Note 69 — Chapter VII

The editor of “The Scourge” was one Jack Mitford. He received a classical education, was originally in the navy, and fought under Hood and Nelson. Besides “The Scourge,” he edited “The Bon Ton” magazine, and “Quizzical Gazette,” and was author of a sea song once popular, “The King is a true British Sailor.” He was an irreclaimable drunkard, thought only of the necessities of the hour, and slept in the fields when his finances would not admit of payment of a twopenny lodging in St. Giles’s. His largest work was “Johnny Newcome in the Navy,” for which the publisher gave him the generous remuneration of a shilling a day till he finished it. He died in St. Giles’s workhouse in 1831.