AN EVENTFUL CAREER.

Observer, Volume 3, Issue 63, 26 November 1881, Page 168

AN EVENTFUL CAREER.

Some of our readers may remember a young fellow named Bayly — Ernest Bayly, who, vulgarly speaking, " ran-a-mucker " in Auckland about fourteen months ago, and eventually departed down South rather precipitately leaving, as mementoes of his stay amongst \is, a, largo number of unsettled 1.0.U.'s and unpaid tradesmen's bills, not to mention other trifling etceteras. Bavly is the son of the first classical master at Cheltenham College, an M.A. of Oxford and a clergyman of the Church of England. The boy evidenced symptoms of being a " rip " very early in life, and in consequence his father sent him to sea when a little more than twelve. Being what is called a "taking lad" he. got along very well for the first few years, and would probably have received promotion unusually early in life but for a confirmed habit of lying in the most

extraordinary and preposterous manner. Tins trifling defect together -vvitli other peculiar evidences of moral obliquity caused him to receive ,' the sack" from one employ after another till, at the age o£ I*7, he found himself in the streets of Calcutta one fine morning with no billet, no prospects, and nothing but a portmanteau of clothes and the sum of £15 between him and starvation. Most youths would have been somewhat depressed by such a melancholy wind up to a promising nautical career, but Bayly, according to his own account, felt rather clatod than not. " I was free, yo\i see," he says when telling the story, " and after being ordered about for so long by captain and officers that seemed a great deal." Anyhow, economy appears to have been the last thought to enter his mind. The fellow went at . once to a crack hotel, and, demanding first-class rooms, declared himself to be the junior partner of a (fictitious) firm of Bombay commission agents, " Maleolmson and C 0.," on whose account he had come across the Continent to open a branch house. Mr Bayly seemed rather young for such a billet, and at first the hotelkeeper appears to have received the story with considerable doubt and suspicion. The lavish way, however, in which the young man slapped down his money, his frank and apparently honest face and his intimate knowledge of all the swells in Bombay (he had stayed there sometime) reassured "mine host," and Bayly declares that before night he was overpowering civil. Having established himself in comfortable quarters, B.s next work was to engage an office (" Maleolmson & Co." over the door), and two black clerks, whom he set to work inditing circulars informing the commercial community that a branch of that well-known Scotch firm, M. and Co., had been started in Calcutta. Well, a week passed, and the new " commission agent," by dint of calling on one person and scraping an acquaintance at the hotel with others, had got to know a large number of persons, all of whom, he says, were " fetched :> by his " gentlemanly demeanour and pleasant manner." Money, however, was running short. "When the first week's board had been paid Bayly found he had only £4 left, and the commission business did not seem likely to yield any very brilliant returns. Whether the fellow really believed he would be able to pull tlmnigh. and pay everyone honestly on the proceeds of this happy-go-lucky start, we have never felt quite able lo determine. His exploits in Auckland subsequently (notably the short lived journal called Life and the ''Private Inquiry Office") were quite as mad mid visionary, yet he seemed to believe in their yielding him a handsome competence implicitly. Anyhow, Bayly never showed any shame in telling the story. We heard him recount it on board ship before a smoking-room full of passengers, and he brought forth billheads, circular forms and advertisements to prove its veracity. Without doubt the yarn was adorned by many imaginative details, but we are dropping these now, and fully believe the narrative as related here to be time. But to resume : A month passed, and Mr Bayly was very much in Queer-street. The Bombay branch' of " Maleolmson and Co." proved strangely remiss in forwarding the junior partner cash to carry on their Calcutta branch : and though that luckless individual managed to negotiate sundry small loans which kept him in pocket money, the landlord at the hotel was politely hinting at a settlement of his rather lengthy account, and a " bust-up" appeared to be imminent. At this crisis Bayly met an old shipmate, and with refreshing candour revealed to him the difficulties of the position. This worthy was a relative of the manager of the British India Company in Bombay, and gave his friend a. letter to that gentleman, saying it would get him a passage home to London in some capacity or another. "But," suggested 8., "the hotel bill ; lioav am Ito pay it ?" " Oh," replied his friend, "you will have to send the money for that when you get to England. I can let you have enough to take you & to Bombay." After some talk Bayly agreed to the plan, though not, he declares, without shame; and by dint of lying freely, managed to clear Calcutta. It was not, however, so easy to get to Bombay. The journey is a terribly long and expensive one, and when at last he did reach the great Indian seaport, two or three rupees represented his entire available capital. As luck would have it, however, a doctor was wanted for the s.s. El Dorado, leaving for London in two days; and Bayly seeing an advertisement in the paper to this effect, at once presented his letter to the manager of the B.S.ISf. Company, and demanded the billet. That gentleman received him cordially, and never (so Bayly says) seemed to suspect he was anything but what he represented himself to be, -i.e., a medical student who had just received hie diploma, and was travelling as ship doctor for a time. The appointment was conferred on him without inquiry, and the manager asked him out to dinner. The self -dubbed " doctor " went, and his host was so- pleasant and friendly, and made him take so much champagne, that after dinner, in a moment of maudlin confidence, Mr Bayly let out that he was "no doctor at all." Instead of laughing at the joke and appreciating the humour of the situation, the manager looked very serious. He said nothing, and soon°after the pair went to bed; but when Bayly woke up in the morning it was with the pleasing conviction that he had once The above article appeared in our Thames edition a. few weeks ago.

more " cooked liis goose." The manager, lioav•ever, was more genercras tlian might have been Anticipated. He told the youth he could not go in the El Dorado as doctor, but, on finding he ■knew something of soamahship, allowed him to • ship as fourth mate. _ Bayly did not go straight Home. He got his -discharge at Malta, and tried to obtain a situation there, but merely succeeded in contracting more ■debts for his father to pay. When at last the fellow did reach England, he had a very pretty Story to tell, and the drafts that had to be :sent to Calcutta and Malta totted up to a nice little sum. Parents, however, are long- • suffering, more especially with an eldest son, and after a solemn lecture the young man was forgiven, and spent a jolly three months' holiday in London and Cheltenham. His father then -offered him another start in New Zealand, and, after purchasing a good outfit, Bayly was, with many promises of amendment, duly shipped to Auckland. During the voyage out, the writer, as a passenger on the same ship, had ample opportunities of studying Mr Bayly's character. He betted and gambled .-.(the latter very luckily) as if ho had a fortune .instead of about £20 at his back ; and when he landed here we had seen enough of " my gentleman "to make us very shy of him. It was, how•ever, not our business to spoil the future of a lad commencing "a new life in a new land " with illnatured inuendoes, and we are glad to think we 'did what little we could to induce him to settle down to work on an up-country farm. The country, however, didn't suit Mr Bayly. He lied in such an outrageous fashion that even the most hospitable of settlers couldn't stand him, and after a week on the Kaipara the fellow came back to town again. This trip, however, brought •about one result. Bayly met a gentleman on the :steamer coming down avlio took a great fancy to him, and two days later lie was made an honorary member of the Auckland Club. Jfrom this point ■Mr Bayly's career in the North is pretty avcll known. Almost immediately he became friendly with a number of members, all of whom were ultimately bled more or less, and when he went down South it was in H.M.S Dana?. At Wellington, which Bayly made his first stopping place, he was a member of the Club, and went into the " best " society- There was a- ' story current here to the effect that he proposed to the daughter of one of the richest squatters in the Masterton district, and, by representing himsenting himself as a sprig of the English nobility, well nigh succeeded in marrying her. We don't know whether this is true, but it is quite likely, for ladies invariably appeared to " take " to the fellow. When next heard of, Bayly was at Ilobart Town, where he was brought before the magistrate for obtaining money on false pretences, and only got off with a light sentence on the ground of his youth and supposed ignorance of business matters. He had been going into the best society in Tasmania, and the night before his arrest was at the Governors ball. The papers avc saAv appeared to be much exercised about a small boy the adventurer had with him, nominally his pupil . (and the son of a Avealthy English merchant), but in reality, it Avas staled, the offspring of a Melbourne publican. This boy would give no information as to his own parentage, and Avas dreadfully distressed aa"licii the police locked up his protector in durance vile. One of the Pollards, who Avas staying in the same hotel at Ilobart Town as Bayly, declared he accidentally caught the former teaching his little protegee how to cheat at cards. This yarn, however, must ho receiA'cd cam grana stali.s. Biiylv may be a '"' bad lot," but avc don't guile believe he is a card sharper. It Avas in April or May that the Ilobart Town trouble took place, and from then till Thursday last nothing Avas heard of tins extraordinary felloAv. The Albion, however, brought a letter from him to an acquaintance in Auckland to avlioih lie oaves money. Baylv is iioav a. tutor to two small boys (we A\'on't say where, because if he is earning an honest livelihood he ought not to be molested) . As he both writes and spells infamously, and through going to sea at 12 years of ago had literally no education, it avouM be interesting to know hoAv and by Avhat means he teaches his youthful charges and humbugs their parents.