution, he attempted various literary avenues—pastoral poems rejected by booksellers, translation work that paid a pittance—before descending to write sensationalist ballads and ghostly tales for Grub Street publishers, earning meager sums while producing content for the lowest tastes of the common people.