HARRISON, (John L.) [Captain,18th Century] Manuscript Miscellany books

HARRISON, (John L.) [Captain,18th Century] Manuscript Miscellany books of letters and poems, [London, circa 1771-75], small 4to, one volume in contemporary vellum, the other marbled paper boards and leather spine, approximately 80 text pages (not including blanks), some leaves excised (stubs remaining)

Provenance:

Pencilled note to paste-down states “MSS book of Capt. J. L. Harrison. London”

Footnote:

The two books show the ambitions of its author to be a wit and a poet and captures friendships built through letters and exchange of verse. Among the extracts from published works and occasional jokes, Captain Harrison of Bishop’s Hall in Bethnal Green, has copied letters sent and received, the majority of which are in verse form.
Several names occur in the manuscript, but one appears multiple times, a “Mr A-m M-t”. In a prefatory note to a poem he sends to A. M., he writes: “I beg you’ll point out the faults it contains of which I’m conscious there are many and communicate them and your opinion of the whole to me” (ff. 25). Harrison records verse he receives in return, with both men using the medium of poetry to foster their friendship and affirm each other’s work.
In a series of letters to and from “A M—t”, he asks his friend to help settle “A controversy [which] arose between two young lady’s and myself: I held that in the marriage state the man is the better half, they that the woman is which we left to be undecided…” A.M. does not fully agree, so Harrison replies, “I wonder sir you should give the preference to the Lady’s for I think the man is certainly the better half for he has the care of his business the getting of money to support his family and sundry other things I might mention” and marshals quotations from Virgil, Ovid, William Shenstone, Elizabeth Rowe, and John Milton. A.M. responds with allegory which tells of a man (aptly named “John”) who fails to understand the meaning of things: On discovering a leather purse he thinks: “Leather says he can serve some end / Old shoes perhaps may patch and mend […] Regardless of the luck thus gain’d / Concerned him not what it contain’d”
Harrison pens a “jocular” verse regarding women (including the line “As he the Master she should Mistress be”), then after a confused defence of his position, protests that it “was A jocular Piece of raillery and as such I apprehended it would have been taken”. He concludes his apologetic letter, “This sir I hope will Atone for the misapprehensions of my former. I conclude With saying I entertain the most sincere and unfeign’st respect for them [women] and all those that defend them And remain your sincere Friend.” (ff. 17-18). On the next page we see Harrison’s “jocular” verse in action again in a rebuke to an unresponsive servant (we are given only their initials “C. B”) whose door he has been “thumping” to no avail: “But all my labour’s been in vain / And you have laid reclin’d till eight / Beneath your drowsy sluggish weight […]”. When not attempting to assert the superiority of men or berating servants, he shares an “Acrostic to Miss E.H on having the toothache”, and there are several letters and verse to his sister, which he signs “your ever loving Brother”. There are also a handful of pages detailing accounts relating to millinery.