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You may copy it, + give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project + Gutenberg License <a href="#pglicense" class="tei tei-ref">included with this + eBook</a> or online at <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/license" class="tei tei-xref">http://www.gutenberg.org/license</a></p></div><pre class="pre tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em">Title: Henry Esmond; The English Humourists; The Four Georges + +Author: William Makepeace Thackeray + +Release Date: July 10, 2009 [Ebook #29363] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HENRY ESMOND; THE ENGLISH HUMOURISTS; THE FOUR GEORGES*** +</pre></div> + </div> + <div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> + + </div> + + <hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.73em"><span style="font-size: 173%">Henry Esmond</span></p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.73em"><span style="font-size: 173%">The English Humourists</span></p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.73em"><span style="font-size: 173%">The Four Georges</span></p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.20em"><span style="font-size: 120%">By</span></p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.73em"><span style="font-size: 173%">William Makepeace Thackeray</span></p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.20em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Edited, with an Introduction, by</span></p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.20em"><span style="font-size: 120%">George Saintsbury</span></p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.20em"><span style="font-size: 120%">With 15 Illustrations</span></p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em">Humphrey Milford</p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em">Oxford University Press</p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em">London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Copenhagen,</p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em">New York, Toronto, Melbourne, Cape Town,</p> + <p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em">Bombay, Calcutta, Madras, Shanghai</p> + </div> + <hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> + <h1 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 3.46em; margin-top: 3.46em"><span style="font-size: 173%">Contents</span></h1> + <ul class="tei tei-index tei-index-toc"><li><a href="#toc1">Introduction.</a></li><li><a href="#toc3">The History Of Henry Esmond, Esq.</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc5">Dedication.</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc7">Preface. The Esmonds Of Virginia</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc9">Book I. The Early Youth Of Henry Esmond, Up To The Time Of His +Leaving Trinity College, In Cambridge</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc11">Chapter I. An Account Of The Family Of Esmond Of Castlewood Hall</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc13">Chapter II. Relates How Francis, Fourth Viscount, Arrives At Castlewood</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc15">Chapter III. Whither In The Time Of Thomas, Third Viscount, I Had Preceded +Him As Page To Isabella</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc17">Chapter IV. I Am Placed Under A Popish Priest And Bred +To That Religion.—Viscountess Castlewood</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc19">Chapter V. My Superiors Are Engaged In Plots For The Restoration Of +King James II</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc21">Chapter VI. The Issue Of The Plots.—The Death Of Thomas, Third Viscount +Of Castlewood; And The Imprisonment Of His Viscountess</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc23">Chapter VII. I Am Left At Castlewood An Orphan, And Find Most Kind Protectors +There</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc25">Chapter VIII. After Good Fortune Comes Evil</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc27">Chapter IX. I Have The Small-Pox, And Prepare To Leave Castlewood</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc29">Chapter X. I Go To Cambridge, And Do But Little Good There</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc31">Chapter XI. I Come Home For A Holiday To Castlewood, And Find +A Skeleton In The House</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc33">Chapter XII. My Lord Mohun Comes Among Us For No Good</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc35">Chapter XIII. My Lord Leaves Us And His Evil Behind Him</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc37">Chapter XIV. We Ride After Him To London</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc39">Book II. Contains Mr. Esmond's Military Life, And Other Matters +Appertaining To The Esmond Family</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc41">Chapter I. I Am In Prison, And Visited, But Not Consoled There</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc43">Chapter II. I Come To The End Of My Captivity, But Not Of My Trouble</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc45">Chapter III. I Take The Queen's Pay In Quin's Regiment</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc47">Chapter IV. Recapitulations</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc49">Chapter V. I Go On The Vigo Bay Expedition, Taste Salt Water And Smell +Powder</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc51">Chapter VI. The 29th December</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc53">Chapter VII. I Am Made Welcome At Walcote</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc55">Chapter VIII. Family Talk</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc57">Chapter IX. I Make The Campaign Of 1704</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc59">Chapter X. An Old Story About A Fool And A Woman</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc61">Chapter XI. The Famous Mr. Joseph Addison</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc63">Chapter XII. I Get A Company In The Campaign Of 1706</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc65">Chapter XIII. I Meet An Old Acquaintance In Flanders, And Find My Mother's +Grave And My Own Cradle There</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc67">Chapter XIV. The Campaign Of 1707, 1708</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc69">Chapter XV. General Webb Wins The Battle Of Wynendael</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc71">Book III. Containing The End Of Mr. Esmond's Adventures In England</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc73">Chapter I. I Come To An End Of My Battles And Bruises</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc75">Chapter II. I Go Home, And Harp On The Old String</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc77">Chapter III. A Paper Out Of The “Spectator”</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc79">Chapter IV. Beatrix's New Suitor</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc81">Chapter V. Mohun Appears For The Last Time In This History</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc83">Chapter VI. Poor Beatrix</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc85">Chapter VII. I Visit Castlewood Once More</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc87">Chapter VIII. I Travel To France And Bring Home A Portrait Of Rigaud</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc89">Chapter IX. The Original Of The Portrait Comes To England</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc91">Chapter X. We Entertain A Very Distinguished Guest At Kensington</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc93">Chapter XI. Our Guest Quits Us As Not Being Hospitable Enough</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc95">Chapter XII. A Great Scheme, And Who Balked It</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc97">Chapter XIII. August 1st, 1714</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc99">Appendix</a></li><li><a href="#toc101">The English Humourists Of The Eighteenth Century</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc103">Lecture The First. Swift</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc105">Lecture The Second. Congreve And Addison</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc107">Lecture The Third. Steele</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc109">Lecture The Fourth. Prior, Gay, And Pope</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc111">Lecture The Fifth. Hogarth, Smollett, And Fielding</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc113">Lecture The Sixth. Sterne And Goldsmith</a></li><li><a href="#toc115">The Georges</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc117">The Poems</a></li><li style="margin-left: 2em"><a href="#toc119">Sketches Of Manners, Morals, Court And Town Life</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc121">George The First</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc123">George The Second</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc125">George The Third</a></li><li style="margin-left: 4em"><a href="#toc127">George The Fourth</a></li><li><a href="#toc129">Footnotes</a></li></ul> + </div> + + </div> +<div class="tei tei-body" style="margin-bottom: 6.00em; margin-top: 6.00em"> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> +<a name="toc1" id="toc1"></a> +<a name="pdf2" id="pdf2"></a> +<h1 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 3.46em; margin-top: 3.46em"><span style="font-size: 173%">Introduction.</span></h1> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/study.png" width="700" height="580" alt="Illustration" title="Thackeray In His Study At Onslow Square. From a painting by E. M. Ward" /><div class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em">Thackeray In His Study At Onslow Square. From a painting by E. M. Ward</div></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We know exceedingly little of the genesis and progress of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span>. <span class="tei tei-q">“It did not seem to be a part of our lives as +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pendennis</span></span> was,”</span> says Lady Ritchie, though she wrote part +of it to dictation. She <span class="tei tei-q">“only heard <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> spoken of +very rarely”</span>. Perhaps its state was not the less gracious. +The Milton girls found <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Paradise Lost</span></span> a very considerable +part of their lives—and were not the happier. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But its parallels are respectable. The greatest things +have a way of coming <span class="tei tei-q">“all so still”</span> into the world. We +wrangle—that is, those of us who are not content simply +not to know—about the composition of Homer, the purpose +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Divina Commedia</span></span>, the probable plan of the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Canterbury Tales</span></span>, the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Ur-Hamlet</span></span>. Nobody +put preliminary advertisements in the papers, you see, about these things: there +was a discreditable neglect of the first requirements of the +public. So it is with <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span>. There is, I thought, a reference +to it in the Brookfield letters; but in several searches +I cannot find it. To his mother he speaks of the book +as <span class="tei tei-q">“grand and melancholy”</span>, and to Lady Stanley as of +<span class="tei tei-q">“cut-throat melancholy”</span>. It is said to have been sold +for a thousand pounds—the same sum that Master Shallow +lent Falstaff on probably inferior security. Those who +knew thought well of it—which is not wholly surprising. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is still, perhaps, in possession of a success rather of +esteem than of affection. A company of young men and +maidens to whom it was not long ago submitted pronounced +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagex">[pg x]</span><a name="Pgx" id="Pgx" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +it (with one or two exceptions) inferior as a work +of humour. The hitting of little Harry in the eye with +a potato was, they admitted, humorous, but hardly anything +else. As representing another generation and +another point of view, the faithful Dr. John Brown did not +wholly like it—Esmond's marriage with Rachel, after +his love for Beatrix, being apparently <span class="tei tei-q">“the fly in the ointment”</span> +to him. Even the author could only plead <span class="tei tei-q">“there's +a deal of pains in it that goes for nothing”</span>, as he says in one +of his rare published references to the subject: but he was +wrong. Undoubtedly the mere taking of pains will not +do; but that is when they are taken in not the right +manner, by not the right person, on not the right subject. +Here everything was right, and accordingly it <span class="tei tei-q">“went for”</span> +everything. A greater novel than <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> I do not know; +and I do not know many greater books. It may be <span class="tei tei-q">“melancholy”</span>, +and none the worse for that: it is <span class="tei tei-q">“grand”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For though there may not be much humour of the +potato-throwing sort in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span>, it will, perhaps, be found +that in no book of Thackeray's, or of any one else's, is that +deeper and higher humour which takes all life for its province—which +is the humour of humanity—more absolutely +pervading. And it may be found likewise, at least by some, +that in no book is there to be found such a constant intertwist +of the passion which, in all humanity's higher +representatives, goes with humour hand in hand—a loving +yet a mutually critical pair. Of the extraordinarily +difficult form of autobiography I do not know such another +masterly presentment; nor is it very difficult to recognize +the means by which this mastery is attained, though +Heaven knows it is not easy to understand the skill with +which they are applied. The success is, in fact, the result +of that curious <span class="tei tei-q">“doubleness”</span>—amounting, in fact, here to +something like <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">triplicity</span></em>—which distinguishes Thackeray's +attitude and handling. Thus Henry Esmond, who is on +the whole, I should say, the most like him of all his characters +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexi">[pg xi]</span><a name="Pgxi" id="Pgxi" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +(though of course <span class="tei tei-q">“romanced”</span> a little), is himself and <span class="tei tei-q">“the +other fellow”</span>, and also, as it were, human criticism of both. +At times we have a tolerably unsophisticated account of +his actions, or it may be even his thoughts; at another his +thoughts and actions as they present themselves, or might +present themselves, to another mind: and yet at other +times a reasoned view of them, as it were that of an impartial +historian. The mixed form of narrative and mono-drama +lends itself to this as nothing else could: and so +does the author's well-known, much discussed, and sometimes +heartily abused habit of <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">parabasis</span></span> or soliloquy to +the audience. Of this nothing has yet been directly said, +and anything that is said would have to be repeated as +to every novel: so that we may as well keep it for the last +or a late example, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Virginians</span></span> +or <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Philip</span></span>. But its +efficacy in this peculiar kind of double or treble handling +is almost indisputable, even by those who may dispute +its legitimacy as a constantly applied method. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One result, however, it has, as regards the hero-spokesman, +which is curious. I believe thoroughly in Henry Esmond—he +is to me one of the most real of illustrious Henrys as +well of Thackeray's characters—but his reality is of +a rather different kind from that of most of his fellows. +It is somewhat more abstract, more typical, more generalized +than the reality of English heroes usually is. He is not in +the least shadowy or allegoric: but still he is somehow +<span class="tei tei-q">“Esmondity”</span> as well as Esmond—<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">the</span></em> melancholy rather than +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">a</span></em> melancholy, clearsighted, aloofminded man. His heart +and his head act to each other as their governing powers, +passion and humour, have been sketched as acting above. +He is a man never likely to be very successful, famous, or +fortunate in the world; not what is generally called a +happy man; yet enjoying constant glows and glimmers +of a cloudy happiness which he would hardly exchange +for any other light. The late Professor Masson—himself +no posture-monger or man of megrims, but one of genial +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexii">[pg xii]</span><a name="Pgxii" id="Pgxii" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +temper and steady sense—described Thackeray as <span class="tei tei-q">“a man +apart”</span>; and so is the Marquis of Esmond. Yet Thackeray +was a very real man; and so is the Marquis too. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/onslow.png" width="447" height="700" alt="Illustration" title="No. 36 Onslow Square, Brompton, Where Thackeray Lived From 1853 to 1862." /><div class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em">No. 36 Onslow Square, Brompton, Where Thackeray Lived From 1853 to 1862.</div></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The element of abstraction disappears, or rather retires +into the background, when we pass to Beatrix. She +also has the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Ewigweibliche</span></span> in her—as much of it +as any, or almost any, of Shakespeare's women, and therefore more +than anybody else's. But she is very much more than a +type—she is Beatrix Esmond in flesh and blood, and damask +and diamond, born <span class="tei tei-q">“for the destruction of mankind”</span> +and fortunately for the delight of them, or some of them, +as well. Beatrix is beyond eulogy. <span class="tei tei-q">“Cease! cease to sing +her praise!”</span> is really the only motto, though perhaps something +more may be said when we come to the terrible pendant +which only Thackeray has had the courage and the skill +to draw, with truth and without a disgusting result. If +she had died when <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> closes I doubt whether, in +the Wood of Fair Ladies, even Cleopatra would have dared +to summon her to her side, lest the comparison should not +be favourable enough to herself, and the throne have to be +shared. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But, as usual with Thackeray, you must not look to the +hero and heroine too exclusively, even when there is +such a heroine as this. For is there not here another +heroine—cause of the dubieties of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Doctor Fidelis</span></span> as +above cited? As to that it may perhaps be pointed out +to the extreme sentimentalists that, after all, Harry had +been in love with the mother, as well as with the daughter, +all along. If they consider this an aggravation, it cannot +be helped: but, except from the extreme point of view +of Miss Marianne Dashwood in her earlier stage, it ought +rather to be considered a palliative. And if they say further +that the thing is made worse still by the fact that Harry was +himself Rachel's <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">second</span></em> love, and that she did not exactly +wait to be a widow before she fell in love with him—why, +there is, again, nothing for it but to confess that it is very +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexiii">[pg xiii]</span><a name="Pgxiii" id="Pgxiii" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +shocking—and excessively human. Indeed, the fact is +that Rachel is as human as Beatrix, though in a different +way. You may not only <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">love</span></em> her less, but—in a different +sense of contrast from that of the Roman poet—<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">like</span></em> her +a little less. But you cannot, if you have any knowledge +of human nature, call her unnatural. And really I do +not know that the third lady of the family, Isabel Marchioness +of Esmond, though there is less written about her, is not as +real and almost as wonderful as the other two. She is +not so fairly treated, however, poor thing! for we have her +Bernstein period without her Beatrix one. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for my Lords Castlewood—Thomas, and Francis +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">père et fils</span></span>—their creator has not +taken so much trouble with them; but they are never <span class="tei tei-q">“out”</span>. The least of a piece, +I think, is Rachel's too fortunate or too unfortunate husband. +The people who regard Ibsen's great triumph in +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Doll's House</span></span> as consisting in the conduct of the husband +as to the incriminating documents, ought to admire +Thackeray's management of the temporary loss of Rachel's +beauty. They are certainly both touches of the baser side +of human nature ingeniously worked in. But the question +is, What, in this wonderful book, is <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">not</span></em> ingeniously worked +in—character or incident, description or speech? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If the champions of <span class="tei tei-q">“Unity”</span> were wise, they would take +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> as a battle-horse, for it is certain that, great as +are its parts, the whole is greater than almost any one of +them—which is certainly not the case with <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pendennis</span></span>. +And it is further certain that, of these parts, the personages +of the hero and the heroine stand out commandingly, +which is certainly not the case with <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pendennis</span></span>, again. +The unity, however, is of a peculiar kind: and differs +from the ordinary non-classical <span class="tei tei-q">“Unity of Interest”</span> which +Thackeray almost invariably exhibits. It is rather a +Unity of <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Temper</span></em>, which is also present (as the all-pervading +motto <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Vanitas Vanitatum</span></span> almost necessitates) in +all the books, but here reaches a transcendence not elsewhere +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexiv">[pg xiv]</span><a name="Pgxiv" id="Pgxiv" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +attained. The brooding spirit of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Ecclesiastes</span></span> here +covers, as it were, with the shadow of one of its wings +the joys and sorrows, the failures and successes of a private +family and their friends, with the other the fates of +England and Europe; the fortunes of Marlborough and +of Swift on their way from dictatorship, in each case, +to dotage and death; the big wars and the notable literary +triumphs as well as the hopeless passions or acquiescent +losses. It is thus an instance—and the greatest—of that +revival of the historical novel which was taking place, +and in which the novel of Scott<a id="noteref_1" name="noteref_1" href="#note_1"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">1</span></span></a>—simpler, though not so +very simple as is sometimes thought—is being dashed with +a far heavier dose of the novel-element as opposed to +the romance, yet without abandonment of the romance-quality +proper. Of these novel-romance scenes, as they +may be called, the famous mock-duel at the end is of +course the greatest. But that where the Duke of Hamilton +has to acknowledge the Marquis of Esmond, and where +Beatrix gives the kiss of Beatrix, is almost as great: and +there are many others. It is possible that this very transcendence +accounts to some extent for the somewhat lukewarm +admiration which it has received. The usual devotee of +the novel of analysis dislikes the historic, and has taught +himself to consider it childish; the common lover of +romance (not the better kind) feels himself hampered by +the character-study, as Émile de Girardin's subscribers felt +themselves hampered by Gautier's style. All the happier +those who can make the best of both dispensations! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Nothing, however, has yet been said of one of the most +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexv">[pg xv]</span><a name="Pgxv" id="Pgxv" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +salient characteristics of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span>—one, perhaps, which has +had as much to do with the love of its lovers and the +qualified esteem of those who do not quite love it, as anything +else. This is, of course, the attempt, certainly a very +audacious one, at once to give the very form and pressure +of the time of the story—sometimes in actual diction—and +yet to suffuse it with a modern thought and colour which +most certainly were <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">not</span></em> of the time. The boldness and the +peril of this attempt are both quite indisputable; and the +peril itself is, in a way, double. There is the malcontent +who will say <span class="tei tei-q">“This may be all very fine: but I don't like +it. It bothers and teases me. I do not want to be talked +to in the language of Addison and Steele”</span>. And there +will be the possibly less ingenuous but more obtrusive +malcontent who will say that it ought never to have +been done, or that it is not, as it is, done well. With the +first, who probably exists <span class="tei tei-q">“in squadrons and gross bands”</span>, +argument is, of course, impossible. He may be taught better +if he is caught young, but that is all: and certainly the +last thing that any honest lover of literature would wish +would be to make him say that he likes a thing when he +does not. That may be left to those who preach and follow +the fashions of the moment. Nor, perhaps, is there very +much to do with those who say that the double attempt +is not successful—except to disable their judgement. But +as for the doctrine that this attempt <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">deserves</span></em> to fail, and +must fail—that it is wrong in itself—there one may take +up the cudgels with some confidence. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So far from there being anything illegitimate in this +attempt to bring one period before the eyes of another +in its habit as it lived, and speaking as it spoke, +but to allow those eyes themselves to move as they move +and see as they see—it is merely the triumph and the +justification of the whole method of prose fiction in general, +and of the historical novel in particular. For that historical +novel is itself the result of the growth of the historic sense +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexvi">[pg xvi]</span><a name="Pgxvi" id="Pgxvi" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +acting upon the demand for fiction. So long as people +made no attempt to understand things and thoughts +different from those around and within them; so long as, +like the men of the Middle Ages, they blandly threw everything +into their own image, or, like those of the Renaissance +to some extent and the Augustan period still more, regarded +other ages at worst with contempt, and at best with +indulgence as childish—the historical novel could not +come into being, and did not. It only became possible +when history began to be seriously studied as something +more than a chronicle of external events. When it had +thus been made possible, it was a perfectly legitimate +experiment to carry the process still further; not merely +to discuss or moralize, but to represent the period as it was, +without forfeiting the privilege of regarding it from a +point of view which it had not itself reached. The process +of Thackeray is really only an unfolding, and carrying +further into application, of the method of Shakespeare. +Partly his date, partly his genius, partly his dramatic +necessities, obliged Shakespeare to combine his treatment—to +make his godlike Romans at once Roman and Elizabethan, +and men of all time, and men of no time at all. +Thackeray, with the conveniences of the novel and the +demands of his audience, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">dichotomizes</span></em> the presentation +while observing a certain unity in the fictitious person, now +of Henry Esmond, now of William Makepeace Thackeray +himself. If anybody does not like the result, there is +nothing to be said. But there are those who regard it +as one of the furthest explorations that we yet possess +of human genius—one of the most extraordinary achievements +of that higher imagination which Coleridge liked to +call <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">esenoplastic</span></em>.<a id="noteref_2" name="noteref_2" href="#note_2"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">2</span></span></a> That a man should have the faculty +of reproducing contemporary or general life is wonderful; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexvii">[pg xvii]</span><a name="Pgxvii" id="Pgxvii" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +that he should have the faculty of reproducing past life +is wonderful still more. But that he should thus revive +the past and preserve the present—command and provide at +once theatre and company, audience and performance—this +is the highest wizardry of all. And this, as it seems +to me, is what Thackeray had attempted, and more, what +he has done, in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">History of Henry Esmond</span></span>.<a id="noteref_3" name="noteref_3" href="#note_3"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">3</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He could not have done it without the <span class="tei tei-q">“pains”</span> to which +he refers in the saying quoted above; but these pains, as +usual, bore fruit more than once. It has been thought +desirable to include in the present volume the two main +after-crops,<a id="noteref_4" name="noteref_4" href="#note_4"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">4</span></span></a> <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The English Humourists</span></span> and +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Four Georges</span></span>. +Exactly <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">how</span></em> early Thackeray's attention was drawn to +the eighteenth century it would, in the necessarily incomplete +state of our biographical information about +him, be very difficult to say. We have pointed out that +the connexion was pretty well established as early as +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Catherine</span></span>. But it was evidently founded upon that +peculiar congeniality, freshened and enlivened with a +proper dose of difference, which is the most certain source +and the purest maintainer of love in life and literature. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At the same time, the two sets of lectures are differentiated +from the novel not so much by their form—for Thackeray +as a lecturer had very little that smacked of the platform, +and as a novelist he had a great deal that smacked of the +satiric conversation-scene—as by their purport. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span>, +though partly critical, is mainly and in far the greater part +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexviii">[pg xviii]</span><a name="Pgxviii" id="Pgxviii" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +creative. The Lectures, though partly creative—<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">resurrective</span></em>, +at any rate—are professedly and substantially critical. +Now, a good deal has been said already of Thackeray's +qualities and defects as a critic: and it has been pointed +out that, in consequence of his peculiar impulsiveness, +his strong likes and dislikes, his satiric-romantic temperament, +and perhaps certain deficiencies in all-round literary +and historical learning, his critical light was apt to be +rather uncertain, and his critical deductions by no means +things from which there should be no appeal. But <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +English Humourists</span></span> is by far the most important <span class="tei tei-q">“place”</span> +for this criticism in the literary department; and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +Four Georges</span></span> (with <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Book of Snobs</span></span> to some extent +supplementing it) is the chief place for his criticism of +society, personality, and the like. Moreover, both have +been, and are, violently attacked by those who do not +like him. So that, for more reasons than one or two, +both works deserve faithful critical handling themselves. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is always best to disperse Maleger and his myrmidons +before exploring the beauties of the House of Alma: +so we may take the objections to the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Humourists</span></span> first. +They are chiefly concerned with the handling of Swift and +(in a less degree) of Sterne. Now, it is quite certain that +we have here, in the first case at any rate, to confess, +though by no means to avoid. It is an instance of that +excessive <span class="tei tei-q">“taking sides”</span> with or against his characters +which has been noticed, and will be noticed, again and +again. Nor is the reason of this in the least difficult to +perceive. It is very doubtful whether Thackeray's own +estimate of average humanity was much higher than Swift's: +nor is it quite certain that the affection which Swift professed +and (from more than one instance) seems to have really +felt for Dick, Tom, and Harry, in particular, as opposed +to mankind at large, was very much less sincere than +Thackeray's own for individuals. But the temperament +of the one deepened and aggravated his general understanding +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexix">[pg xix]</span><a name="Pgxix" id="Pgxix" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of mankind into a furious misanthropy; while +the temperament of the other softened <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">his</span></em> into a general +pardon. In the same way, Swift's very love and friendship +were dangerous and harsh-faced, while Thackeray's were +sunny and caressing. But there can be very little doubt +that Thackeray himself, when the <span class="tei tei-q">“Shadow of Vanity”</span> was +heaviest on him, felt the danger of actual misanthropy, +and thus revolted from its victim with a kind of terror; +while his nature could not help feeling a similar revulsion +from Swift's harsh ways. That to all this revulsion he +gives undue force of expression need not be denied: but +then, it must be remembered that he does not allow it to +affect his <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">literary</span></em> judgement. I do not believe that any +one now living has a greater admiration for Swift than +I have: and all that I can say is that I know no estimate +of his genius anywhere more adequate than Thackeray's. +As for Sterne, I do not intend to say much. If you will +thrust your personality into your literature, as Sterne +constantly does, you must take the chances of your personality +as well as of your literature. You practically +expose both to the judgement of the public. And if +anybody chooses to take up the cudgels for Sterne's personality +I shall hand them over to him and take no part +on one side or another in that bout. To his <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">genius</span></em>, once +more, I do not think Thackeray at all unjust. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The fact is, however, that as is usual with persons of +genius, but even more than as usual, the defects and the +qualities are so intimately connected that you cannot have +one without the other—you must pay the price of the +other for the one. All I can say is that such another <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">live</span></em> +piece of English criticism of English literature as this +I do not know anywhere. What is alive is very seldom +perfect: to get perfection you must go to epitaphs. But, +once more, though I could pick plenty of small holes in +the details of the actual critical dicta, I know no picture +of the division of literature here concerned from which +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexx">[pg xx]</span><a name="Pgxx" id="Pgxx" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a fairly intelligent person will derive a better impression +of the facts than from this. Addison may be a little +depressed, and Steele a little exalted: but it is necessary +to remember that by Macaulay, whose estimate then +practically held the field, Steele had been most unduly +depressed and Addison rather unduly exalted. You may +go about among our critics on the brightest day with the +largest lantern and find nothing more brilliant itself than +the <span class="tei tei-q">“Congreve”</span> article, where the spice of injustice will, +again, deceive nobody but a fool. The vividness of the +<span class="tei tei-q">“Addison and Steele”</span> presentation is miraculous. He redresses +Johnson on Prior as he had redressed Macaulay on +Steele; and he is not unjust, as we might have feared that +he would be, to Pope. <span class="tei tei-q">“Hogarth, Smollett, and Fielding”</span> +is another miracle of appreciation: and I should like to +ask the objectors to <span class="tei tei-q">“sentimentality”</span> by what other means +than an intense <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">sympathy</span></em> (from which it is impossible to +exclude something that may be called sentimental) such +a study as that of Goldsmith could have been produced? +Now Goldsmith is one of the most difficult persons in the +whole range of literature to treat, from the motley of his +merits and his weaknesses. Yet Thackeray has achieved +the adventure here. In short, throughout the book, +he is invaluable as a critic, if not impeccable in criticism. +His faults, and the causes of them, are obvious, +separable, negligible: his merits (the chief of them, as +usual, the constant shower of happy and illuminative +phrase) as rare in quality as they are abundant in +quantity. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The lectures on <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The English Humourists</span></span> must have been +composed very much <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">pari passu</span></span> +with <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span>; they were +being delivered while it was being finished, and it was published +just as the author was setting off to re-deliver them +in America. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Four Georges</span></span> were not regularly taken +in hand till some years later, when <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Newcomes</span></span> was +finished or finishing, and when fresh material was wanted +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexxiii">[pg xxiii]</span><a name="Pgxxiii" id="Pgxxiii" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +for the second American trip. But there exists a very +remarkable <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">scenario</span></em> of them—as it may be almost called—a +full decade older, in the shape of a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">satura</span></span> of verse and +prose contributed to <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Punch</span></span> on October 11, 1845; which +has accordingly been kept back from its original associates +to be inserted here. All things considered, it gives the +lines which are followed in the later lectures with remarkable +precision: and it is not at all improbable that Thackeray +actually, though not of necessity consciously, took it for +head-notes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +No book of his has been so violently attacked both at +the time of its appearance and since. Nor—for, as the reader +must have seen long ago, the present writer, though proud +to be called a Thackerayan stalwart, is not a Thackerayan +<span class="tei tei-q">“know-nothing”</span>, a <span class="tei tei-q">“Thackeray-right-or-wrong”</span> man—is +there any that exposes itself more to attack. From the +strictly literary side, indeed, it has the advantage of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +Book of Snobs</span></span>: for it is nowhere unequal, and exhibits +its author's unmatched power of historical-artistic imagination +or reconstruction in almost the highest degree possible. +But in other respects it certainly does show the omission +<span class="tei tei-q">“to erect a sconce on Drumsnab”</span>. There was (it has +already been hinted at in connexion with the Eastern +Journey) a curious innocence about Thackeray. It may +be that, like the Hind, +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +He feared no danger for he knew no sin; +</span></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +but the absence of fear with him implied an apparent +ignoring of danger, which is a danger in itself. Nobody +who has even passed Responsions in the study of his +literary and moral character will suspect him for one +moment of having pandered to American prejudice by +prating to it, as a tit-bit and <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">primeur</span></span>, scandal about +this or that King George. But it was quite evident from the +first, and ought to have been evident to the author long +beforehand, that the enemy <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">might</span></em> think, and <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">would</span></em> say so. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexxiv">[pg xxiv]</span><a name="Pgxxiv" id="Pgxxiv" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +In fact, putting considerations of mere expediency aside, +I think myself that he had much better not have done it. +As for the justice of the general verdict, it is no doubt +affected throughout by Thackeray's political incapacity, +whatever side he might have taken, and by that quaint +theoretical republicanism, with a good deal of pure Toryism +mixed, which he attributes to some of his characters, and no +doubt, in a kind of rather confused speculative way, held +himself. He certainly puts George III's ability too low, +and as certainly he indulges in the case of George IV in one +of these curious outbursts—a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Hetze</span></span> of unreasoning, frantic, +<span class="tei tei-q">“stop-thief!”</span> and <span class="tei tei-q">“mad-dog!”</span> persecution—to which he +was liable. <span class="tei tei-q">“Gorgius”</span> may not have been a hero or a +proper moral man: he was certainly <span class="tei tei-q">“a most expensive +<span lang="de" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="de"><span style="font-style: italic">Herr</span></span>”</span>, and by no means a pattern husband. +But recent and by no means Pharisaical expositions have exhibited +his wife as almost infinitely <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">not</span></em> better than she should be; +the allegations of treachery to private friends are, on +the whole, Not Proven: if he deserted the Whigs, it was +no more than some of these very Whigs very shortly afterwards +did to their country: he played the difficult part +of Regent and the not very easy one of King by no means +ill; he was, by common and even reluctant consent, an +extremely pleasant host and companion; and he liked +Jane Austen's novels. There have been a good many +princes—and a good many demagogues too—of whom as +much good could not be said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Admitting excess in these details, and <span class="tei tei-q">“inconvenience”</span> +in the circumstances of the original representation, there +remains, as it seems to me, a more than sufficient balance +to credit. That social-historic sense, accompanied with +literary power of bodying forth its results, which we noticed +as early as the opening of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Catherine</span></span> has, in the seventeen +years' interval, fully and marvellously matured itself. The +picture is not a mere mob of details: it is an orderly pageant +of artistically composed material. It is possible; it is life-like; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexxv">[pg xxv]</span><a name="Pgxxv" id="Pgxxv" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the only question (and that is rather a minor one) +is, <span class="tei tei-q">“Is it true?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Minor, I say, because the artistic value would remain +if the historical were impaired. But I do not think it is. +I shall bow to the authority of persons better acquainted +with the eighteenth century than I am: but if some decades +of familiarity with essayists and novelists and diarists +and letter-writers may give one a scanty +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">locus standi</span></span>, I shall +certainly give my testimony in favour of <span class="tei tei-q">“Thackeray's +Extract”</span>. The true essence of the life that exhibits itself +in fiction from <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pamela</span></span> and +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Joseph Andrews</span></span> down to <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pompey +the Little</span></span> and the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spiritual Quixote</span></span>; in essay from the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span> to the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mirror</span></span>; +in Lord Chesterfield and Lady Mary +and Horace Walpole; in Pope and Young and Green and +Churchill and Cowper, in Boswell and Wraxall, in Mrs. +Delany and Madame d'Arblay, seems to me to deserve +warrant of excise and guarantee of analysis as it lies in +these four little flaskets. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And, as has been done before, let me finish with an almost +silent indication of the wonderful variety of this volume +also. In one sense the subject of its constituents is the +same. Yet in another it is treated with the widest and +most infinite difference. Any one of the three treatments +would be a masterpiece of single achievement; while the +first of the three is, as it seems to me, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">the</span></em> masterpiece of +its entire class.<a id="noteref_5" name="noteref_5" href="#note_5"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">5</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexxvii">[pg xxvii]</span><a name="Pgxxvii" id="Pgxxvii" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +THE MS. OF <span class="tei tei-q">“ESMOND”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The MS. is contained in two volumes and was presented +to Trinity College, Cambridge, by the author's daughter; +it is now deposited in the College Library. Sir Leslie +Stephen, in writing to the Librarian about it on June 11, +1889, says:— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There are three separate handwritings. Thackeray's own +small upright handwriting; that of his daughter, now +Mrs. Richmond Ritchie, a rather large round handwriting; +and that of an amanuensis whose name I do not know. +The interest is mainly this, that it shows that Thackeray +dictated a considerable part of the book; and, as Mrs. +Ritchie tells me, he dictated it without having previously +written anything. The copy was sent straight to press as +it stands, with, as you will see, remarkably little alteration. +As <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> is generally considered to be his most perfect +work in point of style, I think that this is a remarkable +fact and adds considerably to the interest of the MS.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The four facsimiles which follow, and which appear here +by the very kind permission of Lady Ritchie and of the +authorities of the College, have been slightly reduced to fit +the pages. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="pagexxix">[pg xxix]</span><a name="Pgxxix" id="Pgxxix" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/facsimile-1.png" width="451" height="700" alt="Illustration: Facsimile 1" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/facsimile-2.png" width="454" height="700" alt="Illustration: Facsimile 2" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/facsimile-3.png" width="478" height="700" alt="Illustration: Facsimile 3" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/facsimile-4.png" width="454" height="700" alt="Illustration: Facsimile 4" /></div> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page001">[pg 001]</span><a name="Pg001" id="Pg001" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> +<a name="toc3" id="toc3"></a> +<a name="pdf4" id="pdf4"></a> +<h1 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 3.46em; margin-top: 3.46em"><span style="font-size: 173%">The History Of Henry Esmond, Esq.</span></h1> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +THE HISTORY OF +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +HENRY ESMOND, ESQ. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A COLONEL IN THE SERVICE OF HER MAJESTY +QUEEN ANNE +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +WRITTEN BY HIMSELF +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Servetur ad imum<br /> +Qualis ab incepto processerit, et sibi constet +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +[First edition in three volumes, 1852. Revised edition, 1858] +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page005">[pg 005]</span><a name="Pg005" id="Pg005" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc5" id="toc5"></a> +<a name="pdf6" id="pdf6"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Dedication.</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +WILLIAM BINGHAM, LORD ASHBURTON +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">My Dear Lord</span></span>, +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The writer of a book which copies the manners and +language of Queen Anne's time, must not omit the Dedication +to the Patron; and I ask leave to inscribe this volume +to your lordship, for the sake of the great kindness and +friendship which I owe to you and yours. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My volume will reach you when the Author is on his +voyage to a country where your name is as well known as +here. Wherever I am, I shall gratefully regard you; and +shall not be the less welcomed in America because I am +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Your obliged friend and servant, +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +W. M. THACKERAY. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">London</span></span>, October 18, 1852. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page007">[pg 007]</span><a name="Pg007" id="Pg007" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc7" id="toc7"></a> +<a name="pdf8" id="pdf8"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Preface. The Esmonds Of Virginia</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The estate of Castlewood, in Virginia, which was given +to our ancestors by King Charles the First, as some return +for the sacrifices made in his Majesty's cause by the Esmond +family, lies in Westmoreland county, between the rivers +Potomac and Rappahannoc, and was once as great as an +English Principality, though in the early times its revenues +were but small. Indeed, for near eighty years after our +forefathers possessed them, our plantations were in the +hands of factors, who enriched themselves one after another, +though a few scores of hogsheads of tobacco were all the +produce that, for long after the Restoration, our family +received from their Virginian estates. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My dear and honoured father, Colonel Henry Esmond, +whose history, written by himself, is contained in the accompanying +volume, came to Virginia in the year 1718, built +his house of Castlewood, and here permanently settled. +After a long stormy life in England, he passed the remainder +of his many years in peace and honour in this country; +how beloved and respected by all his fellow citizens, how +inexpressibly dear to his family, I need not say. His whole +life was a benefit to all who were connected with him. +He gave the best example, the best advice, the most bounteous +hospitality to his friends; the tenderest care to his +dependants; and bestowed on those of his immediate +family such a blessing of fatherly love and protection, as +can never be thought of, by us at least, without veneration +and thankfulness; and my son's children, whether established +here in our Republick, or at home in the always +beloved mother country, from which our late quarrel hath +separated us, may surely be proud to be descended from +one who in all ways was so truly noble. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My dear mother died in 1736, soon after our return from +England, whither my parents took me for my education; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page008">[pg 008]</span><a name="Pg008" id="Pg008" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and where I made the acquaintance of Mr. Warrington, +whom my children never saw. When it pleased Heaven, +in the bloom of his youth, and after but a few months of +a most happy union, to remove him from me, I owed my +recovery from the grief which that calamity caused me, +mainly to my dearest father's tenderness, and then to the +blessing vouchsafed to me in the birth of my two beloved +boys. I know the fatal differences which separated them +in politics never disunited their hearts; and as I can love +them both, whether wearing the king's colours or the +Republick's, I am sure that they love me, and one another, +and him above all, my father and theirs, the dearest friend +of their childhood, the noble gentleman who bred them +from their infancy in the practice and knowledge of Truth, +and Love, and Honour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My children will never forget the appearance and figure +of their revered grandfather; and I wish I possessed the +art of drawing (which my papa had in perfection), so that +I could leave to our descendants a portrait of one who was +so good and so respected. My father was of a dark complexion, +with a very great forehead and dark hazel eyes, +overhung by eyebrows which remained black long after +his hair was white. His nose was aquiline, his smile extraordinary +sweet. How well I remember it, and how little +any description I can write can recall his image! He +was of rather low stature, not being above five feet seven +inches in height; he used to laugh at my sons, whom he +called his crutches, and say they were grown too tall for him +to lean upon. But small as he was he had a perfect grace +and majesty of deportment, such as I have never seen in +this country, except perhaps in our friend Mr. Washington, +and commanded respect wherever he appeared. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In all bodily exercises he excelled, and showed an extraordinary +quickness and agility. Of fencing he was especially +fond, and made my two boys proficient in that art; so +much so, that when the French came to this country with +Monsieur Rochambeau, not one of his officers was superior +to my Henry, and he was not the equal of my poor George, +who had taken the king's side in our lamentable but glorious +War of Independence. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Neither my father nor my mother ever wore powder in +their hair; both their heads were as white as silver, as +I can remember them. My dear mother possessed to the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page009">[pg 009]</span><a name="Pg009" id="Pg009" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +last an extraordinary brightness and freshness of complexion; +nor would people believe that she did not wear rouge. At +sixty years of age she still looked young, and was quite +agile. It was not until after that dreadful siege of our +house by the Indians, which left me a widow ere I was +a mother, that my dear mother's health broke. She never +recovered her terror and anxiety of those days, which ended +so fatally for me, then a bride scarce six months married, +and died in my father's arms ere my own year of widowhood +was over. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From that day, until the last of his dear and honoured +life, it was my delight and consolation to remain with him +as his comforter and companion; and from those little +notes which my mother hath made here and there in the +volume in which my father describes his adventures in +Europe, I can well understand the extreme devotion with +which she regarded him—a devotion so passionate and +exclusive as to prevent her, I think, from loving any other +person except with an inferior regard; her whole thoughts +being centred on this one object of affection and worship. +I know that, before her, my dear father did not show the +love which he had for his daughter; and in her last and +most sacred moments, this dear and tender parent owned +to me her repentance that she had not loved me enough: +her jealousy even that my father should give his affection +to any but herself; and in the most fond and beautiful +words of affection and admonition, she bade me never to +leave him, and to supply the place which she was quitting. +With a clear conscience, and a heart inexpressibly thankful, +I think I can say that I fulfilled those dying commands, and +that until his last hour my dearest father never had to +complain that his daughter's love and fidelity failed him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And it is since I knew him entirely, for during my mother's +life he never quite opened himself to me—since I knew the +value and splendour of that affection which he bestowed +upon me, that I have come to understand and pardon what, +I own, used to anger me in my mother's lifetime, her jealousy +respecting her husband's love. 'Twas a gift so precious, +that no wonder she who had it was for keeping it all, and +could part with none of it, even to her daughter. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Though I never heard my father use a rough word, 'twas +extraordinary with how much awe his people regarded him; +and the servants on our plantation, both those assigned +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page010">[pg 010]</span><a name="Pg010" id="Pg010" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +from England and the purchased negroes, obeyed him with +an eagerness such as the most severe taskmasters round +about us could never get from their people. He was never +familiar, though perfectly simple and natural; he was the +same with the meanest man as with the greatest, and as +courteous to a black slave-girl as to the governor's wife. +No one ever thought of taking a liberty with him (except +once a tipsy gentleman from York, and I am bound to own +that my papa never forgave him): he set the humblest +people at once on their ease with him, and brought down +the most arrogant by a grave satiric way, which made +persons exceedingly afraid of him. His courtesy was not +put on like a Sunday suit, and laid by when the company +went away; it was always the same; as he was always +dressed the same whether for a dinner by ourselves or for +a great entertainment. They say he liked to be the first +in his company; but what company was there in which +he would not be first? When I went to Europe for my +education, and we passed a winter at London with my half-brother, +my Lord Castlewood and his second lady, I saw at +her Majesty's Court some of the most famous gentlemen of +those days; and I thought to myself, <span class="tei tei-q">“None of these are +better than my papa”</span>; and the famous Lord Bolingbroke, +who came to us from Dawley, said as much, and that the +men of that time were not like those of his youth:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Were +your father, madam,”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“to go into the woods, the +Indians would elect him Sachem;”</span> and his lordship was +pleased to call me Pocahontas. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I did not see our other relative, Bishop Tusher's lady, +of whom so much is said in my papa's memoirs—although +my mamma went to visit her in the country. I have no +pride (as I showed by complying with my mother's request, +and marrying a gentleman who was but the younger son +of a Suffolk baronet), yet I own to a <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">decent respect</span></em> for my +name, and wonder how one, who ever bore it, should change +it for that of Mrs. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Thomas Tusher</span></span>. I pass over as odious +and unworthy of credit those reports (which I heard in +Europe, and was then too young to understand), how this +person, having <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">left her family</span></em> and fled to Paris, out of +jealousy of the Pretender, betrayed his secrets to my Lord +Stair, King George's ambassador, and nearly caused the +prince's death there; how she came to England and married +this Mr. Tusher, and became a great favourite of King +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page011">[pg 011]</span><a name="Pg011" id="Pg011" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +George the Second, by whom Mr. Tusher was made a dean, +and then a bishop. I did not see the lady, who chose to +remain <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">at her palace</span></em> all the time we were in London; but +after visiting her, my poor mamma said she had lost all +her good looks, and warned me not to set too much store +by any such gifts which nature had bestowed upon me. +She grew exceedingly stout; and I remember my brother's +wife, Lady Castlewood, saying—<span class="tei tei-q">“No wonder she became +a favourite, for the king likes them old and ugly, as his +father did before him.”</span> On which papa said—<span class="tei tei-q">“All women +were alike; that there was never one so beautiful as that +one; and that we could forgive her everything but her +beauty.”</span> And hereupon my mamma looked vexed, and +my Lord Castlewood began to laugh; and I, of course, +being a young creature, could not understand what was +the subject of their conversation. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the circumstances narrated in the third book of +these memoirs, my father and mother both went abroad, +being advised by their friends to leave the country in consequence +of the transactions which are recounted at the +close of the volume of the memoirs. But my brother, +hearing how the <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">future bishop's lady</span></em> had quitted Castlewood +and joined the Pretender at Paris, pursued him, and would +have killed him, prince as he was, had not the prince +managed to make his escape. On his expedition to Scotland +directly after, Castlewood was so enraged against him that +he asked leave to serve as a volunteer, and join the Duke +of Argyle's army in Scotland, which the Pretender never +had the courage to face; and thenceforth my lord was +quite reconciled to the present reigning family, from whom +he hath even received promotion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mrs. Tusher was by this time as angry against the +Pretender as any of her relations could be, and used to boast, +as I have heard, that she not only brought back my lord +to the Church of England, but procured the English peerage +for him, which the <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">junior branch</span></em> of our family at present +enjoys. She was a great friend of Sir Robert Walpole, and +would not rest until her husband slept at Lambeth, my papa +used laughing to say. However, the bishop died of apoplexy +suddenly, and his wife erected a great monument over him; +and the pair sleep under that stone, with a canopy of marble +clouds and angels above them—the first Mrs. Tusher lying +sixty miles off at Castlewood. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page012">[pg 012]</span><a name="Pg012" id="Pg012" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But my papa's genius and education are both greater +than any a woman can be expected to have, and his +adventures in Europe far more exciting than his life in this +country, which was past in the tranquil offices of love and +duty; and I shall say no more by way of introduction +to his memoirs, nor keep my children from the perusal of a +story which is much more interesting than that of their +affectionate old mother, +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Rachel Esmond Warrington. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Castlewood, Virginia</span></span>,<br /> +November 3, 1778. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page013">[pg 013]</span><a name="Pg013" id="Pg013" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc9" id="toc9"></a> +<a name="pdf10" id="pdf10"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Book I. The Early Youth Of Henry Esmond, Up To The Time Of His +Leaving Trinity College, In Cambridge</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The actors in the old tragedies, as we read, piped their +iambics to a tune, speaking from under a mask, and wearing +stilts and a great head-dress. 'Twas thought the dignity +of the Tragic Muse required these appurtenances, and that +she was not to move except to a measure and cadence. So +Queen Medea slew her children to a slow music: and King +Agamemnon perished in a dying fall (to use Mr. Dryden's +words): the Chorus standing by in a set attitude, and +rhythmically and decorously bewailing the fates of those +great crowned persons. The Muse of History hath encumbered +herself with ceremony as well as her Sister of the +Theatre. She too wears the mask and the cothurnus, and +speaks to measure. She too, in our age, busies herself with +the affairs only of kings; waiting on them obsequiously +and stately, as if she were but a mistress of Court ceremonies, +and had nothing to do with the registering of the affairs of +the common people. I have seen in his very old age and +decrepitude the old French King Lewis the Fourteenth, the +type and model of kinghood—who never moved but to +measure, who lived and died according to the laws of his +Court-marshal, persisting in enacting through life the part +of Hero; and, divested of poetry, this was but a little +wrinkled old man, pock-marked, and with a great periwig +and red heels to make him look tall—a hero for a book if +you like, or for a brass statue or a painted ceiling, a god +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page014">[pg 014]</span><a name="Pg014" id="Pg014" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +in a Roman shape, but what more than a man for Madame +Maintenon, or the barber who shaved him, or Monsieur +Fagon, his surgeon? I wonder shall History ever pull off +her periwig and cease to be court-ridden? Shall we see +something of France and England besides Versailles and +Windsor? I saw Queen Anne at the latter place tearing +down the Park slopes after her staghounds, and driving +her one-horse chaise—a hot, red-faced woman, not in the +least resembling that statue of her which turns its stone +back upon St. Paul's, and faces the coaches struggling +up Ludgate Hill. She was neither better bred nor wiser +than you and me, though we knelt to hand her a letter +or a washhand-basin. Why shall History go on kneeling +to the end of time? I am for having her rise up off her +knees, and take a natural posture: not to be for ever +performing cringes and congees like a Court-chamberlain, +and shuffling backwards out of doors in the presence of +the sovereign. In a word, I would have History familiar +rather than heroic: and think that Mr. Hogarth and Mr. +Fielding will give our children a much better idea of the +manners of the present age in England, than the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Court +Gazette</span></span> and the newspapers which we get thence. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There was a German officer of Webb's, with whom we +used to joke, and of whom a story (whereof I myself was +the author) was got to be believed in the army, that he was +eldest son of the Hereditary Grand Bootjack of the Empire, +and heir to that honour of which his ancestors had been +very proud, having been kicked for twenty generations by +one imperial foot, as they drew the boot from the other. +I have heard that the old Lord Castlewood, of part of whose +family these present volumes are a chronicle, though he +came of quite as good blood as the Stuarts whom he served +(and who as regards mere lineage are no better than a dozen +English and Scottish houses I could name), was prouder +of his post about the Court than of his ancestral honours +and valued his dignity (as Lord of the Butteries and Groom +of the King's Posset) so highly, that he cheerfully ruined +himself for the thankless and thriftless race who bestowed +it. He pawned his plate for King Charles the First, mortgaged +his property for the same cause, and lost the greater +part of it by fines and sequestration: stood a siege of his +castle by Ireton, where his brother Thomas capitulated +(afterwards making terms with the Commonwealth, for +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page015">[pg 015]</span><a name="Pg015" id="Pg015" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +which the elder brother never forgave him), and where his +second brother Edward, who had embraced the ecclesiastical +profession, was slain on Castlewood tower, being +engaged there both as preacher and artilleryman. This +resolute old loyalist, who was with the king whilst his house +was thus being battered down, escaped abroad with his +only son, then a boy, to return and take a part in Worcester +fight. On that fatal field Eustace Esmond was killed, and +Castlewood fled from it once more into exile, and henceforward, +and after the Restoration, never was away from +the Court of the monarch (for whose return we offer thanks +in the Prayer-book) who sold his country and who took +bribes of the French king. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What spectacle is more august than that of a great king +in exile? Who is more worthy of respect than a brave +man in misfortune? Mr. Addison has painted such a figure +in his noble piece of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cato</span></span>. But suppose fugitive Cato +fuddling himself at a tavern with a wench on each knee, +a dozen faithful and tipsy companions of defeat, and a landlord +calling out for his bill; and the dignity of misfortune +is straightway lost. The Historical Muse turns away +shamefaced from the vulgar scene, and closes the door—on +which the exile's unpaid drink is scored up—upon him +and his pots and his pipes, and the tavern-chorus which +he and his friends are singing. Such a man as Charles +should have had an Ostade or Mieris to paint him. Your +Knellers and Le Bruns only deal in clumsy and impossible +allegories: and it hath always seemed to me blasphemy +to claim Olympus for such a wine-drabbled divinity as that. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +About the king's follower the Viscount Castlewood—orphan +of his son, ruined by his fidelity, bearing many +wounds and marks of bravery, old and in exile, his kinsmen +I suppose should be silent; nor if this patriarch fell down +in his cups, call fie upon him, and fetch passers-by to laugh +at his red face and white hairs. What! does a stream +rush out of a mountain free and pure, to roll through fair +pastures, to feed and throw out bright tributaries, and to +end in a village gutter? Lives that have noble commencements +have often no better endings; it is not without +a kind of awe and reverence that an observer should +speculate upon such careers as he traces the course of them. +I have seen too much of success in life to take off my hat +and huzza to it as it passes in its gilt coach: and would +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page016">[pg 016]</span><a name="Pg016" id="Pg016" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +do my little part with my neighbours on foot, that they +should not gape with too much wonder, nor applaud too +loudly. Is it the Lord Mayor going in state to mince-pies +and the Mansion House? Is it poor Jack of Newgate's +procession, with the sheriff and javelin-men, conducting +him on his last journey to Tyburn? I look into my heart +and think that I am as good as my Lord Mayor, and know +I am as bad as Tyburn Jack. Give me a chain and red +gown and a pudding before me, and I could play the part +of alderman very well, and sentence Jack after dinner. +Starve me, keep me from books and honest people, educate +me to love dice, gin, and pleasure, and put me on Hounslow +Heath, with a purse before me and I will take it. <span class="tei tei-q">“And +I shall be deservedly hanged,”</span> say you, wishing to put an +end to this prosing. I don't say no. I can't but accept +the world as I find it, including a rope's end, as long as it is +in fashion. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc11" id="toc11"></a> +<a name="pdf12" id="pdf12"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter I. An Account Of The Family Of Esmond Of Castlewood Hall</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Francis, fourth Viscount Castlewood, came to his +title, and presently after to take possession of his house of +Castlewood, county Hants, in the year 1691, almost the +only tenant of the place besides the domestics was a lad +of twelve years of age, of whom no one seemed to take any +note until my lady viscountess lighted upon him, going +over the house, with the housekeeper on the day of her +arrival. The boy was in the room known as the book-room, +or yellow gallery, where the portraits of the family used to +hang, that fine piece among others of Sir Antonio Van +Dyck of George, second viscount, and that by Mr. Dobson +of my lord the third viscount, just deceased, which it seems +his lady and widow did not think fit to carry away, when +she sent for and carried off to her house at Chelsey, near +to London, the picture of herself by Sir Peter Lely, in which +her ladyship was represented as a huntress of Diana's court. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The new and fair lady of Castlewood found the sad lonely +little occupant of this gallery busy over his great book, +which he laid down when he was aware that a stranger +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page017">[pg 017]</span><a name="Pg017" id="Pg017" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +was at hand. And, knowing who that person must be, +the lad stood up and bowed before her, performing a shy +obeisance to the mistress of his house. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She stretched out her hand—indeed when was it that +that hand would not stretch out to do an act of kindness, +or to protect grief and ill-fortune? <span class="tei tei-q">“And this is our kinsman,'”</span> +she said; <span class="tei tei-q">“and what is your name, kinsman?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My name is Henry Esmond,”</span> said the lad, looking up at +her in a sort of delight and wonder, for she had come upon +him as a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Dea certè</span></span>, and appeared the most charming object +he had ever looked on. Her golden hair was shining in the +gold of the sun; her complexion was of a dazzling bloom; +her lips smiling, and her eyes beaming with a kindness +which made Harry Esmond's heart to beat with surprise. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“His name is Henry Esmond, sure enough, my lady,”</span> +says Mrs. Worksop the housekeeper (an old tyrant whom +Henry Esmond plagued more than he hated), and the old +gentlewoman looked significantly towards the late lord's +picture, as it now is in the family, noble and severe-looking, +with his hand on his sword, and his order on his cloak, +which he had from the emperor during the war on the +Danube against the Turk. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Seeing the great and undeniable likeness between this +portrait and the lad, the new viscountess, who had still +hold of the boy's hand as she looked at the picture, blushed +and dropped the hand quickly, and walked down the gallery, +followed by Mrs. Worksop. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the lady came back, Harry Esmond stood exactly +in the same spot, and with his hand as it had fallen when +he dropped it on his black coat. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Her heart melted I suppose (indeed she hath since owned +as much) at the notion that she should do anything unkind +to any mortal, great or small; for, when she returned, she +had sent away the housekeeper upon an errand by the door +at the farther end of the gallery; and, coming back to the +lad, with a look of infinite pity and tenderness in her eyes, +she took his hand again, placing her other fair hand on his +head, and saying some words to him, which were so kind +and said in a voice so sweet, that the boy, who had never +looked upon so much beauty before, felt as if the touch +of a superior being or angel smote him down to the ground, +and kissed the fair protecting hand as he knelt on one knee. +To the very last hour of his life, Esmond remembered the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page018">[pg 018]</span><a name="Pg018" id="Pg018" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lady as she then spoke and looked, the rings on her fair +hands, the very scent of her robe, the beam of her eyes +lighting up with surprise and kindness, her lips blooming +in a smile, the sun making a golden halo round her hair. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As the boy was yet in this attitude of humility, enters +behind him a portly gentleman, with a little girl of four +years old in his hand. The gentleman burst into a great +laugh at the lady and her adorer, with his little queer figure, +his sallow face, and long black hair. The lady blushed, +and seemed to deprecate his ridicule by a look of appeal +to her husband, for it was my lord viscount who now +arrived, and whom the lad knew, having once before seen +him in the late lord's lifetime. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“So this is the little priest!”</span> says my lord, looking down +at the lad; <span class="tei tei-q">“welcome, kinsman.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He is saying his prayers to mamma,”</span> says the little girl, +who came up to her papa's knee; and my lord burst out +into another great laugh at this, and kinsman Henry looked +very silly. He invented a half-dozen of speeches in reply, +but 'twas months afterwards when he thought of this +adventure: as it was, he had never a word in answer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Le pauvre enfant, il +n'a que nous</span></span>,”</span> says the lady, looking +to her lord; and the boy, who understood her, though +doubtless she thought otherwise, thanked her with all his +heart for her kind speech. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And he shan't want for friends here,”</span> says my lord, in +a kind voice, <span class="tei tei-q">“shall he, little Trix?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The little girl, whose name was Beatrix, and whom her +papa called by this diminutive, looked at Henry Esmond +solemnly, with a pair of large eyes, and then a smile shone +over her face, which was as beautiful as that of a cherub, +and she came up and put out a little hand to him. A keen +and delightful pang of gratitude, happiness, affection, filled +the orphan child's heart, as he received from the protectors, +whom Heaven had sent to him, these touching words, and +tokens of friendliness and kindness. But an hour since he +had felt quite alone in the world: when he heard the great +peal of bells from Castlewood church ringing that morning +to welcome the arrival of the new lord and lady, it had rung +only terror and anxiety to him, for he knew not how the +new owner would deal with him; and those to whom he formerly +looked for protection were forgotten or dead. Pride +and doubt too had kept him within doors: when the vicar +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page019">[pg 019]</span><a name="Pg019" id="Pg019" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and the people of the village, and the servants of the house, +had gone out to welcome my Lord Castlewood—for Henry +Esmond was no servant, though a dependant; no relative, +though he bore the name and inherited the blood of the +house; and in the midst of the noise and acclamations +attending the arrival of the new lord (for whom you may +be sure a feast was got ready, and guns were fired, and +tenants and domestics huzzaed when his carriage approached +and rolled into the courtyard of the hall), no one +ever took any notice of young Henry Esmond, who sat unobserved +and alone in the book-room, until the afternoon +of that day, when his new friends found him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When my lord and lady were going away thence, the +little girl, still holding her kinsman by the hand, bade him +to come too. <span class="tei tei-q">“Thou wilt always forsake an old friend for +a new one, Trix,”</span> says her father to her good-naturedly; +and went into the gallery, giving an arm to his lady. They +passed thence through the music-gallery, long since dismantled, +and Queen Elizabeth's rooms, in the clock-tower, +and out into the terrace, where was a fine prospect of sunset, +and the great darkling woods with a cloud of rooks returning; +and the plain and river with Castlewood village beyond, +and purple hills beautiful to look at—and the little heir +of Castlewood, a child of two years old, was already here +on the terrace in his nurse's arms, from whom he ran +across the grass instantly he perceived his mother, and came +to her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If thou canst not be happy here,”</span> says my lord, looking +round at the scene, <span class="tei tei-q">“thou art hard to please, Rachel.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am happy where you are,”</span> she said, <span class="tei tei-q">“but we were +happiest of all at Walcote Forest.”</span> Then my lord began +to describe what was before them to his wife, and what +indeed little Harry knew better than he—viz., the history +of the house: how by yonder gate the page ran away with +the heiress of Castlewood, by which the estate came into +the present family, how the Roundheads attacked the clock-tower, +which my lord's father was slain in defending. <span class="tei tei-q">“I +was but two years old then,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“but take forty-six +from ninety, and how old shall I be, kinsman Harry?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thirty,”</span> says his wife, with a laugh. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A great deal too old for you, Rachel,”</span> answers my lord, +looking fondly down at her. Indeed she seemed to be a +girl; and was at that time scarce twenty years old. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page020">[pg 020]</span><a name="Pg020" id="Pg020" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You know, Frank, I will do anything to please you,”</span> +says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“and I promise you I will grow older every day.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You mustn't call papa Frank; you must call papa my +lord, now,”</span> says Miss Beatrix, with a toss of her little head; +at which the mother smiled, and the good-natured father +laughed, and the little, trotting boy laughed, not knowing +why—but because he was happy no doubt—as every one +seemed to be there. How those trivial incidents and words, +the landscape and sunshine, and the group of people +smiling and talking, remain fixed on the memory! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As the sun was setting, the little heir was sent in the +arms of his nurse to bed, whither he went howling; but +little Trix was promised to sit to supper that night—<span class="tei tei-q">“and +you will come too, kinsman, won't you?”</span> she said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond blushed: <span class="tei tei-q">“I—I have supper with Mrs. +Worksop,”</span> says he. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“D—n it,”</span> says my lord, <span class="tei tei-q">“thou shalt sup with us, Harry, +to-night! Shan't refuse a lady, shall he, Trix?”</span>—and +they all wondered at Harry's performance as a trencherman, +in which character the poor boy acquitted himself +very remarkably; for the truth is he had no dinner, nobody +thinking of him in the bustle which the house was in, during +the preparations antecedent to the new lord's arrival. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No dinner! poor dear child!”</span> says my lady, heaping +up his plate with meat, and my lord filling a bumper for +him, bade him call a health; on which Master Harry, +crying <span class="tei tei-q">“The King”</span>, tossed off the wine. My lord was ready +to drink that, and most other toasts: indeed, only too ready. +He would not hear of Doctor Tusher (the Vicar of Castlewood, +who came to supper) going away when the sweetmeats +were brought: he had not had a chaplain long enough, +he said, to be tired of him: so his reverence kept my lord +company for some hours over a pipe and a punchbowl; and +went away home with rather a reeling gait, and declaring +a dozen of times, that his lordship's affability surpassed +every kindness he had ever had from his lordship's gracious +family. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for young Esmond, when he got to his little chamber, +it was with a heart full of surprise and gratitude towards +the new friends whom this happy day had brought him. +He was up and watching long before the house was astir, +longing to see that fair lady and her children—that kind +protector and patron; and only fearful lest their welcome +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page021">[pg 021]</span><a name="Pg021" id="Pg021" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of the past night should in any way be withdrawn or altered. +But presently little Beatrix came out into the garden, and +her mother followed, who greeted Harry as kindly as before. +He told her at greater length the histories of the house +(which he had been taught in the old lord's time), and to +which she listened with great interest; and then he told +her, with respect to the night before, that he understood +French, and thanked her for her protection. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Do you?”</span> says she, with a blush; <span class="tei tei-q">“then, sir, you shall +teach me and Beatrix.”</span> And she asked him many more +questions regarding himself, which had best be told more +fully and explicitly, than in those brief replies which the +lad made to his mistress's questions. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc13" id="toc13"></a> +<a name="pdf14" id="pdf14"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter II. Relates How Francis, Fourth Viscount, Arrives At Castlewood</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Tis known that the name of Esmond and the estate of +Castlewood, com. Hants, came into possession of the present +family through Dorothea, daughter and heiress of Edward, +Earl and Marquis of Esmond, and Lord of Castlewood, +which lady married, 23 Eliz., Henry Poyns, gent.; the +said Henry being then a page in the household of her father. +Francis, son and heir of the above Henry and Dorothea, +who took the maternal name which the family hath borne +subsequently, was made knight and baronet by King James +the First; and, being of a military disposition, remained +long in Germany with the Elector-Palatine, in whose service +Sir Francis incurred both expense and danger, lending large +sums of money to that unfortunate prince; and receiving +many wounds in the battles against the Imperialists, in +which Sir Francis engaged. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On his return home Sir Francis was rewarded for his +services and many sacrifices, by his late Majesty James the +First, who graciously conferred upon this tried servant +the post of Warden of the Butteries and Groom of the King's +Posset, which high and confidential office he filled in that +king's, and his unhappy successor's, reign. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His age, and many wounds and infirmities, obliged Sir +Francis to perform much of his duty by deputy; and his +son, Sir George Esmond, knight and banneret, first as his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page022">[pg 022]</span><a name="Pg022" id="Pg022" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +father's lieutenant, and afterwards as inheritor of his father's +title and dignity, performed this office during almost the +whole of the reign of King Charles the First, and his two +sons who succeeded him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Sir George Esmond married rather beneath the rank that +a person of his name and honour might aspire to, the daughter +of Thos. Topham, of the city of London, alderman and +goldsmith, who, taking the Parliamentary side in the +troubles then commencing, disappointed Sir George of the +property which he expected at the demise of his father-in-law, +who devised his money to his second daughter, Barbara, +a spinster. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Sir George Esmond, on his part, was conspicuous for his +attachment and loyalty to the royal cause and person, and +the king being at Oxford in 1642, Sir George, with the +consent of his father, then very aged and infirm, and residing +at his house of Castlewood, melted the whole of the family +plate for his Majesty's service. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For this, and other sacrifices and merits, his Majesty, by +patent under the Privy Seal, dated Oxford, Jan., 1643, was +pleased to advance Sir Francis Esmond to the dignity of +Viscount Castlewood, of Shandon, in Ireland: and the +viscount's estate being much impoverished by loans to the +king, which in those troublesome times his Majesty could +not repay, a grant of land in the plantations of Virginia +was given to the lord viscount; part of which land is in +possession of descendants of his family to the present day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The first Viscount Castlewood died full of years, and +within a few months after he had been advanced to his +honours. He was succeeded by his eldest son, the before-named +George; and left issue besides, Thomas, a colonel +in the king's army, that afterwards joined the Usurper's +government; and Francis, in holy orders, who was slain +whilst defending the house of Castlewood against the +Parliament, anno 1647. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +George, Lord Castlewood (the second viscount) of King +Charles the First's time, had no male issue save his one +son Eustace Esmond, who was killed, with half of the +Castlewood men beside him, at Worcester fight. The lands +about Castlewood were sold and apportioned to the Commonwealth +men; Castlewood being concerned in almost all of +the plots against the Protector, after the death of the king, +and up to King Charles the Second's restoration. My lord +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page023">[pg 023]</span><a name="Pg023" id="Pg023" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +followed that king's Court about in its exile, having ruined +himself in its service. He had but one daughter, who was +of no great comfort to her father; for misfortune had not +taught those exiles sobriety of life; and it is said that the +Duke of York and his brother the king both quarrelled +about Isabel Esmond. She was maid of honour to the Queen +Henrietta Maria; she early joined the Roman Church; her +father, a weak man, following her not long after at Breda. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the death of Eustace Esmond at Worcester, Thomas +Esmond, nephew to my Lord Castlewood, and then a stripling, +became heir to the title. His father had taken the +Parliament side in the quarrels, and so had been estranged +from the chief of his house; and my Lord Castlewood was +at first so much enraged to think that his title (albeit little +more than an empty one now) should pass to a rascally +Roundhead, that he would have married again, and indeed +proposed to do so to a vintner's daughter at Bruges, to whom +his lordship owed a score for lodging when the king was +there, but for fear of the laughter of the Court, and the +anger of his daughter, of whom he stood in awe; for she +was in temper as imperious and violent as my lord, who +was much enfeebled by wounds and drinking, was weak. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Lord Castlewood would have had a match between his +daughter Isabel and her cousin, the son of that Francis +Esmond who was killed at Castlewood siege. And the lady, +it was said, took a fancy to the young man, who was her +junior by several years (which circumstance she did not +consider to be a fault in him); but having paid his court, +and being admitted to the intimacy of the house, he suddenly +flung up his suit, when it seemed to be pretty prosperous, +without giving a pretext for his behaviour. His friends +rallied him at what they laughingly chose to call his infidelity. +Jack Churchill, Frank Esmond's lieutenant in the royal +regiment of foot guards, getting the company which Esmond +vacated, when he left the Court and went to Tangier in a rage +at discovering that his promotion depended on the complaisance +of his elderly affianced bride. He and Churchill, +who had been <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">condiscipuli</span></span> at St. Paul's School, had words +about this matter; and Frank Esmond said to him with +an oath, <span class="tei tei-q">“Jack, your sister may be so-and-so, but by Jove, +my wife shan't!”</span> and swords were drawn, and blood drawn, +too, until friends separated them on this quarrel. Few +men were so jealous about the point of honour in those +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page024">[pg 024]</span><a name="Pg024" id="Pg024" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +days; and gentlemen of good birth and lineage thought +a royal blot was an ornament to their family coat. Frank +Esmond retired in the sulks, first to Tangier, whence he +returned after two years' service, settling on a small property +he had of his mother, near to Winchester, and became +a country gentleman, and kept a pack of beagles, and never +came to Court again in King Charles's time. But his uncle +Castlewood was never reconciled to him; nor, for some +time afterwards, his cousin whom he had refused. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By places, pensions, bounties from France, and gifts +from the king, whilst his daughter was in favour, Lord +Castlewood, who had spent in the royal service his youth +and fortune, did not retrieve the latter quite, and never +cared to visit Castlewood, or repair it, since the death of +his son, but managed to keep a good house, and figure at +Court, and to save a considerable sum of ready money. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And now, his heir and nephew, Thomas Esmond, began +to bid for his uncle's favour. Thomas had served with the +emperor, and with the Dutch, when King Charles was +compelled to lend troops to the States, and against them, +when his Majesty made an alliance with the French king. +In these campaigns Thomas Esmond was more remarked +for duelling, brawling, vice, and play, than for any conspicuous +gallantry in the field, and came back to England, +like many another English gentleman who has travelled, with +a character by no means improved by his foreign experience. +He had dissipated his small paternal inheritance of a younger +brother's portion, and, as truth must be told, was no better +than a hanger-on of ordinaries, and a brawler about Alsatia +and the Friars, when he bethought him of a means of +mending his fortune. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His cousin was now of more than middle age, and had +nobody's word but her own for the beauty which she said +she once possessed. She was lean, and yellow, and long +in the tooth; all the red and white in all the toy-shops in +London could not make a beauty of her—Mr. Killigrew +called her the Sibyl, the death's-head put up at the king's +feast as a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">memento mori</span></span>, &c.—in +fine, a woman who might +be easy of conquest, but whom only a very bold man would +think of conquering. This bold man was Thomas Esmond. +He had a fancy to my Lord Castlewood's savings, the +amount of which rumour had very much exaggerated. +Madam Isabel was said to have royal jewels of great +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page025">[pg 025]</span><a name="Pg025" id="Pg025" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +value; whereas poor Tom Esmond's last coat but one was +in pawn. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord had at this time a fine house in Lincoln's Inn +Fields, nigh to the Duke's Theatre and the Portugal ambassador's +chapel. Tom Esmond, who had frequented the one +as long as he had money to spend among the actresses, +now came to the church as assiduously. He looked so +lean and shabby, that he passed without difficulty for a +repentant sinner; and so, becoming converted, you may +be sure took his uncle's priest for a director. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This charitable father reconciled him with the old lord +his uncle, who a short time before would not speak to him, +as Tom passed under my lord's coach window, his lordship +going in state to his place at Court, while his nephew slunk +by with his battered hat and feather, and the point of his +rapier sticking out of the scabbard—to his twopenny +ordinary in Bell Yard. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Thomas Esmond, after this reconciliation with his uncle, +very soon began to grow sleek, and to show signs of the +benefits of good living and clean linen. He fasted rigorously +twice a week to be sure; but he made amends on the other +days: and, to show how great his appetite was, Mr. Wycherley +said, he ended by swallowing that fly-blown rank old +morsel his cousin. There were endless jokes and lampoons +about this marriage at Court: but Tom rode thither in his +uncle's coach now, called him father, and having won +could afford to laugh. This marriage took place very shortly +before King Charles died: whom the Viscount of Castlewood +speedily followed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The issue of this marriage was one son, whom the parents +watched with an intense eagerness and care; but who, in +spite of nurses and physicians, had only a brief existence. +His tainted blood did not run very long in his poor feeble +little body. Symptoms of evil broke out early on him; and, +part from flattery, part superstition, nothing would satisfy +my lord and lady, especially the latter, but having the poor +little cripple touched by his Majesty at his church. They +were ready to cry out miracle at first (the doctors and +quack-salvers being constantly in attendance on the child, +and experimenting on his poor little body with every +conceivable nostrum)—but though there seemed from some +reason a notable amelioration in the infant's health after +his Majesty touched him, in a few weeks afterward the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page026">[pg 026]</span><a name="Pg026" id="Pg026" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +poor thing died—causing the lampooners of the Court to +say, that the king in expelling evil out of the infant of +Tom Esmond and Isabella his wife, expelled the life out of +it, which was nothing but corruption. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The mother's natural pang at losing this poor little child +must have been increased when she thought of her rival +Frank Esmond's wife, who was a favourite of the whole +Court, where my poor Lady Castlewood was neglected, and +who had one child, a daughter, flourishing and beautiful, +and was about to become a mother once more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Court, as I have heard, only laughed the more +because the poor lady, who had pretty well passed the age +when ladies are accustomed to have children, nevertheless +determined not to give hope up, and even when she came +to live at Castlewood, was constantly sending over to Hexton +for the doctor, and announcing to her friends the arrival +of an heir. This absurdity of hers was one amongst many +others which the wags used to play upon. Indeed, to the +last days of her life, my lady viscountess had the comfort +of fancying herself beautiful, and persisted in blooming up +to the very midst of winter, painting roses on her cheeks +long after their natural season, and attiring herself like +summer though her head was covered with snow. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Gentlemen who were about the Court of King Charles +and King James, have told the present writer a number of +stories about this queer old lady, with which it's not necessary +that posterity should be entertained. She is said to +have had great powers of invective; and, if she fought with +all her rivals in King James's favour, 'tis certain she must +have had a vast number of quarrels on her hands. She +was a woman of an intrepid spirit, and it appears pursued +and rather fatigued his Majesty with her rights and her +wrongs. Some say that the cause of her leaving Court was +jealousy of Frank Esmond's wife: others, that she was +forced to retreat after a great battle which took place at +Whitehall, between her ladyship and Lady Dorchester, +Tom Killigrew's daughter, whom the king delighted to +honour, and in which that ill-favoured Esther got the +better of our elderly Vashti. But her ladyship for her part +always averred that it was her husband's quarrel, and not +her own, which occasioned the banishment of the two into +the country; and the cruel ingratitude of the sovereign in +giving away, out of the family, that place of Warden of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page027">[pg 027]</span><a name="Pg027" id="Pg027" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the Butteries and Groom of the King's Posset, which the +two last Lords Castlewood had held so honourably, and +which was now conferred upon a fellow of yesterday, and +a hanger-on of that odious Dorchester creature, my Lord +Bergamot<a id="noteref_6" name="noteref_6" href="#note_6"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">6</span></span></a>; <span class="tei tei-q">“I never,”</span> said my lady, <span class="tei tei-q">“could have come +to see his Majesty's posset carried by any other hand than +an Esmond. I should have dashed the salver out of Lord +Bergamot's hand, had I met him.”</span> And those who knew +her ladyship are aware that she was a person quite capable +of performing this feat, had she not wisely kept out of +the way. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Holding the purse-strings in her own control, to which, +indeed, she liked to bring most persons who came near her, +Lady Castlewood could command her husband's obedience, +and so broke up her establishment at London; she had +removed from Lincoln's Inn Fields to Chelsey, to a pretty +new house she bought there; and brought her establishment, +her maids, lap-dogs, and gentlewomen, her priest, +and his lordship, her husband, to Castlewood Hall, that +she had never seen since she quitted it as a child with her +father during the troubles of King Charles the First's reign. +The walls were still open in the old house as they had been +left by the shot of the Commonwealth men. A part of the +mansion was restored and furnished up with the plate, +hangings, and furniture, brought from the house in London. +My lady meant to have a triumphal entry into Castlewood +village, and expected the people to cheer as she drove over +the Green in her great coach, my lord beside her, her gentlewomen, +lap-dogs, and cockatoos on the opposite seat, six +horses to her carriage, and servants armed and mounted, +following it and preceding it. But 'twas in the height of +the No-Popery cry; the folks in the village and the neighbouring +town were scared by the sight of her ladyship's +painted face and eyelids, as she bobbed her head out of the +coach window, meaning no doubt to be very gracious; and +one old woman said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Lady Isabel! lord-a-mercy, it's Lady +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page028">[pg 028]</span><a name="Pg028" id="Pg028" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Jezebel!”</span> a name by which the enemies of the right +honourable viscountess were afterwards in the habit of +designating her. The country was then in a great No-Popery +fervour, her ladyship's known conversion, and her +husband's, the priest in her train, and the service performed +at the chapel of Castlewood (though the chapel had been +built for that worship before any other was heard of in the +country, and though the service was performed in the +most quiet manner), got her no favour at first in the county +or village. By far the greater part of the estate of Castlewood +had been confiscated, and been parcelled out to +Commonwealth men. One or two of these old Cromwellian +soldiers were still alive in the village, and looked grimly +at first upon my lady viscountess, when she came to +dwell there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She appeared at the Hexton Assembly, bringing her lord +after her, scaring the country folks with the splendour of her +diamonds, which she always wore in public. They said she +wore them in private, too, and slept with them round her +neck; though the writer can pledge his word that this was +a calumny. <span class="tei tei-q">“If she were to take them off,”</span> my Lady Sark +said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Tom Esmond, her husband, would run away with +them and pawn them.”</span> 'Twas another calumny. My +Lady Sark was also an exile from Court, and there had been +war between the two ladies before. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The village people began to be reconciled presently to their +lady, who was generous and kind, though fantastic and +haughty, in her ways; and whose praises Dr. Tusher, the +vicar, sounded loudly amongst his flock. As for my lord, he +gave no great trouble, being considered scarce more than +an appendage to my lady, who as daughter of the old lords +of Castlewood, and possessor of vast wealth, as the country +folks said (though indeed nine-tenths of it existed but in +rumour), was looked upon as the real queen of the Castle, +and mistress of all it contained. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page029">[pg 029]</span><a name="Pg029" id="Pg029" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc15" id="toc15"></a> +<a name="pdf16" id="pdf16"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter III. Whither In The Time Of Thomas, Third Viscount, I Had Preceded +Him As Page To Isabella</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Coming up to London again some short time after this +retreat, the Lord Castlewood dispatched a retainer of his +to a little cottage in the village of Ealing, near to London, +where for some time had dwelt an old French refugee, by +name Mr. Pastoureau, one of those whom the persecution +of the Huguenots by the French king had brought over +to this country. With this old man lived a little lad, who +went by the name of Henry Thomas. He remembered to +have lived in another place a short time before, near to +London, too, amongst looms and spinning-wheels, and +a great deal of psalm-singing and church-going, and a whole +colony of Frenchmen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There he had a dear, dear friend, who died and whom he +called aunt. She used to visit him in his dreams sometimes; +and her face, though it was homely, was a thousand times +dearer to him than that of Mrs. Pastoureau, Bon Papa +Pastoureau's new wife, who came to live with him after +aunt went away. And there, at Spittlefields, as it used +to be called, lived Uncle George, who was a weaver too, +but used to tell Harry that he was a little gentleman, and +that his father was a captain, and his mother an angel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When he said so, Bon Papa used to look up from the +loom, where he was embroidering beautiful silk flowers, and +say, <span class="tei tei-q">“Angel! she belongs to the Babylonish Scarlet Woman.”</span> +Bon Papa was always talking of the Scarlet Woman. He +had a little room where he always used to preach and sing +hymns out of his great old nose. Little Harry did not like +the preaching; he liked better the fine stories which aunt +used to tell him. Bon Papa's wife never told him pretty +stories; she quarrelled with Uncle George, and he went +away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After this Harry's Bon Papa, and his wife and two children +of her own that she brought with her, came to live at Ealing. +The new wife gave her children the best of everything, and +Harry many a whipping, he knew not why. Besides blows, +he got ill names from her, which need not be set down here, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page030">[pg 030]</span><a name="Pg030" id="Pg030" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +for the sake of old Mr. Pastoureau, who was still kind sometimes. +The unhappiness of those days is long forgiven, +though they cast a shade of melancholy over the child's +youth, which will accompany him, no doubt, to the end of +his days: as those tender twigs are bent the trees grow +afterward; and he, at least, who has suffered as a child, +and is not quite perverted in that early school of unhappiness, +learns to be gentle and long-suffering with little +children. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry was very glad when a gentleman dressed in black, +on horseback, with a mounted servant behind him, came to +fetch him away from Ealing. The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">noverca</span></span>, or unjust stepmother, +who had neglected him for her own two children, +gave him supper enough the night before he went away, +and plenty in the morning. She did not beat him once, and +told the children to keep their hands off him. One was a +girl, and Harry never could bear to strike a girl; and the +other was a boy, whom he could easily have beat, but he +always cried out, when Mrs. Pastoureau came sailing to the +rescue with arms like a flail. She only washed Harry's face +the day he went away; nor ever so much as once boxed +his ears. She whimpered rather when the gentleman in +black came for the boy; and old Mr. Pastoureau, as he +gave the child his blessing, scowled over his shoulder at the +strange gentleman, and grumbled out something about +Babylon and the scarlet lady. He was grown quite old, +like a child almost. Mrs. Pastoureau used to wipe his +nose as she did to the children. She was a great, big, +handsome young woman; but, though she pretended to +cry, Harry thought 'twas only a sham, and sprung quite +delighted upon the horse upon which the lackey helped him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He was a Frenchman; his name was Blaise. The child +could talk to him in his own language perfectly well: he +knew it better than English indeed: having lived hitherto +chiefly among French people: and being called the little +Frenchman by other boys on Ealing Green. He soon learnt +to speak English perfectly, and to forget some of his French: +children forget easily. Some earlier and fainter recollections +the child had, of a different country; and a town with tall +white houses; and a ship. But these were quite indistinct +in the boy's mind, as indeed the memory of Ealing soon +became, at least of much that he suffered there. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page031">[pg 031]</span><a name="Pg031" id="Pg031" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The lackey before whom he rode was very lively and +voluble, and informed the boy that the gentleman riding +before him was my lord's chaplain, Father Holt—that he +was now to be called Master Harry Esmond—that my Lord +Viscount Castlewood was his <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">parrain</span></span>—that he was +to live at the great house of Castlewood, in the province of ——shire, +where he would see madame the viscountess, who was a +grand lady. And so, seated on a cloth before Blaise's +saddle, Harry Esmond was brought to London, and to a fine +square called Covent Garden, near to which his patron +lodged. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Holt the priest took the child by the hand, and +brought him to this nobleman, a grand languid nobleman +in a great cap and flowered morning-gown, sucking oranges. +He patted Harry on the head and gave him an orange. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">C'est bien ça</span></span>,”</span> +he said to the priest after eyeing the +child, and the gentleman in black shrugged his shoulders. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Let Blaise take him out for a holiday,”</span> and out for a +holiday the boy and the valet went. Harry went jumping +along; he was glad enough to go. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He will remember to his life's end the delights of those +days. He was taken to see a play by Monsieur Blaise, in +a house a thousand times greater and finer than the booth +at Ealing Fair—and on the next happy day they took water +on the river, and Harry saw London Bridge, with the +houses and booksellers' shops thereon, looking like a street, +and the Tower of London, with the armour, and the great +lions and bears in the moats—all under company of Monsieur +Blaise. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Presently, of an early morning, all the party set forth for +the country, namely, my lord viscount and the other +gentleman; Monsieur Blaise, and Harry on a pillion behind +them, and two or three men with pistols leading the baggage-horses. +And all along the road the Frenchman told little +Harry stories of brigands, which made the child's hair stand +on end, and terrified him; so that at the great gloomy inn +on the road where they lay, he besought to be allowed to +sleep in a room with one of the servants, and was compassionated +by Mr. Holt, the gentleman who travelled with +my lord, and who gave the child a little bed in his chamber. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His artless talk and answers very likely inclined this +gentleman in the boy's favour, for next day Mr. Holt said +Harry should ride behind him, and not with the French +lacky; and all along the journey put a thousand questions +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page032">[pg 032]</span><a name="Pg032" id="Pg032" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to the child—as to his foster-brother and relations at +Ealing; what his old grandfather had taught him; what +languages he knew; whether he could read and write, and +sing, and so forth. And Mr. Holt found that Harry could +read and write, and possessed the two languages of French +and English very well; and when he asked Harry about +singing, the lad broke out with a hymn to the tune of +Dr. Martin Luther, which set Mr. Holt a-laughing; and +even caused his <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">grand parrain</span></span> in the laced hat and +periwig to laugh too when Holt told him what the child was singing. +For it appeared that Dr. Martin Luther's hymns were not +sung in the churches Mr. Holt preached at. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You must never sing that song any more, do you hear, +little manikin?”</span> says my lord viscount, holding up a +finger. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But we will try and teach you a better, Harry.”</span> Mr. Holt +said; and the child answered, for he was a docile child, +and of an affectionate nature, <span class="tei tei-q">“That he loved pretty songs, +and would try and learn anything the gentleman would +tell him.”</span> That day he so pleased the gentlemen by his +talk, that they had him to dine with them at the inn, and +encouraged him in his prattle; and Monsieur Blaise, with +whom he rode and dined the day before, waited upon him +now. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis well, 'tis well!”</span> said Blaise, that night (in his own +language) when they lay again at an inn. <span class="tei tei-q">“We are a little +lord here; we are a little lord now: we shall see what we are +when we come to Castlewood where my lady is.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When shall we come to Castlewood, Monsieur Blaise?”</span> +says Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Parbleu!</span></span> +my lord does not press himself.”</span> Blaise says, +with a grin; and, indeed, it seemed as if his lordship was +not in a great hurry, for he spent three days on that journey, +which Harry Esmond hath often since ridden in a dozen +hours. For the last two of the days, Harry rode with the +priest, who was so kind to him, that the child had grown +to be quite fond and familiar with him by the journey's +end, and had scarce a thought in his little heart which by +that time he had not confided to his new friend. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At length on the third day, at evening, they came to a +village standing on a green with elms round it, very pretty +to look at; and the people there all took off their hats, +and made curtsies to my lord viscount, who bowed to them +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page033">[pg 033]</span><a name="Pg033" id="Pg033" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +all languidly; and there was one portly person that wore +a cassock and a broad-leafed hat, who bowed lower than +any one—and with this one both my lord and Mr. Holt +had a few words. <span class="tei tei-q">“This, Harry, is Castlewood church,”</span> +says Mr. Holt, <span class="tei tei-q">“and this is the pillar thereof, learned Doctor +Tusher. Take off your hat, sirrah, and salute Doctor +Tusher.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Come up to supper, doctor,”</span> says my lord; at which +the doctor made another low bow, and the party moved on +towards a grand house that was before them, with many +grey towers, and vanes on them, and windows flaming in +the sunshine; and a great army of rooks, wheeling over +their heads, made for the woods behind the house, as Harry +saw; and Mr. Holt told him that they lived at Castlewood +too. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They came to the house, and passed under an arch into +a courtyard, with a fountain in the centre, where many +men came and held my lord's stirrup as he descended, and +paid great respect to Mr. Holt likewise. And the child +thought that the servants looked at him curiously, and +smiled to one another—and he recalled what Blaise had +said to him when they were in London, and Harry had +spoken about his godpapa, when the Frenchman said, +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Parbleu!</span></span> +one sees well that my lord is your godfather”</span>; +words whereof the poor lad did not know the meaning then, +though he apprehended the truth in a very short time afterwards, +and learned it and thought of it with no small feeling +of shame. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Taking Harry by the hand as soon as they were both +descended from their horses, Mr. Holt led him across the +court, and under a low door to rooms on a level with the +ground; one of which Father Holt said was to be the boy's +chamber, the other on the other side of the passage being +the father's own; and as soon as the little man's face was +washed, and the father's own dress arranged, Harry's guide +took him once more to the door by which my lord had entered +the hall, and up a stair, and through an ante-room to my +lady's drawing-room—an apartment than which Harry +thought he had never seen anything more grand—no, not in +the Tower of London which he had just visited. Indeed +the chamber was richly ornamented in the manner of +Queen Elizabeth's time, with great stained windows at +either end, and hangings of tapestry, which the sun shining +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page034">[pg 034]</span><a name="Pg034" id="Pg034" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +through the coloured glass painted of a thousand hues; +and here in state, by the fire, sat a lady to whom the priest +took up Harry, who was indeed amazed by her appearance. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady viscountess's face was daubed with white and +red up to the eyes, to which the paint gave an unearthly +glare: she had a tower of lace on her head, under which +was a bush of black curls—borrowed curls—so that no +wonder little Harry Esmond was scared when he was first +presented to her—the kind priest acting as master of the +ceremonies at that solemn introduction—and he stared at +her with eyes almost as great as her own, as he had stared +at the player-woman who acted the wicked tragedy-queen, +when the players came down to Ealing Fair. She sat in +a great chair by the fire-corner; in her lap was a spaniel-dog +that barked furiously; on a little table by her was her +ladyship's snuff-box and her sugar-plum box. She wore +a dress of black velvet, and a petticoat of flame-coloured +brocade. She had as many rings on her fingers as the old +woman of Banbury Cross; and pretty small feet which +she was fond of showing, with great gold clocks to her +stockings, and white pantofles with red heels; and an +odour of musk was shook out of her garments whenever she +moved or quitted the room, leaning on her tortoiseshell +stick, little Fury barking at her heels. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mrs. Tusher, the parson's wife, was with my lady. She +had been waiting-woman to her ladyship in the late lord's +time, and, having her soul in that business, took naturally +to it when the Viscountess of Castlewood returned to inhabit +her father's house. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I present to your ladyship your kinsman and little page +of honour, Master Henry Esmond,”</span> Mr. Holt said, bowing +lowly, with a sort of comical humility. <span class="tei tei-q">“Make a pretty +bow to my lady, monsieur; and then another little bow, +not so low, to Madam Tusher—the fair priestess of Castlewood.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where I have lived and hope to die, sir,”</span> says Madam +Tusher, giving a hard glance at the brat, and then at my +lady. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Upon her the boy's whole attention was for a time directed. +He could not keep his great eyes off from her. Since the +Empress of Ealing he had seen nothing so awful. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Does my appearance please you, little page?”</span> asked +the lady. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page035">[pg 035]</span><a name="Pg035" id="Pg035" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He would be very hard to please if it didn't,”</span> cried +Madam Tusher. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Have done, you silly Maria,”</span> said Lady Castlewood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where I'm attached, I'm attached, madam—and I'd +die rather than not say so.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Je meurs où je m'attache</span></span>,”</span> +Mr. Holt said, with a polite +grin. <span class="tei tei-q">“The ivy says so in the picture, and clings to the oak +like a fond parasite as it is.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Parricide, sir!”</span> cries Mrs. Tusher. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush, Tusher—you are always bickering with Father +Holt,”</span> cried my lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“Come and kiss my hand, child,”</span> +and the oak held out a <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">branch</span></em> to little Harry Esmond, who +took and dutifully kissed the lean old hand, upon the +gnarled knuckles of which there glittered a hundred rings. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“To kiss that hand would make many a pretty fellow +happy!”</span> cried Mrs. Tusher: on which my lady crying out, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Go, you foolish Tusher,”</span> and tapping her with her great +fan, Tusher ran forward to seize her hand and kiss it. Fury +arose and barked furiously at Tusher; and Father Holt +looked on at this queer scene, with arch grave glances. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The awe exhibited by the little boy perhaps pleased the +lady to whom this artless flattery was bestowed; for having +gone down on his knee (as Father Holt had directed him, +and the mode then was) and performed his obeisance, she +said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Page Esmond, my groom of the chamber will inform +you what your duties are, when you wait upon my lord and +me; and good Father Holt will instruct you as becomes +a gentleman of our name. You will pay him obedience in +everything, and I pray you may grow to be as learned and +as good as your tutor.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The lady seemed to have the greatest reverence for +Mr. Holt, and to be more afraid of him than of anything +else in the world. If she was ever so angry, a word or look +from Father Holt made her calm: indeed he had a vast +power of subjecting those who came near him; and, among +the rest, his new pupil gave himself up with an entire confidence +and attachment to the good father, and became +his willing slave almost from the first moment he saw him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He put his small hand into the father's as he walked +away from his first presentation to his mistress, and asked +many questions in his artless childish way. <span class="tei tei-q">“Who is that +other woman?”</span> he asked. <span class="tei tei-q">“She is fat and round; she is +more pretty than my Lady Castlewood.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page036">[pg 036]</span><a name="Pg036" id="Pg036" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She is Madam Tusher, the parson's wife of Castlewood. +She has a son of your age, but bigger than you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Why does she like so to kiss my lady's hand? It is not +good to kiss.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Tastes are different, little man. Madam Tusher is +attached to my lady, having been her waiting-woman, +before she was married, in the old lord's time. She married +Doctor Tusher the chaplain. The English household +divines often marry the waiting-women.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You will not marry the French woman, will you? I saw +her laughing with Blaise in the buttery.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I belong to a church that is older and better than the +English Church,”</span> Mr. Holt said (making a sign whereof +Esmond did not then understand the meaning, across his +breast and forehead); <span class="tei tei-q">“in our Church the clergy do not marry. +You will understand these things better soon.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Was not St. Peter the head of your Church?—Dr. Rabbits +of Ealing told us so.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The father said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, he was.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But St. Peter was married, for we heard only last Sunday +that his wife's mother lay sick of a fever.”</span> On which the +father again laughed, and said he would understand this +too better soon, and talked of other things, and took away +Harry Esmond, and showed him the great old house which +he had come to inhabit. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It stood on a rising green hill, with woods behind it, in +which were rooks' nests, where the birds at morning and +returning home at evening made a great cawing. At the +foot of the hill was a river with a steep ancient bridge crossing +it; and beyond that a large pleasant green flat, where +the village of Castlewood stood and stands, with the church +in the midst, the parsonage hard by it, the inn with the blacksmith's +forge beside it, and the sign of the <span class="tei tei-q">“Three Castles”</span> +on the elm. The London road stretched away towards +the rising sun, and to the west were swelling hills and peaks, +behind which many a time Harry Esmond saw the same sun +setting, that he now looks on thousands of miles away +across the great ocean—in a new Castlewood by another +stream, that bears, like the new country of wandering +Aeneas, the fond names of the land of his youth. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Hall of Castlewood was built with two courts, whereof +one only, the fountain court, was now inhabited, the other +having been battered down in the Cromwellian wars. In +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page037">[pg 037]</span><a name="Pg037" id="Pg037" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the fountain court, still in good repair, was the great hall, +near to the kitchen and butteries. A dozen of living-rooms +looking to the north, and communicating with the little +chapel that faced eastwards and the buildings stretching +from that to the main gate, and with the hall (which looked +to the west) into the court now dismantled. This court +had been the most magnificent of the two, until the protector's +cannon tore down one side of it before the place was +taken and stormed. The besiegers entered at the terrace +under the clock-tower, slaying every man of the garrison, +and at their head my lord's brother, Francis Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Restoration did not bring enough money to the +Lord Castlewood to restore this ruined part of his house; +where were the morning parlours, above them the long +music-gallery, and before which stretched the garden-terrace, +where, however, the flowers grew again, which the +boots of the Roundheads had trodden in their assault, and +which was restored without much cost, and only a little +care, by both ladies who succeeded the second viscount in +the government of this mansion. Round the terrace-garden +was a low wall with a wicket leading to the wooded +height beyond, that is called Cromwell's battery to this day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Young Harry Esmond learned the domestic part of his +duty, which was easy enough, from the groom of her ladyship's +chamber: serving the countess, as the custom commonly +was in his boyhood, as page, waiting at her chair, +bringing her scented water and the silver basin after dinner—sitting +on her carriage step on state occasions, or on +public days introducing her company to her. This was +chiefly of the Catholic gentry, of whom there were a pretty +many in the country and neighbouring city; and who rode +not seldom to Castlewood to partake of the hospitalities +there. In the second year of their residence the company +seemed especially to increase. My lord and my lady were +seldom without visitors, in whose society it was curious to +contrast the difference of behaviour between Father Holt, +the director of the family, and Doctor Tusher, the rector of +the parish—Mr. Holt moving amongst the very highest as +quite their equal, and as commanding them all; while poor +Doctor Tusher, whose position was indeed a difficult one, +having been chaplain once to the Hall, and still to the +Protestant servants there, seemed more like an usher than +an equal, and always rose to go away after the first course. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page038">[pg 038]</span><a name="Pg038" id="Pg038" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Also there came in these times to Father Holt many private +visitors, whom after a little, Henry Esmond had little +difficulty in recognizing as ecclesiastics of the father's +persuasion; whatever their dresses (and they adopted all) +might be. These were closeted with the father constantly, +and often came and rode away without paying their devoirs +to my lord and lady—to the lady and lord rather—his lordship +being little more than a cipher in the house, and entirely +under his domineering partner. A little fowling, a little +hunting, a great deal of sleep, and a long time at cards and +table, carried through one day after another with his lordship. +When meetings took place in this second year, which +often would happen with closed doors, the page found my +lord's sheet of paper scribbled over with dogs and horses, +and 'twas said he had much ado to keep himself awake at +these councils: the countess ruling over them, and he acting +as little more than her secretary. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Father Holt began speedily to be so much occupied with +these meetings as rather to neglect the education of the +little lad who so gladly put himself under the kind priest's +orders. At first they read much and regularly, both in +Latin and French; the father not neglecting in anything to +impress his faith upon his pupil, but not forcing him +violently, and treating him with a delicacy and kindness +which surprised and attached the child; always more easily +won by these methods than by any severe exercise of authority. +And his delight in our walks was to tell Harry of +the glories of his order, of its martyrs and heroes, of its +brethren converting the heathen by myriads, traversing +the desert, facing the stake, ruling the courts and councils, +or braving the tortures of kings; so that Harry Esmond +thought that to belong to the Jesuits was the greatest +prize of life and bravest end of ambition; the greatest +career here, and in heaven the surest reward; and began +to long for the day, not only when he should enter into the +one Church and receive his first communion, but when he +might join that wonderful brotherhood, which was present +throughout all the world, and which numbered the wisest, +the bravest, the highest born, the most eloquent of men +among its members. Father Holt bade him keep his views +secret, and to hide them as a great treasure which would +escape him if it was revealed; and proud of this confidence +and secret vested in him, the lad became fondly attached +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page039">[pg 039]</span><a name="Pg039" id="Pg039" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to the master who initiated him into a mystery so wonderful +and awful. And when little Tom Tusher, his neighbour, +came from school for his holiday, and said how he, too, +was to be bred up for an English priest, and would get what +he called an exhibition from his school, and then a college +scholarship and fellowship, and then a good living—it tasked +young Harry Esmond's powers of reticence not to say to +his young companion, <span class="tei tei-q">“Church! priesthood! fat living! +My dear Tommy, do you call yours a Church and a priesthood? +What is a fat living compared to converting a hundred +thousand heathens by a single sermon? What is a +scholarship at Trinity by the side of a crown of martyrdom, +with angels awaiting you as your head is taken off? Could +your master at school sail over the Thames on his gown? +Have you statues in your church that can bleed, speak, +walk, and cry? My good Tommy, in dear Father Holt's +Church these things take place every day. You know +St. Philip of the Willows appeared to Lord Castlewood and +caused him to turn to the one true Church. No saints ever +come to you.”</span> And Harry Esmond, because of his promise +to Father Holt, hiding away these treasures of faith from +T. Tusher, delivered himself of them nevertheless simply to +Father Holt, who stroked his head, smiled at him with his +inscrutable look, and told him that he did well to meditate +on these great things, and not to talk of them except +under direction. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc17" id="toc17"></a> +<a name="pdf18" id="pdf18"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter IV. I Am Placed Under A Popish Priest And Bred +To That Religion.—Viscountess Castlewood</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Had time enough been given, and his childish inclinations +been properly nurtured, Harry Esmond had been a Jesuit +priest ere he was a dozen years older, and might have +finished his days a martyr in China or a victim on Tower +Hill: for, in the few months they spent together at Castlewood, +Mr. Holt obtained an entire mastery over the boy's +intellect and affections; and had brought him to think, +as indeed Father Holt thought with all his heart too, that +no life was so noble, no death so desirable, as that which +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page040">[pg 040]</span><a name="Pg040" id="Pg040" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +many brethren of his famous order were ready to undergo. +By love, by a brightness of wit and good humour that +charmed all, by an authority which he knew how to assume, +by a mystery and silence about him which increased the +child's reverence for him, he won Harry's absolute fealty, +and would have kept it, doubtless, if schemes greater and +more important than a poor little boy's admission into +orders had not called him away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After being at home for a few months in tranquillity +(if theirs might be called tranquillity, which was, in truth, +a constant bickering), my lord and lady left the country +for London, taking their director with them: and his little +pupil scarce ever shed more bitter tears in his life than he +did for nights after the first parting with his dear friend, +as he lay in the lonely chamber next to that which the +father used to occupy. He and a few domestics were left +as the only tenants of the great house: and, though Harry +sedulously did all the tasks which the father set him, he had +many hours unoccupied, and read in the library, and +bewildered his little brains with the great books he found +there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After a while the little lad grew accustomed to the loneliness +of the place; and in after days remembered this part +of his life as a period not unhappy. When the family was +at London the whole of the establishment travelled thither +with the exception of the porter, who was, moreover, brewer, +gardener, and woodman, and his wife and children. These +had their lodging in the gate-house hard by, with a door +into the court; and a window looking out on the green +was the chaplain's room; and next to this a small chamber +where Father Holt had his books, and Harry Esmond his +sleeping-closet. The side of the house facing the east had +escaped the guns of the Cromwellians, whose battery was +on the height facing the western court; so that this eastern +end bore few marks of demolition, save in the chapel, where +the painted windows surviving Edward the Sixth had been +broke by the Commonwealth men. In Father Holt's time +little Harry Esmond acted as his familiar, and faithful little +servitor; beating his clothes, folding his vestments, fetching +his water from the well long before daylight, ready to run +anywhere for the service of his beloved priest. When the +father was away he locked his private chamber; but the +room where the books were was left to little Harry, who, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page041">[pg 041]</span><a name="Pg041" id="Pg041" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +but for the society of this gentleman, was little less solitary +when Lord Castlewood was at home. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The French wit saith that a hero is none to his valet de +chambre, and it required less quick eyes than my lady's +little page was naturally endowed with, to see that she had +many qualities by no means heroic, however much Mrs. +Tusher might flatter and coax her. When Father Holt was +not by, who exercised an entire authority over the pair, +my lord and my lady quarrelled and abused each other so +as to make the servants laugh, and to frighten the little +page on duty. The poor boy trembled before his mistress, +who called him by a hundred ugly names, who made nothing +of boxing his ears—and tilting the silver basin in his face +which it was his business to present to her after dinner. +She hath repaired, by subsequent kindness to him, these +severities, which it must be owned made his childhood very +unhappy. She was but unhappy herself at this time, poor +soul, and I suppose made her dependants lead her own sad +life. I think my lord was as much afraid of her as her page +was, and the only person of the household who mastered +her was Mr. Holt. Harry was only too glad when the +father dined at table, and to slink away and prattle with +him afterwards, or read with him, or walk with him. Luckily +my lady viscountess did not rise till noon. Heaven help +the poor waiting-woman who had charge of her toilet! +I have often seen the poor wretch come out with red eyes +from the closet, where those long and mysterious rites of +her ladyship's dress were performed, and the backgammon-box +locked up with a rap on Mrs. Tusher's fingers when she +played ill or the game was going the wrong way. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Blessed be the king who introduced cards, and the kind +inventors of piquet and cribbage, for they employed six +hours at least of her ladyship's day, during which her family +was pretty easy. Without this occupation my lady frequently +declared she should die. Her dependants one after +another relieved guard—'twas rather a dangerous post to +play with her ladyship—and took the cards turn about. +Mr. Holt would sit with her at piquet during hours together, +at which time she behaved herself properly; and, as for +Dr. Tusher, I believe he would have left a parishioner's +dying bed, if summoned to play a rubber with his patroness +at Castlewood. Sometimes, when they were pretty comfortable +together, my lord took a hand. Besides these my lady +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page042">[pg 042]</span><a name="Pg042" id="Pg042" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +had her faithful poor Tusher, and one, two, three gentlewomen +whom Harry Esmond could recollect in his time. +They could not bear that genteel service very long; one +after another tried and failed at it. These and the housekeeper, +and little Harry Esmond, had a table of their own. +Poor ladies! their life was far harder than the page's. He +was found asleep tucked up in his little bed, whilst they +were sitting by her ladyship reading her to sleep, with the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">News Letter</span></span> or the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Grand Cyrus</span></span>. My lady +used to have boxes of new plays from London, and Harry was forbidden, +under the pain of a whipping, to look into them. I am +afraid he deserved the penalty pretty often, and got it +sometimes. Father Holt applied it twice or thrice, when +he caught the young scapegrace with a delightful wicked +comedy of Mr. Shadwell's or Mr. Wycherley's under his +pillow. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +These, when he took any, were my lord's favourite +reading. But he was averse to much study, and, as his +little page fancied, to much occupation of any sort. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It always seemed to young Harry Esmond that my lord +treated him with more kindness when his lady was not +present, and Lord Castlewood would take the lad sometimes +on his little journeys a-hunting or a-birding; he loved to +play at cards and tric-trac with him, which games the boy +learned to pleasure his lord: and was growing to like him +better daily, showing a special pleasure if Father Holt gave +a good report of him, patting him on the head, and promising +that he would provide for the boy. However, in my +lady's presence, my lord showed no such marks of kindness, +and affected to treat the lad roughly, and rebuked him +sharply for little faults—for which he in a manner asked +pardon of young Esmond when they were private, saying +if he did not speak roughly, she would, and his tongue was +not such a bad one as his lady's—a point whereof the boy, +young as he was, was very well assured. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Great public events were happening all this while, of +which the simple young page took little count. But one +day, riding into the neighbouring town on the step of my +lady's coach, his lordship and she and Father Holt being +inside, a great mob of people came hooting and jeering +round the coach, bawling out, <span class="tei tei-q">“The bishops for ever!”</span> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Down with the Pope!”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“No Popery! no Popery! Jezebel, +Jezebel!”</span> so that my lord began to laugh, my lady's eyes +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page043">[pg 043]</span><a name="Pg043" id="Pg043" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to roll with anger, for she was as bold as a lioness, and feared +nobody; whilst Mr. Holt, as Esmond saw from his place +on the step, sank back with rather an alarmed face, crying +out to her ladyship, <span class="tei tei-q">“For God's sake, madam, do not speak +or look out of window, sit still.”</span> But she did not obey this +prudent injunction of the father; she thrust her head out +of the coach window, and screamed out to the coachman, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Flog your way through them, the brutes, James, and use +your whip!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The mob answered with a roaring jeer of laughter, and +fresh cries of, <span class="tei tei-q">“Jezebel! Jezebel!”</span> My lord only laughed +the more: he was a languid gentleman: nothing seemed +to excite him commonly, though I have seen him cheer +and halloo the hounds very briskly, and his face (which +was generally very yellow and calm) grow quite red and +cheerful during a burst over the Downs after a hare, and +laugh, and swear, and huzza at a cockfight, of which sport +he was very fond. And now, when the mob began to hoot +his lady, he laughed with something of a mischievous look, +as though he expected sport, and thought that she and they +were a match. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +James the coachman was more afraid of his mistress than +the mob, probably, for he whipped on his horses as he was +bidden, and the postboy that rode with the first pair (my +lady always went with her coach-and-six) gave a cut of his +thong over the shoulders of one fellow who put his hand +out towards the leading horse's rein. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was a market day and the country people were all +assembled with their baskets of poultry, eggs, and such +things; the postilion had no sooner lashed the man who +would have taken hold of his horse, but a great cabbage +came whirling like a bombshell into the carriage, at which +my lord laughed more, for it knocked my lady's fan out of +her hand, and plumped into Father Holt's stomach. Then +came a shower of carrots and potatoes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“For heaven's sake be still!”</span> says Mr. Holt; <span class="tei tei-q">“we are +not ten paces from the <span class="tei tei-q">‘Bell’</span> archway, where they can +shut the gates on us, and keep out this <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">canaille</span></span>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The little page was outside the coach on the step, and +a fellow in the crowd aimed a potato at him, and hit him +in the eye, at which the poor little wretch set up a shout; +the man laughed, a great big saddler's apprentice of the +town. <span class="tei tei-q">“Ah! you d—— little yelling Popish bastard,”</span> he +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page044">[pg 044]</span><a name="Pg044" id="Pg044" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +said, and stooped to pick up another; the crowd had +gathered quite between the horses and in the inn door by +this time, and the coach was brought to a dead standstill. +My lord jumped as briskly as a boy out of the door on his +side of the coach, squeezing little Harry behind it; had +hold of the potato-thrower's collar in an instant, and the +next moment the brute's heels were in the air, and he fell +on the stones with a thump. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You hulking coward!”</span> says he; <span class="tei tei-q">“you pack of screaming +blackguards! how dare you attack children, and insult +women? Fling another shot at that carriage, you sneaking +pigskin cobbler, and by the Lord I'll send my rapier through +you!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Some of the mob cried, <span class="tei tei-q">“Huzza, my lord!”</span> for they knew +him, and the saddler's man was a known bruiser, near twice +as big as my lord viscount. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Make way, there,”</span> says he (he spoke in a high shrill +voice, but with a great air of authority). <span class="tei tei-q">“Make way, and +let her ladyship's carriage pass.”</span> The men that were +between the coach and the gate of the <span class="tei tei-q">“Bell”</span> actually did +make way, and the horses went in, my lord walking after +them with his hat on his head. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As he was going in at the gate, through which the coach +had just rolled, another cry begins of <span class="tei tei-q">“No Popery—no +Papists!”</span> My lord turns round and faces them once more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“God save the king!”</span> says he at the highest pitch of his +voice. <span class="tei tei-q">“Who dares abuse the king's religion? You, you +d——d psalm-singing cobbler, as sure as I'm a magistrate +of this county I'll commit you!”</span> The fellow shrunk back, +and my lord retreated with all the honours of the day. But +when the little flurry caused by the scene was over, and the +flush passed off his face, he relapsed into his usual languor, +trifled with his little dog, and yawned when my lady spoke +to him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This mob was one of many thousands that were going +about the country at that time, huzzaing for the acquittal +of the seven bishops who had been tried just then, and +about whom little Harry Esmond at that time knew scarce +anything. It was assizes at Hexton, and there was a great +meeting of the gentry at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Bell”</span>; and my lord's people +had their new liveries on, and Harry a little suit of blue and +silver, which he wore upon occasions of state; and the +gentlefolks came round and talked to my lord; and a judge +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page045">[pg 045]</span><a name="Pg045" id="Pg045" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +in a red gown, who seemed a very great personage, especially +complimented him and my lady, who was mighty grand. +Harry remembers her train borne up by her gentlewoman. +There was an assembly and ball at the great room at the +<span class="tei tei-q">“Bell”</span>, and other young gentlemen of the county families +looked on as he did. One of them jeered him for his black +eye, which was swelled by the potato, and another called +him a bastard, on which he and Harry fell to fisticuffs. My +lord's cousin, Colonel Esmond of Walcote, was there, and +separated the two lads, a great tall gentleman with a handsome, +good-natured face. The boy did not know how +nearly in after-life he should be allied to Colonel Esmond, +and how much kindness he should have to owe him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There was little love between the two families. My lady +used not to spare Colonel Esmond in talking of him, for +reasons which have been hinted already; but about which, +at his tender age, Henry Esmond could be expected to +know nothing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Very soon afterwards my lord and lady went to London +with Mr. Holt, leaving, however, the page behind them. +The little man had the great house of Castlewood to himself; +or between him and the housekeeper, Mrs. Worksop, +an old lady who was a kinswoman of the family in some +distant way, and a Protestant, but a stanch Tory and +king's-man, as all the Esmonds were. He used to go to +school to Dr. Tusher when he was at home, though the doctor +was much occupied too. There was a great stir and commotion +everywhere, even in the little quiet village of Castlewood, +whither a party of people came from the town, who +would have broken Castlewood Chapel windows, but the +village people turned out, and even old Sievewright, the republican +blacksmith, along with them: for my lady, though +she was a Papist, and had many odd ways, was kind to the +tenantry, and there was always a plenty of beef, and +blankets, and medicine for the poor at Castlewood Hall. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A kingdom was changing hands whilst my lord and lady +were away. King James was flying, the Dutchmen were +coming; awful stories about them and the Prince of Orange +used old Mrs. Worksop to tell to the idle little page. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He liked the solitude of the great house very well; he +had all the play-books to read, and no Father Holt to whip +him, and a hundred childish pursuits and pastimes, without +doors and within, which made this time very pleasant. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page046">[pg 046]</span><a name="Pg046" id="Pg046" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc19" id="toc19"></a> +<a name="pdf20" id="pdf20"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter V. My Superiors Are Engaged In Plots For The Restoration Of +King James II</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Not having been able to sleep, for thinking of some lines +for eels which he had placed the night before, the lad was +lying in his little bed, waiting for the hour when the gate +would be open, and he and his comrade, Job Lockwood, +the porter's son, might go to the pond and see what fortune +had brought them. At daybreak Job was to awaken him, +but his own eagerness for the sport had served as a réveille +long since—so long, that it seemed to him as if the day +never would come. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It might have been four o'clock when he heard the door +of the opposite chamber, the chaplain's room, open, and +the voice of a man coughing in the passage. Harry jumped +up, thinking for certain it was a robber, or hoping perhaps +for a ghost, and, flinging open his own door, saw before +him the chaplain's door open, and a light inside, and a +figure standing in the doorway, in the midst of a great +smoke which issued from the room. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who's there?”</span> cried out the boy, who was of a good +spirit. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Silentium!</span></span>”</span> +whispered the other; <span class="tei tei-q">“'tis I, my boy!”</span> +and, holding his hand out, Harry had no difficulty in +recognizing his master and friend, Father Holt. A curtain +was over the window of the chaplain's room that looked +to the court, and Harry saw that the smoke came from a +great flame of papers which were burning in a brazier when +he entered the chaplain's room. After giving a hasty +greeting and blessing to the lad, who was charmed to see +his tutor, the father continued the burning of his papers, +drawing them from a cupboard over the mantelpiece wall, +which Harry had never seen before. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Father Holt laughed, seeing the lad's attention fixed at +once on this hole. <span class="tei tei-q">“That is right, Harry,”</span> he said; <span class="tei tei-q">“faithful +little famuli see all and say nothing. You are faithful, +I know.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I know I would go to the stake for you,”</span> said Harry. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page047">[pg 047]</span><a name="Pg047" id="Pg047" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I don't want your head,”</span> said the father, patting it +kindly; <span class="tei tei-q">“all you have to do is to hold your tongue. Let +us burn these papers, and say nothing to anybody. Should +you like to read them?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond blushed, and held down his head; he <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">had</span></em> +looked as the fact was, and without thinking, at the paper +before him; and though he had seen it, could not understand +a word of it, the letters being quite clear enough, but +quite without meaning. They burned the papers, beating +down the ashes in a brazier, so that scarce any traces of +them remained. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry had been accustomed to see Father Holt in more +dresses than one; it not being safe, or worth the danger, +for Popish ecclesiastics to wear their proper dress; and he +was, in consequence, in no wise astonished that the priest +should now appear before him in a riding dress, with large +buff leather boots, and a feather to his hat, plain, but such +as gentlemen wore. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You know the secret of the cupboard,”</span> said he, laughing, +<span class="tei tei-q">“and must be prepared for other mysteries;”</span> and he opened—but +not a secret cupboard this time—only a wardrobe, +which he usually kept locked, and from which he now took +out two or three dresses and perukes of different colours, and +a couple of swords of a pretty make (Father Holt was an +expert practitioner with the small sword, and every day, +whilst he was at home, he and his pupil practised this +exercise, in which the lad became a very great proficient), +a military coat and cloak, and a farmer's smock, and placed +them in the large hole over the mantelpiece from which +the papers had been taken. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If they miss the cupboard,”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“they will not find +these; if they find them, they'll tell no tales, except that +Father Holt wore more suits of clothes than one. All Jesuits +do. You know what deceivers we are, Harry.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry was alarmed at the notion that his friend was about +to leave him; but <span class="tei tei-q">“No”</span>, the priest said; <span class="tei tei-q">“I may very likely +come back with my lord in a few days. We are to be +tolerated; we are not to be persecuted. But they may take +a fancy to pay a visit at Castlewood ere our return; and, as +gentlemen of my cloth are suspected, they might choose +to examine my papers, which concern nobody—at least, not +them.”</span> And to this day, whether the papers in cipher +related to politics, or to the affairs of that mysterious society +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page048">[pg 048]</span><a name="Pg048" id="Pg048" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +whereof Father Holt was a member, his pupil, Harry +Esmond, remains in entire ignorance. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The rest of his goods, his small wardrobe, &c., Holt left +untouched on his shelves and in his cupboard, taking down—with +a laugh, however—and flinging into the brazier, where +he only half burned them, some theological treatises which +he had been writing against the English divines. <span class="tei tei-q">“And +now,”</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">“Henry, my son, you may testify, with a safe +conscience, that you saw me burning Latin sermons the +last time I was here before I went away to London; and +it will be daybreak directly, and I must be away before +Lockwood is stirring.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Will not Lockwood let you out, sir?”</span> Esmond asked. +Holt laughed; he was never more gay or good-humoured +than when in the midst of action or danger. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Lockwood knows nothing of my being here, mind you,”</span> +he said; <span class="tei tei-q">“nor would you, you little wretch, had you slept +better. You must forget that I have been here; and now +farewell. Close the door, and go to your own room, and +don't come out till—stay, why should you not know one +secret more? I know you will never betray me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the chaplain's room were two windows; the one +looking into the court facing westwards to the fountain; +the other, a small casement strongly barred, and looking +on to the green in front of the Hall. This window was too +high to reach from the ground; but, mounting on a buffet +which stood beneath it, Father Holt showed me how, by +pressing on the base of the window, the whole framework +of lead, glass, and iron stanchions, descended into a cavity +worked below, from which it could be drawn and restored +to its usual place from without; a broken pane being +purposely open to admit the hand which was to work upon +the spring of the machine. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When I am gone,”</span> Father Holt said, <span class="tei tei-q">“you may push +away the buffet, so that no one may fancy that an exit +has been made that way; lock the door; place the key—where +shall we put the key?—under <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Chrysostom</span></span> on the +book-shelf; and if any ask for it, say I keep it there, and +told you where to find it, if you had need to go to my room. +The descent is easy down the wall into the ditch; and so, +once more farewell, until I see thee again, my dear son.”</span> +And with this the intrepid father mounted the buffet with +great agility and briskness, stepped across the window, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page049">[pg 049]</span><a name="Pg049" id="Pg049" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lifting up the bars and framework again from the other +side, and only leaving room for Harry Esmond to stand on +tiptoe and kiss his hand before the casement closed, the +bars fixing as firm as ever seemingly in the stone arch overhead. +When Father Holt next arrived at Castlewood, it +was by the public gate on horseback; and he never so +much as alluded to the existence of the private issue to +Harry, except when he had need of a private messenger +from within, for which end, no doubt, he had instructed +his young pupil in the means of quitting the Hall. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond, young as he was, would have died sooner than +betray his friend and master, as Mr. Holt well knew; for +he had tried the boy more than once, putting temptations +in his way, to see whether he would yield to them and +confess afterwards, or whether he would resist them, as +he did sometimes, or whether he would lie, which he never +did. Holt instructing the boy on this point, however, that +if to keep silence is not to lie, as it certainly is not, yet +silence is, after all, equivalent to a negation—and therefore +a downright No, in the interest of justice or your friend, and +in reply to a question that may be prejudicial to either, is +not criminal, but, on the contrary, praiseworthy; and as +lawful a way as the other of eluding a wrongful demand. +For instance (says he), suppose a good citizen, who had seen +his Majesty take refuge there, had been asked, <span class="tei tei-q">“Is King +Charles up that oak-tree?”</span> His duty would have been +not to say, Yes—so that the Cromwellians should seize +the king and murder him like his father—but No; his +Majesty being private in the tree, and therefore not to be +seen there by loyal eyes: all which instruction, in religion +and morals, as well as in the rudiments of the tongues and +sciences, the boy took eagerly and with gratitude from his +tutor. When, then, Holt was gone, and told Harry not to +see him, it was as if he had never been. And he had this +answer pat when he came to be questioned a few days after. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Prince of Orange was then at Salisbury, as young +Esmond learned from seeing Doctor Tusher in his best +cassock (though the roads were muddy, and he never was +known to wear his silk, only his stuff one, a-horseback), with a +great orange cockade in his broad-leafed hat, and Nahum, his +clerk, ornamented with a like decoration. The doctor was +walking up and down, in front of his parsonage, when little +Esmond saw him, and heard him say he was going to pay +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page050">[pg 050]</span><a name="Pg050" id="Pg050" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his duty to his highness the prince, as he mounted his pad +and rode away with Nahum behind. The village people +had orange cockades too, and his friend the blacksmith's +laughing daughter pinned one into Harry's old hat, which +he tore out indignantly when they bid him to cry, <span class="tei tei-q">“God +save the Prince of Orange and the Protestant religion!”</span> +but the people only laughed, for they liked the boy in the +village, where his solitary condition moved the general pity, +and where he found friendly welcomes and faces in many +houses. Father Holt had many friends there too, for he +not only would fight the blacksmith at theology, never +losing his temper, but laughing the whole time in his pleasant +way, but he cured him of an ague with quinquina, and was +always ready with a kind word for any man that asked it, +so that they said in the village 'twas a pity the two were +Papists. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The director and the Vicar of Castlewood agreed very +well; indeed, the former was a perfectly bred gentleman, +and it was the latter's business to agree with everybody. +Doctor Tusher and the lady's maid, his spouse, had a boy +who was about the age of little Esmond; and there was +such a friendship between the lads, as propinquity and +tolerable kindness and good humour on either side would +be pretty sure to occasion. Tom Tusher was sent off early +however to a school in London, whither his father took him +and a volume of sermons in the first year of the reign of +King James; and Tom returned but once, a year afterwards, +to Castlewood for many years of his scholastic and +collegiate life. Thus there was less danger to Tom of a perversion +of his faith by the director, who scarce ever saw him, +than there was to Harry, who constantly was in the vicar's +company; but as long as Harry's religion was his Majesty's, +and my lord's, and my lady's, the doctor said gravely, it +should not be for him to disturb or disquiet him: it was +far from him to say that his Majesty's Church was not a +branch of the Catholic Church; upon which Father Holt +used, according to his custom, to laugh and say, that the +Holy Church throughout all the world, and the noble army +of martyrs, were very much obliged to the doctor. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was while Dr. Tusher was away at Salisbury that there +came a troop of dragoons with orange scarfs, and quartered +in Castlewood, and some of them came up to the Hall, +where they took possession, robbing nothing however +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page051">[pg 051]</span><a name="Pg051" id="Pg051" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +beyond the hen-house and the beer-cellar; and only insisting +upon going through the house and looking for papers. +The first room they asked to look at was Father Holt's +room, of which Harry Esmond brought the key, and they +opened the drawers and the cupboards, and tossed over the +papers and clothes—but found nothing except his books +and clothes, and the vestments in a box by themselves, +with which the dragoons made merry, to Harry Esmond's +horror. And to the questions which the gentleman put to +Harry, he replied, that Father Holt was a very kind man +to him, and a very learned man, and Harry supposed +would tell him none of his secrets if he had any. He was +about eleven years old at this time, and looked as innocent +as boys of his age. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The family were away more than six months, and when +they returned they were in the deepest state of dejection, +for King James had been banished, the Prince of Orange +was on the throne, and the direst persecutions of those of +the Catholic faith were apprehended by my lady, who +said she did not believe that there was a word of truth in +the promises of toleration that Dutch monster made, or in +a single word the perjured wretch said. My lord and lady +were in a manner prisoners in their own house; so her +ladyship gave the little page to know, who was by this +time growing of an age to understand what was passing +about him, and something of the characters of the people +he lived with. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We are prisoners,”</span> says she; <span class="tei tei-q">“in everything but chains, +we are prisoners. Let them come, let them consign me to +dungeons, or strike off my head from this poor little throat”</span> +(and she clasped it in her long fingers). <span class="tei tei-q">“The blood of the +Esmonds will always flow freely for their kings. We are +not like the Churchills—the Judases, who kiss their master +and betray him. We know how to suffer, how even to forgive +in the royal cause”</span> (no doubt it was to that fatal business +of losing the place of Groom of the Posset to which her +ladyship alluded, as she did half a dozen times in the day). +<span class="tei tei-q">“Let the tyrant of Orange bring his rack and his odious +Dutch tortures—the beast! the wretch! I spit upon him +and defy him. Cheerfully will I lay this head upon the +block; cheerfully will I accompany my lord to the scaffold: +we will cry, <span class="tei tei-q">‘God save King James!’</span> with our dying breath, +and smile in the face of the executioner.”</span> And she told her +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page052">[pg 052]</span><a name="Pg052" id="Pg052" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +page a hundred times at least of the particulars of the last +interview which she had with his Majesty. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I flung myself before my liege's feet,”</span> she said, <span class="tei tei-q">“at Salisbury. +I devoted myself—my husband—my house, to his +cause. Perhaps he remembered old times, when Isabella +Esmond was young and fair; perhaps he recalled the day +when 'twas not <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">I</span></em> that knelt—at least he spoke to me with +a voice that reminded <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">me</span></em> of days gone by. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Egad!’</span> said +his Majesty, <span class="tei tei-q">‘you should go to the Prince of Orange, if you +want anything.’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘No, sire,’</span> I replied, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I would not kneel +to a usurper; the Esmond that would have served your +Majesty will never be groom to a traitor's posset.’</span> The +royal exile smiled, even in the midst of his misfortune; he +deigned to raise me with words of consolation. The viscount, +my husband, himself, could not be angry at the +august salute with which he honoured me!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The public misfortune had the effect of making my lord +and his lady better friends than they ever had been since +their courtship. My lord viscount had shown both loyalty +and spirit, when these were rare qualities in the dispirited +party about the king; and the praise he got elevated him +not a little in his wife's good opinion, and perhaps in his +own. He wakened up from the listless and supine life which +he had been leading; was always riding to and fro in consultation +with this friend or that of the king's; the page of +course knowing little of his doings, but remarking only his +greater cheerfulness and altered demeanour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Father Holt came to the Hall constantly, but officiated +no longer openly as chaplain; he was always fetching and +carrying: strangers, military and ecclesiastic (Harry knew +the latter though they came in all sorts of disguises), were +continually arriving and departing. My lord made long +absences and sudden reappearances, using sometimes the +means of exit which Father Holt had employed, though +how often the little window in the chaplain's room let in +or let out my lord and his friends, Harry could not tell. He +stoutly kept his promise to the father of not prying, and if +at midnight from his little room he heard noises of persons +stirring in the next chamber, he turned round to the wall +and hid his curiosity under his pillow until it fell asleep. +Of course he could not help remarking that the priest's +journeys were constant, and understanding by a hundred +signs that some active though secret business employed +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page053">[pg 053]</span><a name="Pg053" id="Pg053" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +him: what this was may pretty well be guessed by what +soon happened to my lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +No garrison or watch was put into Castlewood when my +lord came back, but a guard was in the village; and one +or other of them was always on the Green keeping a look-out +on our great gate, and those who went out and in. Lockwood +said that at night especially every person who came in or +went out was watched by the outlying sentries. 'Twas +lucky that we had a gate which their worships knew nothing +about. My lord and Father Holt must have made constant +journeys at night: once or twice little Harry acted as their +messenger and discreet little aide de camp. He remembers +he was bidden to go into the village with his fishing-rod, +enter certain houses, ask for a drink of water, and tell the +good man, <span class="tei tei-q">“There would be a horse-market at Newbury +next Thursday,”</span> and so carry the same message on to the +next house on his list. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He did not know what the message meant at the time, +nor what was happening: which may as well, however, for +clearness' sake, be explained here. The Prince of Orange +being gone to Ireland, where the king was ready to meet him +with a great army, it was determined that a great rising of +his Majesty's party should take place in this country: and +my lord was to head the force in our county. Of late he +had taken a greater lead in affairs than before, having the +indefatigable Mr. Holt at his elbow, and my lady viscountess +strongly urging him on; and my Lord Sark being in the +Tower a prisoner, and Sir Wilmot Crawley, of Queen's +Crawley, having gone over to the Prince of Orange's side—my +lord became the most considerable person in our part +of the county for the affairs of the king. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was arranged that the regiment of Scots Greys and +Dragoons, then quartered at Newbury, should declare for the +king on a certain day, when likewise the gentry affected to +his Majesty's cause were to come in with their tenants and +adherents to Newbury, march upon the Dutch troops at +Reading under Ginckel; and, these overthrown, and their +indomitable little master away in Ireland, 'twas thought +that our side might move on London itself, and a confident +victory was predicted for the king. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As these great matters were in agitation, my lord lost +his listless manner and seemed to gain health; my lady +did not scold him, Mr. Holt came to and fro, busy always; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page054">[pg 054]</span><a name="Pg054" id="Pg054" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and little Harry longed to have been a few inches taller, +that he might draw a sword in this good cause. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One day, it must have been about the month of July, +1690, my lord, in a great horseman's coat, under which +Harry could see the shining of a steel breastplate he had on, +called little Harry to him, put the hair off the child's forehead, +and kissed him, and bade God bless him in such an +affectionate way as he never had used before. Father Holt +blessed him too, and then they took leave of my lady +viscountess, who came from her apartment with a pocket-handkerchief +to her eyes, and her gentlewoman and Mrs. +Tusher supporting her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are going to—to ride,”</span> says she. <span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, that I might +come too!—but in my situation I am forbidden horse +exercise.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We kiss my lady marchioness's hand,”</span> says Mr. Holt. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord, God speed you!”</span> she said, stepping up and +embracing my lord in a grand manner. <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Holt, I ask +your blessing:”</span> and she knelt down for that, whilst Mrs. +Tusher tossed her head up. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Holt gave the same benediction to the little page, who +went down and held my lord's stirrups for him to mount; +there were two servants waiting there too—and they rode +out of Castlewood gate. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As they crossed the bridge Harry could see an officer in +scarlet ride up touching his hat, and address my lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The party stopped, and came to some parley or discussion, +which presently ended, my lord putting his horse into a +canter after taking off his hat and making a bow to the +officer who rode alongside him step for step: the trooper +accompanying him, falling back, and riding with my lord's +two men. They cantered over the Green, and behind the +elms (my lord waving his hand, Harry thought), and so +they disappeared. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That evening we had a great panic, the cow-boy coming +at milking-time riding one of our horses, which he had +found grazing at the outer park wall. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All night my lady viscountess was in a very quiet and +subdued mood. She scarce found fault with anybody; +she played at cards for six hours; little page Esmond went +to sleep. He prayed for my lord and the good cause before +closing his eyes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was quite in the grey of the morning when the porter's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page055">[pg 055]</span><a name="Pg055" id="Pg055" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +bell rang, and old Lockwood waking up, let in one of my +lord's servants, who had gone with him in the morning, and +who returned with a melancholy story. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The officer who rode up to my lord had, it appeared, said +to him, that it was his duty to inform his lordship that he +was not under arrest, but under surveillance, and to request +him not to ride abroad that day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord replied that riding was good for his health, that +if the captain chose to accompany him he was welcome, and +it was then that he made a bow, and they cantered away +together. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When he came on to Wansey Down, my lord all of a +sudden pulled up, and the party came to a halt at the crossway. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir”</span> says he to the officer, <span class="tei tei-q">“we are four to two; will you +be so kind as to take that road, and leave me to go mine?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your road is mine, my lord,”</span> says the officer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Then,”</span> says my lord, but he had no time to say more, +for the officer, drawing a pistol, snapped it at his lordship; +as at the same moment Father Holt, drawing a pistol, shot +the officer through the head. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was done, and the man dead in an instant of time. +The orderly, gazing at the officer, looked scared for a moment, +and galloped away for his life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Fire! fire!”</span> cries out Father Holt, sending another +shot after the trooper, but the two servants were too much +surprised to use their pieces, and my lord calling to them to +hold their hands, the fellow got away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Holt, <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">qui +pensoit à tout</span></span>,”</span> says Blaise, <span class="tei tei-q">“gets off his +horse, examines the pockets of the dead officer for papers, +gives his money to us two, and says, <span class="tei tei-q">‘The wine is drawn, +monsieur le marquis,’</span>—why did he say marquis to monsieur +le vicomte?—<span class="tei tei-q">‘we must drink it.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The poor gentleman's horse was a better one than that +I rode,”</span> Blaise continues; <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Holt bids me get on him, +and so I gave a cut to Whitefoot, and she trotted home. +We rode on towards Newbury; we heard firing towards +midday: at two o'clock a horseman comes up to us as we +were giving our cattle water at an inn—and says, All is done. +The Ecossois declared an hour too soon—General Ginckel +was down upon them. The whole thing was at an end.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘And we've shot an officer on duty, and let his orderly +escape,’</span> says my lord.</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page056">[pg 056]</span><a name="Pg056" id="Pg056" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Blaise,’</span> says Mr. Holt, writing two lines on his table-book, +one for my lady, and one for you, Master Harry; +<span class="tei tei-q">‘you must go back to Castlewood, and deliver these,’</span> and +behold me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And he gave Harry the two papers. He read that to +himself, which only said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Burn the papers in the cupboard, +burn this. You know nothing about anything.”</span> Harry +read this, ran upstairs to his mistress's apartment, where +her gentlewoman slept near to the door, made her bring a +light and wake my lady, into whose hands he gave the +paper. She was a wonderful object to look at in her night +attire, nor had Harry ever seen the like. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As soon as she had the paper in her hand, Harry stepped +back to the chaplain's room, opened the secret cupboard +over the fireplace, burned all the papers in it, and, as he +had seen the priest do before, took down one of his reverence's +manuscript sermons, and half burnt that in the brazier. +By the time the papers were quite destroyed it was daylight. +Harry ran back to his mistress again. Her gentlewoman +ushered him again into her ladyship's chamber; she told +him (from behind her nuptial curtains) to bid the coach +be got ready, and that she would ride away anon. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the mysteries of her ladyship's toilet were as awfully +long on this day as on any other, and, long after the coach +was ready, my lady was still attiring herself. And just as +the viscountess stepped forth from her room, ready for +departure, young Job Lockwood comes running up from +the village with news that a lawyer, three officers, and +twenty or four-and-twenty soldiers, were marching thence +upon the house. Job had but two minutes the start of them, +and, ere he had well told his story, the troop rode into our +courtyard. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page057">[pg 057]</span><a name="Pg057" id="Pg057" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc21" id="toc21"></a> +<a name="pdf22" id="pdf22"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VI. The Issue Of The Plots.—The Death Of Thomas, Third Viscount +Of Castlewood; And The Imprisonment Of His Viscountess</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At first my lady was for dying like Mary, Queen of Scots (to +whom she fancied she bore a resemblance in beauty), and, +stroking her scraggy neck, said, <span class="tei tei-q">“They will find Isabel of +Castlewood is equal to her fate.”</span> Her gentlewoman, +Victoire, persuaded her that her prudent course was, as she +could not fly, to receive the troops as though she suspected +nothing, and that her chamber was the best place wherein +to await them. So her black japan casket which Harry +was to carry to the coach was taken back to her ladyship's +chamber, whither the maid and mistress retired. Victoire +came out presently, bidding the page to say her ladyship was +ill, confined to her bed with the rheumatism. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By this time the soldiers had reached Castlewood. +Harry Esmond saw them from the window of the tapestry +parlour; a couple of sentinels were posted at the gate—a +half-dozen more walked towards the stable; and some +others, preceded by their commander, and a man in black, +a lawyer probably, were conducted by one of the servants +to the stair leading up to the part of the house which my +lord and lady inhabited. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So the captain, a handsome kind man, and the lawyer, +came through the ante-room to the tapestry parlour, and +where now was nobody but young Harry Esmond, the page. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Tell your mistress, little man,”</span> says the captain kindly, +<span class="tei tei-q">“that we must speak to her.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My mistress is ill abed,”</span> said the page. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What complaint has she?”</span> asked the captain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The boy said, <span class="tei tei-q">“the rheumatism!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Rheumatism! that's a sad complaint,”</span> continues the +good-natured captain; <span class="tei tei-q">“and the coach is in the yard to +fetch the doctor, I suppose?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I don't know,”</span> says the boy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And how long has her ladyship been ill?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I don't know,”</span> says the boy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When did my lord go away?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yesterday night.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page058">[pg 058]</span><a name="Pg058" id="Pg058" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“With Father Holt?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“With Mr. Holt.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And which way did they travel?”</span> asks the lawyer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“They travelled without me,”</span> says the page. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We must see Lady Castlewood.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have orders that nobody goes in to her ladyship—she +is sick,”</span> says the page; but at this moment Victoire came +out. <span class="tei tei-q">“Hush!”</span> says she; and, as if not knowing that any +one was near, <span class="tei tei-q">“What's this noise?”</span> says she. <span class="tei tei-q">“Is this +gentleman the doctor?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Stuff! we must see Lady Castlewood,”</span> says the lawyer, +pushing by. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The curtains of her ladyship's room were down, and the +chamber dark, and she was in bed with a nightcap on her +head, and propped up by her pillows, looking none the less +ghastly because of the red which was still on her cheeks, and +which she could not afford to forgo. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Is that the doctor?”</span> she said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There is no use with this deception, madam,”</span> Captain +Westbury said (for so he was named). <span class="tei tei-q">“My duty is to arrest +the person of Thomas, Viscount Castlewood, a nonjuring +peer—of Robert Tusher, Vicar of Castlewood—and Henry +Holt, known under various other names and designations, +a Jesuit priest, who officiated as chaplain here in the late +king's time, and is now at the head of the conspiracy which +was about to break out in this country against the authority +of their Majesties King William and Queen Mary—and my +orders are to search the house for such papers or traces of +the conspiracy as may be found here. Your ladyship will +please to give me your keys, and it will be as well for yourself +that you should help us, in every way, in our search.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You see, sir, that I have the rheumatism, and cannot +move,”</span> said the lady, looking uncommonly ghastly as she +sat up in her bed, where however she had had her cheeks +painted, and a new cap put on, so that she might at least +look her best when the officers came. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I shall take leave to place a sentinel in the chamber, so +that your ladyship, in case you should wish to rise, may have +an arm to lean on,”</span> Captain Westbury said. <span class="tei tei-q">“Your woman +will show me where I am to look;”</span> and Madame Victoire, +chattering in her half-French and half-English jargon, opened +while the captain examined one drawer after another; but, +as Harry Esmond thought, rather carelessly, with a smile on +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page059">[pg 059]</span><a name="Pg059" id="Pg059" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his face, as if he was only conducting the examination for +form's sake. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Before one of the cupboards Victoire flung herself down, +stretching out her arms, and, with a piercing shriek, cried, +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Non, jamais, +monsieur l'officier! Jamais!</span></span> I will rather +die than let you see this wardrobe.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But Captain Westbury would open it, still with a smile +on his face, which, when the box was opened, turned into +a fair burst of laughter. It contained—not papers regarding +the conspiracy—but my lady's wigs, washes, and rouge-pots, +and Victoire said men were monsters, as the captain went +on with his perquisition. He tapped the back to see whether +or no it was hollow, and as he thrust his hands into the +cupboard, my lady from her bed called out with a voice that +did not sound like that of a very sick woman, <span class="tei tei-q">“Is it your +commission to insult ladies as well as to arrest gentlemen, +captain?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“These articles are only dangerous when worn by your +ladyship,”</span> the captain said with a low bow, and a mock +grin of politeness. <span class="tei tei-q">“I have found nothing which concerns +the Government as yet—only the weapons with which beauty +is authorized to kill,”</span> says he, pointing to a wig with his +sword-tip. <span class="tei tei-q">“We must now proceed to search the rest of the +house.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are not going to leave that wretch in the room with +me,”</span> cried my lady, pointing to the soldier. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What can I do, madam? Somebody you must have +to smooth your pillow and bring your medicine—permit +me——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir!”</span> screamed out my lady— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Madam, if you are too ill to leave the bed,”</span> the captain +then said, rather sternly, <span class="tei tei-q">“I must have in four of my men +to lift you off in the sheet: I must examine this bed, in +a word; papers may be hidden in a bed as elsewhere; we +know that very well and——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here it was her ladyship's turn to shriek, for the captain, +with his fist shaking the pillows and bolsters, at last came +to <span class="tei tei-q">“burn”</span>, as they say in the play of forfeits, and wrenching +away one of the pillows, said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Look, did not I tell you so? +Here is a pillow stuffed with paper.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Some villain has betrayed us,”</span> cried out my lady, sitting +up in the bed, showing herself full dressed under her +night-rail. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page060">[pg 060]</span><a name="Pg060" id="Pg060" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And now your ladyship can move, I am sure; permit +me to give you my hand to rise. You will have to travel +for some distance, as far as Hexton Castle to-night. Will +you have your coach? Your woman shall attend you if you +like—and the japan-box?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir! you don't strike a <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">man</span></em> when he is down,”</span> said my +lady, with some dignity: <span class="tei tei-q">“can you not spare a woman?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your ladyship must please to rise and let me search the +bed,”</span> said the captain; <span class="tei tei-q">“there is no more time to lose in +bandying talk.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And, without more ado, the gaunt old woman got up. +Harry Esmond recollected to the end of his life that figure, +with the brocade dress and the white night-rail, and the +gold-clocked red stockings, and white red-heeled shoes +sitting up in the bed, and stepping down from it. The +trunks were ready packed for departure in her ante-room, +and the horses ready harnessed in the stable: about all +which the captain seemed to know, by information got +from some quarter or other; and, whence, Esmond could +make a pretty shrewd guess in after-times, when Dr. Tusher +complained that King William's Government had basely +treated him for services done in that cause. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And here he may relate, though he was then too young +to know all that was happening, what the papers contained, +of which Captain Westbury had made a seizure, and which +papers had been transferred from the japan-box to the bed +when the officers arrived. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There was a list, of gentlemen of the county in Father +Holt's handwriting—Mr. Freeman's (King James's) friends—a +similar paper being found among those of Sir John +Fenwick and Mr. Coplestone, who suffered death for this +conspiracy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There was a patent conferring the title of Marquis of +Esmond on my Lord Castlewood, and the heirs male of his +body; his appointment as lord lieutenant of the county, +and major-general.<a id="noteref_7" name="noteref_7" href="#note_7"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">7</span></span></a></p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page061">[pg 061]</span><a name="Pg061" id="Pg061" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There were various letters from the nobility and gentry, +some ardent and some doubtful, in the king's service; +and (very luckily for him) two letters concerning Colonel +Francis Esmond; one from Father Holt, which said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I have +been to see this colonel at his house at Walcote near to Wells, +where he resides since the king's departure, and pressed him +very eagerly in Mr. Freeman's cause, showing him the great +advantage he would have by trading with that merchant, +offering him large premiums there as agreed between us. +But he says no: he considers Mr. Freeman the head of the +firm, will never trade against him or embark with any other +trading company, but considers his duty was done when +Mr. Freeman left England. This colonel seems to care +more for his wife and his beagles than for affairs. He asked +me much about young H. E., <span class="tei tei-q">‘that bastard,’</span> as he called +him: doubting my lord's intentions respecting him. I reassured +him on this head, stating what I knew of the lad, +and our intentions respecting him, but with regard to Freeman +he was inflexible.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And another letter was from Colonel Esmond to his kinsman, +to say that one Captain Holton had been with him +offering him large bribes to join, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you know who</span></em>, and saying +that the head of the house of Castlewood was deeply engaged +in that quarter. But for his part he had broke his sword +when the K. left the country, and would never again fight +in that quarrel. The P. of O. was a man, at least, of a noble +courage, and his duty and, as he thought, every Englishman's, +was to keep the country quiet, and the French out +of it: and, in fine, that he would have nothing to do with +the scheme. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of the existence of these two letters and the contents of +the pillow, Colonel Frank Esmond, who became Viscount +Castlewood, told Henry Esmond afterwards, when the +letters were shown to his lordship, who congratulated himself, +as he had good reason, that he had not joined in the +scheme which proved so fatal to many concerned in it. But, +naturally, the lad knew little about these circumstances +when they happened under his eyes: only being aware that +his patron and his mistress were in some trouble, which +had caused the flight of the one, and the apprehension of +the other by the officers of King William. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page062">[pg 062]</span><a name="Pg062" id="Pg062" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The seizure of the papers effected, the gentlemen did not +pursue their further search through Castlewood house very +rigorously. They examined Mr. Holt's room, being led +thither by his pupil, who showed, as the father had bidden +him, the place where the key of his chamber lay, opened +the door for the gentlemen, and conducted them into +the room. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the gentlemen came to the half-burned papers in +the brazier, they examined them eagerly enough, and their +young guide was a little amused at their perplexity. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What are these?”</span> says one. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“They're written in a foreign language,”</span> says the lawyer. +<span class="tei tei-q">“What are you laughing at, little whelp?”</span> adds he, turning +round as he saw the boy smile. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Holt said they were sermons,”</span> Harry said, <span class="tei tei-q">“and bade +me to burn them;”</span> which indeed was true of those papers. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sermons, indeed—it's treason, I would lay a wager,”</span> +cries the lawyer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Egad! it's Greek to me,”</span> says Captain Westbury. <span class="tei tei-q">“Can +you read it, little boy?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, sir, a little,”</span> Harry said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Then read, and read in English, sir, on your peril,”</span> said +the lawyer. And Harry began to translate:— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hath not one of your own writers said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘The children +of Adam are now labouring as much as he himself ever did, +about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, shaking +the boughs thereof, and seeking the fruit, being for the most +part unmindful of the tree of life.’</span> O blind generation! +'tis this tree of knowledge to which the serpent has led you”</span>—and +here the boy was obliged to stop, the rest of the page +being charred by the fire: and asked of the lawyer—<span class="tei tei-q">“Shall +I go on, sir?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The lawyer said—<span class="tei tei-q">“This boy is deeper than he seems: +who knows that he is not laughing at us?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Let's have in Dick the Scholar,”</span> cried Captain Westbury, +laughing; and he called to a trooper out of the window—<span class="tei tei-q">“Ho, +Dick, come in here and construe.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A thick-set soldier, with a square good-humoured face, +came in at the summons, saluting his officer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Tell us what is this, Dick,”</span> says the lawyer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My name is Steele, sir,”</span> says the soldier. <span class="tei tei-q">“I may be +Dick for my friends, but I don't name gentlemen of your +cloth amongst them.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page063">[pg 063]</span><a name="Pg063" id="Pg063" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well then, Steele.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Steele, sir, if you please. When you address a gentleman +of his Majesty's Horse Guards, be pleased not to be +so familiar.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I didn't know, sir,”</span> said the lawyer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“How should you? I take it you are not accustomed to +meet with gentlemen,”</span> says the trooper. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hold thy prate, and read that bit of paper,”</span> says Westbury. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis Latin,”</span> says Dick, glancing at it, and again saluting +his officer, <span class="tei tei-q">“and from a sermon of Mr. Cudworth's,”</span> and he +translated the words pretty much as Henry Esmond had +rendered them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What a young scholar you are,”</span> says the captain to the +boy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Depend on't, he knows more than he tells,”</span> says the +lawyer. <span class="tei tei-q">“I think we will pack him off in the coach with +old Jezebel.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“For construing a bit of Latin?”</span> said the captain very +good-naturedly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I would as lief go there as anywhere,”</span> Harry Esmond +said, simply, <span class="tei tei-q">“for there is nobody to care for me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There must have been something touching in the child's +voice, or in this description of his solitude—for the captain +looked at him very good-naturedly, and the trooper, called +Steele, put his hand kindly on the lad's head, and said some +words in the Latin tongue. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What does he say?”</span> says the lawyer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Faith, ask Dick himself,”</span> cried Captain Westbury. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I said I was not ignorant of misfortune myself, and had +learned to succour the miserable, and that's not <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">your</span></em> trade, +Mr. Sheepskin,”</span> said the trooper. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You had better leave Dick the Scholar alone, Mr. Corbet,”</span> +the captain said. And Harry Esmond, always touched by +a kind face and kind word, felt very grateful to this good-natured +champion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The horses were by this time harnessed to the coach; and +the countess and Victoire came down and were put into the +vehicle. This woman, who quarrelled with Harry Esmond +all day, was melted at parting with him, and called him +<span class="tei tei-q">“dear angel”</span>, and <span class="tei tei-q">“poor infant”</span>, and a hundred other names. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The viscountess, giving him her lean hand to kiss, bade +him always be faithful to the house of Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“If evil +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page064">[pg 064]</span><a name="Pg064" id="Pg064" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +should happen to my lord,”</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“his <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">successor</span></em> I trust +will be found, and give you protection. Situated as I am, +they will not dare wreak their vengeance on me <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">now</span></em>.”</span> And +she kissed a medal she wore with great fervour, and Henry +Esmond knew not in the least what her meaning was; but +hath since learned that, old as she was, she was for ever +expecting, by the good offices of saints and relics, to have +an heir to the title of Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond was too young to have been introduced +into the secrets of politics in which his patrons were implicated; +for they put but few questions to the boy (who was +little of stature, and looked much younger than his age), +and such questions as they put he answered cautiously +enough, and professing even more ignorance than he had, +for which his examiners willingly enough gave him credit. +He did not say a word about the window or the cupboard +over the fireplace; and these secrets quite escaped the +eyes of the searchers. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So then my lady was consigned to her coach, and sent +off to Hexton, with her woman and the man of law to bear +her company, a couple of troopers riding on either side of +the coach. And Harry was left behind at the Hall, belonging +as it were to nobody, and quite alone in the world. The +captain and a guard of men remained in possession there; +and the soldiers, who were very good-natured and kind, +ate my lord's mutton and drank his wine, and made themselves +comfortable, as they well might do, in such pleasant +quarters. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The captains had their dinner served in my lord's tapestry +parlour, and poor little Harry thought his duty was to wait +upon Captain Westbury's chair, as his custom had been +to serve his lord when he sat there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the departure of the countess, Dick the Scholar +took Harry Esmond under his special protection, and would +examine him in his humanities, and talk to him both of +French and Latin, in which tongues the lad found, and his +new friend was willing enough to acknowledge, that he was +even more proficient than Scholar Dick. Hearing that he +had learned them from a Jesuit, in the praise of whom and +whose goodness Harry was never tired of speaking, Dick, +rather to the boy's surprise, who began to have an early +shrewdness, like many children bred up alone, showed +a great deal of theological science, and knowledge of the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page065">[pg 065]</span><a name="Pg065" id="Pg065" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +points at issue between the two Churches; so that he and +Harry would have hours of controversy together, in which +the boy was certainly worsted by the arguments of this +singular trooper. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am no common soldier,”</span> Dick would +say, and indeed it was easy to see by his learning, breeding, +and many accomplishments, that he was not. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am of +one of the most ancient families in the Empire; I have had +my education at a famous school, and a famous university; +I learned my first rudiments of Latin near to Smithfield, +in London, where the martyrs were roasted.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You hanged as many of ours,”</span> interposed Harry; <span class="tei tei-q">“and, +for the matter of persecution, Father Holt told me that +a young gentleman of Edinburgh, eighteen years of age, +student at the college there, was hanged for heresy only +last year, though he recanted, and solemnly asked pardon +for his errors.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Faith! there has been too much persecution on both +sides: but 'twas you taught us.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Nay, 'twas the pagans began it,”</span> cried the lad, and +began to instance a number of saints of the Church, from +the Protomartyr downwards—<span class="tei tei-q">“this one's fire went out +under him: that one's oil cooled in the cauldron: at a +third holy head the executioner chopped three times and +it would not come off. Show us martyrs in <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">your</span></em> Church +for whom such miracles have been done.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Nay,”</span> says the trooper gravely, <span class="tei tei-q">“the miracles of the +first three centuries belong to my Church as well as yours, +Master Papist,”</span> and then added, with something of a smile +upon his countenance, and a queer look at Harry—<span class="tei tei-q">“And +yet, my little catechizer, I have sometimes thought about +those miracles, that there was not much good in them, since +the victim's head always finished by coming off at the +third or fourth chop, and the cauldron, if it did not boil +one day, boiled the next. Howbeit, in our times, the +Church has lost that questionable advantage of respites. +There never was a shower to put out Ridley's fire, nor an +angel to turn the edge of Campion's axe. The rack tore +the limbs of Southwell the Jesuit and Sympson the Protestant +alike. For faith, everywhere multitudes die willingly +enough. I have read in Monsieur Rycaut's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">History of the +Turks</span></span>, of thousands of Mahomet's followers rushing upon +death in battle as upon certain Paradise; and in the Great +Mogul's dominions people fling themselves by hundreds +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page066">[pg 066]</span><a name="Pg066" id="Pg066" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +under the cars of the idols annually, and the widows burn +themselves on their husbands' bodies, as 'tis well known. +'Tis not the dying for a faith that's so hard, Master Harry—every +man of every nation has done that—'tis the living +up to it that is difficult, as I know to my cost,”</span> he added, +with a sigh. <span class="tei tei-q">“And ah!”</span> he added, <span class="tei tei-q">“my poor lad, I am not +strong enough to convince thee by my life—though to die +for my religion would give me the greatest of joys—but +I had a dear friend in Magdalen College in Oxford; I wish +Joe Addison were here to convince thee, as he quickly could—for +I think he's a match for the whole College of Jesuits; +and what's more, in his life too. In that very sermon of +Dr. Cudworth's which your priest was quoting from, and +which suffered martyrdom in the brazier,”</span> Dick added, with +a smile, <span class="tei tei-q">“I had a thought of wearing the black coat (but +was ashamed of my life you see, and took to this sorry red +one)—I have often thought of Joe Addison—Doctor +Cudworth says, <span class="tei tei-q">‘A good conscience is the best looking-glass +of Heaven’</span>—and there's a serenity in my friend's +face which always reflects it—I wish you could see him, +Harry.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Did he do you a great deal of good?”</span> asked the lad, +simply. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He might have done,”</span> said the other—<span class="tei tei-q">“at least he taught +me to see and approve better things. 'Tis my own fault, +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">deteriora sequi</span></span>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You seem very good,”</span> the boy said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I'm not what I seem, alas!”</span> answered the trooper—and +indeed, as it turned out, poor Dick told the truth—for that +very night, at supper in the hall, where the gentlemen of +the troop took their repasts, and passed most part of their +days dicing and smoking of tobacco, and singing and cursing, +over the Castlewood ale—Harry Esmond found Dick the +Scholar in a woful state of drunkenness. He hiccuped +out a sermon; and his laughing companions bade him sing +a hymn, on which Dick, swearing he would run the scoundrel +through the body who insulted his religion, made for his +sword, which was hanging on the wall, and fell down flat +on the floor under it, saying to Harry, who ran forward to +help him, <span class="tei tei-q">“Ah, little Papist, I wish Joseph Addison was +here!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Though the troopers of the king's Life Guards were all +gentlemen, yet the rest of the gentlemen seemed ignorant +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page067">[pg 067]</span><a name="Pg067" id="Pg067" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and vulgar boors to Harry Esmond, with the exception of +this good-natured Corporal Steele the Scholar, and Captain +Westbury and Lieutenant Trant, who were always kind +to the lad. They remained for some weeks or months +encamped in Castlewood, and Harry learned from them, +from time to time, how the lady at Hexton Castle was +treated, and the particulars of her confinement there. 'Tis +known that King William was disposed to deal very leniently +with the gentry who remained faithful to the old king's +cause; and no prince usurping a crown, as his enemies +said he did (righteously taking it as I think now), ever +caused less blood to be shed. As for women-conspirators, +he kept spies on the least dangerous, and locked up the +others. Lady Castlewood had the best rooms in Hexton +Castle, and the gaoler's garden to walk in; and though +she repeatedly desired to be led out to execution, like Mary +Queen of Scots, there never was any thought of taking her +painted old head off, or any desire to do aught but keep her +person in security. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And it appeared she found that some were friends in her +misfortune, whom she had, in her prosperity, considered +as her worst enemies. Colonel Francis Esmond, my lord's +cousin and her ladyship's, who had married the Dean of +Winchester's daughter, and, since King James's departure +out of England, had lived not very far away from Hexton +town, hearing of his kinswoman's strait, and being friends +with Colonel Brice, commanding for King William in +Hexton, and with the Church dignitaries there, came to +visit her ladyship in prison, offering to his uncle's daughter +any friendly services which lay in his power. And he brought +his lady and little daughter to see the prisoner, to the +latter of whom, a child of great beauty, and many winning +ways, the old viscountess took not a little liking, although +between her ladyship and the child's mother there was little +more love than formerly. There are some injuries which +women never forgive one another; and Madam Francis +Esmond, in marrying her cousin, had done one of those +irretrievable wrongs to Lady Castlewood. But as she was +now humiliated, and in misfortune, Madam Francis could +allow a truce to her enmity, and could be kind for a while, +at least, to her husband's discarded mistress. So the little +Beatrix, her daughter, was permitted often to go and visit +the imprisoned viscountess, who, in so far as the child and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page068">[pg 068]</span><a name="Pg068" id="Pg068" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +its father were concerned, got to abate in her anger towards +that branch of the Castlewood family. And the letters of +Colonel Esmond coming to light, as has been said, and his +conduct being known to the king's council, the colonel was +put in a better position with the existing Government than +he had ever before been; any suspicions regarding his +loyalty were entirely done away; and so he was enabled +to be of more service to his kinswoman than he could otherwise +have been. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And now there befell an event by which this lady recovered +her liberty, and the house of Castlewood got a new owner, +and fatherless little Harry Esmond a new and most kind +protector and friend. Whatever that secret was which +Harry was to hear from my lord, the boy never heard it; +for that night when Father Holt arrived, and carried my +lord away with him, was the last on which Harry ever saw +his patron. What happened to my lord may be briefly +told here. Having found the horses at the place where +they were lying, my lord and Father Holt rode together +to Chatteris, where they had temporary refuge with one of +the father's penitents in that city; but the pursuit being +hot for them, and the reward for the apprehension of one +or the other considerable, it was deemed advisable that they +should separate; and the priest betook himself to other +places of retreat known to him, whilst my lord passed over +from Bristol into Ireland, in which kingdom King James +had a Court and an army. My lord was but a small addition +to this; bringing, indeed, only his sword and the few +pieces in his pocket; but the king received him with some +kindness and distinction in spite of his poor plight, confirmed +him in his new title of marquis, gave him a regiment, and +promised him further promotion. But titles or promotion +were not to benefit him now. My lord was wounded at the +fatal battle of the Boyne, flying from which field (long after +his master had set him an example), he lay for a while +concealed in the marshy country near to the town of Trim, +and more from catarrh and fever caught in the bogs than +from the steel of the enemy in the battle, sank and died. +May the earth lie light upon Thomas of Castlewood! He +who writes this must speak in charity, though this lord +did him and his two grievous wrongs: for one of these he +would have made amends, perhaps, had life been spared +him; but the other lay beyond his power to repair, though +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page069">[pg 069]</span><a name="Pg069" id="Pg069" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +'tis to be hoped that a greater Power than a priest has +absolved him of it. He got the comfort of this absolution, +too, such as it was: a priest of Trim writing a letter to my +lady to inform her of this calamity. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But in those days letters were slow of travelling, and our +priest's took two months or more on its journey from +Ireland to England: where, when it did arrive, it did not +find my lady at her own house; she was at the king's +house of Hexton Castle when the letter came to Castlewood, +but it was opened for all that by the officer in command +there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond well remembered the receipt of this letter, +which Lockwood brought in as Captain Westbury and +Lieutenant Trant were on the green playing at bowls, young +Esmond looking on at the sport, or reading his book in the +arbour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Here's news for Frank Esmond,”</span> says Captain Westbury; +<span class="tei tei-q">“Harry, did you ever see Colonel Esmond?”</span> And Captain +Westbury looked very hard at the boy as he spoke. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry said he had seen him but once when he was at +Hexton, at the ball there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And did he say anything?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He said what I don't care to repeat,”</span> Harry answered. +For he was now twelve years of age: he knew what his +birth was and the disgrace of it; and he felt no love towards +the man who had most likely stained his mother's honour +and his own. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Did you love my Lord Castlewood?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wait until I know my mother, sir, to say,”</span> the boy +answered, his eyes filling with tears. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Something has happened to Lord Castlewood,”</span> Captain +Westbury said, in a vary grave tone—<span class="tei tei-q">“something which +must happen to us all. He is dead of a wound received +at the Boyne, fighting for King James.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am glad my lord fought for the right cause,”</span> the boy +said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It was better to meet death on the field like a man, than +face it on Tower Hill, as some of them may,”</span> continued +Mr. Westbury. <span class="tei tei-q">“I hope he has made some testament, or +provided for thee somehow. This letter says, he recommends +<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">unicum filium suum +dilectissimum</span></span> to his lady. I hope he +has left you more than that.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry did not know, he said. He was in the hands of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page070">[pg 070]</span><a name="Pg070" id="Pg070" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Heaven and Fate; but more lonely now, as it seemed to +him, than he had been all the rest of his life; and that night, +as he lay in his little room which he still occupied, the boy +thought with many a pang of shame and grief of his strange +and solitary condition:—how he had a father and no father; +a nameless mother that had been brought to ruin, perhaps, +by that very father whom Harry could only acknowledge +in secret and with a blush, and whom he could neither love +nor revere. And he sickened to think how Father Holt, +a stranger, and two or three soldiers, his acquaintances of +the last six weeks, were the only friends he had in the great +wide world, where he was now quite alone. The soul of +the boy was full of love, and he longed as he lay in the +darkness there for some one upon whom he could bestow it. +He remembers, and must to his dying day, the thoughts +and tears of that long night, the hours tolling through it. +Who was he and what? Why here rather than elsewhere? +I have a mind, he thought, to go to that priest at Trim, and +find out what my father said to him on his death-bed +confession. Is there any child in the whole world so unprotected +as I am? Shall I get up and quit this place, and +run to Ireland? With these thoughts and tears the lad +passed that night away until he wept himself to sleep. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The next day, the gentlemen of the guard who had heard +what had befallen him were more than usually kind to the +child, especially his friend Scholar Dick, who told him +about his own father's death, which had happened when +Dick was a child at Dublin, not quite five years of age. +<span class="tei tei-q">“That was the first sensation of grief,”</span> Dick said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I ever +knew. I remember I went into the room where his body +lay, and my mother sat weeping beside it. I had my battledore +in my hand, and fell a-beating the coffin, and calling +papa; on which my mother caught me in her arms, and +told me in a flood of tears papa could not hear me, and +would play with me no more, for they were going to put him +under ground, whence he could never come to us again. +And this,”</span> said Dick kindly, <span class="tei tei-q">“has made me pity all children +ever since; and caused me to love thee, my poor fatherless, +motherless lad. And if ever thou wantest a friend, thou +shalt have one in Richard Steele.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond thanked him, and was grateful. But what +could Corporal Steele do for him? take him to ride a spare +horse, and be servant to the troop? Though there might +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page071">[pg 071]</span><a name="Pg071" id="Pg071" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +be a bar in Harry Esmond's shield, it was a noble one. The +counsel of the two friends was, that little Harry should +stay where he was, and abide his fortune: so Esmond +stayed on at Castlewood, awaiting with no small anxiety +the fate, whatever it was, which was over him. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc23" id="toc23"></a> +<a name="pdf24" id="pdf24"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VII. I Am Left At Castlewood An Orphan, And Find Most Kind Protectors +There</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +During the stay of the soldiers in Castlewood, honest Dick +the Scholar was the constant companion of the lonely little +orphan lad Harry Esmond: and they read together, and +they played bowls together, and when the other troopers +or their officers, who were free-spoken over their cups +(as was the way of that day, when neither men nor women +were over-nice), talked unbecomingly of their amours and +gallantries before the child, Dick, who very likely was +setting the whole company laughing, would stop their jokes +with a <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">maxima debetur +pueris reverentia</span></span>, and once offered to +lug out against another trooper called Hulking Tom, who +wanted to ask Harry Esmond a ribald question. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Also, Dick seeing that the child had, as he said, a sensibility +above his years, and a great and praiseworthy discretion, +confided to Harry his love for a vintner's daughter, +near to the Tollyard, Westminster, whom Dick addressed +as Saccharissa in many verses of his composition, and without +whom he said it would be impossible that he could +continue to live. He vowed this a thousand times in a day, +though Harry smiled to see the lovelorn swain had his +health and appetite as well as the most heart-whole trooper +in the regiment: and he swore Harry to secrecy too, which +vow the lad religiously kept, until he found that officers and +privates were all taken into Dick's confidence, and had the +benefit of his verses. And it must be owned likewise that, +while Dick was sighing after Saccharissa in London, he had +consolations in the country; for there came a wench out +of Castlewood village who had washed his linen, and who +cried sadly when she heard he was gone: and without +paying her bill too, which Harry Esmond took upon himself +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page072">[pg 072]</span><a name="Pg072" id="Pg072" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to discharge by giving the girl a silver pocket-piece, which +Scholar Dick had presented to him, when, with many +embraces and prayers for his prosperity, Dick parted from +him, the garrison of Castlewood being ordered away. Dick +the Scholar said he would never forget his young friend, +nor indeed did he: and Harry was sorry when the kind +soldiers vacated Castlewood, looking forward with no small +anxiety (for care and solitude had made him thoughtful +beyond his years) to his fate when the new lord and lady of +the house came to live there. He had lived to be past +twelve years old now; and had never had a friend, save +this wild trooper perhaps, and Father Holt; and had a fond +and affectionate heart, tender to weakness, that would fain +attach itself to somebody, and did not seem at rest until +it had found a friend who would take charge of it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The instinct which led Henry Esmond to admire and +love the gracious person, the fair apparition of whose beauty +and kindness had so moved him when he first beheld her, +became soon a devoted affection and passion of gratitude, +which entirely filled his young heart, that as yet, except in +the case of dear Father Holt, had had very little kindness +for which to be thankful. <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">O +Dea certè</span></span>, thought he, remembering +the lines out of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Aeneis</span></span> which Mr. Holt had taught +him. There seemed, as the boy thought, in every look or +gesture of this fair creature, an angelical softness and bright +pity—in motion or repose she seemed gracious alike; the +tone of her voice, though she uttered words ever so trivial, +gave him a pleasure that amounted almost to anguish. It +cannot be called love, that a lad of twelve years of age, little +more than a menial, felt for an exalted lady, his mistress: +but it was worship. To catch her glance, to divine her +errand and run on it before she had spoken it; to watch, +to follow, adore her; became the business of his life. +Meanwhile, as is the way often, his idol had idols of her own, +and never thought of or suspected the admiration of her +little pigmy adorer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady had on her side her three idols: first and foremost, +Jove and supreme ruler, was her lord, Harry's patron, +the good Viscount of Castlewood. All wishes of his were +laws with her. If he had a headache, she was ill. If he +frowned, she trembled. If he joked, she smiled and was +charmed. If he went a-hunting, she was always at the +window to see him ride away, her little son crowing on her +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page073">[pg 073]</span><a name="Pg073" id="Pg073" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +arm, or on the watch till his return. She made dishes for +his dinner: spiced his wine for him: made the toast for +his tankard at breakfast: hushed the house when he slept +in his chair, and watched for a look when he woke. If my +lord was not a little proud of his beauty, my lady adored it. +She clung to his arm as he paced the terrace, her two fair +little hands clasped round his great one; her eyes were +never tired of looking in his face and wondering at its +perfection. Her little son was his son, and had his father's +look and curly brown hair. Her daughter Beatrix was his +daughter, and had his eyes—were there ever such beautiful +eyes in the world? All the house was arranged so as to +bring him ease and give him pleasure. She liked the small +gentry round about to come and pay him court, never +caring for admiration for herself; those who wanted to +be well with the lady must admire him. Not regarding +her dress, she would wear a gown to rags, because he +had once liked it: and, if he brought her a brooch or a +ribbon, would prefer it to all the most costly articles of her +wardrobe. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord went to London every year for six weeks, and the +family being too poor to appear at Court with any figure, +he went alone. It was not until he was out of sight that +her face showed any sorrow: and what a joy when he came +back! What preparation before his return! The fond +creature had his arm-chair at the chimney-side—delighting +to put the children in it, and look at them there. Nobody +took his place at the table; but his silver tankard stood +there as when my lord was present. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A pretty sight it was to see, during my lord's absence, or +on those many mornings when sleep or headache kept him +abed, this fair young lady of Castlewood, her little daughter +at her knee, and her domestics gathered round her reading +the Morning Prayer of the English Church. Esmond long +remembered how she looked and spoke kneeling reverently +before the sacred book, the sun shining upon her golden +hair until it made a halo round about her. A dozen of +the servants of the house kneeled in a line opposite their +mistress; for awhile Harry Esmond kept apart from these +mysteries, but Doctor Tusher showing him that the prayers +read were those of the Church of all ages, and the boy's +own inclination prompting him to be always as near as he +might to his mistress, and to think all things she did right, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page074">[pg 074]</span><a name="Pg074" id="Pg074" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +from listening to the prayers in the antechamber, he came +presently to kneel down with the rest of the household in +the parlour; and before a couple of years my lady had made +a thorough convert. Indeed, the boy loved his catechizer +so much that he would have subscribed to anything she +bade him, and was never tired of listening to her fond +discourse and simple comments upon the book, which she +read to him in a voice of which it was difficult to resist +the sweet persuasion and tender appealing kindness. This +friendly controversy, and the intimacy which it occasioned, +bound the lad more fondly than ever to his mistress. The +happiest period of all his life was this; and the young +mother, with her daughter and son, and the orphan lad +whom she protected, read and worked and played, and +were children together. If the lady looked forward—as +what fond woman does not?—towards the future, she had +no plans from which Harry Esmond was left out; and +a thousand and a thousand times in his passionate and +impetuous way he vowed that no power should separate +him from his mistress, and only asked for some chance to +happen by which he might show his fidelity to her. Now, +at the close of his life, as he sits and recalls in tranquillity +the happy and busy scenes of it, he can think, not ungratefully, +that he has been faithful to that early vow. Such +a life is so simple that years may be chronicled in a few +lines. But few men's life-voyages are destined to be all +prosperous; and this calm of which we are speaking was +soon to come to an end. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As Esmond grew, and observed for himself, he found of +necessity much to read and think of outside that fond circle +of kinsfolk who had admitted him to join hand with them. +He read more books than they cared to study with him; +was alone in the midst of them many a time, and passed +nights over labours, futile perhaps, but in which they could +not join him. His dear mistress divined his thoughts with +her usual jealous watchfulness of affection: began to forebode +a time when he would escape from his home-nest; +and, at his eager protestations to the contrary, would only +sigh and shake her head. Before those fatal decrees in +life are executed, there are always secret previsions and +warning omens. When everything yet seems calm, we are +aware that the storm is coming. Ere the happy days were +over, two at least of that home-party felt that they were +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page075">[pg 075]</span><a name="Pg075" id="Pg075" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +drawing to a close; and were uneasy, and on the look-out +for the cloud which was to obscure their calm. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas easy for Harry to see, however much his lady persisted +in obedience and admiration for her husband, that my +lord tired of his quiet life, and grew weary, and then testy, +at those gentle bonds with which his wife would have held +him. As they say the Grand Lama of Thibet is very much +fatigued by his character of divinity, and yawns on his altar +as his bonzes kneel and worship him, many a home-god +grows heartily sick of the reverence with which his family +devotees pursue him, and sighs for freedom and for his old +life, and to be off the pedestal on which his dependants +would have him sit for ever, whilst they adore him, and ply +him with flowers, and hymns, and incense, and flattery;—so, +after a few years of his marriage, my honest Lord Castlewood +began to tire; all the high-flown raptures and devotional +ceremonies with which his wife, his chief priestess, +treated him, first sent him to sleep, and then drove him out +of doors; for the truth must be told, that my lord was a +jolly gentleman, with very little of the august or divine in +his nature, though his fond wife persisted in revering it—and, +besides, he had to pay a penalty for this love, which +persons of his disposition seldom like to defray: and, in +a word, if he had a loving wife, had a very jealous and exacting +one. Then he wearied of this jealousy: then he broke +away from it; then came, no doubt, complaints and +recriminations; then, perhaps, promises of amendment +not fulfilled; then upbraidings not the more pleasant +because they were silent, and only sad looks and tearful +eyes conveyed them. Then, perhaps, the pair reached that +other stage which is not uncommon in married life, when +the woman perceives that the god of the honeymoon is a god +no more; only a mortal like the rest of us—and so she looks +into her heart, and lo! <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">vacuae sedes +et inania arcana</span></span>. And +now, supposing our lady to have a fine genius and a brilliant +wit of her own, and the magic spell and infatuation removed +from her which had led her to worship as a god a very +ordinary mortal—and what follows? They live together, +and they dine together, and they say <span class="tei tei-q">“my dear”</span> and <span class="tei tei-q">“my +love”</span> as heretofore; but the man is himself, and the +woman herself: that dream of love is over, as everything +else is over in life; as flowers and fury, and griefs and +pleasures, are over. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page076">[pg 076]</span><a name="Pg076" id="Pg076" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Very likely the Lady Castlewood had ceased to adore her +husband herself long before she got off her knees, or would +allow her household to discontinue worshipping him. To +do him justice, my lord never exacted this subservience: +he laughed and joked, and drank his bottle, and swore when +he was angry, much too familiarly for any one pretending +to sublimity; and did his best to destroy the ceremonial +with which his wife chose to surround him. And it required +no great conceit on young Esmond's part to see that his +own brains were better than his patron's, who, indeed, +never assumed any airs of superiority over the lad, or over +any dependant of his, save when he was displeased, in which +case he would express his mind, in oaths, very freely; and +who, on the contrary, perhaps, spoiled <span class="tei tei-q">“Parson Harry”</span>, as +he called young Esmond, by constantly praising his parts, +and admiring his boyish stock of learning. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It may seem ungracious in one who has received a hundred +favours from his patron to speak in any but a reverential +manner of his elders; but the present writer has had +descendants of his own, whom he has brought up with as +little as possible of the servility at present exacted by +parents from children (under which mask of duty there +often lurks indifference, contempt, or rebellion): and as he +would have his grandsons believe or represent him to be +not an inch taller than Nature has made him: so, with +regard to his past acquaintances, he would speak without +anger, but with truth, as far as he knows it, neither extenuating +nor setting down aught in malice. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So long, then, as the world moved according to Lord +Castlewood's wishes, he was good-humoured enough; of +a temper naturally sprightly and easy, liking to joke, +especially with his inferiors, and charmed to receive the +tribute of their laughter. All exercises of the body he +could perform to perfection—shooting at a mark and flying, +breaking horses, riding at the ring, pitching the quoit, +playing at all games with great skill. And not only did he +do these things well, but he thought he did them to perfection; +hence he was often tricked about horses, which he +pretended to know better than any jockey; was made to +play at ball and billiards by sharpers who took his money; +and came back from London wofully poorer each time than +he went, as the state of his affairs testified, when the sudden +accident came by which his career was brought to an end. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page077">[pg 077]</span><a name="Pg077" id="Pg077" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He was fond of the parade of dress, and passed as many +hours daily at his toilette as an elderly coquette. A tenth +part of his day was spent in the brushing of his teeth and +the oiling of his hair, which was curling and brown, and +which he did not like to conceal under a periwig, such as +almost everybody of that time wore (we have the liberty of +our hair back now, but powder and pomatum along with it. +When, I wonder, will these monstrous poll-taxes of our +age be withdrawn, and men allowed to carry their colours, +black, red, or grey, as nature made them?) And, as he liked +her to be well dressed, his lady spared no pains in that matter +to please him; indeed, she would dress her head or cut it +off if he had bidden her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was a wonder to young Esmond, serving as page to my +lord and lady, to hear, day after day, to such company as +came, the same boisterous stories told by my lord, at which +his lady never failed to smile or hold down her head, and +Doctor Tusher to burst out laughing at the proper point, or +cry, <span class="tei tei-q">“Fie, my lord, remember my cloth,”</span> but with such a +faint show of resistance, that it only provoked my lord +further. Lord Castlewood's stories rose by degrees, and +became stronger after the ale at dinner and the bottle afterwards; +my lady always taking flight after the very first +glass to Church and King, and leaving the gentlemen to +drink the rest of the toasts by themselves. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And, as Harry Esmond was her page, he also was called +from duty at this time. <span class="tei tei-q">“My lord has lived in the army +and with soldiers,”</span> she would say to the lad, <span class="tei tei-q">“amongst whom +great licence is allowed. You have had a different nurture, +and I trust these things will change as you grow older; not +that any fault attaches to my lord, who is one of the best +and most religious men in this kingdom.”</span> And very likely +she believed so. 'Tis strange what a man may do, and +a woman yet think him an angel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And as Esmond has taken truth for his motto, it must +be owned, even with regard to that other angel, his mistress, +that she had a fault of character, which flawed her perfections. +With the other sex perfectly tolerant and kindly, +of her own she was invariably jealous, and a proof that she +had this vice is, that though she would acknowledge a +thousand faults that she had not, to this which she had she +could never be got to own. But if there came a woman with +even a semblance of beauty to Castlewood, she was so sure +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page078">[pg 078]</span><a name="Pg078" id="Pg078" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to find out some wrong in her, that my lord, laughing in his +jolly way, would often joke with her concerning her foible. +Comely servant-maids might come for hire, but none were +taken at Castlewood. The housekeeper was old; my lady's +own waiting-woman squinted, and was marked with the +small-pox; the housemaids and scullion were ordinary +country wenches, to whom Lady Castlewood was kind, as +her nature made her to everybody almost; but as soon +as ever she had to do with a pretty woman, she was cold, +retiring, and haughty. The country ladies found this fault +in her; and though the men all admired her, their wives +and daughters complained of her coldness and airs, and said +that Castlewood was pleasanter in Lady Jezebel's time (as +the dowager was called) than at present. Some few were +of my mistress's side. Old Lady Blenkinsop Jointure, who +had been at Court in King James the First's time, always +took her side; and so did old Mistress Crookshank, Bishop +Crookshank's daughter, of Hexton, who, with some more +of their like, pronounced my lady an angel; but the pretty +women were not of this mind; and the opinion of the +country was, that my lord was tied to his wife's apron-strings, +and that she ruled over him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The second fight which Harry Esmond had, was at +fourteen years of age, with Bryan Hawkshaw, Sir John +Hawkshaw's son, of Bramblebrook, who advancing this +opinion, that my lady was jealous, and henpecked my lord, +put Harry into such a fury, that Harry fell on him, and with +such rage, that the other boy, who was two years older, and +by far bigger than he, had by far the worst of the assault, +until it was interrupted by Doctor Tusher walking out of +the dinner room. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Bryan Hawkshaw got up, bleeding at the nose, having, +indeed, been surprised, as many a stronger man might have +been, by the fury of the assault upon him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You little bastard beggar!”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I'll murder you for this!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And indeed he was big enough. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Bastard or not,”</span> said the other, grinding his teeth, +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have a couple of swords, and if you like to meet me, +as a man, on the terrace to-night——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And here the doctor coming up, the colloquy of the young +champions ended. Very likely, big as he was, Hawkshaw +did not care to continue a fight with such a ferocious +opponent as this had been. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page079">[pg 079]</span><a name="Pg079" id="Pg079" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc25" id="toc25"></a> +<a name="pdf26" id="pdf26"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VIII. After Good Fortune Comes Evil</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Since my Lady Mary Wortley Montagu brought home the +custom of inoculation from Turkey (a perilous practice +many deem it, and only a useless rushing into the jaws of +danger), I think the severity of the small-pox, that dreadful +scourge of the world, has somewhat been abated in our part +of it; and remembering in my time hundreds of the young +and beautiful who have been carried to the grave, or have +only risen from their pillows frightfully scarred and disfigured +by this malady. Many a sweet face hath left its +roses on the bed, on which this dreadful and withering blight +has laid them. In my early days this pestilence would enter +a village and destroy half its inhabitants: at its approach +it may well be imagined not only the beautiful but the +strongest were alarmed, and those fled who could. One +day in the year 1694 (I have good reason to remember it), +Doctor Tusher ran into Castlewood House, with a face of +consternation, saying that the malady had made its appearance +at the blacksmith's house in the village, and that one +of the maids there was down in the small-pox. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The blacksmith, beside his forge and irons for horses, had +an alehouse for men, which his wife kept, and his company +sat on benches before the inn door, looking at the smithy +while they drank their beer. Now, there was a pretty girl +at this inn, the landlord's men called Nancy Sievewright, +a bouncing fresh-looking lass, whose face was as red as the +hollyhocks over the pales of the garden behind the inn. +At this time Harry Esmond was a lad of sixteen, and +somehow in his walks and rambles it often happened that +he fell in with Nancy Sievewright's bonny face; if he did +not want something done at the blacksmith's he would go +and drink ale at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Three Castles”</span>, or find some pretext +for seeing this poor Nancy. Poor thing, Harry meant or +imagined no harm; and she, no doubt, as little, but the +truth is they were always meeting—in the lanes, or by the +brook, or at the garden-palings, or about Castlewood: it +was, <span class="tei tei-q">“Lord, Mr. Henry!”</span> and <span class="tei tei-q">“How do you do, Nancy?”</span> +many and many a time in the week. 'Tis surprising the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page080">[pg 080]</span><a name="Pg080" id="Pg080" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +magnetic attraction which draws people together from ever +so far. I blush as I think of poor Nancy now, in a red +bodice and buxom purple cheeks and a canvas petticoat; +and that I devised schemes, and set traps, and made +speeches in my heart, which I seldom had courage to say +when in presence of that humble enchantress, who knew +nothing beyond milking a cow, and opened her black eyes +with wonder when I made one of my fine speeches out of +Waller or Ovid. Poor Nancy! from the mist of far-off +years thine honest country face beams out; and I remember +thy kind voice as if I had heard it yesterday. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Doctor Tusher brought the news that the small-pox +was at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Three Castles”</span>, whither a tramper, it was +said, had brought the malady, Henry Esmond's first thought +was of alarm for poor Nancy, and then of shame and disquiet +for the Castlewood family, lest he might have brought +this infection; for the truth is that Mr. Harry had been +sitting in a back room for an hour that day, where Nancy +Sievewright was with a little brother who complained of +headache, and was lying stupefied and crying, either in a +chair by the corner of the fire, or in Nancy's lap, or on +mine. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Little Lady Beatrix screamed out at Dr. Tusher's news; +and my lord cried out, <span class="tei tei-q">“God bless me!”</span> He was a brave +man, and not afraid of death in any shape but this. He +was very proud of his pink complexion and fair hair—but +the idea of death by small-pox scared him beyond all other +ends. <span class="tei tei-q">“We will take the children and ride away to-morrow +to Walcote:”</span> this was my lord's small house, inherited from +his mother, near to Winchester. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“That is the best refuge in case the disease spreads,”</span> said +Dr. Tusher. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis awful to think of it beginning at the +alehouse. Half the people of the village have visited that +to-day, or the blacksmith's, which is the same thing. My +clerk Simons lodges with them—I can never go into my +reading-desk and have that fellow so near me. I won't have +that man near me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If a parishioner dying in the small-pox sent to you, +would you not go?”</span> asked my lady, looking up from her +frame of work, with her calm blue eyes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By the Lord, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">I</span></em> wouldn't,”</span> said my lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We are not in a Popish country: and a sick man doth +not absolutely need absolution and confession,”</span> said the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page081">[pg 081]</span><a name="Pg081" id="Pg081" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +doctor. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis true they are a comfort and a help to him +when attainable, and to be administered with hope of +good. But in a case where the life of a parish priest in the +midst of his flock is highly valuable to them, he is not called +upon to risk it (and therewith the lives, future prospects, +and temporal, even spiritual welfare of his own family) for +the sake of a single person, who is not very likely in a condition +even to understand the religious message whereof +the priest is the bringer—being uneducated, and likewise +stupefied or delirious by disease. If your ladyship or his +lordship, my excellent good friend and patron, were to +take it——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“God forbid!”</span> cried my lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Amen,”</span> continued Dr. Tusher. <span class="tei tei-q">“Amen to that prayer, +my very good lord! for your sake I would lay my life down”</span>—and, +to judge from the alarmed look of the doctor's purple +face, you would have thought that that sacrifice was about +to be called for instantly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +To love children, and be gentle with them, was an instinct, +rather than a merit, in Henry Esmond, so much so, that he +thought almost with a sort of shame of his liking for them, +and of the softness into which it betrayed him; and on this +day the poor fellow had not only had his young friend, the +milkmaid's brother, on his knee, but had been drawing +pictures, and telling stories to the little Frank Esmond, +who had occupied the same place for an hour after dinner, +and was never tired of Henry's tales, and his pictures of +soldiers and horses. As luck would have it, Beatrix had +not on that evening taken her usual place, which generally +she was glad enough to have, upon her tutor's lap. For +Beatrix, from the earliest time, was jealous of every caress +which was given to her little brother Frank. She would +fling away even from the maternal arms, if she saw Frank +had been there before her; insomuch that Lady Castlewood +was obliged not to show her love for her son in the presence +of the little girl, and embrace one or the other alone. She +would turn pale and red with rage if she caught signs of +intelligence or affection between Frank and his mother; +would sit apart, and not speak for a whole night, if she +thought the boy had a better fruit or a larger cake than +hers; would fling away a ribbon if he had one; and from +the earliest age, sitting up in her little chair by the great +fireplace opposite to the corner where Lady Castlewood +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page082">[pg 082]</span><a name="Pg082" id="Pg082" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +commonly sat at her embroidery, would utter infantine +sarcasms about the favour shown to her brother. These, if +spoken in the presence of Lord Castlewood, tickled and +amused his humour; he would pretend to love Frank best, +and dandle and kiss him, and roar with laughter at Beatrix's +jealousy. But the truth is, my lord did not often witness +these scenes, nor very much trouble the quiet fireside at +which his lady passed many long evenings. My lord was +hunting all day when the season admitted; he frequented +all the cockfights and fairs in the country, and would ride +twenty miles to see a main fought, or two clowns break their +heads at a cudgelling match; and he liked better to sit in +his parlour drinking ale and punch with Jack and Tom, +than in his wife's drawing-room: whither, if he came, he +brought only too often bloodshot eyes, a hiccuping voice, +and a reeling gait. The management of the house and the +property, the care of the few tenants and the village poor, +and the accounts of the estate, were in the hands of his lady +and her young secretary, Harry Esmond. My lord took +charge of the stables, the kennel, and the cellar—and he +filled this and emptied it too. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So it chanced that upon this very day, when poor Harry +Esmond had had the blacksmith's son, and the peer's son, +alike upon his knee, little Beatrix, who would come to her +tutor willingly enough with her book and her writing, had +refused him, seeing the place occupied by her brother, and, +luckily for her, had sat at the further end of the room, +away from him, playing with a spaniel dog which she had +(and for which, by fits and starts, she would take a great +affection), and talking at Harry Esmond over her shoulder, +as she pretended to caress the dog, saying, that Fido would +love her, and she would love Fido, and nothing but Fido, +all her life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When, then, the news was brought that the little boy at +the <span class="tei tei-q">“Three Castles”</span> was ill with the small-pox, poor Harry +Esmond felt a shock of alarm, not so much for himself as for +his mistress's son, whom he might have brought into peril. +Beatrix, who had pouted sufficiently (and who whenever +a stranger appeared began, from infancy almost, to play off +little graces to catch his attention), her brother being now +gone to bed, was for taking her place upon Esmond's knee: +for, though the doctor was very obsequious to her, she did +not like him, because he had thick boots and dirty hands +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page083">[pg 083]</span><a name="Pg083" id="Pg083" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +(the pert young miss said), and because she hated learning +the catechism. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But as she advanced towards Esmond from the corner +where she had been sulking, he started back and placed the +great chair on which he was sitting between him and her—saying +in the French language to Lady Castlewood, with +whom the young lad had read much, and whom he had +perfected in this tongue—<span class="tei tei-q">“Madam, the child must not +approach me; I must tell you that I was at the blacksmith's +to-day, and had his little boy upon my lap.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where you took my son afterwards,”</span> Lady Castlewood +said, very angry, and turning red. <span class="tei tei-q">“I thank you, sir, for +giving him such company. Beatrix,”</span> she said in English, +<span class="tei tei-q">“I forbid you to touch Mr. Esmond. Come away, child—come +to your room. Come to your room—I wish your +reverence good night—and you, sir, had you not better go +back to your friends at the alehouse?”</span> Her eyes, ordinarily +so kind, darted flashes of anger as she spoke; and she +tossed up her head (which hung down commonly) with the +mien of a princess. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hey-day!”</span> says my lord, who was standing by the +fireplace—indeed he was in the position to which he generally +came by that hour of the evening—<span class="tei tei-q">“Hey-day! Rachel, +what are you in a passion about? Ladies ought never to +be in a passion. Ought they, Doctor Tusher? though it +does good to see Rachel in a passion—Damme, Lady Castlewood, +you look dev'lish handsome in a passion.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It is, my lord, because Mr. Henry Esmond, having +nothing to do with his time here, and not having a taste for +our company, has been to the alehouse, where he has <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">some +friends</span></em>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord burst out with a laugh and an oath—<span class="tei tei-q">“You young +sly-boots, you've been at Nancy Sievewright. D—— the +young hypocrite, who'd have thought it in him? I say, +Tusher, he's been after——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Enough, my lord,”</span> said my lady, <span class="tei tei-q">“don't insult me with +this talk.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Upon my word,”</span> said poor Harry, ready to cry with +shame and mortification, <span class="tei tei-q">“the honour of that young person +is perfectly unstained for me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, of course, of course,”</span> says my lord, more and more +laughing and tipsy. <span class="tei tei-q">“Upon his <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">honour</span></em>, doctor—Nancy +Sieve——”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page084">[pg 084]</span><a name="Pg084" id="Pg084" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Take Mistress Beatrix to bed,”</span> my lady cried at this +moment to Mrs. Tucker her woman, who came in with her +ladyship's tea. <span class="tei tei-q">“Put her into my room—no, into yours,”</span> +she added quickly. <span class="tei tei-q">“Go, my child: go, I say: not a word!”</span> +And Beatrix, quite surprised at so sudden a tone of authority +from one who was seldom accustomed to raise her voice, +went out of the room with a scared countenance and waited +even to burst out a-crying, until she got to the door with +Mrs. Tucker. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For once her mother took little heed of her sobbing, and +continued to speak eagerly—<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord,”</span> she said, <span class="tei tei-q">“this young +man—your dependant—told me just now in French—he +was ashamed to speak in his own language—that he had +been at the ale-house all day, where he has had that little +wretch who is now ill of the small-pox on his knee. And +he comes home reeking from that place—yes, reeking +from it—and takes my boy into his lap without shame, +and sits down by me, yes, by <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">me</span></em>. He may have killed +Frank for what I know—killed our child. Why was +he brought in to disgrace our house? Why is he here? +Let him go—let him go, I say, to-night, and pollute the +place no more.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She had never once uttered a syllable of unkindness to +Harry Esmond; and her cruel words smote the poor boy, +so that he stood for some moments bewildered with grief and +rage at the injustice of such a stab from such a hand. He +turned quite white from red, which he had been. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I cannot help my birth, madam,”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“nor my other +misfortune. And as for your boy, if—if my coming nigh +to him pollutes him now, it was not so always. Good night, +my lord. Heaven bless you and yours for your goodness +to me. I have tired her ladyship's kindness out, and I will +go;”</span> and, sinking down on his knee, Harry Esmond took +the rough hand of his benefactor and kissed it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He wants to go to the ale-house—let him go,”</span> cried my +lady. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I'm d——d if he shall,”</span> said my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“I didn't think +you could be so d——d ungrateful, Rachel.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Her reply was to burst into a flood of tears, and to quit +the room with a rapid glance at Harry Esmond. As my +lord, not heeding them, and still in great good humour, +raised up his young client from his kneeling posture (for +a thousand kindnesses had caused the lad to revere my lord +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page085">[pg 085]</span><a name="Pg085" id="Pg085" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as a father), and put his broad hand on Harry Esmond's +shoulder— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She was always so,”</span> my lord said; <span class="tei tei-q">“the very notion of +a woman drives her mad. I took to liquor on that very +account, by Jove, for no other reason than that; for she +can't be jealous of a beer-barrel or a bottle of rum, can she, +doctor? D—— it, look at the maids—just look at the maids +in the house”</span> (my lord pronounced all the words +together—just-look-at-the-maze-in-the-house: +jever-see-such-maze?) +<span class="tei tei-q">“You wouldn't take a wife out of Castlewood now, would +you, doctor?”</span> and my lord burst out laughing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The doctor, who had been looking at my Lord Castlewood +from under his eyelids, said, <span class="tei tei-q">“But joking apart, and, my +lord, as a divine, I cannot treat the subject in a jocular light, +nor, as a pastor of this congregation, look with anything +but sorrow at the idea of so very young a sheep going astray.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir,”</span> said young Esmond, bursting out indignantly, +<span class="tei tei-q">“she told me that you yourself were a horrid old man, and +had offered to kiss her in the dairy.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“For shame, Henry,”</span> cried Doctor Tusher, turning as red +as a turkey-cock, while my lord continued to roar with +laughter. <span class="tei tei-q">“If you listen to the falsehoods of an abandoned +girl——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She is as honest as any woman in England, and as pure +for me,”</span> cried out Henry, <span class="tei tei-q">“and as kind, and as good. For +shame on you to malign her!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Far be it from me to do so,”</span> cried the doctor. <span class="tei tei-q">“Heaven +grant I may be mistaken in the girl, and in you, sir, who have +a truly <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">precocious</span></em> genius; but that is not the point at issue +at present. It appears that the small-pox broke out in the +little boy at the <span class="tei tei-q">‘Three Castles’</span>; that it was on him when +you visited the ale-house, for your <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">own</span></em> reasons; and that +you sat with the child for some time, and immediately +afterwards with my young lord.”</span> The doctor raised his +voice as he spoke, and looked towards my lady, who had +now come back, looking very pale, with a handkerchief in +her hand. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“This is all very true, sir,”</span> said Lady Esmond, looking at +the young man. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis to be feared that he may have brought the infection +with him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“From the ale-house—yes,”</span> said my lady. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“D—— it, I forgot when I collared you, boy,”</span> cried my +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page086">[pg 086]</span><a name="Pg086" id="Pg086" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lord, stepping back. <span class="tei tei-q">“Keep off, Harry, my boy; there's +no good in running into the wolf's jaws, you know.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady looked at him with some surprise, and instantly +advancing to Henry Esmond, took his hand. <span class="tei tei-q">“I beg your +pardon, Henry,”</span> she said; <span class="tei tei-q">“I spoke very unkindly. I have +no right to interfere with you—with your——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord broke out into an oath. <span class="tei tei-q">“Can't you leave the +boy alone, my lady?”</span> She looked a little red, and faintly +pressed the lad's hand as she dropped it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There is no use, my lord,”</span> she said; <span class="tei tei-q">“Frank was on his +knee as he was making pictures, and was running constantly +from Henry to me. The evil is done, if any.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Not with me, damme,”</span> cried my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“I've been +smoking”</span>—and he lighted his pipe again with a coal—<span class="tei tei-q">“and +it keeps off infection; and as the disease is in the village—plague +take it—I would have you leave it. We'll go tomorrow +to Walcote, my lady.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have no fear,”</span> said my lady; <span class="tei tei-q">“I may have had it as +an infant, it broke out in our house then; and when four of +my sisters had it at home, two years before our marriage, +I escaped it, and two of my dear sisters died.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I won't run the risk,”</span> said my lord; <span class="tei tei-q">“I'm as bold as +any man, but I'll not bear that.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Take Beatrix with you and go,”</span> said my lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“For +us the mischief is done; and Tucker can wait upon us, who +has had the disease.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You take care to choose 'em ugly enough,”</span> said my lord, +at which her ladyship hung down her head and looked +foolish: and my lord, calling away Tusher, bade him come +to the oak parlour and have a pipe. The doctor made a low +bow to her ladyship (of which salaams he was profuse), and +walked off on his creaking square-toes after his patron. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the lady and the young man were alone, there was +a silence of some moments, during which he stood at the +fire, looking rather vacantly at the dying embers, whilst +her ladyship busied herself with her tambour-frame and +needles. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am sorry,”</span> she said, after a pause, in a hard, dry voice,—<span class="tei tei-q">“I +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">repeat</span></em> I am sorry that I showed myself so ungrateful +for the safety of my son. It was not at all my wish that you +should leave us, I am sure, unless you found pleasure elsewhere. +But you must perceive, Mr. Esmond, that at your +age, and with your tastes, it is impossible that you can +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page087">[pg 087]</span><a name="Pg087" id="Pg087" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +continue to stay upon the intimate footing in which you +have been in this family. You have wished to go to the +University, and I think 'tis quite as well that you should +be sent thither. I did not press this matter, thinking you +a child, as you are, indeed, in years—quite a child; and +I should never have thought of treating you otherwise +until—until these <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">circumstances</span></em> came to light. And I shall +beg my lord to dispatch you as quick as possible: and will +go on with Frank's learning as well as I can (I owe my +father thanks for a little grounding, and you, I'm sure, for +much that you have taught me),—and—and I wish you +a good night, Mr. Esmond.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And with this she dropped a stately curtsy, and, taking +her candle, went away through the tapestry door, which led +to her apartments. Esmond stood by the fireplace, blankly +staring after her. Indeed, he scarce seemed to see until +she was gone; and then her image was impressed upon him, +and remained for ever fixed upon his memory. He saw +her retreating, the taper lighting up her marble face, her +scarlet lip quivering, and her shining golden hair. He went +to his own room, and to bed, where he tried to read, as his +custom was; but he never knew what he was reading until +afterwards he remembered the appearance of the letters of +the book (it was in Montaigne's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Essays</span></span>), and the events of +the day passed before him—that is, of the last hour of the +day; for as for the morning, and the poor milkmaid yonder, +he never so much as once thought. And he could not get +to sleep until daylight, and woke with a violent headache, +and quite unrefreshed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He had brought the contagion with him from the <span class="tei tei-q">“Three +Castles”</span> sure enough, and was presently laid up with the +small-pox, which spared the Hall no more than it did the +cottage. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page088">[pg 088]</span><a name="Pg088" id="Pg088" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc27" id="toc27"></a> +<a name="pdf28" id="pdf28"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter IX. I Have The Small-Pox, And Prepare To Leave Castlewood</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Harry Esmond passed through the crisis of that +malady, and returned to health again, he found that little +Frank Esmond had also suffered and rallied after the disease, +and the lady his mother was down with it, with a couple +more of the household. <span class="tei tei-q">“It was a providence, for which we +all ought to be thankful,”</span> Doctor Tusher said, <span class="tei tei-q">“that my lady +and her son were spared, while Death carried off the poor +domestics of the house;”</span> and rebuked Harry for asking, +in his simple way—for which we ought to be thankful—that +the servants were killed, or the gentlefolks were saved? +Nor could young Esmond agree in the doctor's vehement +protestations to my lady, when he visited her during her +convalescence, that the malady had not in the least impaired +her charms, and had not been churl enough to injure +the fair features of the Viscountess of Castlewood, whereas +in spite of these fine speeches, Harry thought that her +ladyship's beauty was very much injured by the smallpox. +When the marks of the disease cleared away, they +did not, it is true, leave furrows or scars on her face (except +one, perhaps, on her forehead over her left eyebrow); but +the delicacy of her rosy colour and complexion were gone: +her eyes had lost their brilliancy, her hair fell, and her face +looked older. It was as if a coarse hand had rubbed off +the delicate tints of that sweet picture, and brought it, as +one has seen unskilful painting-cleaners do, to the dead +colour. Also, it must be owned, that for a year or two after +the malady, her ladyship's nose was swollen and redder. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There would be no need to mention these trivialities, but +that they actually influenced many lives, as trifles will in +the world, where a gnat often plays a greater part than an +elephant, and a mole-hill, as we know in King William's case, +can upset an empire. When Tusher in his courtly way (at +which Harry Esmond always chafed and spoke scornfully) +vowed and protested that my lady's face was none the +worse—the lad broke out and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“It <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">is</span></em> worse: and my +mistress is not near so handsome as she was”</span>; on which +poor Lady Esmond gave a rueful smile, and a look into a +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page089">[pg 089]</span><a name="Pg089" id="Pg089" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +little Venice glass she had, which showed her I suppose +that what the stupid boy said was only too true, for she +turned away from the glass and her eyes filled with tears. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The sight of these in Esmond's heart always created a sort +of rage of pity, and seeing them on the face of the lady whom +he loved best, the young blunderer sank down on his knees, +and besought her to pardon him, saying that he was a fool +and an idiot, that he was a brute to make such a speech, he +who had caused her malady, and Doctor Tusher told him +that a bear he was indeed, and a bear he would remain, at +which speech poor young Esmond was so dumb-stricken that +he did not even growl. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He is <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">my</span></em> bear, and I will not have him baited, doctor,”</span> +my lady said, patting her hand kindly on the boy's head, +as he was still kneeling at her feet. <span class="tei tei-q">“How your hair has +come off! And mine, too,”</span> she added with another sigh. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It is not for myself that I cared,”</span> my lady said to Harry, +when the parson had taken his leave; <span class="tei tei-q">“but <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">am</span></em> I very much +changed? Alas! I fear 'tis too true.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Madam, you have the dearest, and kindest, and sweetest +face in the world, I think,”</span> the lad said; and indeed he +thought and thinks so. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Will my lord think so when he comes back?”</span> the +lady asked, with a sigh, and another look at her Venice +glass. <span class="tei tei-q">“Suppose he should think as you do, sir, that I am +hideous—yes, you said hideous—he will cease to care for me. +'Tis all men care for in women, our little beauty. Why did +he select me from among my sisters? 'Twas only for that. +We reign but for a day or two: and be sure that Vashti knew +Esther was coming.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Madam,”</span> said Mr. Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“Ahasuerus was the Grand +Turk, and to change was the manner of his country, and +according to his law.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are all Grand Turks for that matter,”</span> said my lady, +<span class="tei tei-q">“or would be if you could. Come, Frank, come, my child. +You are well, praised be Heaven. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Your</span></em> locks are not +thinned by this dreadful small-pox: nor your poor face +scarred—is it, my angel?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Frank began to shout and whimper at the idea of such +a misfortune. From the very earliest time the young lord +had been taught to admire his beauty by his mother: and +esteemed it as highly as any reigning toast valued hers. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One day, as he himself was recovering from his fever and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page090">[pg 090]</span><a name="Pg090" id="Pg090" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +illness, a pang of something like shame shot across young +Esmond's breast as he remembered that he had never once, +during his illness, given a thought to the poor girl at the +smithy, whose red cheeks but a month ago he had been so +eager to see. Poor Nancy! her cheeks had shared the fate +of roses, and were withered now. She had taken the illness +on the same day with Esmond—she and her brother were +both dead of the small-pox, and buried under the Castlewood +yew-trees. There was no bright face looking now from the +garden, or to cheer the old smith at his lonely fireside. +Esmond would have liked to have kissed her in her shroud +(like the lass in Mr. Prior's pretty poem), but she rested +many foot below the ground, when Esmond after his malady +first trod on it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Doctor Tusher brought the news of this calamity, about +which Harry Esmond longed to ask, but did not like. He +said almost the whole village had been stricken with the +pestilence; seventeen persons were dead of it, among them +mentioning the names of poor Nancy and her little brother. +He did not fail to say how thankful we survivors ought to +be. It being this man's business to flatter and make +sermons, it must be owned he was most industrious in it, +and was doing the one or the other all day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And so Nancy was gone; and Harry Esmond blushed that +he had not a single tear for her, and fell to composing an +elegy in Latin verses over the rustic little beauty. He bade +the dryads mourn and the river-nymphs deplore her. As +her father followed the calling of Vulcan, he said that surely +she was like a daughter of Venus, though Sievewright's +wife was an ugly shrew, as he remembered to have heard +afterwards. He made a long face, but, in truth, felt scarcely +more sorrowful than a mute at a funeral. These first +passions of men and women are mostly abortive; and are +dead almost before they are born. Esmond could repeat, +to his last day, some of the doggerel lines in which his muse +bewailed his pretty lass; not without shame to remember +how bad the verses were, and how good he thought them; +how false the grief, and yet how he was rather proud of it. +'Tis an error, surely, to talk of the simplicity of youth. +I think no persons are more hypocritical, and have a more +affected behaviour to one another, than the young. They +deceive themselves and each other with artifices that do +not impose upon men of the world; and so we got to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page091">[pg 091]</span><a name="Pg091" id="Pg091" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +understand truth better, and grow simpler as we grow +older. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When my lady heard of the fate which had befallen poor +Nancy, she said nothing so long as Tusher was by, but when +he was gone, she took Harry Esmond's hand and said— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Harry, I beg your pardon for those cruel words I used +on the night you were taken ill. I am shocked at the fate +of the poor creature, and am sure that nothing had happened +of that with which, in my anger, I charged you. And the +very first day we go out, you must take me to the blacksmith, +and we must see if there is anything I can do to +console the poor old man. Poor man! to lose both his +children! What should I do without mine!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And this was, indeed, the very first walk which my lady +took, leaning on Esmond's arm, after her illness. But +her visit brought no consolation to the old father; and +he showed no softness, or desire to speak. <span class="tei tei-q">“The Lord +gave and took away,”</span> he said; and he knew what His +servant's duty was. He wanted for nothing—less now than +ever before, as there were fewer mouths to feed. He wished +her ladyship and Master Esmond good morning—he had +grown tall in his illness, and was but very little marked; +and with this, and a surly bow, he went in from the smithy +to the house, leaving my lady, somewhat silenced and +shamefaced, at the door. He had a handsome stone put +up for his two children, which may be seen in Castlewood +churchyard to this very day; and before a year was out +his own name was upon the stone. In the presence of +Death, that sovereign ruler, a woman's coquetry is scared; +and her jealousy will hardly pass the boundaries of that +grim kingdom. 'Tis entirely of the earth that passion, and +expires in the cold blue air, beyond our sphere. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At length, when the danger was quite over, it was announced +that my lord and his daughter would return. +Esmond well remembered the day. The lady, his mistress, +was in a flurry of fear: before my lord came, she went into +her room, and returned from it with reddened cheeks. +Her fate was about to be decided. Her beauty was gone—was +her reign, too, over? A minute would say. My lord +came riding over the bridge—he could be seen from the +great window, clad in scarlet, and mounted on his grey +hackney—his little daughter ambled by him in a bright +riding-dress of blue, on a shining chestnut horse. My lady +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page092">[pg 092]</span><a name="Pg092" id="Pg092" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +leaned against the great mantelpiece, looking on, with one +hand on her heart—she seemed only the more pale for +those red marks on either cheek. She put her handkerchief +to her eyes, and withdrew it, laughing hysterically—the +cloth was quite red with the rouge when she took it away. +She ran to her room again, and came back with pale cheeks +and red eyes—her son in her hand—just as my lord entered, +accompanied by young Esmond, who had gone out to meet +his protector, and to hold his stirrup as he descended from +horseback. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What, Harry, boy!”</span> my lord said good-naturedly, +<span class="tei tei-q">“you look as gaunt as a greyhound. The small-pox hasn't +improved your beauty, and your side of the house hadn't +never too much of it—ho, ho!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And he laughed, and sprang to the ground with no small +agility, looking handsome and red, with a jolly face and +brown hair, like a beef-eater; Esmond kneeling again, as +soon as his patron had descended, performed his homage, +and then went to greet the little Beatrix, and help her +from her horse. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Fie! how yellow you look,”</span> she said; <span class="tei tei-q">“and there are +one, two, red holes in your face;”</span> which, indeed, was very +true; Harry Esmond's harsh countenance bearing, as long +as it continued to be a human face, the marks of the disease. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord laughed again, in high good humour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“D—— it!”</span> said he, with one of his usual oaths, <span class="tei tei-q">“the +little slut sees everything. She saw the dowager's paint +t'other day, and asked her why she wore that red stuff—didn't +you, Trix? and the Tower; and St. James's; and +the play; and the Prince George, and the Princess Anne—didn't +you, Trix?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“They are both very fat, and smelt of brandy,”</span> the child +said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Papa roared with laughing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Brandy!”</span> he said. <span class="tei tei-q">“And how do you know, Miss +Pert?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Because your lordship smells of it after supper, when +I embrace you before you go to bed,”</span> said the young lady, +who, indeed, was as pert as her father said, and looked as +beautiful a little gipsy as eyes ever gazed on. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And now for my lady,”</span> said my lord, going up the stairs, +and passing under the tapestry curtain that hung before +the drawing-room door. Esmond remembered that noble +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page093">[pg 093]</span><a name="Pg093" id="Pg093" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +figure handsomely arrayed in scarlet. Within the last few +months he himself had grown from a boy to be a man, and +with his figure, his thoughts had shot up, and grown manly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady's countenance, of which Harry Esmond was +accustomed to watch the changes, and with a solicitous +affection to note and interpret the signs of gladness or care, +wore a sad and depressed look for many weeks after her +lord's return: during which it seemed as if, by caresses and +entreaties, she strove to win him back from some ill humour +he had, and which he did not choose to throw off. In her +eagerness to please him she practised a hundred of those +arts which had formerly charmed him, but which seemed +now to have lost their potency. Her songs did not amuse +him; and she hushed them and the children when in his +presence. My lord sat silent at his dinner, drinking greatly, +his lady opposite to him, looking furtively at his face, +though also speechless. Her silence annoyed him as much +as her speech; and he would peevishly, and with an oath, +ask her why she held her tongue and looked so glum, or +he would roughly check her when speaking, and bid her +not talk nonsense. It seemed as if, since his return, nothing +she could do or say could please him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When a master and mistress are at strife in a house, the +subordinates in the family take the one side or the other. +Harry Esmond stood in so great fear of my lord, that he +would run a league barefoot to do a message for him; but +his attachment for Lady Esmond was such a passion of +grateful regard, that to spare her a grief, or to do her +a service, he would have given his life daily: and it was +by the very depth and intensity of this regard that he began +to divine how unhappy his adored lady's life was, and that +a secret care (for she never spoke of her anxieties) was +weighing upon her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Can any one, who has passed through the world and +watched the nature of men and women there, doubt what +had befallen her? I have seen, to be sure, some people +carry down with them into old age the actual bloom of their +youthful love, and I know that Mr. Thomas Parr lived to +be a hundred and sixty years old. But, for all that, threescore +and ten is the age of men, and few get beyond it; and +'tis certain that a man who marries for mere <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">beaux yeux</span></span>, +as my lord did, considers his part of the contract at end +when the woman ceases to fulfil hers, and his love does +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page094">[pg 094]</span><a name="Pg094" id="Pg094" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +not survive her beauty. I know 'tis often otherwise, I say; +and can think (as most men in their own experience may) +of many a house, where, lighted in early years, the sainted +lamp of love hath never been extinguished; but so there +is Mr. Parr, and so there is the great giant at the fair that +is eight feet high—exceptions to men—and that poor lamp +whereof I speak, that lights at first the nuptial chamber, +is extinguished by a hundred winds and draughts down the +chimney, or sputters out for want of feeding. And then—and +then it is Chloe, in the dark, stark awake, and Strephon +snoring unheeding; or <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">vice versa</span></span>, 'tis poor Strephon that +has married a heartless jilt, and awoke out of that absurd +vision of conjugal felicity, which was to last for ever, and +is over like any other dream. One and other has made +his bed, and so must lie in it, until that final day when life +ends, and they sleep separate. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +About this time young Esmond, who had a knack of +stringing verses, turned some of Ovid's epistles into rhymes, +and brought them to his lady for her delectation. Those +which treated of forsaken women touched her immensely, +Harry remarked; and when Oenone called after Paris, and +Medea bade Jason come back again, the lady of Castlewood +sighed, and said she thought that part of the verses was the +most pleasing. Indeed, she would have chopped up the +dean, her old father, in order to bring her husband back +again. But her beautiful Jason was gone, as beautiful +Jasons will go, and the poor enchantress had never a spell +to keep him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord was only sulky as long as his wife's anxious face +or behaviour seemed to upbraid him. When she had got +to master these, and to show an outwardly cheerful countenance +and behaviour, her husband's good humour returned +partially, and he swore and stormed no longer at dinner, +but laughed sometimes, and yawned unrestrainedly; +absenting himself often from home, inviting more company +thither, passing the greater part of his days in the +hunting-field, or over the bottle as before; but, with this +difference, that the poor wife could no longer see now, +as she had done formerly, the light of love kindled in his +eyes. He was with her, but that flame was out; and that +once welcome beacon no more shone there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What were this lady's feelings when forced to admit the +truth whereof her foreboding glass had given her only too +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page095">[pg 095]</span><a name="Pg095" id="Pg095" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +true warning, that with her beauty her reign had ended, +and the days of her love were over? What does a seaman +do in a storm if mast and rudder are carried away? He +ships a jurymast, and steers as he best can with an oar. +What happens if your roof falls in a tempest? After the +first stun of the calamity the sufferer starts up, gropes +around to see that the children are safe, and puts them +under a shed out of the rain. If the palace burns down, +you take shelter in the barn. What man's life is not +overtaken by one or more of these tornadoes that send +us out of the course, and fling us on rocks to shelter as +best we may? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Lady Castlewood found that her great ship had +gone down, she began as best she might, after she had +rallied from the effects of the loss, to put out small ventures +of happiness; and hope for little gains and returns, as +a merchant on <span class="tei tei-q">“Change, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">indocilis pauperiem pati</span></span>,”</span> +having lost his thousands, embarks a few guineas upon the next +ship. She laid out her all upon her children, indulging +them beyond all measure, as was inevitable with one of her +kindness of disposition; giving all her thoughts to their +welfare—learning, that she might teach them, and improving +her own many natural gifts and feminine accomplishments, +that she might impart them to her young ones. To be doing +good for some one else, is the life of most good women. +They are exuberant of kindness, as it were, and must impart +it to some one. She made herself a good scholar of French, +Italian, and Latin, having been grounded in these by her +father in her youth: hiding these gifts from her husband +out of fear, perhaps, that they should offend him, for my +lord was no bookman—pish'd and psha'd at the notion of +learned ladies, and would have been angry that his wife +could construe out of a Latin book of which he could scarce +understand two words. Young Esmond was usher, or +house tutor, under her or over her, as it might happen. +During my lord's many absences, these schooldays would +go on uninterruptedly: the mother and daughter learning +with surprising quickness: the latter by fits and starts only, +and as suited her wayward humour. As for the little lord, +it must be owned that he took after his father in the matter +of learning—liked marbles and play, and the great horse, +and the little one which his father brought him, and on +which he took him out a-hunting—a great deal better than +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page096">[pg 096]</span><a name="Pg096" id="Pg096" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Corderius and Lily; marshalled the village boys, and had +a little court of them, already flogging them, and domineering +over them with a fine imperious spirit, that made his +father laugh when he beheld it, and his mother fondly warn +him. The cook had a son, the woodman had two, the big +lad at the porter's lodge took his cuffs and his orders. +Doctor Tusher said he was a young nobleman of gallant +spirit; and Harry Esmond, who was his tutor, and eight +years his little lordship's senior, had hard work sometimes +to keep his own temper, and hold his authority over his +rebellious little chief and kinsman. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In a couple of years after that calamity had befallen +which had robbed Lady Castlewood of a little—a very +little—of her beauty, and her careless husband's heart (if +the truth must be told, my lady had found not only that +her reign was over, but that her successor was appointed, +a princess of a noble house in Drury Lane somewhere, who +was installed and visited by my lord at the town eight miles +off—<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">pudet haec +opprobria dicere nobis</span></span>)—a great change had +taken place in her mind, which, by struggles only known to +herself, at least never mentioned to any one, and unsuspected +by the person who caused the pain she endured—had been +schooled into such a condition as she could not very likely +have imagined possible a score of months since, before her +misfortunes had begun. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She had oldened in that time as people do who suffer +silently great mental pain; and learned much that she had +never suspected before. She was taught by that bitter +teacher Misfortune. A child, the mother of other children, +but two years back her lord was a god to her; his words +her law; his smile her sunshine; his lazy commonplaces +listened to eagerly, as if they were words of wisdom—all +his wishes and freaks obeyed with a servile devotion. She +had been my lord's chief slave and blind worshipper. Some +women bear farther than this, and submit not only to +neglect but to unfaithfulness too—but here this lady's allegiance +had failed her. Her spirit rebelled and disowned any +more obedience. First she had to bear in secret the passion +of losing the adored object; then to get a farther initiation, +and to find this worshipped being was but a clumsy idol: +then to admit the silent truth, that it was she was superior, +and not the monarch her master: that she had thoughts +which his brains could never master, and was the better +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page097">[pg 097]</span><a name="Pg097" id="Pg097" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of the two; quite separate from my lord although tied to +him, and bound as almost all people (save a very happy few) +to work all her life alone. My lord sat in his chair, laughing +his laugh, cracking his joke, his face flushing with wine—my +lady in her place over against him—he never suspecting +that his superior was there, in the calm resigned lady, cold +of manner, with downcast eyes. When he was merry in +his cups, he would make jokes about her coldness, and, +<span class="tei tei-q">“D—— it, now my lady is gone, we will have t'other bottle,”</span> +he would say. He was frank enough in telling his thoughts, +such as they were. There was little mystery about my +lord's words or actions. His fair Rosamond did not live +in a labyrinth, like the lady of Mr. Addison's opera, but +paraded with painted cheeks and a tipsy retinue in the +country town. Had she a mind to be revenged, Lady +Castlewood could have found the way to her rival's house +easily enough; and, if she had come with bowl and dagger, +would have been routed off the ground by the enemy with +a volley of Billingsgate, which the fair person always kept +by her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Meanwhile, it has been said, that for Harry Esmond his +benefactress's sweet face had lost none of its charms. It +had always the kindest of looks and smiles for him—smiles, +not so gay and artless perhaps as those which Lady Castlewood +had formerly worn, when, a child herself, playing +with her children, her husband's pleasure and authority +were all she thought of; but out of her griefs and cares, +as will happen I think when these trials fall upon a kindly +heart, and are not too unbearable, grew up a number of +thoughts and excellences which had never come into +existence, had not her sorrow and misfortunes engendered +them. Sure, occasion is the father of most that is good +in us. As you have seen the awkward fingers and clumsy +tools of a prisoner cut and fashion the most delicate little +pieces of carved work; or achieve the most prodigious +underground labours, and cut through walls of masonry, +and saw iron bars and fetters; 'tis misfortune that awakens +ingenuity, or fortitude, or endurance, in hearts where these +qualities had never come to life but for the circumstance +which gave them a being. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas after Jason left her, no doubt,”</span> Lady Castlewood +once said with one of her smiles to young Esmond (who +was reading to her a version of certain lines out of Euripides), +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page098">[pg 098]</span><a name="Pg098" id="Pg098" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“that Medea became a learned woman and a great enchantress.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And she could conjure the stars out of heaven,”</span> the +young tutor added, <span class="tei tei-q">“but she could not bring Jason back +again.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What do you mean?”</span> asked my lady, very angry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed I mean nothing,”</span> said the other, <span class="tei tei-q">“save what I've +read in books. What should I know about such matters? +I have seen no woman save you and little Beatrix, and the +parson's wife and my late mistress, and your ladyship's +woman here.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The men who wrote your books,”</span> says my lady, <span class="tei tei-q">“your +Horaces, and Ovids, and Virgils, as far as I know of them, +all thought ill of us, as all the heroes they wrote about used +us basely. We were bred to be slaves always; and even +of our own times, as you are still the only lawgivers, I think +our sermons seem to say that the best woman is she who +bears her master's chains most gracefully. 'Tis a pity there +are no nunneries permitted by our Church: Beatrix and +I would fly to one, and end our days in peace there away +from you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And is there no slavery in a convent?”</span> says Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At least if women are slaves there, no one sees them,”</span> +answered the lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“They don't work in street-gangs with +the public to jeer them: and if they suffer, suffer in private. +Here comes my lord home from hunting. Take away the +books. My lord does not love to see them. Lessons are +over for to-day, Mr. Tutor.”</span> And with a curtsy and a smile +she would end this sort of colloquy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Indeed <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Tutor”</span>, as my lady called Esmond, had now +business enough on his hands in Castlewood House. He had +three pupils, his lady and her two children, at whose lessons +she would always be present; besides writing my lord's +letters, and arranging his accompts for him—when these +could be got from Esmond's indolent patron. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of the pupils the two young people were but lazy scholars, +and as my lady would admit no discipline such as was then +in use, my lord's son only learned what he liked, which was +but little, and never to his life's end could be got to construe +more than six lines of Virgil. Mistress Beatrix chattered +French prettily from a very early age; and sang sweetly, +but this was from her mother's teaching—not Harry +Esmond's, who could scarce distinguish between <span class="tei tei-q">“Green +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page099">[pg 099]</span><a name="Pg099" id="Pg099" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Sleeves”</span> and <span class="tei tei-q">“Lillabullero”</span>; although he had no greater +delight in life than to hear the ladies sing. He sees them +now (will he ever forget them?) as they used to sit together +of the summer evenings—the two golden heads over the +page—the child's little hand and the mother's beating the +time, with their voices rising and falling in unison. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But if the children were careless, 'twas a wonder how +eagerly the mother learned from her young tutor—and +taught him too. The happiest instinctive faculty was this +lady's—a faculty for discerning latent beauties and hidden +graces of books, especially books of poetry, as in a walk +she would spy out field-flowers and make posies of them, +such as no other hand could. She was a critic not by +reason but by feeling; the sweetest commentator of those +books they read together; and the happiest hours of young +Esmond's life, perhaps, were those passed in the company +of this kind mistress and her children. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +These happy days were to end soon, however; and it +was by the Lady Castlewood's own decree that they were +brought to a conclusion. It happened about Christmastime, +Harry Esmond being now past sixteen years of age, +that his old comrade, adversary, and friend, Tom Tusher, +returned from his school in London, a fair, well-grown, and +sturdy lad, who was about to enter college, with an exhibition +from his school, and a prospect of after promotion in +the Church. Tom Tusher's talk was of nothing but Cambridge, +now; and the boys, who were good friends, examined +each other eagerly about their progress in books. Tom had +learned some Greek and Hebrew, besides Latin, in which +he was pretty well skilled, and also had given himself to +mathematical studies under his father's guidance, who was +a proficient in those sciences, of which Esmond knew nothing, +nor could he write Latin so well as Tom, though he could +talk it better, having been taught by his dear friend the +Jesuit father, for whose memory the lad ever retained the +warmest affection, reading his books, keeping his swords +clean in the little crypt where the father had shown them +to Esmond on the night of his visit; and often of a night +sitting in the chaplain's room, which he inhabited, over +his books, his verses, and rubbish, with which the lad +occupied himself, he would look up at the window, thinking +he wished it might open and let in the good father. He had +come and passed away like a dream; but for the swords +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page100">[pg 100]</span><a name="Pg100" id="Pg100" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and books Harry might almost think the father was an +imagination of his mind—and for two letters which had +come to him, one from abroad full of advice and affection, +another soon after he had been confirmed by the Bishop +of Hexton, in which Father Holt deplored his falling away. +But Harry Esmond felt so confident now of his being in +the right, and of his own powers as a casuist, that he thought +he was able to face the father himself in argument, and +possibly convert him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +To work upon the faith of her young pupil, Esmond's +kind mistress sent to the library of her father the dean, who +had been distinguished in the disputes of the late king's +reign; and, an old soldier now, had hung up his weapons +of controversy. These he took down from his shelves +willingly for young Esmond, whom he benefited by his own +personal advice and instruction. It did not require much +persuasion to induce the boy to worship with his beloved +mistress. And the good old nonjuring dean flattered himself +with a conversion which in truth was owing to a much +gentler and fairer persuader. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Under her ladyship's kind eyes (my lord's being sealed +in sleep pretty generally), Esmond read many volumes of +the works of the famous British divines of the last age, +and was familiar with Wake and Sherlock, with Stillingfleet +and Patrick. His mistress never tired to listen or to read, +to pursue the text with fond comments, to urge those points +which her fancy dwelt on most, or her reason deemed most +important. Since the death of her father the dean, this +lady hath admitted a certain latitude of theological reading, +which her orthodox father would never have allowed; +his favourite writers appealing more to reason and antiquity +than to the passions or imaginations of their readers, so +that the works of Bishop Taylor, nay, those of Mr. Baxter +and Mr. Law, have in reality found more favour with my +Lady Castlewood than the severer volumes of our great +English schoolmen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In later life, at the University, Esmond reopened the +controversy, and pursued it in a very different manner, +when his patrons had determined for him that he was to +embrace the ecclesiastical life. But though his mistress's +heart was in this calling, his own never was much. After +that first fervour of simple devotion, which his beloved +Jesuit priest had inspired in him, speculative theology took +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page101">[pg 101]</span><a name="Pg101" id="Pg101" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +but little hold upon the young man's mind. When his +early credulity was disturbed, and his saints and virgins +taken out of his worship, to rank little higher than the +divinities of Olympus, his belief became acquiescence rather +than ardour; and he made his mind up to assume the +cassock and bands, as another man does to wear a breastplate +and jack-boots, or to mount a merchant's desk for +a livelihood, and from obedience and necessity, rather than +from choice. There were scores of such men in Mr. Esmond's +time at the Universities, who were going to the Church +with no better calling than his. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Thomas Tusher was gone, a feeling of no small +depression and disquiet fell upon young Esmond, of which, +though he did not complain, his kind mistress must have +divined the cause: for soon after she showed not only that +she understood the reason of Harry's melancholy, but could +provide a remedy for it. Her habit was thus to watch, +unobservedly, those to whom duty or affection bound her, +and to prevent their designs, or to fulfil them, when she +had the power. It was this lady's disposition to think +kindnesses, and devise silent bounties, and to scheme +benevolence for those about her. We take such goodness, +for the most part, as if it was our due; the Marys who +bring ointment for our feet get but little thanks. Some of +us never feel this devotion at all, or are moved by it to +gratitude or acknowledgement; others only recall it years +after, when the days are past in which those sweet kindnesses +were spent on us, and we offer back our return for the debt +by a poor tardy payment of tears. Then forgotten tones +of love recur to us, and kind glances shine out of the past—oh, +so bright and clear!—oh, so longed after!—because +they are out of reach; as holiday music from withinside +a prison wall—or sunshine seen through the bars; more +prized because unattainable—more bright because of the +contrast of present darkness and solitude, whence there is +no escape. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All the notice, then, which Lady Castlewood seemed to take +of Harry Esmond's melancholy, upon Tom Tusher's departure, +was, by a gaiety unusual to her, to attempt to dispel +his gloom. She made his three scholars (herself being the +chief one) more cheerful than ever they had been before, and +more docile too, all of them learning and reading much more +than they had been accustomed to do. <span class="tei tei-q">“For who knows,”</span> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page102">[pg 102]</span><a name="Pg102" id="Pg102" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +said the lady, <span class="tei tei-q">“what may happen, and whether we may be +able to keep such a learned tutor long?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Frank Esmond said he for his part did not want to learn +any more, and Cousin Harry might shut up his book whenever +he liked, if he would come out a-fishing; and little +Beatrix declared she would send for Tom Tusher, and <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">he</span></em> +would be glad enough to come to Castlewood, if Harry chose +to go away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At last comes a messenger from Winchester one day, +bearer of a letter with a great black seal from the dean there, +to say that his sister was dead, and had left her fortune +of 2,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> among her six nieces, the dean's daughters; and +many a time since has Harry Esmond recalled the flushed +face and eager look wherewith, after this intelligence, his +kind lady regarded him. She did not pretend to any grief +about the deceased relative, from whom she and her family +had been many years parted. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When my lord heard of the news, he also did not make +any very long face. <span class="tei tei-q">“The money will come very handy to +furnish the music-room and the cellar, which is getting low, +and buy your ladyship a coach and a couple of horses that +will do indifferent to ride or for the coach. And Beatrix, +you shall have a spinet: and Frank, you shall have a little +horse from Hexton Fair; and Harry, you shall have five +pounds to buy some books,”</span> said my lord, who was generous +with his own, and indeed with other folks' money. <span class="tei tei-q">“I wish +your aunt would die once a year, Rachel; we could spend +your money, and all your sisters', too.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have but one aunt—and—and I have another use for +the money, my lord,”</span> says my lady, turning very red. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Another use, my dear; and what do you know about +money?”</span> cries my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“And what the devil is there that +I don't give you which you want?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I intend to give this money—can't you fancy how, my +lord?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord swore one of his large oaths that he did not know +in the least what she meant. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I intend it for Harry Esmond to go to college.—Cousin +Harry,”</span> says my lady, <span class="tei tei-q">“you mustn't stay longer in this +dull place, but make a name to yourself, and for us too, +Harry.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“D——n it, Harry's well enough here,”</span> says my lord, for +a moment looking rather sulky. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page103">[pg 103]</span><a name="Pg103" id="Pg103" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Is Harry going away? You don't mean to say you will +go away?”</span> cry out Frank and Beatrix at one breath. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But he will come back: and this will always be his +home,”</span> cries my lady, with blue eyes looking a celestial +kindness: <span class="tei tei-q">“and his scholars will always love him; won't +they?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By G——d, Rachel, you're a good woman!”</span> says my lord, +seizing my lady's hand, at which she blushed very much, +and shrank back, putting her children before her. <span class="tei tei-q">“I wish +you joy, my kinsman,”</span> he continued, giving Harry Esmond +a hearty slap on the shoulder. <span class="tei tei-q">“I won't balk your luck. +Go to Cambridge, boy; and when Tusher dies you shall +have the living here, if you are not better provided by that +time. We'll furnish the dining-room and buy the horses +another year. I'll give thee a nag out of the stable: take +any one except my hack and the bay gelding and the coach-horses; +and God speed thee, my boy!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Have the sorrel, Harry; 'tis a good one. Father says +'tis the best in the stable,”</span> says little Frank, clapping his +hands, and jumping up. <span class="tei tei-q">“Let's come and see him in the +stable.”</span> And the other, in his delight and eagerness, was +for leaving the room that instant to arrange about his +journey. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Lady Castlewood looked after him with sad penetrating +glances. <span class="tei tei-q">“He wishes to be gone already, my lord,”</span> +said she to her husband. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The young man hung back abashed. <span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, I would +stay for ever, if your ladyship bade me,”</span> he said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And thou wouldst be a fool for thy pains, kinsman,”</span> +said my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“Tut, tut, man. Go and see the world. +Sow thy wild oats; and take the best luck that Fate sends +thee. I wish I were a boy again that I might go to college, +and taste the Trumpington ale.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Ours indeed is but a dull home,”</span> cries my lady, with +a little of sadness, and maybe of satire, in her voice: <span class="tei tei-q">“an +old glum house, half ruined, and the rest only half furnished; +a woman and two children are but poor company for men +that are accustomed to better. We are only fit to be your +worship's handmaids, and your pleasures must of necessity +lie elsewhere than at home.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Curse me, Rachel, if I know now whether thou art in +earnest or not,”</span> said my lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“In earnest, my lord!”</span> says she, still clinging by one of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page104">[pg 104]</span><a name="Pg104" id="Pg104" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +her children. <span class="tei tei-q">“Is there much subject here for joke?”</span> +And she made him a grand curtsy, and, giving a stately +look to Harry Esmond, which seemed to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“Remember; +you understand me, though he does not,”</span> she left the room +with her children. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Since she found out that confounded Hexton business,”</span> +my lord said—<span class="tei tei-q">“and be hanged to them that told her!—she +has not been the same woman. She, who used to be +as humble as a milkmaid, is as proud as a princess,”</span> says +my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“Take my counsel, Harry Esmond, and keep +clear of women. Since I have had anything to do with +the jades, they have given me nothing but disgust. I had +a wife at Tangier, with whom, as she couldn't speak a word +of my language, you'd have thought I might lead a quiet +life. But she tried to poison me, because she was jealous +of a Jew girl. There was your aunt, for aunt she is—aunt +Jezebel, a pretty life your father led with <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">her</span></em>, and here's +my lady. When I saw her on a pillion riding behind the +dean her father, she looked and was such a baby, that a +sixpenny doll might have pleased her. And now you see +what she is—hands off, highty-tighty, high and mighty, +an empress couldn't be grander. Pass us the tankard, +Harry, my boy. A mug of beer and a toast at morn, says +my host. A toast and a mug of beer at noon, says my dear. +D——n it, Polly loves a mug of ale, too, and laced with +brandy, by Jove!”</span> Indeed, I suppose they drank it together; +for my lord was often thick in his speech at mid-day +dinner; and at night at supper, speechless altogether. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond's departure resolved upon, it seemed as +if the Lady Castlewood, too, rejoiced to lose him; for +more than once, when the lad, ashamed perhaps at his own +secret eagerness to go away (at any rate stricken with +sadness at the idea of leaving those from whom he had +received so many proofs of love and kindness inestimable), +tried to express to his mistress his sense of gratitude to her, +and his sorrow at quitting those who had so sheltered and +tended a nameless and houseless orphan, Lady Castlewood +cut short his protests of love and his lamentations, and +would hear of no grief, but only look forward to Harry's +fame and prospects in life. <span class="tei tei-q">“Our little legacy will keep +you for four years like a gentleman. Heaven's Providence, +your own genius, industry, honour, must do the rest for +you. Castlewood will always be a home for you; and these +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page105">[pg 105]</span><a name="Pg105" id="Pg105" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +children, whom you have taught and loved, will not forget +to love you. And Harry,”</span> said she (and this was the only +time when she spoke with a tear in her eye, or a tremor in +her voice), <span class="tei tei-q">“it may happen in the course of nature that +I shall be called away from them: and their father—and—and +they will need true friends and protectors. Promise +me that you will be true to them—as—as I think I have +been to you—and a mother's fond prayer and blessing go +with you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“So help me God, madam, I will,”</span> said Harry Esmond, +falling on his knees, and kissing the hand of his dearest +mistress. <span class="tei tei-q">“If you will have me stay now, I will. What +matters whether or no I make my way in life, or whether +a poor bastard dies as unknown as he is now? 'Tis enough +that I have your love and kindness surely; and to make +you happy is duty enough for me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Happy!”</span> says she; <span class="tei tei-q">“but indeed I ought to be, with my +children, and——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Not happy!”</span> cried Esmond (for he knew what her life +was, though he and his mistress never spoke a word concerning +it). <span class="tei tei-q">“If not happiness, it may be ease. Let me stay +and work for you—let me stay and be your servant.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, you are best away,”</span> said my lady, laughing, as +she put her hand on the boy's head for a moment. <span class="tei tei-q">“You +shall stay in no such dull place. You shall go to college +and distinguish yourself as becomes your name. That is +how you shall please me best; and—and if my children +want you, or I want you, you shall come to us; and I +know we may count on you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“May Heaven forsake me if you may not,”</span> Harry said, +getting up from his knee. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And my knight longs for a dragon this instant that he +may fight,”</span> said my lady, laughing; which speech made +Harry Esmond start, and turn red; for indeed the very +thought was in his mind, that he would like that some +chance should immediately happen whereby he might show +his devotion. And it pleased him to think that his lady +had called him <span class="tei tei-q">“her knight”</span>, and often and often he recalled +this to his mind, and prayed that he might be her true +knight, too. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady's bedchamber window looked out over the +country, and you could see from it the purple hills beyond +Castlewood village, the green common betwixt that and the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page106">[pg 106]</span><a name="Pg106" id="Pg106" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Hall, and the old bridge which crossed over the river. When +Harry Esmond went away for Cambridge, little Frank ran +alongside his horse as far as the bridge, and there Harry +stopped for a moment, and looked back at the house where +the best part of his life had been passed. It lay before him +with its grey familiar towers, a pinnacle or two shining in +the sun, the buttresses and terrace walls casting great blue +shades on the grass. And Harry remembered all his life +after how he saw his mistress at the window looking out on +him, in a white robe, the little Beatrix's chestnut curls +resting at her mother's side. Both waved a farewell to +him, and little Frank sobbed to leave him. Yes, he +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">would</span></em> be his lady's true knight, he vowed in his heart; he +waved her an adieu with his hat. The village people had +good-bye to say to him too. All knew that Master Harry +was going to college, and most of them had a kind word and +a look of farewell. I do not stop to say what adventures he +began to imagine, or what career to devise for himself, +before he had ridden three miles from home. He had not +read Monsieur Galland's ingenious Arabian tales as yet; +but be sure that there are other folks who build castles in +the air, and have fine hopes, and kick them down too, besides +honest Alnaschar. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc29" id="toc29"></a> +<a name="pdf30" id="pdf30"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter X. I Go To Cambridge, And Do But Little Good There</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord, who said he should like to revisit the old haunts +of his youth, kindly accompanied Harry Esmond in his first +journey to Cambridge. Their road lay through London, +where my lord viscount would also have Harry stay a few +days to show him the pleasures of the town, before he entered +upon his University studies, and whilst here Harry's patron +conducted the young man to my lady dowager's house at +Chelsey near London: the kind lady at Castlewood having +specially ordered that the young gentleman and the old +should pay a respectful visit in that quarter. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Her ladyship the viscountess dowager occupied a handsome +new house in Chelsey, with a garden behind it, and +facing the river, always a bright and animated sight with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page107">[pg 107]</span><a name="Pg107" id="Pg107" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +its swarms of sailors, barges, and wherries. Harry laughed +at recognizing in the parlour the well-remembered old piece +of Sir Peter Lely, wherein his father's widow was represented +as a virgin huntress, armed with a gilt bow and arrow, and +encumbered only with that small quantity of drapery which +it would seem the virgins in King Charles's day were accustomed +to wear. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady dowager had left off this peculiar habit of huntress +when she married. But though she was now considerably +past sixty years of age, I believe she thought that airy +nymph of the picture could still be easily recognized in the +venerable personage who gave an audience to Harry and +his patron. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She received the young man with even more favour than +she showed to the elder, for she chose to carry on the conversation +in French, in which my Lord Castlewood was no +great proficient, and expressed her satisfaction at finding +that Mr. Esmond could speak fluently in that language. +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas the only one fit for polite conversation,”</span> she condescended +to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“and suitable to persons of high breeding.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord laughed afterwards, as the gentlemen went away, +at his kinswoman's behaviour. He said he remembered +the time when she could speak English fast enough, and +joked in his jolly way at the loss he had had of such a lovely +wife as that. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady viscountess deigned to ask his lordship news of +his wife and children; she had heard that Lady Castlewood +had had the small-pox; she hoped she was not so <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">very</span></em> +much disfigured as people said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At this remark about his wife's malady, my lord viscount +winced and turned red; but the dowager, in speaking of +the disfigurement of the young lady, turned to her looking-glass +and examined her old wrinkled countenance in it with +such a grin of satisfaction, that it was all her guests could +do to refrain from laughing in her ancient face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She asked Harry what his profession was to be; and my +lord, saying that the lad was to take orders, and have the +living of Castlewood when old Dr. Tusher vacated it; she +did not seem to show any particular anger at the notion of +Harry's becoming a Church of England clergyman, nay, +was rather glad than otherwise, that the youth should be +so provided for. She bade Mr. Esmond not to forget to pay +her a visit whenever he passed through London, and carried +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page108">[pg 108]</span><a name="Pg108" id="Pg108" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +her graciousness so far as to send a purse with twenty +guineas for him, to the tavern at which my lord put up (the +<span class="tei tei-q">“Greyhound”</span>, in Charing Cross); and, along with this +welcome gift for her kinsman, she sent a little doll for a +present to my lord's little daughter Beatrix, who was +growing beyond the age of dolls by this time, and was as +tall almost as her venerable relative. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After seeing the town, and going to the plays, my Lord +Castlewood and Esmond rode together to Cambridge, +spending two pleasant days upon the journey. Those +rapid new coaches were not established as yet, that performed +the whole journey between London and the University +in a single day; however, the road was pleasant and +short enough to Harry Esmond, and he always gratefully +remembered that happy holiday, which his kind patron +gave him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond was entered a pensioner of Trinity College in +Cambridge, to which famous college my lord had also in his +youth belonged. Dr. Montague was master at this time, +and received my lord viscount with great politeness: so did +Mr. Bridge, who was appointed to be Harry's tutor. Tom +Tusher, who was of Emmanuel College, and was by this time +a junior soph, came to wait upon my lord, and to take Harry +under his protection; and comfortable rooms being provided +for him in the great court close by the gate, and +near to the famous Mr. Newton's lodgings, Harry's patron +took leave of him with many kind words and blessings, and +an admonition to him to behave better at the University +than my lord himself had ever done. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Tis needless in these memoirs to go at any length into +the particulars of Harry Esmond's college career. It was +like that of a hundred young gentlemen of that day. But he +had the ill fortune to be older by a couple of years than +most of his fellow students; and by his previous solitary +mode of bringing up, the circumstances of his life, and the +peculiar thoughtfulness and melancholy that had naturally +engendered, he was, in a great measure, cut off from the +society of comrades who were much younger and higher-spirited +than he. His tutor, who had bowed down to the +ground, as he walked my lord over the college grass-plats, +changed his behaviour as soon as the nobleman's back was +turned, and was—at least Harry thought so—harsh and +overbearing. When the lads used to assemble in their +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page109">[pg 109]</span><a name="Pg109" id="Pg109" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">greges</span></span> in hall, Harry found himself alone in the midst of +that little flock of boys; they raised a great laugh at him +when he was set on to read Latin, which he did with the +foreign pronunciation taught to him by his old master, the +Jesuit, than which he knew no other. Mr. Bridge, the tutor, +made him the object of clumsy jokes, in which he was fond of +indulging. The young man's spirit was chafed, and his +vanity mortified; and he found himself, for some time, as +lonely in this place as ever he had been at Castlewood, +whither he longed to return. His birth was a source of +shame to him, and he fancied a hundred slights and sneers +from young and old, who, no doubt, had treated him better +had he met them himself more frankly. And as he looks +back, in calmer days, upon this period of his life, which he +thought so unhappy, he can see that his own pride and +vanity caused no small part of the mortifications which he +attributed to others' ill will. The world deals good-naturedly +with good-natured people, and I never knew a sulky +misanthropist who quarrelled with it, but it was he, and not +it, that was in the wrong. Tom Tusher gave Harry plenty +of good advice on this subject, for Tom had both good sense +and good humour; but Mr. Harry chose to treat his senior +with a great deal of superfluous disdain and absurd scorn, +and would by no means part from his darling injuries, in +which, very likely, no man believed but himself. As for +honest Doctor Bridge, the tutor found, after a few trials of +wit with the pupil, that the younger man was an ugly subject +for wit, and that the laugh was often turned against him. +This did not make tutor and pupil any better friends; but +had, so far, an advantage for Esmond, that Mr. Bridge was +induced to leave him alone; and so long as he kept his +chapels, and did the college exercises required of him, Bridge +was content not to see Harry's glum face in his class, and to +leave him to read and sulk for himself in his own chamber. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A poem or two in Latin and English, which were pronounced +to have some merit, and a Latin oration (for +Mr. Esmond could write that language better than pronounce +it), got him a little reputation both with the authorities of +the University and amongst the young men, with whom he +began to pass for more than he was worth. A few victories +over their common enemy Mr. Bridge, made them incline +towards him, and look upon him as the champion of their +order against the seniors. Such of the lads as he took into +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page110">[pg 110]</span><a name="Pg110" id="Pg110" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his confidence, found him not so gloomy and haughty as +his appearance led them to believe; and Don Dismallo, as +he was called, became presently a person of some little +importance in his college, and was, as he believes, set down +by the seniors there as rather a dangerous character. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Don Dismallo was a stanch young Jacobite, like the rest +of his family; gave himself many absurd airs of loyalty; +used to invite young friends to burgundy, and give the +king's health on King James's birthday; wore black on the +day of his abdication; fasted on the anniversary of King +William's coronation; and performed a thousand absurd +antics, of which he smiles now to think. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +These follies caused many remonstrances on Tom Tusher's +part, who was always a friend to the powers that be, as +Esmond was always in opposition to them. Tom was a +Whig, while Esmond was a Tory. Tom never missed a +lecture, and capped the proctor with the profoundest of +bows. No wonder he sighed over Harry's insubordinate +courses, and was angry when the others laughed at him. +But that Harry was known to have my lord viscount's +protection, Tom no doubt would have broken with him altogether. +But honest Tom never gave up a comrade as long +as he was the friend of a great man. This was not out of +scheming on Tom's part, but a natural inclination towards +the great. 'Twas no hypocrisy in him to flatter, but the +bent of his mind, which was always perfectly good-humoured, +obliging, and servile. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry had very liberal allowances, for his dear mistress +of Castlewood not only regularly supplied him, but the +dowager at Chelsey made her donation annual, and received +Esmond at her house near London every Christmas; but, +in spite of these benefactions, Esmond was constantly +poor; whilst 'twas a wonder with how small a stipend +from his father, Tom Tusher contrived to make a good +figure. 'Tis true that Harry both spent, gave, and lent +his money very freely, which Thomas never did. I think +he was like the famous Duke of Marlborough in this instance, +who, getting a present of fifty pieces, when a young +man, from some foolish woman who fell in love with his +good looks, showed the money to Cadogan in a drawer +scores of years after, where it had lain ever since he had +sold his beardless honour to procure it. I do not mean to +say that Tom ever let out his good looks so profitably, for +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page111">[pg 111]</span><a name="Pg111" id="Pg111" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +nature had not endowed him with any particular charms of +person, and he ever was a pattern of moral behaviour, losing +no opportunity of giving the very best advice to his younger +comrade; with which article, to do him justice, he parted +very freely. Not but that he was a merry fellow, too, in his +way; he loved a joke, if by good fortune he understood it, +and took his share generously of a bottle if another paid for +it, and especially if there was a young lord in company to +drink it. In these cases there was not a harder drinker +in the University than Mr. Tusher could be; and it was +edifying to behold him, fresh shaved and with smug face, +singing out <span class="tei tei-q">“Amen!”</span> at early chapel in the morning. In +his reading, poor Harry permitted himself to go a-gadding +after all the Nine Muses, and so very likely had but little +favour from any one of them; whereas Tom Tusher, who +had no more turn for poetry than a ploughboy, nevertheless, +by a dogged perseverance and obsequiousness in courting +the divine Calliope, got himself a prize, and some credit +in the University, and a fellowship at his college, as a +reward for his scholarship. In this time of Mr. Esmond's +life, he got the little reading which he ever could boast of, +and passed a good part of his days greedily devouring all +the books on which he could lay hand. In this desultory +way the works of most of the English, French, and Italian +poets came under his eyes, and he had a smattering of the +Spanish tongue likewise, besides the ancient languages, of +which, at least of Latin, he was a tolerable master. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Then, about midway in his University career, he fell to +reading for the profession to which worldly prudence rather +than inclination called him, and was perfectly bewildered +in theological controversy. In the course of his reading +(which was neither pursued with that seriousness or that +devout mind which such a study requires), the youth found +himself, at the end of one month, a Papist, and was about +to proclaim his faith; the next month a Protestant, with +Chillingworth; and the third a sceptic, with Hobbs and +Bayle. Whereas honest Tom Tusher never permitted his +mind to stray out of the prescribed University path, +accepted the Thirty-nine Articles with all his heart, and +would have signed and sworn to other nine-and-thirty +with entire obedience. Harry's wilfulness in this matter, +and disorderly thoughts and conversation, so shocked and +afflicted his senior, that there grew up a coldness and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page112">[pg 112]</span><a name="Pg112" id="Pg112" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +estrangement between them, so that they became scarce +more than mere acquaintances, from having been intimate +friends when they came to college first. Politics ran high, +too, at the University; and here, also, the young men were +at variance. Tom professed himself, albeit a High Churchman, +a strong King William's-man; whereas Harry brought +his family Tory politics to college with him, to which he +must add a dangerous admiration for Oliver Cromwell, +whose side, or King James's by turns, he often chose to take +in the disputes which the young gentlemen used to hold in +each other's rooms, where they debated on the state of the +nation, crowned and deposed kings, and toasted past and +present heroes or beauties in flagons of college ale. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Thus, either from the circumstances of his birth, or the +natural melancholy of his disposition, Esmond came to live +very much by himself during his stay at the University, +having neither ambition enough to distinguish himself in +the college career, nor caring to mingle with the mere pleasures +and boyish frolics of the students, who were, for the +most part, two or three years younger than he. He fancied +that the gentlemen of the common-room of his college +slighted him on account of his birth, and hence kept aloof +from their society. It may be that he made the ill will, +which he imagined came from them, by his own behaviour, +which, as he looks back on it in after-life, he now sees was +morose and haughty. At any rate, he was as tenderly +grateful for kindness as he was susceptible of slight and +wrong; and, lonely as he was generally, yet had one or two +very warm friendships for his companions of those days. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One of these was a queer gentleman that resided in the +University, though he was no member of it, and was the +professor of a science scarce recognized in the common course +of college education. This was a French refugee officer, +who had been driven out of his native country at the time of +the Protestant persecutions there, and who came to Cambridge, +where he taught the science of the small-sword, and +set up a saloon-of-arms. Though he declared himself a +Protestant, 'twas said Mr. Moreau was a Jesuit in disguise; +indeed, he brought very strong recommendations to the +Tory party, which was pretty strong in that University, +and very likely was one of the many agents whom King +James had in this country. Esmond found this gentleman's +conversation very much more agreeable, and to his taste, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page113">[pg 113]</span><a name="Pg113" id="Pg113" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +than the talk of the college divines in the common-room; +he never wearied of Moreau's stories of the wars of Turenne +and Condé, in which he had borne a part; and being +familiar with the French tongue from his youth, and in +a place where but few spoke it, his company became very +agreeable to the brave old professor of arms, whose favourite +pupil he was, and who made Mr. Esmond a very tolerable +proficient in the noble science of <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">escrime</span></span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At the next term Esmond was to take his degree of +Bachelor of Arts, and afterwards, in proper season, to assume +the cassock and bands which his fond mistress would have +him wear. Tom Tusher himself was a parson and a fellow +of his college by this time; and Harry felt that he would +very gladly cede his right to the living of Castlewood to +Tom, and that his own calling was in no way the pulpit. +But as he was bound, before all things in the world, to his +dear mistress at home, and knew that a refusal on his part +would grieve her, he determined to give her no hint of his +unwillingness to the clerical office; and it was in this +unsatisfactory mood of mind that he went to spend the +last vacation he should have at Castlewood before he +took orders. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc31" id="toc31"></a> +<a name="pdf32" id="pdf32"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XI. I Come Home For A Holiday To Castlewood, And Find +A Skeleton In The House</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At his third long vacation, Esmond came as usual to Castlewood, +always feeling an eager thrill of pleasure when he +found himself once more in the house where he had passed +so many years, and beheld the kind familiar eyes of his +mistress looking upon him. She and her children (out of +whose company she scarce ever saw him) came to greet him. +Miss Beatrix was grown so tall that Harry did not quite +know whether he might kiss her or no; and she blushed and +held back when he offered that salutation, though she took +it, and even courted it, when they were alone. The young +lord was shooting up to be like his gallant father in look, +though with his mother's kind eyes: the Lady of Castlewood +herself seemed grown, too, since Harry saw her—in her look +more stately, in her person fuller, in her face, still as ever +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page114">[pg 114]</span><a name="Pg114" id="Pg114" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +most tender and friendly, a greater air of command and decision +than had appeared in that guileless sweet countenance +which Harry remembered so gratefully. The tone of her +voice was so much deeper and sadder when she spoke and +welcomed him, that it quite startled Esmond, who looked up +at her surprised as she spoke, when she withdrew her eyes +from him; nor did she ever look at him afterwards when +his own eyes were gazing upon her. A something hinting +at grief and secret, and filling his mind with alarm undefinable, +seemed to speak with that low thrilling voice of hers, +and look out of those dear sad eyes. Her greeting to Esmond +was so cold that it almost pained the lad (who would have +liked to fall on his knees and kiss the skirt of her robe, so +fond and ardent was his respect and regard for her), and +he faltered in answering the questions which she, hesitating +on her side, began to put to him. Was he happy at Cambridge? +Did he study too hard? She hoped not. He had +grown very tall, and looked very well. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He has got a moustache!”</span> cries out Master Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Why does he not wear a peruke like my Lord Mohun?”</span> +asked Miss Beatrix. <span class="tei tei-q">“My lord says that nobody wears +their own hair.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I believe you will have to occupy your old chamber,”</span> +says my lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“I hope the housekeeper has got it ready.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Why, mamma, you have been there ten times these +three days yourself!”</span> exclaims Frank. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And she cut some flowers which you planted in my +garden—do you remember, ever so many years ago?—when +I was quite a little girl,”</span> cries out Miss Beatrix, on +tiptoe. <span class="tei tei-q">“And mamma put them in your window.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I remember when you grew well after you were ill that +you used to like roses,”</span> said the lady, blushing like one of +them. They all conducted Harry Esmond to his chamber; +the children running before, Harry walking by his mistress +hand-in-hand. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The old room had been ornamented and beautified not +a little to receive him. The flowers were in the window +in a china vase; and there was a fine new counterpane on +the bed, which chatterbox Beatrix said mamma had made +too. A fire was crackling on the hearth, although it was +June. My lady thought the room wanted warming; everything +was done to make him happy and welcome: <span class="tei tei-q">“And +you are not to be a page any longer, but a gentleman and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page115">[pg 115]</span><a name="Pg115" id="Pg115" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +kinsman, and to walk with papa and mamma,”</span> said the +children. And as soon as his dear mistress and children +had left him to himself, it was with a heart overflowing +with love and gratefulness that he flung himself down on +his knees by the side of the little bed, and asked a blessing +upon those who were so kind to him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The children, who are always house tell-tales, soon made +him acquainted with the little history of the house and +family. Papa had been to London twice. Papa often went +away now. Papa had taken Beatrix to Westlands, where +she was taller than Sir George Harper's second daughter, +though she was two years older. Papa had taken Beatrix +and Frank both to Bellminster, where Frank had got the +better of Lord Bellminster's son in a boxing-match—my +lord, laughing, told Harry afterwards. Many gentlemen +came to stop with papa, and papa had gotten a new game +from London, a French game, called a billiard—that the +French king played it very well: and the Dowager Lady +Castlewood had sent Miss Beatrix a present; and papa had +gotten a new chaise, with two little horses, which he drove +himself, beside the coach, which mamma went in; and +Dr. Tusher was a cross old plague, and they did not like +to learn from him at all; and papa did not care about them +learning, and laughed when they were at their books, but +mamma liked them to learn, and taught them; and <span class="tei tei-q">“I don't +think papa is fond of mamma”</span>, said Miss Beatrix, with her +great eyes. She had come quite close up to Harry Esmond +by the time this prattle took place, and was on his knee, and +had examined all the points of his dress, and all the good +or bad features of his homely face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You shouldn't say that papa is not fond of mamma,”</span> +said the boy, at this confession. <span class="tei tei-q">“Mamma never said so; +and mamma forbade you to say it, Miss Beatrix.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas this, no doubt, that accounted for the sadness in +Lady Castlewood's eyes, and the plaintive vibrations of +her voice. Who does not know of eyes, lighted by love once, +where the flame shines no more?—of lamps extinguished, +once properly trimmed and tended? Every man has such +in his house. Such mementoes make our splendidest chambers +look blank and sad; such faces seen in a day cast a +gloom upon our sunshine. So oaths mutually sworn, and +invocations of Heaven, and priestly ceremonies, and fond +belief, and love, so fond and faithful that it never doubted +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page116">[pg 116]</span><a name="Pg116" id="Pg116" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +but that it should live for ever, are all of no avail towards +making love eternal: it dies, in spite of the banns and the +priest; and I have often thought there should be a visitation +of the sick for it, and a funeral service, and an extreme +unction, and an <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">abi in pace</span></span>. +It has its course, like all mortal +things—its beginning, progress, and decay. It buds and it +blooms out into sunshine, and it withers and ends. Strephon +and Chloe languish apart; join in a rapture: and presently +you hear that Chloe is crying, and Strephon has broken his +crook across her back. Can you mend it so as to show no +marks of rupture? Not all the priests of Hymen, not all +the incantations to the gods, can make it whole! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Waking up from dreams, books, and visions of college +honours, in which, for two years, Harry Esmond had been +immersed, he found himself instantly, on his return home, +in the midst of this actual tragedy of life, which absorbed +and interested him more than all his tutor taught him. The +persons whom he loved best in the world, and to whom he +owed most, were living unhappily together. The gentlest +and kindest of women was suffering ill-usage and shedding +tears in secret: the man who made her wretched by neglect, +if not by violence, was Harry's benefactor and patron. In +houses where, in place of that sacred, inmost flame of love, +there is discord at the centre, the whole, household becomes +hypocritical, and each lies to his neighbour. The husband +(or it may be the wife) lies when the visitor comes in, and +wears a grin of reconciliation or politeness before him. +The wife lies (indeed, her business is to do that, and to smile, +however much she is beaten), swallows her tears, and lies to +her lord and master; lies in bidding little Jacky respect dear +papa; lies in assuring grandpapa that she is perfectly +happy. The servants lie, wearing grave faces behind their +master's chair, and pretending to be unconscious of the +fighting; and so, from morning till bedtime, life is passed +in falsehood. And wiseacres call this a proper regard of +morals, and point out Baucis and Philemon as examples +of a good life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If my lady did not speak of her griefs to Harry Esmond, +my lord was by no means reserved when in his cups, and +spoke his mind very freely, bidding Harry in his coarse way, +and with his blunt language, beware of all women as cheats, +jades, jilts, and using other unmistakable monosyllables +in speaking of them. Indeed, 'twas the fashion of the day +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page117">[pg 117]</span><a name="Pg117" id="Pg117" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as I must own; and there's not a writer of my time of any +note, with the exception of poor Dick Steele, that does not +speak of a woman as of a slave, and scorn and use her as +such. Mr. Pope, Mr. Congreve, Mr. Addison, Mr. Gay, +every one of 'em, sing in this key, each according to his +nature and politeness; and louder and fouler than all in +abuse is Dr. Swift, who spoke of them as he treated them, +worst of all. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Much of the quarrels and hatred which arise between +married people come in my mind from the husband's rage +and revolt at discovering that his slave and bedfellow, who +is to minister to all his wishes, and is church-sworn to honour +and obey him—is his superior; and that <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">he</span></em>, and not she, +ought to be the subordinate of the twain; and in these +controversies, I think, lay the cause of my lord's anger +against his lady. When he left her, she began to think for +herself, and her thoughts were not in his favour. After +the illumination, when the love-lamp is put out that anon +we spoke of, and by the common daylight we look at the +picture, what a daub it looks! what a clumsy effigy! How +many men and wives come to this knowledge, think you? +And if it be painful to a woman to find herself mated for +life to a boor, and ordered to love and honour a dullard; it is +worse still for the man himself perhaps, whenever in his dim +comprehension the idea dawns that his slave and drudge +yonder is, in truth, his superior; that the woman who does +his bidding, and submits to his humour, should be his lord; +that she can think a thousand things beyond the power of +his muddled brains; and that in yonder head, on the pillow +opposite to him, lie a thousand feelings, mysteries of +thought, latent scorns and rebellions, whereof he only dimly +perceives the existence as they look out furtively from her +eyes: treasures of love doomed to perish without a hand +to gather them; sweet fancies and images of beauty that +would grow and unfold themselves into flower; bright wit +that would shine like diamonds could it be brought into +the sun: and the tyrant in possession crushes the outbreak +of all these, drives them back like slaves into the dungeon +and darkness, and chafes without that his prisoner is rebellious, +and his sworn subject undutiful and refractory. So +the lamp was out in Castlewood Hall, and the lord and lady +there saw each other as they were. With her illness and +altered beauty my lord's fire for his wife disappeared; with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page118">[pg 118]</span><a name="Pg118" id="Pg118" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his selfishness and faithlessness her foolish fiction of love +and reverence was rent away. Love!—who is to love what +is base and unlovely? Respect!—who is to respect what is +gross and sensual? Not all the marriage oaths sworn before +all the parsons, cardinals, ministers, muftis, and rabbins in +the world, can bind to that monstrous allegiance. This +couple was living apart then; the woman happy to be +allowed to love and tend her children (who were never of +her own goodwill away from her) and thankful to have +saved such treasures as these out of the wreck in which the +better part of her heart went down. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +These young ones had had no instructors save their +mother, and Doctor Tusher for their theology occasionally, +and had made more progress than might have been expected +under a tutor so indulgent and fond as Lady Castlewood. +Beatrix could sing and dance like a nymph. Her voice +was her father's delight after dinner. She ruled over the +house with little imperial ways, which her parents coaxed +and laughed at. She had long learned the value of her +bright eyes, and tried experiments in coquetry, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">in corpore +vili</span></span>, upon rustics and country squires, until she should +prepare to conquer the world and the fashion. She put on +a new ribbon to welcome Harry Esmond, made eyes at him, +and directed her young smiles at him, not a little to the +amusement of the young man, and the joy of her father, +who laughed his great laugh, and encouraged her in her +thousand antics. Lady Castlewood watched the child +gravely and sadly: the little one was pert in her replies to +her mother, yet eager in her protestations of love and +promises of amendment; and as ready to cry (after a little +quarrel brought on by her own giddiness) until she had won +back her mamma's favour, as she was to risk the kind lady's +displeasure by fresh outbreaks of restless vanity. From +her mother's sad looks she fled to her father's chair and +boozy laughter. She already set the one against the other: +and the little rogue delighted in the mischief which she +knew how to make so early. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The young heir of Castlewood was spoiled by father and +mother both. He took their caresses as men do, and as if +they were his right. He had his hawks and his spaniel +dog, his little horse and his beagles. He had learned to ride +and to drink, and to shoot flying: and he had a small court, +the sons of the huntsman and woodman, as became the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page119">[pg 119]</span><a name="Pg119" id="Pg119" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +heir-apparent, taking after the example of my lord his +father. If he had a headache, his mother was as much +frightened as if the plague were in the house: my lord +laughed and jeered in his abrupt way—(indeed, 'twas on the +day after New Year's Day, and an excess of mince-pie)—and +said with some of his usual oaths—<span class="tei tei-q">“D——n it, Harry +Esmond—you see how my lady takes on about Frank's +megrim. She used to be sorry about me, my boy (pass the +tankard, Harry), and to be frightened if I had a headache +once. She don't care about my head now. They're like +that—women are—all the same, Harry, all jilts in their +hearts. Stick to college—stick to punch and buttery ale: +and never see a woman that's handsomer than an old +cinder-faced bedmaker. That's my counsel.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was my lord's custom to fling out many jokes of this +nature, in presence of his wife and children, at meals—clumsy +sarcasms which my lady turned many a time, or +which, sometimes, she affected not to hear, or which now +and again would hit their mark and make the poor victim +wince (as you could see by her flushing face and eyes filling +with tears), or which again worked her up to anger and +retort, when, in answer to one of these heavy bolts, she +would flash back with a quivering reply. The pair were +not happy; nor indeed was it happy to be with them. +Alas that youthful love and truth should end in bitterness +and bankruptcy! To see a young couple loving each other +is no wonder; but to see an old couple loving each other is +the best sight of all. Harry Esmond became the confidant +of one and the other—that is, my lord told the lad all his +griefs and wrongs (which were indeed of Lord Castlewood's +own making), and Harry divined my lady's; his affection +leading him easily to penetrate the hypocrisy under which +Lady Castlewood generally chose to go disguised, and see +her heart aching whilst her face wore a smile. 'Tis a hard +task for women in life, that mask which the world bids them +wear. But there is no greater crime than for a woman who +is ill used and unhappy to show that she is so. The world +is quite relentless about bidding her to keep a cheerful face; +and our women, like the Malabar wives, are forced to go +smiling and painted to sacrifice themselves with their husbands; +their relations being the most eager to push them +on to their duty, and, under their shouts and applauses, to +smother and hush their cries of pain. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page120">[pg 120]</span><a name="Pg120" id="Pg120" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So, into the sad secret of his patron's household, Harry +Esmond became initiated, he scarce knew how. It had +passed under his eyes two years before, when he could not +understand it; but reading, and thought, and experience +of men, had oldened him; and one of the deepest sorrows +of a life which had never, in truth, been very happy, came +upon him now, when he was compelled to understand and +pity a grief which he stood quite powerless to relieve. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It hath been said my lord would never take the oath of +allegiance, nor his seat as a peer of the kingdom of Ireland, +where, indeed, he had but a nominal estate; and refused +an English peerage which King William's Government +offered him as a bribe to secure his loyalty. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He might have accepted this, and would doubtless, but +for the earnest remonstrances of his wife (who ruled her +husband's opinions better than she could govern his conduct), +and who being a simple-hearted woman, with but one rule +of faith and right, never thought of swerving from her fidelity +to the exiled family, or of recognizing any other sovereign +but King James; and, though she acquiesced in the doctrine +of obedience to the reigning power, no temptation, she +thought, could induce her to acknowledge the Prince of +Orange as rightful monarch, nor to let her lord so acknowledge +him. So my Lord Castlewood remained a nonjuror +all his life nearly, though his self-denial caused him many +a pang, and left him sulky and out of humour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The year after the Revolution, and all through King +William's life, 'tis known there were constant intrigues for +the restoration of the exiled family; but if my Lord Castlewood +took any share of these, as is probable, 'twas only for +a short time, and when Harry Esmond was too young to be +introduced into such important secrets. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But in the year 1695, when that conspiracy of Sir John +Fenwick, Colonel Lowick, and others, was set on foot, for +waylaying King William as he came from Hampton Court +to London, and a secret plot was formed, in which a vast +number of the nobility and people of honour were engaged; +Father Holt appeared at Castlewood, and brought a young +friend with him, a gentleman whom 'twas easy to see that +both my lord and the father treated with uncommon deference. +Harry Esmond saw this gentleman, and knew and +recognized him in after-life, as shall be shown in its place; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page121">[pg 121]</span><a name="Pg121" id="Pg121" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and he has little doubt now that my lord viscount was implicated +somewhat in the transactions which always kept +Father Holt employed and travelling hither and thither +under a dozen of different names and disguises. The +father's companion went by the name of Captain James; +and it was under a very different name and appearance +that Harry Esmond afterwards saw him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was the next year that the Fenwick conspiracy blew up, +which is a matter of public history now, and which ended +in the execution of Sir John and many more, who suffered +manfully for their treason, and who were attended to Tyburn +by my lady's father, Dean Armstrong, Mr. Collier, and other +stout nonjuring clergymen, who absolved them at the +gallows' foot. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Tis known that when Sir John was apprehended, discovery +was made of a great number of names of gentlemen engaged +in the conspiracy; when, with a noble wisdom and clemency, +the prince burned the list of conspirators furnished to him, +and said he would know no more. Now it was, after this, +that Lord Castlewood swore his great oath, that he would +never, so help him Heaven, be engaged in any transaction +against that brave and merciful man; and so he told Holt +when the indefatigable priest visited him, and would have +had him engage in a farther conspiracy. After this my +lord ever spoke of King William as he was—as one of the +wisest, the bravest, and the greatest of men. My Lady +Esmond (for her part) said she could never pardon the king, +first, for ousting his father-in-law from his throne, and +secondly, for not being constant to his wife, the Princess +Mary. Indeed, I think if Nero were to rise again, and be +king of England, and a good family man, the ladies would +pardon him. My lord laughed at his wife's objections—the +standard of virtue did not fit him much. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The last conference which Mr. Holt had with his lordship +took place when Harry was come home for his first vacation +from college (Harry saw his old tutor but for a half-hour, +and exchanged no private words with him), and their talk, +whatever it might be, left my lord viscount very much +disturbed in mind—so much so, that his wife, and his young +kinsman, Henry Esmond, could not but observe his disquiet. +After Holt was gone, my lord rebuffed Esmond, and again +treated him with the greatest deference; he shunned his +wife's questions and company, and looked at his children +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page122">[pg 122]</span><a name="Pg122" id="Pg122" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +with such a face of gloom and anxiety, muttering, <span class="tei tei-q">“Poor +children—poor children!”</span> in a way that could not but fill +those whose life it was to watch him and obey him, with +great alarm. For which gloom, each person interested in +the Lord Castlewood, framed in his or her own mind an +interpretation. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady, with a laugh of cruel bitterness, said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I suppose +the person at Hexton has been ill, or has scolded him”</span> (for +my lord's infatuation about Mrs. Marwood was known only +too well). Young Esmond feared for his money affairs, +into the condition of which he had been initiated; and that +the expenses, always greater than his revenue, had caused +Lord Castlewood disquiet. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One of the causes why my lord viscount had taken young +Esmond into his special favour was a trivial one, that hath +not before been mentioned, though it was a very lucky +accident in Henry Esmond's life. A very few months after +my lord's coming to Castlewood, in the winter-time—the +little boy, being a child in a petticoat, trotting about—it +happened that little Frank was with his father after dinner, +who fell asleep over his wine, heedless of the child, who +crawled to the fire; and, as good fortune would have it, +Esmond was sent by his mistress for the boy just as the +poor little screaming urchin's coat was set on fire by a log; +when Esmond, rushing forward, tore the dress off the infant, +so that his own hands were burned more than the child's, +who was frightened rather than hurt, by this accident. +But certainly 'twas providential that a resolute person +should have come in at that instant, or the child had been +burned to death probably, my lord sleeping very heavily +after drinking, and not waking so cool as a man should who +had a danger to face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Ever after this the father, loud in his expressions of +remorse and humility for being a tipsy good-for-nothing, +and of admiration for Harry Esmond, whom his lordship +would style a hero for doing a very trifling service, had the +tenderest regard for his son's preserver, and Harry became +quite as one of the family. His burns were tended with the +greatest care by his kind mistress, who said that Heaven +had sent him to be the guardian of her children, and that +she would love him all her life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And it was after this, and from the very great love and +tenderness which had grown up in this little household, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page123">[pg 123]</span><a name="Pg123" id="Pg123" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +rather than to the exhortations of Dean Armstrong (though +these had no small weight with him), that Harry came to +be quite of the religion of his house and his dear mistress, +of which he has ever since been a professing member. +As for Dr. Tusher's boasts that he was the cause of this +conversion—even in these young days Mr. Esmond had +such a contempt for the doctor, that had Tusher bade him +believe anything (which he did not—never meddling at all), +Harry would that instant have questioned the truth on't. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady seldom drank wine; but on certain days of +the year, such as birthdays (poor Harry had never a one) +and anniversaries, she took a little; and this day, the 29th +December, was one. At the end, then, of this year, '96, +it might have been a fortnight after Mr. Holt's last visit, +Lord Castlewood being still very gloomy in mind, and sitting +at table—my lady bidding a servant bring her a glass of +wine, and looking at her husband with one of her sweet +smiles, said— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord, will you not fill a bumper too, and let me call +a toast?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What is it, Rachel?”</span> says he, holding out his empty +glass to be filled. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis the 29th of December,”</span> says my lady, with her fond +look of gratitude; <span class="tei tei-q">“and my toast is, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Harry—and God +bless him, who saved my boy's life!’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord looked at Harry hard, and drank the glass, but +clapped it down on the table in a moment, and, with a +sort of groan, rose up, and went out of the room. What +was the matter? We all knew that some great grief was +over him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whether my lord's prudence had made him richer, or +legacies had fallen to him, which enabled him to support +a greater establishment than that frugal one which had +been too much for his small means, Harry Esmond knew +not; but the house of Castlewood was now on a scale +much more costly than it had been during the first year +of his lordship's coming to the title. There were more +horses in the stable and more servants in the hall, and +many more guests coming and going now than formerly, +when it was found difficult enough by the strictest economy +to keep the house as befitted one of his lordship's rank, and +the estate out of debt. And it did not require very much +penetration to find, that many of the new acquaintances +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page124">[pg 124]</span><a name="Pg124" id="Pg124" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +at Castlewood were not agreeable to the lady there: not +that she ever treated them or any mortal with anything +but courtesy; but they were persons who could not be +welcome to her; and whose society a lady so refined and +reserved could scarce desire for her children. There came +fuddling squires from the country round, who bawled their +songs under her windows and drank themselves tipsy with +my lord's punch and ale: there came officers from Hexton, +in whose company our little lord was made to hear talk +and to drink, and swear too in a way that made the delicate +lady tremble for her son. Esmond tried to console her by +saying what he knew of his college experience; that with +this sort of company and conversation a man must fall in +sooner or later in his course through the world: and it +mattered very little whether he heard it at twelve years old +or twenty—the youths who quitted mother's apron-strings +the latest being not uncommonly the wildest rakes. But +it was about her daughter that Lady Castlewood was the +most anxious, and the danger which she thought menaced +the little Beatrix from the indulgences which her father +gave her (it must be owned that my lord, since these unhappy +domestic differences especially, was at once violent in his +language to the children when angry, as he was too familiar, +not to say coarse, when he was in a good humour), and from +the company into which the careless lord brought the child. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Not very far off from Castlewood is Sark Castle, where +the Marchioness of Sark lived, who was known to have +been a mistress of the late King Charles—and to this house, +whither indeed a great part of the country gentry went, +my lord insisted upon going, not only himself, but on +taking his little daughter and son to play with the children +there. The children were nothing loath, for the house was +splendid, and the welcome kind enough. But my lady, +justly no doubt, thought that the children of such a mother +as that noted Lady Sark had been, could be no good +company for her two; and spoke her mind to her lord. +His own language when he was thwarted was not indeed +of the gentlest: to be brief, there was a family dispute +on this, as there had been on many other points—and the +lady was not only forced to give in, for the other's will was +law—nor could she, on account of their tender age, tell +her children what was the nature of her objection to their +visit of pleasure, or indeed mention to them any objection +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page125">[pg 125]</span><a name="Pg125" id="Pg125" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +at all—but she had the additional secret mortification to +find them returning delighted with their new friends, loaded +with presents from them, and eager to be allowed to go back +to a place of such delights as Sark Castle. Every year she +thought the company there would be more dangerous to +her daughter, as from a child Beatrix grew to a woman, +and her daily increasing beauty, and many faults of character +too, expanded. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was Harry Esmond's lot to see one of the visits which +the old lady of Sark paid to the lady of Castlewood Hall: +whither she came in state with six chestnut horses and blue +ribbons, a page on each carriage step, a gentleman of the +horse, and armed servants riding before and behind her. +And, but that it was unpleasant to see Lady Castlewood's +face, it was amusing to watch the behaviour of the two +enemies: the frigid patience of the younger lady, and the +unconquerable good humour of the elder—who would see +no offence whatever her rival intended, and who never +ceased to smile and to laugh, and to coax the children, +and to pay compliments to every man, woman, child, nay +dog, or chair and table, in Castlewood, so bent was she +upon admiring everything there. She lauded the children, +and wished—as indeed she well might—that her own family +had been brought up as well as those cherubs. She had +never seen such a complexion as dear Beatrix's—though +to be sure she had a right to it from father and mother—Lady +Castlewood's was indeed a wonder of freshness, and +Lady Sark sighed to think she had not been born a fair +woman; and remarking Harry Esmond, with a fascinating +superannuated smile, she complimented him on his wit, +which she said she could see from his eyes and forehead; +and vowed that she would never have <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">him</span></em> at Sark until +her daughter were out of the way. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page126">[pg 126]</span><a name="Pg126" id="Pg126" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc33" id="toc33"></a> +<a name="pdf34" id="pdf34"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XII. My Lord Mohun Comes Among Us For No Good</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There had ridden along with this old princess's cavalcade, +two gentlemen; her son, my Lord Firebrace, and his friend, +my Lord Mohun, who both were greeted with a great deal +of cordiality by the hospitable Lord of Castlewood. My +Lord Firebrace was but a feeble-minded and weak-limbed +young nobleman, small in stature and limited in understanding—to +judge from the talk young Esmond had with +him; but the other was a person of a handsome presence, +with the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">bel air</span></span>, and a bright daring warlike aspect, +which, according to the chronicle of those days, had already +achieved for him the conquest of several beauties and +toasts. He had fought and conquered in France, as well +as in Flanders; he had served a couple of campaigns with +the Prince of Baden on the Danube, and witnessed the +rescue of Vienna from the Turk. And he spoke of his +military exploits pleasantly, and with the manly freedom of +a soldier, so as to delight all his hearers at Castlewood, who +were little accustomed to meet a companion so agreeable. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the first day this noble company came, my lord would +not hear of their departure before dinner, and carried away +the gentlemen to amuse them, whilst his wife was left to +do the honours of her house to the old marchioness and her +daughter within. They looked at the stables, where my +Lord Mohun praised the horses, though there was but +a poor show there: they walked over the old house and +gardens, and fought the siege of Oliver's time over again: +they played a game of rackets in the old court, where my +Lord Castlewood beat my Lord Mohun, who said he loved +ball of all things, and would quickly come back to Castlewood +for his revenge. After dinner they played bowls, and +drank punch in the green alley; and when they parted +they were sworn friends, my Lord Castlewood kissing the +other lord before he mounted on horseback, and pronouncing +him the best companion he had met for many a long day. +All night long, over his tobacco-pipe Castlewood did not +cease to talk to Harry Esmond in praise of his new friend, +and in fact did not leave off speaking of him until his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page127">[pg 127]</span><a name="Pg127" id="Pg127" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lordship was so tipsy that he could not speak plainly any +more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At breakfast next day it was the same talk renewed; +and when my lady said there was something free in the +Lord Mohun's looks and manner of speech which caused +her to mistrust him, her lord burst out with one of his +laughs and oaths; said that he never liked man, woman, +or beast, but what she was sure to be jealous of it; that +Mohun was the prettiest fellow in England; that he hoped +to see more of him whilst in the country; and that he +would let Mohun know what my Lady Prude said of him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed,”</span> Lady Castlewood said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I liked his conversation +well enough. 'Tis more amusing than that of most people +I know. I thought it, I own, too free; not from what he +said, as rather from what he implied.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Psha! your ladyship does not know the world,”</span> said her +husband; <span class="tei tei-q">“and you have always been as squeamish as +when you were a miss of fifteen.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You found no fault when I was a miss at fifteen.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Begad, madam, you are grown too old for a pinafore +now; and I hold that 'tis for me to judge what company +my wife shall see,”</span> said my lord, slapping the table. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, Francis, I never thought otherwise,”</span> answered +my lady, rising and dropping him a curtsy, in which stately +action, if there was obedience, there was defiance too; and +in which a bystander, deeply interested in the happiness +of that pair as Harry Esmond was, might see how hopelessly +separated they were; what a great gulf of difference and +discord had run between them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By G——d! Mohun is the best fellow in England; and +I'll invite him here, just to plague that woman. Did you +ever see such a frigid insolence as it is, Harry? That's +the way she treats me,”</span> he broke out, storming, and his face +growing red as he clenched his fists and went on. <span class="tei tei-q">“I'm +nobody in my own house. I'm to be the humble servant of +that parson's daughter. By Jove! I'd rather she should +fling the dish at my head than sneer at me as she does. +She puts me to shame before the children with her d——d +airs; and, I'll swear, tells Frank and Beaty that papa's +a reprobate, and that they ought to despise me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed and indeed, sir, I never heard her say a word +out of respect regarding you,”</span> Harry Esmond interposed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No, curse it! I wish she would speak. But she never +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page128">[pg 128]</span><a name="Pg128" id="Pg128" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +does. She scorns me, and holds her tongue. She keeps +off from me, as if I was a pestilence. By George! she was +fond enough of her pestilence once. And when I came +a-courting, you would see miss blush—blush red, by George! +for joy. Why, what do you think she said to me, Harry? +She said herself, when I joked with her about her d—d +smiling red cheeks: <span class="tei tei-q">‘'Tis as they do at St. James's; I put +up my red flag when my king comes.’</span> I was the king, +you see, she meant. But now, sir, look at her! I believe +she would be glad if I was dead; and dead I've been to +her these five years—ever since you all of you had the +small-pox: and she never forgave me for going away.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, my lord, though 'twas hard to forgive, I think +my mistress forgave it,”</span> Harry Esmond said; <span class="tei tei-q">“and remember +how eagerly she watched your lordship's return, and +how sadly she turned away when she saw your cold looks.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Damme!”</span> cries out my lord; <span class="tei tei-q">“would you have had +me wait and catch the small-pox? Where the deuce had +been the good of that? I'll bear danger with any man—but +not useless danger—no, no. Thank you for nothing. +And—you nod your head, and I know very well, Parson +Harry, what you mean. There was the—the other affair +to make her angry. But is a woman never to forgive +a husband who goes a-tripping? Do you take me for +a saint?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, sir, I do not,”</span> says Harry, with a smile. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Since that time my wife's as cold as the statue at +Charing Cross. I tell thee she has no forgiveness in her, +Henry. Her coldness blights my whole life, and sends me +to the punch-bowl, or driving about the country. My +children are not mine, but hers, when we are together. +'Tis only when she is out of sight with her abominable +cold glances, that run through me, that they'll come to +me, and that I dare to give them so much as a kiss; and +that's why I take 'em and love 'em in other people's houses, +Harry. I'm killed by the very virtue of that proud woman. +Virtue! give me the virtue that can forgive; give me the +virtue that thinks not of preserving itself, but of making +other folks happy. Damme, what matters a scar or two +if 'tis got in helping a friend in ill fortune?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And my lord again slapped the table, and took a great +draught from the tankard. Harry Esmond admired as +he listened to him, and thought how the poor preacher of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page129">[pg 129]</span><a name="Pg129" id="Pg129" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +this self-sacrifice had fled from the small-pox, which the +lady had borne so cheerfully, and which had been the cause +of so much disunion in the lives of all in this house. <span class="tei tei-q">“How +well men preach,”</span> thought the young man, <span class="tei tei-q">“and each is +the example in his own sermon. How each has a story +in a dispute, and a true one, too, and both are right, or +wrong as you will!”</span> Harry's heart was pained within him, +to watch the struggles and pangs that tore the breast of +this kind, manly friend and protector. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, sir,”</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">“I wish to God that my mistress +could hear you speak as I have heard you; she would know +much that would make her life the happier, could she hear +it.”</span> But my lord flung away with one of his oaths, and +a jeer; he said that Parson Harry was a good fellow; but +that as for women, all women were alike—all jades and +heartless. So a man dashes a fine vase down and despises +it for being broken. It may be worthless—true: but who +had the keeping of it, and who shattered it? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry, who would have given his life to make his benefactress +and her husband happy, bethought him, now that +he saw what my lord's state of mind was, and that he +really had a great deal of that love left in his heart, and +ready for his wife's acceptance if she would take it, whether +he could not be a means of reconciliation between these +two persons, whom he revered the most in the world. And +he cast about how he should break a part of his mind to +his mistress, and warn her that in his, Harry's opinion, at +least, her husband was still her admirer, and even her lover. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But he found the subject a very difficult one to handle, +when he ventured to remonstrate, which he did in the very +gravest tone (for long confidence and reiterated proofs of +devotion and loyalty had given him a sort of authority in +the house, which he resumed as soon as ever he returned +to it); and with a speech that should have some effect, +as, indeed, it was uttered with the speaker's own heart, +he ventured most gently to hint to his adored mistress, +that she was doing her husband harm by her ill opinion +of him, and that the happiness of all the family depended +upon setting her right. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She, who was ordinarily calm and most gentle, and full +of smiles and soft attentions, flushed up when young Esmond +so spoke to her, and rose from her chair, looking at him +with a haughtiness and indignation that he had never before +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page130">[pg 130]</span><a name="Pg130" id="Pg130" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +known her to display. She was quite an altered being for +that moment; and looked an angry princess insulted by +a vassal. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Have you ever heard me utter a word in my lord's +disparagement?”</span> she asked hastily, hissing out her words, +and stamping her foot. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, no,”</span> Esmond said, looking down. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Are you come to me as his ambassador—<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">You?</span></em>”</span> she +continued. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I would sooner see peace between you than anything +else in the world,”</span> Harry answered, <span class="tei tei-q">“and would go of any +embassy that had that end.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“So <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you</span></em> are my lord's go-between?”</span> she went on, not +regarding this speech. <span class="tei tei-q">“You are sent to bid me back +into slavery again, and inform me that my lord's favour is +graciously restored to his handmaid? He is weary of +Covent Garden, is he, that he comes home and would have +the fatted calf killed?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There's good authority for it, surely,”</span> said Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“For a son, yes; but my lord is not my son. It was +he who cast me away from him. It was he who broke +our happiness down, and he bids me to repair it. It was +he who showed himself to me at last, as he was, not as I had +thought him. It is he who comes before my children stupid +and senseless with wine—who leaves our company for that +of frequenters of taverns and bagnios—who goes from his +home to the city yonder and his friends there, and when +he is tired of them returns hither, and expects that I shall +kneel and welcome him. And he sends <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you</span></em> as his chamberlain! +What a proud embassy! Monsieur, I make you my +compliment of the new place.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It would be a proud embassy, and a happy embassy +too, could I bring you and my lord together,”</span> Esmond +replied. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I presume you have fulfilled your mission now, sir. +'Twas a pretty one for you to undertake. I don't know +whether 'tis your Cambridge philosophy, or time, that has +altered your ways of thinking,”</span> Lady Castlewood continued, +still in a sarcastic tone. <span class="tei tei-q">“Perhaps you too have learned +to love drink, and to hiccup over your wine or punch;—which +is your worship's favourite liquor? Perhaps you +too put up at the <span class="tei tei-q">‘Rose’</span> on your way through London, and +have your acquaintances in Covent Garden. My services +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page131">[pg 131]</span><a name="Pg131" id="Pg131" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to you, sir, to principal and ambassador, to master and—and +lackey.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Great Heavens, madam,”</span> cried Harry, <span class="tei tei-q">“what have I +done that thus, for a second time, you insult me? Do +you wish me to blush for what I used to be proud of, that +I lived on your bounty? Next to doing you a service +(which my life would pay for), you know that to receive +one from you is my highest pleasure. What wrong have +I done you that you should wound me so, cruel woman?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What wrong?”</span> she said, looking at Esmond with wild +eyes. <span class="tei tei-q">“Well, none—none that you know of, Harry, or +could help. Why did you bring back the small-pox,”</span> she +added, after a pause, <span class="tei tei-q">“from Castlewood village? You could +not help it, could you? Which of us knows whither fate +leads us? But we were all happy, Henry, till then.”</span> And +Harry went away from this colloquy, thinking still that +the estrangement between his patron and his beloved +mistress was remediable, and that each had at heart a strong +attachment to the other. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The intimacy between the Lords Mohun and Castlewood +appeared to increase as long as the former remained in the +country; and my Lord of Castlewood especially seemed +never to be happy out of his new comrade's sight. They +sported together, they drank, they played bowls and tennis: +my Lord Castlewood would go for three days to Sark, and +bring back my Lord Mohun to Castlewood—where indeed +his lordship made himself very welcome to all persons, +having a joke or a new game at romps for the children, +all the talk of the town for my lord, and music and gallantry +and plenty of the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">beau langage</span></span> for my lady, and for Harry +Esmond, who was never tired of hearing his stories of his +campaigns and his life at Vienna, Venice, Paris, and the +famous cities of Europe which he had visited both in peace +and war. And he sang at my lady's harpsichord, and +played cards or backgammon, or his new game of billiards +with my lord (of whom he invariably got the better); +always having a consummate good humour, and bearing +himself with a certain manly grace, that might exhibit +somewhat of the camp and Alsatia perhaps, but that had +its charm and stamped him a gentleman: and his manner +to Lady Castlewood was so devoted and respectful, that +she soon recovered from the first feelings of dislike which +she had conceived against him—nay, before long, began to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page132">[pg 132]</span><a name="Pg132" id="Pg132" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +be interested in his spiritual welfare, and hopeful of his +conversion, lending him books of piety, which he promised +dutifully to study. With her my lord talked of reform, +of settling into quiet life, quitting the Court and town, and +buying some land in the neighbourhood—though it must +be owned that, when the two lords were together over their +burgundy after dinner, their talk was very different, and +there was very little question of conversion on my Lord +Mohun's part. When they got to their second bottle, +Harry Esmond used commonly to leave these two noble +topers, who, though they talked freely enough, Heaven +knows, in his presence (Good Lord, what a set of stories, +of Alsatia and Spring Garden, of the taverns and gaming-houses, +of the ladies of the Court, and mesdames of the +theatres, he can recall out of their godly conversation!)—although +I say they talked before Esmond freely, yet they +seemed pleased when he went away, and then they had +another bottle, and then they fell to cards, and then my +Lord Mohun came to her ladyship's drawing-room; leaving +his boon companion to sleep off his wine. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas a point of honour with the fine gentlemen of those +days to lose or win magnificently at their horse-matches, +or games of cards and dice—and you could never tell, +from the demeanour of these two lords afterwards, which +had been successful and which the loser at their games. +And when my lady hinted to my lord that he played more +than she liked, he dismissed her with a <span class="tei tei-q">“pish”</span>, and swore +that nothing was more equal than play betwixt gentlemen, +if they did but keep it up long enough. And these kept +it up long enough you may be sure. A man of fashion +of that time often passed a quarter of his day at cards, +and another quarter at drink: I have known many a pretty +fellow, who was a wit too, ready of repartee, and possessed +of a thousand graces, who would be puzzled if he had to +write more than his name. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There is scarce any thoughtful man or woman, I suppose, +but can look back upon his course of past life, and remember +some point, trifling as it may have seemed at the time of +occurrence, which has nevertheless turned and altered his +whole career. 'Tis with almost all of us, as in Monsieur +Massillon's magnificent image regarding King William, a +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">grain de sable</span></span> that perverts or perhaps overthrows us; +and so it was but a light word flung in the air, a mere freak of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page133">[pg 133]</span><a name="Pg133" id="Pg133" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a perverse child's temper, that brought down a whole heap +of crushing woes upon that family whereof Harry Esmond +formed a part. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Coming home to his dear Castlewood in the third year +of his academical course (wherein he had now obtained +some distinction, his Latin Poem on the death of the Duke +of Gloucester, Princess Anne of Denmark's son, having +gained him a medal, and introduced him to the society of +the University wits), Esmond found his little friend and +pupil Beatrix grown to be taller than her mother, a slim +and lovely young girl, with cheeks mantling with health +and roses: with eyes like stars shining out of azure, with +waving bronze hair clustered about the fairest young forehead +ever seen: and a mien and shape haughty and beautiful, +such as that of the famous antique statue of the huntress +Diana—at one time haughty, rapid, imperious, with eyes +and arrows that dart and kill. Harry watched and wondered +at this young creature, and likened her in his mind to +Artemis with the ringing bow and shafts flashing death +upon the children of Niobe; at another time she was coy +and melting as Luna shining tenderly upon Endymion. +This fair creature, this lustrous Phoebe, was only young as +yet, nor had nearly reached her full splendour: but crescent +and brilliant, our young gentleman of the University, his +head full of poetical fancies, his heart perhaps throbbing +with desires undefined, admired this rising young divinity; +and gazed at her (though only as at some <span class="tei tei-q">“bright particular +star”</span>, far above his earth) with endless delight and wonder. +She had been a coquette from the earliest times almost, +trying her freaks and jealousies, her wayward frolics and +winning caresses, upon all that came within her reach; +she set her women quarrelling in the nursery, and practised +her eyes on the groom as she rode behind him on the pillion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She was the darling and torment of father and mother. +She intrigued with each secretly; and bestowed her fondness +and withdrew it, plied them with tears, smiles, kisses, +cajolements;—when the mother was angry, as happened +often, flew to the father, and sheltering behind him, pursued +her victim; when both were displeased, transferred her +caresses to the domestics, or watched until she could win +back her parents' good graces, either by surprising them +into laughter and good humour, or appeasing them by +submission and artful humility. She was +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">saevo laeta negotio</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page134">[pg 134]</span><a name="Pg134" id="Pg134" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +like that fickle goddess Horace describes, and of whose +<span class="tei tei-q">“malicious joy”</span> a great poet of our own has written so +nobly—who, famous and heroic as he was, was not strong +enough to resist the torture of women. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was but three years before, that the child, then but +ten years old, had nearly managed to make a quarrel +between Harry Esmond and his comrade, good-natured, +phlegmatic Thomas Tusher, who never of his own seeking +quarrelled with anybody: by quoting to the latter some +silly joke which Harry had made regarding him—(it was +the merest, idlest jest, though it near drove two old friends +to blows, and I think such a battle would have pleased +her)—and from that day Tom kept at a distance from her; +and she respected him, and coaxed him sedulously whenever +they met. But Harry was much more easily appeased, +because he was fonder of the child: and when she made +mischief, used cutting speeches, or caused her friends pain, +she excused herself for her fault, not by admitting and +deploring it, but by pleading not guilty, and asserting +innocence so constantly, and with such seeming artlessness, +that it was impossible to question her plea. In her childhood, +they were but mischiefs then which she did; but her +power became more fatal as she grew older—as a kitten first +plays with a ball, and then pounces on a bird and kills it. +'Tis not to be imagined that Harry Esmond had all this +experience at this early stage of his life, whereof he is now +writing the history—many things here noted were but +known to him in later days. Almost everything Beatrix +did or undid seemed good, or at least pardonable, to him +then, and years afterwards. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It happened, then, that Harry Esmond came home to +Castlewood for his last vacation, with good hopes of a fellowship +at his college, and a contented resolve to advance his +fortune that way. 'Twas in the first year of the present +century, Mr. Esmond (as far as he knew the period of +his birth) being then twenty-two years old. He found +his quondam pupil shot up into this beauty of which we +have spoken, and promising yet more: her brother, my +lord's son, a handsome high-spirited brave lad, generous +and frank, and kind to everybody, save perhaps his sister, +with whom Frank was at war (and not from his but her +fault)—adoring his mother, whose joy he was: and taking +her side in the unhappy matrimonial differences which +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page135">[pg 135]</span><a name="Pg135" id="Pg135" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +were now permanent, while of course Mistress Beatrix +ranged with her father. When heads of families fall out, +it must naturally be that their dependants wear the one +or the other party's colour; and even in the parliaments +in the servants' hall or the stables, Harry, who had an +early observant turn, could see which were my lord's +adherents and which my lady's, and conjecture pretty +shrewdly how their unlucky quarrel was debated. Our +lackeys sit in judgement on us. My lord's intrigues may +be ever so stealthily conducted, but his valet knows them; +and my lady's woman carries her mistress's private history +to the servants' scandal-market, and exchanges it against +the secrets of other abigails. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc35" id="toc35"></a> +<a name="pdf36" id="pdf36"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XIII. My Lord Leaves Us And His Evil Behind Him</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My Lord Mohun (of whose exploits and fame some of the +gentlemen of the University had brought down but ugly +reports) was once more a guest at Castlewood, and seemingly +more intimately allied with my lord even than before. +Once in the spring those two noblemen had ridden to Cambridge +from Newmarket, whither they had gone for the +horse-racing, and had honoured Harry Esmond with a visit +at his rooms; after which Doctor Montague, the master +of the college, who had treated Harry somewhat haughtily, +seeing his familiarity with these great folks, and that my +Lord Castlewood laughed and walked with his hand on +Harry's shoulder, relented to Mr. Esmond, and condescended +to be very civil to him; and some days after his arrival, +Harry, laughing, told this story to Lady Esmond, remarking +how strange it was that men famous for learning and +renowned over Europe, should, nevertheless, so bow down +to a title, and cringe to a nobleman ever so poor. At this, +Mistress Beatrix flung up her head, and said, it became +those of low origin to respect their betters; that the parsons +made themselves a great deal too proud, she thought; and +that she liked the way at Lady Sark's best, where the +chaplain, though he loved pudding, as all parsons do, +always went away before the custard. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page136">[pg 136]</span><a name="Pg136" id="Pg136" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And when I am a parson,”</span> says Mr. Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“will you +give me no custard, Beatrix?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You—you are different,”</span> Beatrix answered. <span class="tei tei-q">“You are +of our blood.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My father was a parson, as you call him,”</span> said my +lady. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But mine is a peer of Ireland,”</span> says Mistress Beatrix, +tossing her head. <span class="tei tei-q">“Let people know their places. I suppose +you will have me go down on my knees and ask a blessing +of Mr. Thomas Tusher, that has just been made a curate, +and whose mother was a waiting-maid.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And she tossed out of the room, being in one of her flighty +humours then. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When she was gone, my lady looked so sad and grave, +that Harry asked the cause of her disquietude. She said +it was not merely what he said of Newmarket, but what +she had remarked, with great anxiety and terror, that my +lord, ever since his acquaintance with the Lord Mohun +especially, had recurred to his fondness for play, which he +had renounced since his marriage. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But men promise more than they are able to perform +in marriage,”</span> said my lady, with a sigh. <span class="tei tei-q">“I fear he has lost +large sums; and our property, always small, is dwindling +away under this reckless dissipation. I heard of him in +London with very wild company. Since his return letters +and lawyers are constantly coming and going: he seems +to me to have a constant anxiety, though he hides it under +boisterousness and laughter. I looked through—through +the door last night, and—and before,”</span> said my lady, <span class="tei tei-q">“and +saw them at cards after midnight; no estate will bear that +extravagance, much less ours, which will be so diminished +that my son will have nothing at all, and my poor Beatrix +no portion!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wish I could help you, madam,”</span> said Harry Esmond, +sighing, and wishing that unavailingly, and for the thousandth +time in his life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who can? Only God,”</span> said Lady Esmond—<span class="tei tei-q">“only God, +in whose hands we are.”</span> And so it is, and for his rule over +his family, and for his conduct to wife and children—subjects +over whom his power is monarchical—any one who +watches the world must think with trembling sometimes of +the account which many a man will have to render. For +in our society there's no law to control the King of the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page137">[pg 137]</span><a name="Pg137" id="Pg137" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Fireside. He is master of property, happiness—life almost. +He is free to punish, to make happy or unhappy—to ruin +or to torture. He may kill a wife gradually, and be no +more questioned than the Grand Seignior who drowns a +slave at midnight. He may make slaves and hypocrites +of his children; or friends and freemen; or drive them into +revolt and enmity against the natural law of love. I have +heard politicians and coffee-house wiseacres talking over +the newspaper, and railing at the tyranny of the French +king, and the emperor, and wondered how these (who are +monarchs, too, in their way) govern their own dominions +at home, where each man rules absolute? When the annals +of each little reign are shown to the Supreme Master, under +whom we hold sovereignty, histories will be laid bare of +household tyrants as cruel as Amurath, and as savage as +Nero, and as reckless and dissolute as Charles. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If Harry Esmond's patron erred, 'twas in the latter way, +from a disposition rather self-indulgent than cruel; and he +might have been brought back to much better feelings, had +time been given to him to bring his repentance to a lasting +reform. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As my lord and his friend Lord Mohun were such close +companions, Mistress Beatrix chose to be jealous of the +latter; and the two gentlemen often entertained each other +by laughing, in their rude boisterous way, at the child's +freaks of anger and show of dislike. <span class="tei tei-q">“When thou art old +enough, thou shalt marry Lord Mohun,”</span> Beatrix's father +would say: on which the girl would pout and say, <span class="tei tei-q">“I would +rather marry Tom Tusher.”</span> And because the Lord Mohun +always showed an extreme gallantry to my Lady Castlewood, +whom he professed to admire devotedly, one day, in +answer to this old joke of her father's, Beatrix said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I think +my lord would rather marry mamma than marry me; and +is waiting till you die to ask her.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The words were said lightly and pertly by the girl one +night before supper, as the family party were assembled +near the great fire. The two lords, who were at cards, both +gave a start; my lady turned as red as scarlet, and bade +Mistress Beatrix go to her own chamber; whereupon the +girl, putting on, as her wont was, the most innocent air, said, +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am sure I meant no wrong; I am sure mamma talks a +great deal more to Harry Esmond than she does to papa—and +she cried when Harry went away, and she never does +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page138">[pg 138]</span><a name="Pg138" id="Pg138" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +when papa goes away; and last night she talked to Lord +Mohun for ever so long, and sent us out of the room, and +cried when we came back, and——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“D——n!”</span> cried out my Lord Castlewood, out of all +patience. <span class="tei tei-q">“Go out of the room, you little viper!”</span> and he +started up and flung down his cards. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Ask Lord Mohun what I said to him, Francis,”</span> her ladyship +said, rising up with a scared face, but yet with a great +and touching dignity and candour in her look and voice. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Come away with me, Beatrix.”</span> Beatrix sprung up too; +she was in tears now. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dearest mamma, what have I done?”</span> she asked. <span class="tei tei-q">“Sure +I meant no harm.”</span> And she clung to her mother, and the +pair went out sobbing together. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I will tell you what your wife said to me, Frank,”</span> my +Lord Mohun cried—<span class="tei tei-q">“Parson Harry may hear it; and, as +I hope for heaven, every word I say is true. Last night, +with tears in her eyes, your wife implored me to play no +more with you at dice or at cards, and you know best +whether what she asked was not for your good.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Of course it was, Mohun,”</span> says my lord, in a dry hard +voice. <span class="tei tei-q">“Of course, you are a model of a man: and the +world knows what a saint you are.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My Lord Mohun was separated from his wife, and had had +many affairs of honour: of which women as usual had been +the cause. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am no saint, though your wife is—and I can answer +for my actions as other people must for their words,”</span> said +my Lord Mohun. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By G——, my lord, you shall,”</span> cried the other, starting up. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We have another little account to settle first, my lord,”</span> +says Lord Mohun. Whereupon Harry Esmond, filled with +alarm for the consequences to which this disastrous dispute +might lead, broke out into the most vehement expostulations +with his patron and his adversary. <span class="tei tei-q">“Gracious Heavens!”</span> +he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“my lord, are you going to draw a sword upon your +friend in your own house? Can you doubt the honour of +a lady who is as pure as Heaven, and would die a thousand +times rather than do you a wrong? Are the idle words of +a jealous child to set friends at variance? Has not my +mistress, as much as she dared to, besought your lordship, +as the truth must be told, to break your intimacy with my +Lord Mohun; and to give up the habit which may bring +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page139">[pg 139]</span><a name="Pg139" id="Pg139" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +ruin on your family? But for my Lord Mohun's illness, had +he not left you?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Faith, Frank, a man with a gouty toe can't run after +other men's wives,”</span> broke out my Lord Mohun, who indeed +was in that way, and with a laugh and a look at his swathed +limb so frank and comical, that the other dashing his fist +across his forehead was caught by that infectious good +humour, and said with his oath, <span class="tei tei-q">“—— it, Harry, I +believe thee,”</span> and so this quarrel was over, and the two +gentlemen, at swords drawn but just now, dropped their +points, and shook hands. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">Beati pacifici.</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Go, bring my lady back,”</span> said Harry's +patron. Esmond went away only too glad to be the bearer +of such good news. He found her at the door; she had +been listening there, but went back as he came. She took +both his hands, hers were marble cold. She seemed as if she +would fall on his shoulder. <span class="tei tei-q">“Thank you, and God bless +you, my dear brother Harry,”</span> she said. She kissed his hand, +Esmond felt her tears upon it: and leading her into the +room, and up to my lord, the Lord Castlewood with an +outbreak of feeling and affection, such as he had not +exhibited for many a long day, took his wife to his heart, +and bent over and kissed her and asked her pardon. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis time for me to go to roost. I will have my gruel +abed,”</span> said my Lord Mohun: and limped off comically on +Harry Esmond's arm. <span class="tei tei-q">“By George, that woman is a pearl!”</span> +he said; <span class="tei tei-q">“and 'tis only a pig that wouldn't value her. +Have you seen the vulgar trapesing orange-girl whom +Esmond”</span>—but here Mr. Esmond interrupted him, saying, +that these were not affairs for him to know. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord's gentleman came in to wait upon his master, +who was no sooner in his nightcap and dressing-gown than +he had another visitor whom his host insisted on sending +to him: and this was no other than the Lady Castlewood +herself with the toast and gruel, which her husband bade her +make and carry with her own hands in to her guest. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Lord Castlewood stood looking after his wife as she went +on this errand, and as he looked, Harry Esmond could not +but gaze on him, and remarked in his patron's face an +expression of love, and grief, and care, which very much +moved and touched the young man. Lord Castlewood's +hands fell down at his sides, and his head on his breast, and +presently he said— +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page140">[pg 140]</span><a name="Pg140" id="Pg140" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You heard what Mohun said, parson?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“That my lady was a saint?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“That there are two accounts to settle. I have been going +wrong these five years, Harry Esmond. Ever since you +brought that damned small-pox into the house, there has +been a fate pursuing me, and I had best have died of it, and +not run away from it like a coward. I left Beatrix with her +relations, and went to London; and I fell among thieves, +Harry, and I got back to confounded cards and dice, which +I hadn't touched since my marriage—no, not since I was in +the duke's guard, with those wild Mohocks. And I have +been playing worse and worse, and going deeper and deeper +into it; and I owe Mohun two thousand pounds now; and +when it's paid I am little better than a beggar. I don't +like to look my boy in the face; he hates me, I know he does. +And I have spent Beaty's little portion; and the Lord +knows what will come if I live; the best thing I can do is to +die, and release what portion of the estate is redeemable for +the boy.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mohun was as much master at Castlewood as the owner +of the Hall itself; and his equipages filled the stables, where, +indeed, there was room in plenty for many more horses than +Harry Esmond's impoverished patron could afford to keep. +He had arrived on horseback with his people; but when his +gout broke out my Lord Mohun sent to London for a light +chaise he had, drawn by a pair of small horses, and running +as swift, wherever roads were good, as a Laplander's sledge. +When this carriage came, his lordship was eager to drive +the Lady Castlewood abroad in it, and did so many times, +and at a rapid pace, greatly to his companion's enjoyment, +who loved the swift motion and the healthy breezes over +the downs which lie hard upon Castlewood, and stretch +thence towards the sea. As this amusement was very +pleasant to her, and her lord, far from showing any mistrust +of her intimacy with Lord Mohun, encouraged her to be +his companion; as if willing, by his present extreme confidence, +to make up for any past mistrust which his jealousy +had shown; the Lady Castlewood enjoyed herself freely in +this harmless diversion, which, it must be owned, her guest +was very eager to give her; and it seemed that she grew +the more free with Lord Mohun, and pleased with his company, +because of some sacrifice which his gallantry was +pleased to make in her favour. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page141">[pg 141]</span><a name="Pg141" id="Pg141" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Seeing the two gentlemen constantly at cards still of +evenings, Harry Esmond one day deplored to his mistress +that this fatal infatuation of her lord should continue; +and now they seemed reconciled together, begged his lady +to hint to her husband that he should play no more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But Lady Castlewood, smiling archly and gaily, said she +would speak to him presently, and that, for a few nights +more at least, he might be let to have his amusement. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, madam,”</span> said Harry, <span class="tei tei-q">“you know not what it costs +you; and 'tis easy for any observer who knows the game, +to see that Lord Mohun is by far the stronger of the two.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I know he is,”</span> says my lady, still with exceeding good +humour; <span class="tei tei-q">“he is not only the best player, but the kindest +player in the world.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Madam, madam,”</span> Esmond cried, transported and provoked. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Debts of honour must be paid some time or other; +and my master will be ruined if he goes on.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Harry, shall I tell you a secret?”</span> my lady replied, with +kindness and pleasure still in her eyes. <span class="tei tei-q">“Francis will not +be ruined if he goes on; he will be rescued if he goes on. +I repent of having spoken and thought unkindly of the Lord +Mohun when he was here in the past year. He is full of +much kindness and good: and 'tis my belief that we shall +bring him to better things. I have lent him Tillotson and +your favourite Bishop Taylor, and he is much touched, he +says; and as a proof of his repentance—(and herein lies +my secret)—what do you think he is doing with Francis? +He is letting poor Frank win his money back again. He +hath won already at the last four nights; and my Lord +Mohun says that he will not be the means of injuring poor +Frank and my dear children.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And in God's name, what do you return him for this +sacrifice?”</span> asked Esmond, aghast; who knew enough of +men, and of this one in particular, to be aware that such +a finished rake gave nothing for nothing. <span class="tei tei-q">“How, in +Heaven's name, are you to pay him?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Pay him! With a mother's blessing and a wife's +prayers!”</span> cries my lady, clasping her hands together. +Harry Esmond did not know whether to laugh, to be angry, +or to love his dear mistress more than ever for the obstinate +innocency with which she chose to regard the conduct of +a man of the world, whose designs he knew better how to +interpret. He told the lady, guardedly, but so as to make +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page142">[pg 142]</span><a name="Pg142" id="Pg142" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his meaning quite clear to her, what he knew in respect of +the former life and conduct of this nobleman; of other +women against whom he had plotted, and whom he had +overcome; of the conversation which he Harry himself +had had with Lord Mohun, wherein the lord made a boast +of his libertinism, and frequently avowed that he held all +women to be fair game (as his lordship styled this pretty +sport), and that they were all, without exception, to be won. +And the return Harry had for his entreaties and remonstrances +was a fit of anger on Lady Castlewood's part, who +would not listen to his accusations, she said, and retorted +that he himself must be very wicked and perverted, to suppose +evil designs, where she was sure none were meant. +<span class="tei tei-q">“And this is the good meddlers get of interfering,”</span> Harry +thought to himself with much bitterness; and his perplexity +and annoyance were only the greater, because he could not +speak to my Lord Castlewood himself upon a subject of this +nature, or venture to advise or warn him regarding a +matter so very sacred as his own honour, of which my lord +was naturally the best guardian. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But though Lady Castlewood would listen to no advice +from her young dependant, and appeared indignantly to +refuse it when offered, Harry had the satisfaction to find +that she adopted the counsel which she professed to reject; +for the next day she pleaded a headache, when my Lord +Mohun would have had her drive out, and the next day +the headache continued; and next day, in a laughing gay +way she proposed that the children should take her place +in his lordship's car, for they would be charmed with a ride +of all things; and she must not have all the pleasure for +herself. My lord gave them a drive with a very good grace, +though I dare say with rage and disappointment inwardly—not +that his heart was very seriously engaged in his designs +upon this simple lady: but the life of such men is often one +of intrigue, and they can no more go through the day without +a woman to pursue, than a fox-hunter without his sport +after breakfast. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Under an affected carelessness of demeanour, and though +there was no outward demonstration of doubt upon his +patron's part since the quarrel between the two lords, +Harry yet saw that Lord Castlewood was watching his guest +very narrowly; and caught signs of distrust and smothered +rage (as Harry thought) which foreboded no good. On the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page143">[pg 143]</span><a name="Pg143" id="Pg143" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +point of honour Esmond knew how touchy his patron was; +and watched him almost as a physician watches a patient, +and it seemed to him that this one was slow to take the +disease, though he could not throw off the poison when once +it had mingled with his blood. We read in Shakespeare +(whom the writer for his part considers to be far beyond +Mr. Congreve, Mr. Dryden, or any of the wits of the present +period) that when jealousy is once declared, nor poppy, +nor mandragora, nor all the drowsy syrups of the East, will +ever soothe it or medicine it away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In fine, the symptoms seemed to be so alarming to this +young physician (who indeed young as he was had felt the +kind pulses of all those dear kinsmen), that Harry thought +it would be his duty to warn my Lord Mohun, and let him +know that his designs were suspected and watched. So +one day, when in rather a pettish humour, his lordship had +sent to Lady Castlewood, who had promised to drive with +him, and now refused to come, Harry said—<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord, if +you will kindly give me a place by your side I will thank +you; I have much to say to you, and would like to speak +to you alone.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You honour me by giving me your confidence, Mr. Henry +Esmond,”</span> says the other, with a very grand bow. My lord +was always a fine gentleman, and young as he was there +was that in Esmond's manner which showed that he was +a gentleman too, and that none might take a liberty with +him—so the pair went out, and mounted the little carriage +which was in waiting for them in the court, with its two +little cream-coloured Hanoverian horses covered with +splendid furniture and champing at the bit. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord,”</span> says Harry Esmond, after they were got into +the country, and pointing to my Lord Mohun's foot, which +was swathed in flannel, and put up rather ostentatiously on +a cushion—<span class="tei tei-q">“my lord, I studied medicine at Cambridge.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, Parson Harry,”</span> says he: <span class="tei tei-q">“and are you going +to take out a diploma: and cure your fellow student of +the——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Of the gout,”</span> says Harry, interrupting him, and looking +him hard in the face; <span class="tei tei-q">“I know a good deal about the gout.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I hope you may never have it. 'Tis an infernal disease,”</span> +says my lord, <span class="tei tei-q">“and its twinges are diabolical. Ah!”</span> and +he made a dreadful wry face, as if he just felt a twinge. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your lordship would be much better if you took off all +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page144">[pg 144]</span><a name="Pg144" id="Pg144" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +that flannel—it only serves to inflame the toe,”</span> Harry continued, +looking his man full in the face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh! it only serves to inflame the toe, does it?”</span> says the +other, with an innocent air. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If you took off that flannel, and flung that absurd +slipper away, and wore a boot,”</span> continues Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You recommend me boots, Mr. Esmond?”</span> asks my lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, boots and spurs. I saw your lordship three days +ago run down the gallery fast enough,”</span> Harry goes on. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am sure that taking gruel at night is not so pleasant as +claret to your lordship; and besides it keeps your lordship's +head cool for play, whilst my patron's is hot and flustered +with drink.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Sdeath, sir, you dare not say that I don't play fair?”</span> +cries my lord, whipping his horses, which went away at +a gallop. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are cool when my lord is drunk,”</span> Harry continued; +<span class="tei tei-q">“your lordship gets the better of my patron. I have +watched you as I looked up from my books.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You young Argus!”</span> says Lord Mohun, who liked Harry +Esmond—and for whose company and wit, and a certain +daring manner, Harry had a great liking too—<span class="tei tei-q">“You young +Argus! you may look with all your hundred eyes and see +we play fair. I've played away an estate of a night, and +I've played my shirt off my back; and I've played away +my periwig and gone home in a nightcap. But no man +can say I ever took an advantage of him beyond the advantage +of the game. I played a dice-cogging scoundrel in +Alsatia for his ears and won 'em, and have one of 'em in my +lodging in Bow Street in a bottle of spirits. Harry Mohun +will play any man for anything—always would.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are playing awful stakes, my lord, in my patron's +house,”</span> Harry said, <span class="tei tei-q">“and more games than are on the cards.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What do you mean, sir?”</span> cries my lord, turning round, +with a flush on his face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I mean,”</span> answers Harry, in a sarcastic tone, <span class="tei tei-q">“that your +gout is well—if ever you had it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir!”</span> cried my lord, getting hot. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And to tell the truth I believe your lordship has no more +gout than I have. At any rate, change of air will do you +good, my Lord Mohun. And I mean fairly that you had +better go from Castlewood.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And were you appointed to give me this message?”</span> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page145">[pg 145]</span><a name="Pg145" id="Pg145" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +cries the Lord Mohun. <span class="tei tei-q">“Did Frank Esmond commission +you?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No one did. 'Twas the honour of my family that commissioned +me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And you are prepared to answer this?”</span> cries the other, +furiously lashing his horses. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Quite, my lord: your lordship will upset the carriage +if you whip so hotly.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By George, you have a brave spirit!”</span> my lord cried out, +bursting into a laugh. <span class="tei tei-q">“I suppose 'tis that infernal +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">botte de Jésuite</span></span> that makes you so bold,”</span> he added. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis the peace of the family I love best in the world,”</span> +Harry Esmond said warmly—<span class="tei tei-q">“'tis the honour of a noble +benefactor—the happiness of my dear mistress and her +children. I owe them everything in life, my lord; and +would lay it down for any one of them. What brings you +here to disturb this quiet household? What keeps you +lingering month after month in the country? What makes +you feign illness and invent pretexts for delay? Is it to +win my poor patron's money? Be generous, my lord, and +spare his weakness for the sake of his wife and children. +Is it to practise upon the simple heart of a virtuous lady? +You might as well storm the Tower single-handed. But +you may blemish her name by light comments on it, or by +lawless pursuits—and I don't deny that 'tis in your power +to make her unhappy. Spare these innocent people, and +leave them.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By the Lord, I believe thou hast an eye to the pretty +Puritan thyself, Master Harry,”</span> says my lord, with his +reckless, good-humoured laugh, and as if he had been +listening with interest to the passionate appeal of the young +man. <span class="tei tei-q">“Whisper, Harry. Art thou in love with her thyself? +Hath tipsy Frank Esmond come by the way of all +flesh?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord, my lord,”</span> cried Harry, his face flushing and his +eyes filling as he spoke, <span class="tei tei-q">“I never had a mother, but I love +this lady as one. I worship her as a devotee worships a +saint. To hear her name spoken lightly seems blasphemy +to me. Would you dare think of your own mother so, or +suffer any one so to speak of her! It is a horror to me to +fancy that any man should think of her impurely. I implore +you, I beseech you, to leave her. Danger will come out +of it.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page146">[pg 146]</span><a name="Pg146" id="Pg146" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Danger, psha!”</span> says my lord, giving a cut to the horses, +which at this minute—for we were got on to the Downs—fairly +ran off into a gallop that no pulling could stop. The +rein broke in Lord Mohun's hands, and the furious beasts +scampered madly forwards, the carriage swaying to and +fro, and the persons within it holding on to the sides as best +they might, until seeing a great ravine before them, where +an upset was inevitable, the two gentlemen leapt for their +lives, each out of his side of the chaise. Harry Esmond +was quit for a fall on the grass, which was so severe that +it stunned him for a minute; but he got up presently very +sick, and bleeding at the nose, but with no other hurt. +The Lord Mohun was not so fortunate; he fell on his +head against a stone, and lay on the ground dead to all +appearance. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This misadventure happened as the gentlemen were on +their return homewards; and my Lord Castlewood, with his +son and daughter, who were going out for a ride, met the +ponies as they were galloping with the car behind, the +broken traces entangling their heels, and my lord's people +turned and stopped them. It was young Frank who spied +out Lord Mohun's scarlet coat as he lay on the ground, and +the party made up to that unfortunate gentleman and +Esmond, who was now standing over him. His large periwig +and feathered hat had fallen off, and he was bleeding +profusely from a wound on the forehead, and looking, and +being, indeed, a corpse. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Great God! he's dead!”</span> says my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“Ride, some +one: fetch a doctor—stay. I'll go home and bring back +Tusher; he knows surgery,”</span> and my lord, with his son after +him, galloped away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They were scarce gone when Harry Esmond, who was +indeed but just come to himself, bethought him of a similar +accident which he had seen on a ride from Newmarket to +Cambridge, and taking off a sleeve of my lord's coat, Harry, +with a penknife, opened a vein in his arm, and was greatly +relieved, after a moment, to see the blood flow. He was +near half an hour before he came to himself, by which time +Doctor Tusher and little Frank arrived, and found my lord +not a corpse indeed, but as pale as one. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After a time, and when he was able to bear motion, they +put my lord upon a groom's horse, and gave the other to +Esmond, the men walking on each side of my lord, to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page147">[pg 147]</span><a name="Pg147" id="Pg147" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +support him, if need were, and worthy Doctor Tusher with +them. Little Frank and Harry rode together at a foot pace. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When we rode together home, the boy said: <span class="tei tei-q">“We met +mamma, who was walking on the terrace with the doctor, +and papa frightened her, and told her you were dead——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“That I was dead?”</span> asks Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes. Papa says: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Here's poor Harry killed, my dear;’</span> +on which mamma gives a great scream; and oh, Harry! +she drops down; and I thought she was dead, too. And +you never saw such a way as papa was in: he swore one of +his great oaths: and he turned quite pale; and then he +began to laugh somehow, and he told the doctor to take +his horse, and me to follow him; and we left him. And +I looked back, and saw him dashing water out of the fountain +on to mamma. Oh, she was so frightened!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Musing upon this curious history—for my Lord Mohun's +name was Henry too, and they called each other Frank and +Harry often—and not a little disturbed and anxious, +Esmond rode home. His dear lady was on the terrace still, +one of her women with her, and my lord no longer there. +There are steps and a little door thence down into the road. +My lord passed, looking very ghastly, with a handkerchief +over his head, and without his hat and periwig, which a +groom carried, but his politeness did not desert him, and he +made a bow to the lady above. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thank Heaven you are safe,”</span> she said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And so is Harry, too, mamma,”</span> says little Frank,—<span class="tei tei-q">“huzzay!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond got off the horse to run to his mistress, as +did little Frank, and one of the grooms took charge of the +two beasts, while the other, hat and periwig in hand, walked +by my lord's bridle to the front gate, which lay half a mile +away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, my boy! what a fright you have given me!”</span> Lady +Castlewood said, when Harry Esmond came up, greeting +him with one of her shining looks, and a voice of tender +welcome; and she was so kind as to kiss the young man +('twas the second time she had so honoured him), and she +walked into the house between him and her son, holding +a hand of each. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page148">[pg 148]</span><a name="Pg148" id="Pg148" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc37" id="toc37"></a> +<a name="pdf38" id="pdf38"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XIV. We Ride After Him To London</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After a repose of a couple of days, the Lord Mohun was so +far recovered of his hurt as to be able to announce his +departure for the next morning; when, accordingly, he +took leave of Castlewood, proposing to ride to London by +easy stages, and lie two nights upon the road. His host +treated him with a studied and ceremonious courtesy, +certainly different from my lord's usual frank and careless +demeanour; but there was no reason to suppose that the +two lords parted otherwise than good friends, though Harry +Esmond remarked that my lord viscount only saw his +guest in company with other persons, and seemed to avoid +being alone with him. Nor did he ride any distance with +Lord Mohun, as his custom was with most of his friends, +whom he was always eager to welcome and unwilling to lose; +but contented himself, when his lordship's horses were +announced, and their owner appeared booted for his journey, +to take a courteous leave of the ladies of Castlewood, by +following the Lord Mohun downstairs to his horses, and by +bowing and wishing him a good day, in the courtyard. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I shall see you in London before very long, Mohun,”</span> my +lord said, with, a smile; <span class="tei tei-q">“when we will settle our accounts +together.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Do not let them trouble you, Frank,”</span> said the other +good-naturedly, and, holding out his hand, looked rather +surprised at the grim and stately manner in which his host +received his parting salutation: and so, followed by his +people, he rode away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond was witness of the departure. It was +very different to my lord's coming, for which great preparation +had been made (the old house putting on its best +appearance to welcome its guest), and there was a sadness +and constraint about all persons that day, which filled +Mr. Esmond with gloomy forebodings, and sad indefinite +apprehensions. Lord Castlewood stood at the door watching +his guest and his people as they went out under the +arch of the outer gate. When he was there, Lord Mohun +turned once more, my lord viscount slowly raised his beaver +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page149">[pg 149]</span><a name="Pg149" id="Pg149" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and bowed. His face wore a peculiar livid look, Harry +thought. He cursed and kicked away his dogs, which came +jumping about him—then he walked up to the fountain in +the centre of the court, and leaned against a pillar and +looked into the basin. As Esmond crossed over to his +own room, late the chaplain's, on the other side of the +court, and turned to enter in at the low door, he saw Lady +Castlewood looking through the curtains of the great +window of the drawing-room overhead, at my lord as he +stood regarding the fountain. There was in the court +a peculiar silence somehow; and the scene remained long +in Esmond's memory;—the sky bright overhead; the +buttresses of the building and the sundial casting shadow +over the gilt <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">memento +mori</span></span> inscribed underneath; the two +dogs, a black greyhound and a spaniel nearly white, the one +with his face up to the sun, and the other snuffing amongst +the grass and stones, and my lord leaning over the fountain, +which was plashing audibly. 'Tis strange how that scene +and the sound of that fountain remain fixed on the memory +of a man who has beheld a hundred sights of splendour, and +danger too, of which he has kept no account. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was Lady Castlewood, she had been laughing all the +morning, and especially gay and lively before her husband +and his guest, who, as soon as the two gentlemen went +together from her room, ran to Harry, the expression of her +countenance quite changed now, and with a face and eyes +full of care, and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Follow them, Harry, I am sure +something has gone wrong.”</span> And so it was that Esmond +was made an eavesdropper at this lady's orders: and +retired to his own chamber, to give himself time in truth to +try and compose a story which would soothe his mistress, +for he could not but have his own apprehension that some +serious quarrel was pending between the two gentlemen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And now for several days the little company at Castlewood +sat at table as of evenings: this care, though unnamed +and invisible, being nevertheless present alway, in the minds +of at least three persons there. My lord was exceeding +gentle and kind. Whenever he quitted the room, his wife's +eyes followed him. He behaved to her with a kind of mournful +courtesy and kindness remarkable in one of his blunt +ways and ordinary rough manner. He called her by her +Christian name often and fondly, was very soft and gentle +with the children, especially with the boy, whom he did not +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page150">[pg 150]</span><a name="Pg150" id="Pg150" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +love, and being lax about church generally, he went thither +and performed all the offices (down even to listening to +Doctor Tusher's sermon) with great devotion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He paces his room all night; what is it? Henry, find +out what it is,”</span> Lady Castlewood said constantly to her +young dependant. <span class="tei tei-q">“He has sent three letters to London,”</span> +she said, another day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, madam, they were to a lawyer,”</span> Harry answered, +who knew of these letters, and had seen a part of the +correspondence, which related to a new loan my lord was +raising; and when the young man remonstrated with his +patron, my lord said, <span class="tei tei-q">“He was only raising money to +pay off an old debt on the property, which must be +discharged.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Regarding the money, Lady Castlewood was not in the +least anxious. Few fond women feel money-distressed; +indeed you can hardly give a woman a greater pleasure than +to bid her pawn her diamonds for the man she loves; and +I remember hearing Mr. Congreve say of my Lord Marlborough, +that the reason why my lord was so successful +with women as a young man was, because he took money of +them. <span class="tei tei-q">“There are few men who will make such a sacrifice +for them,”</span> says Mr. Congreve, who knew a part of the sex +pretty well. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond's vacation was just over, and, as hath +been said, he was preparing to return to the University for +his last term before taking his degree and entering into the +Church. He had made up his mind for this office, not +indeed with that reverence which becomes a man about +to enter upon a duty so holy, but with a worldly spirit of +acquiescence in the prudence of adopting that profession +for his calling. But his reasoning was that he owed all to +the family of Castlewood, and loved better to be near them +than anywhere else in the world; that he might be useful +to his benefactors, who had the utmost confidence in him +and affection for him in return; that he might aid in bringing +up the young heir of the house and acting as his governor; +that he might continue to be his dear patron's and mistress's +friend and adviser, who both were pleased to say that they +should ever look upon him as such: and so, by making himself +useful to those he loved best, he proposed to console +himself for giving up of any schemes of ambition which he +might have had in his own bosom. Indeed, his mistress had +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page151">[pg 151]</span><a name="Pg151" id="Pg151" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +told him that she would not have him leave her; and whatever +she commanded was will to him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Lady Castlewood's mind was greatly relieved in the +last few days of this well-remembered holiday time, by my +lord's announcing one morning, after the post had brought +him letters from London, in a careless tone, that the Lord +Mohun was gone to Paris, and was about to make a great +journey in Europe; and though Lord Castlewood's own +gloom did not wear off, or his behaviour alter, yet this cause +of anxiety being removed from his lady's mind, she began to +be more hopeful and easy in her spirits: striving too, with +all her heart, and by all the means of soothing in her power, +to call back my lord's cheerfulness and dissipate his moody +humour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He accounted for it himself, by saying that he was out of +health; that he wanted to see his physician; that he +would go to London, and consult Doctor Cheyne. It was +agreed that his lordship and Harry Esmond should make +the journey as far as London together; and of a Monday +morning, the 10th of October, in the year 1700, they set +forwards towards London on horseback. The day before +being Sunday, and the rain pouring down, the family did +not visit church; and at night my lord read the service to +his family, very finely, and with a peculiar sweetness and +gravity—speaking the parting benediction, Harry thought, +as solemn as ever he heard it. And he kissed and embraced +his wife and children before they went to their own chambers +with more fondness than he was ordinarily wont to show, +and with a solemnity and feeling of which they thought in +after days with no small comfort. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They took horse the next morning (after adieux from +the family as tender as on the night previous), lay that +night on the road, and entered London at nightfall; my +lord going to the <span class="tei tei-q">“Trumpet”</span>, in the Cockpit, Whitehall, a +house used by the military in his time as a young man, and +accustomed by his lordship ever since. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +An hour after my lord's arrival (which showed that his +visit had been arranged beforehand), my lord's man of +business arrived from Gray's Inn; and thinking that his +patron might wish to be private with the lawyer, Esmond +was for leaving them: but my lord said his business was +short; introduced Mr. Esmond particularly to the lawyer, +who had been engaged for the family in the old lord's time; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page152">[pg 152]</span><a name="Pg152" id="Pg152" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +who said that he had paid the money, as desired that day, +to my Lord Mohun himself, at his lodgings in Bow Street; +that his lordship had expressed some surprise, as it was not +customary to employ lawyers, he said, in such transactions +between men of honour; but, nevertheless, he had returned +my lord viscount's note of hand, which he held at his client's +disposition. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I thought the Lord Mohun had been in Paris!”</span> cried +Mr. Esmond, in great alarm and astonishment. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He is come back at my invitation,”</span> said my lord +viscount. <span class="tei tei-q">“We have accounts to settle together.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I pray Heaven they are over, sir,”</span> says Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, quite,”</span> replied the other, looking hard at the young +man. <span class="tei tei-q">“He was rather troublesome about that money +which I told you I had lost to him at play. And now 'tis +paid, and we are quits on that score, and we shall meet +good friends again.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord,”</span> cried out Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“I am sure you are deceiving +me, and that there is a quarrel between the Lord Mohun +and you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Quarrel—pish! We shall sup together this very night, +and drink a bottle. Every man is ill-humoured who loses +such a sum as I have lost. But now 'tis paid, and my +anger is gone with it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where shall we sup, sir?”</span> says Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">We!</span></em> Let some gentlemen wait till they are asked,”</span> +says my lord viscount, with a laugh. <span class="tei tei-q">“You go to Duke +Street, and see Mr. Betterton. You love the play, I know. +Leave me to follow my own devices; and in the morning +we'll breakfast together, with what appetite we may, as +the play says.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By G——! my lord, I will not leave you this night,”</span> says +Harry Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“I think I know the cause of your dispute. +I swear to you 'tis nothing. On the very day the accident +befell Lord Mohun, I was speaking to him about it. I know +that nothing has passed but idle gallantry on his part.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You know that nothing has passed but idle gallantry +between Lord Mohun and my wife,”</span> says my lord, in a +thundering voice—<span class="tei tei-q">“you knew of this, and did not tell me?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I knew more of it than my dear mistress did herself, +sir—a thousand times more. How was she, who was as +innocent as a child, to know what was the meaning of the +covert addresses of a villain?”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page153">[pg 153]</span><a name="Pg153" id="Pg153" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A villain he is, you allow, and would have taken my +wife away from me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir, she is as pure as an angel,”</span> cried young Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Have I said a word against her?”</span> shrieks out my lord. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Did I ever doubt that she was pure? It would have been +the last day of her life when I did. Do you fancy I think +that <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">she</span></em> would go astray? No, she hasn't passion enough +for that. She neither sins nor forgives. I know her +temper—and now I've lost her: by Heaven I love her +ten thousand times more than ever I did—yes, when she +was young and as beautiful as an angel—when she smiled +at me in her old father's house, and used to lie in wait +for me there as I came from hunting—when I used to fling +my head down on her little knees and cry like a child on +her lap—and swear I would reform and drink no more, and +play no more, and follow women no more; when all the +men of the Court used to be following her—when she used +to look with her child more beautiful, by George, than the +Madonna in the Queen's Chapel. I am not good like her, +I know it. Who is—by Heaven, who is? I tired and +wearied her, I know that very well. I could not talk to +her. You men of wit and books could do that, and +I couldn't—I felt I couldn't. Why, when you was but +a boy of fifteen I could hear you two together talking your +poetry and your books till I was in such a rage that I was +fit to strangle you. But you were always a good lad, +Harry, and I loved you, you know I did. And I felt she +didn't belong to me: and the children don't. And I besotted +myself, and gambled, and drank, and took to all +sorts of devilries out of despair and fury. And now comes +this Mohun, and she likes him, I know she likes him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, and on my soul, you are wrong, sir,”</span> Esmond +cried. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She takes letters from him,”</span> cries my lord—<span class="tei tei-q">“look here +Harry,”</span> and he pulled out a paper with a brown stain of +blood upon it. <span class="tei tei-q">“It fell from him that day he wasn't killed. +One of the grooms picked it up from the ground and gave +it me. Here it is in their d——d comedy jargon. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Divine +Gloriana—Why look so coldly on your slave who adores +you? Have you no compassion on the tortures you have +seen me suffering? Do you vouchsafe no reply to billets +that are written with the blood of my heart.’</span> She had +more letters from him.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page154">[pg 154]</span><a name="Pg154" id="Pg154" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But she answered none,”</span> cries Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“That's not Mohun's fault,”</span> says my lord, <span class="tei tei-q">“and I will +be revenged on him, as God's in heaven, I will.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“For a light word or two, will you risk your lady's honour +and your family's happiness, my lord?”</span> Esmond interposed +beseechingly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Psha—there shall be no question of my wife's honour,”</span> +said my lord; <span class="tei tei-q">“we can quarrel on plenty of grounds beside. +If I live, that villain will be punished; if I fall, my family +will be only the better: there will only be a spendthrift +the less to keep in the world: and Frank has better teaching +than his father. My mind is made up, Harry Esmond, and +whatever the event is I am easy about it. I leave my wife +and you as guardians to the children.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Seeing that my lord was bent upon pursuing this quarrel, +and that no entreaties would draw him from it, Harry +Esmond (then of a hotter and more impetuous nature than +now, when care, and reflection, and grey hairs have calmed +him) thought it was his duty to stand by his kind generous +patron, and said—<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord, if you are determined upon +war, you must not go into it alone. 'Tis the duty of our +house to stand by its chief: and I should neither forgive +myself nor you if you did not call me, or I should be absent +from you at a moment of danger.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Why, Harry, my poor boy, you are bred for a parson,”</span> +says my lord, taking Esmond by the hand very kindly: +<span class="tei tei-q">“and it were a great pity that you should meddle in the +matter.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your lordship thought of being a churchman once,”</span> +Harry answered, <span class="tei tei-q">“and your father's orders did not prevent +him fighting at Castlewood against the Roundheads. Your +enemies are mine, sir: I can use the foils, as you have seen, +indifferently well, and don't think I shall be afraid when +the buttons are taken off 'em.”</span> And then Harry explained +with some blushes and hesitation (for the matter was +delicate, and he feared lest, by having put himself forward +in the quarrel, he might have offended his patron), how he +had himself expostulated with the Lord Mohun, and proposed +to measure swords with him if need were, and he +could not be got to withdraw peaceably in this dispute. +<span class="tei tei-q">“And I should have beat him, sir,”</span> says Harry, laughing. +<span class="tei tei-q">“He never could parry that <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">botte</span></span> I brought from +Cambridge. Let us have half an hour of it, and rehearse—I can teach +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page155">[pg 155]</span><a name="Pg155" id="Pg155" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +it your lordship: 'tis the most delicate point in the world, +and if you miss it your adversary's sword is through you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By George, Harry! you ought to be the head of the +house,”</span> says my lord gloomily. <span class="tei tei-q">“You had been better +Lord Castlewood than a lazy sot like me,”</span> he added, drawing +his hand across his eyes, and surveying his kinsman with +very kind and affectionate glances. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Let us take our coats off and have half an hour's practice +before nightfall,”</span> says Harry, after thankfully grasping his +patron's manly hand. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are but a little bit of a lad,”</span> says my lord good-humouredly; +<span class="tei tei-q">“but, in faith, I believe you could do for +that fellow. No, my boy,”</span> he continued, <span class="tei tei-q">“I'll have none +of your feints and tricks of stabbing: I can use my sword +pretty well too, and will fight my own quarrel my own way.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But I shall be by to see fair play,”</span> cries Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, God bless you—you shall be by.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When is it, sir?”</span> says Harry, for he saw that the matter +had been arranged privately, and beforehand, by my +lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis arranged thus: I sent off a courier to Jack Westbury +to say that I wanted him specially. He knows for what, +and will be here presently, and drink part of that bottle +of sack. Then we shall go to the theatre in Duke Street, +where we shall meet Mohun; and then we shall all go sup at +the <span class="tei tei-q">‘Rose’</span> or the <span class="tei tei-q">‘Greyhound’</span>. Then we shall call for cards, +and there will be probably a difference over the cards—and +then, God help us!—either a wicked villain and traitor +shall go out of the world, or a poor worthless devil, that +doesn't care to remain in it. I am better away, Hal—my +wife will be all the happier when I am gone,”</span> says my lord, +with a groan, that tore the heart of Harry Esmond so that +he fairly broke into a sob over his patron's kind hand. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The business was talked over with Mohun before he left +home—Castlewood I mean”</span>—my lord went on. <span class="tei tei-q">“I took +the letter in to him, which I had read, and I charged him +with his villany, and he could make no denial of it, only +he said that my wife was innocent.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And so she is; before Heaven, my lord, she is!”</span> cries +Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No doubt, no doubt. They always are,”</span> says my lord. +<span class="tei tei-q">“No doubt, when she heard he was killed, she fainted from +accident.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page156">[pg 156]</span><a name="Pg156" id="Pg156" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But, my lord, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">my</span></em> name is Harry,”</span> cried out Esmond, +burning red. <span class="tei tei-q">“You told my lady, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Harry was killed!’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Damnation! shall I fight you too?”</span> shouts my lord, +in a fury. <span class="tei tei-q">“Are you, you little serpent, warmed by my +fire, going to sting—<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you?</span></em>—No, my boy, you're an honest +boy; you are a good boy.”</span> (And here he broke from rage +into tears even more cruel to see.) <span class="tei tei-q">“You are an honest boy, +and I love you; and, by Heavens, I am so wretched that +I don't care what sword it is that ends me. Stop, here's +Jack Westbury. Well, Jack! Welcome, old boy! This +is my kinsman, Harry Esmond.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who brought your bowls for you at Castlewood, sir,”</span> +says Harry, bowing; and the three gentlemen sat down +and drank of that bottle of sack which was prepared for +them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Harry is number three,”</span> says my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“You needn't +be afraid of him, Jack.”</span> And the colonel gave a look, as +much as to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, he don't look as if I need.”</span> And +then my lord explained what he had only told by hints +before. When he quarrelled with Lord Mohun he was +indebted to his lordship in a sum of sixteen hundred pounds, +for which Lord Mohun said he proposed to wait until my lord +viscount should pay him. My lord had raised the sixteen +hundred pounds and sent them to Lord Mohun that morning, +and before quitting home had put his affairs into order, +and was now quite ready to abide the issue of the quarrel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When we had drunk a couple of bottles of sack, a coach +was called, and the three gentlemen went to the Duke's +Playhouse, as agreed. The play was one of Mr. Wycherley's—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Love +in a Wood</span></span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond has thought of that play ever since with +a kind of terror, and of Mrs. Bracegirdle, the actress who +performed the girl's part in the comedy. She was disguised +as a page, and came and stood before the gentlemen as +they sat on the stage, and looked over her shoulder with +a pair of arch black eyes, and laughed at my lord, and +asked what ailed the gentlemen from the country, and had +he had bad news from Bullock Fair? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Between the acts of the play the gentlemen crossed over +and conversed freely. There were two of Lord Mohun's +party, Captain Macartney, in a military habit, and a gentleman +in a suit of blue velvet and silver in a fair periwig, +with a rich fall of point of Venice lace—my lord the Earl of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page157">[pg 157]</span><a name="Pg157" id="Pg157" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Warwick and Holland. My lord had a paper of oranges, +which he ate and offered to the actresses, joking with them. +And Mrs. Bracegirdle, when my Lord Mohun said something +rude, turned on him, and asked him what he did there, +and whether he and his friends had come to stab anybody +else, as they did poor Will Mountford? My lord's dark face +grew darker at this taunt, and wore a mischievous fatal look. +They that saw it remembered it, and said so afterward. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the play was ended the two parties joined company; +and my Lord Castlewood then proposed that they should go +to a tavern and sup. Lockit's, the <span class="tei tei-q">“Greyhound”</span>, in Charing +Cross, was the house selected. All six marched together +that way; the three lords going ahead, Lord Mohun's +captain, and Colonel Westbury, and Harry Esmond, walking +behind them. As they walked, Westbury told Harry +Esmond about his old friend Dick the Scholar, who had +got promotion, and was cornet of the Guards, and had +wrote a book called the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Christian Hero</span></span>, and had all the +Guards to laugh at him for his pains, for the Christian +Hero was breaking the commandments constantly, Westbury +said, and had fought one or two duels already. And, in +a lower tone, Westbury besought young Mr. Esmond to take +no part in the quarrel. <span class="tei tei-q">“There was no need for more +seconds than one,”</span> said the colonel, <span class="tei tei-q">“and the captain or +Lord Warwick might easily withdraw.”</span> But Harry said +no; he was bent on going through with the business. +Indeed, he had a plan in his head, which, he thought, might +prevent my lord viscount from engaging. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They went in at the bar of the tavern, and desired +a private room and wine and cards, and when the drawer +had brought these, they began to drink and call healths, +and as long as the servants were in the room appeared very +friendly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry Esmond's plan was no other than to engage in talk +with Lord Mohun, to insult him, and so get the first of the +quarrel. So when cards were proposed he offered to play. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Psha!”</span> says my Lord Mohun (whether wishing to save +Harry, or not choosing to try the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">botte de Jésuite</span></span>, it +is not to be known)—<span class="tei tei-q">“young gentlemen from college should not +play these stakes. You are too young.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who dares say I am too young?”</span> broke out Harry. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Is your lordship afraid?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Afraid!”</span> cries out Mohun. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page158">[pg 158]</span><a name="Pg158" id="Pg158" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But my good lord viscount saw the move—<span class="tei tei-q">“I'll play you +for ten moidores, Mohun,”</span> says he—<span class="tei tei-q">“You silly boy, we don't +play for groats here as you do at Cambridge:”</span> and Harry, +who had no such sum in his pocket (for his half-year's +salary was always pretty well spent before it was due), fell +back with rage and vexation in his heart that he had not +money enough to stake. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I'll stake the young gentleman a crown,”</span> says the Lord +Mohun's captain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I thought crowns were rather scarce with the gentlemen +of the army,”</span> says Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Do they birch at college?”</span> says the captain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“They birch fools,”</span> says Harry, <span class="tei tei-q">“and they cane bullies, +and they fling puppies into the water.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Faith, then, there's some escapes drowning,”</span> says the +captain, who was an Irishman; and all the gentlemen +began to laugh, and made poor Harry only more angry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My Lord Mohun presently snuffed a candle. It was when +the drawers brought in fresh bottles and glasses and were +in the room—on which my lord viscount said—<span class="tei tei-q">“The deuce +take you, Mohun, how damned awkward you are! Light +the candle, you drawer.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Damned awkward is a damned awkward expression, my +lord,”</span> says the other. <span class="tei tei-q">“Town gentlemen don't use such +words—or ask pardon if they do.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I'm a country gentleman,”</span> says my lord viscount. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I see it by your manner,”</span> says my Lord Mohun. <span class="tei tei-q">“No +man shall say <span class="tei tei-q">‘damned awkward’</span> to me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I fling the words in your face, my lord,”</span> says the other; +<span class="tei tei-q">“shall I send the cards too?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Gentlemen, gentlemen! before the servants?”</span> cry out +Colonel Westbury and my Lord Warwick in a breath. +The drawers go out of the room hastily. They tell the +people below of the quarrel upstairs. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Enough has been said,”</span> says Colonel Westbury. <span class="tei tei-q">“Will +your lordships meet to-morrow morning?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Will my Lord Castlewood withdraw his words?”</span> asks +the Earl of Warwick. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My Lord Castlewood will be —— first,”</span> says Colonel +Westbury. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Then we have nothing for it. Take notice, gentlemen, +there have been outrageous words—reparation asked and +refused.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page159">[pg 159]</span><a name="Pg159" id="Pg159" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And refused,”</span> says my Lord Castlewood, putting on his +hat. <span class="tei tei-q">“Where shall the meeting be? and when?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Since my lord refuses me satisfaction, which I deeply +regret, there is no time so good as now,”</span> says my Lord +Mohun. <span class="tei tei-q">“Let us have chairs and go to Leicester Field.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Are your lordship and I to have the honour of exchanging +a pass or two?”</span> says Colonel Westbury, with a low bow +to my Lord of Warwick and Holland. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It is an honour for me,”</span> says my lord, with a profound +congée, <span class="tei tei-q">“to be matched with a gentleman who has been +at Mons and Namur.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Will your reverence permit me to give you a lesson?”</span> +says the captain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Nay, nay, gentlemen, two on a side are plenty,”</span> says +Harry's patron. <span class="tei tei-q">“Spare the boy, Captain Macartney,”</span> +and he shook Harry's hand—for the last time, save one, +in his life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At the bar of the tavern all the gentlemen stopped, and +my lord viscount said, laughing, to the barwoman, that +those cards set people sadly a-quarrelling; but that the +dispute was over now, and the parties were all going away +to my Lord Mohun's house, in Bow Street, to drink a bottle +more before going to bed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A half-dozen of chairs were now called, and the six gentlemen +stepping into them, the word was privately given to +the chairmen to go to Leicester Field, where the gentlemen +were set down opposite the <span class="tei tei-q">“Standard”</span> Tavern. It was midnight, +and the town was abed by this time, and only a few +lights in the windows of the houses; but the night was +bright enough for the unhappy purpose which the disputants +came about; and so all six entered into that fatal square, +the chairmen standing without the railing and keeping the +gate, lest any persons should disturb the meeting. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All that happened there hath been matter of public +notoriety, and is recorded, for warning to lawless men, in +the annals of our country. After being engaged for not +more than a couple of minutes, as Harry Esmond thought +(though being occupied at the time with his own adversary's +point, which was active, he may not have taken a good note +of time), a cry from the chairmen without, who were +smoking their pipes, and leaning over the railings of the +field as they watched the dim combat within, announced +that some catastrophe had happened which caused Esmond +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page160">[pg 160]</span><a name="Pg160" id="Pg160" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to drop his sword and look round, at which moment his +enemy wounded him in the right hand. But the young +man did not heed this hurt much, and ran up to the place +where he saw his dear master was down. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My Lord Mohun was standing over him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Are you much hurt, Frank?”</span> he asked, in a hollow voice. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I believe I'm a dead man,”</span> my lord said from the ground. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No, no, not so,”</span> says the other; <span class="tei tei-q">“and I call God to +witness, Frank Esmond, that I would have asked your +pardon, had you but given me a chance. In—in the first +cause of our falling out, I swear that no one was to blame +but me, and—and that my lady——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush!”</span> says my poor lord viscount, lifting himself on +his elbow, and speaking faintly. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas a dispute about +the cards—the cursed cards. Harry, my boy, are you +wounded, too? God help thee! I loved thee, Harry, and +thou must watch over my little Frank—and—and carry +this little heart to my wife.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And here my dear lord felt in his breast for a locket he +wore there, and, in the act, fell back, fainting. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We were all at this terrified, thinking him dead; but +Esmond and Colonel Westbury bade the chairmen to come +into the field; and so my lord was carried to one Mr. Aimes, +a surgeon, in Long Acre, who kept a bath, and there the +house was wakened up, and the victim of this quarrel +carried in. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord viscount was put to bed, and his wound looked +to by the surgeon, who seemed both kind and skilful. +When he had looked to my lord, he bandaged up Harry +Esmond's hand (who, from loss of blood, had fainted too, +in the house, and may have been some time unconscious); +and when the young man came to himself, you may be sure +he eagerly asked what news there were of his dear patron; +on which the surgeon carried him to the room where the +Lord Castlewood lay; who had already sent for a priest; +and desired earnestly, they said, to speak with his kinsman. +He was lying on a bed, very pale and ghastly, with that +fixed, fatal look in his eyes, which betokens death; and +faintly beckoning all the other persons away from him with +his hand, and crying out <span class="tei tei-q">“Only Harry Esmond”</span>, the hand +fell powerless down on the coverlet, as Harry came forward, +and knelt down and kissed it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thou art all but a priest, Harry,”</span> my lord viscount +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page161">[pg 161]</span><a name="Pg161" id="Pg161" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +gasped out, with a faint smile, and pressure of his cold hand. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Are they all gone? Let me make thee a death-bed +confession.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And with sacred Death waiting, as it were, at the bed-foot, +as an awful witness of his words, the poor dying soul gasped +out his last wishes in respect of his family;—his humble +profession of contrition for his faults;—and his charity +towards the world he was leaving. Some things he said +concerned Harry Esmond as much as they astonished him. +And my lord viscount, sinking visibly, was in the midst +of these strange confessions, when the ecclesiastic for whom +my lord had sent, Mr. Atterbury, arrived. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This gentleman had reached to no great church dignity +as yet, but was only preacher at St. Bride's, drawing all +the town thither by his eloquent sermons. He was godson +to my lord, who had been pupil to his father; had paid +a visit to Castlewood from Oxford more than once; and +it was by his advice, I think, that Harry Esmond was +sent to Cambridge, rather than to Oxford, of which place +Mr. Atterbury, though a distinguished member, spoke +but ill. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our messenger found the good priest already at his books, +at five o'clock in the morning, and he followed the man +eagerly to the house where my poor lord viscount lay—Esmond +watching him, and taking his dying words from +his mouth. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord, hearing of Mr. Atterbury's arrival, and squeezing +Esmond's hand, asked to be alone with the priest; and +Esmond left them there for this solemn interview. You +may be sure that his own prayers and grief accompanied +that dying benefactor. My lord had said to him that which +confounded the young man—informed him of a secret which +greatly concerned him. Indeed, after hearing it, he had +had good cause for doubt and dismay; for mental anguish +as well as resolution. While the colloquy between Mr. +Atterbury and his dying penitent took place within, an +immense contest of perplexity was agitating Lord Castlewood's +young companion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At the end of an hour—it may be more—Mr. Atterbury +came out of the room looking very hard at Esmond, and +holding a paper. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He is on the brink of God's awful judgement,”</span> the +priest whispered. <span class="tei tei-q">“He has made his breast clean to me. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page162">[pg 162]</span><a name="Pg162" id="Pg162" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +He forgives and believes, and makes restitution. Shall it +be in public? Shall we call a witness to sign it?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“God knows,”</span> sobbed out the young man, <span class="tei tei-q">“my dearest +lord has only done me kindness all his life.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The priest put the paper into Esmond's hand. He looked +at it. It swam before his eyes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis a confession,”</span> he said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis as you please,”</span> said Mr. Atterbury. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There was a fire in the room, where the cloths were +drying for the baths, and there lay a heap in a corner, +saturated with the blood of my dear lord's body. Esmond +went to the fire, and threw the paper into it. 'Twas a great +chimney with glazed Dutch tiles. How we remember such +trifles in such awful moments!—the scrap of the book that +we have read in a great grief—the taste of that last dish +that we have eaten before a duel or some such supreme +meeting or parting. On the Dutch tiles at the bagnio was +a rude picture representing Jacob in hairy gloves, cheating +Isaac of Esau's birthright. The burning paper lighted +it up. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis only a confession, Mr. Atterbury,”</span> said the young +man. He leaned his head against the mantelpiece: a burst +of tears came to his eyes. They were the first he had shed +as he sat by his lord, scared by this calamity and more yet +by what the poor dying gentleman had told him, and +shocked to think that he should be the agent of bringing +this double misfortune on those he loved best. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Let us go to him,”</span> said Mr. Esmond. And accordingly +they went into the next chamber, where, by this time, the +dawn had broke, which showed my lord's poor pale face +and wild appealing eyes, that wore that awful fatal look of +coming dissolution. The surgeon was with him. He went +into the chamber as Atterbury came out thence. My lord +viscount turned round his sick eyes towards Esmond. It +choked the other to hear that rattle in his throat. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord viscount,”</span> says Mr. Atterbury, <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Esmond +wants no witnesses, and hath burned the paper.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My dearest master!”</span> Esmond said, kneeling down, and +taking his hand and kissing it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord viscount sprang up in his bed, and flung his +arms round Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“God bl—bless...,”</span> was all he said. +The blood rushed from his mouth, deluging the young man. +My dearest lord was no more. He was gone with a blessing +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page163">[pg 163]</span><a name="Pg163" id="Pg163" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +on his lips, and love and repentance and kindness in his +manly heart. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">Benedicti +benedicentes</span></span>,”</span> says Mr. Atterbury, and the young +man kneeling at the bedside, groaned out an Amen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who shall take the news to her?”</span> was Mr. Esmond's +next thought. And on this he besought Mr. Atterbury to +bear the tidings to Castlewood. He could not face his +mistress himself with those dreadful news. Mr. Atterbury +complying kindly, Esmond writ a hasty note on his table-book +to my lord's man, bidding him get the horses for Mr. +Atterbury, and ride with him, and send Esmond's own +valise to the Gatehouse prison, whither he resolved to go +and give himself up. +</p> + +</div> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page165">[pg 165]</span><a name="Pg165" id="Pg165" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc39" id="toc39"></a> +<a name="pdf40" id="pdf40"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Book II. Contains Mr. Esmond's Military Life, And Other Matters +Appertaining To The Esmond Family</span></h2> + + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc41" id="toc41"></a> +<a name="pdf42" id="pdf42"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter I. I Am In Prison, And Visited, But Not Consoled There</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Those may imagine, who have seen death untimely strike +down persons revered and beloved, and know how unavailing +consolation is, what was Harry Esmond's anguish after being +an actor in that ghastly midnight scene of blood and homicide. +He could not, he felt, have faced his dear mistress, +and told her that story. He was thankful that kind Atterbury +consented to break the sad news to her; but, besides +his grief, which he took into prison with him, he had that +in his heart which secretly cheered and consoled him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A great secret had been told to Esmond by his unhappy +stricken kinsman, lying on his death-bed. Were he to +disclose it, as in equity and honour he might do, the discovery +would but bring greater grief upon those whom he loved +best in the world, and who were sad enough already. Should +he bring down shame and perplexity upon all those beings +to whom he was attached by so many tender ties of affection +and gratitude? degrade his father's widow? impeach and +sully his father's and kinsman's honour? and for what? +for a barren title, to be worn at the expense of an innocent +boy, the son of his dearest benefactress. He had debated +this matter in his conscience, whilst his poor lord was +making his dying confession. On one side were ambition, +temptation, justice even; but love, gratitude, and fidelity, +pleaded on the other. And when the struggle was over in +Harry's mind, a glow of righteous happiness filled it; and +it was with grateful tears in his eyes that he returned thanks +to God for that decision which he had been enabled to make. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When I was denied by my own blood,”</span> thought he; +<span class="tei tei-q">“these dearest friends received and cherished me. When +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page166">[pg 166]</span><a name="Pg166" id="Pg166" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +I was a nameless orphan myself, and needed a protector, +I found one in yonder kind soul, who has gone to his account +repenting of the innocent wrong he has done.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And with this consoling thought he went away to give +himself up at the prison, after kissing the cold lips of his +benefactor. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was on the third day after he had come to the Gatehouse +prison (where he lay in no small pain from his wound, which +inflamed and ached severely); and with those thoughts and +resolutions that have been just spoke of, to depress, and +yet to console him, that H. Esmond's keeper came and told +him that a visitor was asking for him, and though he could +not see her face, which was enveloped in a black hood, her +whole figure, too, being veiled and covered with the deepest +mourning, Esmond knew at once that his visitor was his +dear mistress. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He got up from his bed, where he was lying, being very +weak; and advancing towards her, as the retiring keeper +shut the door upon him and his guest in that sad place, +he put forward his left hand (for the right was wounded and +bandaged), and he would have taken that kind one of his +mistress, which had done so many offices of friendship for +him for so many years. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the Lady Castlewood went back from him, putting +back her hood, and leaning against the great stanchioned +door which the gaoler had just closed upon them. Her +face was ghastly white, as Esmond saw it, looking from the +hood; and her eyes, ordinarily so sweet and tender, were +fixed at him with such a tragic glance of woe and anger, +as caused the young man, unaccustomed to unkindness +from that person, to avert his own glances from her +face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And this, Mr. Esmond,”</span> she said, <span class="tei tei-q">“is where I see you; +and 'tis to this you have brought me!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You have come to console me in my calamity, madam,”</span> +said he (though, in truth, he scarce knew how to address +her, his emotions at beholding her, so overpowered him). +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She advanced a little, but stood silent and trembling, +looking out at him from her black draperies, with her small +white hands clasped together, and quivering lips and hollow +eyes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Not to reproach me,”</span> he continued, after a pause, <span class="tei tei-q">“My +grief is sufficient as it is.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page167">[pg 167]</span><a name="Pg167" id="Pg167" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Take back your hand—do not touch me with it!”</span> she +cried. <span class="tei tei-q">“Look! there's blood on it!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wish they had taken it all,”</span> said Esmond; <span class="tei tei-q">“if you are +unkind to me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where is my husband?”</span> she broke out. <span class="tei tei-q">“Give me +back my husband, Henry? Why did you stand by at +midnight and see him murdered? Why did the traitor +escape who did it? You, the champion of your house, who +offered to die for us! You that he loved and trusted, and +to whom I confided him—you that vowed devotion and +gratitude, and I believed you—yes, I believed you—why +are you here, and my noble Francis gone? Why did you +come among us? You have only brought us grief and +sorrow; and repentance, bitter, bitter repentance, as a +return for our love and kindness. Did I ever do you +a wrong, Henry? You were but an orphan child when +I first saw you—when <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">he</span></em> first saw you, who was so good, +and noble, and trusting. He would have had you sent +away, but, like a foolish woman, I besought him to let you +stay. And you pretended to love us, and we believed you—and +you made our house wretched, and my husband's +heart went from me: and I lost him through you—I lost +him—the husband of my youth, I say. I worshipped him: +you know I worshipped him—and he was changed to me. +He was no more my Francis of old—my dear, dear soldier. +He loved me before he saw you; and I loved him; oh, +God is my witness how I loved him! Why did he not send +you from among us? 'Twas only his kindness, that could +refuse me nothing then. And, young as you were—yes, +and weak and alone—there was evil, I knew there was evil +in keeping you. I read it in your face and eyes. I saw +that they boded harm to us—and it came, I knew it would. +Why did you not die when you had the small-pox—and +I came myself and watched you, and you didn't know me +in your delirium—and you called out for me, though I was +there at your side. All that has happened since, was a just +judgement on my wicked heart—my wicked jealous heart. +Oh, I am punished—awfully punished! My husband lies +in his blood—murdered for defending me, my kind, kind, +generous lord—and you were by, and you let him die, +Henry!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +These words, uttered in the wildness of her grief, by one +who was ordinarily quiet, and spoke seldom except with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page168">[pg 168]</span><a name="Pg168" id="Pg168" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a gentle smile and a soothing tone, rung in Esmond's ear; +and 'tis said that he repeated many of them in the fever +into which he now fell from his wound, and perhaps from +the emotion which such passionate, undeserved upbraidings +caused him. It seemed as if his very sacrifices and love +for this lady and her family were to turn to evil and reproach: +as if his presence amongst them was indeed a cause of grief, +and the continuance of his life but woe and bitterness to +theirs. As the Lady Castlewood spoke bitterly, rapidly, +without a tear, he never offered a word of appeal or remonstrance; +but sat at the foot of his prison-bed, stricken only +with the more pain at thinking it was that soft and beloved +hand which should stab him so cruelly, and powerless against +her fatal sorrow. Her words as she spoke struck the chords +of all his memory, and the whole of his boyhood and youth +passed within him; whilst this lady, so fond and gentle but +yesterday—this good angel whom he had loved and worshipped—stood +before him, pursuing him with keen words +and aspect malign. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wish I were in my lord's place,”</span> he groaned out. <span class="tei tei-q">“It +was not my fault that I was not there, madam. But Fate +is stronger than all of us, and willed what has come to pass. +It had been better for me to have died when I had the +illness.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, Henry,”</span> said she—and as she spoke she looked at +him with a glance that was at once so fond and so sad, +that the young man, tossing up his arms, wildly fell back, +hiding his head in the coverlet of the bed. As he turned +he struck against the wall with his wounded hand, displacing +the ligature; and he felt the blood rushing again from the +wound. He remembered feeling a secret pleasure at the +accident—and thinking, <span class="tei tei-q">“Suppose I were to end now, who +would grieve for me?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This haemorrhage, or the grief and despair in which the +luckless young man was at the time of the accident, must +have brought on a deliquium presently; for he had scarce +any recollection afterwards, save of some one, his mistress +probably, seizing his hand—and then of the buzzing noise +in his ears as he awoke, with two or three persons of the +prison around his bed, whereon he lay in a pool of blood +from his arm. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was now bandaged up again by the prison surgeon, +who happened to be in the place; and the governor's wife +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page169">[pg 169]</span><a name="Pg169" id="Pg169" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and servant, kind people both, were with the patient. +Esmond saw his mistress still in the room when he awoke +from his trance; but she went away without a word; +though the governor's wife told him that she sat in her +room for some time afterward, and did not leave the prison +until she heard that Esmond was likely to do well. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Days afterwards, when Esmond was brought out of a +fever which he had, and which attacked him that night +pretty sharply, the honest keeper's wife brought her patient +a handkerchief fresh washed and ironed, and at the corner of +which he recognized his mistress's well-known cipher and +viscountess's crown. <span class="tei tei-q">“The lady had bound it round his +arm when he fainted, and before she called for help,”</span> the +keeper's wife said; <span class="tei tei-q">“poor lady; she took on sadly about her +husband. He has been buried to-day, and a many of the +coaches of the nobility went with him,—my Lord Marlborough's +and my Lord Sunderland's, and many of the +officers of the Guards, in which he served in the old king's +time; and my lady has been with her two children to the +king at Kensington, and asked for justice against my Lord +Mohun, who is in hiding, and my lord the Earl of Warwick +and Holland, who is ready to give himself up and take his +trial.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Such were the news, coupled with assertions about her +own honesty and that of Molly her maid, who would never +have stolen a certain trumpery gold sleeve-button of Mr. +Esmond's that was missing after his fainting fit, that the +keeper's wife brought to her lodger. His thoughts followed +to that untimely grave, the brave heart, the kind friend, +the gallant gentleman, honest of word and generous of +thought (if feeble of purpose, but are his betters much +stronger than he?) who had given him bread and shelter +when he had none; home and love when he needed them; +and who, if he had kept one vital secret from him, had done +that of which he repented ere dying—a wrong indeed, but +one followed by remorse, and occasioned by almost irresistible +temptation. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond took his handkerchief when his nurse left him, +and very likely kissed it, and looked at the bauble embroidered +in the corner. <span class="tei tei-q">“It has cost thee grief enough,”</span> +he thought, <span class="tei tei-q">“dear lady, so loving and so tender. Shall +I take it from thee and thy children? No, never! Keep +it, and wear it, my little Frank, my pretty boy. If I cannot +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page170">[pg 170]</span><a name="Pg170" id="Pg170" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +make a name for myself, I can die without one. Some day, +when my dear mistress sees my heart, I shall be righted; +or if not here or now, why, elsewhere; where Honour doth +not follow us, but where Love reigns perpetual.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Tis needless to narrate here, as the reports of the lawyers +already have chronicled them, the particulars or issue of +that trial which ensued upon my Lord Castlewood's melancholy +homicide. Of the two lords engaged in that said +matter, the second, my lord the Earl of Warwick and Holland, +who had been engaged with Colonel Westbury, and +wounded by him, was found not guilty by his peers, before +whom he was tried (under the presidence of the Lord +Steward, Lord Somers); and the principal, the Lord +Mohun, being found guilty of the manslaughter (which, +indeed, was forced upon him, and of which he repented +most sincerely), pleaded his clergy; and so was discharged +without any penalty. The widow of the slain nobleman, +as it was told us in prison, showed an extraordinary spirit; +and, though she had to wait for ten years before her son was +old enough to compass it, declared she would have revenge +of her husband's murderer. So much and suddenly had +grief, anger, and misfortune appeared to change her. But +fortune, good or ill, as I take it, does not change men and +women. It but develops their characters. As there are +a thousand thoughts lying within a man that he does not +know till he takes up the pen to write, so the heart is a +secret even to him (or her) who has it in his own breast. +Who hath not found himself surprised into revenge, or +action, or passion, for good or evil; whereof the seeds lay +within him, latent and unsuspected, until the occasion +called them forth? With the death of her lord, a change +seemed to come over the whole conduct and mind of Lady +Castlewood; but of this we shall speak in the right season +and anon. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The lords being tried then before their peers at Westminster, +according to their privilege, being brought from +the Tower with state processions and barges, and accompanied +by lieutenants and axe-men, the commoners engaged +in that melancholy fray took their trial at Newgate, as +became them; and, being all found guilty, pleaded likewise +their benefit of clergy. The sentence, as we all know, +in these cases is, that the culprit lies a year in prison, or +during the king's pleasure, and is burned in the hand, or +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page171">[pg 171]</span><a name="Pg171" id="Pg171" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +only stamped with a cold iron; or this part of the punishment +is altogether remitted at the grace of the sovereign. +So Harry Esmond found himself a criminal and a prisoner +at two-and-twenty years old; as for the two colonels, his +comrades, they took the matter very lightly. Duelling +was a part of their business; and they could not in honour +refuse any invitations of that sort. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the case was different with Mr. Esmond. His life +was changed by that stroke of the sword which destroyed +his kind patron's. As he lay in prison, old Dr. Tusher fell +ill and died; and Lady Castlewood appointed Thomas +Tusher to the vacant living; about the filling of which she +had a thousand times fondly talked to Harry Esmond: +how they never should part; how he should educate her +boy; how to be a country clergyman, like saintly George +Herbert, or pious Dr. Ken, was the happiness and greatest +lot in life; how (if he were obstinately bent on it, though, +for her part, she owned rather to holding Queen Bess's +opinion, that a bishop should have no wife, and if not a +bishop why a clergyman?) she would find a good wife for +Harry Esmond: and so on, with a hundred pretty prospects +told by fireside evenings, in fond prattle, as the children +played about the hall. All these plans were overthrown now. +Thomas Tusher wrote to Esmond, as he lay in prison, +announcing that his patroness had conferred upon him the +living his reverend father had held for many years; that +she never, after the tragical events which had occurred +(whereof Tom spoke with a very edifying horror), could +see in the revered Tusher's pulpit, or at her son's table, the +man who was answerable for the father's life; that her +ladyship bade him to say that she prayed for her kinsman's +repentance and his worldly happiness; that he was free +to command her aid for any scheme of life which he might +propose to himself; but that on this side of the grave she +would see him no more. And Tusher, for his own part, +added that Harry should have his prayers as a friend of his +youth, and commended him whilst he was in prison to read +certain works of theology, which his reverence pronounced +to be very wholesome for sinners in his lamentable condition. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And this was the return for a life of devotion—this the +end of years of affectionate intercourse and passionate +fidelity! Harry would have died for his patron, and was +held as little better than his murderer: he had sacrificed, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page172">[pg 172]</span><a name="Pg172" id="Pg172" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +she did not know how much, for his mistress, and she threw +him aside—he had endowed her family with all they had, +and she talked about giving him alms as to a menial! The +grief for his patron's loss: the pains of his own present +position, and doubts as to the future: all these were forgotten +under the sense of the consummate outrage which +he had to endure, and overpowered by the superior pang +of that torture. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He writ back a letter to Mr. Tusher from his prison, +congratulating his reverence upon his appointment to the +living of Castlewood: sarcastically bidding him to follow +in the footsteps of his admirable father, whose gown had +descended upon him—thanking her ladyship for her offer +of alms, which he said he should trust not to need; and +beseeching her to remember that, if ever her determination +should change towards him, he would be ready to give her +proofs of a fidelity which had never wavered, and which +ought never to have been questioned by that house. <span class="tei tei-q">“And +if we meet no more, or only as strangers in this world,”</span> +Mr. Esmond concluded, <span class="tei tei-q">“a sentence against the cruelty +and injustice of which I disdain to appeal; hereafter she +will know who was faithful to her, and whether she had any +cause to suspect the love and devotion of her kinsman and +servant.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the sending of this letter, the poor young fellow's +mind was more at ease than it had been previously. The +blow had been struck, and he had borne it. His cruel +goddess had shaken her wings and fled: and left him alone +and friendless, but <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">virtute sua</span></span>. And he had to bear him +up, at once the sense of his right and the feeling of his +wrongs, his honour and his misfortune. As I have seen +men waking and running to arms at a sudden trumpet; +before emergency a manly heart leaps up resolute; meets +the threatening danger with undaunted countenance; and, +whether conquered or conquering, faces it always. Ah! +no man knows his strength or his weakness, till occasion +proves them. If there be some thoughts and actions of his +life from the memory of which a man shrinks with shame, +sure there are some which he may be proud to own and +remember; forgiven injuries, conquered temptations (now +and then), and difficulties vanquished by endurance. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was these thoughts regarding the living, far more than +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page173">[pg 173]</span><a name="Pg173" id="Pg173" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +any great poignancy of grief respecting the dead, which +affected Harry Esmond whilst in prison after his trial: but +it may be imagined that he could take no comrade of misfortune +into the confidence of his feelings, and they thought +it was remorse and sorrow for his patron's loss which +affected the young man, in error of which opinion he chose +to leave them. As a companion he was so moody and silent +that the two officers, his fellow sufferers, left him to himself +mostly, liked little very likely what they knew of him, +consoled themselves with dice, cards, and the bottle, and +whiled away their own captivity in their own way. It +seemed to Esmond as if he lived years in that prison: and +was changed and aged when he came out of it. At certain +periods of life we live years of emotion in a few weeks—and +look back on those times, as on great gaps between the old +life and the new. You do not know how much you suffer +in those critical maladies of the heart, until the disease is +over and you look back on it afterwards. During the time, +the suffering is at least sufferable. The day passes in more +or less of pain, and the night wears away somehow. 'Tis +only in after-days that we see what the danger has been—as +a man out a-hunting or riding for his life looks at a leap, +and wonders how he should have survived the taking of it. +O dark months of grief and rage! of wrong and cruel endurance! +He is old now who recalls you. Long ago he has +forgiven and blest the soft hand that wounded him: but +the mark is there, and the wound is cicatrized only—no time, +tears, caresses, or repentance, can obliterate the scar. We +are indocile to put up with grief, however. <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Reficimus rates +quassas</span></span>: we tempt the ocean again and again, and try upon +new ventures. Esmond thought of his early time as a +novitiate, and of this past trial as an initiation before entering +into life—as our young Indians undergo tortures silently +before they pass to the rank of warriors in the tribe. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The officers, meanwhile, who were not let into the secret +of the grief which was gnawing at the side of their silent +young friend, and being accustomed to such transactions, +in which one comrade or another was daily paying the forfeit +of the sword, did not of course bemoan themselves very +inconsolably about the fate of their late companion in arms. +This one told stories of former adventures of love, or war, or +pleasure, in which poor Frank Esmond had been engaged; +t'other recollected how a constable had been bilked, or a +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page174">[pg 174]</span><a name="Pg174" id="Pg174" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +tavern-bully beaten: whilst my lord's poor widow was +sitting at his tomb worshipping him as an actual saint and +spotless hero—so the visitors said who had news of Lady +Castlewood; and Westbury and Macartney had pretty +nearly had all the town to come and see them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The duel, its fatal termination, the trial of the two peers +and the three commoners concerned, had caused the +greatest excitement in the town. The prints and News +Letters were full of them. The three gentlemen in Newgate +were almost as much crowded as the bishops in the Tower, +or a highwayman before execution. We were allowed to +live in the governor's house, as hath been said, both before +trial and after condemnation, waiting the king's pleasure; +nor was the real cause of the fatal quarrel known, so closely +had my lord and the two other persons who knew it kept +the secret, but every one imagined that the origin of the +meeting was a gambling dispute. Except fresh air, the +prisoners had, upon payment, most things they could desire. +Interest was made that they should not mix with the vulgar +convicts, whose ribald choruses and loud laughter and +curses could be heard from their own part of the prison, +where they and the miserable debtors were confined pell-mell. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc43" id="toc43"></a> +<a name="pdf44" id="pdf44"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter II. I Come To The End Of My Captivity, But Not Of My Trouble</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Among the company which came to visit the two officers +was an old acquaintance of Harry Esmond; that gentleman +of the Guards, namely, who had been so kind to Harry +when Captain Westbury's troop had been quartered at +Castlewood more than seven years before. Dick the +Scholar was no longer Dick the Trooper now, but Captain +Steele of Lucas's Fusiliers, and secretary to my Lord Cutts, +that famous officer of King William's, the bravest and most +beloved man of the English army. The two jolly prisoners +had been drinking with a party of friends (for our cellar +and that of the keepers of Newgate, too, were supplied with +endless hampers of burgundy and champagne that the +friends of the colonels sent in); and Harry, having no wish +for their drink or their conversation, being too feeble in +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page175">[pg 175]</span><a name="Pg175" id="Pg175" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +health for the one and too sad in spirits for the other, was +sitting apart in his little room, reading such books as he +had, one evening, when honest Colonel Westbury, flushed +with liquor, and always good-humoured in and out of his +cups, came laughing into Harry's closet, and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Ho, +young Killjoy! here's a friend come to see thee; he'll pray +with thee, or he'll drink with thee; or he'll drink and pray +turn about. Dick, my Christian hero, here's the little +scholar of Castlewood.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Dick came up and kissed Esmond on both cheeks, imparting +a strong perfume of burnt sack along with his caress to +the young man. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What! is this the little man that used to talk Latin +and fetch our bowls? How tall thou art grown! I protest +I should have known thee anywhere. And so you have +turned ruffian and fighter; and wanted to measure swords +with Mohun, did you? I protest that Mohun said at the +Guard dinner yesterday, where there was a pretty company +of us, that the young fellow wanted to fight him, and was +the better man of the two.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wish we could have tried and proved it, Mr. Steele,”</span> +says Esmond, thinking of his dead benefactor, and his eyes +filling with tears. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With the exception of that one cruel letter which he had +from his mistress, Mr. Esmond heard nothing from her, and +she seemed determined to execute her resolve of parting +from him and disowning him. But he had news of her, +such as it was, which Mr. Steele assiduously brought him +from the prince's and princesses' Court, where our honest +captain had been advanced to the post of gentleman waiter. +When off duty there, Captain Dick often came to console +his friends in captivity; a good nature and a friendly +disposition towards all who were in ill fortune no doubt +prompting him to make his visits, and good fellowship and +good wine to prolong them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Faith,”</span> says Westbury, <span class="tei tei-q">“the little scholar was the first +to begin the quarrel—I mind me of it now—at Lockit's. +I always hated that fellow Mohun. What was the real +cause of the quarrel betwixt him and poor Frank? I would +wager 'twas a woman.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas a quarrel about play—on my word, about play,”</span> +Harry said. <span class="tei tei-q">“My poor lord lost great sums to his guest at +Castlewood. Angry words passed between them; and, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page176">[pg 176]</span><a name="Pg176" id="Pg176" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +though Lord Castlewood was the kindest and most pliable +soul alive, his spirit was very high; and hence that meeting +which has brought us all here,”</span> says Mr. Esmond, resolved +never to acknowledge that there had ever been any other +but cards for the duel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I do not like to use bad words of a nobleman,”</span> says +Westbury; <span class="tei tei-q">“but if my Lord Mohun were a commoner, +I would say, 'twas a pity he was not hanged. He was +familiar with dice and women at a time other boys are at +school, being birched; he was as wicked as the oldest rake, +years ere he had done growing; and handled a sword and +a foil, and a bloody one too, before ever he used a razor. +He held poor Will Mountford in talk that night, when bloody +Dick Hill ran him through. He will come to a bad end, will +that young lord; and no end is bad enough for him,”</span> says +honest Mr. Westbury: whose prophecy was fulfilled twelve +years after, upon that fatal day when Mohun fell, dragging +down one of the bravest and greatest gentlemen in England +in his fall. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From Mr. Steele, then, who brought the public rumour, +as well as his own private intelligence, Esmond learned the +movements of his unfortunate mistress. Steele's heart was +of very inflammable composition; and the gentleman usher +spoke in terms of boundless admiration both of the widow +(that most beautiful woman, as he said) and of her daughter, +who, in the captain's eyes, was a still greater paragon. If +the pale widow, whom Captain Richard, in his poetic rapture, +compared to a Niobe in tears—to a Sigismunda—to a weeping +Belvidera, was an object the most lovely and pathetic +which his eyes had ever beheld, or for which his heart had +melted, even her ripened perfections and beauty were as +nothing compared to the promise of that extreme loveliness +which the good captain saw in her daughter. It was <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">matre +pulcra filia pulcrior</span></span>. Steele composed sonnets whilst he +was on duty in his prince's antechamber, to the maternal +and filial charms. He would speak for hours about them +to Harry Esmond; and, indeed, he could have chosen few +subjects more likely to interest the unhappy young man, +whose heart was now as always devoted to these ladies; +and who was thankful to all who loved them, or praised +them, or wished them well. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Not that his fidelity was recompensed by any answering +kindness, or show of relenting even, on the part of a mistress +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page177">[pg 177]</span><a name="Pg177" id="Pg177" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +obdurate now after ten years of love and benefactions. The +poor young man getting no answer, save Tusher's, to that +letter which he had written, and being too proud to write +more, opened a part of his heart to Steele, than whom no +man, when unhappy, could find a kinder hearer or more +friendly emissary; described (in words which were no +doubt pathetic, for they came <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">imo pectore</span></span>, and caused +honest Dick to weep plentifully) his youth, his constancy, his fond +devotion to that household which had reared him; his +affection how earned, and how tenderly requited until but +yesterday, and (as far as he might) the circumstances and +causes for which that sad quarrel had made of Esmond a +prisoner under sentence, a widow and orphans of those whom +in life he held dearest. In terms that might well move +a harder-hearted man than young Esmond's confidant—for, +indeed, the speaker's own heart was half broke as he uttered +them; he described a part of what had taken place in that +only sad interview which his mistress had granted him; +how she had left him with anger and almost imprecation, +whose words and thoughts until then had been only blessing +and kindness; how she had accused him of the guilt of that +blood, in exchange for which he would cheerfully have +sacrificed his own (indeed, in this the Lord Mohun, the +Lord Warwick, and all the gentlemen engaged, as well as +the common rumour out of doors—Steele told him—bore +out the luckless young man); and with all his heart, and +tears, he besought Mr. Steele to inform his mistress of her +kinsman's unhappiness, and to deprecate that cruel anger +she showed him. Half frantic with grief at the injustice +done him, and contrasting it with a thousand soft recollections +of love and confidence gone by, that made his present +misery inexpressibly more bitter, the poor wretch passed +many a lonely day and wakeful night in a kind of powerless +despair and rage against his iniquitous fortune. It was +the softest hand that struck him, the gentlest and most +compassionate nature that persecuted him. <span class="tei tei-q">“I would as +lief,”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“have pleaded guilty to the murder, and +have suffered for it like any other felon, as have to endure +the torture to which my mistress subjects me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Although the recital of Esmond's story, and his passionate +appeals and remonstrances, drew so many tears from Dick +who heard them, they had no effect upon the person whom +they were designed to move. Esmond's ambassador came +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page178">[pg 178]</span><a name="Pg178" id="Pg178" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +back from the mission with which the poor young gentleman +had charged him, with a sad blank face and a shake of the +head, which told that there was no hope for the prisoner; +and scarce a wretched culprit in that prison of Newgate +ordered for execution, and trembling for a reprieve, felt +more cast down than Mr. Esmond, innocent and condemned. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As had been arranged between the prisoner and his +counsel in their consultations, Mr. Steele had gone to the +dowager's house in Chelsey, where it has been said the +widow and her orphans were, had seen my lady viscountess +and pleaded the cause of her unfortunate kinsman. <span class="tei tei-q">“And +I think I spoke well, my poor boy,”</span> says Mr. Steele; <span class="tei tei-q">“for +who would not speak well in such a cause, and before so +beautiful a judge? I did not see the lovely Beatrix (sure +her famous namesake of Florence was never half so beautiful), +only the young viscount was in the room with the Lord +Churchill, my Lord of Marlborough's eldest son. But these +young gentlemen went off to the garden, I could see them +from the window tilting at each other with poles in a mimic +tournament (grief touches the young but lightly, and I +remember that I beat a drum at the coffin of my own father). +My lady viscountess looked out at the two boys at their +game, and said—<span class="tei tei-q">‘You see, sir, children are taught to use +weapons of death as toys, and to make a sport of murder’</span>; +and as she spoke she looked so lovely, and stood there in +herself so sad and beautiful an instance of that doctrine +whereof I am a humble preacher, that had I not dedicated +my little volume of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Christian Hero</span></span> (I perceive, Harry, +thou hast not cut the leaves of it. The sermon is good, +believe me, though the preacher's life may not answer it)—I +say, hadn't I dedicated the volume to Lord Cutts, I would +have asked permission to place her ladyship's name on the +first page. I think I never saw such a beautiful violet +as that of her eyes, Harry. Her complexion is of the pink +of the blush-rose, she hath an exquisite turned wrist and +dimpled hand, and I make no doubt——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Did you come to tell me about the dimples on my lady's +hand?”</span> broke out Mr. Esmond, sadly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A lovely creature in affliction seems always doubly +beautiful to me,”</span> says the poor captain, who indeed was +but too often in a state to see double, and so checked he +resumed the interrupted thread of his story. <span class="tei tei-q">“As I spoke +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page179">[pg 179]</span><a name="Pg179" id="Pg179" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +my business,”</span> Mr. Steele said, <span class="tei tei-q">“and narrated to your +mistress what all the world knows, and the other side hath +been eager to acknowledge—that you had tried to put +yourself between the two lords, and to take your patron's +quarrel on your own point; I recounted the general praises +of your gallantry, besides my Lord Mohun's particular +testimony to it; I thought the widow listened with some +interest, and her eyes—I have never seen such a violet, +Harry—looked up at mine once or twice. But after +I had spoken on this theme for a while she suddenly broke +away with a cry of grief. <span class="tei tei-q">‘I would to God, sir,’</span> she +said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I had never heard that word gallantry which +you use, or known the meaning of it. My lord might +have been here but for that; my home might be happy; +my poor boy have a father. It was what you gentlemen +call gallantry came into my home, and drove my +husband on to the cruel sword that killed him. You +should not speak the word to a Christian woman, sir—a +poor widowed mother of orphans, whose home was +happy until the world came into it—the wicked godless +world, that takes the blood of the innocent, and lets the +guilty go free.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As the afflicted lady spoke in this strain, sir,”</span> Mr. Steele +continued, <span class="tei tei-q">“it seemed as if indignation moved her, even +more than grief. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Compensation!’</span> she went on passionately, +her cheeks and eyes kindling; <span class="tei tei-q">‘what compensation +does your world give the widow for her husband, and the +children for the murderer of their father? The wretch +who did the deed has not even a punishment. Conscience! +what conscience has he, who can enter the house of a friend, +whisper falsehood and insult to a woman that never harmed +him, and stab the kind heart that trusted him? My lord—my +Lord Wretch, my Lord Villain's, my Lord Murderer's +peers meet to try him, and they dismiss him with a word +or two of reproof, and send him into the world again, to +pursue women with lust and falsehood, and to murder +unsuspecting guests that harbour him. That day, my +lord—my Lord Murderer—(I will never name him)—was +let loose, a woman was executed at Tyburn for stealing in +a shop. But a man may rob another of his life, or a lady +of her honour, and shall pay no penalty! I take my +child, run to the throne, and on my knees ask for justice, +and the king refuses me. The king! he is no king of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page180">[pg 180]</span><a name="Pg180" id="Pg180" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +mine—he never shall be. He, too, robbed the throne from +the king his father—the true king—and he has gone +unpunished, as the great do.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I then thought to speak for you,”</span> Mr. Steele continued, +<span class="tei tei-q">“and I interposed by saying, <span class="tei tei-q">‘There was one, madam, +who, at least, would have put his own breast between your +husband's and my Lord Mohun's sword. Your poor young +kinsman, Harry Esmond, hath told me that he tried to +draw the quarrel on himself.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Are you come from <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">him</span></em>?’</span> asked the lady”</span> (so Mr. +Steele went on), <span class="tei tei-q">“rising up with a great severity and stateliness. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘I thought you had come from the princess. I saw +Mr. Esmond in his prison, and bade him farewell. He +brought misery into my house. He never should have +entered it.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Madam, madam, he is not to blame,’</span> I interposed,”</span> +continued Mr. Steele. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Do I blame him to you, sir?’</span> asked the widow. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘If 'tis he who sent you, say that I have taken counsel, +where’</span>—she spoke with a very pallid cheek now, and +a break in her voice—<span class="tei tei-q">‘where all who ask may have it;—and +that it bids me to part from him, and to see him no +more. We met in the prison for the last time—at least +for years to come. It may be, in years hence, when—when +our knees and our tears and our contrition have +changed our sinful hearts, sir, and wrought our pardon, +we may meet again—but not now. After what has passed, +I could not bear to see him. I wish him well, sir; but +I wish him farewell, too; and if he has that—that regard +towards us which he speaks of, I beseech him to prove it +by obeying me in this.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘I shall break the young man's heart, madam, by this +hard sentence,’</span> ”</span> Mr. Steele said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The lady shook her head,”</span> continued my kind scholar. +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘The hearts of young men, Mr. Steele, are not so made,’</span> +she said. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Mr. Esmond will find other—other friends. +The mistress of this house has relented very much towards +the late lord's son,’</span> she added, with a blush, <span class="tei tei-q">‘and has +promised me, that is, has promised that she will care for +his fortune. Whilst I live in it, after the horrid, horrid +deed which has passed, Castlewood must never be a home +to him—never. Nor would I have him write to me—except—no—I +would have him never write to me, nor see +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page181">[pg 181]</span><a name="Pg181" id="Pg181" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +him more. Give him, if you will, my parting—Hush! not +a word of this before my daughter.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Here the fair Beatrix entered from the river, with her +cheeks flushing with health, and looking only the more +lovely and fresh for the mourning habiliments which she +wore. And my lady viscountess said—</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Beatrix, this is Mr. Steele, gentleman-usher to the +prince's highness. When does your new comedy appear, +Mr. Steele?’</span> I hope thou wilt be out of prison for the +first night, Harry.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The sentimental captain concluded his sad tale, saying, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Faith, the beauty of <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Filia +pulcrior</span></span> drove <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">pulcram matrem</span></span> +out of my head; and yet as I came down the river, and +thought about the pair, the pallid dignity and exquisite +grace of the matron had the uppermost, and I thought her +even more noble than the virgin!”</span> +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The party of prisoners lived very well in Newgate, and +with comforts very different to those which were awarded +to the poor wretches there (his insensibility to their misery, +their gaiety still more frightful, their curses and blasphemy, +hath struck with a kind of shame since—as proving how +selfish, during his imprisonment, his own particular grief +was, and how entirely the thoughts of it absorbed him): +if the three gentlemen lived well under the care of the +warden of Newgate, it was because they paid well: and +indeed the cost at the dearest ordinary or the grandest +tavern in London could not have furnished a longer reckoning, +than our host of the <span class="tei tei-q">“Handcuff Inn”</span>—as Colonel Westbury +called it. Our rooms were the three in the gate over +Newgate—on the second story looking up Newgate Street +towards Cheapside and Paul's Church. And we had leave +to walk on the roof, and could see thence Smithfield and +the Bluecoat Boys' School, Gardens, and the Chartreux, +where, as Harry Esmond remembered, Dick the Scholar, +and his friend Tom Tusher, had had their schooling. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry could never have paid his share of that prodigious +heavy reckoning which my landlord brought to his guests +once a week: for he had but three pieces in his pockets +that fatal night before the duel, when the gentlemen were +at cards, and offered to play five. But whilst he was yet +ill at the Gatehouse, after Lady Castlewood had visited +him there, and before his trial, there came one in an orange-tawny +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page182">[pg 182]</span><a name="Pg182" id="Pg182" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +coat and blue lace, the livery which the Esmonds +always wore, and brought a sealed packet for Mr. Esmond, +which contained twenty guineas, and a note saying that +a counsel had been appointed for him, and that more +money would be forthcoming whenever he needed it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas a queer letter from the scholar as she was, or as +she called herself: the Dowager Viscountess Castlewood, +written in the strange barbarous French which she and +many other fine ladies of that time—witness Her Grace of +Portsmouth—employed. Indeed, spelling was not an +article of general commodity in the world then, and my +Lord Marlborough's letters can show that he, for one, had +but a little share of this part of grammar. +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +Mong Coussin (my lady viscountess dowager wrote), je scay +que vous vous etes bravement batew et grievement bléssay—du +costé de feu M. le Vicomte. M. le Compte de Varique ne se playt +qua parlay de vous: M. de Moon auçy. Il di que vous avay voulew +vous bastre avecque luy—que vous estes plus fort que luy sur +l'ayscrimme—quil'y a surtout certaine Botte que vous scavay quil +n'a jammay sceu pariay: et que c'en eut été fay de luy si vouseluy +vous vous fussiay battews ansamb. Aincy ce pauv Vicompte est +mort. Mort et peutayt—Mon coussin, mon coussin! jay dans la +tayste que vous n'estes quung pety Monst—angcy que les Esmonds +ong tousjours esté. La veuve est chay moy. J'ay recuilly cet' +pauve famme. Elle est furieuse cont vous, allans tous les jours +chercher le Roy (d'icy) démandant à gran cri revanche pour son +Mary. Elle ne veux voyre ni entende parlay de vous: pourtant elle +ne fay qu'en parlay milfoy par jour. Quand vous seray hor prison +venay me voyre. J'auray soing de vous. Si cette petite Prude veut +se défaire de song pety Monste (Hélas je craing qùil ne soy trotar!) +je m'en chargeray. J'ay encor quelqu interay et quelques escus de +costay. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +La Veuve se raccommode avec Miladi Marlboro qui est tout +puiçante avecque la Reine Anne. Cet dam sentéraysent pour la +petite prude; qui pourctant a un fi du mesme asge que vous savay. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +En sortant de prisong venez icy. Je ne puy vous recevoir chay-moy +à cause des méchansetés du monde, may pre du moy vous +aurez logement. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-variant: small-caps">Isabelle Vicomptesse d'Esmond.</span></span> +</p> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Marchioness of Esmond this lady sometimes called herself, +in virtue of that patent which had been given by the +late King James to Harry Esmond's father; and in this +state she had her train carried by a knight's wife, a cup +and cover of assay to drink from, and fringed cloth. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He who was of the same age as little Francis, whom we +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page183">[pg 183]</span><a name="Pg183" id="Pg183" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +shall henceforth call Viscount Castlewood here, was H.R.H. +the Prince of Wales, born in the same year and month with +Frank, and just proclaimed at St. Germains, King of Great +Britain, France, and Ireland. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc45" id="toc45"></a> +<a name="pdf46" id="pdf46"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter III. I Take The Queen's Pay In Quin's Regiment</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The fellow in the orange-tawny livery with blue lace +and facings was in waiting when Esmond came out of +prison, and, taking the young gentleman's slender baggage, +led the way out of that odious Newgate, and by Fleet +Conduit, down to the Thames, where a pair of oars was +called, and they went up the river to Chelsea. Esmond +thought the sun had never shone so bright; nor the air +felt so fresh and exhilarating. Temple Garden, as they +rowed by, looked like the garden of Eden to him, and the +aspect of the quays, wharves, and buildings by the river, +Somerset House, and Westminster (where the splendid +new bridge was just beginning), Lambeth tower and palace, +and that busy shining scene of the Thames swarming with +boats and barges, filled his heart with pleasure and cheerfulness—as +well such a beautiful scene might to one who had +been a prisoner so long, and with so many dark thoughts +deepening the gloom of his captivity. They rowed up at +length to the pretty village of Chelsey, where the nobility +have many handsome country-houses; and so came to +my lady viscountess's house, a cheerful new house in the +row facing the river, with a handsome garden behind it, +and a pleasant look-out both towards Surrey and Kensington, +where stands the noble ancient palace of the Lord +Warwick, Harry's reconciled adversary. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here in her ladyship's saloon, the young man saw again +some of those pictures which had been at Castlewood, and +which she had removed thence on the death of her lord, +Harry's father. Specially, and in the place of honour, +was Sir Peter Lely's picture of the Honourable Mistress +Isabella Esmond as Diana, in yellow satin, with a bow +in her hand and a crescent in her forehead; and dogs +frisking about her. 'Twas painted about the time when +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page184">[pg 184]</span><a name="Pg184" id="Pg184" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +royal Endymions were said to find favour with this virgin +huntress; and, as goddesses have youth perpetual, this +one believed to the day of her death that she never grew +older: and always persisted in supposing the picture was +still like her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After he had been shown to her room by the groom of +the chamber, who filled many offices besides in her ladyship's +modest household; and after a proper interval, his +elderly goddess Diana vouchsafed to appear to the young +man. A blackamoor in a Turkish habit, with red boots +and a silver collar, on which the viscountess's arms were +engraven, preceded her and bore her cushion; then came +her gentlewoman; a little pack of spaniels barking and +frisking about preceded the austere huntress—then, behold, +the viscountess herself <span class="tei tei-q">“dropping odours”</span>. Esmond recollected +from his childhood that rich aroma of musk which +his mother-in-law (for she may be called so) exhaled. As +the sky grows redder and redder towards sunset, so, in the +decline of her years, the cheeks of my lady dowager blushed +more deeply. Her face was illuminated with vermilion, which +appeared the brighter from the white paint employed to +set it off. She wore the ringlets which had been in fashion +in King Charles's time; whereas the ladies of King William's +had head-dresses like the towers of Cybele. Her eyes +gleamed out from the midst of this queer structure of +paint, dyes, and pomatums. Such was my lady viscountess, +Mr. Esmond's father's widow. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He made her such a profound bow as her dignity and +relationship merited: and advanced with the greatest +gravity, and once more kissed that hand, upon the trembling +knuckles of which glittered a score of rings—remembering +old times when that trembling hand made him tremble. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Marchioness,”</span> says he, bowing, and on one knee, <span class="tei tei-q">“is it only +the hand I may have the honour of saluting?”</span> For, +accompanying that inward laughter, which the sight of +such an astonishing old figure might well produce in the +young man, there was goodwill too, and the kindness of +consanguinity. She had been his father's wife, and was his +grandfather's daughter. She had suffered him in old days, +and was kind to him now after her fashion. And now +that bar-sinister was removed from Esmond's thought, and +that secret opprobrium no longer cast upon his mind, he +was pleased to feel family ties and own them—perhaps +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page185">[pg 185]</span><a name="Pg185" id="Pg185" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +secretly vain of the sacrifice he had made, and to think +that he, Esmond, was really the chief of his house, and only +prevented by his own magnanimity from advancing his +claim. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At least, ever since he had learned that secret from his +poor patron on his dying bed, actually as he was standing +beside it, he had felt an independency which he had never +known before, and which since did not desert him. So he +called his old aunt marchioness, but with an air as if he +was the Marquis of Esmond who so addressed her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Did she read in the young gentleman's eyes, which had +now no fear of hers or their superannuated authority, that +he knew or suspected the truth about his birth? She gave +a start of surprise at his altered manner: indeed, it was +quite a different bearing to that of the Cambridge student +who had paid her a visit two years since, and whom she +had dismissed with five pieces sent by the groom of the +chamber. She eyed him, then trembled a little more than +was her wont, perhaps, and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Welcome, cousin”</span>, in +a frightened voice. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His resolution, as has been said before, had been quite +different, namely, so to bear himself through life as if the +secret of his birth was not known to him; but he suddenly +and rightly determined on a different course. He asked +that her ladyship's attendants should be dismissed, and +when they were private—<span class="tei tei-q">“Welcome, nephew, at least, +madam, it should be,”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“A great wrong has been +done to me and to you, and to my poor mother, who is +no more.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I declare before Heaven that I was guiltless of it,”</span> she +cried out, giving up her cause at once. <span class="tei tei-q">“It was your wicked +father who——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who brought this dishonour on our family,”</span> says Mr. +Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“I know it full well. I want to disturb no one. +Those who are in present possession have been my dearest +benefactors, and are quite innocent of intentional wrong +to me. The late lord, my dear patron, knew not the truth +until a few months before his death, when Father Holt +brought the news to him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The wretch! he had it in confession! He had it in +confession!”</span> cried out the dowager lady. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Not so. He learned it elsewhere as well as in confession,”</span> +Mr. Esmond answered. <span class="tei tei-q">“My father, when wounded at the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page186">[pg 186]</span><a name="Pg186" id="Pg186" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Boyne, told the truth to a French priest, who was in hiding +after the battle, as well as to the priest there, at whose +house he died. This gentleman did not think fit to divulge +the story till he met with Mr. Holt at St. Omer's. And +the latter kept it back for his own purpose, and until he +had learned whether my mother was alive or no. She is +dead years since: my poor patron told me with his dying +breath; and I doubt him not. I do not know even whether +I could prove a marriage. I would not if I could. I do +not care to bring shame on our name, or grief upon those +whom I love, however hardly they may use me. My father's +son, madam, won't aggravate the wrong my father did you. +Continue to be his widow, and give me your kindness. +'Tis all I ask from you; and I shall never speak of this +matter again.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Mais vous êtes +un noble jeune homme!</span></span>”</span> breaks out my +lady, speaking, as usual with her when she was agitated, +in the French language. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Noblesse oblige</span></span>,”</span> +says Mr. Esmond, making her a low +bow. <span class="tei tei-q">“There are those alive to whom, in return for their +love to me, I often fondly said I would give my life away. +Shall I be their enemy now, and quarrel about a title? +What matters who has it? 'Tis with the family still.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What can there be in that little prude of a woman, that +makes men so <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">raffoler</span></span> about her?”</span> cries out my lady +dowager. <span class="tei tei-q">“She was here for a month petitioning the +king. She is pretty, and well conserved; but she has not +the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">bel air</span></span>. In his late Majesty's Court all the men +pretended to admire her; and she was no better than a little wax +doll. She is better now, and looks the sister of her daughter: +but what mean you all by bepraising her? Mr. Steele, +who was in waiting on Prince George, seeing her with her +two children going to Kensington, writ a poem about her; +and says he shall wear her colours, and dress in black for +the future. Mr. Congreve says he will write a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mourning +Widow</span></span>, that shall be better than his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mourning Bride</span></span>. +Though their husbands quarrelled and fought when that +wretch Churchill deserted the king (for which he deserved +to be hung), Lady Marlborough has again gone wild about +the little widow; insulted me in my own drawing-room, by +saying that 'twas not the <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">old</span></em> widow, but the young viscountess, +she had come to see. Little Castlewood and little +Lord Churchill are to be sworn friends, and have boxed +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page187">[pg 187]</span><a name="Pg187" id="Pg187" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +each other twice or thrice like brothers already. 'Twas +that wicked young Mohun who, coming back from the +provinces last year, where he had disinterred her, raved +about her all the winter; said she was a pearl set before +swine; and killed poor stupid Frank. The quarrel was +all about his wife. I know 'twas all about her. Was there +anything between her and Mohun, nephew? Tell me now; +was there anything? About yourself, I do not ask you +to answer questions.”</span> Mr. Esmond blushed up. <span class="tei tei-q">“My +lady's virtue is like that of a saint in heaven, madam,”</span> he +cried out. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Eh!—<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">mon neveu</span></span>. Many saints get to Heaven after +having a deal to repent of. I believe you are like all the +rest of the fools, and madly in love with her.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, I loved and honoured her before all the world,”</span> +Esmond answered. <span class="tei tei-q">“I take no shame in that.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And she has shut her door on you—given the living to +that horrid young cub, son of that horrid old bear, Tusher, +and says she will never see you more. +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Monsieur mon neveu</span></span>—we +are all like that. When I was a young woman, I'm +positive that a thousand duels were fought about me. And +when poor Monsieur de Souchy drowned himself in the +canal at Bruges because I danced with Count Springbock, +I couldn't squeeze out a single tear, but danced till five +o'clock the next morning. 'Twas the count—no, 'twas my +Lord Ormonde that paid the fiddles, and his Majesty did +me the honour of dancing all night with me.—How you are +grown! You have got the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">bel air</span></span>. You are a black man. +Our Esmonds are all black. The little prude's son is fair; so +was his father—fair and stupid. You were an ugly little +wretch when you came to Castlewood—you were all eyes, +like a young crow. We intended you should be a priest. +That awful Father Holt—how he used to frighten me when +I was ill! I have a comfortable director now—the Abbé +Douillette—a dear man. We make meagre on Fridays +always. My cook is a devout pious man. You, of course, +are of the right way of thinking. They say the Prince +of Orange is very ill indeed.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In this way the old dowager rattled on remorselessly to +Mr. Esmond, who was quite astounded with her present +volubility, contrasting it with her former haughty behaviour +to him. But she had taken him into favour for the moment, +and chose not only to like him, as far as her nature permitted, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page188">[pg 188]</span><a name="Pg188" id="Pg188" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +but to be afraid of him; and he found himself to be as +familiar with her now as a young man, as when a boy, +he had been timorous and silent. She was as good as her +word respecting him. She introduced him to her company, +of which she entertained a good deal—of the adherents of +King James of course—and a great deal of loud intriguing +took place over her card-tables. She presented Mr. Esmond +as her kinsman to many persons of honour; she supplied +him not illiberally with money, which he had no scruple +in accepting from her, considering the relationship which +he bore to her, and the sacrifices which he himself was +making in behalf of the family. But he had made up his +mind to continue at no woman's apron-strings longer; and +perhaps had cast about how he should distinguish himself, +and make himself a name, which his singular fortune had +denied him. A discontent with his former bookish life and +quietude,—a bitter feeling of revolt at that slavery in which +he had chosen to confine himself for the sake of those whose +hardness towards him made his heart bleed,—a restless wish +to see men and the world,—led him to think of the military +profession: at any rate, to desire to see a few campaigns, +and accordingly he pressed his new patroness to get him +a pair of colours; and one day had the honour of finding +himself appointed an ensign in Colonel Quin's regiment of +Fusiliers on the Irish establishment. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond's commission was scarce three weeks old +when that accident befell King William which ended the +life of the greatest, the wisest, the bravest, and most clement +sovereign whom England ever knew. 'Twas the fashion +of the hostile party to assail this great prince's reputation +during his life; but the joy which they and all his enemies +in Europe showed at his death, is a proof of the terror in +which they held him. Young as Esmond was, he was wise +enough (and generous enough too, let it be said) to scorn +that indecency of gratulation which broke out amongst the +followers of King James in London, upon the death of this +illustrious prince, this invincible warrior, this wise and +moderate statesman. Loyalty to the exiled king's family +was traditional, as has been said, in that house to which +Mr. Esmond belonged. His father's widow had all her +hopes, sympathies, recollections, prejudices, engaged on +King James's side; and was certainly as noisy a conspirator +as ever asserted the king's rights, or abused his opponent's, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page189">[pg 189]</span><a name="Pg189" id="Pg189" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +over a quadrille table or a dish of bohea. Her ladyship's +house swarmed with ecclesiastics, in disguise and out; with +tale-bearers from St. Germains; and quidnuncs that knew +the last news from Versailles; nay, the exact force and +number of the next expedition which the French king was +to send from Dunkirk, and which was to swallow up the +Prince of Orange, his army, and his Court. She had +received the Duke of Berwick when he landed here in '96. +She kept the glass he drank from, vowing she never would +use it till she drank King James the Third's health in it +on his Majesty's return; she had tokens from the queen, +and relics of the saint who, if the story was true, had not +always been a saint as far as she and many others were concerned. +She believed in the miracles wrought at his tomb, +and had a hundred authentic stories of wondrous cures +effected by the blessed king's rosaries, the medals which he +wore, the locks of his hair, or what not. Esmond remembered +a score of marvellous tales which the credulous old woman +told him. There was the Bishop of Autun, that was healed +of a malady he had for forty years, and which left him +after he said mass for the repose of the king's soul. There +was Monsieur Marais, a surgeon in Auvergne, who had a +palsy in both his legs, which was cured through the king's +intercession. There was Philip Pitet, of the Benedictines, +who had a suffocating cough, which wellnigh killed him, but +he besought relief of Heaven through the merits and intercession +of the blessed king, and he straightway felt a profuse +sweat breaking out all over him, and was recovered perfectly. +And there was the wife of Monsieur Lepervier, dancing-master +to the Duke of Saxe-Gotha, who was entirely eased +of a rheumatism by the king's intercession, of which miracle +there could be no doubt, for her surgeon and his apprentice +had given their testimony, under oath, that they did not +in any way contribute to the cure. Of these tales, and +a thousand like them, Mr. Esmond believed as much as +he chose. His kinswoman's greater faith had swallow for +them all. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The English High Church party did not adopt these +legends. But truth and honour, as they thought, bound +them to the exiled king's side; nor had the banished +family any warmer supporter than that kind lady of Castlewood, +in whose house Esmond was brought up. She influenced +her husband, very much more perhaps than my +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page190">[pg 190]</span><a name="Pg190" id="Pg190" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lord knew, who admired his wife prodigiously though he +might be inconstant to her, and who, adverse to the trouble +of thinking himself, gladly enough adopted the opinions +which she chose for him. To one of her simple and faithful +heart, allegiance to any sovereign but the one was impossible. +To serve King William for interest's sake would have been +a monstrous hypocrisy and treason. Her pure conscience +could no more have consented to it than to a theft, a forgery, +or any other base action. Lord Castlewood might have +been won over, no doubt, but his wife never could: and +he submitted his conscience to hers in this case as he did +in most others, when he was not tempted too sorely. And +it was from his affection and gratitude most likely, and +from that eager devotion for his mistress, which characterized +all Esmond's youth, that the young man subscribed +to this, and other articles of faith, which his fond benefactress +set him. Had she been a Whig, he had been one; +had she followed Mr. Fox, and turned Quaker, no doubt +he would have abjured ruffles and a periwig, and have +forsworn swords, lace coats, and clocked stockings. In +the scholars' boyish disputes at the University, where +parties ran very high, Esmond was noted as a Jacobite, +and very likely from vanity as much as affection took the +side of his family. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Almost the whole of the clergy of the country and more +than a half of the nation were on this side. Ours is the +most loyal people in the world surely; we admire our +kings, and are faithful to them long after they have ceased +to be true to us. 'Tis a wonder to any one who looks back +at the history of the Stuart family to think how they kicked +their crowns away from them; how they flung away chances +after chances; what treasures of loyalty they dissipated, +and how fatally they were bent on consummating their +own ruin. If ever men had fidelity, 'twas they; if ever +men squandered opportunity, 'twas they; and, of all the +enemies they had, they themselves were the most fatal.<a id="noteref_8" name="noteref_8" href="#note_8"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">8</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the Princess Anne succeeded, the wearied nation +was glad enough to cry a truce from all these wars, controversies, +and conspiracies, and to accept in the person of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page191">[pg 191]</span><a name="Pg191" id="Pg191" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a princess of the blood royal a compromise between the +parties into which the country was divided. The Tories +could serve under her with easy consciences; though a +Tory herself, she represented the triumph of the Whig +opinion. The people of England, always liking that their +princes should be attached to their own families, were +pleased to think the princess was faithful to hers; and up +to the very last day and hour of her reign, and but for that +fatality which he inherited from his fathers along with their +claims to the English crown, King James the Third might +have worn it. But he neither knew how to wait an opportunity, +nor to use it when he had it; he was venturesome +when he ought to have been cautious, and cautious when +he ought to have dared everything. 'Tis with a sort of +rage at his inaptitude that one thinks of his melancholy +story. Do the Fates deal more specially with kings than +with common men? One is apt to imagine so, in considering +the history of that royal race, in whose behalf so much +fidelity, so much valour, so much blood were desperately +and bootlessly expended. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The king dead then, the Princess Anne (ugly Anne Hyde's +daughter, our dowager at Chelsey called her) was proclaimed +by trumpeting heralds all over the town from +Westminster to Ludgate Hill, amidst immense jubilations +of the people. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Next week my Lord Marlborough was promoted to the +Garter, and to be captain-general of her Majesty's forces +at home and abroad. This appointment only inflamed the +dowager's rage, or, as she thought it, her fidelity to her +rightful sovereign. <span class="tei tei-q">“The princess is but a puppet in the +hands of that fury of a woman, who comes into my drawing-room +and insults me to my face. What can come to a +country that is given over to such a woman?”</span> says the +dowager: <span class="tei tei-q">“As for that double-faced traitor, my Lord +Marlborough, he has betrayed every man and every woman +with whom he has had to deal, except his horrid wife, +who makes him tremble. 'Tis all over with the country +when it has got into the clutches of such wretches as these.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's old kinswoman saluted the new powers in this +way; but some good fortune at least occurred to a family +which stood in great need of it, by the advancement of +these famous personages who benefited humbler people that +had the luck of being in their favour. Before Mr. Esmond +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page192">[pg 192]</span><a name="Pg192" id="Pg192" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +left England in the month of August, and being then at +Portsmouth, where he had joined his regiment, and was +busy at drill, learning the practice and mysteries of the +musket and pike, he heard that a pension on the Stamp +Office had been got for his late beloved mistress, and that +the young Mistress Beatrix was also to be taken into Court. +So much good, at least, had come of the poor widow's visit +to London, not revenge upon her husband's enemies, but +reconcilement to old friends, who pitied, and seemed inclined +to serve her. As for the comrades in prison and the late +misfortune; Colonel Westbury was with the captain-general +gone to Holland; Captain Macartney was now at Portsmouth, +with his regiment of Fusiliers and the force under command +of his grace the Duke of Ormonde, bound for Spain it was +said; my Lord Warwick was returned home; and Lord +Mohun, so far from being punished for the homicide which +had brought so much grief and change into the Esmond +family, was gone in company of my Lord Macclesfield's +splendid embassy to the Elector of Hanover, carrying the +Garter to his highness, and a complimentary letter from the +queen. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc47" id="toc47"></a> +<a name="pdf48" id="pdf48"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter IV. Recapitulations</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From such fitful lights as could be cast upon his dark +history by the broken narrative of his poor patron, torn +by remorse and struggling in the last pangs of dissolution, +Mr. Esmond had been made to understand so far, that his +mother was long since dead; and so there could be no +question as regarded her or her honour, tarnished by her +husband's desertion and injury, to influence her son in any +steps which he might take either for prosecuting or relinquishing +his own just claims. It appeared from my poor +lord's hurried confession, that he had been made acquainted +with the real facts of the case only two years since, when +Mr. Holt visited him, and would have implicated him in +one of those many conspiracies by which the secret leaders +of King James's party in this country were ever endeavouring +to destroy the Prince of Orange's life or power; conspiracies +so like murder, so cowardly in the means used, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page193">[pg 193]</span><a name="Pg193" id="Pg193" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +so wicked in the end, that our nation has sure done well +in throwing off all allegiance and fidelity to the unhappy +family that could not vindicate its right except by such +treachery—by such dark intrigue and base agents. There +were designs against King William that were no more +honourable than the ambushes of cut-throats and footpads. +'Tis humiliating to think that a great prince, possessor of +a great and sacred right, and upholder of a great cause, +should have stooped to such baseness of assassination and +treasons as are proved by the unfortunate King James's +own warrant and sign-manual given to his supporters in +this country. What he and they called levying war was, +in truth, no better than instigating murder. The noble +Prince of Orange burst magnanimously through those feeble +meshes of conspiracy in which his enemies tried to envelop +him: it seemed as if their cowardly daggers broke upon +the breast of his undaunted resolution. After King James's +death, the queen and her people at St. Germains—priests +and women for the most part—continued their intrigues in +behalf of the young prince, James the Third, as he was +called in France and by his party here (this prince, or +Chevalier de St. George, was born in the same year with +Esmond's young pupil Frank, my lord viscount's son): and +the prince's affairs, being in the hands of priests and women, +were conducted as priests and women will conduct them, +artfully, cruelly, feebly, and to a certain bad issue. The +moral of the Jesuit's story I think as wholesome a one as +ever was writ: the artfullest, the wisest, the most toilsome, +and dexterous plot-builders in the world—there always +comes a day when the roused public indignation kicks their +flimsy edifice down, and sends its cowardly enemies a-flying. +Mr. Swift hath finely described that passion for intrigue, +that love of secrecy, slander, and lying, which belongs to +weak people, hangers-on of weak courts. 'Tis the nature +of such to hate and envy the strong, and conspire their +ruin; and the conspiracy succeeds very well, and everything +presages the satisfactory overthrow of the great +victim; until one day Gulliver rouses himself, shakes off +the little vermin of an enemy, and walks away unmolested. +Ah! the Irish soldiers might well say after the Boyne, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Change kings with us, and we will fight it over again.”</span> +Indeed, the fight was not fair between the two. 'Twas +a weak priest-ridden, woman-ridden man, with such puny +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page194">[pg 194]</span><a name="Pg194" id="Pg194" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +allies and weapons as his own poor nature led him to choose, +contending against the schemes, the generalship, the wisdom, +and the heart of a hero. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On one of these many coward's errands, then (for, as +I view them now, I can call them no less), Mr. Holt had +come to my lord at Castlewood, proposing some infallible +plan for the Prince of Orange's destruction, in which my +lord viscount, loyalist as he was, had indignantly refused +to join. As far as Mr. Esmond could gather from his dying +words, Holt came to my lord with a plan of insurrection, +and offer of the renewal, in his person, of that marquis's +title which King James had conferred on the preceding +viscount; and on refusal of this bribe, a threat was made, +on Holt's part, to upset my lord viscount's claim to his +estate and title of Castlewood altogether. To back this +astounding piece of intelligence, of which Henry Esmond's +patron now had the first light, Holt came armed with the +late lord's dying declaration, after the affair of the Boyne, +at Trim, in Ireland, made both to the Irish priest and a +French ecclesiastic of Holt's order, that was with King +James's army. Holt showed, or pretended to show, the +marriage certificate of the late Viscount Esmond with my +mother, in the city of Brussels, in the year 1677, when the +viscount, then Thomas Esmond, was serving with the +English army in Flanders; he could show, he said, that +this Gertrude, deserted by her husband long since, was +alive, and a professed nun in the year 1685, at Brussels, +in which year Thomas Esmond married his uncle's daughter, +Isabella, now called Viscountess Dowager of Castlewood; +and leaving him, for twelve hours, to consider this astounding +news (so the poor dying lord said), disappeared with +his papers in the mysterious way in which he came. Esmond +knew how, well enough: by that window from which he +had seen the father issue:—but there was no need to explain +to my poor lord, only to gather from his parting lips the +words which he would soon be able to utter no more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Ere the twelve hours were over, Holt himself was a +prisoner, implicated in Sir John Fenwick's conspiracy, and +locked up at Hexton first, whence he was transferred to the +Tower; leaving the poor lord viscount, who was not aware +of the others being taken, in daily apprehension of his return, +when (as my Lord Castlewood declared, calling God to +witness, and with tears in his dying eyes) it had been his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page195">[pg 195]</span><a name="Pg195" id="Pg195" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +intention at once to give up his estate and his title to their +proper owner, and to retire to his own house at Walcote +with his family. <span class="tei tei-q">“And would to God I had done it,”</span> the poor +lord said; <span class="tei tei-q">“I would not be here now, wounded to death, a +miserable, stricken man!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord waited day after day, and, as may be supposed, +no messenger came; but at a month's end Holt got means +to convey to him a message out of the Tower, which was +to this effect: that he should consider all unsaid that had +been said, and that things were as they were. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I had a sore temptation,”</span> said my poor lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“Since +I had come into this cursed title of Castlewood, which hath +never prospered with me, I have spent far more than the +income of that estate and my paternal one, too. I calculated +all my means down to the last shilling, and found +I never could pay you back, my poor Harry, whose fortune +I had had for twelve years. My wife and children must +have gone out of the house dishonoured, and beggars. God +knows, it hath been a miserable one for me and mine. Like +a coward, I clung to that respite which Holt gave me. +I kept the truth from Rachel and you. I tried to win +money of Mohun, and only plunged deeper into debt; +I scarce dared look thee in the face when I saw thee. This +sword hath been hanging over my head these two years. +I swear I felt happy when Mohun's blade entered my side.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After lying ten months in the Tower, Holt, against whom +nothing could be found except that he was a Jesuit priest, +known to be in King James's interest, was put on shipboard +by the incorrigible forgiveness of King William, who promised +him, however, a hanging if ever he should again set foot +on English shore. More than once, whilst he was in prison +himself, Esmond had thought where those papers could be, +which the Jesuit had shown to his patron, and which had +such an interest for himself. They were not found on Mr. +Holt's person when that father was apprehended, for had +such been the case my lords of the council had seen them, +and this family history had long since been made public. +However, Esmond cared not to seek the papers. His resolution +being taken; his poor mother dead; what matter to +him that documents existed proving his right to a title +which he was determined not to claim, and of which he +vowed never to deprive that family which he loved best in +the world? Perhaps he took a greater pride out of his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page196">[pg 196]</span><a name="Pg196" id="Pg196" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +sacrifice than he would have had in those honours which +he was resolved to forgo. Again, as long as these titles +were not forthcoming, Esmond's kinsman, dear young +Francis, was the honourable and undisputed owner of the +Castlewood estate and title. The mere word of a Jesuit could +not overset Frank's right of occupancy, and so Esmond's +mind felt actually at ease to think the papers were missing, +and in their absence his dear mistress and her son the lawful +lady and lord of Castlewood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Very soon after his liberation, Mr. Esmond made it his +business to ride to that village of Ealing where he had +passed his earliest years in this country, and to see if his +old guardians were still alive and inhabitants of that place. +But the only relic which he found of old Monsieur Pastoureau +was a stone in the churchyard, which told that Athanasius +Pastoureau, a native of Flanders, lay there buried, aged +87 years. The old man's cottage, which Esmond perfectly +recollected, and the garden (where in his childhood he had +passed many hours of play and reverie, and had many +a beating from his termagant of a foster-mother), were now +in the occupation of quite a different family; and it was +with difficulty that he could learn in the village what had +come of Pastoureau's widow and children. The clerk of the +parish recollected her—the old man was scarce altered in +the fourteen years that had passed since last Esmond set +eyes on him. It appeared she had pretty soon consoled +herself after the death of her old husband, whom she ruled +over, by taking a new one younger than herself, who spent +her money and ill-treated her and her children. The girl +died; one of the boys 'listed; the other had gone apprentice. +Old Mr. Rogers, the clerk, said he had heard that +Mrs. Pastoureau was dead too. She and her husband had +left Ealing this seven year; and so Mr. Esmond's hopes +of gaining any information regarding his parentage from +this family, were brought to an end. He gave the old clerk +a crown-piece for his news, smiling to think of the time +when he and his little playfellows had slunk out of the +churchyard, or hidden behind the gravestones, at the +approach of this awful authority. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Who was his mother? What had her name been? +When did she die? Esmond longed to find some one who +could answer these questions to him, and thought even of +putting them to his aunt the viscountess, who had innocently +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page197">[pg 197]</span><a name="Pg197" id="Pg197" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +taken the name which belonged of right to Henry's +mother. But she knew nothing, or chose to know nothing, +on this subject, nor, indeed, could Mr. Esmond press her +much to speak on it. Father Holt was the only man who +could enlighten him, and Esmond felt he must wait until +some fresh chance or new intrigue might put him face to +face with his old friend, or bring that restless indefatigable +spirit back to England again. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The appointment to his ensigncy, and the preparations +necessary for the campaign, presently gave the young gentleman +other matters to think of. His new patroness treated +him very kindly and liberally; she promised to make +interest and pay money, too, to get him a company speedily; +she bade him procure a handsome outfit, both of clothes +and of arms, and was pleased to admire him when he made +his first appearance in his laced scarlet coat, and to permit +him to salute her on the occasion of this interesting investiture. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Red,”</span> says she, tossing up her old head, <span class="tei tei-q">“hath +always been the colour worn by the Esmonds.”</span> And so her +ladyship wore it on her own cheeks very faithfully to the +last. She would have him be dressed, she said, as became +his father's son, and paid cheerfully for his five-pound +beaver, his black buckled periwig, and his fine holland +shirts, and his swords, and his pistols, mounted with silver. +Since the day he was born, poor Harry had never looked +such a fine gentleman: his liberal stepmother filled his +purse with guineas, too, some of which Captain Steele and +a few choice spirits helped Harry to spend in an entertainment +which Dick ordered (and, indeed, would have paid +for, but that he had no money when the reckoning was +called for; nor would the landlord give him any more +credit) at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Garter”</span>, over against the gate of the Palace, +in Pall Mall. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The old viscountess, indeed, if she had done Esmond any +wrong formerly, seemed inclined to repair it by the present +kindness of her behaviour: she embraced him copiously +at parting, wept plentifully, bade him write by every packet, +and gave him an inestimable relic, which she besought him +to wear round his neck—a medal, blessed by I know not +what Pope, and worn by his late sacred Majesty King James. +So Esmond arrived at his regiment with a better equipage +than most young officers could afford. He was older than +most of his seniors, and had a further advantage which +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page198">[pg 198]</span><a name="Pg198" id="Pg198" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +belonged but to very few of the army gentlemen in his day—many +of whom could do little more than write their +names—that he had read much, both at home and at the +University, was master of two or three languages, and had +that further education which neither books nor years will +give, but which some men get from the silent teaching of +adversity. She is a great schoolmistress, as many a poor +fellow knows, that hath held his hand out to her ferule, +and whimpered over his lesson before her awful chair. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc49" id="toc49"></a> +<a name="pdf50" id="pdf50"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter V. I Go On The Vigo Bay Expedition, Taste Salt Water And Smell +Powder</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The first expedition in which Mr. Esmond had the honour +to be engaged, rather resembled one of the invasions projected +by the redoubted Captain Avory or Captain Kid, +than a war between crowned heads, carried on by generals +of rank and honour. On the 1st day of July, 1702, a great +fleet, of a hundred and fifty sail, set sail from Spithead, +under the command of Admiral Shovell, having on board +12,000 troops, with his grace the Duke of Ormond as the +captain-general of the expedition. One of these 12,000 +heroes having never been to sea before, or, at least, only +once in his infancy, when he made the voyage to England +from that unknown country where he was born—one of +those 12,000—the junior ensign of Colonel Quin's regiment +of Fusiliers—was in a quite unheroic state of corporal prostration +a few hours after sailing; and an enemy, had he +boarded the ship, would have had easy work of him. From +Portsmouth we put into Plymouth, and took in fresh reinforcements. +We were off Finisterre on the 31st of July, +so Esmond's table-book informs him; and on the 8th of +August made the rock of Lisbon. By this time the ensign +was grown as bold as an admiral, and a week afterwards +had the fortune to be under fire for the first time—and +under water, too—his boat being swamped in the surf in +Toros Bay, where the troops landed. The ducking of his +new coat was all the harm the young soldier got in this +expedition, for, indeed, the Spaniards made no stand before +our troops, and were not in strength to do so. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page199">[pg 199]</span><a name="Pg199" id="Pg199" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the campaign, if not very glorious, was very pleasant. +New sights of nature, by sea and land—a life of action, +beginning now for the first time—occupied and excited the +young man. The many accidents, and the routine of ship-board—the +military duty—the new acquaintances, both of +his comrades in arms, and of the officers of the fleet—served +to cheer and occupy his mind, and waken it out of +that selfish depression into which his late unhappy fortunes +had plunged him. He felt as if the ocean separated him +from his past care, and welcomed the new era of life which +was dawning for him. Wounds heal rapidly in a heart +of two-and-twenty; hopes revive daily; and courage +rallies, in spite of a man. Perhaps, as Esmond thought of +his late despondency and melancholy, and how irremediable +it had seemed to him, as he lay in his prison a few months +back, he was almost mortified in his secret mind at finding +himself so cheerful. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +To see with one's own eyes men and countries, is better +than reading all the books of travel in the world: and it +was with extreme delight and exultation that the young +man found himself actually on his grand tour, and in the +view of people and cities which he had read about as a boy. +He beheld war for the first time—the pride, pomp, and +circumstance of it, at least, if not much of the danger. He +saw actually, and with his own eyes, those Spanish cavaliers +and ladies whom he had beheld in imagination in that +immortal story of Cervantes, which had been the delight +of his youthful leisure. 'Tis forty years since Mr. Esmond +witnessed those scenes, but they remain as fresh in his +memory as on the day when first he saw them as a young +man. A cloud, as of grief, that had lowered over him, and +had wrapped the last years of his life in gloom, seemed to +clear away from Esmond during this fortunate voyage and +campaign. His energies seemed to awaken and to expand, +under a cheerful sense of freedom. Was his heart secretly +glad to have escaped from that fond but ignoble bondage +at home? Was it that the inferiority to which the idea +of his base birth had compelled him, vanished with the +knowledge of that secret, which though, perforce, kept to +himself, was yet enough to cheer and console him? At +any rate, young Esmond of the army was quite a different +being to the sad little dependant of the kind Castlewood +household, and the melancholy student of Trinity Walks; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page200">[pg 200]</span><a name="Pg200" id="Pg200" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +discontented with his fate, and with the vocation into +which that drove him, and thinking, with a secret indignation, +that the cassock and bands, and the very sacred office +with which he had once proposed to invest himself, were, in +fact, but marks of a servitude which was to continue all his +life long. For, disguise it as he might to himself, he had +all along felt that to be Castlewood's chaplain was to be +Castlewood's inferior still, and that his life was but to be +a long, hopeless servitude. So, indeed, he was far from +grudging his old friend Tom Tusher's good fortune (as Tom, +no doubt, thought it). Had it been a mitre and Lambeth +which his friends offered him, and not a small living and +a country parsonage, he would have felt as much a slave +in one case as in the other, and was quite happy and thankful +to be free. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The bravest man I ever knew in the army, and who had +been present in most of King William's actions, as well as +in the campaigns of the great Duke of Marlborough, could +never be got to tell us of any achievement of his, except +that once Prince Eugene ordered him up a tree to reconnoitre +the enemy, which feat he could not achieve on account of +the horseman's boots he wore; and on another day that +he was very nearly taken prisoner because of these jackboots, +which prevented him from running away. The +present narrator shall imitate this laudable reserve, and +doth not intend to dwell upon his military exploits, which +were in truth not very different from those of a thousand +other gentlemen. This first campaign of Mr. Esmond's +lasted but a few days; and as a score of books have been +written concerning it, it may be dismissed very briefly here. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When our fleet came within view of Cadiz, our commander +sent a boat with a white flag and a couple of officers to the +Governor of Cadiz, Don Scipio de Brancaccio, with a letter +from his grace, in which he hoped that as Don Scipio had +formerly served with the Austrians against the French in +England, 'twas to be hoped that his excellency would now +declare himself against the French king and for the Austrian +in the war between King Philip and King Charles. But his +excellency, Don Scipio, prepared a reply, in which he +announced that, having served his former king with honour +and fidelity, he hoped to exhibit the same loyalty and +devotion towards his present sovereign, King Philip V; +and by the time this letter was ready, the officers who had +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page201">[pg 201]</span><a name="Pg201" id="Pg201" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +been taken to see the town, and the Alameda, and the +theatre, where bull-fights are fought, and the convents, +where the admirable works of Don Bartholomew Murillo +inspired one of them with a great wonder and delight—such +as he had never felt before—concerning this divine +art of painting; and these sights over, and a handsome +refection and chocolate being served to the English gentlemen, +they were accompanied back to their shallop with +every courtesy, and were the only two officers of the English +army that saw at that time that famous city. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The general tried the power of another proclamation on +the Spaniards, in which he announced that we only came +in the interest of Spain and King Charles, and for ourselves +wanted to make no conquest nor settlement in Spain at all. +But all this eloquence was lost upon the Spaniards, it would +seem: the Captain-General of Andalusia would no more +listen to us than the Governor of Cadiz; and in reply to +his grace's proclamation, the Marquis of Villadarias fired +off another, which those who knew the Spanish thought +rather the best of the two; and of this number was Harry +Esmond, whose kind Jesuit in old days had instructed him, +and now had the honour of translating for his grace these +harmless documents of war. There was a hard touch for +his grace, and, indeed, for other generals in her Majesty's +service, in the concluding sentence of the Don: <span class="tei tei-q">“That he +and his council had the generous example of their ancestors +to follow, who had never yet sought their elevation in the +blood or in the flight of their kings. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">Mori pro patria</span></span>’</span> +was his device, which the duke might communicate to the +princess who governed England.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whether the troops were angry at this repartee or no, +'tis certain something put them in a fury; for, not being +able to get possession of Cadiz, our people seized upon +Port St. Mary's and sacked it, burning down the merchants' +storehouses, getting drunk with the famous wines +there, pillaging and robbing quiet houses and convents, +murdering and doing worse. And the only blood which +Mr. Esmond drew in this shameful campaign, was the +knocking down an English sentinel with a half-pike, who +was offering insult to a poor trembling nun. Is she going +to turn out a beauty? or a princess? or perhaps Esmond's +mother that he had lost and never seen? Alas no, it was +but a poor wheezy old dropsical woman, with a wart on +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page202">[pg 202]</span><a name="Pg202" id="Pg202" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +her nose. But having been early taught a part of the +Roman religion, he never had the horror of it that some +Protestants have shown, and seem to think to be a part +of ours. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the pillage and plunder of St. Mary's, and an +assault upon a fort or two, the troops all took shipping, and +finished their expedition, at any rate, more brilliantly +than it had begun. Hearing that the French fleet with +a great treasure was in Vigo Bay, our admirals, Rooke +and Hopson, pursued the enemy thither; the troops +landed and carried the forts that protected the bay, Hopson +passing the boom first on board his ship the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Torbay</span></span>, and +the rest of the ships, English and Dutch, following him. +Twenty ships were burned or taken in the port of Redondilla, +and a vast deal more plunder than was ever accounted +for; but poor men before that expedition were rich afterwards, +and so often was it found and remarked that the +Vigo officers came home with pockets full of money, that +the notorious Jack Shafto, who made such a figure at the +coffee-houses and gaming-tables in London, and gave out +that he had been a soldier at Vigo, owned, when he was +about to be hanged, that Bagshot Heath had been his +Vigo, and that he only spoke of La Redondilla to turn +away people's eyes from the real place where the booty lay. +Indeed, Hounslow or Vigo—which matters much? The +latter was a bad business, though Mr. Addison did sing its +praises in Latin. That honest gentleman's muse had an +eye to the main chance; and I doubt whether she saw +much inspiration in the losing side. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But though Esmond, for his part, got no share of this +fabulous booty, one great prize which he had out of the +campaign was, that excitement of action and change of +scene, which shook off a great deal of his previous melancholy. +He learnt at any rate to bear his fate cheerfully. +He brought back a browned face, a heart resolute enough, +and a little pleasant store of knowledge and observation, +from that expedition, which was over with the autumn, +when the troops were back in England again; and Esmond +giving up his post of secretary to General Lumley, whose +command was over, and parting with that officer with +many kind expressions of goodwill on the general's side, +had leave to go to London, to see if he could push his +fortunes any way further, and found himself once more +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page203">[pg 203]</span><a name="Pg203" id="Pg203" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +in his dowager aunt's comfortable quarters at Chelsey, +and in greater favour than ever with the old lady. He +propitiated her with a present of a comb, a fan, and a black +mantle, such as the ladies of Cadiz wear, and which my +lady viscountess pronounced became her style of beauty +mightily. And she was greatly edified at hearing of that +story of his rescue of the nun, and felt very little doubt +but that her King James's relic, which he had always +dutifully worn in his desk, had kept him out of danger, +and averted the shot of the enemy. My lady made feasts +for him, introduced him to more company, and pushed +his fortunes with such enthusiasm and success, that she +got a promise of a company for him through the Lady +Marlborough's interest, who was graciously pleased to +accept of a diamond worth a couple of hundred guineas, +which Mr. Esmond was enabled to present to her ladyship +through his aunt's bounty, and who promised that she +would take charge of Esmond's fortune. He had the +honour to make his appearance at the queen's drawing-room +occasionally, and to frequent my Lord Marlborough's +levees. That great man received the young one with very +especial favour, so Esmond's comrades said, and deigned to +say that he had received the best reports of Mr. Esmond, +both for courage and ability, whereon you may be sure +the young gentleman made a profound bow, and expressed +himself eager to serve under the most distinguished captain +in the world. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whilst his business was going on thus prosperously, +Esmond had his share of pleasure, too, and made his +appearance along with other young gentlemen at the +coffee-houses, the theatres, and the Mall. He longed to +hear of his dear mistress and her family: many a time, +in the midst of the gaieties and pleasures of the town, his +heart fondly reverted to them; and often as the young +fellows of his society were making merry at the tavern, +and calling toasts (as the fashion of that day was) over +their wine, Esmond thought of persons—of two fair women, +whom he had been used to adore almost, and emptied his +glass with a sigh. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By this time the elder viscountess had grown tired again +of the younger, and whenever she spoke of my lord's +widow, 'twas in terms by no means complimentary towards +that poor lady: the younger woman not needing her +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page204">[pg 204]</span><a name="Pg204" id="Pg204" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +protection any longer, the elder abused her. Most of the +family quarrels that I have seen in life (saving always +those arising from money disputes, when a division of +twopence-halfpenny will often drive the dearest relatives +into war and estrangement), spring out of jealousy and +envy. Jack and Tom, born of the same family and to the +same fortune, live very cordially together, not until Jack +is ruined when Tom deserts him, but until Tom makes +a sudden rise in prosperity, which Jack can't forgive. +Ten times to one 'tis the unprosperous man that is angry, +not the other who is in fault. 'Tis Mrs. Jack, who can +only afford a chair that sickens at Mrs. Tom's new coach-and-six, +cries out against her sister's airs, and sets her +husband against his brother. 'Tis Jack who sees his +brother shaking hands with a lord (with whom Jack would +like to exchange snuff-boxes himself), that goes home and +tells his wife how poor Tom is spoiled, he fears, and no +better than a sneak, parasite, and beggar on horseback. +I remember how furious the coffee-house wits were with +Dick Steele when he set up his coach, and fine house in +Bloomsbury: they began to forgive him when the bailiffs +were after him, and abused Mr. Addison for selling Dick's +country-house. And yet Dick in the spunging-house, or +Dick in the Park, with his four mares and plated harness, +was exactly the same gentle, kindly, improvident, jovial +Dick Steele: and yet Mr. Addison was perfectly right in +getting the money which was his, and not giving up the +amount of his just claim, to be spent by Dick upon champagne +and fiddlers, laced clothes, fine furniture, and parasites, +Jew and Christian, male and female, who clung to +him. As, according to the famous maxim of Monsieur de +Rochefoucault, <span class="tei tei-q">“in our friends' misfortunes there's something +secretly pleasant to us”</span>; so, on the other hand, +their good fortune is disagreeable. If 'tis hard for a man +to bear his own good luck, 'tis harder still for his friends +to bear it for him; and but few of them ordinarily can +stand that trial: whereas one of the <span class="tei tei-q">“precious uses”</span> of +adversity is, that it is a great reconciler; that it brings +back averted kindness, disarms animosity, and causes +yesterday's enemy to fling his hatred aside, and hold out +a hand to the fallen friend of old days. There's pity and +love, as well as envy, in the same heart and towards the same +person. The rivalry stops when the competitor tumbles; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page205">[pg 205]</span><a name="Pg205" id="Pg205" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and, as I view it, we should look at these agreeable and +disagreeable qualities of our humanity humbly alike. They +are consequent and natural, and our kindness and meanness +both manly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So you may either read the sentence, that the elder of +Esmond's two kinswomen pardoned the younger her beauty, +when that had lost somewhat of its freshness, perhaps; +and forgot most her grievances against the other, when +the subject of them was no longer prosperous and enviable; +or we may say more benevolently (but the sum comes to the +same figures, worked either way), that Isabella repented +of her unkindness towards Rachel, when Rachel was +unhappy; and, bestirring herself in behalf of the poor +widow and her children, gave them shelter and friendship. +The ladies were quite good friends as long as the weaker +one needed a protector. Before Esmond went away on his +first campaign, his mistress was still on terms of friendship +(though a poor little chit, a woman that had evidently no +spirit in her, &c.) with the elder Lady Castlewood; and +Mistress Beatrix was allowed to be a beauty. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But between the first year of Queen Anne's reign, and +the second, sad changes for the worse had taken place in +the two younger ladies, at least in the elder's description +of them. Rachel, Viscountess Castlewood, had no more +face than a dumpling, and Mrs. Beatrix was grown quite +coarse, and was losing all her beauty. Little Lord Blandford +(she never would call him Lord Blandford; his +father was Lord Churchill—the king, whom he betrayed, +had made him Lord Churchill, and he was Lord Churchill +still)—might be making eyes at her; but his mother, that +vixen of a Sarah Jennings, would never hear of such a folly. +Lady Marlborough had got her to be a maid of honour +at Court to the princess, but she would repent of it. The +widow Francis (she was but Mrs. Francis Esmond) was +a scheming, artful, heartless hussy. She was spoiling her +brat of a boy, and she would end by marrying her chaplain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What, Tusher?”</span> cried Mr. Esmond, feeling a strange +pang of rage and astonishment. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes—Tusher, my maid's son; and who has got all the +qualities of his father, the lackey in black, and his accomplished +mamma, the waiting-woman,”</span> cries my lady. +<span class="tei tei-q">“What, do you suppose that a sentimental widow, who +will live down in that dingy dungeon of a Castlewood, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page206">[pg 206]</span><a name="Pg206" id="Pg206" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +where she spoils her boy, kills the poor with her drugs, +has prayers twice a day and sees nobody but the chaplain—what +do you suppose she can do, <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">mon cousin</span></span>, but +let the horrid parson, with his great square toes, and hideous +little green eyes, make love to her? <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Cela c'est vu, mon +cousin.</span></span> When I was a girl at Castlewood, all the chaplains +fell in love with me—they've nothing else to do.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady went on with more talk of this kind, though, +in truth, Esmond had no idea of what she said further, so +entirely did her first words occupy his thought. Were +they true? Not all, nor half, nor a tenth part of what the +garrulous old woman said, was true. Could this be so? +No ear had Esmond for anything else, though his patroness +chattered on for an hour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Some young gentlemen of the town, with whom Esmond +had made acquaintance, had promised to present him to +that most charming of actresses, and lively and agreeable +of women, Mrs. Bracegirdle, about whom Harry's old +adversary Mohun had drawn swords, a few years before +my poor lord and he fell out. The famous Mr. Congreve +had stamped with his high approval, to the which there +was no gainsaying, this delightful person: and she was +acting in Dick Steele's comedies, and finally, and for +twenty-four hours after beholding her, Mr. Esmond felt +himself, or thought himself, to be as violently enamoured +of this lovely brunette, as were a thousand other young +fellows about the city. To have once seen her was to long +to behold her again; and to be offered the delightful +privilege of her acquaintance, was a pleasure the very idea +of which set the young lieutenant's heart on fire. A man +cannot live with comrades under the tents without finding +out that he too is five-and-twenty. A young fellow cannot +be cast down by grief and misfortune ever so severe but +some night he begins to sleep sound, and some day when +dinner-time comes to feel hungry for a beefsteak. Time, +youth, and good health, new scenes and the excitement of +action and a campaign, had pretty well brought Esmond's +mourning to an end; and his comrades said that Don +Dismal, as they called him, was Don Dismal no more. So +when a party was made to dine at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Rose”</span>, and go to the +playhouse afterward, Esmond was as pleased as another +to take his share of the bottle and the play. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How was it that the old aunt's news, or it might be +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page207">[pg 207]</span><a name="Pg207" id="Pg207" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +scandal, about Tom Tusher, caused such a strange and +sudden excitement in Tom's old playfellow? Hadn't he +sworn a thousand times in his own mind that the lady +of Castlewood, who had treated him with such kindness +once, and then had left him so cruelly, was, and was to +remain henceforth, indifferent to him for ever? Had his +pride and his sense of justice not long since helped him to +cure the pain of that desertion—was it even a pain to him +now? Why, but last night as he walked across the fields +and meadows to Chelsey from Pall Mall, had he not composed +two or three stanzas of a song, celebrating Bracegirdle's +brown eyes, and declaring them a thousand times +more beautiful than the brightest blue ones that ever +languished under the lashes of an insipid fair beauty! +But Tom Tusher! Tom Tusher, the waiting-woman's son, +raising up his little eyes to his mistress! Tom Tusher +presuming to think of Castlewood's widow! Rage and +contempt filled Mr. Harry's heart at the very notion; the +honour of the family, of which he was the chief, made it +his duty to prevent so monstrous an alliance, and to +chastise the upstart who could dare to think of such an +insult to their house. 'Tis true Mr. Esmond often boasted +of republican principles, and could remember many fine +speeches he had made at college and elsewhere, with <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">worth</span></em> +and not <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">birth</span></em> for a text: but Tom Tusher to take the +place of the noble Castlewood—faugh! 'twas as monstrous +as King Hamlet's widow taking off her weeds for Claudius. +Esmond laughed at all widows, all wives, all women; and +were the banns about to be published, as no doubt they +were, that very next Sunday at Walcote Church, Esmond +swore that he would be present to shout No! in the face +of the congregation, and to take a private revenge upon +the ears of the bridegroom. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Instead of going to dinner then at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Rose”</span> that night, +Mr. Esmond bade his servant pack a portmanteau and get +horses, and was at Farnham, half-way on the road to +Walcote, thirty miles off, before his comrades had got to +their supper after the play. He bade his man give no hint +to my lady dowager's household of the expedition on +which he was going: and as Chelsey was distant from +London, the roads bad, and infested by footpads, and +Esmond often in the habit, when engaged in a party of +pleasure, of lying at a friend's lodging in town, there was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page208">[pg 208]</span><a name="Pg208" id="Pg208" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +no need that his old aunt should be disturbed at his absence—indeed, +nothing more delighted the old lady than to +fancy that <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">mon cousin</span></span>, the incorrigible young +sinner, was abroad boxing the watch, or scouring St. Giles's. When +she was not at her books of devotion, she thought Etheridge +and Sedley very good reading. She had a hundred pretty +stories about Rochester, Harry Jermyn, and Hamilton; +and if Esmond would but have run away with the wife +even of a citizen, 'tis my belief she would have pawned her +diamonds (the best of them went to our Lady of Chaillot) +to pay his damages. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord's little house of Walcote, which he inhabited +before he took his title and occupied the house of Castlewood—lies +about a mile from Winchester, and his widow +had returned to Walcote after my lord's death as a place +always dear to her, and where her earliest and happiest +days had been spent, cheerfuller than Castlewood, which +was too large for her straitened means, and giving her, +too, the protection of the ex-dean, her father. The young +viscount had a year's schooling at the famous college there, +with Mr. Tusher as his governor. So much news of them +Mr. Esmond had had during the past year from the old +viscountess, his own father's widow; from the young one +there had never been a word. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Twice or thrice in his benefactor's lifetime, Esmond had +been to Walcote; and now, taking but a couple of hours' +rest only at the inn on the road, he was up again long +before daybreak, and made such good speed that he was +at Walcote by two o'clock of the day. He rid to the inn +of the village, where he alighted and sent a man thence +to Mr. Tusher, with a message that a gentleman from +London would speak with him on urgent business. The +messenger came back to say the doctor was in town, most +likely at prayers in the cathedral. My lady viscountess +was there too; she always went to cathedral prayers +every day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The horses belonged to the post-house at Winchester. +Esmond mounted again, and rode on to the <span class="tei tei-q">“George”</span>; +whence he walked, leaving his grumbling domestic at last +happy with a dinner, straight to the cathedral. The +organ was playing: the winter's day was already growing +grey: as he passed under the street-arch into the cathedral-yard, +and made his way into the ancient solemn edifice. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page209">[pg 209]</span><a name="Pg209" id="Pg209" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc51" id="toc51"></a> +<a name="pdf52" id="pdf52"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VI. The 29th December</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There was scarce a score of persons in the Cathedral +besides the dean and some of his clergy, and the choristers, +young and old, that performed the beautiful evening +prayer. But Dr. Tusher was one of the officiants, and read +from the eagle, in an authoritative voice, and a great +black periwig; and in the stalls, still in her black widow's +hood, sat Esmond's dear mistress, her son by her side, +very much grown, and indeed a noble-looking youth, with +his mother's eyes, and his father's curling brown hair, that +fell over his <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">point de Venise</span></span>—a pretty picture +such as Vandyke might have painted. Monsieur Rigaud's portrait +of my lord viscount, done at Paris afterwards, gives but +a French version of his manly, frank, English face. When +he looked up there were two sapphire beams out of his +eyes, such as no painter's palette has the colour to match, +I think. On this day there was not much chance of seeing +that particular beauty of my young lord's countenance; +for the truth is, he kept his eyes shut for the most part, +and, the anthem being rather long, was asleep. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the music ceasing, my lord woke up, looking about +him, and his eyes lighting on Mr. Esmond, who was sitting +opposite him, gazing with no small tenderness and melancholy +upon two persons who had had so much of his heart +for so many years; Lord Castlewood, with a start, pulled +at his mother's sleeve (her face had scarce been lifted from +her book), and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Look, mother!”</span> so loud, that Esmond +could hear on the other side of the church, and the old +dean on his throned stall. Lady Castlewood looked for +an instant as her son bade her, and held up a warning +finger to Frank; Esmond felt his whole face flush, and +his heart throbbing, as that dear lady beheld him once +more. The rest of the prayers were speedily over: Mr. +Esmond did not hear them; nor did his mistress, very +likely, whose hood went more closely over her face, and +who never lifted her head again until the service was over, +the blessing given, and Mr. Dean, and his procession of +ecclesiastics, out of the inner chapel. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page210">[pg 210]</span><a name="Pg210" id="Pg210" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Young Castlewood came clambering over the stalls +before the clergy were fairly gone, and, running up to +Esmond, eagerly embraced him. <span class="tei tei-q">“My dear, dearest old +Harry,”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“are you come back? Have you been +to the wars? You'll take me with you when you go again? +Why didn't you write to us? Come to mother.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond could hardly say more than a <span class="tei tei-q">“God bless +you, my boy”</span>, for his heart was very full and grateful at +all this tenderness on the lad's part; and he was as much +moved at seeing Frank, as he was fearful about that other +interview which was now to take place; for he knew not +if the widow would reject him as she had done so cruelly +a year ago. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It was kind of you to come back to us, Henry,”</span> Lady +Esmond said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I thought you might come.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We read of the fleet coming to Portsmouth. Why did +you not come from Portsmouth?”</span> Frank asked, or my +lord viscount, as he now must be called. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond had thought of that too. He would have given +one of his eyes so that he might see his dear friends again +once more; but believing that his mistress had forbidden +him her house, he had obeyed her, and remained at a +distance. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You had but to ask, and you knew I would be here,”</span> +he said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She gave him her hand, her little fair hand: there was +only her marriage ring on it. The quarrel was all over. +The year of grief and estrangement was passed. They +never had been separated. His mistress had never been +out of his mind all that time. No, not once. No, not in +the prison; nor in the camp; nor on shore before the +enemy; nor at sea under the stars of solemn midnight, +nor as he watched the glorious rising of the dawn: not +even at the table, where he sat carousing with friends, +or at the theatre yonder, where he tried to fancy that +other eyes were brighter than hers. Brighter eyes there +might be, and faces more beautiful, but none so dear—no +voice so sweet as that of his beloved mistress, who had +been sister, mother, goddess to him during his youth—goddess +now no more, for he knew of her weaknesses; +and by thought, by suffering, and that experience it brings, +was older now than she; but more fondly cherished as +woman perhaps than ever she had been adored as divinity. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page211">[pg 211]</span><a name="Pg211" id="Pg211" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What is it? Where lies it? the secret which makes one +little hand the dearest of all? Whoever can unriddle +that mystery? Here she was, her son by his side, his +dear boy. Here she was, weeping and happy. She took +his hand in both hers; he felt her tears. It was a rapture +of reconciliation. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Here comes Squaretoes,”</span> says Frank. <span class="tei tei-q">“Here's Tusher.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Tusher, indeed, now appeared, creaking on his great +heels. Mr. Tom had divested himself of his alb or surplice, +and came forward habited in his cassock and great black +periwig. How had Harry Esmond ever been for a moment +jealous of this fellow? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Give us thy hand, Tom Tusher,”</span> he said. The chaplain +made him a very low and stately bow. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am charmed +to see Captain Esmond,”</span> says he. <span class="tei tei-q">“My lord and I have +read the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Reddas incolumem precor</span></span>, and applied it, I am +sure, to you. You come back with Gaditanian laurels: +when I heard you were bound thither, I wished, I am sure, +I was another Septimius. My lord viscount, your lordship +remembers <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">Septimi, Gades aditure mecum?</span></span>”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There's an angle of earth that I love better than Gades, +Tusher,”</span> says Mr. Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis that one where your +reverence hath a parsonage, and where our youth was +brought up.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A house that has so many sacred recollections to me,”</span> +says Mr. Tusher (and Harry remembered how Tom's father +used to flog him there)—<span class="tei tei-q">“a house near to that of my +respected patron, my most honoured patroness, must ever +be a dear abode to me. But, madam, the verger waits to +close the gates on your ladyship.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And Harry's coming home to supper. Huzzay! huzzay!”</span> +cries my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“Mother, shall I run home and bid Beatrix +put her ribbons on? Beatrix is a maid of honour, Harry. +Such a fine set-up minx!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your heart was never in the Church, Harry,”</span> the widow +said, in her sweet low tone, as they walked away together. +(Now, it seemed they had never been parted, and again, +as if they had been ages asunder.) <span class="tei tei-q">“I always thought you +had no vocation that way; and that 'twas a pity to shut +you out from the world. You would but have pined and +chafed at Castlewood: and 'tis better you should make +a name for yourself. I often said so to my dear lord. How +he loved you! 'Twas my lord that made you stay with us.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page212">[pg 212]</span><a name="Pg212" id="Pg212" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I asked no better than to stay near you always,”</span> said +Mr. Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But to go was best, Harry. When the world cannot +give peace, you will know where to find it; but one of +your strong imagination and eager desires must try the +world first before he tires of it. 'Twas not to be thought +of, or if it once was, it was only by my selfishness that you +should remain as chaplain to a country gentleman and +tutor to a little boy. You are of the blood of the Esmonds, +kinsman; and that was always wild in youth. Look at +Francis. He is but fifteen, and I scarce can keep him in +my nest. His talk is all of war and pleasure, and he longs +to serve in the next campaign. Perhaps he and the young +Lord Churchill shall go the next. Lord Marlborough has +been good to us. You know how kind they were in my +misfortune. And so was your—your father's widow. No +one knows how good the world is, till grief comes to try us. +'Tis through my Lady Marlborough's goodness that Beatrix +hath her place at Court; and Frank is under my Lord +Chamberlain. And the dowager lady, your father's widow, +has promised to provide for you—has she not?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Yes. As far as present favour went, +Lady Castlewood was very good to him. And should her +mind change,”</span> he added gaily, <span class="tei tei-q">“as ladies' minds will, I am +strong enough to bear my own burden, and make my way +somehow. Not by the sword very likely. Thousands +have a better genius for that than I, but there are many +ways in which a young man of good parts and education +can get on in the world; and I am pretty sure, one way +or other, of promotion!”</span> Indeed, he had found patrons +already in the army, and amongst persons very able to +serve him, too; and told his mistress of the flattering +aspect of fortune. They walked as though they had never +been parted, slowly, with the grey twilight closing round +them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And now we are drawing near to home,”</span> she continued. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I knew you would come, Harry, if—if it was but to +forgive me for having spoken unjustly to you after that +horrid—horrid misfortune. I was half frantic with grief +then when I saw you. And I know now—they have told +me. That wretch, whose name I can never mention, even +has said it: how you tried to avert the quarrel, and would +have taken it on yourself, my poor child: but it was God's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page213">[pg 213]</span><a name="Pg213" id="Pg213" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +will that I should be punished, and that my dear lord +should fall.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He gave me his blessing on his death-bed,”</span> Esmond +said. <span class="tei tei-q">“Thank God for that legacy!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Amen, amen! dear Henry,”</span> says the lady, pressing his +arm. <span class="tei tei-q">“I knew it. Mr. Atterbury, of St. Bride's, who was +called to him, told me so. And I thanked God, too, and +in my prayers ever since remembered it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You had spared me many a bitter night, had you told +me sooner,”</span> Mr. Esmond said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I know it, I know it,”</span> she answered, in a tone of such +sweet humility, as made Esmond repent that he should +ever have dared to reproach her. <span class="tei tei-q">“I know how wicked +my heart has been; and I have suffered too, my dear. +I confessed to Mr. Atterbury—I must not tell any more. +He—I said I would not write to you or go to you—and +it was better even that, having parted, we should part. +But I knew you would come back—I own that. That is +no one's fault. And to-day, Henry, in the anthem, when +they sang it, <span class="tei tei-q">‘When the Lord turned the captivity of Zion, +we were like them that dream’</span>, I thought, yes, like them +that dream—them that dream. And then it went, <span class="tei tei-q">‘They +that sow in tears shall reap in joy; and he that goeth +forth and weepeth, shall doubtless come home again with +rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him’</span>; I looked up +from the book, and saw you. I was not surprised when +I saw you. I knew you would come, my dear, and saw +the gold sunshine round your head.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She smiled an almost wild smile as she looked up at him. +The moon was up by this time, glittering keen in the frosty +sky. He could see, for the first time now clearly, her sweet +careworn face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Do you know what day it is?”</span> she continued. <span class="tei tei-q">“It is +the 29th of December—it is your birthday! But last year +we did not drink it—no, no. My lord was cold, and my +Harry was likely to die; and my brain was in a fever; and +we had no wine. But now—now you are come again, +bringing your sheaves with you, my dear.”</span> She burst into +a wild flood of weeping as she spoke; she laughed and +sobbed on the young man's heart, crying out wildly, <span class="tei tei-q">“bringing +your sheaves with you—your sheaves with you!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As he had sometimes felt, gazing up from the deck at +midnight into the boundless starlit depths overhead, in +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page214">[pg 214]</span><a name="Pg214" id="Pg214" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a rapture of devout wonder at that endless brightness and +beauty—in some such a way as now, the depth of this pure +devotion (which was, for the first time, revealed to him +quite) smote upon him, and filled his heart with thanksgiving. +Gracious God, who was he, weak and friendless +creature, that such a love should be poured out upon him? +Not in vain, not in vain has he lived—hard and thankless +should he be to think so—that has such a treasure given +him. What is ambition compared to that? but selfish +vanity. To be rich, to be famous? What do these profit +a year hence, when other names sound louder than yours, +when you lie hidden away under the ground, along with +the idle titles engraven on your coffin? But only true +love lives after you—follows your memory with secret +blessing—or precedes you, and intercedes for you. <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Non +omnis moriar</span></span>—if dying, I yet live in a tender heart or two; +nor am lost and hopeless living, if a sainted departed soul +still loves and prays for me. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If—if 'tis so, dear lady,”</span> Mr. Esmond said, <span class="tei tei-q">“why should +I ever leave you? If God hath given me this great boon—and +near or far from me, as I know now—the heart of my +dearest mistress follows me; let me have that blessing near +me, nor ever part with it till life separate us. Come away—leave +this Europe, this place which has so many sad recollections +for you. Begin a new life in a new world. My good +lord often talked of visiting that land in Virginia which +King Charles gave us—gave his ancestor. Frank will give +us that. No man there will ask if there is a blot on my +name, or inquire in the woods what my title is.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And my children—and my duty—and my good father?—Henry,”</span> +she broke out. <span class="tei tei-q">“He has none but me now; for +soon my sister will leave him, and the old man will be alone. +He has conformed since the new queen's reign; and here +in Winchester, where they love him, they have found a +church for him. When the children leave me, I will stay +with him. I cannot follow them into the great world, +where their way lies—it scares me. They will come and +visit me; and you will, sometimes, Henry—yes, sometimes, +as now, in the holy Advent season, when I have seen and +blessed you once more.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I would leave all to follow you,”</span> said Mr. Esmond; <span class="tei tei-q">“and +can you not be as generous for me, dear lady?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush, boy!”</span> she said, and it was with a mother's sweet +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page215">[pg 215]</span><a name="Pg215" id="Pg215" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +plaintive tone and look that she spoke. <span class="tei tei-q">“The world is +beginning for you. For me, I have been so weak and +sinful that I must leave it, and pray out an expiation, dear +Henry. Had we houses of religion as there were once, and +many divines of our Church would have them again, I often +think I would retire to one and pass my life in penance. +But I would love you still—yes, there is no sin in such +a love as mine now; and my dear lord in heaven may see +my heart; and knows the tears that have washed my sin +away—and now—now my duty is here, by my children +whilst they need me, and by my poor old father, and——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And not by me?”</span> Henry said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush!”</span> she said again, and raised her hand up to his +lip. <span class="tei tei-q">“I have been your nurse. You could not see me, +Harry, when you were in the small-pox, and I came and +sat by you. Ah! I prayed that I might die, but it would +have been in sin, Henry. Oh, it is horrid to look back to +that time. It is over now and past, and it has been forgiven +me. When you need me again I will come ever so far. +When your heart is wounded, then come to me, my dear. +Be silent! let me say all. You never loved me, dear +Henry—no, you do not now, and I thank Heaven for it. +I used to watch you, and knew by a thousand signs that +it was so. Do you remember how glad you were to go +away to college? 'Twas I sent you. I told my papa that, +and Mr. Atterbury too, when I spoke to him in London. +And they both gave me absolution—both—and they are +godly men, having authority to bind and to loose. And they +forgave me, as my dear lord forgave me before he went to +heaven.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I think the angels are not all in heaven,”</span> Mr. Esmond +said. And as a brother folds a sister to his heart; and as +a mother cleaves to her son's breast—so for a few moments +Esmond's beloved mistress came to him and blessed him. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page216">[pg 216]</span><a name="Pg216" id="Pg216" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc53" id="toc53"></a> +<a name="pdf54" id="pdf54"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VII. I Am Made Welcome At Walcote</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As they came up to the house at Walcote, the windows +from within were lighted up with friendly welcome; the +supper-table was spread in the oak-parlour; it seemed as if +forgiveness and love were awaiting the returning prodigal. +Two or three familiar faces of domestics were on the lookout +at the porch—the old housekeeper was there, and young +Lockwood from Castlewood in my lord's livery of tawny +and blue. His dear mistress pressed his arm as they passed +into the hall. Her eyes beamed out on him with affection +indescribable. <span class="tei tei-q">“Welcome,”</span> was all she said: as she looked +up, putting back her fair curls and black hood. A sweet +rosy smile blushed on her face: Harry thought he had +never seen her look so charming. Her face was lighted +with a joy that was brighter than beauty—she took a hand +of her son who was in the hall waiting his mother—she +did not quit Esmond's arm. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Welcome, Harry!”</span> my young lord echoed after her. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Here, we are all come to say so. Here's old Pincot, +hasn't she grown handsome?”</span> and Pincot, who was older, +and no handsomer than usual, made a curtsy to the captain, +as she called Esmond, and told my lord to <span class="tei tei-q">“Have done, +now.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And here's Jack Lockwood. He'll make a famous +grenadier, Jack; and so shall I; we'll both 'list under you, +cousin. As soon as I am seventeen, I go to the army—every +gentleman goes to the army. Look! who comes +here—ho, ho!”</span> he burst into a laugh. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis Mistress Trix, +with a new ribbon; I knew she would put one on as soon +as she heard a captain was coming to supper.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This laughing colloquy took place in the hall of Walcote +House: in the midst of which is a staircase that leads from +an open gallery, where are the doors of the sleeping-chambers: +and from one of these, a wax candle in her hand, +and illuminating her, came Mistress Beatrix—the light +falling indeed upon the scarlet ribbon which she wore, and +upon the most brilliant white neck in the world. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond had left a child and found a woman, grown +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page217">[pg 217]</span><a name="Pg217" id="Pg217" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +beyond the common height; and arrived at such a dazzling +completeness of beauty, that his eyes might well show +surprise and delight at beholding her. In hers there was +a brightness so lustrous and melting, that I have seen +a whole assembly follow her as if by an attraction irresistible: +and that night the great duke was at the playhouse after +Ramillies, every soul turned and looked (she chanced to +enter at the opposite side of the theatre at the same moment) +at her, and not at him. She was a brown beauty: that is, +her eyes, hair, and eyebrows and eyelashes, were dark: +her hair curling with rich undulations, and waving over her +shoulders; but her complexion was as dazzling white as +snow in sunshine; except her cheeks, which were a bright +red, and her lips, which were of a still deeper crimson. +Her mouth and chin, they said, were too large and full, +and so they might be for a goddess in marble, but not for +a woman whose eyes were fire, whose look was love, whose +voice was the sweetest low song, whose shape was perfect +symmetry, health, decision, activity, whose foot as it planted +itself on the ground, was firm but flexible, and whose +motion, whether rapid or slow, was always perfect grace—agile +as a nymph, lofty as a queen—now melting, now +imperious, now sarcastic, there was no single movement +of hers but was beautiful. As he thinks of her, he who +writes feels young again, and remembers a paragon. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So she came holding her dress with one fair rounded arm, +and her taper before her, tripping down the stair to greet +Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She hath put on her scarlet stockings and white shoes,”</span> +says my lord, still laughing. <span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, my fine mistress! is +this the way you set your cap at the captain!”</span> She +approached, shining smiles upon Esmond, who could look +at nothing but her eyes. She advanced holding forward +her head, as if she would have him kiss her as he used to +do when she was a child. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Stop,”</span> she said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I am grown too big! Welcome, cousin +Harry,”</span> and she made him an arch curtsy, sweeping down +to the ground almost, with the most gracious bend, looking +up the while with the brightest eyes and sweetest smile. +Love seemed to radiate from her. Harry eyed her with such +a rapture as the first lover is described as having by Milton. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">N'est-ce pas?</span></span>”</span> says my lady, in a low, +sweet voice, still hanging on his arm. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page218">[pg 218]</span><a name="Pg218" id="Pg218" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond turned round with a start and a blush, as he +met his mistress's clear eyes. He had forgotten her, wrapt +in admiration of the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">filia pulcrior</span></span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Right foot forward, toe turned out, so: now drop the +curtsy, and show the red stockings, Trix. They've silver +clocks, Harry. The dowager sent 'em. She went to put +'em on,”</span> cries my lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush, you stupid child!”</span> says miss, smothering her +brother with kisses; and then she must come and kiss her +mamma, looking all the while at Harry, over his mistress's +shoulder. And if she did not kiss him, she gave him both +her hands, and then took one of his in both hands, and said, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, Harry, we're so, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">so</span></em> glad you're come!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There are woodcocks for supper,”</span> says my lord: <span class="tei tei-q">“huzzay! +It was such a hungry sermon.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And it is the 29th of December; and our Harry has +come home.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Huzzay, old Pincot!”</span> again says my lord; and my +dear lady's lips looked as if they were trembling with +a prayer. She would have Harry lead in Beatrix to the +supper-room, going herself with my young lord viscount; +and to this party came Tom Tusher directly, whom four +at least out of the company of five wished away. Away +he went, however, as soon as the sweetmeats were put +down, and then, by the great crackling fire, his mistress +or Beatrix, with her blushing graces, filling his glass for him, +Harry told the story of his campaign, and passed the most +delightful night his life had ever known. The sun was up +long ere he was, so deep, sweet, and refreshing was his +slumber. He woke as if angels had been watching at his +bed all night. I dare say one that was as pure and loving +as an angel had blest his sleep with her prayers. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Next morning the chaplain read prayers to the little +household at Walcote, as the custom was; Esmond thought +Mistress Beatrix did not listen to Tusher's exhortation +much: her eyes were wandering everywhere during the +service, at least whenever he looked up he met them. +Perhaps he also was not very attentive to his reverence the +chaplain. <span class="tei tei-q">“This might have been my life,”</span> he was thinking; +<span class="tei tei-q">“this might have been my duty from now till old age. +Well, were it not a pleasant one to be with these dear +friends and part from 'em no more? Until—until the +destined lover comes and takes away pretty Beatrix”</span>—and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page219">[pg 219]</span><a name="Pg219" id="Pg219" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the best part of Tom Tusher's exposition, which may +have been very learned and eloquent, was quite lost to poor +Harry by this vision of the destined lover, who put the +preacher out. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All the while of the prayers, Beatrix knelt a little way +before Harry Esmond. The red stockings were changed +for a pair of grey, and black shoes, in which her feet looked +to the full as pretty. All the roses of spring could not +vie with the brightness of her complexion; Esmond thought +he had never seen anything like the sunny lustre of her +eyes. My lady viscountess looked fatigued, as if with +watching, and her face was pale. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Miss Beatrix remarked these signs of indisposition in her +mother, and deplored them. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am an old woman,”</span> says +my lady, with a kind smile; <span class="tei tei-q">“I cannot hope to look as +young as you do, my dear.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She'll never look as good as you do if she lives till she's +a hundred,”</span> says my lord, taking his mother by the waist, +and kissing her hand. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Do I look very wicked, cousin?”</span> says Beatrix, turning +full round on Esmond, with her pretty face so close under +his chin, that the soft perfumed hair touched it. She laid +her finger-tips on his sleeve as she spoke; and he put his +other hand over hers. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I'm like your looking-glass,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“and that can't +flatter you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He means that you are always looking at him, my dear,”</span> +says her mother, archly. Beatrix ran away from Esmond +at this, and flew to her mamma, whom she kissed, stopping +my lady's mouth with her pretty hand. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And Harry is very good to look at,”</span> says my lady, with +her fond eyes regarding the young man. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If 'tis good to see a happy face,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“you see that.”</span> +My lady said <span class="tei tei-q">“Amen”</span>, with a sigh; and Harry thought the +memory of her dead lord rose up and rebuked her back +again into sadness; for her face lost the smile, and resumed +its look of melancholy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Why, Harry, how fine we look in our scarlet and silver, +and our black periwig,”</span> cries my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“Mother, I am +tired of my own hair. When shall I have a peruke? +Where did you get your steenkirk, Harry?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It's some of my lady dowager's lace,”</span> says Harry; <span class="tei tei-q">“she +gave me this and a number of other fine things.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page220">[pg 220]</span><a name="Pg220" id="Pg220" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lady dowager isn't such a bad woman,”</span> my lord +continued. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She's not so—so red as she's painted,”</span> says Miss Beatrix. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Her brother broke into a laugh. <span class="tei tei-q">“I'll tell her you said +so; by the lord, Trix, I will,”</span> he cries out. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She'll know that you hadn't the wit to say it, my lord,”</span> +says Miss Beatrix. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We won't quarrel the first day Harry's here, will we, +mother?”</span> said the young lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“We'll see if we can get +on to the new year without a fight. Have some of this +Christmas pie? and here comes the tankard; no, it's +Pincot with the tea.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Will the captain choose a dish?”</span> asks Mistress Beatrix. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I say, Harry,”</span> my lord goes on, <span class="tei tei-q">“I'll show thee my horses +after breakfast; and we'll go a bird-netting to-night, and +on Monday there's a cock-match at Winchester—do you +love cock-fighting, Harry?—between the gentlemen of +Sussex and the gentlemen of Hampshire, at ten pound the +battle, and fifty pound the odd battle to show one-and-twenty +cocks.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And what will you do, Beatrix, to amuse our kinsman?”</span> +asks my lady. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I'll listen to him,”</span> says Beatrix; <span class="tei tei-q">“I am sure he has +a hundred things to tell us. And I'm jealous already of +the Spanish ladies. Was that a beautiful nun at Cadiz that +you rescued from the soldiers? Your man talked of it last +night in the kitchen, and Mrs. Betty told me this morning +as she combed my hair. And he says you must be in love, +for you sat on deck all night, and scribbled verses all day +in your table-book.”</span> Harry thought if he had wanted a +subject for verses yesterday, to-day he had found one: and +not all the Lindamiras and Ardelias of the poets were half +so beautiful as this young creature; but he did not say so, +though some one did for him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This was his dear lady who, after the meal was over, and +the young people were gone, began talking of her children +with Mr. Esmond, and of the characters of one and the +other, and of her hopes and fears for both of them. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis +not while they are at home,”</span> she said, <span class="tei tei-q">“and in their mother's +nest, I fear for them—'tis when they are gone into the world, +whither I shall not be able to follow them. Beatrix will +begin her service next year. You may have heard a rumour +about—about my Lord Blandford. They were both children; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page221">[pg 221]</span><a name="Pg221" id="Pg221" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and it is but idle talk. I know my kinswoman would +never let him make such a poor marriage as our Beatrix +would be. There's scarce a princess in Europe that she +thinks is good enough for him or for her ambition.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There's not a princess in Europe to compare with her,”</span> +says Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“In beauty? No, perhaps not,”</span> answered my lady. +<span class="tei tei-q">“She is most beautiful, isn't she? 'Tis not a mother's +partiality that deceives me. I marked you yesterday when +she came down the stair: and read it in your face. We +look when you don't fancy us looking, and see better than +you think, dear Harry: and just now when they spoke +about your poems—you writ pretty lines when you were +but a boy—you thought Beatrix was a pretty subject for +verse, did not you, Harry?”</span> (The gentleman could only +blush for a reply.) <span class="tei tei-q">“And so she is—nor are you the first +her pretty face has captivated. 'Tis quickly done. Such +a pair of bright eyes as hers learn their power very soon, +and use it very early.”</span> And, looking at him keenly with +hers, the fair widow left him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And so it is—a pair of bright eyes with a dozen glances +suffice to subdue a man; to enslave him, and inflame him; +to make him even forget; they dazzle him so that the past +becomes straightway dim to him; and he so prizes them +that he would give all his life to possess 'em. What is the +fond love of dearest friends compared to this treasure? +Is memory as strong as expectancy? fruition, as hunger? +gratitude, as desire? I have looked at royal diamonds in +the jewel-rooms in Europe, and thought how wars have been +made about 'em: Mogul sovereigns deposed and strangled +for them, or ransomed with them: millions expended to +buy them; and daring lives lost in digging out the little +shining toys that I value no more than the button in my +hat. And so there are other glittering baubles (of rare +water too) for which men have been set to kill and quarrel +ever since mankind began; and which last but for a score +of years, when their sparkle is over. Where are those +jewels now that beamed under Cleopatra's forehead, or +shone in the sockets of Helen? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The second day after Esmond's coming to Walcote, Tom +Tusher had leave to take a holiday, and went off in his very +best gown and bands to court the young woman whom his +reverence desired to marry, and who was not a viscount's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page222">[pg 222]</span><a name="Pg222" id="Pg222" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +widow, as it turned out, but a brewer's relict at Southampton, +with a couple of thousand pounds to her fortune: +for honest Tom's heart was under such excellent control, +that Venus herself without a portion would never have +caused it to flutter. So he rode away on his heavy-paced +gelding to pursue his jog-trot loves, leaving Esmond to the +society of his dear mistress and her daughter, and with +his young lord for a companion, who was charmed not only +to see an old friend, but to have the tutor and his Latin +books put out of the way. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The boy talked of things and people, and not a little +about himself, in his frank artless way. 'Twas easy to see +that he and his sister had the better of their fond mother, +for the first place in whose affections, though they fought +constantly, and though the kind lady persisted that she +loved both equally, 'twas not difficult to understand that +Frank was his mother's darling and favourite. He ruled +the whole household (always excepting rebellious Beatrix) +not less now than when he was a child marshalling the +village boys in playing at soldiers, and caning them lustily +too, like the sturdiest corporal. As for Tom Tusher, his +reverence treated the young lord with that politeness and +deference which he always showed for a great man, whatever +his age or his stature was. Indeed, with respect to +this young one, it was impossible not to love him, so frank +and winning were his manners, his beauty, his gaiety, the +ring of his laughter, and the delightful tone of his voice. +Wherever he went, he charmed and domineered. I think +his old grandfather, the dean, and the grim old housekeeper, +Mrs. Pincot, were as much his slaves as his mother was: +and as for Esmond, he found himself presently submitting +to a certain fascination the boy had, and slaving it like the +rest of the family. The pleasure which he had in Frank's +mere company and converse exceeded that which he ever +enjoyed in the society of any other man, however delightful +in talk, or famous for wit. His presence brought sunshine +into a room, his laugh, his prattle, his noble beauty and +brightness of look cheered and charmed indescribably. At +the least tale of sorrow, his hands were in his purse, and he +was eager with sympathy and bounty. The way in which +women loved and petted him, when, a year or two afterwards, +he came upon the world, yet a mere boy, and the +follies which they did for him (as indeed he for them), +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page223">[pg 223]</span><a name="Pg223" id="Pg223" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +recalled the career of Rochester, and outdid the successes +of Grammont. His very creditors loved him; and the +hardest usurers, and some of the rigid prudes of the other +sex too, could deny him nothing. He was no more witty +than another man, but what he said, he said and looked +as no man else could say or look it. I have seen the women +at the comedy at Bruxelles crowd round him in the lobby: +and as he sat on the stage more people looked at him than +at the actors, and watched him; and I remember at +Ramillies, when he was hit and fell, a great big red-haired +Scotch sergeant flung his halbert down, burst out a-crying +like a woman, seizing him up as if he had been an infant, +and carrying him out of the fire. This brother and sister +were the most beautiful couple ever seen; though after +he winged away from the maternal nest this pair were +seldom together. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Sitting at dinner two days after Esmond's arrival (it was +the last day of the year), and so happy a one to Harry +Esmond, that to enjoy it was quite worth all the previous +pain which he had endured and forgot: my young lord, +filling a bumper, and bidding Harry take another, drank +to his sister, saluting her under the title of <span class="tei tei-q">“marchioness”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Marchioness!”</span> says Harry, not without a pang of +wonder, for he was curious and jealous already. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Nonsense, my lord,”</span> says Beatrix, with a toss of her +head. My lady viscountess looked up for a moment at +Esmond, and cast her eyes down. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The Marchioness of Blandford,”</span> says Frank, <span class="tei tei-q">“don't you +know—hath not Rouge Dragon told you?”</span> (My lord used +to call the dowager at Chelsey by this and other names.) +<span class="tei tei-q">“Blandford has a lock of her hair: the duchess found him +on his knees to Mistress 'Trix, and boxed his ears, and said +Dr. Hare should whip him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wish Mr. Tusher would whip you too,”</span> says Beatrix. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady only said: <span class="tei tei-q">“I hope you will tell none of these +silly stories elsewhere than at home, Francis.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis true, on my word,”</span> continues Frank: <span class="tei tei-q">“look at +Harry scowling, mother, and see how Beatrix blushes as +red as the silver-clocked stockings.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I think we had best leave the gentlemen to their wine +and their talk,”</span> says Mistress Beatrix, rising up with the +air of a young queen, tossing her rustling, flowing draperies +about her, and quitting the room, followed by her mother. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page224">[pg 224]</span><a name="Pg224" id="Pg224" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Lady Castlewood again looked at Esmond, as she stooped +down and kissed Frank. <span class="tei tei-q">“Do not tell those silly stories, +child,”</span> she said: <span class="tei tei-q">“do not drink much wine, sir; Harry +never loved to drink wine.”</span> And she went away, too, in +her black robes, looking back on the young man with her +fair, fond face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Egad! it's true,”</span> says Frank, sipping his wine with the +air of a lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“What think you of this Lisbon—real +Collares? 'Tis better than your heady port: we got it out +of one of the Spanish ships that came from Vigo last year: +my mother bought it at Southampton, as the ship was lying +there—the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Rose</span></span>, Captain Hawkins.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Why, I came home in that ship,”</span> says Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And it brought home a good fellow and good wine,”</span> says +my lord. <span class="tei tei-q">“I say, Harry, I wish thou hadst not that cursed +bar sinister.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And why not the bar sinister?”</span> asks the other. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Suppose I go to the army and am killed—every gentleman +goes to the army—who is to take care of the women? +'Trix will never stop at home; mother's in love with you,—yes, +I think mother's in love with you. She was always +praising you, and always talking about you; and when +she went to Southampton, to see the ship, I found her out. +But you see it is impossible: we are of the oldest blood in +England; we came in with the Conqueror; we were only +baronets,—but what then? we were forced into that. +James the First forced our great-grandfather. We are above +titles; we old English gentry don't want 'em; the queen +can make a duke any day. Look at Blandford's father, +Duke Churchill, and Duchess Jennings, what were they, +Harry? Damn it, sir, what are they, to turn up their +noses at us? Where were they, when our ancestor rode +with King Henry at Agincourt, and filled up the French +king's cup after Poictiers? 'Fore George, sir, why shouldn't +Blandford marry Beatrix? By G——! he <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">shall</span></em> marry +Beatrix, or tell me the reason why. We'll marry with the +best blood of England, and none but the best blood of +England. You are an Esmond, and you can't help your +birth, my boy. Let's have another bottle. What! no +more? I've drunk three parts of this myself. I had many +a night with my father; you stood to him like a man, +Harry. You backed your blood; you can't help your misfortune, +you know,—no man can help that.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page225">[pg 225]</span><a name="Pg225" id="Pg225" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The elder said he would go in to his mistress's tea-table. +The young lad, with a heightened colour and voice, began +singing a snatch of a song, and marched out of the room. +Esmond heard him presently calling his dogs about him, +and cheering and talking to them; and by a hundred of +his looks and gestures, tricks of voice and gait, was reminded +of the dead lord, Frank's father. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And so, the Sylvester Night passed away; the family +parted long before midnight, Lady Castlewood remembering, +no doubt, former New-Year's Eves, when healths were +drunk, and laughter went round in the company of him to +whom years, past, and present, and future, were to be as +one; and so cared not to sit with her children and hear the +cathedral bells ringing the birth of the year 1703. Esmond +heard the chimes as he sat in his own chamber, ruminating +by the blazing fire there, and listened to the last notes of +them, looking out from his window towards the city, and +the great grey towers of the cathedral lying under the frosty +sky, with the keen stars shining above. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The sight of these brilliant orbs no doubt made him think +of other luminaries. <span class="tei tei-q">“And so her eyes have already done +execution,”</span> thought Esmond—<span class="tei tei-q">“on whom?—who can tell +me?”</span> Luckily his kinsman was by, and Esmond knew he +would have no difficulty in finding out Mistress Beatrix's +history from the simple talk of the boy. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc55" id="toc55"></a> +<a name="pdf56" id="pdf56"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VIII. Family Talk</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What Harry admired and submitted to in the pretty lad, +his kinsman, was (for why should he resist it?) the calmness +of patronage which my young lord assumed, as if to command +was his undoubted right, and all the world (below his degree) +ought to bow down to Viscount Castlewood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I know my place, Harry,”</span> he said. <span class="tei tei-q">“I'm not proud—the +boys at Winchester College say I'm proud: but I'm +not proud. I am simply Francis James Viscount Castlewood +in the peerage of Ireland. I might have been (do you +know that?) Francis James Marquis and Earl of Esmond in +that of England. The late lord refused the title which was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page226">[pg 226]</span><a name="Pg226" id="Pg226" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +offered to him by my godfather, his late Majesty. You +should know that—you are of our family, you know—you +cannot help your bar sinister, Harry, my dear fellow; and +you belong to one of the best families in England, in spite of +that; and you stood by my father, and by G——! I'll stand +by you. You shall never want a friend, Harry, while +Francis James Viscount Castlewood has a shilling. It's +now 1703—I shall come of age in 1709. I shall go back +to Castlewood; I shall live at Castlewood; I shall build +up the house. My property will be pretty well restored +by then. The late viscount mismanaged my property, and +left it in a very bad state. My mother is living close, as +you see, and keeps me in a way hardly befitting a peer of +these realms; for I have but a pair of horses, a governor, +and a man that is valet and groom. But when I am of +age, these things will be set right, Harry. Our house will +be as it should be. You'll always come to Castlewood, +won't you? You shall always have your two rooms in +the court kept for you; and if anybody slights you, d—— +them! let them have a care of <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">me</span></em>. I shall marry early—'Trix +will be a duchess by that time, most likely; for +a cannon-ball may knock over his grace any day, you +know.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“How?”</span> says Harry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush, my dear!”</span> says my lord viscount. <span class="tei tei-q">“You are of +the family—you are faithful to us, by George, and I tell +you everything. Blandford will marry her—or ——”</span> and +here he put his little hand on his sword—<span class="tei tei-q">“you understand +the rest. Blandford knows which of us two is the best +weapon. At small-sword, or back-sword, or sword and +dagger, if he likes: I can beat him. I have tried him, +Harry; and begad, he knows I am a man not to be trifled +with.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But you do not mean,”</span> says Harry, concealing his +laughter, but not his wonder, <span class="tei tei-q">“that you can force my Lord +Blandford, the son of the first man of this kingdom, to +marry your sister at sword's point?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I mean to say that we are cousins by the mother's side, +though that's nothing to boast of. I mean to say that an +Esmond is as good as a Churchill; and when the king comes +back, the Marquis of Esmond's sister may be a match for +any nobleman's daughter in the kingdom. There are but +two marquises in all England, William Herbert, Marquis of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page227">[pg 227]</span><a name="Pg227" id="Pg227" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Powis, and Francis James, Marquis of Esmond; and hark +you, Harry, now swear you'll never mention this. Give +me your honour as a gentleman, for you <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">are</span></em> a gentleman, +though you are a——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well, well,”</span> says Harry, a little impatient. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well, then, when after my late viscount's misfortune, +my mother went up with us to London, to ask for justice +against you all (as for Mohun, I'll have his blood, as sure +as my name is Francis Viscount Esmond), we went to stay +with our cousin my Lady Marlborough, with whom we had +quarrelled for ever so long. But when misfortune came, +she stood by her blood:—so did the dowager viscountess +stand by her blood,—so did you. Well, sir, whilst my +mother was petitioning the late Prince of Orange—for I will +never call him king—and while you were in prison, we lived +at my Lord Marlborough's house, who was only a little +there, being away with the army in Holland. And then ... +I say, Harry, you won't tell, now?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry again made a vow of secrecy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well, there used to be all sorts of fun, you know: my +Lady Marlborough was very fond of us, and she said I was +to be her page; and she got 'Trix to be a maid of honour, +and while she was up in her room crying, we used to be +always having fun, you know; and the duchess used to +kiss me, and so did her daughters, and Blandford fell tremendous +in love with 'Trix, and she liked him; and one day +he—he kissed her behind a door—he did though,—and the +duchess caught him, and she banged such a box of the ear +both to 'Trix and Blandford—you should have seen it! +And then she said that we must leave directly, and abused +my mamma, who was cognizant of the business; but she +wasn't—never thinking about anything but father. And +so we came down to Walcote. Blandford being locked +up, and not allowed to see 'Trix. But <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">I</span></em> got at him. I +climbed along the gutter, and in through the window, where +he was crying.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Marquis,’</span> says I, when he had opened it and helped +me in, <span class="tei tei-q">‘you know I wear a sword,’</span> for I had brought it.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Oh, viscount,’</span> says he—<span class="tei tei-q">‘oh, my dearest Frank!’</span> +and he threw himself into my arms and burst out a-crying. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘I do love Mistress Beatrix so, that I shall die if I don't +have her.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘My dear Blandford,’</span> says I, <span class="tei tei-q">‘you are young to think +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page228">[pg 228]</span><a name="Pg228" id="Pg228" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of marrying;’</span> for he was but fifteen, and a young fellow +of that age can scarce do so, you know.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘But I'll wait twenty years, if she'll have me,’</span> says he. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘I'll never marry—no never, never, never, marry anybody +but her. No, not a princess, though they would have me do +it ever so. If Beatrix will wait for me, her Blandford +swears he will be faithful.’</span> And he wrote a paper (it wasn't +spelt right, for he wrote: <span class="tei tei-q">‘I'm ready to <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">sine with my blode</span></span>’</span>, +which you know, Harry, isn't the way of spelling it), and +vowing that he would marry none other but the Honourable +Mistress Gertrude Beatrix Esmond, only sister of his dearest +friend Francis James, fourth Viscount Esmond. And so I +gave him a locket of her hair.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A locket of her hair!”</span> cries Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes. 'Trix gave me one after the fight with the duchess +that very day. I am sure I didn't want it; and so I gave +it him, and we kissed at parting, and said—<span class="tei tei-q">‘Good-bye, +brother.’</span> And I got back through the gutter; and we +set off home that very evening. And he went to King's +College, in Cambridge, and <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">I'm</span></em> going to Cambridge soon; +and if he doesn't stand to his promise (for he's only wrote +once),—he knows I wear a sword, Harry. Come along, and +let's go see the cocking-match at Winchester.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“....But I say,”</span> he added laughing, after a pause, +<span class="tei tei-q">“I don't think 'Trix will break her heart about him. Law +bless you! Whenever she sees a man, she makes eyes at +him; and young Sir Wilmot Crawley of Queen's Crawley, +and Anthony Henley of Alresford, were at swords drawn +about her, at the Winchester Assembly, a month ago.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That night Mr. Harry's sleep was by no means so pleasant or +sweet as it had been on the first two evenings after his arrival +at Walcote. <span class="tei tei-q">“So the bright eyes have been already shining +on another,”</span> thought he, <span class="tei tei-q">“and the pretty lips, or the cheeks +at any rate, have begun the work which they were made for. +Here's a girl not sixteen, and one young gentleman is already +whimpering over a lock of her hair, and two country squires +are ready to cut each other's throats that they may have +the honour of a dance with her. What a fool am I to be +dallying about this passion, and singeing my wings in this +foolish flame. Wings!—why not say crutches? There is +but eight years' difference between us, to be sure; but in +life I am thirty years older. How could I ever hope to +please such a sweet creature as that, with my rough ways +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page229">[pg 229]</span><a name="Pg229" id="Pg229" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and glum face? Say that I have merit ever so much, and +won myself a name, could she ever listen to me? She must +be my lady marchioness, and I remain a nameless bastard. +O my master, my master!”</span> (here he fell to thinking with +a passionate grief of the vow which he had made to his +poor dying lord); <span class="tei tei-q">“O my mistress, dearest and kindest, +will you be contented with the sacrifice which the poor +orphan makes for you, whom you love, and who so loves +you?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And then came a fiercer pang of temptation. <span class="tei tei-q">“A word +from me,”</span> Harry thought, <span class="tei tei-q">“a syllable of explanation, and +all this might be changed; but no, I swore it over the dying +bed of my benefactor. For the sake of him and his; for +the sacred love and kindness of old days; I gave my +promise to him, and may kind Heaven enable me to keep +my vow!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The next day, although Esmond gave no sign of what +was going on in his mind, but strove to be more than ordinarily +gay and cheerful when he met his friends at the +morning meal, his dear mistress, whose clear eyes it seemed +no emotion of his could escape, perceived that something +troubled him, for she looked anxiously towards him more +than once during the breakfast, and when he went up to +his chamber afterwards she presently followed him, and +knocked at his door. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As she entered, no doubt the whole story was clear to +her at once, for she found our young gentleman packing +his valise, pursuant to the resolution which he had come to +over-night of making a brisk retreat out of this temptation. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She closed the door very carefully behind her, and then +leant against it, very pale, her hands folded before her, +looking at the young man, who was kneeling over his work +of packing. <span class="tei tei-q">“Are you going so soon?”</span> she said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He rose up from his knees, blushing, perhaps, to be so +discovered, in the very act, as it were, and took one of +her fair little hands—it was that which had her marriage +ring on—and kissed it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It is best that it should be so, dearest lady,”</span> he said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I knew you were going, at breakfast. I—I thought +you might stay. What has happened? Why can't you +remain longer with us? What has Frank told you—you +were talking together late last night?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I had but three days' leave from Chelsea,”</span> Esmond said, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page230">[pg 230]</span><a name="Pg230" id="Pg230" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as gaily as he could. <span class="tei tei-q">“My aunt—she lets me call her aunt—is +my mistress now; I owe her my lieutenancy and my +laced coat. She has taken me into high favour; and my +new general is to dine at Chelsea to-morrow—General +Lumley, madam—who has appointed me his aide de camp, +and on whom I must have the honour of waiting. See, +here is a letter from the dowager; the post brought it last +night; and I would not speak of it, for fear of disturbing +our last merry meeting.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady glanced at the letter, and put it down with +a smile that was somewhat contemptuous. <span class="tei tei-q">“I have no +need to read the letter,”</span> says she—(indeed, 'twas as well +she did not; for the Chelsea missive, in the poor dowager's +usual French jargon, permitted him a longer holiday than +he said. <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Je vous +donne</span></span>,”</span> quoth her ladyship, <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">oui jour, +pour vous fatigay parfaictement de vos parens fatigans</span></span>”</span>)—<span class="tei tei-q">“I +have no need to read the letter,”</span> says she. <span class="tei tei-q">“What was +it Frank told you last night?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He told me little I did not know,”</span> Mr. Esmond answered. +<span class="tei tei-q">“But I have thought of that little, and here's the result; +I have no right to the name I bear, dear lady; and it is +only by your sufferance that I am allowed to keep it. If +I thought for an hour of what has perhaps crossed your +mind too——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, I did, Harry,”</span> said she; <span class="tei tei-q">“I thought of it; and think +of it. I would sooner call you my son than the greatest +prince in Europe—yes, than the greatest prince. For who +is there so good and so brave, and who would love her as +you would? But there are reasons a mother can't tell.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I know them,”</span> said Mr. Esmond, interrupting her with +a smile.—<span class="tei tei-q">“I know there's Sir Wilmot Crawley of Queen's +Crawley, and Mr. Anthony Henley of the Grange, and my +Lord Marquis of Blandford, that seems to be the favoured +suitor. You shall ask me to wear my lady marchioness's +favours and to dance at her ladyship's wedding.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, Harry, Harry, it is none of these follies that +frighten me,”</span> cried out Lady Castlewood. <span class="tei tei-q">“Lord Churchill +is but a child, his outbreak about Beatrix was a mere boyish +folly. His parents would rather see him buried than +married to one below him in rank. And do you think that +I would stoop to sue for a husband for Francis Esmond's +daughter; or submit to have my girl smuggled into that +proud family to cause a quarrel between son and parents, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page231">[pg 231]</span><a name="Pg231" id="Pg231" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and to be treated only as an inferior? I would disdain such +a meanness. Beatrix would scorn it. Ah! Henry, 'tis +not with you the fault lies, 'tis with her. I know you both, +and love you: need I be ashamed of that love now? No, +never, never, and 'tis not you, dear Harry, that is unworthy. +'Tis for my poor Beatrix I tremble—whose headstrong will +frightens me; whose jealous temper (they say I was jealous +too, but, pray God, I am cured of that sin) and whose vanity +no words or prayers of mine can cure—only suffering, only +experience, and remorse afterwards. Oh, Henry, she will +make no man happy who loves her. Go away, my son, +leave her: love us always, and think kindly of us: and for +me, my dear, you know that these walls contain all that +I love in the world.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In after-life, did Esmond find the words true which his +fond mistress spoke from her sad heart? Warning he had: +but I doubt others had warning before his time, and since: +and he benefited by it as most men do. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My young lord viscount was exceeding sorry when he +heard that Harry could not come to the cock-match with +him, and must go to London, but no doubt my lord consoled +himself when the Hampshire cocks won the match; +and he saw every one of the battles, and crowed properly +over the conquered Sussex gentlemen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As Esmond rode towards town his servant, coming up +to him, informed him with a grin, that Mistress Beatrix had +brought out a new gown and blue stockings for that day's +dinner, in which she intended to appear, and had flown into +a rage and given her maid a slap on the face soon after she +heard he was going away. Mistress Beatrix's woman, the +fellow said, came down to the servants' hall, crying, and +with the mark of a blow still on her cheek: but Esmond +peremptorily ordered him to fall back and be silent, and +rode on with thoughts enough of his own to occupy him—some +sad ones, some inexpressibly dear and pleasant. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His mistress, from whom he had been a year separated, +was his dearest mistress again. The family from which he +had been parted, and which he loved with the fondest devotion, +was his family once more. If Beatrix's beauty shone +upon him, it was with a friendly lustre, and he could regard +it with much such a delight as he brought away after +seeing the beautiful pictures of the smiling Madonnas in +the convent at Cadiz, when he was dispatched thither with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page232">[pg 232]</span><a name="Pg232" id="Pg232" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a flag: and as for his mistress, 'twas difficult to say with +what a feeling he regarded her. 'Twas happiness to have +seen her: 'twas no great pang to part; a filial tenderness, +a love that was at once respect and protection, filled his +mind as he thought of her; and near her or far from her, +and from that day until now, and from now till death +is past, and beyond it, he prays that sacred flame may +ever burn. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc57" id="toc57"></a> +<a name="pdf58" id="pdf58"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter IX. I Make The Campaign Of 1704</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond rode up to London then, where, if the dowager +had been angry at the abrupt leave of absence he took, she +was mightily pleased at his speedy return. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He went immediately and paid his court to his new +general, General Lumley, who received him graciously, +having known his father, and also, he was pleased to say, +having had the very best accounts of Mr. Esmond from the +officer whose aide de camp he had been at Vigo. During +this winter Mr. Esmond was gazetted to a lieutenancy in +Brigadier Webb's regiment of Fusiliers, then with their +colonel in Flanders; but being now attached to the suite +of Mr. Lumley, Esmond did not join his own regiment until +more than a year afterwards, and after his return from the +campaign of Blenheim, which was fought the next year. +The campaign began very early, our troops marching out of +their quarters before the winter was almost over, and investing +the city of Bonn, on the Rhine, under the duke's command. +His grace joined the army in deep grief of mind, +with crape on his sleeve, and his household in mourning; +and the very same packet which brought the commander-in-chief +over, brought letters to the forces which preceded +him, and one from his dear mistress to Esmond, which +interested him not a little. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The young Marquis of Blandford, his grace's son, who +had been entered in King's College in Cambridge (whither +my lord viscount had also gone, to Trinity, with Mr. Tusher +as his governor), had been seized with small-pox, and was +dead at sixteen years of age, and so poor Frank's schemes +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page233">[pg 233]</span><a name="Pg233" id="Pg233" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +for his sister's advancement were over, and that innocent +childish passion nipped in the birth. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's mistress would have had him return, at least +her letters hinted as much; but in the presence of the +enemy this was impossible, and our young man took his +humble share in the siege, which need not be described here, +and had the good luck to escape without a wound of any +sort, and to drink his general's health after the surrender. +He was in constant military duty this year, and did not +think of asking for a leave of absence, as one or two of his +less fortunate friends did, who were cast away in that +tremendous storm which happened towards the close of +November, that <span class="tei tei-q">“which of late o'er pale Britannia past”</span> +(as Mr. Addison sang of it), and in which scores of our +greatest ships and 15,000 of our seamen went down. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They said that our duke was quite heartbroken by the +calamity which had befallen his family; but his enemies +found that he could subdue them, as well as master his grief. +Successful as had been this great general's operations in the +past year, they were far enhanced by the splendour of his +victory in the ensuing campaign. His grace the captain-general +went to England after Bonn, and our army fell back +into Holland, where, in April, 1704, his grace again found +the troops embarking from Harwich and landing at Maesland +Sluys: thence his grace came immediately to the Hague, +where he received the foreign ministers, general officers, +and other people of quality. The greatest honours were +paid to his grace everywhere—at the Hague, Utrecht, +Ruremonde, and Maestricht; the civic authorities coming +to meet his coaches: salvos of cannon saluting him, +canopies of state being erected for him where he stopped, +and feasts prepared for the numerous gentlemen following +in his suite. His grace reviewed the troops of the States-General +between Liége and Maestricht, and afterwards the +English forces, under the command of General Churchill, +near Bois-le-Duc. Every preparation was made for a long +march; and the army heard, with no small elation, that it +was the commander-in-chief's intention to carry the war +out of the Low Countries, and to march on the Mozelle. +Before leaving our camp at Maestricht, we heard that the +French, under the Marshal Villeroy, were also bound towards +the Mozelle. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Towards the end of May, the army reached Coblentz; and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page234">[pg 234]</span><a name="Pg234" id="Pg234" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +next day, his grace, and the generals accompanying him, +went to visit the Elector of Treves at his Castle of Ehrenbreitstein, +the horse and dragoons passing the Rhine whilst +the duke was entertained at a grand feast by the Elector. +All as yet was novelty, festivity, and splendour—a brilliant +march of a great and glorious army through a friendly +country, and sure through some of the most beautiful scenes +of nature which I ever witnessed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The foot and artillery, following after the horse as quick +as possible, crossed the Rhine under Ehrenbreitstein, and so +to Castel, over against Mayntz, in which city his grace, his +generals, and his retinue were received at the landing-place +by the Elector's coaches, carried to his highness's palace +amidst the thunder of cannon, and then once more magnificently +entertained. Gidlingen, in Bavaria, was appointed +as the general rendezvous of the army, and thither, by +different routes, the whole forces of English, Dutch, Danes, +and German auxiliaries took their way. The foot and +artillery under General Churchill passed the Neckar, at +Heidelberg; and Esmond had an opportunity of seeing +that city and palace, once so famous and beautiful (though +shattered and battered by the French, under Turenne, in +the late war), where his grandsire had served the beautiful +and unfortunate Electress-Palatine, the first King Charles's +sister. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At Mindelsheim, the famous Prince of Savoy came to +visit our commander, all of us crowding eagerly to get a sight +of that brilliant and intrepid warrior; and our troops were +drawn up in battalia before the prince, who was pleased to +express his admiration of this noble English army. At +length we came in sight of the enemy between Dillingen and +Lawingen, the Brentz lying between the two armies. The +Elector, judging that Donauwort would be the point of +his grace's attack, sent a strong detachment of his best +troops to Count Darcos, who was posted at Schellenberg, +near that place, where great entrenchments were thrown +up, and thousands of pioneers employed to strengthen the +position. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the 2nd of July, his grace stormed the post, with what +success on our part need scarce be told. His grace advanced +with six thousand foot, English and Dutch, thirty squadrons +and three regiments of Imperial cuirassiers, the duke +crossing the river at the head of the cavalry. Although our +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page235">[pg 235]</span><a name="Pg235" id="Pg235" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +troops made the attack with unparalleled courage and fury—rushing +up to the very guns of the enemy, and being +slaughtered before their works—we were driven back many +times, and should not have carried them, but that the +Imperialists came up under the Prince of Baden, when the +enemy could make no head against us: we pursued him +into the trenches, making a terrible slaughter there, and +into the very Danube, where a great part of his troops, +following the example of their generals, Count Darcos +and the Elector himself, tried to save themselves by swimming. +Our army entered Donauwort, which the Bavarians +evacuated; and where 'twas said the Elector purposed to +have given us a warm reception, by burning us in our beds; +the cellars of the houses, when we took possession of them, +being found stuffed with straw. But though the links +were there, the link-boys had run away. The townsmen +saved their houses, and our general took possession of the +enemy's ammunition in the arsenals, his stores, and magazines. +Five days afterwards a great <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Te Deum</span></span> was sung +in Prince Lewis's army, and a solemn day of thanksgiving +held in our own; the Prince of Savoy's compliments coming +to his grace the captain-general during the day's religious +ceremony, and concluding, as it were, with an amen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And now, having seen a great military march through +a friendly country; the pomps and festivities of more than +one German court; the severe struggle of a hotly-contested +battle, and the triumph of victory; Mr. Esmond beheld +another part of military duty; our troops entering the +enemy's territory, and putting all around them to fire and +sword; burning farms, wasted fields, shrieking women, +slaughtered sons and fathers, and drunken soldiery, cursing +and carousing in the midst of tears, terror, and murder. +Why does the stately Muse of History, that delights in +describing the valour of heroes and the grandeur of conquest, +leave out these scenes, so brutal, mean, and degrading, +that yet form by far the greater part of the drama of war? +You, gentlemen of England, who live at home at ease, and +compliment yourselves in the songs of triumph with which +our chieftains are bepraised—you pretty maidens, that come +tumbling down the stairs when the fife and drum call you, +and huzzah for the British Grenadiers—do you take account +that these items go to make up the amount of the triumph +you admire, and form part of the duties of the heroes you +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page236">[pg 236]</span><a name="Pg236" id="Pg236" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +fondle? Our chief, whom England and all Europe, saving +only the Frenchmen, worshipped almost, had this of the +godlike in him, that he was impassible before victory, before +danger, before defeat. Before the greatest obstacle or the +most trivial ceremony; before a hundred thousand men +drawn in battalia, or a peasant slaughtered at the door of +his burning hovel; before a carouse of drunken German +lords, or a monarch's court, or a cottage-table, where his plans +were laid, or an enemy's battery, vomiting flame and death, +and strewing corpses round about him;—he was always +cold, calm, resolute, like fate. He performed a treason or +a court-bow, he told a falsehood as black as Styx, as easily +as he paid a compliment or spoke about the weather. He +took a mistress, and left her; he betrayed his benefactor, +and supported him, or would have murdered him, with the +same calmness always, and having no more remorse than +Clotho when she weaves the thread, or Lachesis when she +cuts it. In the hour of battle I have heard the Prince of +Savoy's officers say, the prince became possessed with a sort +of warlike fury; his eyes lighted up; he rushed hither and +thither, raging; he shrieked curses and encouragement, +yelling and harking his bloody war-dogs on, and himself +always at the first of the hunt. Our duke was as calm at +the mouth of the cannon as at the door of a drawing-room. +Perhaps he could not have been the great man he was, had +he had a heart either for love or hatred, or pity or fear, or +regret, or remorse. He achieved the highest deed of daring, +or deepest calculation of thought, as he performed the very +meanest action of which a man is capable; told a lie, or +cheated a fond woman, or robbed a poor beggar of a halfpenny, +with a like awful serenity and equal capacity of the +highest and lowest acts of our nature. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His qualities were pretty well known in the army, where +there were parties of all politics, and of plenty of shrewdness +and wit; but there existed such a perfect confidence in him, +as the first captain of the world, and such a faith and admiration +in his prodigious genius and fortune, that the very men +whom he notoriously cheated of their pay, the chiefs whom +he used and injured—(for he used all men, great and small, +that came near him, as his instruments alike, and took +something of theirs, either some quality or some property—the +blood of a soldier, it might be, or a jewelled hat, or a +hundred thousand crowns from a king, or a portion out of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page237">[pg 237]</span><a name="Pg237" id="Pg237" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a starving sentinel's three farthings; or (when he was young) +a kiss from a woman, and the gold chain off her neck, taking +all he could from woman or man, and having, as I have said, +this of the godlike in him, that he could see a hero perish +or a sparrow fall, with the same amount of sympathy for +either. Not that he had no tears; he could always order +up this reserve at the proper moment to battle; he could +draw upon tears or smiles alike, and whenever need was for +using this cheap coin. He would cringe to a shoeblack, +as he would flatter a minister or a monarch; be haughty, +be humble, threaten, repent, weep, grasp your hand, or +stab you whenever he saw occasion)—But yet those of the +army, who knew him best and had suffered most from him, +admired him most of all: and as he rode along the lines to +battle or galloped up in the nick of time to a battalion +reeling from before the enemy's charge or shot, the fainting +men and officers got new courage as they saw the splendid +calm of his face, and felt that his will made them irresistible. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the great victory of Blenheim the enthusiasm of the +army for the duke, even of his bitterest personal enemies in +it, amounted to a sort of rage—nay, the very officers who +cursed him in their hearts, were among the most frantic +to cheer him. Who could refuse his meed of admiration to +such a victory and such a victor? Not he who writes: +a man may profess to be ever so much a philosopher; but +he who fought on that day must feel a thrill of pride as he +recalls it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The French right was posted near to the village of Blenheim, +on the Danube, where the Marshal Tallard's quarters +were; their line extending through, it may be a league and +a half, before Lutzingen and up to a woody hill, round the +base of which, and acting against the Prince of Savoy, were +forty of his squadrons. Here was a village that the Frenchmen +had burned, the wood being, in fact, a better shelter +and easier of guard than any village. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Before these two villages and the French lines ran a little +stream, not more than two foot broad, through a marsh +(that was mostly dried up from the heats of the weather), +and this stream was the only separation between the two +armies—ours coming up and ranging themselves in line of +battle before the French, at six o'clock in the morning; so +that our line was quite visible to theirs; and the whole of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page238">[pg 238]</span><a name="Pg238" id="Pg238" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +this great plain was black and swarming with troops for +hours before the cannonading began. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On one side and the other this cannonading lasted many +hours. The French guns being in position in front of their +line, and doing severe damage among our horse especially, +and on our right wing of Imperialists under the Prince of +Savoy, who could neither advance his artillery nor his lines, +the ground before him being cut up by ditches, morasses, +and very difficult of passage for the guns. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was past midday when the attack began on our left, +where Lord Cutts commanded, the bravest and most beloved +officer in the English army. And now, as if to make his +experience in war complete, our young aide de camp having +seen two great armies facing each other in line of battle, and +had the honour of riding with orders from one end to other +of the line, came in for a not uncommon accompaniment of +military glory, and was knocked on the head, along with +many hundred of brave fellows, almost at the very commencement +of this famous day of Blenheim. A little after +noon, the disposition for attack being completed with much +delay and difficulty, and under a severe fire from the +enemy's guns, that were better posted and more numerous +than ours, a body of English and Hessians, with Major-General +Wilkes commanding at the extreme left of our line, +marched upon Blenheim, advancing with great gallantry, +the major-general on foot, with his officers, at the head of the +column, and marching, with his hat off, intrepidly in the face +of the enemy, who was pouring in a tremendous fire from +his guns and musketry, to which our people were instructed +not to reply, except with pike and bayonet when they +reached the French palisades. To these Wilkes walked +intrepidly, and struck the woodwork with his sword before +our people charged it. He was shot down at the instant, +with his colonel, major, and several officers; and our troops +cheering and huzzaing, and coming on, as they did, with +immense resolution and gallantry, were nevertheless stopped +by the murderous fire from behind the enemy's defences, +and then attacked in flank by a furious charge of French +horse which swept out of Blenheim, and cut down our men +in great numbers. Three fierce and desperate assaults of +our foot were made and repulsed by the enemy; so that +our columns of foot were quite shattered, and fell back, +scrambling over the little rivulet, which we had crossed so +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page239">[pg 239]</span><a name="Pg239" id="Pg239" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +resolutely an hour before, and pursued by the French +cavalry, slaughtering us and cutting us down. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And now the conquerors were met by a furious charge of +English horse under Esmond's general, General Lumley, +behind whose squadrons the flying foot found refuge, and +formed again, whilst Lumley drove back the French horse, +charging up to the village of Blenheim and the palisades +where Wilkes, and many hundred more gallant Englishmen, +lay in slaughtered heaps. Beyond this moment, and of +this famous victory, Mr. Esmond knows nothing; for a shot +brought down his horse and our young gentleman on it, who +fell crushed and stunned under the animal; and came to his +senses he knows not how long after, only to lose them again +from pain and loss of blood. A dim sense, as of people +groaning round about him, a wild incoherent thought or +two for her who occupied so much of his heart now, and +that here his career, and his hopes, and misfortunes were +ended, he remembers in the course of these hours. When +he woke up it was with a pang of extreme pain, his breast-plate +was taken off, his servant was holding his head up, the +good and faithful lad of Hampshire<a id="noteref_9" name="noteref_9" href="#note_9"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">9</span></span></a> was blubbering over his +master, whom he found and had thought dead, and a surgeon +was probing a wound in the shoulder, which he must have +got at the same moment when his horse was shot and fell +over him. The battle was over at this end of the field, by +this time: the village was in possession of the English, its +brave defenders prisoners, or fled, or drowned, many of them, +in the neighbouring waters of the Donau. But for honest +Lockwood's faithful search after his master, there had no +doubt been an end of Esmond here, and of this his story. +The marauders were out rifling the bodies as they lay on the +field, and Jack had brained one of these gentry with the +club-end of his musket, who had eased Esmond of his hat +and periwig, his purse, and fine silver-mounted pistols which +the dowager gave him, and was fumbling in his pockets +for further treasure, when Jack Lockwood came up and +put an end to the scoundrel's triumph. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Hospitals for our wounded were established at Blenheim, +and here for several weeks Esmond lay in very great danger +of his life; the wound was not very great from which he +suffered, and the ball extracted by the surgeon on the spot +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page240">[pg 240]</span><a name="Pg240" id="Pg240" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +where our young gentleman received it; but a fever set in +next day, as he was lying in hospital, and that almost +carried him away. Jack Lockwood said he talked in the +wildest manner during his delirium; that he called himself +the Marquis of Esmond, and seizing one of the surgeon's +assistants who came to dress his wounds, swore that he was +Madam Beatrix, and that he would make her a duchess if she +would but say yes. He was passing the days in these crazy +fancies, and <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">vana somnia</span></span>, +whilst the army was singing <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Te +Deum</span></span> for the victory, and those famous festivities were +taking place at which our duke, now made a Prince of the +Empire, was entertained by the King of the Romans and his +nobility. His grace went home by Berlin and Hanover, +and Esmond lost the festivities which took place at those +cities, and which his general shared in company of the other +general officers who travelled with our great captain. When +he could move it was by the Duke of Wirtemburg's city of +Stuttgard that he made his way homewards, revisiting +Heidelberg again, whence he went to Manheim, and hence +had a tedious but easy water journey down the river of +Rhine, which he had thought a delightful and beautiful +voyage indeed, but that his heart was longing for home, and +something far more beautiful and delightful. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As bright and welcome as the eyes almost of his mistress +shone the lights of Harwich, as the packet came in from +Holland. It was not many hours ere he, Esmond, was in +London, of that you may be sure, and received with open +arms by the old dowager of Chelsea, who vowed, in her +jargon of French and English, that he had the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">air noble</span></span>, +that his pallor embellished him, that he was an Amadis and +deserved a Gloriana; and, O flames and darts! what +was his joy at hearing that his mistress was come into +waiting, and was now with her Majesty at Kensington! +Although Mr. Esmond had told Jack Lockwood to get horses +and they would ride for Winchester that night; when he +heard this news he countermanded the horses at once; his +business lay no longer in Hants; all his hope and desire lay +within a couple of miles of him in Kensington Park wall. +Poor Harry had never looked in the glass before so eagerly +to see whether he had the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">bel air</span></span>, and his paleness +really did become him; he never took such pains about the curl of +his periwig, and the taste of his embroidery and point-lace, +as now, before Mr. Amadis presented himself to Madam +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page241">[pg 241]</span><a name="Pg241" id="Pg241" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Gloriana. Was the fire of the French lines half so murderous +as the killing glances from her ladyship's eyes? O darts +and raptures, how beautiful were they! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And as, before the blazing sun of morning, the moon fades +away in the sky almost invisible; Esmond thought, with +a blush perhaps, of another sweet pale face, sad and faint, +and fading out of sight, with its sweet fond gaze of affection; +such a last look it seemed to cast as Eurydice might have +given, yearning after her lover, when Fate and Pluto summoned +her, and she passed away into the shades. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc59" id="toc59"></a> +<a name="pdf60" id="pdf60"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter X. An Old Story About A Fool And A Woman</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Any taste for pleasure which Esmond had (and he liked to +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">desipere in loco</span></span>, neither more nor less than most young +men of his age) he could now gratify to the utmost extent, and +in the best company which the town afforded. When the +army went into winter quarters abroad, those of the officers +who had interest or money easily got leave of absence, and +found it much pleasanter to spend their time in Pall Mall +and Hyde Park, than to pass the winter away behind the +fortifications of the dreary old Flanders towns, where the +English troops were gathered. Yatches and packets passed +daily between the Dutch and Flemish ports and Harwich; +the roads thence to London and the great inns were crowded +with army gentlemen; the taverns and ordinaries of the +town swarmed with red-coats; and our great duke's levees +at St. James's were as thronged as they had been at Ghent +and Brussels, where we treated him, and he us, with the +grandeur and ceremony of a sovereign. Though Esmond +had been appointed to a lieutenancy in the Fusilier regiment, +of which that celebrated officer, Brigadier John Richmond +Webb, was colonel, he had never joined the regiment, nor +been introduced to its excellent commander, though they +had made the same campaign together, and been engaged +in the same battle. But being aide de camp to General +Lumley, who commanded the division of horse, and the +army marching to its point of destination on the Danube +by different routes, Esmond had not fallen in, as yet, with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page242">[pg 242]</span><a name="Pg242" id="Pg242" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his commander and future comrades of the fort; and it +was in London, in Golden Square, where Major-General +Webb lodged, that Captain Esmond had the honour of first +paying his respects to his friend, patron, and commander +of after-days. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Those who remember this brilliant and accomplished +gentleman may recollect his character, upon which he +prided himself, I think, not a little, of being the handsomest +man in the army; a poet who writ a dull copy of verses +upon the battle of Oudenarde three years after, describing +Webb, says:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To noble danger Webb conducts the way,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">His great example all his troops obey;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Before the front the general sternly rides,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With such an air as Mars to battle strides:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Propitious Heaven must sure a hero save,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Like Paris handsome, and like Hector brave.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Webb thought these verses quite as fine as Mr. Addison's +on the Blenheim campaign, and, indeed, to be Hector +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">à la mode de Paris</span></span>, +was part of this gallant gentleman's +ambition. It would have been difficult to find an officer +in the whole army, or amongst the splendid courtiers and +cavaliers of the Maison-du-Roy, that fought under Vendosme +and Villeroy in the army opposed to ours, who was a more +accomplished soldier and perfect gentleman, and either +braver or better-looking. And, if Mr. Webb believed of +himself what the world said of him, and was deeply convinced +of his own indisputable genius, beauty, and valour, +who has a right to quarrel with him very much? This self-content +of his kept him in general good humour, of which +his friends and dependants got the benefit. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He came of a very ancient Wiltshire family, which he +respected above all families in the world: he could prove +a lineal descent from King Edward the First, and his first +ancestor, Roaldus de Richmond, rode by William the Conqueror's +side on Hastings field. <span class="tei tei-q">“We were gentlemen, +Esmond,”</span> he used to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“when the Churchills were horseboys.”</span> +He was a very tall man, standing in his pumps six +feet three inches (in his great jack-boots, with his tall, fair +periwig, and hat and feather, he could not have been less +than eight feet high). <span class="tei tei-q">“I am taller than Churchill,”</span> he would +say, surveying himself in the glass, <span class="tei tei-q">“and I am a better made +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page243">[pg 243]</span><a name="Pg243" id="Pg243" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +man; and if the women won't like a man that hasn't a wart +on his nose, faith, I can't help myself, and Churchill has the +better of me there.”</span> Indeed, he was always measuring himself +with the duke, and always asking his friends to measure +them. And talking in this frank way, as he would do, over +his cups, wags would laugh and encourage him; friends +would be sorry for him; schemers and flatterers would egg +him on, and tale-bearers carry the stories to head quarters, +and widen the difference which already existed there between +the great captain and one of the ablest and bravest +lieutenants he ever had. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His rancour against the duke was so apparent, that one +saw it in the first half-hour's conversation with General +Webb; and his lady, who adored her general, and thought +him a hundred times taller, handsomer, and braver than a +prodigal nature had made him, hated the great duke with +such an intensity as it becomes faithful wives to feel against +their husbands' enemies. Not that my lord duke was +so yet; Mr. Webb had said a thousand things against him, +which his superior had pardoned; and his grace, whose +spies were everywhere, had heard a thousand things more +that Webb had never said. But it cost this great man no +pains to pardon; and he passed over an injury or a benefit +alike easily. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Should any child of mine take the pains to read these, his +ancestor's memoirs, I would not have him judge of the +great duke<a id="noteref_10" name="noteref_10" href="#note_10"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">10</span></span></a> by what a contemporary has written of him. +No man hath been so immensely lauded and decried as this +great statesman and warrior; as, indeed, no man ever +deserved better the very greatest praise and the strongest +censure. If the present writer joins with the latter faction, +very likely a private pique of his own may be the cause +of his ill-feeling. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On presenting himself at the commander-in-chief's levee, +his grace had not the least remembrance of General Lumley's +aide de camp, and though he knew Esmond's family perfectly +well, having served with both lords (my Lord Francis +and the viscount, Esmond's father) in Flanders, and in the +Duke of York's Guard, the Duke of Marlborough, who +was friendly and serviceable to the (so-styled) legitimate +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page244">[pg 244]</span><a name="Pg244" id="Pg244" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +representatives of the Viscount Castlewood, took no sort of +notice of the poor lieutenant who bore their name. A word +of kindness or acknowledgement, or a single glance of approbation, +might have changed Esmond's opinion of the great +man; and instead of a satire, which his pen cannot help +writing, who knows but that the humble historian might +have taken the other side of panegyric? We have but +to change the point of view, and the greatest action looks +mean; as we turn the perspective-glass, and a giant appears +a pigmy. You may describe, but who can tell whether +your sight is clear or not, or your means of information +accurate? Had the great man said but a word of kindness +to the small one (as he would have stepped out of his gilt +chariot to shake hands with Lazarus in rags and sores, if he +thought Lazarus could have been of any service to him), no +doubt Esmond would have fought for him with pen and +sword to the utmost of his might; but my lord the lion did +not want master mouse at this moment, and so Muscipulus +went off and nibbled in opposition. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So it was, however, that a young gentleman, who, in the +eyes of his family, and in his own, doubtless, was looked upon +as a consummate hero, found that the great hero of the day +took no more notice of him than of the smallest drummer +in his grace's army. The dowager at Chelsea was furious +against this neglect of her family, and had a great battle +with Lady Marlborough (as Lady Castlewood insisted on +calling the duchess). Her grace was now mistress of the +robes to her Majesty, and one of the greatest personages in +this kingdom, as her husband was in all Europe, and the +battle between the two ladies took place in the queen's +drawing-room. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The duchess, in reply to my aunt's eager clamour, said +haughtily, that she had done her best for the legitimate +branch of the Esmonds, and could not be expected to provide +for the bastard brats of the family. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Bastards,”</span> says the viscountess, in a fury, <span class="tei tei-q">“there are +bastards amongst the Churchills, as your grace knows, and +the Duke of Berwick is provided for well enough.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Madam,”</span> says the duchess, <span class="tei tei-q">“you know whose fault it is +that there are no such dukes in the Esmond family too, and +how that little scheme of a certain lady miscarried.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's friend, Dick Steele, who was in waiting on the +prince, heard the controversy between the ladies at Court, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page245">[pg 245]</span><a name="Pg245" id="Pg245" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And faith,”</span> says Dick, <span class="tei tei-q">“I think, Harry, thy kinswoman +had the worst of it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He could not keep the story quiet; 'twas all over the +coffee-houses ere night; it was printed in a News Letter +before a month was over, and <span class="tei tei-q">“The Reply of her Grace the +Duchess of M-rlb-r-gh, to a Popish Lady of the Court, once +a favourite of the late K— J-m-s,”</span> was printed in half a dozen +places, with a note stating that this duchess, when the head +of this lady's family came by his death lately in a fatal +duel, never rested until she got a pension for the orphan +heir, and widow, from her Majesty's bounty. The squabble +did not advance poor Esmond's promotion much, and indeed +made him so ashamed of himself that he dared not show his +face at the commander-in-chief's levees again. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +During those eighteen months which had passed since +Esmond saw his dear mistress, her good father, the old +dean, quitted this life, firm in his principles to the very last, +and enjoining his family always to remember that the +queen's brother, King James the Third, was their rightful +sovereign. He made a very edifying end, as his daughter +told Esmond, and, not a little to her surprise, after his +death (for he had lived always very poorly) my lady found +that her father had left no less a sum than 3,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> behind +him, which he bequeathed to her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With this little fortune Lady Castlewood was enabled, +when her daughter's turn at Court came, to come to London, +where she took a small genteel house at Kensington, in the +neighbourhood of the Court, bringing her children with her, +and here it was that Esmond found his friends. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for the young lord, his University career had ended +rather abruptly. Honest Tusher, his governor, had found +my young gentleman quite ungovernable. My lord worried +his life away with tricks; and broke out, as home-bred lads +will, into a hundred youthful extravagances, so that +Dr. Bentley, the new master of Trinity, thought fit to write +to the Viscountess Castlewood, my lord's mother, and beg +her to remove the young nobleman from a college where he +declined to learn, and where he only did harm by his riotous +example. Indeed, I believe he nearly set fire to Nevil's +Court, that beautiful new quadrangle of our college, which +Sir Christopher Wren had lately built. He knocked down +a proctor's man that wanted to arrest him in a midnight +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page246">[pg 246]</span><a name="Pg246" id="Pg246" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +prank; he gave a dinner party on the Prince of Wales's +birthday, which was within a fortnight of his own, and the +twenty young gentlemen then present sallied out after their +wine, having toasted King James's health with open windows, +and sung cavalier songs, and shouted, <span class="tei tei-q">“God save the +King!”</span> in the great court, so that the master came out of +his lodge at midnight, and dissipated the riotous assembly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This was my lord's crowning freak, and the Rev. Thomas +Tusher, domestic chaplain to the Right Honourable the +Lord Viscount Castlewood, finding his prayers and sermons +of no earthly avail to his lordship, gave up his duties of +governor; went and married his brewer's widow at +Southampton, and took her and her money to his parsonage-house +at Castlewood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lady could not be angry with her son for drinking +King James's health, being herself a loyal Tory, as all the +Castlewood family were, and acquiesced with a sigh, +knowing, perhaps, that her refusal would be of no avail to +the young lord's desire for a military life. She would have +liked him to be in Mr. Esmond's regiment, hoping that +Harry might act as guardian and adviser to his wayward +young kinsman; but my young lord would hear of nothing +but the Guards, and a commission was got for him in the +Duke of Ormonde's regiment; so Esmond found my lord, +ensign and lieutenant, when he returned from Germany +after the Blenheim campaign. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The effect produced by both Lady Castlewood's children +when they appeared in public was extraordinary, and the +whole town speedily rang with their fame; such a beautiful +couple, it was declared, never had been seen; the young +maid of honour was toasted at every table and tavern, +and as for my young lord, his good looks were even more +admired than his sister's. A hundred songs were written +about the pair, and as the fashion of that day was, my +young lord was praised in these Anacreontics as warmly +as Bathyllus. You may be sure that he accepted very +complacently the town's opinion of him, and acquiesced +with that frankness and charming good humour he always +showed in the idea that he was the prettiest fellow in all +London. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The old dowager at Chelsea, though she could never be +got to acknowledge that Mrs. Beatrix was any beauty at all +(in which opinion, as it may be imagined, a vast number +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page247">[pg 247]</span><a name="Pg247" id="Pg247" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of the ladies agreed with her), yet, on the very first sight +of young Castlewood, she owned she fell in love with him; +and Henry Esmond, on his return to Chelsea, found himself +quite superseded in her favour by her younger kinsman. +That feat of drinking the king's health at Cambridge +would have won her heart, she said, if nothing else did. +<span class="tei tei-q">“How had the dear young fellow got such beauty?”</span> she +asked. <span class="tei tei-q">“Not from his father—certainly not from his +mother. How had he come by such noble manners, and +the perfect <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">bel air</span></span>? That countrified Walcote widow could +never have taught him.”</span> Esmond had his own opinion +about the countrified Walcote widow, who had a quiet +grace, and serene kindness, that had always seemed to +him the perfection of good breeding, though he did not +try to argue this point with his aunt. But he could agree +in most of the praises which the enraptured old dowager +bestowed on my lord viscount, than whom he never +beheld a more fascinating and charming gentleman. Castlewood +had not wit so much as enjoyment. <span class="tei tei-q">“The lad looks +good things,”</span> Mr. Steele used to say; <span class="tei tei-q">“and his laugh lights +up a conversation as much as ten repartees from Mr. +Congreve. I would as soon sit over a bottle with him +as with Mr. Addison; and rather listen to his talk than +hear Nicolini. Was ever man so gracefully drunk as my +Lord Castlewood? I would give anything to carry my +wine (though, indeed, Dick bore his very kindly, and +plenty of it, too) like this incomparable young man. When +he is sober he is delightful; and when tipsy, perfectly +irresistible.”</span> And referring to his favourite, Shakespeare +(who was quite out of fashion until Steele brought him +back into the mode), Dick compared Lord Castlewood to +Prince Hal, and was pleased to dub Esmond as ancient +Pistol. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The mistress of the robes, the greatest lady in England +after the queen, or even before her Majesty, as the world +said, though she never could be got to say a civil word to +Beatrix, whom she had promoted to her place as maid of +honour, took her brother into instant favour. When +young Castlewood, in his new uniform, and looking like +a prince out of a fairy-tale, went to pay his duty to her +grace, she looked at him for a minute in silence, the young +man blushing and in confusion before her, then fairly +burst out a-crying, and kissed him before her daughters +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page248">[pg 248]</span><a name="Pg248" id="Pg248" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and company. <span class="tei tei-q">“He was my boy's friend,”</span> she said, through +her sobs. <span class="tei tei-q">“My Blandford might have been like him.”</span> +And everybody saw, after this mark of the duchess's +favour, that my young lord's promotion was secure, and +people crowded round the favourite's favourite, who became +vainer and gayer, and more good-humoured than ever. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Meanwhile Madam Beatrix was making her conquests on +her own side, and amongst them was one poor gentleman, +who had been shot by her young eyes two years before, +and had never been quite cured of that wound; he knew, +to be sure, how hopeless any passion might be, directed in +that quarter, and had taken that best, though ignoble, +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">remedium amoris</span></span>, a speedy retreat from before the +charmer, and a long absence from her; and not being dangerously +smitten in the first instance, Esmond pretty soon got the +better of his complaint, and if he had it still, did not know +he had it, and bore it easily. But when he returned after +Blenheim, the young lady of sixteen, who had appeared +the most beautiful object his eyes had ever looked on two +years back, was now advanced to a perfect ripeness and +perfection of beauty, such as instantly enthralled the poor +devil, who had already been a fugitive from her charms. +Then he had seen her but for two days, and fled; now he +beheld her day after day, and when she was at Court, +watched after her; when she was at home, made one of +the family party; when she went abroad, rode after her +mother's chariot; when she appeared in public places, +was in the box near her, or in the pit looking at her; when +she went to church was sure to be there, though he might +not listen to the sermon, and be ready to hand her to her +chair if she deigned to accept of his services, and select +him from a score of young men who were always hanging +round about her. When she went away, accompanying +her Majesty to Hampton Court, a darkness fell over London. +Gods, what nights has Esmond passed, thinking of her, +rhyming about her, talking about her! His friend Dick +Steele was at this time courting the young lady, Mrs. +Scurlock, whom he married; she had a lodging in Kensington +Square, hard by my Lady Castlewood's house there. +Dick and Harry, being on the same errand, used to meet +constantly at Kensington. They were always prowling +about that place, or dismally walking thence, or eagerly +running thither. They emptied scores of bottles at the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page249">[pg 249]</span><a name="Pg249" id="Pg249" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“King's Arms”</span>, each man prating of his love, and allowing +the other to talk on condition that he might have his own +turn as a listener. Hence arose an intimacy between them, +though to all the rest of their friends they must have been +insufferable. Esmond's verses to <span class="tei tei-q">“Gloriana at the Harpsichord”</span>, +to <span class="tei tei-q">“Gloriana's Nosegay”</span>, to <span class="tei tei-q">“Gloriana at Court”</span>, +appeared this year in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Observator</span></span>.—Have you never read +them? They were thought pretty poems, and attributed +by some to Mr. Prior. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This passion did not escape—how should it?—the clear +eyes of Esmond's mistress: he told her all; what will +a man not do when frantic with love? To what baseness +will he not demean himself? What pangs will he not make +others suffer, so that he may ease his selfish heart of a part +of its own pain? Day after day he would seek his dear +mistress, pour insane hopes, supplications, rhapsodies, +raptures, into her ear. She listened, smiled, consoled, +with untiring pity and sweetness. Esmond was the eldest +of her children, so she was pleased to say; and as for her +kindness, who ever had or would look for aught else from +one who was an angel of goodness and pity? After what +has been said, 'tis needless almost to add that poor Esmond's +suit was unsuccessful. What was a nameless, penniless +lieutenant to do, when some of the greatest in the land +were in the field? Esmond never so much as thought of +asking permission to hope so far above his reach as he knew +this prize was—and passed his foolish, useless life in mere +abject sighs and impotent longing. What nights of rage, +what days of torment, of passionate unfulfilled desire, of +sickening jealousy, can he recall! Beatrix thought no +more of him than of the lackey that followed her chair. +His complaints did not touch her in the least; his raptures +rather fatigued her; she cared for his verses no more than +for Dan Chaucer's, who's dead these ever so many hundred +years; she did not hate him; she rather despised him, +and just suffered him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One day, after talking to Beatrix's mother, his dear, +fond, constant mistress—for hours—for all day long—pouring +out his flame and his passion, his despair and rage, +returning again and again to the theme, pacing the room, +tearing up the flowers on the table, twisting and breaking +into bits the wax out of the standish, and performing +a hundred mad freaks of passionate folly; seeing his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page250">[pg 250]</span><a name="Pg250" id="Pg250" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +mistress at last quite pale and tired out with sheer weariness +of compassion, and watching over his fever for the hundredth +time, Esmond seized up his hat, and took his leave. As +he got into Kensington Square, a sense of remorse came +over him for the wearisome pain he had been inflicting +upon the dearest and kindest friend ever man had. He +went back to the house, where the servant still stood at +the open door, ran up the stairs, and found his mistress +where he had left her in the embrasure of the window, +looking over the fields towards Chelsea. She laughed, +wiping away at the same time the tears which were in her +kind eyes; he flung himself down on his knees, and buried +his head in her lap. She had in her hand the stalk of one +of the flowers, a pink, that he had torn to pieces. <span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, +pardon me, pardon me, my dearest and kindest,”</span> he said; +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am in hell, and you are the angel that brings me a drop +of water.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am your mother, you are my son, and I love you +always,”</span> she said, holding her hands over him; and he +went away comforted and humbled in mind, as he thought +of that amazing and constant love and tenderness with +which this sweet lady ever blessed and pursued him. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc61" id="toc61"></a> +<a name="pdf62" id="pdf62"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XI. The Famous Mr. Joseph Addison</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The gentlemen ushers had a table at Kensington, and the +Guard a very splendid dinner daily at St. James's, at either +of which ordinaries Esmond was free to dine. Dick Steele +liked the Guard-table better than his own at the gentleman +ushers', where there was less wine and more ceremony; +and Esmond had many a jolly afternoon in company of +his friend, and a hundred times at least saw Dick into his +chair. If there is verity in wine, according to the old +adage, what an amiable-natured character Dick's must +have been! In proportion as he took in wine he overflowed +with kindness. His talk was not witty so much +as charming. He never said a word that could anger anybody, +and only became the more benevolent the more +tipsy he grew. Many of the wags derided the poor fellow +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page251">[pg 251]</span><a name="Pg251" id="Pg251" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +in his cups, and chose him as a butt for their satire; but +there was a kindness about him, and a sweet playful fancy, +that seemed to Esmond far more charming than the pointed +talk of the brightest wits, with their elaborate repartees +and affected severities. I think Steele shone rather than +sparkled. Those famous <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">beaux-esprits</span></span> +of the coffee-houses (Mr. William Congreve, for instance, when his gout and his +grandeur permitted him to come among us) would make +many brilliant hits—half a dozen in a night sometimes—but, +like sharpshooters, when they had fired their shot, +they were obliged to retire under cover till their pieces +were loaded again, and wait till they got another chance +at their enemy; whereas Dick never thought that his +bottle-companion was a butt to aim at—only a friend to +shake by the hand. The poor fellow had half the town +in his confidence; everybody knew everything about his +loves and his debts, his creditors or his mistress's obduracy. +When Esmond first came on to the town, honest Dick was +all flames and raptures for a young lady, a West India +fortune, whom he married. In a couple of years the lady +was dead, the fortune was all but spent, and the honest +widower was as eager in pursuit of a new paragon of beauty +as if he had never courted and married and buried the +last one. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Quitting the Guard-table on one sunny afternoon, when +by chance Dick had a sober fit upon him, he and his friend +were making their way down Germain Street, and Dick +all of a sudden left his companion's arm, and ran after +a gentleman who was poring over a folio volume at the +book-shop near to St. James's Church. He was a fair, +tall man, in a snuff-coloured suit, with a plain sword, very +sober, and almost shabby in appearance—at least when +compared to Captain Steele, who loved to adorn his jolly +round person with the finest of clothes, and shone in +scarlet and gold lace. The captain rushed up, then, to +the student of the bookstall, took him in his arms, hugged +him, and would have kissed him—for Dick was always +hugging and bussing his friends—but the other stepped +back with a flush on his pale face, seeming to decline this +public manifestation of Steele's regard. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My dearest Joe, where hast thou hidden thyself this +age?”</span> cries the captain, still holding both his friend's +hands; <span class="tei tei-q">“I have been languishing for thee this fortnight.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page252">[pg 252]</span><a name="Pg252" id="Pg252" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A fortnight is not an age, Dick,”</span> says the other, very +good-humouredly. (He had light blue eyes, extraordinary +bright, and a face perfectly regular and handsome, like +a tinted statue.) <span class="tei tei-q">“And I have been hiding myself—where +do you think?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What! not across the water, my dear Joe?”</span> says +Steele, with a look of great alarm: <span class="tei tei-q">“thou knowest I have +always——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No,”</span> says his friend, interrupting him with a smile: +<span class="tei tei-q">“we are not come to such straits as that, Dick. I have +been hiding, sir, at a place where people never think of finding +you—at my own lodgings, whither I am going to smoke +a pipe now and drink a glass of sack; will your honour +come?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Harry Esmond, come hither,”</span> cries out Dick. <span class="tei tei-q">“Thou +hast heard me talk over and over again at my dearest Joe, +my guardian angel.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed,”</span> says Mr. Esmond, with a bow, <span class="tei tei-q">“it is not from +you only that I have learnt to admire Mr. Addison. We +loved good poetry at Cambridge, as well as at Oxford; +and I have some of yours by heart, though I have put on +a red-coat ... <span class="tei tei-q">‘<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">O qui canoro blandius Orpheo vocale +ducis carmen</span></span>’</span>; shall I go on, sir?”</span> says Mr. Esmond, +who indeed had read and loved the charming Latin poems +of Mr. Addison, as every scholar of that time knew and +admired them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“This is Captain Esmond who was at Blenheim,”</span> says +Steele. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Lieutenant Esmond,”</span> says the other, with a low bow; +<span class="tei tei-q">“at Mr. Addison's service.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have heard of you,”</span> says Mr. Addison, with a smile; +as, indeed, everybody about town had heard that unlucky +story about Esmond's dowager aunt and the duchess. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We were going to the <span class="tei tei-q">‘George’</span>, to take a bottle before +the play,”</span> says Steele; <span class="tei tei-q">“wilt thou be one, Joe?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Addison said his own lodgings were hard by, where +he was still rich enough to give a good bottle of wine to his +friends; and invited the two gentlemen to his apartment +in the Haymarket, whither we accordingly went. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I shall get credit with my landlady,”</span> says he, with +a smile, <span class="tei tei-q">“when she sees two such fine gentlemen as you +come up my stair.”</span> And he politely made his visitors +welcome to his apartment, which was indeed but a shabby +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page253">[pg 253]</span><a name="Pg253" id="Pg253" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +one, though no grandee of the land could receive his guests +with a more perfect and courtly grace than this gentleman. +A frugal dinner, consisting of a slice of meat and a penny +loaf, was awaiting the owner of the lodgings. <span class="tei tei-q">“My wine +is better than my meat,”</span> says Mr. Addison; <span class="tei tei-q">“my Lord +Halifax sent me the burgundy.”</span> And he set a bottle and +glasses before his friends, and eat his simple dinner in +a very few minutes, after which the three fell to, and +began to drink. <span class="tei tei-q">“You see,”</span> says Mr. Addison, pointing +to his writing-table, whereon was a map of the action at +Hochstedt, and several other gazettes and pamphlets +relating to the battle, <span class="tei tei-q">“that I, too, am busy about your +affairs, captain. I am engaged as a poetical gazetteer, to +say truth, and am writing a poem on the campaign.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So Esmond, at the request of his host, told him what +he knew about the famous battle, drew the river on the +table, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">aliquo mero</span></span>, +and with the aid of some bits of tobacco-pipe, +showed the advance of the left wing, where he had +been engaged. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A sheet or two of the verses lay already on the table +beside our bottles and glasses, and Dick having plentifully +refreshed himself from the latter, took up the pages of +manuscript, writ out with scarce a blot or correction, in +the author's slim, neat handwriting, and began to read +therefrom with great emphasis and volubility. At pauses +of the verse the enthusiastic reader stopped and fired off +a great salvo of applause. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond smiled at the enthusiasm of Addison's friend. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are like the German burghers,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“and the +princes on the Mozelle; when our army came to a halt, +they always sent a deputation to compliment the chief, +and fired a salute with all their artillery from their walls.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And drunk the great chief's health afterward, did not +they?”</span> says Captain Steele, gaily filling up a bumper;—he +never was tardy at that sort of acknowledgement of +a friend's merit. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And the duke, since you will have me act his grace's +part,”</span> says Mr. Addison, with a smile and something of +a blush, <span class="tei tei-q">“pledged his friends in return. Most serene +Elector of Covent Garden, I drink to your highness's +health,”</span> and he filled himself a glass. Joseph required +scarce more pressing than Dick to that sort of amusement; +but the wine never seemed at all to fluster Mr. Addison's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page254">[pg 254]</span><a name="Pg254" id="Pg254" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +brains; it only unloosed his tongue, whereas Captain +Steele's head and speech were quite overcome by a single +bottle. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +No matter what the verses were, and, to say truth, Mr. +Esmond found some of them more than indifferent, Dick's +enthusiasm for his chief never faltered, and in every line +from Addison's pen, Steele found a master-stroke. By the +time Dick had come to that part of the poem, wherein the +bard describes as blandly as though he were recording +a dance at the Opera, or a harmless bout of bucolic cudgelling +at a village fair, that bloody and ruthless part of our +campaign, with the remembrance whereof every soldier who +bore a part in it must sicken with shame—when we were +ordered to ravage and lay waste the Elector's country; +and with fire and murder, slaughter and crime, a great +part of his dominions was overrun: when Dick came to +the lines— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In vengeance roused the soldier fills his hand</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With sword and fire, and ravages the land.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In crackling flames a thousand harvests burn,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">A thousand villages to ashes turn.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To the thick woods the woolly flocks retreat,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And mixed with bellowing herds confusedly bleat.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Their trembling lords the common shade partake,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And cries of infants found in every brake.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The listening soldier fixed in sorrow stands,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Loath to obey his leader's just commands.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The leader grieves, by generous pity swayed,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To see his just commands so well obeyed:</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +by this time wine and friendship had brought poor Dick +to a perfectly maudlin state, and he hiccuped out the +last line with a tenderness that set one of his auditors +a-laughing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I admire the licence of you poets,”</span> says Esmond to Mr. +Addison. (Dick, after reading of the verses, was fain to +go off, insisting on kissing his two dear friends before his +departure, and reeling away with his periwig over his +eyes.) <span class="tei tei-q">“I admire your art: the murder of the campaign +is done to military music, like a battle at the Opera, and +the virgins shriek in harmony, as our victorious grenadiers +march into their villages. Do you know what a scene it +was”</span> (by this time, perhaps, the wine had warmed Mr. +Esmond's head too),—<span class="tei tei-q">“what a triumph you are celebrating? +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page255">[pg 255]</span><a name="Pg255" id="Pg255" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +what scenes of shame and horror were enacted, over which +the commander's genius presided, as calm as though he +didn't belong to our sphere? You talk of the <span class="tei tei-q">‘listening +soldier fixed in sorrow’</span>, the <span class="tei tei-q">‘leader's grief swayed by +generous pity’</span>; to my belief the leader cared no more +for bleating flocks than he did for infants' cries, and many +of our ruffians butchered one or the other with equal +alacrity. I was ashamed of my trade when I saw those +horrors perpetrated, which came under every man's eyes. +You hew out of your polished verses a stately image of +smiling victory; I tell you 'tis an uncouth, distorted, +savage idol; hideous, bloody, and barbarous. The rites +performed before it are shocking to think of. You great +poets should show it as it is—ugly and horrible, not beautiful +and serene. Oh, sir, had you made the campaign, believe +me, you never would have sung it so.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +During this little outbreak, Mr. Addison was listening, +smoking out of his long pipe, and smiling very placidly. +<span class="tei tei-q">“What would you have?”</span> says he. <span class="tei tei-q">“In our polished days, +and according to the rules of art, 'tis impossible that the +Muse should depict tortures or begrime her hands with the +horrors of war. These are indicated rather than described; +as in the Greek tragedies, that, I dare say, you have read +(and sure there can be no more elegant specimens of +composition); Agamemnon is slain, or Medea's children +destroyed, away from the scene;—the chorus occupying +the stage and singing of the action to pathetic music. +Something of this I attempt, my dear sir, in my humble +way: 'tis a panegyric I mean to write, and not a satire. +Were I to sing as you would have me, the town would tear +the poet in pieces, and burn his book by the hands of the +common hangman. Do you not use tobacco? Of all the +weeds grown on earth, sure the nicotian is the most soothing +and salutary. We must paint our great duke,”</span> Mr. Addison +went on, <span class="tei tei-q">“not as a man, which no doubt he is, with weaknesses +like the rest of us, but as a hero. 'Tis in a triumph, +not a battle, that your humble servant is riding his sleek +Pegasus. We college-poets trot, you know, on very easy +nags; it hath been, time out of mind, part of the poet's +profession to celebrate the actions of heroes in verse, and +to sing the deeds which you men of war perform. I must +follow the rules of my art, and the composition of such +a strain as this must be harmonious and majestic, not +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page256">[pg 256]</span><a name="Pg256" id="Pg256" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +familiar, or too near the vulgar truth. <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Si +parva licet</span></span>: if +Virgil could invoke the divine Augustus, a humbler poet +from the banks of the Isis may celebrate a victory and a conqueror +of our own nation, in whose triumphs every Briton +has a share, and whose glory and genius contributes to every +citizen's individual honour. When hath there been, since +our Henrys' and Edwards' days, such a great feat of arms +as that from which you yourself have brought away marks +of distinction? If 'tis in my power to sing that song +worthily, I will do so, and be thankful to my Muse. If +I fail as a poet, as a Briton at least I will show my loyalty +and fling up my cap and huzzah for the conqueror:</span> +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">————</span><span class="tei tei-q" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">Rheni pacator et Istri</span></span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Omnis in hoc uno variis discordia cessit</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Ordinibus; laetatur eques, plauditque senator,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span class="tei tei-q" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Votaque patricio certant plebeia favori.</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There were as brave men on that field,”</span> says Mr. +Esmond (who never could be made to love the Duke of +Marlborough, nor to forget those stories which he used to +hear in his youth regarding that great chief's selfishness +and treachery)—<span class="tei tei-q">“there were men at Blenheim as good as +the leader, whom neither knights nor senators applauded, +nor voices plebeian or patrician favoured, and who lie there +forgotten, under the clods. What poet is there to sing +them?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“To sing the gallant souls of heroes sent to Hades!”</span> +says Mr. Addison, with a smile: <span class="tei tei-q">“would you celebrate +them all? If I may venture to question anything in such +an admirable work, the catalogue of the ships in Homer +hath always appeared to me as somewhat wearisome; +what had the poem been, supposing the writer had chronicled +the names of captains, lieutenants, rank and file? +One of the greatest of a great man's qualities is success; +'tis the result of all the others; 'tis a latent power in him +which compels the favour of the gods, and subjugates +fortune. Of all his gifts I admire that one in the great +Marlborough. To be brave? every man is brave. But +in being victorious, as he is, I fancy there is something +divine. In presence of the occasion, the great soul of +the leader shines out, and the god is confessed. Death +itself respects him, and passes by him to lay others low. +War and carnage flee before him to ravage other parts of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page257">[pg 257]</span><a name="Pg257" id="Pg257" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the field, as Hector from before the divine Achilles. You +say he hath no pity; no more have the gods, who are +above it, and superhuman. The fainting battle gathers +strength at his aspect; and, wherever he rides, victory +charges with him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A couple of days after, when Mr. Esmond revisited his +poetic friend, he found this thought, struck out in the +fervour of conversation, improved and shaped into those +famous lines, which are in truth the noblest in the poem +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span>. As the two gentlemen sat engaged +in talk, Mr. Addison solacing himself with his customary +pipe; the little maidservant that waited on his lodging +came up, preceding a gentleman in fine laced clothes, that +had evidently been figuring at Court or a great man's +levee. The courtier coughed a little at the smoke of the +pipe, and looked round the room curiously, which was +shabby enough, as was the owner in his worn snuff-coloured +suit and plain tie-wig. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“How goes on the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">magnum opus</span></span>, Mr. Addison?”</span> says +the Court gentleman on looking down at the papers that +were on the table. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We were but now over it,”</span> says Addison (the greatest +courtier in the land could not have a more splendid politeness, +or greater dignity of manner); <span class="tei tei-q">“here is the plan,”</span> +says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“on the table; <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">hac +ibat Simois</span></span>, here ran the little +river Nebel: <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">hic est Sigeia tellus</span></span>, +here are Tallard's quarters, +at the bowl of this pipe, at the attack of which Captain +Esmond was present. I have the honour to introduce him +to Mr. Boyle; and Mr. Esmond was but now depicting +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">aliquo praelia mixta mero</span></span>, when you came in.”</span> In truth +the two gentlemen had been so engaged when the visitor +arrived, and Addison, in his smiling way, speaking of +Mr. Webb, colonel of Esmond's regiment (who commanded +a brigade in the action, and greatly distinguished himself +there), was lamenting that he could find never a suitable +rhyme for Webb, otherwise the brigade should have had +a place in the poet's verses. <span class="tei tei-q">“And for you, you are but +a lieutenant,”</span> says Addison, <span class="tei tei-q">“and the Muse can't occupy +herself with any gentleman under the rank of a field-officer.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Boyle was all impatient to hear, saying that my +Lord Treasurer and my Lord Halifax were equally anxious; +and Addison, blushing, began reading of his verses, and, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page258">[pg 258]</span><a name="Pg258" id="Pg258" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +I suspect, knew their weak parts as well as the most critical +hearer. When he came to the lines describing the +angel, that +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Inspired repulsed battalions to engage,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And taught the doubtful battle where to rage,</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +he read with great animation, looking at Esmond, as much +as to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“You know where that simile came from—from +our talk, and our bottle of burgundy, the other day.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The poet's two hearers were caught with enthusiasm, +and applauded the verses with all their might. The +gentleman of the Court sprang up in great delight. <span class="tei tei-q">“Not +a word more, my dear sir,”</span> says he. <span class="tei tei-q">“Trust me with the +papers—I'll defend them with my life. Let me read them +over to my Lord Treasurer, whom I am appointed to see +in half an hour. I venture to promise, the verses shall +lose nothing by my reading, and then, sir, we shall see +whether Lord Halifax has a right to complain that his +friend's pension is no longer paid.”</span> And without more +ado, the courtier in lace seized the manuscript pages, +placed them in his breast with his ruffled hand over his +heart, executed a most gracious wave of the hat with the +disengaged hand, and smiled and bowed out of the room, +leaving an odour of pomander behind him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Does not the chamber look quite dark,”</span> says Addison, +surveying it, <span class="tei tei-q">“after the glorious appearance and disappearance +of that gracious messenger? Why, he illuminated the +whole room. Your scarlet, Mr. Esmond, will bear any +light; but this threadbare old coat of mine, how very +worn it looked under the glare of that splendour! I wonder +whether they will do anything for me,”</span> he continued. +<span class="tei tei-q">“When I came out of Oxford into the world, my patrons +promised me great things; and you see where their promises +have landed me, in a lodging up two pair of stairs, +with a sixpenny dinner from the cook's shop. Well, +I suppose this promise will go after the others, and fortune +will jilt me, as the jade has been doing any time these +seven years. <span class="tei tei-q">‘I puff the prostitute away,’</span> ”</span> says he, +smiling, and blowing a cloud out of his pipe. <span class="tei tei-q">“There is +no hardship in poverty, Esmond, that is not bearable; no +hardship even in honest dependence that an honest man +may not put up with. I came out of the lap of Alma +Mater, puffed up with her praises of me, and thinking to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page259">[pg 259]</span><a name="Pg259" id="Pg259" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +make a figure in the world with the parts and learning +which had got me no small name in our college. The +world is the ocean, and Isis and Charwell are but little +drops, of which the sea takes no account. My reputation +ended a mile beyond Maudlin Tower; no one took note +of me; and I learned this, at least, to bear up against +evil fortune with a cheerful heart. Friend Dick hath +made a figure in the world, and has passed me in the race +long ago. What matters a little name or a little fortune? +There is no fortune that a philosopher cannot endure. +I have been not unknown as a scholar, and yet forced to live +by turning bear-leader, and teaching a boy to spell. What +then? The life was not pleasant, but possible—the bear +was bearable. Should this venture fail, I will go back to +Oxford; and some day, when you are a general, you shall +find me a curate in a cassock and bands, and I shall welcome +your honour to my cottage in the country, and to a mug +of penny ale. 'Tis not poverty that's the hardest to bear, +or the least happy lot in life,”</span> says Mr. Addison, shaking +the ash out of his pipe. <span class="tei tei-q">“See, my pipe is smoked out. +Shall we have another bottle? I have still a couple in the +cupboard, and of the right sort. No more?—let us go +abroad and take a turn on the Mall, or look in at the theatre +and see Dick's comedy. 'Tis not a masterpiece of wit; +but Dick is a good fellow, though he doth not set the +Thames on fire.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Within a month after this day, Mr. Addison's ticket had +come up a prodigious prize in the lottery of life. All the +town was in an uproar of admiration of his poem, the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span>, which Dick Steele was spouting at every coffee-house +in Whitehall and Covent Garden. The wits on the +other side of Temple Bar saluted him at once as the +greatest poet the world had seen for ages; the people +huzza'ed for Marlborough and for Addison, and, more +than this, the party in power provided for the meritorious +poet, and Mr. Addison got the appointment of +Commissioner of Excise, which the famous Mr. Locke +vacated, and rose from this place to other dignities and +honours; his prosperity from henceforth to the end of his +life being scarce ever interrupted. But I doubt whether +he was not happier in his garret in the Haymarket, than +ever he was in his splendid palace at Kensington; and +I believe the fortune that came to him in the shape of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page260">[pg 260]</span><a name="Pg260" id="Pg260" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the countess his wife, was no better than a shrew and +a vixen. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Gay as the town was, 'twas but a dreary place for Mr. +Esmond, whether his charmer was in it or out of it, and +he was glad when his general gave him notice that he was +going back to his division of the army which lay in winter +quarters at Bois-le-Duc. His dear mistress bade him +farewell with a cheerful face; her blessing he knew he had +always, and wheresoever fate carried him. Mrs. Beatrix +was away in attendance on her Majesty at Hampton Court, +and kissed her fair finger-tips to him, by way of adieu, +when he rode thither to take his leave. She received her +kinsman in a waiting-room where there were half a dozen +more ladies of the Court, so that his high-flown speeches, +had he intended to make any (and very likely he did), +were impossible; and she announced to her friends that +her cousin was going to the army, in as easy a manner +as she would have said he was going to a chocolate-house. +He asked with a rather rueful face, if she had any orders +for the army? and she was pleased to say that she would +like a mantle of Mechlin lace. She made him a saucy +curtsy in reply to his own dismal bow. She deigned to +kiss her finger-tips from the window, where she stood +laughing with the other ladies, and chanced to see him +as he made his way to the <span class="tei tei-q">“Toy”</span>. The dowager at Chelsea +was not sorry to part with him this time. <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Mon cher, +vous êtes triste comme un sermon</span></span>,”</span> she did him the honour +to say to him; indeed, gentlemen in his condition are by +no means amusing companions, and besides, the fickle old +woman had now found a much more amiable favourite, +and <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">raffole</span></span>'d for her darling lieutenant of the Guard. +Frank remained behind for a while, and did not join the army +till later, in the suite of his grace the commander-in-chief. +His dear mother, on the last day before Esmond went +away, and when the three dined together, made Esmond +promise to befriend her boy, and besought Frank to take +the example of his kinsman as of a loyal gentleman and +brave soldier, so she was pleased to say; and at parting, +betrayed not the least sign of faltering or weakness, though, +God knows, that fond heart was fearful enough when others +were concerned, though so resolute in bearing its own pain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's general embarked at Harwich. 'Twas a grand +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page261">[pg 261]</span><a name="Pg261" id="Pg261" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +sight to see Mr. Webb dressed in scarlet on the deck, +waving his hat as our yacht put off, and the guns saluted +from the shore. Harry did not see his viscount again, +until three months after, at Bois-le-Duc, when his grace +the duke came to take the command, and Frank brought +a budget of news from home: how he had supped with +this actress, and got tired of that; how he had got the +better of Mr. St. John, both over the bottle, and with +Mrs. Mountford, of the Haymarket Theatre (a veteran +charmer of fifty, with whom the young scapegrace chose +to fancy himself in love); how his sister was always at +her tricks, and had jilted a young baron for an old earl. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I can't make out Beatrix,”</span> he said; <span class="tei tei-q">“she cares for none +of us—she only thinks about herself; she is never happy +unless she is quarrelling; but as for my mother—my +mother, Harry, is an angel.”</span> Harry tried to impress on +the young fellow the necessity of doing everything in his +power to please that angel; not to drink too much; not +to go into debt; not to run after the pretty Flemish girls, +and so forth, as became a senior speaking to a lad. <span class="tei tei-q">“But +Lord bless thee!”</span> the boy said; <span class="tei tei-q">“I may do what I like, +and I know she will love me all the same;”</span> and so, indeed, +he did what he liked. Everybody spoiled him, and his +grave kinsman as much as the rest. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc63" id="toc63"></a> +<a name="pdf64" id="pdf64"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XII. I Get A Company In The Campaign Of 1706</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On Whit Sunday, the famous 23rd of May, 1706, my young +lord first came under the fire of the enemy, whom we +found posted in order of battle, their lines extending three +miles or more, over the high ground behind the little +Gheet river, and having on his left the little village of +Anderkirk or Autre-église, and on his right Ramillies, +which has given its name to one of the most brilliant and +disastrous days of battle that history ever hath recorded. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our duke here once more met his old enemy of Blenheim, +the Bavarian Elector and the Mareschal Villeroy, over whom +the Prince of Savoy had gained the famous victory of +Chiari. What Englishman or Frenchman doth not know +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page262">[pg 262]</span><a name="Pg262" id="Pg262" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the issue of that day? Having chosen his own ground, +having a force superior to the English, and besides the +excellent Spanish and Bavarian troops, the whole Maison-du-Roy +with him, the most splendid body of horse in the +world,—in an hour (and in spite of the prodigious gallantry +of the French Royal Household, who charged through the +centre of our line and broke it), this magnificent army of +Villeroy was utterly routed by troops that had been marching +for twelve hours, and by the intrepid skill of a commander, +who did, indeed, seem in the presence of the enemy +to be the very Genius of Victory. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I think it was more from conviction than policy, though +that policy was surely the most prudent in the world, that +the great duke always spoke of his victories with an extraordinary +modesty, and as if it was not so much his own +admirable genius and courage which achieved these amazing +successes, but as if he was a special and fatal instrument in +the hands of Providence, that willed irresistibly the enemy's +overthrow. Before his actions he always had the church service +read solemnly, and professed an undoubting belief that +our queen's arms were blessed and our victory sure. All the +letters which he writ after his battles show awe rather than +exultation; and he attributes the glory of these achievements, +about which I have heard mere petty officers and +men bragging with a pardonable vainglory, in no wise to +his own bravery or skill, but to the superintending protection +of Heaven, which he ever seemed to think was our +especial ally. And our army got to believe so, and the +enemy learnt to think so too; for we never entered into +a battle without a perfect confidence that it was to end in +a victory; nor did the French, after the issue of Blenheim, +and that astonishing triumph of Ramillies, ever meet us +without feeling that the game was lost before it was begun +to be played, and that our general's fortune was irresistible. +Here, as at Blenheim, the duke's charger was shot, and +'twas thought for a moment he was dead. As he mounted +another, Binfield, his master of the horse, kneeling to +hold his grace's stirrup, had his head shot away by a cannon-ball. +A French gentleman of the Royal Household, that +was a prisoner with us, told the writer that at the time of the +charge of the Household, when their horse and ours were +mingled, an Irish officer recognized the Prince-Duke, and +calling out—<span class="tei tei-q">“Marlborough, Marlborough!”</span> fired his pistol +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page263">[pg 263]</span><a name="Pg263" id="Pg263" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +at him <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">à bout +portant</span></span>, and that a score more carbines and +pistols were discharged at him. Not one touched him: he +rode through the French Cuirassiers sword in hand, and +entirely unhurt, and calm and smiling rallied the German +horse, that was reeling before the enemy, brought these +and twenty squadrons of Orkney's back upon them, and +drove the French across the river again—leading the charge +himself, and defeating the only dangerous move the French +made that day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Major-General Webb commanded on the left of our line, +and had his own regiment under the orders of their beloved +colonel. Neither he nor they belied their character for +gallantry on this occasion; but it was about his dear young +lord that Esmond was anxious, never having sight of him +save once, in the whole course of the day, when he brought +an order from the commander-in-chief to Mr. Webb. When +our horse, having charged round the right flank of the +enemy by Overkirk, had thrown him into entire confusion, +a general advance was made, and our whole line of foot, +crossing the little river and the morass, ascended the high +ground where the French were posted, cheering as they +went, the enemy retreating before them. 'Twas a service +of more glory than danger, the French battalions never +waiting to exchange push of pike or bayonet with ours; +and the gunners flying from their pieces which our line left +behind us as they advanced, and the French fell back. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At first it was a retreat orderly enough; but presently +the retreat became a rout, and a frightful slaughter of the +French ensued on this panic; so that an army of sixty +thousand men was utterly crushed and destroyed in the course +of a couple of hours. It was as if a hurricane had seized +a compact and numerous fleet, flung it all to the winds, +shattered, sunk, and annihilated it; <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">afflavit Deus, et dissipati +sunt</span></span>. The French army of Flanders was gone, their artillery, +their standards, their treasure, provisions, and ammunition +were all left behind them: the poor devils had even fled +without their soup-kettles, which are as much the palladia +of the French infantry as of the Grand Signor's Janizaries, +and round which they rally even more than round their lilies. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The pursuit, and a dreadful carnage which ensued (for +the dregs of a battle, however brilliant, are ever a base +residue of rapine, cruelty, and drunken plunder), was carried +far beyond the field of Ramillies. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page264">[pg 264]</span><a name="Pg264" id="Pg264" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Honest Lockwood, Esmond's servant, no doubt wanted +to be among the marauders himself and take his share of the +booty; for when, the action over, and the troops got to +their ground for the night, the captain bade Lockwood get +a horse, he asked, with a very rueful countenance, whether +his honour would have him come too; but his honour only +bade him go about his own business, and Jack hopped away +quite delighted as soon as he saw his master mounted. +Esmond made his way, and not without danger and difficulty, +to his grace's head quarters, and found for himself +very quickly where the aides de camp's quarters were, in an +outbuilding of a farm, where several of these gentlemen +were seated, drinking and singing, and at supper. If he +had any anxiety about his boy, 'twas relieved at once. One +of the gentlemen was singing a song to a tune that Mr. +Farquhar and Mr. Gay both had used in their admirable +comedies, and very popular in the army of that day; after +the song came a chorus, <span class="tei tei-q">“Over the hills and far away”</span>; +and Esmond heard Frank's fresh voice soaring, as it were, +over the songs of the rest of the young men—a voice that +had always a certain artless, indescribable pathos with it, +and indeed which caused Mr. Esmond's eyes to fill with +tears now, out of thankfulness to God the child was safe +and still alive to laugh and sing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the song was over Esmond entered the room, where +he knew several of the gentlemen present, and there sat +my young lord, having taken off his cuirass, his waistcoat +open, his face flushed, his long yellow hair hanging over +his shoulders, drinking with the rest; the youngest, gayest, +handsomest there. As soon as he saw Esmond, he clapped +down his glass, and running towards his friend, put both +his arms round him and embraced him. The other's voice +trembled with joy as he greeted the lad; he had thought +but now as he stood in the courtyard under the clear-shining +moonlight: <span class="tei tei-q">“Great God! what a scene of murder +is here within a mile of us; what hundreds and thousands +have faced danger to-day; and here are these lads singing +over their cups, and the same moon that is shining over +yonder horrid field is looking down on Walcote very likely, +while my lady sits and thinks about her boy that is at the +war.”</span> As Esmond embraced his young pupil now, 'twas +with the feeling of quite religious thankfulness, and an +almost paternal pleasure that he beheld him. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page265">[pg 265]</span><a name="Pg265" id="Pg265" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Round his neck was a star with a striped ribbon, that was +made of small brilliants and might be worth a hundred +crowns. <span class="tei tei-q">“Look,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“won't that be a pretty present +for mother?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who gave you the Order?”</span> says Harry, saluting the +gentleman: <span class="tei tei-q">“did you win it in battle?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I won it,”</span> cried the other, <span class="tei tei-q">“with my sword and my spear. +There was a mousquetaire that had it round his neck—such +a big mousquetaire, as big as General Webb. I called out +to him to surrender, and that I'd give him quarter: he +called me a <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">petit +polisson</span></span>, and fired his pistol at me, and +then sent it at my head with a curse. I rode at him, sir, +drove my sword right under his arm-hole, and broke it in +the rascal's body. I found a purse in his holster with sixty-five +louis in it, and a bundle of love-letters, and a flask of +Hungary-water. <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Vive la guerre!</span></span> there are the ten pieces +you lent me. I should like to have a fight every day;”</span> +and he pulled at his little moustache and bade a servant +bring a supper to Captain Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Harry fell to with a very good appetite; he had tasted +nothing since twenty hours ago, at early dawn. Master +Grandson, who read this, do you look for the history of +battles and sieges? Go, find them in the proper books; +this is only the story of your grandfather and his family. +Far more pleasant to him than the victory, though for that +too he may say <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">meminisse juvat</span></span>, it was to find that the +day was over, and his dear young Castlewood was unhurt. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And would you, sirrah, wish to know how it was that +a sedate captain of foot, a studious and rather solitary +bachelor of eight or nine and twenty years of age, who did +not care very much for the jollities which his comrades +engaged in, and was never known to lose his heart in any +garrison town—should you wish to know why such a man +had so prodigious a tenderness, and tended so fondly a boy +of eighteen, wait, my good friend, until thou art in love +with thy schoolfellow's sister, and then see how mighty +tender thou wilt be towards him. Esmond's general and +his grace the prince-duke were notoriously at variance, +and the former's friendship was in no wise likely to advance +any man's promotion, of whose services Webb spoke well; +but rather likely to injure him, so the army said, in the +favour of the greater man. However, Mr. Esmond had the +good fortune to be mentioned very advantageously by +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page266">[pg 266]</span><a name="Pg266" id="Pg266" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Major-General Webb in his report after the action; and +the major of his regiment and two of the captains having +been killed upon the day of Ramillies, Esmond, who was +second of the lieutenants, got his company, and had the +honour of serving as Captain Esmond in the next campaign. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord went home in the winter, but Esmond was afraid +to follow him. His dear mistress wrote him letters more +than once, thanking him, as mothers know how to thank, for +his care and protection of her boy, extolling Esmond's own +merits with a great deal more praise than they deserved; +for he did his duty no better than any other officer; and +speaking sometimes, though gently and cautiously, of +Beatrix. News came from home of at least half a dozen +grand matches that the beautiful maid of honour was about +to make. She was engaged to an earl, our gentlemen of +St. James's said, and then jilted him for a duke, who, in his +turn, had drawn off. Earl or duke it might be who should +win this Helen, Esmond knew she would never bestow herself +on a poor captain. Her conduct, it was clear, was +little satisfactory to her mother, who scarcely mentioned +her, or else the kind lady thought it was best to say nothing, +and leave time to work out its cure. At any rate, Harry +was best away from the fatal object which always wrought +him so much mischief; and so he never asked for leave to go +home, but remained with his regiment that was garrisoned +in Brussels, which city fell into our hands when the victory +of Ramillies drove the French out of Flanders. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc65" id="toc65"></a> +<a name="pdf66" id="pdf66"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XIII. I Meet An Old Acquaintance In Flanders, And Find My Mother's +Grave And My Own Cradle There</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Being one day in the Church of St. Gudule, at Brussels, +admiring the antique splendour of the architecture (and +always entertaining a great tenderness and reverence for +the Mother Church, that hath been as wickedly persecuted +in England as ever she herself persecuted in the days of her +prosperity), Esmond saw kneeling at a side altar, an officer +in a green uniform coat, very deeply engaged in devotion. +Something familiar in the figure and posture of the kneeling +man struck Captain Esmond, even before he saw the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page267">[pg 267]</span><a name="Pg267" id="Pg267" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +officer's face. As he rose up, putting away into his pocket +a little black breviary, such as priests use, Esmond beheld +a countenance so like that of his friend and tutor of early +days, Father Holt, that he broke out into an exclamation of +astonishment and advanced a step towards the gentleman, +who was making his way out of church. The German +officer too looked surprised when he saw Esmond, and his +face from being pale grew suddenly red. By this mark +of recognition, the Englishman knew that he could not be +mistaken; and though the other did not stop, but on the +contrary rather hastily walked away towards the door, +Esmond pursued him and faced him once more, as the +officer helping himself to holy water, turned mechanically +towards the altar to bow to it ere he quitted the sacred +edifice. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My father!”</span> says Esmond in English. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Silence! I do not understand. I do not speak English,”</span> +says the other in Latin. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond smiled at this sign of confusion, and replied in +the same language. <span class="tei tei-q">“I should know my father in any +garment, black or white, shaven or bearded,”</span> for the +Austrian officer was habited quite in the military manner, +and had as warlike a moustachio as any Pandour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He laughed—we were on the church steps by this time, +passing through the crowd of beggars that usually is there +holding up little trinkets for sale and whining for alms. +<span class="tei tei-q">“You speak Latin,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“in the English way, Harry +Esmond; you have forsaken the old true Roman tongue +you once knew.”</span> His tone was very frank, and friendly +quite; the kind voice of fifteen years back; he gave Esmond +his hand as he spoke. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Others have changed their coats too, my father,”</span> says +Esmond, glancing at his friend's military decoration. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush! I am Mr. or Captain von Holtz, in the Bavarian +Elector's service, and on a mission to his highness the +Prince of Savoy. You can keep a secret I know from +old times.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Captain von Holtz,”</span> says Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“I am your very +humble servant.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And you, too, have changed your coat,”</span> continues the +other, in his laughing way; <span class="tei tei-q">“I have heard of you at Cambridge +and afterwards: we have friends everywhere; and +I am told that Mr. Esmond at Cambridge was as good a +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page268">[pg 268]</span><a name="Pg268" id="Pg268" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +fencer as he was a bad theologian.”</span> (So, thinks Esmond, +my old <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">maitre d'armes</span></span> was a Jesuit as they said.) +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Perhaps you are right,”</span> says the other, reading his +thoughts quite as he used to do in old days: <span class="tei tei-q">“you were all +but killed at Hochstedt of a wound in the left side. You +were before that at Vigo, aide de camp to the Duke of +Ormonde. You got your company the other day after +Ramillies; your general and the prince-duke are not +friends; he is of the Webbs of Lydiard Tregoze, in the +county of York, a relation of my Lord St. John. Your +cousin, Monsieur de Castlewood, served his first campaign +this year in the Guard; yes, I do know a few things as +you see.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Captain Esmond laughed in his turn. <span class="tei tei-q">“You have +indeed a curious knowledge,”</span> he says. A foible of Mr. Holt's, +who did know more about books and men than, perhaps, +almost any person Esmond had ever met, was omniscience; +thus in every point he here professed to know, he was nearly +right, but not quite. Esmond's wound was in the right +side, not the left, his first general was General Lumley; +Mr. Webb came out of Wiltshire, not out of Yorkshire; +and so forth. Esmond did not think fit to correct his old +master in these trifling blunders, but they served to give +him a knowledge of the other's character, and he smiled to +think that this was his oracle of early days; only now no +longer infallible or divine. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> continues Father Holt, or Captain von Holtz, +<span class="tei tei-q">“for a man who has not been in England these eight years, +I know what goes on in London very well. The old dean +is dead, my Lady Castlewood's father. Do you know that +your recusant bishops wanted to consecrate him Bishop of +Southampton, and that Collier is Bishop of Thetford by +the same imposition? The Princess Anne has the gout and +eats too much; when the king returns, Collier will be an +archbishop.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Amen!”</span> says Esmond, laughing; <span class="tei tei-q">“and I hope to see +your eminence no longer in jack-boots, but red stockings, +at Whitehall.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are always with us—I know that—I heard of that +when you were at Cambridge; so was the late lord; so is +the young viscount.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And so was my father before me,”</span> said Mr. Esmond, +looking calmly at the other, who did not, however, show the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page269">[pg 269]</span><a name="Pg269" id="Pg269" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +least sign of intelligence in his impenetrable grey eyes—how +well Harry remembered them and their look! only +crows' feet were wrinkled round them—marks of black old +Time had settled there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's face chose to show no more sign of meaning +than the father's. There may have been on the one side and +the other just the faintest glitter of recognition, as you see +a bayonet shining out of an ambush; but each party fell +back, when everything was again dark. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And you, <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">mon +capitaine</span></span>, where have you been?”</span> says +Esmond, turning away the conversation from this dangerous +ground, where neither chose to engage. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I may have been in Pekin,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“or I may have +been in Paraguay—who knows where? I am now Captain +von Holtz, in the service of his electoral highness, come to +negotiate exchange of prisoners with his highness of Savoy.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas well known that very many officers in our army +were well-affected towards the young king at St. Germains, +whose right to the throne was undeniable, and whose +accession to it, at the death of his sister, by far the greater +part of the English people would have preferred, to the +having a petty German prince for a sovereign, about whose +cruelty, rapacity, boorish manners, and odious foreign ways, +a thousand stories were current. It wounded our English pride +to think, that a shabby High-Dutch duke, whose revenues +were not a tithe as great as those of many of the princes +of our ancient English nobility, who could not speak a word +of our language, and whom we chose to represent as a sort +of German boor, feeding on train-oil and sauerkraut, with +a bevy of mistresses in a barn, should come to reign over the +proudest and most polished people in the world. Were we, +the conquerors of the Grand Monarch, to submit to that +ignoble domination? What did the Hanoverian's Protestantism +matter to us? Was it not notorious (we were told +and led to believe so) that one of the daughters of this +Protestant hero was being bred up with no religion at all, +as yet, and ready to be made Lutheran or Roman, according +as the husband might be, whom her parents should find for +her? This talk, very idle and abusive much of it was, went +on at a hundred mess-tables in the army; there was scarce +an ensign that did not hear it, or join in it, and everybody +knew, or affected to know, that the commander-in-chief +himself had relations with his nephew, the Duke of Berwick +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page270">[pg 270]</span><a name="Pg270" id="Pg270" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +('twas by an Englishman, thank God, that we were beaten +at Almanza), and that his grace was most anxious to restore +the royal race of his benefactors, and to repair his former +treason. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This is certain, that for a considerable period no officer in +the duke's army lost favour with the commander-in-chief +for entertaining or proclaiming his loyalty towards the +exiled family. When the Chevalier de St. George, as the +King of England called himself, came with the dukes of +the French blood royal, to join the French army under +Vendosme, hundreds of ours saw him and cheered him, and +we all said he was like his father in this, who, seeing the +action of La Hogue fought between the French ships and +ours, was on the side of his native country during the +battle. But this, at least the chevalier knew, and every +one knew, that, however well our troops and their general +might be inclined towards the prince personally, in the +face of the enemy there was no question at all. Wherever +my lord duke found a French army, he would fight and +beat it, as he did at Oudenarde, two years after Ramillies, +where his grace achieved another of his transcendent victories; +and the noble young prince, who charged gallantly +along with the magnificent Maison-du-Roy, sent to compliment +his conquerors after the action. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In this battle, where the young Electoral Prince of +Hanover behaved himself very gallantly, fighting on our +side, Esmond's dear General Webb distinguished himself +prodigiously, exhibiting consummate skill and coolness as +a general, and fighting with the personal bravery of a common +soldier. Esmond's good luck again attended him; +he escaped without a hurt, although more than a third of +his regiment was killed, had again the honour to be favourably +mentioned in his commander's report, and was advanced +to the rank of major. But of this action there is +little need to speak, as it hath been related in every <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, +and talked of in every hamlet in this country. To return +from it to the writer's private affairs, which here, in his old +age, and at a distance, he narrates for his children who +come after him. Before Oudenarde, and after that chance +rencontre with Captain von Holtz at Brussels, a space of +more than a year elapsed, during which the captain of +Jesuits and the captain of Webb's Fusiliers were thrown +very much together. Esmond had no difficulty in finding +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page271">[pg 271]</span><a name="Pg271" id="Pg271" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +out (indeed, the other made no secret of it to him, being +assured from old times of his pupil's fidelity), that the +negotiator of prisoners was an agent from St. Germains, +and that he carried intelligence between great personages +in our camp and that of the French. <span class="tei tei-q">“My business,”</span> said he, +<span class="tei tei-q">“and I tell you, both because I can trust you, and your +keen eyes have already discovered it, is between the King +of England and his subjects, here engaged in fighting the +French king. As between you and them, all the Jesuits +in the world will not prevent your quarrelling: fight it out, +gentlemen. St. George for England, I say—and you know +who says so, wherever he may be.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I think Holt loved to make a parade of mystery, as it +were, and would appear and disappear at our quarters as +suddenly as he used to return and vanish in the old days +at Castlewood. He had passes between both armies, and +seemed to know (but with that inaccuracy which belonged +to the good father's omniscience) equally well what passed +in the French camp and in ours. One day he would give +Esmond news of a great <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">feste</span></span> that took place in the +French quarters, of a supper of Monsieur de Rohan's, where there +was play and violins, and then dancing and masques: the +king drove thither in Marshal Villar's own guinguette. +Another day he had the news of his Majesty's ague, the +king had not had a fit these ten days, and might be said +to be well. Captain Holtz made a visit to England during +this time, so eager was he about negotiating prisoners; and +'twas on returning from this voyage that he began to open +himself more to Esmond, and to make him, as occasion +served, at their various meetings, several of those confidences +which are here set down all together. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The reason of his increased confidence was this: upon +going to London, the old director of Esmond's aunt, the +dowager, paid her ladyship a visit at Chelsey, and there +learnt from her that Captain Esmond was acquainted with +the secret of his family, and was determined never to divulge +it. The knowledge of this fact raised Esmond in his old +tutor's eyes, so Holt was pleased to say, and he admired +Harry very much for his abnegation. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The family at Castlewood have done far more for me +than my own ever did,”</span> Esmond said. <span class="tei tei-q">“I would give my +life for them. Why should I grudge the only benefit that +'tis in my power to confer on them?”</span> The good father's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page272">[pg 272]</span><a name="Pg272" id="Pg272" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +eyes filled with tears at this speech, which to the other +seemed very simple: he embraced Esmond, and broke out +into many admiring expressions; he said he was a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">noble +cœur</span></span>, that he was proud of him, and fond of him as his pupil +and friend—regretted more than ever that he had lost him, +and been forced to leave him in those early times, when he +might have had an influence over him, have brought him +into that only true Church to which the father belonged, +and enlisted him in the noblest army in which a man ever +engaged—meaning his own Society of Jesus, which numbers +(says he) in its troops the greatest heroes the world ever +knew;—warriors, brave enough to dare or endure anything, +to encounter any odds, to die any death;—soldiers that +have won triumphs a thousand times more brilliant than +those of the greatest general; that have brought nations +on their knees to their sacred banner, the Cross; that have +achieved glories and palms incomparably brighter than +those awarded to the most splendid earthly conquerors—crowns +of immortal light, and seats in the high places of +Heaven. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond was thankful for his old friend's good opinion, +however little he might share the Jesuit father's enthusiasm. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have thought of that question, too,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“dear father,”</span> +and he took the other's hand—<span class="tei tei-q">“thought it out for myself, +as all men must, and contrive to do the right, and trust to +Heaven as devoutly in my way as you in yours. Another +six months of you as a child, and I had desired no better. +I used to weep upon my pillow at Castlewood as I thought +of you, and I might have been a brother of your order; +and who knows,”</span> Esmond added, with a smile, <span class="tei tei-q">“a priest in +full orders, and with a pair of moustachios, and a Bavarian +uniform.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My son,”</span> says Father Holt, turning red, <span class="tei tei-q">“in the cause +of religion and loyalty all disguises are fair.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> broke in Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“all disguises are fair, you say; +and all uniforms, say I, black or red,—a black cockade or +a white one—or a laced hat, or a sombrero, with a tonsure +under it. I cannot believe that St. Francis Xavier sailed +over the sea in a cloak, or raised the dead—I tried; and +very nearly did once, but cannot. Suffer me to do the +right, and to hope for the best in my own way.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond wished to cut short the good father's theology, +and succeeded; and the other, sighing over his pupil's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page273">[pg 273]</span><a name="Pg273" id="Pg273" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +invincible ignorance, did not withdraw his affection from +him, but gave him his utmost confidence—as much, that is +to say, as a priest can give: more than most do; for he +was naturally garrulous, and too eager to speak. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Holt's friendship encouraged Captain Esmond to ask, +what he long wished to know, and none could tell him, some +history of the poor mother whom he had often imagined in +his dreams, and whom he never knew. He described to +Holt those circumstances which are already put down in the +first part of this story—the promise he had made to his dear +lord, and that dying friend's confession; and he besought +Mr. Holt to tell him what he knew regarding the poor woman +from whom he had been taken. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She was of this very town,”</span> Holt said, and took Esmond +to see the street where her father lived, and where, as he +believed, she was born. <span class="tei tei-q">“In 1676, when your father came +hither in the retinue of the late king, then Duke of York, +and banished hither in disgrace, Captain Thomas Esmond +became acquainted with your mother, pursued her, and +made a victim of her; he hath told me in many subsequent +conversations, which I felt bound to keep private then, +that she was a woman of great virtue and tenderness, and +in all respects a most fond, faithful creature. He called +himself Captain Thomas, having good reason to be ashamed +of his conduct towards her, and hath spoken to me many +times with sincere remorse for that, as with fond love for +her many amiable qualities. He owned to having treated +her very ill; and that at this time his life was one of profligacy, +gambling, and poverty. She became with child +of you; was cursed by her own parents at that discovery; +though she never upbraided, except by her involuntary +tears, and the misery depicted on her countenance, the +author of her wretchedness and ruin.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thomas Esmond—Captain Thomas, as he was called—became +engaged in a gaming-house brawl, of which the +consequence was a duel, and a wound so severe that he +never—his surgeon said—could outlive it. Thinking his +death certain, and touched with remorse, he sent for a priest +of the very Church of St. Gudule where I met you; and on +the same day, after his making submission to our Church, +was married to your mother a few weeks before you were +born. My Lord Viscount Castlewood, Marquis of Esmond, +by King James's patent, which I myself took to your father, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page274">[pg 274]</span><a name="Pg274" id="Pg274" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +your lordship was christened at St. Gudule by the same +curé who married your parents, and by the name of Henry +Thomas, son of E. Thomas, officier Anglais, and Gertrude +Maes. You see you belong to us from your birth, and why +I did not christen you when you became my dear little pupil +at Castlewood.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your father's wound took a favourable turn—perhaps +his conscience was eased by the right he had done—and to +the surprise of the doctors he recovered. But as his health +came back, his wicked nature, too, returned. He was tired +of the poor girl, whom he had ruined; and receiving some +remittance from his uncle, my lord the old viscount then in +England, he pretended business, promised return, and never +saw your poor mother more.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He owned to me, in confession first, but afterwards in +talk before your aunt, his wife, else I never could have +disclosed what I now tell you, that on coming to London +he writ a pretended confession to poor Gertrude Maes—Gertrude +Esmond—of his having been married in England +previously, before uniting himself with her; said that his +name was not Thomas; that he was about to quit Europe +for the Virginia plantations, where, indeed, your family +had a grant of land from King Charles the First; sent her +a supply of money, the half of the last hundred guineas he +had, entreated her pardon, and bade her farewell.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Poor Gertrude never thought that the news in this letter +might be untrue as the rest of your father's conduct to her. +But though a young man of her own degree, who knew her +history, and whom she liked before she saw the English +gentleman who was the cause of all her misery, offered to +marry her, and to adopt you as his own child, and give you +his name, she refused him. This refusal only angered her +father, who had taken her home; she never held up her +head there, being the subject of constant unkindness after +her fall; and some devout ladies of her acquaintance +offering to pay a little pension for her, she went into a convent, +and you were put out to nurse.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A sister of the young fellow, who would have adopted +you as his son, was the person who took charge of you. +Your mother and this person were cousins. She had just +lost a child of her own, which you replaced, your own mother +being too sick and feeble to feed you; and presently your +nurse grew so fond of you, that she even grudged letting +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page275">[pg 275]</span><a name="Pg275" id="Pg275" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +you visit the convent where your mother was, and where +the nuns petted the little infant, as they pitied and loved +its unhappy parent. Her vocation became stronger every +day, and at the end of two years she was received as a sister +of the house.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your nurse's family were silk-weavers out of France, +whither they returned to Arras in French Flanders, shortly +before your mother took her vows, carrying you with them, +then a child of three years old. 'Twas a town, before the +late vigorous measures of the French king, full of Protestants, +and here your nurse's father, old Pastoureau, he with +whom you afterwards lived at Ealing, adopted the reformed +doctrines, perverting all his house with him. They were +expelled thence by the edict of his most Christian Majesty, +and came to London, and set up their looms in Spittlefields. +The old man brought a little money with him, and carried +on his trade, but in a poor way. He was a widower; by +this time his daughter, a widow too, kept house for him, +and his son and he laboured together at their vocation. +Meanwhile your father had publicly owned his conversion +just before King Charles's death (in whom our Church had +much such another convert), was reconciled to my Lord +Viscount Castlewood, and married, as you know, to his +daughter.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It chanced that the younger Pastoureau, going with a +piece of brocade to the mercer, who employed him, on +Ludgate Hill, met his old rival coming out of an ordinary +there. Pastoureau knew your father at once, seized him +by the collar, and upbraided him as a villain, who had +seduced his mistress, and afterwards deserted her and her +son. Mr. Thomas Esmond also recognized Pastoureau at +once, besought him to calm his indignation, and not to bring +a crowd round about them; and bade him to enter into the +tavern, out of which he had just stepped, when he would +give him any explanation. Pastoureau entered, and heard +the landlord order the drawer to show Captain Thomas to +a room; it was by his Christian name that your father was +familiarly called at his tavern haunts, which, to say the +truth, were none of the most reputable.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I must tell you that Captain Thomas, or my lord viscount +afterwards, was never at a loss for a story, and could +cajole a woman or a dun with a volubility, and an air of +simplicity at the same time, of which many a creditor of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page276">[pg 276]</span><a name="Pg276" id="Pg276" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his has been the dupe. His tales used to gather verisimilitude +as he went on with them. He strung together fact after +fact with a wonderful rapidity and coherence. It required, +saving your presence, a very long habit of acquaintance +with your father to know when his lordship was l——,—telling +the truth or no.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He told me with rueful remorse when he was ill—for the +fear of death set him instantly repenting, and with shrieks +of laughter when he was well, his lordship having a very +great sense of humour—how in half an hour's time, and +before a bottle was drunk, he had completely succeeded in +biting poor Pastoureau. The seduction he owned too: +that he could not help: he was quite ready with tears at +a moment's warning, and shed them profusely to melt his +credulous listener. He wept for your mother even more +than Pastoureau did, who cried very heartily, poor fellow, +as my lord informed me; he swore upon his honour that +he had twice sent money to Brussels, and mentioned the +name of the merchant with whom it was lying for poor +Gertrude's use. He did not even know whether she had a +child or no, or whether she was alive or dead; but got these +facts easily out of honest Pastoureau's answers to him. +When he heard that she was in a convent, he said he hoped +to end his days in one himself, should he survive his wife, +whom he hated, and had been forced by a cruel father to +marry; and when he was told that Gertrude's son was alive, +and actually in London, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I started,’</span> says he; <span class="tei tei-q">‘for then, +damme, my wife was expecting to lie-in, and I thought +should this old Put, my father-in-law, run rusty, here would +be a good chance to frighten him.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He expressed the deepest gratitude to the Pastoureau +family for their care of the infant; you were now near six +years old; and on Pastoureau bluntly telling him, when he +proposed to go that instant and see the darling child, that +they never wished to see his ill-omened face again within +their doors; that he might have the boy, though they should +all be very sorry to lose him; and that they would take his +money, they being poor, if he gave it; or bring him up, +by God's help, as they had hitherto done, without: he +acquiesced in this at once, with a sigh, said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Well, 'twas +better that the dear child should remain with friends who +had been so admirably kind to him’</span>; and in his talk to +me afterwards, honestly praised and admired the weaver's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page277">[pg 277]</span><a name="Pg277" id="Pg277" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +conduct and spirit; owned that the Frenchman was a right +fellow, and he, the Lord have mercy upon him, a sad villain.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your father,”</span> Mr. Holt went on to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“was good-natured +with his money when he had it; and having that +day received a supply from his uncle, gave the weaver ten +pieces with perfect freedom, and promised him further +remittances. He took down eagerly Pastoureau's name +and place of abode in his table-book, and when the other +asked him for his own, gave, with the utmost readiness, his +name as Captain Thomas, New Lodge, Penzance, Cornwall; +he said he was in London for a few days only on business +connected with his wife's property; described her as a shrew, +though a woman of kind disposition; and depicted his +father as a Cornish squire, in an infirm state of health, at +whose death he hoped for something handsome, when he +promised richly to reward the admirable protector of his +child, and to provide for the boy. <span class="tei tei-q">‘And by Gad, sir,’</span> he +said to me in his strange laughing way, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I ordered a piece +of brocade of the very same pattern as that which the fellow +was carrying, and presented it to my wife for a morning +wrapper, to receive company after she lay-in of our little +boy.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your little pension was paid regularly enough; and when +your father became Viscount Castlewood on his uncle's +demise, I was employed to keep a watch over you, and 'twas +at my instance that you were brought home. Your foster-mother +was dead; her father made acquaintance with +a woman whom he married, who quarrelled with his son. +The faithful creature came back to Brussels to be near the +woman he loved, and died, too, a few months before her. +Will you see her cross in the convent cemetery? The +superior is an old penitent of mine, and remembers Sœur +Marie Madeleine fondly still.”</span> +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond came to this spot in one sunny evening of spring, +and saw, amidst a thousand black crosses, casting their +shadows across the grassy mounds, that particular one +which marked his mother's resting-place. Many more of +those poor creatures that lay there had adopted that same +name, with which sorrow had rebaptized her, and which +fondly seemed to hint their individual story of love and +grief. He fancied her in tears and darkness, kneeling at +the foot of her cross, under which her cares were buried. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page278">[pg 278]</span><a name="Pg278" id="Pg278" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Surely he knelt down, and said his own prayer there, not +in sorrow so much as in awe (for even his memory had no +recollection of her), and in pity for the pangs which the +gentle soul in life had been made to suffer. To this cross +she brought them; for this heavenly bridegroom she +exchanged the husband who had wooed her, the traitor who +had left her. A thousand such hillocks lay round about, +the gentle daisies springing out of the grass over them, and +each bearing its cross and requiescat. A nun, veiled in +black, was kneeling hard by, at a sleeping sister's bedside +(so fresh made, that the spring had scarce had time to spin +a coverlid for it); beyond the cemetery walls you had +glimpses of life and the world, and the spires and gables +of the city. A bird came down from a roof opposite, and +lit first on a cross, and then on the grass below it, whence +it flew away presently with a leaf in its mouth: then came +a sound as of chanting, from the chapel of the sisters hard +by; others had long since filled the place, which poor Mary +Magdalene once had there, were kneeling at the same stall, +and hearing the same hymns and prayers in which her +stricken heart had found consolation. Might she sleep in +peace—might she sleep in peace; and we, too, when our +struggles and pains are over! But the earth is the Lord's +as the heaven is; we are alike His creatures here and +yonder. I took a little flower off the hillock, and kissed it, +and went my way, like the bird that had just lighted on +the cross by me, back into the world again. Silent receptacle +of death! tranquil depth of calm, out of reach of +tempest and trouble! I felt as one who had been walking +below the sea, and treading amidst the bones of shipwrecks. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page279">[pg 279]</span><a name="Pg279" id="Pg279" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc67" id="toc67"></a> +<a name="pdf68" id="pdf68"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XIV. The Campaign Of 1707, 1708</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +During the whole of the year which succeeded that in which +the glorious battle of Ramillies had been fought, our army +made no movement of importance, much to the disgust of +very many of our officers remaining inactive in Flanders, +who said that his grace the captain-general had had fighting +enough, and was all for money now, and the enjoyment of his +five thousand a year and his splendid palace at Woodstock, +which was now being built. And his grace had sufficient +occupation fighting his enemies at home this year, where +it begun to be whispered that his favour was decreasing, +and his duchess losing her hold on the queen, who was +transferring her royal affections to the famous Mrs. Masham, +and Mrs. Masham's humble servant, Mr. Harley. Against +their intrigues, our duke passed a great part of his time +intriguing. Mr. Harley was got out of office, and his grace, +in so far, had a victory. But her Majesty, convinced +against her will, was of that opinion still, of which the +poet says people are when so convinced, and Mr. Harley +before long had his revenge. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Meanwhile the business of fighting did not go on any way +to the satisfaction of Marlborough's gallant lieutenants. +During all 1707, with the French before us, we had never +so much as a battle; our army in Spain was utterly routed +at Almanza by the gallant Duke of Berwick; and we of +Webb's, which regiment the young duke had commanded +before his father's abdication, were a little proud to think +that it was our colonel who had achieved this victory. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I think if I had had Galway's place, and my Fusiliers,”</span> +says our general, <span class="tei tei-q">“we would not have laid down our arms, +even to our old colonel, as Galway did; and Webb's officers +swore if we had had Webb, at least we would not have been +taken prisoners.”</span> Our dear old general talked incautiously +of himself and of others; a braver or a more brilliant +soldier never lived than he; but he blew his honest trumpet +rather more loudly than became a commander of his station, +and, mighty man of valour as he was, shook his great spear, +and blustered before the army too fiercely. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page280">[pg 280]</span><a name="Pg280" id="Pg280" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mysterious Mr. Holtz went off on a secret expedition in +the early part of 1708, with great elation of spirits, and +a prophecy to Esmond that a wonderful something was about +to take place. This secret came out on my friend's return +to the army, whither he brought a most rueful and dejected +countenance, and owned that the great something he had +been engaged upon had failed utterly. He had been indeed +with that luckless expedition of the Chevalier de St. George, +who was sent by the French king with ships and an army +from Dunkirk, and was to have invaded and conquered +Scotland. But that ill wind which ever opposed all the +projects upon which the prince ever embarked, prevented +the Chevalier's invasion of Scotland, as 'tis known, and +blew poor Monsieur von Holtz back into our camp again, +to scheme and foretell, and to pry about as usual. The +Chevalier (the King of England, as some of us held him) +went from Dunkirk to the French army to make the campaign +against us. The Duke of Burgundy had the command +this year, having the Duke of Berry with him, and the +famous Mareschal Vendosme and the Duke of Matignon +to aid him in the campaign. Holtz, who knew everything +that was passing in Flanders and France (and the Indies +for what I know), insisted that there would be no more +fighting in 1708 than there had been in the previous year, +and that our commander had reasons for keeping him quiet. +Indeed, Esmond's general, who was known as a grumbler, +and to have a hearty mistrust of the great duke, and +hundreds more officers besides, did not scruple to say that +these private reasons came to the duke in the shape of +crown-pieces from the French king, by whom the generalissimo +was bribed to avoid a battle. There were plenty of +men in our lines, quidnuncs, to whom Mr. Webb listened +only too willingly, who could specify the exact sums the +duke got, how much fell to Cadogan's share, and what was +the precise fee given to Doctor Hare. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And the successes with which the French began the +campaign of 1708, served to give strength to these reports +of treason, which were in everybody's mouth. Our general +allowed the enemy to get between us and Ghent, and +declined to attack him, though for eight-and-forty hours +the armies were in presence of each other. Ghent was +taken, and on the same day Monsieur de la Mothe summoned +Bruges; and these two great cities fell into the hands of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page281">[pg 281]</span><a name="Pg281" id="Pg281" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the French without firing a shot. A few days afterwards +La Mothe seized upon the fort of Plashendall: and it began +to be supposed that all Spanish Flanders, as well as Brabant, +would fall into the hands of the French troops; when the +Prince Eugene arrived from the Mozelle, and then there was +no more shilly-shallying. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Prince of Savoy always signalized his arrival at the +army by a great feast (my lord duke's entertainments +were both seldom and shabby): and I remember our general +returning from this dinner with the two commanders-in-chief; +his honest head a little excited by wine, which was +dealt out much more liberally by the Austrian than by the +English commander:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Now,”</span> says my general, slapping the +table, with an oath, <span class="tei tei-q">“he must fight; and when he is forced +to it, d—— it, no man in Europe can stand up against +Jack Churchill.”</span> Within a week the battle of Oudenarde +was fought, when, hate each other as they might, Esmond's +general and the commander-in-chief were forced to admire +each other, so splendid was the gallantry of each upon +this day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The brigade commanded by Major-General Webb gave +and received about as hard knocks as any that were delivered +in that action, in which Mr. Esmond had the fortune to serve +at the head of his own company in his regiment, under the +command of their own colonel as major-general; and it +was his good luck to bring the regiment out of action as +commander of it, the four senior officers above him being +killed in the prodigious slaughter which happened on that +day. I like to think that Jack Haythorn, who sneered at +me for being a bastard and a parasite of Webb's, as he chose +to call me, and with whom I had had words, shook hands +with me the day before the battle begun. Three days +before, poor Brace, our lieutenant-colonel, had heard of his +elder brother's death, and was heir to a baronetcy in Norfolk, +and four thousand a year. Fate, that had left him harmless +through a dozen campaigns, seized on him just as the world +was worth living for, and he went into action, knowing, as +he said, that the luck was going to turn against him. The +major had just joined us—a creature of Lord Marlborough, +put in much to the dislike of the other officers, and to be +a spy upon us, as it was said. I know not whether the +truth was so, nor who took the tattle of our mess to head +quarters, but Webb's regiment, as its colonel, was known +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page282">[pg 282]</span><a name="Pg282" id="Pg282" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to be in the commander-in-chief's black books: <span class="tei tei-q">“And if +he did not dare to break it up at home,”</span> our gallant old +chief used to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“he was determined to destroy it before +the enemy;”</span> so that poor Major Proudfoot was put into +a post of danger. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's dear young viscount, serving as aide de camp +to my lord duke, received a wound, and won an honourable +name for himself in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>; and Captain Esmond's +name was sent in for promotion by his general, too, whose +favourite he was. It made his heart beat to think that +certain eyes at home, the brightest in the world, might read +the page on which his humble services were recorded; but +his mind was made up steadily to keep out of their dangerous +influence, and to let time and absence conquer that passion +he had still lurking about him. Away from Beatrix, it did +not trouble him; but he knew as certain that if he returned +home, his fever would break out again, and avoided Walcote +as a Lincolnshire man avoids returning to his fens, where +he is sure that the ague is lying in wait for him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We of the English party in the army, who were inclined +to sneer at everything that came out of Hanover, and to +treat as little better than boors and savages the Elector's +court and family, were yet forced to confess that, on the +day of Oudenarde, the young electoral prince, then making +his first campaign, conducted himself with the spirit and +courage of an approved soldier. On this occasion his +electoral highness had better luck than the King of England, +who was with his cousins in the enemy's camp, and had +to run with them at the ignominious end of the day. With +the most consummate generals in the world before them, +and an admirable commander on their own side, they chose +to neglect the councils, and to rush into a combat with the +former, which would have ended in the utter annihilation +of their army but for the great skill and bravery of the Duke +of Vendosme, who remedied, as far as courage and genius +might, the disasters occasioned by the squabbles and follies +of his kinsmen, the legitimate princes of the blood royal. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If the Duke of Berwick had but been in the army, the +fate of the day would have been very different,”</span> was all +that poor Mr. von Holtz could say; <span class="tei tei-q">“and you would have +seen that the hero of Almanza was fit to measure swords +with the conqueror of Blenheim.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The business relative to the exchange of prisoners was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page283">[pg 283]</span><a name="Pg283" id="Pg283" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +always going on, and was at least that ostensible one which +kept Mr. Holtz perpetually on the move between the forces +of the French and the Allies. I can answer for it, that he +was once very near hanged as a spy by Major-General +Wayne, when he was released and sent on to head quarters +by a special order of the commander-in-chief. He came +and went, always favoured, wherever he was, by some high +though occult protection. He carried messages between +the Duke of Berwick and his uncle, our duke. He seemed +to know as well what was taking place in the prince's quarter +as our own: he brought the compliments of the King of +England to some of our officers, the gentlemen of Webb's +among the rest, for their behaviour on that great day; and +after Wynendael, when our general was chafing at the +neglect of our commander-in-chief, he said he knew how +that action was regarded by the chiefs of the French army, +and that the stand made before Wynendael wood was the +passage by which the Allies entered Lille. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Ah!”</span> says Holtz (and some folks were very willing to +listen to him), <span class="tei tei-q">“if the king came by his own, how changed +the conduct of affairs would be! His Majesty's very exile +has this advantage, that he is enabled to read England +impartially, and to judge honestly of all the eminent men. +His sister is always in the hand of one greedy favourite or +another, through whose eyes she sees, and to whose flattery +or dependants she gives away everything. Do you suppose +that his Majesty, knowing England so well as he does, +would neglect such a man as General Webb? He ought to +be in the House of Peers as Lord Lydiard. The enemy and +all Europe know his merit; it is that very reputation +which certain great people, who hate all equality and independence, +can never pardon.”</span> It was intended that these +conversations should be carried to Mr. Webb. They were +welcome to him, for great as his services were, no man could +value them more than John Richmond Webb did himself, +and the differences between him and Marlborough being +notorious, his grace's enemies in the army and at home +began to court Webb, and set him up against the all-grasping +domineering chief. And soon after the victory of Oudenarde, +a glorious opportunity fell into General Webb's way, which +that gallant warrior did not neglect, and which gave him +the means of immensely increasing his reputation at home. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After Oudenarde, and against the counsels of Marlborough, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page284">[pg 284]</span><a name="Pg284" id="Pg284" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +it was said, the Prince of Savoy sat down before Lille, the +capital of French Flanders, and commenced that siege, the +most celebrated of our time, and almost as famous as the +siege of Troy itself, for the feats of valour performed in the +assault and the defence. The enmity of that Prince of Savoy +against the French king was a furious personal hate, quite +unlike the calm hostility of our great English general, who +was no more moved by the game of war than that of billiards, +and pushed forward his squadrons, and drove his red +battalions hither and thither as calmly as he would combine +a stroke or make a cannon with the balls. The game over +(and he played it so as to be pretty sure to win it), not the +least animosity against the other party remained in the +breast of this consummate tactician. Whereas between the +Prince of Savoy and the French it was +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">guerre à mort</span></span>. Beaten +off in one quarter, as he had been at Toulon in the last year, +he was back again on another frontier of France, assailing +it with his indefatigable fury. When the prince came to +the army, the smouldering fires of war were lighted up and +burst out into a flame. Our phlegmatic Dutch allies were +made to advance at a quick march—our calm duke forced +into action. The prince was an army in himself against the +French; the energy of his hatred prodigious, indefatigable—infectious +over hundreds of thousands of men. The +emperor's general was repaying, and with a vengeance, the +slight the French king had put upon the fiery little Abbé of +Savoy. Brilliant and famous as a leader himself, and beyond +all measure daring and intrepid, and enabled to cope with +almost the best of those famous men of war who commanded +the armies of the French king, Eugene had a weapon, the +equal of which could not be found in France, since the +cannon-shot of Sasbach laid low the noble Turenne, and +could hurl Marlborough at the heads of the French host, +and crush them as with a rock, under which all the gathered +strength of their strongest captains must go down. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The English duke took little part in that vast siege of +Lille, which the Imperial generalissimo pursued with all +his force and vigour, further than to cover the besieging +lines from the Duke of Burgundy's army, between which +and the Imperialists our duke lay. Once, when Prince +Eugene was wounded, our duke took his highness's place +in the trenches; but the siege was with the Imperialists, +not with us. A division under Webb and Rantzau was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page285">[pg 285]</span><a name="Pg285" id="Pg285" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +detached into Artois and Picardy upon the most painful +and odious service that Mr. Esmond ever saw in the course +of his military life. The wretched towns of the defenceless +provinces, whose young men had been drafted away into +the French armies, which year after year the insatiable war +devoured, were left at our mercy; and our orders were to +show them none. We found places garrisoned by invalids, +and children and women: poor as they were, and as the costs +of this miserable war had made them, our commission was +to rob these almost starving wretches—to tear the food out +of their granaries, and strip them of their rags. 'Twas an expedition +of rapine and murder we were sent on: our soldiers +did deeds such as an honest man must blush to remember. +We brought back money and provisions in quantity to the +duke's camp; there had been no one to resist us, and yet +who dares to tell with what murder and violence, with what +brutal cruelty, outrage, insult, that ignoble booty had +been ravished from the innocent and miserable victims of +the war? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Meanwhile, gallantly as the operations before Lille had +been conducted, the Allies had made but little progress, +and 'twas said when we returned to the Duke of Marlborough's +camp, that the siege would never be brought to +a satisfactory end, and that the Prince of Savoy would be +forced to raise it. My Lord Marlborough gave this as his +opinion openly; those who mistrusted him, and Mr. Esmond +owns himself to be of the number, hinted that the duke +had his reasons why Lille should not be taken, and that he +was paid to that end by the French king. If this was so, +and I believe it, General Webb had now a remarkable +opportunity of gratifying his hatred of the commander-in-chief, +of balking that shameful avarice, which was one of +the basest and most notorious qualities of the famous duke, +and of showing his own consummate skill as a commander. +And when I consider all the circumstances preceding the event +which will now be related, that my lord duke was actually +offered certain millions of crowns provided that the siege +of Lille should be raised; that the Imperial army before it +was without provisions and ammunition, and must have +decamped but for the supplies that they received; that +the march of the convoy destined to relieve the siege was +accurately known to the French; and that the force +covering it was shamefully inadequate to that end, and by +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page286">[pg 286]</span><a name="Pg286" id="Pg286" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +six times inferior to Count de la Mothe's army, which was +sent to intercept the convoy; when 'tis certain that the +Duke of Berwick, de la Mothe's chief, was in constant +correspondence with his uncle, the English generalissimo: +I believe on my conscience that 'twas my Lord Marlborough's +intention to prevent those supplies, of which the Prince of +Savoy stood in absolute need, from ever reaching his highness; +that he meant to sacrifice the little army which +covered this convoy, and to betray it as he had betrayed +Tollemache at Brest; as he betrayed every friend he had, +to further his own schemes of avarice or ambition. But +for the miraculous victory which Esmond's general won over +an army six or seven times greater than his own, the siege +of Lille must have been raised; and it must be remembered +that our gallant little force was under the command of +a general whom Marlborough hated, that he was furious +with the conqueror, and tried by the most open and shameless +injustice afterwards to rob him of the credit of his +victory. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc69" id="toc69"></a> +<a name="pdf70" id="pdf70"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XV. General Webb Wins The Battle Of Wynendael</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By the besiegers and besieged of Lille, some of the most +brilliant feats of valour were performed that ever illustrated +any war. On the French side (whose gallantry was prodigious, +the skill and bravery of Marshal Boufflers actually +eclipsing those of his conqueror, the Prince of Savoy) may +be mentioned that daring action of Messieurs de Luxembourg +and Tournefort, who, with a body of horse and dragoons, +carried powder into the town, of which the besieged were +in extreme want, each soldier bringing a bag with forty +pounds of powder behind him; with which perilous provision +they engaged our own horse, faced the fire of the foot brought +out to meet them: and though half of the men were blown +up in the dreadful errand they rode on, a part of them got +into the town with the succours of which the garrison was +so much in want. A French officer, Monsieur du Bois, +performed an act equally daring, and perfectly successful. +The duke's great army lying at Helchin, and covering the +siege, and it being necessary for Monsieur de Vendosme to get +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page287">[pg 287]</span><a name="Pg287" id="Pg287" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +news of the condition of the place, Captain du Bois performed +his famous exploit: not only passing through the lines of +the siege, but swimming afterwards no less than seven moats +and ditches: and coming back the same way, swimming +with his letters in his mouth. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By these letters Monsieur de Boufflers said that he could +undertake to hold the place till October; and that, if one +of the convoys of the Allies could be intercepted, they must +raise the siege altogether. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Such a convoy as hath been said was now prepared at +Ostend, and about to march for the siege; and on the +27th September, we (and the French too) had news that it was +on its way. It was composed of 700 waggons, containing +ammunition of all sorts, and was escorted out of Ostend +by 2,000 infantry and 300 horse. At the same time +Monsieur de la Mothe quitted Bruges, having with him +five-and-thirty battalions, and upwards of sixty squadrons +and forty guns, in pursuit of the convoy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Major-General Webb had meanwhile made up a force of +twenty battalions, and three squadrons of dragoons, at +Turout, whence he moved to cover the convoy and pursue +la Mothe: with whose advanced guard ours came up upon +the great plain of Turout, and before the little wood +and castle of Wynendael; behind which the convoy was +marching. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As soon as they came in sight of the enemy, our advanced +troops were halted, with the wood behind them, and the +rest of our force brought up as quickly as possible, our little +body of horse being brought forward to the opening of the +plain, as our general said, to amuse the enemy. When +Monsieur la Mothe came up he found us posted in two lines +in front of the wood; and formed his own army in battle +facing ours, in eight lines, four of infantry in front, and +dragoons and cavalry behind. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The French began the action, as usual, with a cannonade +which lasted three hours, when they made their attack, +advancing in twelve lines, four of foot and four of horse, +upon the allied troops in the wood where we were posted. +Their infantry behaved ill; they were ordered to charge +with the bayonet, but, instead, began to fire, and almost +at the very first discharge from our men, broke and fled. +The cavalry behaved better; with these alone, who were +three or four times as numerous as our whole force, Monsieur +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page288">[pg 288]</span><a name="Pg288" id="Pg288" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +de la Mothe might have won victory: but only two of our +battalions were shaken in the least; and these speedily +rallied: nor could the repeated attacks of the French horse +cause our troops to budge an inch from the position in the +wood in which our general had placed them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After attacking for two hours, the French retired at night-fall +entirely foiled. With all the loss we had inflicted upon +him, the enemy was still three times stronger than we: and +it could not be supposed that our general could pursue +M. de la Mothe, or do much more than hold our ground +about the wood, from which the Frenchman had in vain +attempted to dislodge us. La Mothe retired behind his +forty guns, his cavalry protecting them better than it had +been enabled to annoy us; and meanwhile the convoy, +which was of more importance than all our little force, and +the safe passage of which we would have dropped to the +last man to accomplish, marched away in perfect safety +during the action, and joyfully reached the besieging camp +before Lille. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Major-General Cadogan, my lord duke's quartermaster-general +(and between whom and Mr. Webb there was no +love lost), accompanied the convoy, and joined Mr. Webb +with a couple of hundred horse just as the battle was over, +and the enemy in full retreat. He offered, readily enough, +to charge with his horse upon the French as they fell back; +but his force was too weak to inflict any damage upon them; +and Mr. Webb, commanding as Cadogan's senior, thought +enough was done in holding our ground before an enemy +that might still have overwhelmed us had we engaged him +in the open territory, and in securing the safe passage of +the convoy. Accordingly, the horse brought up by Cadogan +did not draw a sword; and only prevented, by the good +countenance they showed, any disposition the French might +have had to renew the attack on us. And no attack coming, +at nightfall General Cadogan drew off with his squadron, +being bound for head quarters, the two generals at parting +grimly saluting each other. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He will be at Roncq time enough to lick my lord duke's +trenchers at supper,”</span> says Mr. Webb. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our own men lay out in the woods of Wynendael that +night, and our general had his supper in the little castle +there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If I was Cadogan, I would have a peerage for this day's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page289">[pg 289]</span><a name="Pg289" id="Pg289" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +work,”</span> General Webb said; <span class="tei tei-q">“and Harry, thou shouldst +have a regiment. Thou hast been reported in the last two +actions: thou wert near killed in the first. I shall mention +thee in my dispatch to his grace the commander-in-chief, +and recommend thee to poor Dick Harwood's vacant +majority. Have you ever a hundred guineas to give +Cardonnel? Slip them into his hand to-morrow, when you +go to head quarters with my report.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In this report the major-general was good enough to +mention Captain Esmond's name with particular favour; +and that gentleman carried the dispatch to head quarters +the next day, and was not a little pleased to bring back +a letter by his grace's secretary, addressed to Lieutenant-General +Webb. The Dutch officer dispatched by Count +Nassau Woudenbourg, Vælt-Mareschal Auverquerque's son, +brought back also a complimentary letter to his commander, +who had seconded Mr. Webb in the action with great valour +and skill. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond, with a low bow and a smiling face, presented +his dispatch, and saluted Mr. Webb as Lieutenant-General, +as he gave it in. The gentlemen round about him—he was +riding with his suite on the road to Menin as Esmond +came up with him—gave a cheer, and he thanked them, +and opened the dispatch with rather a flushed eager face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He slapped it down on his boot in a rage after he had +read it. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis not even writ with his own hand. Read it +out, Esmond.”</span> And Esmond read it out:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">Sir—Mr. Cadogan is just now come in, and has acquainted me +with the success of the action you had yesterday in the afternoon +against the body of troops commanded by Monsieur de la Mothe, at +Wynendael, which must be attributed chiefly to your good conduct +and resolution. You may be sure I shall do you justice at home, +and be glad on all occasions to own the service you have done in +securing this convoy.—Yours, &c., M.</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Two lines by that d——d Cardonnel, and no more, for +the taking of Lille—for beating five times our number—for +an action as brilliant as the best he ever fought,”</span> says +poor Mr. Webb. <span class="tei tei-q">“Lieutenant-General! That's not his +doing. I was the oldest major-general. By ——, I believe +he had been better pleased if I had been beat.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The letter to the Dutch officer was in French, and longer +and more complimentary than that to Mr. Webb. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page290">[pg 290]</span><a name="Pg290" id="Pg290" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And this is the man,”</span> he broke out, <span class="tei tei-q">“that's gorged with +gold—that's covered with titles and honours that we won +for him—and that grudges even a line of praise to a comrade +in arms! Hasn't he enough? Don't we fight that he +may roll in riches? Well, well, wait for the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, gentlemen. +The queen and the country will do us justice if his +grace denies it us.”</span> There were tears of rage in the brave +warrior's eyes as he spoke; and he dashed them off his +face on to his glove. He shook his fist in the air. <span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, +by the Lord!”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“I know what I had rather have +than a peerage!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And what is that, sir?”</span> some of them asked. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I had rather have a quarter of an hour with John +Churchill, on a fair green field, and only a pair of rapiers +between my shirt and his ——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir!”</span> interposes one. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Tell him so! I know that's what you mean. I know +every word goes to him that's dropped from every general +officer's mouth. I don't say he's not brave. Curse him! +he's brave enough; but we'll wait for the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, gentlemen. +God save her Majesty! she'll do us justice.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span> did not come to us till a month afterwards; +when my general and his officers had the honour to dine +with Prince Eugene in Lille; his highness being good enough +to say that we had brought the provisions, and ought to +share in the banquet. 'Twas a great banquet. His grace +of Marlborough was on his highness's right, and on his left +the Mareschal de Boufflers, who had so bravely defended +the place. The chief officers of either army were present; +and you may be sure Esmond's general was splendid this +day: his tall noble person, and manly beauty of face, made +him remarkable anywhere; he wore, for the first time, the +star of the Order of Generosity, that his Prussian Majesty +had sent to him for his victory. His Highness, the Prince +of Savoy, called a toast to the conqueror of Wynendael. +My lord duke drank it with rather a sickly smile. The +aides de camp were present; and Harry Esmond and his +dear young lord were together, as they always strove to +be when duty would permit: they were over against the +table where the generals were, and could see all that passed +pretty well. Frank laughed at my lord duke's glum face: +the affair of Wynendael, and the captain-general's conduct +to Webb, had been the talk of the whole army. When his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page291">[pg 291]</span><a name="Pg291" id="Pg291" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +highness spoke, and gave—<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Le vainqueur de +Wynendael; son armée et sa victoire</span></span>,”</span> adding, +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">qui nous font diner à +Lille aujourdhuy</span></span>”</span>—there was a great cheer through the +hall; for Mr. Webb's bravery, generosity, and very weaknesses +of character caused him to be beloved in the army. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Like Hector, handsome, and like Paris, brave!”</span> whispers +Frank Castlewood. <span class="tei tei-q">“A Venus, an elderly Venus, couldn't +refuse him a pippin. Stand up, Harry. See, we are drinking +the army of Wynendael. Ramillies is nothing to it. +Huzzay! Huzzay!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At this very time, and just after our general had made +his acknowledgement, some one brought in an English +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>—and was passing it from hand to hand down the +table. Officers were eager enough to read it; mothers and +sisters at home must have sickened over it. There scarce +came out a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span> for six years that did not tell of some +heroic death or some brilliant achievement. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Here it is—Action of Wynendael—here you are, general,”</span> +says Frank, seizing hold of the little dingy paper that +soldiers love to read so; and, scrambling over from our +bench, he went to where the general sat, who knew him, +and had seen many a time at his table his laughing, handsome +face, which everybody loved who saw. The generals +in their great perukes made way for him. He handed the +paper over General Dohna's buff coat to our general on the +opposite side. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He came hobbling back, and blushing at his feat: <span class="tei tei-q">“I +thought he'd like it, Harry,”</span> the young fellow whispered. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Didn't I like to read my name after Ramillies, in the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">London Gazette</span></span>?—Viscount Castlewood serving a +volunteer—I say, what's yonder?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Webb, reading the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, looked very strange—slapped +it down on the table—then sprung up in his place, +and began,—<span class="tei tei-q">“Will your highness please to ——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His grace the Duke of Marlborough here jumped up too—<span class="tei tei-q">“There's +some mistake, my dear General Webb.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your grace had better rectify it,”</span> says Mr. Webb, holding +out the letter; but he was five off his grace the prince +duke, who, besides, was higher than the general (being +seated with the Prince of Savoy, the Electoral Prince of +Hanover, and the envoys of Prussia and Denmark, under +a baldaquin), and Webb could not reach him, tall as +he was. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page292">[pg 292]</span><a name="Pg292" id="Pg292" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Stay,”</span> says he, with a smile, as if catching at some idea, +and then, with a perfect courtesy, drawing his sword, he +ran the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span> through with the point, and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Permit +me to hand it to your grace.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The duke looked very black. <span class="tei tei-q">“Take it,”</span> says he, to his +master of the horse, who was waiting behind him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The lieutenant-general made a very low bow, and retired +and finished his glass. The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span> in which Mr. Cardonnel, +the duke's secretary, gave an account of the victory of +Wynendael, mentioned Mr. Webb's name, but gave the sole +praise and conduct of the action to the duke's favourite, +Mr. Cadogan. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There was no little talk and excitement occasioned by this +strange behaviour of General Webb, who had almost drawn +a sword upon the commander-in-chief; but the general, +after the first outbreak of his anger, mastered it outwardly +altogether; and, by his subsequent behaviour, had the +satisfaction of even more angering the commander-in-chief, +than he could have done by any public exhibition of resentment. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On returning to his quarters, and consulting with his +chief adviser, Mr. Esmond, who was now entirely in the +general's confidence, and treated by him as a friend, and +almost a son, Mr. Webb writ a letter to his grace the +commander-in-chief, in which he said:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +Your grace must be aware that the sudden perusal of the +</span><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">London Gazette</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%">, in which your grace's secretary, Mr. Cardonnel, +hath mentioned Major-General Cadogan's name, as the officer +commanding in the late action of Wynendael, must have caused a +feeling of anything but pleasure to the general who fought that +action. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +Your grace must be aware that Mr. Cadogan was not even +present at the battle, though he arrived with squadrons of horse +at its close, and put himself under the command of his superior +officer. And as the result of the battle of Wynendael, in which +Lieutenant-General Webb had the good fortune to command, was +the capture of Lille, the relief of Brussels, then invested by the +enemy under the Elector of Bavaria, the restoration of the great +cities of Ghent and Bruges, of which the enemy (by treason within +the walls) had got possession in the previous year: Mr. Webb cannot +consent to forgo the honours of such a success and service, for +the benefit of Mr. Cadogan, or any other person. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +As soon as the military operations of the year are over, Lieutenant-General +Webb will request permission to leave the army, and return +to his place in Parliament, where he gives notice to his grace the +</span><span class="tei tei-pb" id="page293">[pg 293]</span><a name="Pg293" id="Pg293" class="tei tei-anchor"></a><span style="font-size: 90%"> +commander-in-chief, that he shall lay his case before the House of +Commons, the country, and her majesty the queen. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +By his eagerness to rectify that false statement of the </span><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%">, +which had been written by his grace's secretary, Mr. Cardonnel, +Mr. Webb, not being able to reach his grace the commander-in-chief +on account of the gentlemen seated between them, placed the +paper containing the false statement on his sword, so that it might +more readily arrive in the hands of his Grace the Duke of Marlborough, +who surely would wish to do justice to every officer of +his army. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +Mr. Webb knows his duty too well to think of insubordination +to his superior officer, or of using his sword in a campaign against +any but the enemies of her majesty. He solicits permission to return +to England immediately the military duties will permit, and take +with him to England Captain Esmond, of his regiment, who acted +as his aide de camp, and was present during the entire action, and +noted by his watch the time when Mr. Cadogan arrived at its close. +</span></p> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The commander-in-chief could not but grant this permission, +nor could he take notice of Webb's letter, though +it was couched in terms the most insulting. Half the army +believed that the cities of Ghent and Bruges were given +up by a treason, which some in our army very well understood; +that the commander-in-chief would not have +relieved Lille if he could have helped himself; that he +would not have fought that year had not the Prince of +Savoy forced him. When the battle once began, then, +for his own renown, my Lord Marlborough would fight +as no man in the world ever fought better; and no bribe +on earth could keep him from beating the enemy.<a id="noteref_11" name="noteref_11" href="#note_11"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">11</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page294">[pg 294]</span><a name="Pg294" id="Pg294" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the matter was taken up by the subordinates; and +half the army might have been by the ears, if the quarrel +had not been stopped. General Cadogan sent an intimation +to General Webb to say that he was ready if Webb liked, +and would meet him. This was a kind of invitation our +stout old general was always too ready to accept, and +'twas with great difficulty we got the general to reply +that he had no quarrel with Mr. Cadogan, who had behaved +with perfect gallantry, but only with those at head quarters, +who had belied him. Mr. Cardonnel offered General Webb +reparation; Mr. Webb said he had a cane at the service +of Mr. Cardonnel, and the only satisfaction he wanted +from him was one he was not likely to get, namely, the +truth. The officers in our staff of Webb's, and those in +the immediate suite of the general, were ready to come +to blows; and hence arose the only affair in which Mr. +Esmond ever engaged as principal, and that was from +a revengeful wish to wipe off an old injury. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My Lord Mohun, who had a troop in Lord Macclesfield's +regiment of the Horse Guards, rode this campaign with the +duke. He had sunk by this time to the very worst reputation; +he had had another fatal duel in Spain; he had +married, and forsaken his wife; he was a gambler, a +profligate, and debauchee. He joined just before Oudenarde; +and, as Esmond feared, as soon as Frank Castlewood +heard of his arrival, Frank was for seeking him out, and +killing him. The wound my lord got at Oudenarde prevented +their meeting, but that was nearly healed, and +Mr. Esmond trembled daily lest any chance should bring +his boy and this known assassin together. They met at +the mess-table of Handyside's regiment at Lille; the +officer commanding not knowing of the feud between the +two noblemen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond had not seen the hateful handsome face of +Mohun for nine years, since they had met on that fatal +night in Leicester Field. It was degraded with crime and +passion now; it wore the anxious look of a man who has +three deaths—and who knows how many hidden shames +and lusts, and crimes, on his conscience. He bowed with +a sickly low bow, and slunk away when our host presented +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page295">[pg 295]</span><a name="Pg295" id="Pg295" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +us round to one another. Frank Castlewood had not known +him till then, so changed was he. He knew the boy well +enough. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas curious to look at the two—especially the young +man, whose face flushed up when he heard the hated +name of the other; and who said in his bad French and +his brave boyish voice—<span class="tei tei-q">“He had long been anxious to +meet my Lord Mohun.”</span> The other only bowed, and moved +away from him. I do him justice, he wished to have no +quarrel with the lad. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond put himself between them at table. <span class="tei tei-q">“D—— it,”</span> +says Frank, <span class="tei tei-q">“why do you put yourself in the place of +a man who is above you in degree? My Lord Mohun +should walk after me. I want to sit by my Lord Mohun.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond whispered to Lord Mohun, that Frank was hurt +in the leg at Oudenarde; and besought the other to be +quiet. Quiet enough he was for some time; disregarding +the many taunts which young Castlewood flung at him, +until after several healths, when my Lord Mohun got to be +rather in liquor. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Will you go away, my lord?”</span> Mr. Esmond said to him, +imploring him to quit the table. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No, by G——,”</span> says my Lord Mohun. <span class="tei tei-q">“I'll not go +away for any man;”</span> he was quite flushed with wine by +this time. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The talk got round to the affairs of yesterday. Webb +had offered to challenge the commander-in-chief: Webb +had been ill-used: Webb was the bravest, handsomest, +vainest man in the army. Lord Mohun did not know that +Esmond was Webb's aide de camp. He began to tell some +stories against the general; which, from t'other side of +Esmond, young Castlewood contradicted. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I can't bear any more of this,”</span> says my Lord Mohun. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Nor can I, my lord,”</span> says Mr. Esmond, starting up. +<span class="tei tei-q">“The story my Lord Mohun has told respecting General +Webb is false, gentlemen—false, I repeat,”</span> and making +a low bow to Lord Mohun, and without a single word more, +Esmond got up and left the dining-room. These affairs +were common enough among the military of those days. +There was a garden behind the house, and all the party +turned instantly into it; and the two gentlemen's coats +were off and their points engaged within two minutes after +Esmond's words had been spoken. If Captain Esmond +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page296">[pg 296]</span><a name="Pg296" id="Pg296" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +had put Mohun out of the world, as he might, a villain +would have been punished and spared further villanies—but +who is one man to punish another? I declare upon +my honour that my only thought was to prevent Lord +Mohun from mischief with Frank, and the end of this +meeting was, that after half a dozen passes my lord went +home with a hurt which prevented him from lifting his +right arm for three months. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, Harry, why didn't you kill the villain?”</span> young +Castlewood asked. <span class="tei tei-q">“I can't walk without a crutch: but +I could have met him on horseback with sword and pistol.”</span> +But Harry Esmond said, <span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas best to have no man's +life on one's conscience, not even that villain's”</span>; and this +affair, which did not occupy three minutes, being over, +the gentlemen went back to their wine, and my Lord +Mohun to his quarters, where he was laid up with a fever +which had spared mischief had it proved fatal. And very +soon after this affair Harry Esmond and his general left +the camp for London; whither a certain reputation had +preceded the captain, for my Lady Castlewood of Chelsea +received him as if he had been a conquering hero. She +gave a great dinner to Mr. Webb, where the general's +chair was crowned with laurels; and her ladyship called +Esmond's health in a toast, to which my kind general was +graciously pleased to bear the strongest testimony: and +took down a mob of at least forty coaches to cheer our +general as he came out of the House of Commons, the day +when he received the thanks of Parliament for his action. +The mob huzza'ed and applauded him, as well as the fine +company: it was splendid to see him waving his hat, and +bowing, and laying his hand upon his Order of Generosity. +He introduced Mr. Esmond to Mr. St. John and the Right +Honourable Robert Harley, Esquire, as he came out of the +House walking between them; and was pleased to make +many flattering observations regarding Mr. Esmond's +behaviour during the three last campaigns. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. St. John (who had the most winning presence of any +man I ever saw, excepting always my peerless young +Frank Castlewood) said he had heard of Mr. Esmond +before from Captain Steele, and how he had helped Mr. +Addison to write his famous poem of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas as great an achievement as the victory of Blenheim +itself,”</span> Mr. Harley said, who was famous as a judge +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page297">[pg 297]</span><a name="Pg297" id="Pg297" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and patron of letters, and so, perhaps, it may be—though +for my part I think there are twenty beautiful lines, but all +the rest is commonplace, and Mr. Addison's hymn worth +a thousand such poems. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All the town was indignant at my lord duke's unjust +treatment of General Webb, and applauded the vote of +thanks which the House of Commons gave to the general +for his victory at Wynendael. 'Tis certain that the capture +of Lille was the consequence of that lucky achievement, +and the humiliation of the old French king, who was said +to suffer more at the loss of this great city, than from any +of the former victories our troops had won over him. +And, I think, no small part of Mr. Webb's exultation at +his victory, arose from the idea that Marlborough had been +disappointed of a great bribe the French king had promised +him, should the siege be raised. The very sum of money +offered to him was mentioned by the duke's enemies; +and honest Mr. Webb chuckled at the notion, not only of +beating the French, but of beating Marlborough too, and +intercepting a convoy of three millions of French crowns, +that were on their way to the generalissimo's insatiable +pockets. When the general's lady went to the queen's +drawing-room, all the Tory women crowded round her with +congratulations, and made her a train greater than the +Duchess of Marlborough's own. Feasts were given to the +general by all the chiefs of the Tory party, who vaunted +him as the duke's equal in military skill; and perhaps +used the worthy soldier as their instrument, whilst he +thought they were but acknowledging his merits as a commander. +As the general's aide de camp, and favourite +officer, Mr. Esmond came in for a share of his chief's +popularity, and was presented to her Majesty, and advanced +to the rank of lieutenant-colonel, at the request of his +grateful chief. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We may be sure there was one family in which any good +fortune that happened to Esmond, caused such a sincere +pride and pleasure, that he, for his part, was thankful he +could make them so happy. With these fond friends, +Blenheim and Oudenarde seemed to be mere trifling incidents +of the war; and Wynendael was its crowning victory. +Esmond's mistress never tired to hear accounts of the +battle; and I think General Webb's lady grew jealous of +her, for the general was for ever at Kensington, and talking +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page298">[pg 298]</span><a name="Pg298" id="Pg298" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +on that delightful theme. As for his aide de camp, though, +no doubt, Esmond's own natural vanity was pleased at +the little share of reputation which his good fortune had +won him, yet it was chiefly precious to him (he may say so, +now that he hath long since outlived it) because it pleased +his mistress, and, above all, because Beatrix valued it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for the old dowager of Chelsea, never was an old +woman in all England more delighted nor more gracious +than she. Esmond had his quarters in her ladyship's +house, where the domestics were instructed to consider him +as their master. She bade him give entertainments, of +which she defrayed the charges, and was charmed when +his guests were carried away tipsy in their coaches. She +must have his picture taken; and accordingly he was +painted by Mr. Jervas, in his red coat, and smiling upon +a bombshell, which was bursting at the corner of the +piece. She vowed that unless he made a great match, she +should never die easy, and was for ever bringing young +ladies to Chelsea, with pretty faces and pretty fortunes, +at the disposal of the colonel. He smiled to think how +times were altered with him, and of the early days in his +father's lifetime, when a trembling page he stood before +her, with her ladyship's basin and ewer, or crouched in her +coach-step. The only fault she found with him was, that +he was more sober than an Esmond ought to be; and would +neither be carried to bed by his valet, nor lose his heart to +any beauty, whether of St. James's or Covent Garden. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What is the meaning of fidelity in love, and whence the +birth of it? 'Tis a state of mind that men fall into, and +depending on the man rather than the woman. We love +being in love, that's the truth on't. If we had not met +Joan, we should have met Kate, and adored her. We +know our mistresses are no better than many other women, +nor no prettier, nor no wiser, nor no wittier. 'Tis not for +these reasons we love a woman, or for any special quality +or charm I know of; we might as well demand that a lady +should be the tallest woman in the world, like the Shropshire +giantess,<a id="noteref_12" name="noteref_12" href="#note_12"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">12</span></span></a> as that she should be a paragon in any +other character, before we began to love her. Esmond's +mistress had a thousand faults beside her charms: he knew +both perfectly well! She was imperious, she was light-minded, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page299">[pg 299]</span><a name="Pg299" id="Pg299" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +she was flighty, she was false, she had no reverence +in her character; she was in everything, even in beauty, +the contrast of her mother, who was the most devoted +and the least selfish of women. Well, from the very first +moment he saw her on the stairs at Walcote, Esmond +knew he loved Beatrix. There might be better women—he +wanted that one. He cared for none other. Was it +because she was gloriously beautiful? Beautiful as she +was, he had heard people say a score of times in their +company, that Beatrix's mother looked as young, and +was the handsomer of the two. Why did her voice thrill +in his ear so? She could not sing near so well as Nicolini +or Mrs. Tofts; nay, she sang out of tune, and yet he liked +to hear her better than St. Cecilia. She had not a finer +complexion than Mrs. Steele (Dick's wife, whom he had +now got, and who ruled poor Dick with a rod of pickle), +and yet to see her dazzled Esmond; he would shut his +eyes, and the thought of her dazzled him all the same. She +was brilliant and lively in talk, but not so incomparably +witty as her mother, who, when she was cheerful, said the +finest things; but yet to hear her, and to be with her, +was Esmond's greatest pleasure. Days passed away between +him and these ladies, he scarce knew how. He poured his +heart out to them, so as he never could in any other company, +where he hath generally passed for being moody, or +supercilious and silent. This society<a id="noteref_13" name="noteref_13" href="#note_13"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">13</span></span></a> was more delightful +than that of the greatest wits to him. May Heaven pardon +him the lies he told the dowager at Chelsea, in order to +get a pretext for going away to Kensington; the business +at the Ordnance which he invented; the interview with +his general, the courts and statesman's levees which he +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">didn't</span></em> frequent and describe; who wore a new suit on +Sunday at St. James's or at the queen's birthday; how +many coaches filled the street at Mr. Harley's levee; how +many bottles he had had the honour to drink overnight +with Mr. St. John at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Cocoa Tree,”</span> or at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Garter”</span> +with Mr. Walpole and Mr. Steele. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mistress Beatrix Esmond had been a dozen times on the +point of making great matches, so the Court scandal said; +but for his part Esmond never would believe the stories +against her; and came back, after three years' absence +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page300">[pg 300]</span><a name="Pg300" id="Pg300" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +from her, not so frantic as he had been perhaps, but still +hungering after her and no other; still hopeful, still kneeling, +with his heart in his hand for the young lady to take. +We were now got to 1709. She was near twenty-two years +old, and three years at Court, and without a husband. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis not for want of being asked,”</span> Lady Castlewood said, +looking into Esmond's heart, as she could, with that +perceptiveness affection gives. <span class="tei tei-q">“But she will make no +mean match, Harry: she will not marry as I would have +her; the person whom I should like to call my son, and +Henry Esmond knows who that is, is best served by my +not pressing his claim. Beatrix is so wilful, that what +I would urge on her, she would be sure to resist. The +man who would marry her will not be happy with her, +unless he be a great person, and can put her in a great +position. Beatrix loves admiration more than love; and +longs, beyond all things, for command. Why should +a mother speak so of her child? You are my son, too, +Harry. You should know the truth about your sister. +I thought you might cure yourself of your passion,”</span> my +lady added fondly. <span class="tei tei-q">“Other people can cure themselves +of that folly, you know. But I see you are still as infatuated +as ever. When we read your name in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, I pleaded +for you, my poor boy. Poor boy, indeed! You are +growing a grave old gentleman now, and I am an old +woman. She likes your fame well enough, and she likes +your person. She says you have wit, and fire, and good +breeding, and are more natural than the fine gentlemen +of the Court. But this is not enough. She wants a commander-in-chief, +and not a colonel. Were a duke to ask her, +she would leave an earl whom she had promised. I told +you so before. I know not how my poor girl is so worldly.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well,”</span> says Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“a man can but give his best and +his all. She has that from me. What little reputation +I have won, I swear I cared for it because I thought Beatrix +would be pleased with it. What care I to be a colonel +or a general? Think you 'twill matter a few score years +hence, what our foolish honours to-day are? I would +have had a little fame, that she might wear it in her hat. +If I had anything better, I would endow her with it. If +she wants my life, I would give it her. If she marries +another, I will say God bless him. I make no boast, nor +no complaint. I think my fidelity is folly, perhaps. But +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page301">[pg 301]</span><a name="Pg301" id="Pg301" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +so it is. I cannot help myself. I love her. You are +a thousand times better: the fondest, the fairest, the +dearest, of women. Sure, my dear lady, I see all Beatrix's +faults as well as you do. But she is my fate. 'Tis endurable. +I shall not die for not having her. I think I should +be no happier if I won her. <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Que voulez-vous?</span></span> +as my lady of Chelsea would say. <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Je l'aime</span></span>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wish she would have you,”</span> said Harry's fond mistress, +giving a hand to him. He kissed the fair hand ('twas the +prettiest dimpled little hand in the world, and my Lady +Castlewood, though now almost forty years old, did not +look to be within ten years of her age). He kissed and +kept her fair hand, as they talked together. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Why,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“should she hear me? She knows +what I would say. Far or near, she knows I'm her slave. +I have sold myself for nothing, it may be. Well, 'tis the +price I choose to take. I am worth nothing, or I am +worth all.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are such a treasure,”</span> Esmond's mistress was pleased +to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“that the woman who has your love, shouldn't +change it away against a kingdom, I think. I am a country-bred +woman, and cannot say but the ambitions of the +town seem mean to me. I never was awe-stricken by my +lady duchess's rank and finery, or afraid,”</span> she added, +with a sly laugh, <span class="tei tei-q">“of anything but her temper. I hear of +Court ladies who pine because her Majesty looks cold on +them; and great noblemen who would give a limb that +they might wear a garter on the other. This worldliness, +which I can't comprehend, was born with Beatrix, who, +on the first day of her waiting, was a perfect courtier. +We are like sisters, and she the eldest sister, somehow. +She tells me I have a mean spirit. I laugh, and say she +adores a coach-and-six. I cannot reason her out of her +ambition. 'Tis natural to her, as to me to love quiet, +and be indifferent about rank and riches. What are they, +Harry? and for how long do they last? Our home is +not here.”</span> She smiled as she spoke, and looked like an +angel that was only on earth on a visit. <span class="tei tei-q">“Our home is +where the just are, and where our sins and sorrows enter +not. My father used to rebuke me, and say that I was +too hopeful about Heaven. But I cannot help my nature, +and grow obstinate as I grow to be an old woman; and +as I love my children so, sure our Father loves us with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page302">[pg 302]</span><a name="Pg302" id="Pg302" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a thousand and a thousand times greater love. It must +be that we shall meet yonder, and be happy. Yes, you—and +my children, and my dear lord. Do you know, Harry, +since his death, it has always seemed to me as if his love +came back to me, and that we are parted no more. Perhaps +he is here now, Harry—I think he is. Forgiven I am sure +he is: even Mr. Atterbury absolved him, and he died +forgiving. Oh, what a noble heart he had! How generous +he was! I was but fifteen, and a child when he married +me. How good he was to stoop to me! He was always +good to the poor and humble.”</span> She stopped, then presently, +with a peculiar expression, as if her eyes were looking into +Heaven, and saw my lord there, she smiled, and gave a little +laugh. <span class="tei tei-q">“I laugh to see you, sir,”</span> she says; <span class="tei tei-q">“when you +come, it seems as if you never were away.”</span> One may +put her words down, and remember them, but how describe +her sweet tones, sweeter than music. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My young lord did not come home at the end of the +campaign, and wrote that he was kept at Bruxelles on +military duty. Indeed, I believe he was engaged in laying +siege to a certain lady, who was of the suite of Madame +de Soissons, the Prince of Savoy's mother, who was just +dead, and who, like the Flemish fortresses, was taken and +retaken a great number of times during the war, and +occupied by French, English, and Imperialists. Of course, +Mr. Esmond did not think fit to enlighten Lady Castlewood +regarding the young scapegrace's doings: nor had he said +a word about the affair with Lord Mohun, knowing how +abhorrent that man's name was to his mistress. Frank +did not waste much time or money on pen and ink; and, +when Harry came home with his general, only writ two +lines to his mother, to say his wound in the leg was almost +healed, that he would keep his coming of age next year—that +the duty aforesaid would keep him at Bruxelles, and +that Cousin Harry would tell all the news. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But from Bruxelles, knowing how the Lady Castlewood +always liked to have a letter about the famous 29th of +December, my lord writ her a long and full one, and in this +he must have described the affair with Mohun; for when +Mr. Esmond came to visit his mistress one day, early in +the new year, to his great wonderment, she and her daughter +both came up and saluted him, and after them the dowager +of Chelsea, too, whose chairman had just brought her +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page303">[pg 303]</span><a name="Pg303" id="Pg303" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +ladyship from her village to Kensington across the fields. +After this honour, I say, from the two ladies of Castlewood, +the dowager came forward in great state, with her grand +tall head-dress of King James's reign, that she never forsook, +and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Cousin Henry, all our family have met; +and we thank you, cousin, for your noble conduct towards +the head of our house.”</span> And pointing to her blushing +cheek, she made Mr. Esmond aware that he was to enjoy +the rapture of an embrace there. Having saluted one +cheek, she turned to him the other. <span class="tei tei-q">“Cousin Harry,”</span> said +both the other ladies, in a little chorus, <span class="tei tei-q">“we thank you for +your noble conduct;”</span> and then Harry became aware that +the story of the Lille affair had come to his kinswomen's +ears. It pleased him to hear them all saluting him as one +of their family. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The tables of the dining-room were laid for a great +entertainment; and the ladies were in gala dresses—my +lady of Chelsea in her highest <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">tour</span></span>, my lady viscountess +out of black, and looking fair and happy, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">à ravir</span></span>; and +the maid of honour attired with that splendour which +naturally distinguished her, and wearing on her beautiful +breast the French officer's star which Frank had sent home +after Ramillies. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You see, 'tis a gala day with us,”</span> says she, glancing +down to the star complacently, <span class="tei tei-q">“and we have our orders +on. Does not mamma look charming? 'Twas I dressed +her!”</span> Indeed, Esmond's dear mistress, blushing as he +looked at her, with her beautiful fair hair and an elegant +dress, according to the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">mode</span></span>, appeared to have the shape +and complexion of a girl of twenty. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the table was a fine sword, with a red velvet scabbard, +and a beautiful chased silver handle, with a blue ribbon +for a sword-knot. <span class="tei tei-q">“What is this?”</span> says the captain, +going up to look at this pretty piece. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mrs. Beatrix advanced towards it. <span class="tei tei-q">“Kneel down,”</span> says +she: <span class="tei tei-q">“we dub you our knight with this”</span>—and she waved +the sword over his head—<span class="tei tei-q">“my lady dowager hath given +the sword; and I give the ribbon, and mamma hath sewn +on the fringe.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Put the sword on him, Beatrix,”</span> says her mother. <span class="tei tei-q">“You +are our knight, Harry—our true knight. Take a mother's +thanks and prayers for defending her son, my dear, dear +friend.”</span> She could say no more, and even the dowager was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page304">[pg 304]</span><a name="Pg304" id="Pg304" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +affected, for a couple of rebellious tears made sad marks +down those wrinkled old roses which Esmond had just +been allowed to salute. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We had a letter from dearest Frank,”</span> his mother said, +<span class="tei tei-q">“three days since, whilst you were on your visit to your +friend Captain Steele, at Hampton. He told us all that +you had done, and how nobly you had put yourself between +him and that—that wretch.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And I adopt you from this day,”</span> says the dowager; +<span class="tei tei-q">“and I wish I was richer, for your sake, son Esmond,”</span> she +added, with a wave of her hand; and as Mr. Esmond +dutifully went down on his knee before her ladyship, +she cast her eyes up to the ceiling (the gilt chandelier, +and the twelve wax candles in it, for the party was numerous), +and invoked a blessing from that quarter upon the +newly adopted son. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dear Frank,”</span> says the other viscountess, <span class="tei tei-q">“how fond he +is of his military profession! He is studying fortification +very hard. I wish he were here. We shall keep his coming +of age at Castlewood next year.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If the campaign permit us,”</span> says Mr. Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am never afraid when he is with you,”</span> cries the boy's +mother. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am sure my Henry will always defend him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But there will be a peace before next year; we know it +for certain,”</span> cries the maid of honour. <span class="tei tei-q">“Lord Marlborough +will be dismissed, and that horrible duchess turned out of +all her places. Her Majesty won't speak to her now. Did +you see her at Bushy, Harry? she is furious, and she ranges +about the park like a lioness, and tears people's eyes out.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And the Princess Anne will send for somebody,”</span> says +my lady of Chelsea, taking out her medal and kissing it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Did you see the king at Oudenarde, Harry?”</span> his +mistress asked. She was a stanch Jacobite, and would no +more have thought of denying her king than her God. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I saw the young Hanoverian only:”</span> Harry said, <span class="tei tei-q">“the +Chevalier de St. George——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The king, sir, the king!”</span> said the ladies and Miss +Beatrix; and she clapped her pretty hands, and cried, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Vive le Roy!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By this time there came a thundering knock, that drove +in the doors of the house almost. It was three o'clock, +and the company were arriving; and presently the servant +announced Captain Steele and his lady. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page305">[pg 305]</span><a name="Pg305" id="Pg305" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Captain and Mrs. Steele, who were the first to arrive, had +driven to Kensington from their country-house, the Hovel +at Hampton Wick, <span class="tei tei-q">“Not from our mansion in Bloomsbury +Square,”</span> as Mrs. Steele took care to inform the ladies. +Indeed Harry had ridden away from Hampton that very +morning, leaving the couple by the ears; for from the +chamber where he lay, in a bed that was none of the +cleanest, and kept awake by the company which he had +in his own bed, and the quarrel which was going on in the +next room, he could hear both night and morning the +curtain lecture which Mrs. Steele was in the habit of +administering to poor Dick. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At night it did not matter so much for the culprit; +Dick was fuddled, and when in that way no scolding could +interrupt his benevolence. Mr. Esmond could hear him +coaxing and speaking in that maudlin manner, which +punch and claret produce, to his beloved Prue, and beseeching +her to remember that there was a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">distiwisht officer ithe nex +roob</span></span>, who would overhear her. She went on, nevertheless, +calling him a drunken wretch, and was only interrupted +in her harangues by the captain's snoring. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the morning, the unhappy victim awoke to a headache +and consciousness, and the dialogue of the night was +resumed. <span class="tei tei-q">“Why do you bring captains home to dinner +when there's not a guinea in the house? How am I to +give dinners when you leave me without a shilling? How +am I to go trapesing to Kensington in my yellow satin sack +before all the fine company? I've nothing fit to put on; +I never have:”</span> and so the dispute went on—Mr. Esmond +interrupting the talk when it seemed to be growing too +intimate by blowing his nose as loudly as ever he could, at +the sound of which trumpet there came a lull. But Dick +was charming, though his wife was odious, and 'twas to +give Mr. Steele pleasure, that the ladies of Castlewood, +who were ladies of no small fashion, invited Mrs. Steele. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Besides the captain and his lady, there was a great and +notable assemblage of company: my lady of Chelsea +having sent her lackeys and liveries to aid the modest +attendance at Kensington. There was Lieutenant-General +Webb, Harry's kind patron, of whom the dowager took +possession, and who resplended in velvet and gold lace; +there was Harry's new acquaintance, the Right Honourable +Henry St. John, Esquire, the general's kinsman, who was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page306">[pg 306]</span><a name="Pg306" id="Pg306" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +charmed with the Lady Castlewood, even more than with +her daughter; there was one of the greatest noblemen in +the kingdom, the Scots Duke of Hamilton, just created +Duke of Brandon in England; and two other noble lords +of the Tory party, my Lord Ashburnham, and another +I have forgot; and for ladies, her grace the Duchess of +Ormonde and her daughters, the Lady Mary and the Lady +Betty, the former one of Mistress Beatrix's colleagues in +waiting on the queen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What a party of Tories!”</span> whispered Captain Steele to +Esmond, as we were assembled in the parlour before +dinner. Indeed, all the company present, save Steele, were +of that faction. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. St. John made his special compliments to Mrs. Steele, +and so charmed her that she declared she would have Steele +a Tory too. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Or will you have me a Whig?”</span> says Mr. St. John. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I think, madam, you could convert a man to anything.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If Mr. St. John ever comes to Bloomsbury Square I will +teach him what I know,”</span> says Mrs. Steele, dropping her +handsome eyes. <span class="tei tei-q">“Do you know Bloomsbury Square?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Do I know the Mall? Do I know the Opera? Do +I know the reigning toast? Why, Bloomsbury is the very +height of the mode,”</span> says Mr. St. John. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">rus in urbe</span></span>. +You have gardens all the way to Hampstead, and palaces +round about you—Southampton House and Montague +House.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where you wretches go and fight duels,”</span> cries Mrs. Steele. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Of which the ladies are the cause!”</span> says her entertainer. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Madam, is Dick a good swordsman? How charming the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span> is! We all recognized your portrait in the 49th +number, and I have been dying to know you ever since +I read it. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Aspasia must be allowed to be the first of the +beauteous order of love.’</span> Doth not the passage run so? +<span class="tei tei-q">‘In this accomplished lady love is the constant effect, +though it is never the design; yet though her mien carries +much more invitation than command, to behold her is an +immediate check to loose behaviour, and to love her is +a liberal education.’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, indeed!”</span> says Mrs. Steele, who did not seem to +understand a word of what the gentleman was saying. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who could fail to be accomplished under such a mistress?”</span> +says Mr. St. John, still gallant and bowing. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page307">[pg 307]</span><a name="Pg307" id="Pg307" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mistress! upon my word, sir!”</span> cries the lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“If +you mean me, sir, I would have you know that I am the +captain's wife.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sure we all know it,”</span> answers Mr. St. John, keeping his +countenance very gravely; and Steele broke in, saying, +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas not about Mrs. Steele I writ that paper—though +I am sure she is worthy of any compliment I can pay her—but +of the Lady Elizabeth Hastings.”</span><a id="noteref_14" name="noteref_14" href="#note_14"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">14</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I hear Mr. Addison is equally famous as a wit and +a poet,”</span> says Mr. St. John. <span class="tei tei-q">“Is it true that his hand is to +be found in your <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>, Mr. Steele?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Whether 'tis the sublime or the humorous, no man can +come near him,”</span> cries Steele. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A fig, Dick, for your Mr. Addison!”</span> cries out his lady: +<span class="tei tei-q">“a gentleman who gives himself such airs and holds his head +so high now. I hope your ladyship thinks as I do: I can't +bear those very fair men with white eyelashes—a black +man for me.”</span> (All the black men at table applauded, and +made Mrs. Steele a bow for this compliment.) <span class="tei tei-q">“As for this +Mr. Addison,”</span> she went on, <span class="tei tei-q">“he comes to dine with the +captain sometimes, never says a word to me, and then +they walk upstairs, both tipsy, to a dish of tea. I remember +your Mr. Addison when he had but one coat to his back, +and that with a patch at the elbow.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed—a patch at the elbow! You interest me,”</span> says +Mr. St. John. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis charming to hear of one man of letters +from the charming wife of another.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Law, I could tell you ever so much about 'em,”</span> continues +the voluble lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“What do you think the captain +has got now?—a little hunchback fellow—a little hop-o'-my-thumb +creature that he calls a poet—a little Popish +brat!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush, there are two in the room,”</span> whispers her companion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well, I call him Popish because his name is Pope,”</span> says +the lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis only my joking way. And this little +dwarf of a fellow has wrote a pastoral poem—all about +shepherds and shepherdesses, you know.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A shepherd should have a little crook,”</span> says my mistress, +laughing from her end of the table: on which Mrs. Steele +said, <span class="tei tei-q">“She did not know, but the captain brought home +this queer little creature when she was in bed with her +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page308">[pg 308]</span><a name="Pg308" id="Pg308" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +first boy, and it was a mercy he had come no sooner; and +Dick raved about his <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">genus</span></span>, and was always raving about +some nonsense or other.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Which of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatlers</span></span> do you prefer, Mrs. Steele?”</span> +asked Mr. St. John. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I never read but one, and think it all a pack of rubbish, +sir,”</span> says the lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“Such stuff about Bickerstaffe, and +Distaff, and Quarterstaff, as it all is! There's the captain +going on still with the burgundy—I know he'll be tipsy +before he stops—Captain Steele!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I drink to your eyes, my dear,”</span> says the captain, who +seemed to think his wife charming, and to receive as +genuine all the satiric compliments which Mr. St. John paid +her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All this while the maid of honour had been trying to get +Mr. Esmond to talk, and no doubt voted him a dull fellow. +For, by some mistake, just as he was going to pop into the +vacant place, he was placed far away from Beatrix's chair, +who sat between his grace and my Lord Ashburnham, and +shrugged her lovely white shoulders, and cast a look as if to +say, <span class="tei tei-q">“Pity me,”</span> to her cousin. My lord duke and his young +neighbour were presently in a very animated and close +conversation. Mrs. Beatrix could no more help using her +eyes than the sun can help shining, and setting those it +shines on a-burning. By the time the first course was +done the dinner seemed long to Esmond: by the time the +soup came he fancied they must have been hours at table: +and as for the sweets and jellies he thought they never would +be done. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At length the ladies rose, Beatrix throwing a Parthian +glance at her duke as she retreated; a fresh bottle and +glasses were fetched, and toasts were called. Mr. St. John +asked his grace the Duke of Hamilton and the company +to drink to the health of his grace the Duke of Brandon. +Another lord gave General Webb's health, <span class="tei tei-q">“and may he get +the command the bravest officer in the world deserves.”</span> +Mr. Webb thanked the company, complimented his aide +de camp, and fought his famous battle over again. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Il est fatiguant</span></span>,”</span> +whispers Mr. St. John, <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">avec sa trompette +de Wynendael</span></span>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Captain Steele, who was not of our side, loyally gave the +health of the Duke of Marlborough, the greatest general of +the age. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page309">[pg 309]</span><a name="Pg309" id="Pg309" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I drink to the greatest general with all my heart,”</span> says +Mr. Webb; <span class="tei tei-q">“there can be no gainsaying that character of +him. My glass goes to the general, and not to the duke, +Mr. Steele.”</span> And the stout old gentleman emptied his bumper; +to which Dick replied by filling and emptying a pair +of brimmers, one for the general and one for the duke. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And now his grace of Hamilton, rising up, with flashing +eyes (we had all been drinking pretty freely), proposed +a toast to the lovely, to the incomparable Mrs. Beatrix +Esmond; we all drank it with cheers, and my Lord Ashburnham +especially, with a shout of enthusiasm. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What a pity there is a Duchess of Hamilton,”</span> whispers +St. John, who drank more wine and yet was more steady +than most of the others, and we entered the drawing-room +where the ladies were at their tea. As for poor Dick, we +were obliged to leave him alone at the dining-table, where +he was hiccupping out the lines from the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span>, in +which the greatest poet had celebrated the greatest general +in the world; and Harry Esmond found him, half an hour +afterwards, in a more advanced stage of liquor, and weeping +about the treachery of Tom Boxer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The drawing-room was all dark to poor Harry, in spite of +the grand illumination. Beatrix scarce spoke to him. +When my lord duke went away, she practised upon the +next in rank, and plied my young Lord Ashburnham with +all the fire of her eyes and the fascinations of her wit. +Most of the party were set to cards, and Mr. St. John, after +yawning in the face of Mrs. Steele, whom he did not care +to pursue any more, and talking in his most brilliant +animated way to Lady Castlewood, whom he pronounced +to be beautiful, of a far higher order of beauty than her +daughter, presently took his leave, and went his way. The +rest of the company speedily followed, my Lord Ashburnham +the last, throwing fiery glances at the smiling young +temptress, who had bewitched more hearts than his in her +thrall. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +No doubt, as a kinsman of the house, Mr. Esmond thought +fit to be the last of all in it; he remained after the coaches +had rolled away—after his dowager aunt's chair and flambeaux +had marched off in the darkness towards Chelsea, and +the town's-people had gone to bed, who had been drawn into +the square to gape at the unusual assemblage of chairs and +chariots, lackeys and torchmen. The poor mean wretch +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page310">[pg 310]</span><a name="Pg310" id="Pg310" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lingered yet for a few minutes, to see whether the girl would +vouchsafe him a smile, or a parting word of consolation. +But her enthusiasm of the morning was quite died out, or +she chose to be in a different mood. She fell to joking +about the dowdy appearance of Lady Betty, and mimicked +the vulgarity of Mrs. Steele; and then she put up her little +hand to her mouth and yawned, lighted a taper, and shrugged +her shoulders, and dropping Mr. Esmond a saucy curtsy, +sailed off to bed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The day began so well, Henry, that I had hoped it +might have ended better,”</span> was all the consolation that poor +Esmond's fond mistress could give him; and as he trudged +home through the dark alone, he thought, with bitter rage +in his heart, and a feeling of almost revolt against the +sacrifice he had made:—<span class="tei tei-q">“She would have me,”</span> thought he, +<span class="tei tei-q">“had I but a name to give her. But for my promise to her +father, I might have my rank and my mistress too.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I suppose a man's vanity is stronger than any other +passion in him; for I blush, even now, as I recall the +humiliation of those distant days, the memory of which +still smarts, though the fever of baulked desire has passed +away more than a score of years ago. When the writer's +descendants come to read this memoir, I wonder will they +have lived to experience a similar defeat and shame? Will +they ever have knelt to a woman, who has listened to them, +and played with them, and laughed at them—who beckoning +them with lures and caresses, and with Yes, smiling from +her eyes, has tricked them on to their knees, and turned +her back and left them? All this shame Mr. Esmond had +to undergo; and he submitted, and revolted, and presently +came crouching back for more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After this <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">feste</span></span>, my young Lord Ashburnham's coach +was for ever rolling in and out of Kensington Square; his +lady-mother came to visit Esmond's mistress, and at every +assembly in the town, wherever the maid of honour made +her appearance, you might be pretty sure to see the young +gentleman in a new suit every week, and decked out in all +the finery that his tailor or embroiderer could furnish for +him. My lord was for ever paying Mr. Esmond compliments, +bidding him to dinner, offering him horses to ride, +and giving him a thousand uncouth marks of respect and +goodwill. At last, one night at the coffee-house, whither +my lord came considerably flushed and excited with drink, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page311">[pg 311]</span><a name="Pg311" id="Pg311" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he rushes up to Mr. Esmond, and cries out—<span class="tei tei-q">“Give me joy, +my dearest colonel; I am the happiest of men.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The happiest of men needs no dearest colonel to give him +joy,”</span> says Mr. Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“What is the cause of this supreme +felicity?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Haven't you heard?”</span> says he. <span class="tei tei-q">“Don't you know? +I thought the family told you everything: the adorable +Beatrix hath promised to be mine.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What!”</span> cries out Mr. Esmond, who had spent happy +hours with Beatrix that very morning—had writ verses for +her, that she had sung at the harpsichord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> says he; <span class="tei tei-q">“I waited on her to-day. I saw you +walking towards Knightsbridge as I passed in my coach; +and she looked so lovely, and spoke so kind, that I couldn't +help going down on my knees, and—and—sure I'm the +happiest of men in all the world; and I'm very young; but +she says I shall get older: and you know I shall be of age +in four months; and there's very little difference between +us; and I'm so happy. I should like to treat the company +to something. Let us have a bottle—a dozen bottles—and +drink the health of the finest woman in England.”</span> +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond left the young lord tossing off bumper after +bumper, and strolled away to Kensington to ask whether the +news was true. 'Twas only too sure: his mistress's sad, compassionate +face told him the story; and then she related +what particulars of it she knew, and how my young lord +had made his offer, half an hour after Esmond went away +that morning, and in the very room where the song lay +yet on the harpsichord, which Esmond had writ, and they +had sung together. +</p> + +</div> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page313">[pg 313]</span><a name="Pg313" id="Pg313" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc71" id="toc71"></a> +<a name="pdf72" id="pdf72"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Book III. Containing The End Of Mr. Esmond's Adventures In England</span></h2> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc73" id="toc73"></a> +<a name="pdf74" id="pdf74"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter I. I Come To An End Of My Battles And Bruises</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That feverish desire to gain a little reputation which +Esmond had had, left him now perhaps that he had attained +some portion of his wish, and the great motive of his ambition +was over. His desire for military honour was that it +might raise him in Beatrix's eyes. 'Twas next to nobility +and wealth the only kind of rank she valued. It was the +stake quickest won or lost too; for law is a very long game +that requires a life to practise; and to be distinguished in +letters or the Church would not have forwarded the poor +gentleman's plans in the least. So he had no suit to play +but the red one, and he played it; and this, in truth, was +the reason of his speedy promotion; for he exposed himself +more than most gentlemen do, and risked more to win +more. Is he the only man that hath set his life against a +stake which may be not worth the winning? Another risks +his life (and his honour, too, sometimes) against a bundle of +bank-notes, or a yard of blue ribbon, or a seat in Parliament; +and some for the mere pleasure and excitement of the sport; +as a field of a hundred huntsmen will do, each out-bawling +and out-galloping the other at the tail of a dirty fox, that +is to be the prize of the foremost happy conqueror. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When he heard this news of Beatrix's engagement in +marriage, Colonel Esmond knocked under to his fate, and +resolved to surrender his sword, that could win him nothing +now he cared for; and in this dismal frame of mind he +determined to retire from the regiment, to the great delight +of the captain next in rank to him, who happened to be +a young gentleman of good fortune, who eagerly paid +Mr. Esmond a thousand guineas for his majority in Webb's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page314">[pg 314]</span><a name="Pg314" id="Pg314" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +regiment, and was knocked on the head the next campaign. +Perhaps Esmond would not have been sorry to share his +fate. He was more the Knight of the Woful Countenance +than ever he had been. His moodiness must have made +him perfectly odious to his friends under the tents, who like +a jolly fellow, and laugh at a melancholy warrior always +sighing after Dulcinea at home. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Both the ladies of Castlewood approved of Mr. Esmond +quitting the army, and his kind general coincided in his +wish of retirement, and helped in the transfer of his commission, +which brought a pretty sum into his pocket. But +when the commander-in-chief came home, and was forced, +in spite of himself, to appoint Lieutenant-General Webb +to the command of a division of the army in Flanders, the +lieutenant-general prayed Colonel Esmond so urgently to +be his aide de camp and military secretary, that Esmond +could not resist his kind patron's entreaties, and again took +the field, not attached to any regiment, but under Webb's +orders. What must have been the continued agonies of +fears<a id="noteref_15" name="noteref_15" href="#note_15"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">15</span></span></a> and apprehensions which racked the gentle breasts +of wives and matrons in those dreadful days, when every +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span> brought accounts of deaths and battles, and when +the present anxiety over, and the beloved person escaped, +the doubt still remained that a battle might be fought, +possibly, of which the next Flanders letter would bring the +account; so they, the poor tender creatures, had to go on +sickening and trembling through the whole campaign. +Whatever these terrors were on the part of Esmond's mistress +(and that tenderest of women must have felt them +most keenly for both her sons, as she called them), she +never allowed them outwardly to appear, but hid her +apprehension as she did her charities and devotion. 'Twas +only by chance that Esmond, wandering in Kensington, +found his mistress coming out of a mean cottage there, and +heard that she had a score of poor retainers, whom she visited +and comforted in their sickness and poverty, and who blessed +her daily. She attended the early church daily (though of +a Sunday especially, she encouraged and advanced all sorts +of cheerfulness and innocent gaiety in her little household): +and by notes entered into a table-book of hers at this time, +and devotional compositions writ with a sweet artless fervour, +such as the best divines could not surpass, showed +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page315">[pg 315]</span><a name="Pg315" id="Pg315" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +how fond her heart was, how humble and pious her spirit, +what pangs of apprehension she endured silently, and with +what a faithful reliance she committed the care of those she +loved to the awful Dispenser of death and life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for her ladyship at Chelsea, Esmond's newly-adopted +mother, she was now of an age when the danger of any +second party doth not disturb the rest much. She cared +for trumps more than for most things in life. She was firm +enough in her own faith, but no longer very bitter against +ours. She had a very good-natured, easy French director, +Monsieur Gauthier by name, who was a gentleman of the +world, and would take a hand of cards with Dean Atterbury, +my lady's neighbour at Chelsea, and was well with all the +High Church party. No doubt Monsieur Gauthier knew +what Esmond's peculiar position was, for he corresponded +with Holt, and always treated Colonel Esmond with particular +respect and kindness; but for good reasons the +colonel and the abbé never spoke on this matter together, +and so they remained perfect good friends. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All the frequenters of my lady of Chelsea's house were +of the Tory and High Church party. Madame Beatrix was +as frantic about the king as her elderly kinswoman: she +wore his picture on her heart; she had a piece of his hair; +she vowed he was the most injured, and gallant, and accomplished, +and unfortunate, and beautiful of princes. Steele, +who quarrelled with very many of his Tory friends, but +never with Esmond, used to tell the colonel that his kinswoman's +house was a rendezvous of Tory intrigues; that +Gauthier was a spy; that Atterbury was a spy; that +letters were constantly going from that house to the queen +at St. Germains; on which Esmond, laughing, would reply, +that they used to say in the army the Duke of Marlborough +was a spy too, and as much in correspondence with that +family as any Jesuit. And without entering very eagerly +into the controversy, Esmond had frankly taken the side +of his family. It seemed to him that King James the Third +was undoubtedly King of England by right: and at his +sister's death it would be better to have him than a foreigner +over us. No man admired King William more; a hero +and a conqueror, the bravest, justest, wisest of men—but +'twas by the sword he conquered the country, and held and +governed it by the very same right that the great Cromwell +held it, who was truly and greatly a sovereign. But that +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page316">[pg 316]</span><a name="Pg316" id="Pg316" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a foreign despotic prince, out of Germany, who happened +to be descended from King James the First, should take +possession of this empire, seemed to Mr. Esmond a monstrous +injustice—at least, every Englishman had a right to protest, +and the English prince, the heir-at-law, the first of all. +What man of spirit with such a cause would not back it? +What man of honour with such a crown to win would not +fight for it? But that race was destined. That prince +had himself against him, an enemy he could not overcome. +He never dared to draw his sword, though he had it. He +let his chances slip by as he lay in the lap of opera-girls, +or snivelled at the knees of priests asking pardon; and the +blood of heroes, and the devotedness of honest hearts, and +endurance, courage, fidelity, were all spent for him in vain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But let us return to my lady of Chelsea, who, when her +son Esmond announced to her ladyship that he proposed +to make the ensuing campaign, took leave of him with +perfect alacrity, and was down to piquet with her gentlewoman +before he had well quitted the room on his last visit. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Tierce to a king,”</span> were the last words he ever heard her +say: the game of life was pretty nearly over for the good +lady, and three months afterwards she took to her bed, +where she flickered out without any pain, so the Abbé +Gauthier wrote over to Mr. Esmond, then with his general +on the frontier of France. The Lady Castlewood was with +her at her ending, and had written too, but these letters must +have been taken by a privateer in the packet that brought +them; for Esmond knew nothing of their contents until +his return to England. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My Lady Castlewood had left everything to Colonel +Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“as a reparation for the wrong done to him”</span>; +'twas writ in her will. But her fortune was not much, for +it never had been large, and the honest viscountess had +wisely sunk most of the money she had upon an annuity +which terminated with her life. However, there was the +house and furniture, plate and pictures at Chelsea, and +a sum of money lying at her merchant's, Sir Josiah Child, +which altogether would realize a sum of near three hundred +pounds per annum, so that Mr. Esmond found himself, if +not rich, at least easy for life. Likewise, there were the +famous diamonds which had been said to be worth fabulous +sums, though the goldsmith pronounced they would fetch +no more than four thousand pounds. These diamonds, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page317">[pg 317]</span><a name="Pg317" id="Pg317" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +however, Colonel Esmond reserved, having a special use +for them: but the Chelsea house, plate, goods, &c., with +the exception of a few articles which he kept back, were sold +by his orders; and the sums resulting from the sale invested +in the public securities so as to realize the aforesaid annual +income of three hundred pounds. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Having now something to leave, he made a will, and +dispatched it home. The army was now in presence of the +enemy; and a great battle expected every day. 'Twas +known that the general-in-chief was in disgrace, and the +parties at home strong against him; and there was no +stroke this great and resolute player would not venture to +recall his fortune when it seemed desperate. Frank Castlewood +was with Colonel Esmond; his general having gladly +taken the young nobleman on to his staff. His studies of +fortifications at Bruxelles were over by this time. The fort +he was besieging had yielded, I believe, and my lord had +not only marched in with flying colours, but marched out +again. He used to tell his boyish wickednesses with +admirable humour, and was the most charming young +scapegrace in the army. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Tis needless to say that Colonel Esmond had left every +penny of his little fortune to this boy. It was the colonel's +firm conviction that the next battle would put an end to him: +for he felt aweary of the sun, and quite ready to bid that +and the earth farewell. Frank would not listen to his +comrade's gloomy forebodings, but swore they would keep +his birthday at Castlewood that autumn, after the campaign. +He had heard of the engagement at home. <span class="tei tei-q">“If Prince +Eugene goes to London,”</span> says Frank, <span class="tei tei-q">“and Trix can get +hold of him, she'll jilt Ashburnham for his highness. I tell +you, she used to make eyes at the Duke of Marlborough, +when she was only fourteen and ogling poor little Blandford. +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">I</span></em> wouldn't marry her, Harry, no not if her eyes were twice +as big. I'll take my fun. I'll enjoy for the next three +years every possible pleasure. I'll sow my wild oats then, +and marry some quiet, steady, modest, sensible viscountess; +hunt my harriers; and settle down at Castlewood. Perhaps +I'll represent the county—no, damme, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you</span></em> shall represent +the county. You have the brains of the family. By the +Lord, my dear old Harry, you have the best head and the +kindest heart in all the army; and every man says so—and +when the queen dies, and the king comes back, why shouldn't +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page318">[pg 318]</span><a name="Pg318" id="Pg318" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +you go to the House of Commons and be a minister, and +be made a peer, and that sort of thing? <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">You</span></em> be shot in the +next action! I wager a dozen of burgundy you are not +touched. Mohun is well of his wound. He is always with +Corporal John now. As soon as ever I see his ugly face I'll +spit in it. I took lessons of Father—of Captain Holtz at +Bruxelles. What a man that is! He knows everything.”</span> +Esmond bade Frank have a care; that Father Holt's knowledge +was rather dangerous; not, indeed, knowing as yet +how far the father had pushed his instructions with his +young pupil. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The gazetteers and writers, both of the French and +English side, have given accounts sufficient of that bloody +battle of Blarignies or Malplaquet, which was the last and +the hardest-earned of the victories of the great Duke of +Marlborough. In that tremendous combat, near upon two +hundred and fifty thousand men were engaged, more than +thirty thousand of whom were slain or wounded (the Allies +lost twice as many men as they killed of the French, whom +they conquered): and this dreadful slaughter very likely +took place because a great general's credit was shaken at +home, and he thought to restore it by a victory. If such +were the motives which induced the Duke of Marlborough +to venture that prodigious stake, and desperately sacrifice +thirty thousand brave lives, so that he might figure once +more in a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, and hold his places and pensions a little +longer, the event defeated the dreadful and selfish design, +for the victory was purchased at a cost which no nation, +greedy of glory as it may be, would willingly pay for any +triumph. The gallantry of the French was as remarkable +as the furious bravery of their assailants. We took a few +score of their flags, and a few pieces of their artillery; but +we left twenty thousand of the bravest soldiers of the world +round about the entrenched lines, from which the enemy +was driven. He retreated in perfect good order; the panic-spell +seemed to be broke, under which the French had +laboured ever since the disaster of Hochstedt; and, fighting +now on the threshold of their country, they showed an +heroic ardour of resistance, such as had never met us in the +course of their aggressive war. Had the battle been more +successful, the conqueror might have got the price for which +he waged it. As it was (and justly, I think), the party +adverse to the duke in England were indignant at the lavish +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page319">[pg 319]</span><a name="Pg319" id="Pg319" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +extravagance of slaughter, and demanded more eagerly +than ever the recall of a chief, whose cupidity and desperation +might urge him further still. After this bloody fight +of Malplaquet, I can answer for it, that in the Dutch +quarters and our own, and amongst the very regiments and +commanders, whose gallantry was most conspicuous upon +this frightful day of carnage, the general cry was, that there +was enough of the war. The French were driven back into +their own boundary, and all their conquests and booty of +Flanders disgorged. As for the Prince of Savoy, with +whom our commander-in-chief, for reasons of his own, +consorted more closely than ever, 'twas known that he was +animated not merely by a political hatred, but by personal +rage against the old French king: the Imperial Generalissimo +never forgot the slight put by Lewis upon the Abbé de +Savoie; and in the humiliation or ruin of his most Christian +Majesty, the Holy Roman Emperor found his account. +But what were these quarrels to us, the free citizens of +England and Holland? Despot as he was, the French +monarch was yet the chief of European civilization, more +venerable in his age and misfortunes than at the period of +his most splendid successes; whilst his opponent was but +a semi-barbarous tyrant, with a pillaging murderous horde +of Croats and Pandours, composing a half of his army, +filling our camp with their strange figures, bearded like the +miscreant Turks their neighbours, and carrying into +Christian warfare their native heathen habits of rapine, +lust, and murder. Why should the best blood in England +and France be shed in order that the Holy Roman and +Apostolic master of these ruffians should have his revenge +over the Christian king? And it was to this end we were +fighting; for this that every village and family in England +was deploring the death of beloved sons and fathers. We +dared not speak to each other, even at table, of Malplaquet, +so frightful were the gaps left in our army by the cannon +of that bloody action. 'Twas heartrending, for an officer +who had a heart, to look down his line on a parade-day +afterwards, and miss hundreds of faces of comrades—humble +or of high rank—that had gathered but yesterday full of +courage and cheerfulness round the torn and blackened +flags. Where were our friends? As the great duke +reviewed us, riding along our lines with his fine suite of +prancing aides de camp and generals, stopping here and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page320">[pg 320]</span><a name="Pg320" id="Pg320" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +there to thank an officer with those eager smiles and bows +of which his grace was always lavish, scarce a huzzah could +be got for him, though Cadogan, with an oath, rode up and +cried—<span class="tei tei-q">“D—n you, why don't you cheer?”</span> But the men +had no heart for that: not one of them but was thinking, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where's my comrade?—where's my brother that fought +by me, or my dear captain that led me yesterday?”</span> 'Twas +the most gloomy pageant I ever looked on; and the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Te +Deum</span></span>, sung by our chaplains, the most woful and dreary +satire. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's general added one more to the many marks of +honour which he had received in the front of a score of +battles, and got a wound in the groin, which laid him on +his back; and you may be sure he consoled himself by +abusing the commander-in-chief, as he lay groaning:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Corporal +John's as fond of me,”</span> he used to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“as King +David was of General Uriah; and so he always gives me the +post of danger.”</span> He persisted, to his dying day, in believing +that the duke intended he should be beat at Wynendael, +and sent him purposely with a small force, hoping that he +might be knocked on the head there. Esmond and Frank +Castlewood both escaped without hurt, though the division +which our general commanded suffered even more than any +other, having to sustain not only the fury of the enemy's +cannonade, which was very hot and well-served, but the +furious and repeated charges of the famous Maison-du-Roy, +which we had to receive and beat off again and again, with +volleys of shot and hedges of iron, and our four lines of +musketeers and pikemen. They said the King of England +charged us no less than twelve times that day, along with +the French Household. Esmond's late regiment, General +Webb's own Fusiliers, served in the division which their +colonel commanded. The general was thrice in the centre of +the square of the Fusiliers, calling the fire at the French +charges; and, after the action, his grace the Duke of Berwick +sent his compliments to his old regiment and their +colonel for their behaviour on the field. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We drank my Lord Castlewood's health and majority, +the 25th of September, the army being then before Mons: +and here Colonel Esmond was not so fortunate as he had +been in actions much more dangerous, and was hit by a +spent ball just above the place where his former wound was, +which caused the old wound to open again, fever, spitting +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page321">[pg 321]</span><a name="Pg321" id="Pg321" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of blood, and other ugly symptoms, to ensue; and, in a +word, brought him near to death's door. The kind lad, his +kinsman, attended his elder comrade with a very praiseworthy +affectionateness and care until he was pronounced +out of danger by the doctors, when Frank went off, passed +the winter at Bruxelles, and besieged, no doubt, some other +fortress there. Very few lads would have given up their +pleasures so long and so gaily as Frank did; his cheerful +prattle soothed many long days of Esmond's pain and +languor. Frank was supposed to be still at his kinsman's +bedside for a month after he had left it, for letters came +from his mother at home full of thanks to the younger gentleman +for his care of his elder brother (so it pleased Esmond's +mistress now affectionately to style him); nor was Mr. +Esmond in a hurry to undeceive her, when the good young +fellow was gone for his Christmas holiday. It was as +pleasant to Esmond on his couch to watch the young man's +pleasure at the idea of being free, as to note his simple efforts +to disguise his satisfaction on going away. There are days +when a flask of champagne at a cabaret, and a red-cheeked +partner to share it, are too strong temptations for any young +fellow of spirit. I am not going to play the moralist, and +cry <span class="tei tei-q">“Fie!”</span> For ages past, I know how old men preach, and +what young men practise; and that patriarchs have had +their weak moments, too, long since Father Noah toppled +over after discovering the vine. Frank went off, then, to +his pleasures at Bruxelles, in which capital many young +fellows of our army declared they found infinitely greater +diversion even than in London: and Mr. Henry Esmond +remained in his sick-room, where he writ a fine comedy, that +his mistress pronounced to be sublime, and that was acted +no less than three successive nights in London in the next +year. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here, as he lay nursing himself, ubiquitous Mr. Holtz +reappeared, and stopped a whole month at Mons, where +he not only won over Colonel Esmond to the king's side in +politics (that side being always held by the Esmond family); +but where he endeavoured to reopen the controversial +question between the Churches once more, and to recall +Esmond to that religion in which, in his infancy, he had +been baptized. Holtz was a casuist, both dexterous and +learned, and presented the case between the English Church +and his own in such a way that those who granted his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page322">[pg 322]</span><a name="Pg322" id="Pg322" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +premisses ought certainly to allow his conclusions. He +touched on Esmond's delicate state of health, chance of +dissolution, and so forth; and enlarged upon the immense +benefits that the sick man was likely to forgo—benefits +which the Church of England did not deny to those of the +Roman communion, as how should she, being derived from +that Church, and only an offshoot from it. But Mr. Esmond +said that his Church was the church of his country, and to +that he chose to remain faithful: other people were welcome +to worship and to subscribe any other set of articles, whether +at Rome or at Augsburg. But if the good father meant +that Esmond should join the Roman communion for fear of +consequences, and that all England ran the risk of being +damned for heresy, Esmond, for one, was perfectly willing to +take his chance of the penalty along with the countless +millions of his fellow countrymen, who were bred in the +same faith, and along with some of the noblest, the truest, +the purest, the wisest, the most pious and learned men and +women in the world. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for the political question, in that Mr. Esmond could +agree with the father much more readily, and had come to +the same conclusion, though, perhaps, by a different way. +The right-divine, about which Dr. Sacheverel and the High +Church party in England were just now making a bother, +they were welcome to hold as they chose. If Henry Cromwell +and his father before him, had been crowned and +anointed (and bishops enough would have been found to do +it), it seemed to Mr. Esmond that they would have had the +right-divine just as much as any Plantagenet, or Tudor, or +Stuart. But the desire of the country being unquestionably +for an hereditary monarchy, Esmond thought an +English king out of St. Germains was better and fitter than +a German prince from Herrenhausen, and that if he failed +to satisfy the nation, some other Englishman might be +found to take his place; and so, though with no frantic +enthusiasm, or worship of that monstrous pedigree which +the Tories chose to consider divine, he was ready to say, +<span class="tei tei-q">“God save King James!”</span> when Queen Anne went the way +of kings and commoners. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I fear, colonel, you are no better than a republican at +heart,”</span> says the priest, with a sigh. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am an Englishman,”</span> says Harry, <span class="tei tei-q">“and take my country +as I find her. The will of the nation being for Church and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page323">[pg 323]</span><a name="Pg323" id="Pg323" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +King, I am for Church and King, too; but English Church, +and English King; and that is why your Church isn't mine, +though your king is.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Though they lost the day at Malplaquet, it was the French +who were elated by that action, whilst the conquerors were +dispirited by it; and the enemy gathered together a larger +army than ever, and made prodigious efforts for the next +campaign. Marshal Berwick was with the French this year; +and we heard that Mareschal Villars was still suffering of +his wound, was eager to bring our duke to action, and +vowed he would fight us in his coach. Young Castlewood +came flying back from Bruxelles, as soon as he heard that +righting was to begin; and the arrival of the Chevalier de +St. George was announced about May. <span class="tei tei-q">“It's the king's +third campaign, and it's mine,”</span> Frank liked saying. He +was come back a greater Jacobite than ever, and Esmond +suspected that some fair conspirators at Bruxelles had been +inflaming the young man's ardour. Indeed, he owned that +he had a message from the queen, Beatrix's godmother, +who had given her name to Frank's sister the year before +he and his sovereign were born. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +However desirous Marshal Villars might be to fight, my +lord duke did not seem disposed to indulge him this campaign. +Last year his grace had been all for the Whigs and Hanoverians; +but finding, on going to England, his country cold +towards himself, and the people in a ferment of High-Church +loyalty, the duke comes back to his army cooled towards +the Hanoverians, cautious with the Imperialists, and particularly +civil and polite towards the Chevalier de St. George. +'Tis certain that messengers and letters were continually +passing between his grace and his brave nephew, the Duke +of Berwick, in the opposite camp. No man's caresses were +more opportune than his grace's, and no man ever uttered +expressions of regard and affection more generously. He +professed to Monsieur de Torcy, so Mr. St. John told the +writer, quite an eagerness to be cut in pieces for the exiled +queen and her family; nay more, I believe, this year he +parted with a portion of the most precious part of himself—his +money—which he sent over to the royal exiles. Mr. +Tunstal, who was in the prince's service, was twice or thrice +in and out of our camp; the French, in theirs of Arlieu and +about Arras. A little river, the Canihe, I think 'twas called +(but this is writ away from books and Europe; and the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page324">[pg 324]</span><a name="Pg324" id="Pg324" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +only map the writer hath of these scenes of his youth, bears +no mark of this little stream), divided our pickets from the +enemy's. Our sentries talked across the stream, when they +could make themselves understood to each other, and when +they could not, grinned, and handed each other their +brandy-flasks or their pouches of tobacco. And one fine +day of June, riding thither with the officer who visited the +outposts (Colonel Esmond was taking an airing on horseback, +being too weak for military duty), they came to this +river, where a number of English and Scots were assembled, +talking to the good-natured enemy on the other +side. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond was especially amused with the talk of one long +fellow, with a great curling red moustache, and blue eyes, +that was half a dozen inches taller than his swarthy little +comrades on the French side of the stream, and being asked +by the colonel, saluted him, and said that he belonged to +the Royal Cravats. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From his way of saying <span class="tei tei-q">“Royal Cravat”</span>, Esmond at once +knew that the fellow's tongue had first wagged on the banks +of the Liffey, and not the Loire; and the poor soldier—a +deserter probably—did not like to venture very deep into +French conversation, lest his unlucky brogue should peep +out. He chose to restrict himself to such few expressions +in the French language as he thought he had mastered +easily; and his attempt at disguise was infinitely amusing. +Mr. Esmond whistled <span class="tei tei-q">“Lillibullero,”</span> at which Teague's eyes +began to twinkle, and then flung him a dollar, when the +poor boy broke out with a <span class="tei tei-q">“God bless—that is, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Dieu +bénisse votre honor</span></span>”</span>, that would infallibly have sent him +to the provost-marshal had he been on our side of the +river. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whilst this parley was going on, three officers on horseback, +on the French side, appeared at some little distance, +and stopped as if eyeing us, when one of them left the other +two, and rode close up to us who were by the stream. <span class="tei tei-q">“Look, +look!”</span> says the Royal Cravat, with great agitation, <span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">pas +lui</span></span>, that's he; not him, +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">l'autre</span></span>,”</span> and pointed to the distant +officer on a chestnut horse, with a cuirass shining in the sun, +and over it a broad blue ribbon. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Please to take Mr. Hamilton's services to my Lord +Marlborough—my lord duke,”</span> says the gentleman in +English; and, looking to see that the party were not +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page325">[pg 325]</span><a name="Pg325" id="Pg325" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +hostilely disposed, he added, with a smile, <span class="tei tei-q">“There's a friend +of yours, gentlemen, yonder; he bids me to say that he +saw some of your faces on the 11th of September last +year.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As the gentleman spoke, the other two officers rode up, +and came quite close. We knew at once who it was. It +was the king, then two-and-twenty years old, tall and slim, +with deep brown eyes, that looked melancholy, though his +lips wore a smile. We took off our hats and saluted him. +No man, sure, could see for the first time, without emotion, +the youthful inheritor of so much fame and misfortune. +It seemed to Mr. Esmond that the prince was not unlike +young Castlewood, whose age and figure he resembled. The +Chevalier de St. George acknowledged the salute, and looked +at us hard. Even the idlers on our side of the river set up +a hurrah. As for the Royal Cravat, he ran to the prince's +stirrup, knelt down and kissed his boot, and bawled and +looked a hundred ejaculations and blessings. The prince +bade the aide de camp give him a piece of money; and when +the party saluting us had ridden away, Cravat spat upon +the piece of gold by way of benediction, and swaggered +away, pouching his coin and twirling his honest carroty +moustache. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The officer in whose company Esmond was, the same +little captain of Handyside's regiment, Mr. Sterne, who had +proposed the garden at Lille, when my Lord Mohun and +Esmond had their affair, was an Irishman too, and as brave +a little soul as ever wore a sword. <span class="tei tei-q">“Bedad,”</span> says Roger +Sterne, <span class="tei tei-q">“that long fellow spoke French so beautiful that +I shouldn't have known he wasn't a foreigner, till he broke +out with his hulla-balloing, and only an Irish calf can bellow +like that.”</span>—And Roger made another remark in his wild +way, in which there was sense as well as absurdity—<span class="tei tei-q">“If that +young gentleman,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“would but ride over to our +camp instead of Villars's, toss up his hat and say, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Here +am I, the king, who'll follow me?’</span> by the Lord, Esmond, +the whole army would rise and carry him home again, and +beat Villars, and take Paris by the way.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The news of the prince's visit was all through the camp +quickly, and scores of ours went down in hopes to see him. +Major Hamilton, whom we had talked with, sent back by +a trumpet several silver pieces for officers with us. Mr. +Esmond received one of these: and that medal, and a +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page326">[pg 326]</span><a name="Pg326" id="Pg326" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +recompense not uncommon amongst princes, were the only +rewards he ever had from a royal person, whom he endeavoured +not very long after to serve. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond quitted the army almost immediately after this, +following his general home; and, indeed, being advised to +travel in the fine weather and attempt to take no further +part in the campaign. But he heard from the army, that +of the many who crowded to see the Chevalier de St. George, +Frank Castlewood had made himself most conspicuous: +my lord viscount riding across the little stream bareheaded +to where the prince was, and dismounting and kneeling +before him to do him homage. Some said that the prince +had actually knighted him, but my lord denied that statement, +though he acknowledged the rest of the story, and +said:—<span class="tei tei-q">“From having been out of favour with Corporal +John,”</span> as he called the duke, before, his grace warned him +not to commit those follies, and smiled on him cordially +ever after. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And he was so kind to me,”</span> Frank writ, <span class="tei tei-q">“that I thought +I would put in a good word for Master Harry, but when +I mentioned your name he looked as black as thunder, and +said he had never heard of you.”</span> +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc75" id="toc75"></a> +<a name="pdf76" id="pdf76"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter II. I Go Home, And Harp On The Old String</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After quitting Mons and the army, and as he was waiting +for a packet at Ostend, Esmond had a letter from his +young kinsman Castlewood at Bruxelles, conveying intelligence +whereof Frank besought him to be the bearer +to London, and which caused Colonel Esmond no small +anxiety. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The young scapegrace, being one-and-twenty years old, +and being anxious to sow his <span class="tei tei-q">“wild otes”</span>, as he wrote, had +married Mademoiselle de Wertheim, daughter of Count de +Wertheim, Chamberlain to the Emperor, and having a post +in the Household of the Governor of the Netherlands. +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +PS. (the young gentleman wrote): Clotilda is </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">older than me</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">, +which perhaps may be objected to her: but I am so </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">old a raik</span></em> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page327">[pg 327]</span><a name="Pg327" id="Pg327" class="tei tei-anchor"></a><span style="font-size: 90%"> +that the age makes no difference, and I am </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">determined</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%"> to reform. +We were married at St. Gudule, by Father Holt. She is heart +and soul for the </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">good cause</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">. And here the cry is +</span><span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">Vif-le-Roy</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%">, which +my mother will </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">join in</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">, and Trix </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">too</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">. Break this news to 'em +gently: and tell Mr. Finch, my agent, to press the people for +their rents, and send me the </span><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">ryno</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%"> anyhow. Clotilda sings, and +plays on the Spinet </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">beautifully</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">. She is a fair beauty. And if it's +a son, you shall stand </span><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">Godfather</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%">. I'm going to leave the army, +having had </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">enuf of soldering</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">; and my lord duke </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">recommends</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%"> me. +I shall pass the winter here: and stop at least until Clo's lying-in. +I call her </span><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">old Clo</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%">, but nobody else shall. She is the cleverest +woman in all Bruxelles: understanding painting, music, poetry, and perfect +at </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">cookery and puddens</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">. I borded with the count, that's how +I came to know her. There are four counts her brothers. One +an abbey—three with the prince's army. They have a lawsuit +for </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">an immense fortune</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">: but are now in a </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">pore way</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">. Break this +to mother, who'll take anything from </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">you</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">. And write, and bid +Finch write </span><em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">amediately</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%">. Hostel de 'l'Aigle Noire, Bruxelles, +Flanders. +</span></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So Frank had married a Roman Catholic lady, and an +heir was expected, and Mr. Esmond was to carry this intelligence +to his mistress at London. 'Twas a difficult embassy; +and the colonel felt not a little tremor as he neared the +capital. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He reached his inn late, and sent a messenger to Kensington +to announce his arrival and visit the next morning. +The messenger brought back news that the Court was at +Windsor, and the fair Beatrix absent and engaged in her +duties there. Only Esmond's mistress remained in her +house at Kensington. She appeared in Court but once in +the year; Beatrix was quite the mistress and ruler of the +little mansion, inviting the company thither, and engaging +in every conceivable frolic of town pleasure. Whilst her +mother, acting as the young lady's protectress and elder +sister, pursued her own path, which was quite modest and +secluded. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As soon as ever Esmond was dressed (and he had been +awake long before the town), he took a coach for Kensington, +and reached it so early that he met his dear mistress coming +home from morning prayers. She carried her Prayer-book, +never allowing a footman to bear it, as everybody else did: +and it was by this simple sign Esmond knew what her +occupation had been. He called to the coachman to stop, +and jumped out as she looked towards him. She wore her +hood as usual, and she turned quite pale when she saw him. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page328">[pg 328]</span><a name="Pg328" id="Pg328" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +To feel that kind little hand near to his heart seemed to +give him strength. They soon were at the door of her ladyship's +house—and within it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With a sweet sad smile she took his hand and kissed it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“How ill you have been: how weak you look, my dear +Henry,”</span> she said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Tis certain the colonel did look like a ghost, except that +ghosts do not look very happy, 'tis said. Esmond always +felt so on returning to her after absence, indeed whenever +he looked in her sweet kind face. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am come back to be nursed by my family,”</span> says he. +<span class="tei tei-q">“If Frank had not taken care of me after my wound, very +likely I should have gone altogether.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Poor Frank, good Frank!”</span> says his mother. <span class="tei tei-q">“You'll +always be kind to him, my lord,”</span> she went on. <span class="tei tei-q">“The poor +child never knew he was doing you a wrong.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord!”</span> cries out Colonel Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“What do you +mean, dear lady?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am no lady,”</span> says she; <span class="tei tei-q">“I am Rachel Esmond, Francis +Esmond's widow, my lord. I cannot bear that title. +Would we never had taken it from him who has it now. +But we did all in our power, Henry: we did all in our +power; and my lord and I—that is——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who told you this tale, dearest lady?”</span> asked the colonel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Have you not had the letter I writ you? I writ to you +at Mons directly I heard it,”</span> says Lady Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And from whom?”</span> again asked Colonel Esmond—and +his mistress then told him that on her death-bed the dowager +countess, sending for her, had presented her with this +dismal secret as a legacy. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas very malicious of the +dowager,”</span> Lady Esmond said, <span class="tei tei-q">“to have had it so long, and to +have kept the truth from me. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Cousin Rachel,’</span> she said,”</span> +and Esmond's mistress could not forbear smiling as she +told the story, <span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘cousin Rachel,’</span> cries the dowager, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I +have sent for you, as the doctors say I may go off any day +in this dysentery; and to ease my conscience of a great +load that has been on it. You always have been a poor +creature and unfit for great honour, and what I have to +say won't, therefore, affect you so much. You must know, +cousin Rachel, that I have left my house, plate, and furniture, +three thousand pounds in money, and my diamonds that +my late revered saint and sovereign, King James, presented +me with, to my Lord Viscount Castlewood.’</span></span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page329">[pg 329]</span><a name="Pg329" id="Pg329" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘To my Frank?’</span> ”</span> says Lady Castlewood: <span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘I was in +hopes——</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘To Viscount Castlewood, my dear, Viscount Castlewood, +and Baron Esmond of Shandon in the kingdom of +Ireland, Earl and Marquis of Esmond under patent of his +Majesty King James the Second, conferred upon my husband +the late marquis—for I am Marchioness of Esmond +before God and man.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘And have you left poor Harry nothing, dear marchioness?’</span> ”</span> +asks Lady Castlewood (she hath told me the story +completely since with her quiet arch way; the most charming +any woman ever had: and I set down the narrative +here at length so as to have done with it). <span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘And have you +left poor Harry nothing?’</span> ”</span> asks my dear lady: <span class="tei tei-q">“for you +know, Henry,”</span> she says with her sweet smile, <span class="tei tei-q">“I used always +to pity Esau—and I think I am on his side—though papa +tried very hard to convince me the other way.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Poor Harry!’</span> says the old lady. <span class="tei tei-q">‘So you want +something left to poor Harry: he, he! (reach me the drops, +cousin). Well then, my dear, since you want poor Harry +to have a fortune: you must understand that ever since +the year 1691, a week after the battle of the Boyne, where +the Prince of Orange defeated his royal sovereign and father, +for which crime he is now suffering in flames (ugh, ugh), +Henry Esmond hath been Marquis of Esmond and Earl +of Castlewood in the United Kingdom, and Baron and +Viscount Castlewood of Shandon in Ireland, and a baronet—and +his eldest son will be, by courtesy, styled Earl of +Castlewood—he! he! What do you think of that, my dear?’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Gracious mercy! how long have you known this?’</span> ”</span> +cries the other lady (thinking perhaps that the old marchioness +was wandering in her wits). +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘My husband, before he was converted, was a wicked +wretch,’</span> ”</span> the sick sinner continued. <span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘When he was in the +Low Countries he seduced a weaver's daughter; and added +to his wickedness by marrying her. And then he came to +this country and married me—a poor girl—a poor innocent +young thing—I say,’</span> though she was past forty, you know, +Harry, when she married: and as for being innocent—<span class="tei tei-q">‘Well,’</span> +she went on, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I knew nothing of my lord's wickedness +for three years after our marriage, and after the burial +of our poor little boy I had it done over again, my dear. +I had myself married by Father Holt in Castlewood chapel, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page330">[pg 330]</span><a name="Pg330" id="Pg330" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as soon as ever I heard the creature was dead—and having +a great illness then, arising from another sad disappointment +I had, the priest came and told me that my lord had +a son before our marriage, and that the child was at nurse +in England; and I consented to let the brat be brought +home, and a queer little melancholy child it was when it +came.</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Our intention was to make a priest of him: and he +was bred for this, until you perverted him from it, you +wicked woman. And I had again hopes of giving an heir +to my lord, when he was called away upon the king's business, +and died fighting gloriously at the Boyne Water.</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Should I be disappointed—I owed your husband no +love, my dear, for he had jilted me in the most scandalous +way; and I thought there would be time to declare the +little weaver's son for the true heir. But I was carried +off to prison, where your husband was so kind to me—urging +all his friends to obtain my release, and using all +his credit in my favour—that I relented towards him, +especially as my director counselled me to be silent; and +that it was for the good of the king's service that the title +of our family should continue with your husband the late +viscount, whereby his fidelity would be always secured to +the king. And a proof of this is, that a year before your +husband's death, when he thought of taking a place under the +Prince of Orange, Mr. Holt went to him, and told him what +the state of the matter was, and obliged him to raise a large +sum for his Majesty: and engaged him in the true cause +so heartily, that we were sure of his support on any day +when it should be considered advisable to attack the usurper. +Then his sudden death came; and there was a thought of +declaring the truth. But 'twas determined to be best for +the king's service to let the title still go with the younger +branch; and there's no sacrifice a Castlewood wouldn't +make for that cause, my dear.</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘As for Colonel Esmond, he knew the truth already’</span> +(and then, Harry,”</span> my mistress said, <span class="tei tei-q">“she told me of what +had happened at my dear husband's death-bed). <span class="tei tei-q">‘He doth +not intend to take the title, though it belongs to him. But +it eases my conscience that you should know the truth, my +dear. And your son is lawfully Viscount Castlewood so +long as his cousin doth not claim the rank.’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This was the substance of the dowager's revelation. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page331">[pg 331]</span><a name="Pg331" id="Pg331" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Dean Atterbury had knowledge of it, Lady Castlewood said, +and Esmond very well knows how: that divine being the +clergyman for whom the late lord had sent on his death-bed: +and when Lady Castlewood would instantly have written +to her son, and conveyed the truth to him, the dean's advice +was that a letter should be writ to Colonel Esmond rather; +that the matter should be submitted to his decision, by +which alone the rest of the family were bound to abide. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And can my dearest lady doubt what that will be?”</span> +says the colonel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It rests with you, Harry, as the head of our house.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It was settled twelve years since, by my dear lord's +bedside,”</span> says Colonel Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“The children must know +nothing of this. Frank and his heirs after him must bear +our name. 'Tis his rightfully; I have not even a proof +of that marriage of my father and mother, though my poor +lord, on his death-bed, told me that Father Holt had brought +such a proof to Castlewood. I would not seek it when I was +abroad. I went and looked at my poor mother's grave in +her convent. What matter to her now? No court of law +on earth, upon my mere word, would deprive my lord +viscount and set me up. I am the head of the house, dear +lady; but Frank is Viscount of Castlewood still. And +rather than disturb him, I would turn monk, or disappear +in America.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As he spoke so to his dearest mistress, for whom he would +have been willing to give up his life, or to make any sacrifice +any day, the fond creature flung herself down on her knees +before him, and kissed both his hands in an outbreak of +passionate love and gratitude, such as could not but melt +his heart, and make him feel very proud and thankful that +God had given him the power to show his love for her, and +to prove it by some little sacrifice on his own part. To be +able to bestow benefits or happiness on those one loves is +sure the greatest blessing conferred upon a man—and what +wealth or name, or gratification of ambition or vanity, +could compare with the pleasure Esmond now had of being +able to confer some kindness upon his best and dearest +friends? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dearest saint,”</span> says he—<span class="tei tei-q">“purest soul, that has had so +much to suffer, that has blest the poor lonely orphan with +such a treasure of love. 'Tis for me to kneel, not for you: +'tis for me to be thankful that I can make you happy. Hath +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page332">[pg 332]</span><a name="Pg332" id="Pg332" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +my life any other aim? Blessed be God that I can serve +you! What pleasure, think you, could all the world give +me compared to that?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Don't raise me,”</span> she said, in a wild way, to Esmond, who +would have lifted her. <span class="tei tei-q">“Let me kneel—let me kneel, and—and—worship +you.”</span> +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Before such a partial judge, as Esmond's dear mistress +owned herself to be, any cause which he might plead was +sure to be given in his favour; and accordingly he found +little difficulty in reconciling her to the news whereof he +was bearer, of her son's marriage to a foreign lady, Papist +though she was. Lady Castlewood never could be brought +to think so ill of that religion as other people in England +thought of it: she held that ours was undoubtedly a branch +of the Church Catholic, but that the Roman was one of the +main stems on which, no doubt, many errors had been grafted +(she was, for a woman, extraordinarily well versed in this +controversy, having acted, as a girl, as secretary to her +father, the late dean, and written many of his sermons, +under his dictation); and if Frank had chosen to marry +a lady of the Church of South Europe, as she would call the +Roman communion, that was no need why she should not +welcome her as a daughter-in-law: and accordingly she +writ to her new daughter a very pretty, touching letter +(as Esmond thought, who had cognizance of it before it +went), in which the only hint of reproof was a gentle +remonstrance that her son had not written to herself, to +ask a fond mother's blessing for that step which he was +about taking. <span class="tei tei-q">“Castlewood knew very well,”</span> so she wrote +to her son, <span class="tei tei-q">“that she never denied him anything in her +power to give, much less would she think of opposing +a marriage that was to make his happiness, as she trusted, +and keep him out of wild courses, which had alarmed her +a good deal: and she besought him to come quickly to +England, to settle down in his family house of Castlewood +(<span class="tei tei-q">‘It is his family house,’</span> says she, to Colonel Esmond, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘though only his own house by your forbearance’</span>), and to +receive the accompt of her stewardship during his ten years' +minority.”</span> By care and frugality, she had got the estate +into a better condition than ever it had been since the +Parliamentary wars; and my lord was now master of a +pretty, small income, not encumbered of debts, as it had +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page333">[pg 333]</span><a name="Pg333" id="Pg333" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +been, during his father's ruinous time. <span class="tei tei-q">“But in saving my +son's fortune,”</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“I fear I have lost a great part of +my hold on him.”</span> And, indeed, this was the case; her +ladyship's daughter complaining that their mother did all +for Frank, and nothing for her; and Frank himself being +dissatisfied at the narrow, simple way of his mother's +living at Walcote, where he had been brought up more like +a poor parson's son, than a young nobleman that was to +make a figure in the world. 'Twas this mistake in his early +training, very likely, that set him so eager upon pleasure +when he had it in his power; nor is he the first lad that +has been spoiled by the over-careful fondness of women. +No training is so useful for children, great or small, as the +company of their betters in rank or natural parts; in whose +society they lose the overweening sense of their own importance, +which stay-at-home people very commonly learn. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But, as a prodigal that's sending in a schedule of his debts +to his friends, never puts all down, and, you may be sure, +the rogue keeps back some immense swingeing bill, that he +doesn't dare to own; so the poor Frank had a very heavy +piece of news to break to his mother, and which he hadn't +the courage to introduce into his first confession. Some +misgivings Esmond might have, upon receiving Frank's +letter, and knowing into what hands the boy had fallen; +but whatever these misgivings were, he kept them to himself, +not caring to trouble his mistress with any fears that +might be groundless. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +However, the next mail which came from Bruxelles, after +Frank had received his mother's letter there, brought back +a joint composition from himself and his wife, who could +spell no better than her young scapegrace of a husband, +full of expressions of thanks, love, and duty to the dowager +viscountess, as my poor lady now was styled; and along +with this letter (which was read in a family council, namely, +the viscountess, Mistress Beatrix, and the writer of this +memoir, and which was pronounced to be vulgar by the +maid of honour, and felt to be so by the other two), there +came a private letter for Colonel Esmond from poor Frank, +with another dismal commission for the colonel to execute, +at his best opportunity; and this was to announce that +Frank had seen fit, <span class="tei tei-q">“by the exhortation of Mr. Holt, the +influence of his Clotilda, and the blessing of Heaven and +the saints,”</span> says my lord, demurely, <span class="tei tei-q">“to change his religion, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page334">[pg 334]</span><a name="Pg334" id="Pg334" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and be received into the bosom of that Church of which +his sovereign, many of his family, and the greater part of +the civilized world, were members.”</span> And his lordship added +a postscript, of which Esmond knew the inspiring genius +very well, for it had the genuine twang of the seminary, +and was quite unlike poor Frank's ordinary style of writing +and thinking; in which he reminded Colonel Esmond that +he too was, by birth, of that Church; and that his mother +and sister should have his lordship's prayers to the saints +(an inestimable benefit, truly!) for their conversion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If Esmond had wanted to keep this secret he could not; +for a day or two after receiving this letter, a notice from +Bruxelles appeared in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Post-Boy</span></span>, and other prints, +announcing that <span class="tei tei-q">“a young Irish lord, the Viscount C-stle-w—d, +just come to his majority, and who had served the +last campaigns with great credit, as aide de camp to his +grace the Duke of Marlborough, had declared for the Popish +religion at Bruxelles, and had walked in a procession +barefoot, with a wax taper in his hand.”</span> The notorious +Mr. Holt, who had been employed as a Jacobite agent +during the last reign, and many times pardoned by King +William, had been, the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Post-Boy</span></span> said, the agent of this +conversion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Lady Castlewood was as much cast down by this +news as Miss Beatrix was indignant at it. <span class="tei tei-q">“So,”</span> says she, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Castlewood is no longer a home for us, mother. Frank's +foreign wife will bring her confessor, and there will be +frogs for dinner; and all Tusher's and my grandfather's +sermons are flung away upon my brother. I used to tell +you that you killed him with the Catechism, and that he +would turn wicked as soon as he broke from his mammy's +leading-strings. Oh, mother, you would not believe that +the young scapegrace was playing you tricks, and that +sneak of a Tusher was not a fit guide for him. Oh, those +parsons! I hate 'em all,”</span> says Mistress Beatrix, clapping +her hands together; <span class="tei tei-q">“yes, whether they wear cassocks +and buckles, or beards and bare feet. There's a horrid +Irish wretch who never misses a Sunday at Court, and who +pays me compliments there, the horrible man; and if you +want to know what parsons are, you should see his behaviour, +and hear him talk of his own cloth. They're all +the same, whether they're bishops or bonzes, or Indian +fakirs. They try to domineer, and they frighten us with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page335">[pg 335]</span><a name="Pg335" id="Pg335" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +kingdom come; and they wear a sanctified air in public, and +expect us to go down on our knees and ask their blessing; +and they intrigue, and they grasp, and they backbite, and +they slander worse than the worst courtier or the wickedest +old woman. I heard this Mr. Swift sneering at my Lord +Duke of Marlborough's courage the other day. He! that +Teague from Dublin! because his grace is not in favour, +dares to say this of him; and he says this that it may get +to her Majesty's ear, and to coax and wheedle Mrs. Masham. +They say the Elector of Hanover has a dozen of mistresses +in his Court at Herrenhausen, and if he comes to be king +over us, I wager that the bishops and Mr. Swift, that wants +to be one, will coax and wheedle them. Oh, those priests +and their grave airs! I'm sick of their square toes and their +rustling cassocks. I should like to go to a country where +there was not one, or turn Quaker, and get rid of 'em; and +I would, only the dress is not becoming, and I've much +too pretty a figure to hide it. Haven't I, cousin?”</span> and +here she glanced at her person and the looking-glass, which +told her rightly that a more beautiful shape and face never +were seen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I made that onslaught on the priests,”</span> says Miss Beatrix, +afterwards, <span class="tei tei-q">“in order to divert my poor dear mother's +anguish about Frank. Frank is as vain as a girl, cousin. +Talk of us girls being vain, what are <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">we</span></em> to you? It was +easy to see that the first woman who chose would make +a fool of him, or the first robe—I count a priest and a woman +all the same. We are always caballing; we are not answerable +for the fibs we tell; we are always cajoling and coaxing, +or threatening; and we are always making mischief, +Colonel Esmond—mark my word for that, who know the +the world, sir, and have to make my way in it. I see as well +as possible how Frank's marriage hath been managed. The +count, our papa-in-law, is always away at the coffee-house. +The countess, our mother, is always in the kitchen looking +after the dinner. The countess, our sister, is at the spinet. +When my lord comes to say he is going on the campaign, +the lovely Clotilda bursts into tears, and faints so; he +catches her in his arms—no, sir, keep your distance, cousin, +if you please—she cries on his shoulder, and he says, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Oh, +my divine, my adored, my beloved Clotilda, are you sorry +to part with me?’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘Oh, my Francisco,’</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">‘oh, +my lord!’</span> and at this very instant mamma and a couple +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page336">[pg 336]</span><a name="Pg336" id="Pg336" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of young brothers, with moustachios and long rapiers, come +in from the kitchen, where they have been eating bread +and onions. Mark my word, you will have all this woman's +relations at Castlewood three months after she has arrived +there. The old count and countess, and the young counts +and all the little countesses her sisters. Counts! every +one of these wretches says he is a count. Guiscard, that +stabbed Mr. Harvy, said he was a count; and I believe +he was a barber. All Frenchmen are barbers—Fiddle-dee! +don't contradict me—or else dancing-masters, or else +priests;”</span> and so she rattled on. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who was it taught <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you</span></em> to dance, cousin Beatrix?”</span> says +the colonel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She laughed out the air of a minuet, and swept a low +curtsy, coming up to the recover with the prettiest little +foot in the world pointed out. Her mother came in as +she was in this attitude; my lady had been in her closet, +having taken poor Frank's conversion in a very serious +way; the madcap girl ran up to her mother, put her arms +round her waist, kissed her, tried to make her dance, and +said: <span class="tei tei-q">“Don't be silly, you kind little mamma, and cry +about Frank turning Papist. What a figure he must be, +with a white sheet and a candle walking in a procession +barefoot!”</span> And she kicked off her little slippers (the +wonderfullest little shoes with wonderful tall red heels, +Esmond pounced upon one as it fell close beside him), and +she put on the drollest little <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">moue</span></span>, and marched up and +down the room holding Esmond's cane by way of taper. Serious +as her mood was, Lady Castlewood could not refrain from +laughing; and as for Esmond he looked on with that +delight with which the sight of this fair creature always +inspired him: never had he seen any woman so arch, so +brilliant, and so beautiful. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Having finished her march, she put out her foot for her +slipper. The colonel knelt down: <span class="tei tei-q">“If you will be Pope +I will turn Papist,”</span> says he; and her holiness gave him +gracious leave to kiss the little stockinged foot before he +put the slipper on. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mamma's feet began to pat on the floor during this +operation, and Beatrix, whose bright eyes nothing escaped, +saw that little mark of impatience. She ran up and embraced +her mother, with her usual cry of, <span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, you silly little mamma: +your feet are quite as pretty as mine,”</span> says she: <span class="tei tei-q">“they are, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page337">[pg 337]</span><a name="Pg337" id="Pg337" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +cousin, though she hides 'em; but the shoemaker will tell +you that he makes for both off the same last.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are taller than I am, dearest,”</span> says her mother, +blushing over her whole sweet face—<span class="tei tei-q">“and—and it is your +hand, my dear, and not your foot he wants you to give him,”</span> +and she said it with a hysteric laugh, that had more of tears +than laughter in it; laying her head on her daughter's +fair shoulder, and hiding it there. They made a very pretty +picture together, and looked like a pair of sisters—the +sweet simple matron seeming younger than her years, and +her daughter, if not older, yet somehow, from a commanding +manner and grace which she possessed above most women, +her mother's superior and protectress. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But, oh!”</span> cries my mistress, recovering herself after +this scene, and returning to her usual sad tone, <span class="tei tei-q">“'tis a shame +that we should laugh and be making merry on a day when +we ought to be down on our knees and asking pardon.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Asking pardon for what?”</span> says saucy Mrs. Beatrix,—<span class="tei tei-q">“because +Frank takes it into his head to fast on Fridays, +and worship images? You know if you had been born +a Papist, mother, a Papist you would have remained to +the end of your days. 'Tis the religion of the king and of +some of the best quality. For my part, I'm no enemy to +it, and think Queen Bess was not a penny better than Queen +Mary.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush, Beatrix! Do not jest with sacred things, and +remember of what parentage you come,”</span> cries my lady. +Beatrix was ordering her ribbons, and adjusting her tucker, +and performing a dozen provoking pretty ceremonies, before +the glass. The girl was no hypocrite at least. She never +at that time could be brought to think but of the world +and her beauty; and seemed to have no more sense of +devotion than some people have of music, that cannot +distinguish one air from another. Esmond saw this fault +in her, as he saw many others—a bad wife would Beatrix +Esmond make, he thought, for any man under the degree +of a prince. She was born to shine in great assemblies, +and to adorn palaces, and to command everywhere—to +conduct an intrigue of politics, or to glitter in a queen's +train. But to sit at a homely table, and mend the stockings +of a poor man's children! that was no fitting duty for her, +or at least one that she wouldn't have broke her heart in +trying to do. She was a princess, though she had scarce +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page338">[pg 338]</span><a name="Pg338" id="Pg338" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a shilling to her fortune; and one of her subjects—the +most abject and devoted wretch, sure, that ever drivelled +at a woman's knees—was this unlucky gentleman; who +bound his good sense, and reason, and independence, hand +and foot; and submitted them to her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And who does not know how ruthlessly women will +tyrannize when they are let to domineer? and who does +not know how useless advice is? I could give good counsel +to my descendants, but I know they'll follow their own +way, for all their grandfather's sermon. A man gets his +own experience about women, and will take nobody's hearsay; +nor, indeed, is the young fellow worth a fig that would. +'Tis I that am in love with my mistress, not my old grandmother +that counsels me; 'tis I that have fixed the value +of the thing I would have, and know the price I would pay +for it. It may be worthless to you, but 'tis all my life +to me. Had Esmond possessed the Great Mogul's crown +and all his diamonds, or all the Duke of Marlborough's +money, or all the ingots sunk at Vigo, he would have given +them all for this woman. A fool he was, if you will; but +so is a sovereign a fool, that will give half a principality +for a little crystal as big as a pigeon's egg, and called +a diamond: so is a wealthy nobleman a fool, that will +face danger or death, and spend half his life, and all his +tranquillity, caballing for a blue ribbon: so is a Dutch +merchant a fool, that hath been known to pay ten thousand +crowns for a tulip. There's some particular prize we all +of us value, and that every man of spirit will venture his +life for. With this, it may be to achieve a great reputation +for learning; with that, to be a man of fashion, and the +admiration of the town; with another, to consummate +a great work of art or poetry, and go to immortality that +way; and with another, for a certain time of his life, the +sole object and aim is a woman. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whilst Esmond was under the domination of this passion, +he remembers many a talk he had with his intimates, who +used to rally our Knight of the Rueful Countenance at his +devotion, whereof he made no disguise, to Beatrix; and +it was with replies such as the above he met his friends' +satire. <span class="tei tei-q">“Granted, I am a fool,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“and no better +than you; but you are no better than I. You have your +folly you labour for; give me the charity of mine. What +flatteries do you, Mr. St. John, stoop to whisper in the ears +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page339">[pg 339]</span><a name="Pg339" id="Pg339" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of a queen's favourite? What nights of labour doth not +the laziest man in the world endure, forgoing his bottle, +and his boon companions, forgoing Lais, in whose lap he +would like to be yawning, that he may prepare a speech +full of lies, to cajole three hundred stupid country gentlemen +in the House of Commons, and get the hiccuping cheers +of the October Club! What days will you spend in your +jolting chariot!”</span> (Mr. Esmond often rode to Windsor, and +especially, of later days, with the secretary.) <span class="tei tei-q">“What hours +will you pass on your gouty feet—and how humbly will +you kneel down to present a dispatch—you, the proudest +man in the world, that has not knelt to God since you were +a boy, and in that posture whisper, flatter, adore almost, +a stupid woman, that's often boozy with too much meat +and drink, when Mr. Secretary goes for his audience! If +my pursuit is vanity, sure yours is too.”</span> And then the +secretary would fly out in such a rich flow of eloquence, +as this pen cannot pretend to recall; advocating his scheme +of ambition, showing the great good he would do for his +country when he was the undisputed chief of it; backing +his opinion with a score of pat sentences from Greek and +Roman authorities (of which kind of learning he made +rather an ostentatious display), and scornfully vaunting the +very arts and meannesses by which fools were to be made +to follow him, opponents to be bribed or silenced, doubters +converted, and enemies overawed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am Diogenes,”</span> says Esmond, laughing, <span class="tei tei-q">“that is taken +up for a ride in Alexander's chariot. I have no desire to +vanquish Darius or to tame Bucephalus. I do not want +what you want, a great name or a high place: to have +them would bring me no pleasure. But my moderation is +taste, not virtue; and I know that what I do want, is as +vain as that which you long after. Do not grudge me my +vanity, if I allow yours; or rather, let us laugh at both +indifferently, and at ourselves, and at each other.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If your charmer holds out,”</span> says St. John, <span class="tei tei-q">“at this +rate, she may keep you twenty years besieging her, and +surrender by the time you are seventy, and she is old +enough to be a grandmother. I do not say the pursuit of +a particular woman is not as pleasant a pastime as any +other kind of hunting,”</span> he added; <span class="tei tei-q">“only, for my part, +I find the game won't run long enough. They knock under +too soon—that's the fault I find with 'em.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page340">[pg 340]</span><a name="Pg340" id="Pg340" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The game which you pursue is in the habit of being +caught, and used to being pulled down,”</span> says Mr. Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But Dulcinea del Toboso is peerless, eh?”</span> says the +other. <span class="tei tei-q">“Well, honest Harry, go and attack windmills—perhaps +thou art not more mad than other people,”</span> St. John +added, with a sigh. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc77" id="toc77"></a> +<a name="pdf78" id="pdf78"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter III. A Paper Out Of The </span><span class="tei tei-q" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 120%">“</span><span style="font-size: 120%">Spectator</span><span style="font-size: 120%">”</span></span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Doth any young gentleman of my progeny, who may +read his old grandfather's papers, chance to be presently +suffering under the passion of Love? There is a humiliating +cure, but one that is easy and almost specific for the +malady—which is, to try an alibi. Esmond went away +from his mistress and was cured a half-dozen times; he +came back to her side, and instantly fell ill again of the +fever. He vowed that he could leave her and think no +more of her, and so he could pretty well, at least, succeed +in quelling that rage and longing he had whenever he was +with her; but as soon as he returned he was as bad as +ever again. Truly a ludicrous and pitiable object, at least +exhausting everybody's pity but his dearest mistress's, +Lady Castlewood's, in whose tender breast he reposed all +his dreary confessions, and who never tired of hearing him +and pleading for him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Sometimes Esmond would think there was hope. Then +again he would be plagued with despair, at some impertinence +or coquetry of his mistress. For days they would +be like brother and sister, or the dearest friends—she, simple, +fond, and charming—he, happy beyond measure at her +good behaviour. But this would all vanish on a sudden. +Either he would be too pressing, and hint his love, when +she would rebuff him instantly, and give his vanity a box +on the ear: or he would be jealous, and with perfect good +reason, of some new admirer that had sprung up, or some +rich young gentleman newly arrived in the town, that this +incorrigible flirt would set her nets and baits to draw in. +If Esmond remonstrated, the little rebel would say—<span class="tei tei-q">“Who +are you? I shall go my own way, sirrah, and that +way is towards a husband, and I don't want <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you</span></em> on the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page341">[pg 341]</span><a name="Pg341" id="Pg341" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +way. I am for your betters, colonel, for your betters: +do you hear that? You might do if you had an estate +and were younger; only eight years older than I, you say! +pish, you are a hundred years older. You are an old, old +Graveairs, and I should make you miserable, that would be +the only comfort I should have in marrying you. But +you have not money enough to keep a cat decently after +you have paid your man his wages, and your landlady +her bill. Do you think I'm going to live in a lodging, and +turn the mutton at a string whilst your honour nurses the +baby? Fiddlestick, and why did you not get this nonsense +knocked out of your head when you were in the wars? +You are come back more dismal and dreary than ever. +You and mamma are fit for each other. You might be +Darby and Joan, and play cribbage to the end of your +lives.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At least you own to your worldliness, my poor Trix,”</span> +says her mother. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Worldliness—O my pretty lady! Do you think that +I am a child in the nursery, and to be frightened by Bogey? +Worldliness, to be sure; and pray, madam, where is the +harm of wishing to be comfortable? When you are gone, +you dearest old woman, or when I am tired of you and +have run away from you, where shall I go? Shall I go +and be head nurse to my Popish sister-in-law, take the +children their physic, and whip 'em, and put 'em to bed +when they are naughty? Shall I be Castlewood's upper +servant, and perhaps marry Tom Tusher? <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Merci!</span></span> +I have been long enough Frank's humble servant. Why am I not +a man? I have ten times his brains, and had I worn the—well, +don't let your ladyship be frightened—had I worn +a sword and periwig instead of this mantle and commode, +to which nature has condemned me—(though 'tis a pretty +stuff, too—cousin Esmond! you will go to the Exchange +to-morrow, and get the exact counterpart of this ribbon, +sir, do you hear?)—I would have made our name talked +about. So would Graveairs here have made something +out of our name if he had represented it. My Lord Graveairs +would have done very well. Yes, you have a very +pretty way, and would have made a very decent, grave +speaker;”</span> and here she began to imitate Esmond's way +of carrying himself, and speaking to his face, and so +ludicrously that his mistress burst out a-laughing, and even +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page342">[pg 342]</span><a name="Pg342" id="Pg342" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he himself could see there was some likeness in the fantastical +malicious caricature. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“I solemnly vow, own, and confess, that +I want a good husband. Where's the harm of one? My +face is my fortune. Who'll come?—buy, buy, buy! +I cannot toil, neither can I spin, but I can play twenty-three +games on the cards. I can dance the last dance, I can +hunt the stag, and I think I could shoot flying. I can +talk as wicked as any woman of my years, and know +enough stories to amuse a sulky husband for at least one +thousand and one nights. I have a pretty taste for dress, +diamonds, gambling, and old china. I love sugar-plums, +Malines lace (that you brought me, cousin, is very pretty), +the opera, and everything that is useless and costly. I have +got a monkey and a little black boy—Pompey, sir, go and +give a dish of chocolate to Colonel Graveairs,—and a parrot +and a spaniel, and I must have a husband. Cupid, you +hear?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Iss, missis,”</span> says Pompey, a little grinning negro Lord +Peterborow gave her, with a bird of Paradise in his turbant, +and a collar with his mistress's name on it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Iss, missis!”</span> says Beatrix, imitating the child. <span class="tei tei-q">“And +if husband not come, Pompey must go fetch one.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And Pompey went away grinning with his chocolate +tray, as Miss Beatrix ran up to her mother and ended her +sally of mischief in her common way, with a kiss—no +wonder that upon paying such a penalty her fond judge +pardoned her. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Mr. Esmond came home, his health was still +shattered; and he took a lodging near to his mistress's, +at Kensington, glad enough to be served by them, and to +see them day after day. He was enabled to see a little +company—and of the sort he liked best. Mr. Steele and +Mr. Addison both did him the honour to visit him: and +drank many a flask of good claret at his lodging, whilst +their entertainer, through his wound, was kept to diet +drink and gruel. These gentlemen were Whigs, and great +admirers of my Lord Duke of Marlborough; and Esmond +was entirely of the other party. But their different views +of politics did not prevent the gentlemen from agreeing in +private, nor from allowing, on one evening when Esmond's +kind old patron, Lieutenant-General Webb, with a stick +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page343">[pg 343]</span><a name="Pg343" id="Pg343" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and a crutch, hobbled up to the colonel's lodging (which +was prettily situate at Knightsbridge, between London and +Kensington, and looking over the Gardens), that the lieutenant-general +was a noble and gallant soldier—and even +that he had been hardly used in the Wynendael affair. He +took his revenge in talk, that must be confessed; and if +Mr. Addison had had a mind to write a poem about Wynendael, +he might have heard from the commander's own lips +the story a hundred times over. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond, forced to be quiet, betook himself to +literature for a relaxation, and composed his comedy, +whereof the prompter's copy lieth in my walnut escritoire, +sealed up and docketed, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Faithful Fool</span></span>, a Comedy, +as it was performed by her Majesty's servants. 'Twas +a very sentimental piece; and Mr. Steele, who had more +of that kind of sentiment than Mr. Addison, admired it, +whilst the other rather sneered at the performance; though +he owned that, here and there, it contained some pretty +strokes. He was bringing out his own play of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cato</span></span> +at the time, the blaze of which quite extinguished Esmond's +farthing candle: and his name was never put to the piece, +which was printed as by a Person of Quality. Only nine +copies were sold, though Mr. Dennis, the great critic, +praised it, and said 'twas a work of great merit; and +Colonel Esmond had the whole impression burned one day +in a rage, by Jack Lockwood, his man. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All this comedy was full of bitter satiric strokes against +a certain young lady. The plot of the piece was quite +a new one. A young woman was represented with a great +number of suitors, selecting a pert fribble of a peer, in +place of the hero (but ill-acted, I think, by Mr. Wilks, the +Faithful Fool), who persisted in admiring her. In the fifth +act, Teraminta was made to discover the merits of Eugenio +(the F. F.), and to feel a partiality for him too late; for +he announced that he had bestowed his hand and estate +upon Rosaria, a country lass, endowed with every virtue. +But it must be owned that the audience yawned through +the play; and that it perished on the third night, with +only half a dozen persons to behold its agonies. Esmond +and his two mistresses came to the first night, and Miss +Beatrix fell asleep; whilst her mother, who had not been +to a play since King James the Second's time, thought the +piece, though not brilliant, had a very pretty moral. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page344">[pg 344]</span><a name="Pg344" id="Pg344" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond dabbled in letters, and wrote a deal of prose +and verse at this time of leisure. When displeased with +the conduct of Miss Beatrix, he would compose a satire, +in which he relieved his mind. When smarting under the +faithlessness of women, he dashed off a copy of verses, in +which he held the whole sex up to scorn. One day, in one +of these moods, he made a little joke, in which (swearing +him to secrecy) he got his friend Dick Steele to help him; +and, composing a paper, he had it printed exactly like +Steele's paper, and by his printer, and laid on his mistress's +breakfast-table the following:— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“SPECTATOR.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +No. 341. Tuesday, April 1, 1712. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mutato nomine de te Fabula narratur.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Horace.</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Thyself the moral of the Fable see.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Creech.</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Jocasta is known as a woman of learning and fashion, +and as one of the most amiable persons of this Court and +country. She is at home two mornings of the week, and +all the wits and a few of the beauties of London flock to +her assemblies. When she goes abroad to Tunbridge or +the Bath, a retinue of adorers rides the journey with her; +and, besides the London beaux, she has a crowd of admirers +at the Wells, the polite amongst the natives of Sussex and +Somerset pressing round her tea-tables, and being anxious +for a nod from her chair. Jocasta's acquaintance is thus +very numerous. Indeed, 'tis one smart writer's work to +keep her visiting-book—a strong footman is engaged to +carry it; and it would require a much stronger head, even +than Jocasta's own, to remember the names of all her dear +friends.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Either at Epsom Wells or at Tunbridge (for of this +important matter Jocasta cannot be certain) it was her +ladyship's fortune to become acquainted with a young +gentleman, whose conversation was so sprightly, and +manners amiable, that she invited the agreeable young +spark to visit her if ever he came to London, where her +house in Spring Garden should be open to him. Charming +as he was, and without any manner of doubt a pretty +fellow, Jocasta hath such a regiment of the like continually +marching round her standard, that 'tis no wonder her +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page345">[pg 345]</span><a name="Pg345" id="Pg345" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +attention is distracted amongst them. And so, though +this gentleman made a considerable impression upon her, +and touched her heart for at least three-and-twenty minutes, +it must be owned that she has forgotten his name. He +is a dark man, and may be eight-and-twenty years old. +His dress is sober, though of rich materials. He has a mole +on his forehead over his left eye; has a blue ribbon to his +cane and sword, and wears his own hair.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Jocasta was much flattered by beholding her admirer +(for that everybody admires who sees her is a point which +she never can for a moment doubt) in the next pew to +her at St. James's Church last Sunday; and the manner +in which he appeared to go to sleep during the sermon—though +from under his fringed eyelids it was evident he +was casting glances of respectful rapture towards Jocasta—deeply +moved and interested her. On coming out of +church, he found his way to her chair, and made her an +elegant bow as she stepped into it. She saw him at Court +afterwards, where he carried himself with a most distinguished +air, though none of her acquaintances knew his +name; and the next night he was at the play, where her +ladyship was pleased to acknowledge him from the side-box.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“During the whole of the comedy she racked her brains +so to remember his name, that she did not hear a word +of the piece: and having the happiness to meet him once +more in the lobby of the playhouse, she went up to him +in a flutter, and bade him remember that she kept two +nights in the week, and that she longed to see him at +Spring Garden.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He appeared on Tuesday, in a rich suit, showing a very +fine taste both in the tailor and wearer; and though +a knot of us were gathered round the charming Jocasta, +fellows who pretended to know every face upon the town, +not one could tell the gentleman's name in reply to Jocasta's +eager inquiries, flung to the right and left of her as he +advanced up the room with a bow that would become +a duke.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Jocasta acknowledged this salute with one of those +smiles and curtsies of which that lady hath the secret. +She curtsies with a languishing air, as if to say, <span class="tei tei-q">‘You are +come at last. I have been pining for you:’</span> and then +she finishes her victim with a killing look, which declares: +<span class="tei tei-q">‘O Philander! I have no eyes but for you.’</span> Camilla +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page346">[pg 346]</span><a name="Pg346" id="Pg346" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +hath as good a curtsy perhaps, and Thalestris much such +another look; but the glance and the curtsy together +belong to Jocasta of all the English beauties alone.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Welcome to London, sir,’</span> says she. <span class="tei tei-q">‘One can see +you are from the country by your looks.’</span> She would have +said <span class="tei tei-q">‘Epsom’</span>, or <span class="tei tei-q">‘Tunbridge’</span>, had she remembered +rightly at which place she had met the stranger; but, +alas! she had forgotten.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The gentleman said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘he had been in town but three +days; and one of his reasons for coming hither was to +have the honour of paying his court to Jocasta.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘the waters had agreed with her but indifferently.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘The waters were for the sick,’</span> the gentleman said: +<span class="tei tei-q">‘the young and beautiful came but to make them sparkle. +And, as the clergyman read the service on Sunday,’</span> he +added, <span class="tei tei-q">‘your ladyship reminded me of the angel that +visited the pool.’</span> A murmur of approbation saluted this +sally. Manilio, who is a wit when he is not at cards, was +in such a rage that he revoked when he heard it.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Jocasta was an angel visiting the waters; but at which +of the Bethesdas? She was puzzled more and more; and, +as her way always is, looked the more innocent and simple, +the more artful her intentions were.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘We were discoursing,’</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">‘about spelling of +names and words when you came. Why should we say +goold and write gold, and call china chayny, and Cavendish +Candish, and Cholmondeley Chumley? If we call +Pulteney Poltney, why shouldn't we call poultry pultry—and——’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Such an enchantress as your ladyship,’</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘is +mistress of all sorts of spells.’</span> But this was Dr. Swift's +pun, and we all knew it.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘And—and how do you spell your name?’</span> says she, +coming to the point, at length; for this sprightly conversation +had lasted much longer than is here set down, +and been carried on through at least three dishes of tea.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Oh, madam,’</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">I spell my name with the y</span></em>.’</span> +And laying down his dish, my gentleman made another +elegant bow, and was gone in a moment.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Jocasta hath had no sleep since this mortification, and +the stranger's disappearance. If balked in anything, she +is sure to lose her health and temper; and we, her servants, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page347">[pg 347]</span><a name="Pg347" id="Pg347" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +suffer, as usual, during the angry fits of our queen. Can +you help us, Mr. Spectator, who know everything, to read +this riddle for her, and set at rest all our minds? We find +in her list, Mr. Berty, Mr. Smith, Mr. Pike, Mr. Tyler—who +may be Mr. Bertie, Mr. Smyth, Mr. Pyke, Mr. Tiler, +for what we know. She hath turned away the clerk of her +visiting-book, a poor fellow with a great family of children. +Read me this riddle, good Mr. Shortface, and oblige your +admirer—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Oedipus</span></span>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">The </span><span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">“</span><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Trumpet</span><span style="font-variant: small-caps">”</span></span><span style="font-variant: small-caps"> Coffee-house</span></span>, Whitehall. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Mr. Spectator</span></span>—I am a gentleman but little +acquainted with the town, though I have had a university education, +and passed some years serving my country abroad, where +my name is better known than in the coffee-houses and +St. James's.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Two years since my uncle died, leaving me a pretty +estate in the county of Kent; and being at Tunbridge +Wells last summer, after my mourning was over, and on +the look-out, if truth must be told, for some young lady +who would share with me the solitude of my great Kentish +house, and be kind to my tenantry (for whom a woman +can do a great deal more good than the best-intentioned +man can), I was greatly fascinated by a young lady of +London, who was the toast of all the company at the Wells. +Everyone knows Saccharissa's beauty; and I think, Mr. +Spectator, no one better than herself.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My table-book informs me that I danced no less than +seven-and-twenty sets with her at the assembly. I treated +her to the fiddles twice. I was admitted on several days +to her lodging, and received by her with a great deal of +distinction, and, for a time, was entirely her slave. It +was only when I found, from common talk of the company +at the Wells, and from narrowly watching one, who I once +thought of asking the most sacred question a man can put +to a woman, that I became aware how unfit she was to be +a country gentleman's wife; and that this fair creature +was but a heartless worldly jilt, playing with affections +that she never meant to return, and, indeed, incapable of +returning them. 'Tis admiration such women want, not +love that touches them; and I can conceive, in her old +age, no more wretched creature than this lady will be, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page348">[pg 348]</span><a name="Pg348" id="Pg348" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +when her beauty hath deserted her, when her admirers +have left her, and she hath neither friendship nor religion +to console her.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Business calling me to London, I went to St. James's +Church last Sunday, and there opposite me sat my beauty +of the Wells. Her behaviour during the whole service was +so pert, languishing, and absurd; she flirted her fan, and +ogled and eyed me in a manner so indecent, that I was +obliged to shut my eyes, so as actually not to see her, and +whenever I opened them beheld hers (and very bright they +are) still staring at me. I fell in with her afterwards at +Court, and at the playhouse; and here nothing would +satisfy her but she must elbow through the crowd and +speak to me, and invite me to the assembly, which she +holds at her house, nor very far from Ch-r-ng Cr-ss.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Having made her a promise to attend, of course I kept +my promise; and found the young widow in the midst of +a half-dozen of card-tables, and a crowd of wits and +admirers. I made the best bow I could, and advanced +towards her; and saw by a peculiar puzzled look in her +face, though she tried to hide her perplexity, that she had +forgotten even my name.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Her talk, artful as it was, convinced me that I had +guessed aright. She turned the conversation most ridiculously +upon the spelling of names and words; and I replied +with as ridiculous, fulsome compliments as I could pay +her: indeed, one in which I compared her to an angel +visiting the sick-wells, went a little too far; nor should +I have employed it, but that the allusion came from the +Second Lesson last Sunday, which we both had heard, +and I was pressed to answer her.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Then she came to the question, which I knew was +awaiting me, and asked how I <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">spelt</span></em> my name? <span class="tei tei-q">‘Madam,’</span> +says I, turning on my heel, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I spell it with the <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">y</span></em>.’</span> And +so I left her, wondering at the light-heartedness of the +town-people, who forget and make friends so easily, and +resolved to look elsewhere for a partner for your constant +reader.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Cymon Wyldoats</span></span>.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You know my real name, Mr. Spectator, in which +there is no such a letter as <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">hupsilon</span></span>. But if the lady, +whom I have called Saccharissa, wonders that I appear no +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page349">[pg 349]</span><a name="Pg349" id="Pg349" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +more at the tea-tables, she is hereby respectfully informed +the reason <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">y</span></span>.”</span> +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The above is a parable, whereof the writer will now +expound the meaning. Jocasta was no other than Miss +Esmond, maid of honour to her Majesty. She had told +Mr. Esmond this little story of having met a gentleman, +somewhere, and forgetting his name, when the gentleman, +with no such malicious intentions as those of <span class="tei tei-q">“Cymon”</span> +in the above fable, made the answer simply as above; +and we all laughed to think how little Mistress Jocasta-Beatrix +had profited by her artifice and precautions. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for Cymon he was intended to represent yours and +her very humble servant, the writer of the apologue and +of this story, which we had printed on a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> paper +at Mr. Steele's office, exactly as those famous journals were +printed, and which was laid on the table at breakfast in +place of the real newspaper. Mistress Jocasta, who had +plenty of wit, could not live without her <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> to her +tea; and this sham <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> was intended to convey to +the young woman that she herself was a flirt, and that +Cymon was a gentleman of honour and resolution, seeing +all her faults, and determined to break the chains once +and for ever. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For though enough hath been said about this love +business already—enough, at least, to prove to the writer's +heirs what a silly fond fool their old grandfather was, who +would like them to consider him a a very wise old gentleman; +yet not near all has been told concerning this matter, +which, if it were allowed to take in Esmond's journal the +space it occupied in his time, would weary his kinsmen +and women of a hundred years' time beyond all endurance; +and form such a diary of folly and drivelling, raptures and +rage, as no man of ordinary vanity would like to leave +behind him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The truth is, that, whether she laughed at him or encouraged +him; whether she smiled or was cold, and turned +her smiles on another—worldly and ambitious, as he knew +her to be; hard and careless, as she seemed to grow with +her Court life, and a hundred admirers that came to her +and left her; Esmond, do what he would, never could get +Beatrix out of his mind; thought of her constantly at +home or away. If he read his name in a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, or +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page350">[pg 350]</span><a name="Pg350" id="Pg350" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +escaped the shot of a cannon-ball or a greater danger in +the campaign, as has happened to him more than once, +the instant thought after the honour achieved or the +danger avoided, was <span class="tei tei-q">“What will <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">she</span></em> say of it?”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Will +this distinction or the idea of this peril elate her or touch +her, so as to be better inclined towards me?”</span> He could +no more help this passionate fidelity of temper than he +could help the eyes he saw with—one or the other seemed +a part of his nature; and knowing every one of her faults +as well as the keenest of her detractors, and the folly of +an attachment to such a woman, of which the fruition +could never bring him happiness for above a week, there +was yet a charm about this Circe from which the poor +deluded gentleman could not free himself; and for a much +longer period than Ulysses (another middle-aged officer, +who had travelled much, and been in the foreign wars), +Esmond felt himself enthralled and besotted by the wiles +of this enchantress. Quit her! He could no more quit +her, as the Cymon of this story was made to quit his false +one, than he could lose his consciousness of yesterday. +She had but to raise her finger, and he would come back +from ever so far; she had but to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“I have discarded +such-and-such an adorer,”</span> and the poor infatuated wretch +would be sure to come and <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">rôder</span></span> about her mother's house, +willing to be put on the ranks of suitors, though he knew +he might be cast off the next week. If he were like Ulysses +in his folly at least, she was in so far like Penelope, that +she had a crowd of suitors, and undid day after day and +night after night the handiwork of fascination and the +web of coquetry with which she was wont to allure and +entertain them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Part of her coquetry may have come from her position +about the Court, where the beautiful maid of honour was +the light about which a thousand beaux came and fluttered; +where she was sure to have a ring of admirers round her, +crowding to listen to her repartees as much as to admire +her beauty; and where she spoke and listened to much +free talk, such as one never would have thought the lips +or ears of Rachel Castlewood's daughter would have uttered +or heard. When in waiting at Windsor or Hampton, the +Court ladies and gentlemen would be making riding parties +together; Mrs. Beatrix in a horseman's coat and hat, the +foremost after the staghounds and over the park fences, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page351">[pg 351]</span><a name="Pg351" id="Pg351" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a crowd of young fellows at her heels. If the English +country ladies at this time were the most pure and modest +of any ladies in the world—the English town and Court +ladies permitted themselves words and behaviour that were +neither modest nor pure; and claimed, some of them, +a freedom which those who love that sex most would never +wish to grant them. The gentlemen of my family that +follow after me (for I don't encourage the ladies to pursue +any such studies), may read in the works of Mr. Congreve, +and Dr. Swift, and others, what was the conversation and +what the habits of our time. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The most beautiful woman in England in 1712, when +Esmond returned to this country, a lady of high birth, +and though of no fortune to be sure, with a thousand +fascinations of wit and manners—Beatrix Esmond—was +now six-and-twenty years old, and Beatrix Esmond still. +Of her hundred adorers she had not chosen one for a husband; +and those who had asked had been jilted by her; +and more still had left her. A succession of near ten +years' crops of beauties had come up since her time, and +had been reaped by proper <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">husband</span></em>men, if we may make +an agricultural simile, and had been housed comfortably +long ago. Her own contemporaries were sober mothers by +this time; girls with not a tithe of her charms, or her wit, +having made good matches, and now claiming precedence +over the spinster who but lately had derided and outshone +them. The young beauties were beginning to look down +on Beatrix as an old maid, and sneer, and call her one of +Charles the Second's ladies, and ask whether her portrait +was not in the Hampton Court Gallery? But still she +reigned, at least in one man's opinion, superior over all the +little misses that were the toasts of the young lads; and +in Esmond's eyes was ever perfectly lovely and young. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Who knows how many were nearly made happy by +possessing her, or, rather, how many were fortunate in +escaping this siren? 'Tis a marvel to think that her +mother was the purest and simplest woman in the whole +world, and that this girl should have been born from her. +I am inclined to fancy, my mistress, who never said a harsh +word to her children (and but twice or thrice only to one +person), must have been too fond and pressing with the +maternal authority; for her son and her daughter both +revolted early; nor after their first flight from the nest +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page352">[pg 352]</span><a name="Pg352" id="Pg352" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +could they ever be brought back quite to the fond mother's +bosom. Lady Castlewood, and perhaps it was as well, +knew little of her daughter's life and real thoughts. How +was she to apprehend what passed in queens' antechambers +and at Court tables? Mrs. Beatrix asserted her own +authority so resolutely that her mother quickly gave in. +The maid of honour had her own equipage; went from +home and came back at her own will: her mother was +alike powerless to resist her or to lead her, or to command +or to persuade her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She had been engaged once, twice, thrice, to be married, +Esmond believed. When he quitted home, it hath been +said, she was promised to my Lord Ashburnham, and +now, on his return, behold his lordship was just married +to Lady Mary Butler, the Duke of Ormonde's daughter, +and his fine houses, and twelve thousand a year of fortune, +for which Miss Beatrix had rather coveted him, was out +of her power. To her Esmond could say nothing in regard +to the breaking of this match; and, asking his mistress +about it, all Lady Castlewood answered was: <span class="tei tei-q">“Do not +speak to me about it, Harry. I cannot tell you how or +why they parted, and I fear to inquire. I have told you +before, that with all her kindness, and wit, and generosity, +and that sort of splendour of nature she has; I can say +but little good of poor Beatrix, and look with dread at +the marriage she will form. Her mind is fixed on ambition +only, and making a great figure: and, this achieved, she +will tire of it as she does of everything. Heaven help her +husband, whoever he shall be! My Lord Ashburnham +was a most excellent young man, gentle and yet manly, +of very good parts, so they told me, and as my little conversation +would enable me to judge: and a kind temper—kind +and enduring I'm sure he must have been, from all +that he had to endure. But he quitted her at last, from +some crowning piece of caprice or tyranny of hers; and +now he has married a young woman that will make him +a thousand times happier than my poor girl ever could.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The rupture, whatever its cause was (I heard the scandal, +but indeed shall not take pains to repeat at length in this +diary the trumpery coffee-house story), caused a good deal +of low talk; and Mr. Esmond was present at my lord's +appearance at the birthday with his bride, over whom the +revenge that Beatrix took was to look so imperial and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page353">[pg 353]</span><a name="Pg353" id="Pg353" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lovely that the modest downcast young lady could not +appear beside her, and Lord Ashburnham, who had his +reasons for wishing to avoid her, slunk away quite shamefaced, +and very early. This time his grace the Duke of +Hamilton, whom Esmond had seen about her before, was +constant at Miss Beatrix's side: he was one of the most +splendid gentlemen of Europe, accomplished by books, by +travel, by long command of the best company, distinguished +as a statesman, having been ambassador in King +William's time, and a noble speaker in the Scots Parliament, +where he had led the party that was against the +union, and though now five- or six-and-forty years of age, +a gentleman so high in stature, accomplished in wit, and +favoured in person, that he might pretend to the hand of +any princess in Europe. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Should you like the duke for a cousin?”</span> says Mr. +Secretary St. John, whispering to Colonel Esmond in +French; <span class="tei tei-q">“it appears that the widower consoles himself.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But to return to our little <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> paper and the +conversation which grew out of it. Miss Beatrix at first was +quite <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">bit</span></em> (as the phrase of that day was) and did not <span class="tei tei-q">“smoke”</span> +the authorship of the story: indeed Esmond had tried to +imitate as well as he could Mr. Steele's manner (as for the +other author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, his prose style I think is +altogether inimitable); and Dick, who was the idlest and +best-natured of men, would have let the piece pass into +his journal and go to posterity as one of his own lucubrations, +but that Esmond did not care to have a lady's name +whom he loved sent forth to the world in a light so unfavourable. +Beatrix pished and psha'd over the paper; Colonel +Esmond watching with no little interest her countenance +as she read it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“How stupid your friend Mr. Steele becomes!”</span> cries +Miss Beatrix. <span class="tei tei-q">“Epsom and Tunbridge! Will he never +have done with Epsom and Tunbridge, and with beaux at +church, and Jocastas and Lindamiras? Why does he not +call women Nelly and Betty, as their godfathers and godmothers +did for them in their baptism?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Beatrix, Beatrix!”</span> says her mother, <span class="tei tei-q">“speak gravely of +grave things.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mamma thinks the Church Catechism came from Heaven, +I believe,”</span> says Beatrix, with a laugh, <span class="tei tei-q">“and was brought +down by a bishop from a mountain. Oh, how I used to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page354">[pg 354]</span><a name="Pg354" id="Pg354" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +break my heart over it! Besides, I had a Popish god-mother, +mamma; why did you give me one?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I gave you the queen's name,”</span> says her mother, blushing. +<span class="tei tei-q">“And a very pretty name it is,”</span> said somebody else. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Beatrix went on reading—<span class="tei tei-q">“Spell my name with a <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">y</span></em>—why, +you wretch,”</span> says she, turning round to Colonel +Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“you have been telling my story to Mr. Steele—or +stop—you have written the paper yourself to turn me +into ridicule. For shame, sir!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Poor Mr. Esmond felt rather frightened, and told a truth, +which was nevertheless an entire falsehood. <span class="tei tei-q">“Upon my +honour,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“I have not even read the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> of +this morning.”</span> Nor had he, for that was not the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, +but a sham newspaper put in its place. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She went on reading: her face rather flushed as she +read. <span class="tei tei-q">“No,”</span> she says, <span class="tei tei-q">“I think you couldn't have written +it. I think it must have been Mr. Steele when he was +drunk—and afraid of his horrid vulgar wife. Whenever +I see an enormous compliment to a woman, and some +outrageous panegyric about female virtue, I always feel +sure that the captain and his better half have fallen out +overnight, and that he has been brought home tipsy, or +has been found out in ——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Beatrix!”</span> cries the Lady Castlewood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well, mamma! Do not cry out before you are hurt. +I am not going to say anything wrong. I won't give you +more annoyance than I can help, you pretty kind mamma. +Yes, and your little Trix is a naughty little Trix, and she +leaves undone those things which she ought to have done, +and does those things which she ought not to have done, +and there's——well now—I won't go on. Yes, I will, +unless you kiss me.”</span> And with this the young lady +lays aside her paper, and runs up to her mother and +performs a variety of embraces with her ladyship, saying +as plain as eyes could speak to Mr. Esmond—<span class="tei tei-q">“There, +sir: would not <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you</span></em> like to play the very same pleasant +game?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, madam, I would,”</span> says he. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Would what?”</span> asked Miss Beatrix. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What you meant when you looked at me in that provoking +way,”</span> answers Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What a confessor!”</span> cries Beatrix, with a laugh. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What is it Henry would like, my dear?”</span> asks her +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page355">[pg 355]</span><a name="Pg355" id="Pg355" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +mother, the kind soul, who was always thinking what we +would like, and how she could please us. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The girl runs up to her—<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, you silly kind mamma,”</span> she +says, kissing her again, <span class="tei tei-q">“that's what Harry would like;”</span> +and she broke out into a great joyful laugh: and +Lady Castlewood blushed as bashful as a maid of +sixteen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Look at her, Harry,”</span> whispers Beatrix, running up, and +speaking in her sweet low tones. <span class="tei tei-q">“Doesn't the blush become +her? Isn't she pretty? She looks younger than I am: +and I am sure she is a hundred million thousand times +better.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's kind mistress left the room, carrying her +blushes away with her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If we girls at Court could grow such roses as that,”</span> +continues Beatrix, with her laugh, <span class="tei tei-q">“what wouldn't we do +to preserve 'em? We'd clip their stalks and put 'em in +salt and water. But those flowers don't bloom at Hampton +Court and Windsor, Henry.”</span> She paused for a minute, +and the smile fading away from her April face, gave place +to a menacing shower of tears: <span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, how good she is, +Harry,”</span> Beatrix went on to say. <span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, what a saint she is! +Her goodness frightens me. I'm not fit to live with her. +I should be better, I think, if she were not so perfect. She +has had a great sorrow in her life, and a great secret; and +repented of it. It could not have been my father's death. +She talks freely about that; nor could she have loved him +very much—though who knows what we women do love, +and why?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What, and why, indeed,”</span> says Mr. Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No one knows,”</span> Beatrix went on, without noticing this +interruption except by a look, <span class="tei tei-q">“what my mother's life is. +She hath been at early prayer this morning: she passes +hours in her closet; if you were to follow her thither, you +would find her at prayers now. She tends the poor of the +place—the horrid dirty poor! She sits through the curate's +sermons—oh, those dreary sermons! And you see, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">on a beau +dire</span></span>; but good as they are, people like her are not fit to +commune with us of the world. There is always, as it +were, a third person present, even when I and my mother +are alone. She can't be frank with me quite; who is always +thinking of the next world, and of her guardian angel, +perhaps that's in company. Oh, Harry, I'm jealous of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page356">[pg 356]</span><a name="Pg356" id="Pg356" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +that guardian angel!”</span> here broke out Mistress Beatrix. +<span class="tei tei-q">“It's horrid, I know; but my mother's life is all for Heaven, +and mine—all for earth. We can never be friends quite; +and then, she cares more for Frank's little finger than she +does for me—I know she does: and she loves you, sir, a great +deal too much; and I hate you for it. I would have had +her all to myself; but she wouldn't. In my childhood, it +was my father she loved—(Oh, how could she? I remember +him kind and handsome, but so stupid, and not being able +to speak after drinking wine). And then, it was Frank; +and now, it is Heaven and the clergyman. How I would +have loved her! From a child I used to be in a rage that +she loved anybody but me; but she loved you all better—all, +I know she did. And now, she talks of the blessed +consolation of religion. Dear soul! she thinks she is +happier for believing, as she must, that we are all of us +wicked and miserable sinners; and this world is only a +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">pied +à terre</span></span> for the good, where they stay for a night, as we do, +coming from Walcote, at that great, dreary, uncomfortable +Hounslow inn, in those horrid beds. Oh, do you remember +those horrid beds?—and the chariot comes and fetches them +to Heaven the next morning.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush, Beatrix,”</span> says Mr. Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hush, indeed. You are a hypocrite, too, Henry, with +your grave airs and your glum face. We are all hypocrites. +Oh dear me! We are all alone, alone, alone,”</span> says +poor Beatrix, her fair breast heaving with a sigh. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It was I that writ every line of that paper, my dear,”</span> +says Mr. Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“You are not so worldly as you think +yourself, Beatrix, and better than we believe you. The +good we have in us we doubt of; and the happiness that's +to our hand we throw away. You bend your ambition on a +great marriage and establishment—and why? You'll tire +of them when you win them; and be no happier with a +coronet on your coach——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Than riding pillion with Lubin to market,”</span> says Beatrix. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thank you, Lubin!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I'm a dismal shepherd, to be sure,”</span> answers Esmond, +with a blush; <span class="tei tei-q">“and require a nymph that can tuck my +bed-clothes up, and make me water-gruel. Well, Tom +Lockwood can do that. He took me out of the fire upon his +shoulders, and nursed me through my illness as love will +scarce ever do. Only good wages, and a hope of my clothes, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page357">[pg 357]</span><a name="Pg357" id="Pg357" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and the contents of my portmanteau. How long was it +that Jacob served an apprenticeship for Rachel?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“For mamma?”</span> says Beatrix. <span class="tei tei-q">“Is it mamma your +honour wants, and that I should have the happiness of +calling you papa?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond blushed again. <span class="tei tei-q">“I spoke of a Rachel that a +shepherd courted five thousand years ago; when shepherds +were longer lived than now. And my meaning was, that +since I saw you first after our separation—a child you were +then——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And I put on my best stockings to captivate you, +I remember, sir.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You have had my heart ever since then, such as it was; +and such as you were, I cared for no other woman. What +little reputation I have won, it was that you might be +pleased with it: and, indeed, it is not much; and I think +a hundred fools in the army have got and deserved quite +as much. Was there something in the air of that dismal +old Castlewood that made us all gloomy, and dissatisfied, +and lonely under its ruined old roof? We were all so, even +when together and united, as it seemed, following our +separate schemes, each as we sat round the table.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dear, dreary old place!”</span> cries Beatrix. <span class="tei tei-q">“Mamma hath +never had the heart to go back thither since we left it, when—never +mind how many years ago,”</span> and she flung back +her curls, and looked over her fair shoulder at the mirror +superbly, as if she said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Time, I defy you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> says Esmond, who had the art, as she owned, of +divining many of her thoughts. <span class="tei tei-q">“You can afford to look +in the glass still; and only be pleased by the truth it tells +you. As for me, do you know what my scheme is? I think +of asking Frank to give me the Virginia estate King Charles +gave our grandfather.”</span> (She gave a superb curtsy, as much +as to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“Our grandfather, indeed! Thank you, Mr. +Bastard.”</span>) <span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, I know you are thinking of my bar-sinister, +and so am I. A man cannot get over it in this +country; unless, indeed, he wears it across a king's arms, +when 'tis a highly honourable coat: and I am thinking of +retiring into the plantations, and building myself a wigwam +in the woods, and perhaps, if I want company, suiting myself +with a squaw. We will send your ladyship furs over for +the winter; and, when you are old, we'll provide you with +tobacco. I am not quite clever enough, or not rogue enough—I +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page358">[pg 358]</span><a name="Pg358" id="Pg358" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +know not which—for the Old World. I may make a +place for myself in the new, which is not so full; and found +a family there. When you are a mother yourself, and a +great lady, perhaps I shall send you over from the plantation +some day a little barbarian that is half Esmond half +Mohock, and you will be kind to him for his father's sake, +who was, after all, your kinsman; and whom you loved +a little.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What folly you are talking, Harry!”</span> says Miss Beatrix, +looking with her great eyes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis sober earnest,”</span> says Esmond. And, indeed, the +scheme had been dwelling a good deal in his mind for some +time past, and especially since his return home, when he +found how hopeless, and even degrading to himself, his +passion was. <span class="tei tei-q">“No,”</span> says he, then, <span class="tei tei-q">“I have tried half a +dozen times now. I can bear being away from you well +enough; but being with you is intolerable”</span> (another low +curtsy on Mrs. Beatrix's part), <span class="tei tei-q">“and I will go. I have enough +to buy axes and guns for my men, and beads and blankets +for the savages; and I'll go and live amongst them.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Mon ami</span></span>,”</span> +she says, quite kindly, and taking Esmond's +hand, with an air of great compassion. <span class="tei tei-q">“You can't think +that in our position anything more than our present friendship +is possible. You are our elder brother—as such we +view you, pitying your misfortune, not rebuking you with +it. Why, you are old enough and grave enough to be our +father. I always thought you a hundred years old, Harry, +with your solemn face and grave air. I feel as a sister to +you, and can no more. Isn't that enough, sir?”</span> And she +put her face quite close to his—who knows with what +intention? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It's too much,”</span> says Esmond, turning away. <span class="tei tei-q">“I can't +bear this life, and shall leave it. I shall stay, I think, to +see you married, and then freight a ship, and call it the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Beatrix</span></span>, and bid you all——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here the servant, flinging the door open, announced his +grace the Duke of Hamilton, and Esmond started back +with something like an imprecation on his lips, as the nobleman +entered, looking splendid in his star and green ribbon. +He gave Mr. Esmond just that gracious bow which he would +have given to a lackey who fetched him a chair or took +his hat, and seated himself by Miss Beatrix, as the poor +colonel went out of the room with a hang-dog look. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page359">[pg 359]</span><a name="Pg359" id="Pg359" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's mistress was in the lower room as he passed +downstairs. She often met him as he was coming away +from Beatrix; and she beckoned him into the apartment. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Has she told you, Harry?”</span> Lady Castlewood said. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She has been very frank—very,”</span> says Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But—but about what is going to happen?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What is going to happen?”</span> says he, his heart beating. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“His grace the Duke of Hamilton has proposed to her,”</span> +says my lady. <span class="tei tei-q">“He made his offer yesterday. They will +marry as soon as his mourning is over; and you have heard +his grace is appointed ambassador to Paris; and the +ambassadress goes with him.”</span> +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc79" id="toc79"></a> +<a name="pdf80" id="pdf80"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter IV. Beatrix's New Suitor</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The gentleman whom Beatrix had selected was, to be +sure, twenty years older than the colonel, with whom she +quarrelled for being too old; but this one was but a nameless +adventurer, and the other the greatest duke in Scotland, +with pretensions even to a still higher title. My Lord Duke +of Hamilton had, indeed, every merit belonging to a gentleman, +and he had had the time to mature his accomplishments +fully, being upwards of fifty years old when Madam Beatrix +selected him for a bridegroom. Duke Hamilton, then Earl +of Arran, had been educated at the famous Scottish University +of Glasgow, and, coming to London, became a great +favourite of Charles the Second, who made him a lord of +his bedchamber, and afterwards appointed him ambassador +to the French king, under whom the earl served two campaigns +as his Majesty's aide de camp; and he was absent +on this service when King Charles died. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +King James continued my lord's promotion—made him +master of the wardrobe, and colonel of the Royal Regiment +of Horse; and his lordship adhered firmly to King James, +being of the small company that never quitted that unfortunate +monarch till his departure out of England; and +then it was, in 1688, namely, that he made the friendship +with Colonel Francis Esmond, that had always been, more +or less, maintained in the two families. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The earl professed a great admiration for King William +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page360">[pg 360]</span><a name="Pg360" id="Pg360" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +always, but never could give him his allegiance; and was +engaged in more than one of the plots in the late great king's +reign, which always ended in the plotters' discomfiture, +and generally in their pardon, by the magnanimity of the +king. Lord Arran was twice prisoner in the Tower during +this reign, undauntedly saying, when offered his release, +upon parole not to engage against King William, that he +would not give his word, because <span class="tei tei-q">“he was sure he could +not keep it”</span>; but, nevertheless, he was both times discharged +without any trial; and the king bore this noble enemy so +little malice, that when his mother, the Duchess of Hamilton, +of her own right, resigned her claim on her husband's +death, the earl was, by patent signed at Loo, 1690, created +Duke of Hamilton, Marquis of Clydesdale, and Earl of +Arran, with precedency from the original creation. His +grace took the oaths and his seat in the Scottish Parliament +in 1700: was famous there for his patriotism and eloquence, +especially in the debates about the Union Bill, which Duke +Hamilton opposed with all his strength, though he would +not go the length of the Scottish gentry, who were for +resisting it by force of arms. 'Twas said he withdrew his +opposition all of a sudden, and in consequence of letters +from the king at St. Germains, who entreated him on his +allegiance not to thwart the queen, his sister, in this measure; +and the duke, being always bent upon effecting the king's +return to his kingdom through a reconciliation between his +Majesty and Queen Anne, and quite averse to his landing +with arms and French troops, held aloof, and kept out of +Scotland during the time when the Chevalier de St. George's +descent from Dunkirk was projected, passing his time in +England in his great estate of Staffordshire. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the Whigs went out of office in 1710, the queen +began to show his grace the very greatest marks of her +favour. He was created Duke of Brandon and Baron of +Dutton in England; having the Thistle already originally +bestowed on him by King James the Second, his grace was +now promoted to the honour of the Garter—a distinction +so great and illustrious, that no subject hath ever borne +them hitherto together. When this objection was made to +her Majesty, she was pleased to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“Such a subject as the +Duke of Hamilton has a pre-eminent claim to every mark +of distinction which a crowned head can confer. I will +henceforth wear both orders myself.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page361">[pg 361]</span><a name="Pg361" id="Pg361" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At the Chapter held at Windsor in October, 1712, the +duke and other knights, including Lord-Treasurer, the new-created +Earl of Oxford and Mortimer, were installed; and +a few days afterwards his grace was appointed Ambassador-Extraordinary +to France, and his equipages, plate, and +liveries commanded, of the most sumptuous kind, not only +for his excellency the ambassador, but for her excellency +the ambassadress, who was to accompany him. Her arms +were already quartered on the coach panels, and her +brother was to hasten over on the appointed day to give her +away. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His lordship was a widower, having married, in 1698, +Elizabeth, daughter of Digby, Lord Gerard, by which +marriage great estates came into the Hamilton family; +and out of these estates came, in part, that tragic quarrel +which ended the duke's career. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From the loss of a tooth to that of a mistress there's no +pang that is not bearable. The apprehension is much more +cruel than the certainty; and we make up our mind to +the misfortune when 'tis irremediable, part with the tormentor, +and mumble our crust on t'other side of the jaws. +I think Colonel Esmond was relieved when a ducal coach-and-six +came and whisked his charmer away out of his +reach, and placed her in a higher sphere. As you have +seen the nymph in the opera-machine go up to the clouds +at the end of the piece where Mars, Bacchus, Apollo, and +all the divine company of Olympians are seated, and quaver +out her last song as a goddess: so when this portentous +elevation was accomplished in the Esmond family, I am +not sure that every one of us did not treat the divine Beatrix +with special honours; at least, the saucy little beauty +carried her head with a toss of supreme authority, and +assumed a touch-me-not air, which all her friends very +good-humouredly bowed to. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +An old army acquaintance of Colonel Esmond's, honest +Tom Trett, who had sold his company, married a wife, and +turned merchant in the city, was dreadfully gloomy for +a long time, though living in a fine house on the river, and +carrying on a great trade to all appearance. At length +Esmond saw his friend's name in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span> as a bankrupt; +and a week after this circumstance my bankrupt walks into +Mr. Esmond's lodging with a face perfectly radiant with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page362">[pg 362]</span><a name="Pg362" id="Pg362" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +good humour, and as jolly and careless as when they had +sailed from Southampton ten years before for Vigo. <span class="tei tei-q">“This +bankruptcy,”</span> says Tom, <span class="tei tei-q">“has been hanging over my head +these three years; the thought hath prevented my sleeping, +and I have looked at poor Polly's head on t'other pillow, +and then towards my razor on the table, and thought to +put an end to myself, and so give my woes the slip. But +now we are bankrupts: Tom Trett pays as many shillings +in the pound as he can; his wife has a little cottage at Fulham, +and her fortune secured to herself. I am afraid neither of +bailiff nor of creditor; and for the last six nights have slept +easy.”</span> So it was that when Fortune shook her wings and +left him, honest Tom cuddled himself up in his ragged +virtue, and fell asleep. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond did not tell his friend how much his story +applied to Esmond too; but he laughed at it, and used it; +and having fairly struck his docket in this love transaction, +determined to put a cheerful face on his bankruptcy. +Perhaps Beatrix was a little offended at his gaiety. <span class="tei tei-q">“Is +this the way, sir, that you receive the announcement of +your misfortune,”</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“and do you come smiling before +me as if you were glad to be rid of me?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond would not be put off from his good humour, but +told her the story of Tom Trett and his bankruptcy. <span class="tei tei-q">“I +have been hankering after the grapes on the wall,”</span> says he, +<span class="tei tei-q">“and lost my temper because they were beyond my reach; +was there any wonder? They're gone now, and another has +them—a taller man than your humble servant has won +them.”</span> And the colonel made his cousin a low bow. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A taller man, cousin Esmond!”</span> says she. <span class="tei tei-q">“A man of +spirit would have scaled the wall, sir, and seized them! +A man of courage would have fought for 'em, not gaped +for 'em.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A duke has but to gape and they drop into his mouth,”</span> +says Esmond, with another low bow. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, sir,”</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“a duke <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">is</span></em> a taller man than you. +And why should I not be grateful to one such as his grace, +who gives me his heart and his great name? It is a great +gift he honours me with; I know 'tis a bargain between us; +and I accept it, and will do my utmost to perform my part +of it. 'Tis no question of sighing and philandering between +a nobleman of his grace's age and a girl who hath little of +that softness in her nature. Why should I not own that +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page363">[pg 363]</span><a name="Pg363" id="Pg363" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +I am ambitious, Harry Esmond; and if it be no sin in a man +to covet honour, why should a woman too not desire it? +Shall I be frank with you, Harry, and say that if you had +not been down on your knees, and so humble, you might +have fared better with me? A woman of my spirit, cousin, +is to be won by gallantry, and not by sighs and rueful faces. +All the time you are worshipping and singing hymns to me, +I know very well I am no goddess, and grow weary of the +incense. So would you have been weary of the goddess +too—when she was called Mrs. Esmond, and got out of +humour because she had not pin-money enough, and was +forced to go about in an old gown. Eh! cousin, a goddess +in a mob-cap, that has to make her husband's gruel, ceases +to be divine—I am sure of it. I should have been sulky +and scolded; and of all the proud wretches in the world +Mr. Esmond is the proudest, let me tell him that. You +never fall into a passion; but you never forgive, I think. +Had you been a great man, you might have been good +humoured; but being nobody, sir, you are too great a man +for me; and I'm afraid of you, cousin—there; and I won't +worship you, and you'll never be happy except with a +woman who will. Why, after I belonged to you, and after +one of my tantrums, you would have put the pillow over +my head some night, and smothered me, as the black man +does the woman in the play that you're so fond of. What's +the creature's name?—Desdemona. You would, you little +black-eyed Othello!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I think I should, Beatrix,”</span> says the colonel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And I want no such ending. I intend to live to be a +hundred, and to go to ten thousand routs and balls, and +to play cards every night of my life till the year eighteen +hundred. And I like to be the first of my company, sir; and +I like flattery and compliments, and you give me none; and +I like to be made to laugh, sir, and who's to laugh at <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">your</span></em> +dismal face, I should like to know; and I like a coach-and-six +or a coach-and-eight; and I like diamonds, and a new +gown every week; and people to say—<span class="tei tei-q">‘That's the duchess—How +well her grace looks—Make way for Madame l'Ambassadrice +d'Angleterre—Call her excellency's people’</span>—that's +what I like. And as for you, you want a woman to +bring your slippers and cap, and to sit at your feet, and cry, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘O caro! O bravo!’</span> whilst you read your Shakespeares, +and Miltons, and stuff. Mamma would have been the wife +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page364">[pg 364]</span><a name="Pg364" id="Pg364" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +for you, had you been a little older, though you look ten +years older than she does—you do, you glum-faced, blue-bearded, +little old man! You might have sat, like Darby +and Joan, and flattered each other; and billed and cooed +like a pair of old pigeons on a perch. I want my wings and +to use them, sir.”</span> And she spread out her beautiful arms, +as if indeed she could fly off like the pretty <span class="tei tei-q">“Gawrie”</span>, whom +the man in the story was enamoured of. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And what will your Peter Wilkins say to your flight?”</span> +says Esmond, who never admired this fair creature more +than when she rebelled and laughed at him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A duchess knows her place,”</span> says she, with a laugh. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Why, I have a son already made for me, and thirty years +old (my Lord Arran), and four daughters. How they will +scold, and what a rage they will be in, when I come to +take the head of the table! But I give them only a month +to be angry; at the end of that time they shall love me +every one, and so shall Lord Arran, and so shall all his +grace's Scots vassals and followers in the Highlands. I'm +bent on it; and, when I take a thing in my head, 'tis done. +His grace is the greatest gentleman in Europe, and I'll try +and make him happy; and, when the king comes back, +you may count on my protection, Cousin Esmond—for +come back the king will and shall: and I'll bring him back +from Versailles, if he comes under my hoop.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I hope the world will make you happy, Beatrix,”</span> says +Esmond, with a sigh. <span class="tei tei-q">“You'll be Beatrix till you are my +lady duchess—will you not? I shall then make your +grace my very lowest bow.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“None of these sighs and this satire, cousin,”</span> she says. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I take his grace's great bounty thankfully—yes, thankfully; +and will wear his honours becomingly. I do not say +he hath touched my heart; but he has my gratitude, +obedience, admiration—I have told him that, and no more; +and with that his noble heart is content. I have told him +all—even the story of that poor creature that I was engaged +to—and that I could not love; and I gladly gave his word +back to him, and jumped for joy to get back my own. +I am twenty-five years old.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Twenty-six, my dear,”</span> says Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Twenty-five, sir—I choose to be twenty-five; and, in +eight years, no man hath ever touched my heart. Yes—you +did once, for a little, Harry, when you came back after +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page365">[pg 365]</span><a name="Pg365" id="Pg365" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Lille, and engaging with that murderer, Mohun, and saving +Frank's life. I thought I could like you; and mamma +begged me hard, on her knees, and I did—for a day. But +the old chill came over me, Henry, and the old fear of you +and your melancholy; and I was glad when you went +away, and engaged with my Lord Ashburnham, that I might +hear no more of you, that's the truth. You are too good for +me somehow. I could not make you happy, and should +break my heart in trying, and not being able to love you. +But if you had asked me when we gave you the sword, you +might have had me, sir, and we both should have been +miserable by this time. I talked with that silly lord all +night just to vex you and mamma, and I succeeded, +didn't I? How frankly we can talk of these things! It +seems a thousand years ago: and, though we are here +sitting in the same room, there's a great wall between us. +My dear, kind, faithful, gloomy old cousin! I can like you +now, and admire you too, sir, and say that you are brave, +and very kind, and very true, and a fine gentleman for all—for +all your little mishap at your birth,”</span> says she, wagging +her arch head. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And now, sir,”</span> says she, with a curtsy, <span class="tei tei-q">“we must have no +more talk except when mamma is by, as his grace is with +us; for he does not half like you, cousin, and is as jealous +as the black man in your favourite play.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Though the very kindness of the words stabbed Mr. +Esmond with the keenest pang, he did not show his sense +of the wound by any look of his (as Beatrix, indeed, afterwards +owned to him), but said, with a perfect command +of himself and an easy smile, <span class="tei tei-q">“The interview must not end +yet, my dear, until I have had my last word. Stay, here +comes your mother”</span> (indeed she came in here with her sweet +anxious face, and Esmond, going up, kissed her hand +respectfully). <span class="tei tei-q">“My dear lady may hear, too, the last words, +which are no secrets, and are only a parting benediction +accompanying a present for your marriage from an old +gentleman your guardian; for I feel as if I was the guardian +of all the family, and an old, old fellow that is fit to be the +grandfather of you all; and in this character let me make +my lady duchess her wedding present. They are the +diamonds my father's widow left me. I had thought +Beatrix might have had them a year ago; but they are +good enough for a duchess, though not bright enough for +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page366">[pg 366]</span><a name="Pg366" id="Pg366" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the handsomest woman in the world.”</span> And he took the +case out of his pocket in which the jewels were, and presented +them to his cousin. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She gave a cry of delight, for the stones were indeed very +handsome, and of great value; and the next minute the +necklace was where Belinda's cross is in Mr. Pope's admirable +poem, and glittering on the whitest and most perfectly-shaped +neck in all England. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The girl's delight at receiving these trinkets was so great, +that after rushing to the looking-glass and examining the +effect they produced upon that fair neck which they surrounded, +Beatrix was running back with her arms extended, +and was perhaps for paying her cousin with a price, that he +would have liked no doubt to receive from those beautiful +rosy lips of hers, but at this moment the door opened, and +his grace the bridegroom elect was announced. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He looked very black upon Mr. Esmond, to whom he made +a very low bow indeed, and kissed the hand of each lady in +his most ceremonious manner. He had come in his chair +from the palace hard by, and wore his two stars of the +Garter and the Thistle. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Look, my lord duke,”</span> says Mrs. Beatrix, advancing to +him, and showing the diamonds on her breast. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Diamonds,”</span> says his grace. <span class="tei tei-q">“Hm! they seem pretty.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“They are a present on my marriage,”</span> says Beatrix. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“From her Majesty?”</span> asks the duke. <span class="tei tei-q">“The queen is +very good.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“From my cousin Henry—from our cousin Henry”</span>—cry +both the ladies in a breath. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have not the honour of knowing the gentleman. +I thought that my Lord Castlewood had no brother: and +that on your ladyship's side there were no nephews.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“From our cousin, Colonel Henry Esmond, my lord,”</span> says +Beatrix, taking the colonel's hand very bravely—<span class="tei tei-q">“who +was left guardian to us by our father, and who has +a hundred times shown his love and friendship for our +family.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The Duchess of Hamilton receives no diamonds but from +her husband, madam,”</span> says the duke—<span class="tei tei-q">“may I pray you to +restore these to Mr. Esmond?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Beatrix Esmond may receive a present from our kinsman +and benefactor, my lord duke,”</span> says Lady Castlewood, +with an air of great dignity. <span class="tei tei-q">“She is my daughter yet: +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page367">[pg 367]</span><a name="Pg367" id="Pg367" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and if her mother sanctions the gift—no one else hath the +right to question it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Kinsman and benefactor!”</span> says the duke. <span class="tei tei-q">“I know +of no kinsman: and I do not choose that my wife should +have for benefactor a——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord,”</span> says Colonel Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am not here to bandy words,”</span> says his grace: <span class="tei tei-q">“frankly +I tell you that your visits to this house are too frequent, +and that I choose no presents for the Duchess of Hamilton +from gentlemen that bear a name they have no right to.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord!”</span> breaks out Lady Castlewood, <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Esmond +hath the best right to that name of any man in the world: +and 'tis as old and as honourable as your grace's.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord duke smiled, and looked as if Lady Castlewood +was mad, that was so talking to him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If I called him benefactor,”</span> said my mistress, <span class="tei tei-q">“it is +because he has been so to us—yes, the noblest, the truest, +the bravest, the dearest of benefactors. He would have +saved my husband's life from Mohun's sword. He did save +my boy's, and defended him from that villain. Are those +no benefits?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I ask Colonel Esmond's pardon,”</span> says his grace, if +possible more haughty than before; <span class="tei tei-q">“I would say not +a word that should give him offence, and thank him for +his kindness to your ladyship's family. My Lord Mohun +and I are connected, you know, by marriage—though +neither by blood nor friendship; but I must repeat what +I said, that my wife can receive no presents from Colonel +Esmond.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My daughter may receive presents from the Head of our +House: my daughter may thankfully take kindness from +her father's, her mother's, her brother's dearest friend; and +be grateful for one more benefit besides the thousand we +owe him,”</span> cries Lady Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“What is a string of diamond +stones compared to that affection he hath given us—our +dearest preserver and benefactor? We owe him not only +Frank's life, but our all—yes, our all,”</span> says my mistress, +with a heightened colour and a trembling voice. <span class="tei tei-q">“The title +we bear is his, if he would claim it. 'Tis we who have no +right to our name: not he that's too great for it. He +sacrificed his name at my dying lord's bedside—sacrificed +it to my orphan children; gave up rank and honour +because he loved us so nobly. His father was Viscount +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page368">[pg 368]</span><a name="Pg368" id="Pg368" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of Castlewood and Marquis of Esmond before him; and he +is his father's lawful son and true heir, and we are the +recipients of his bounty, and he the chief of a house that's +as old as your own. And if he is content to forgo his name +that my child may bear it, we love him and honour him +and bless him under whatever name he bears”</span>—and here +the fond and affectionate creature would have knelt to +Esmond again, but that he prevented her; and Beatrix, +running up to her with a pale face and a cry of alarm, +embraced her and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Mother, what is this?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis a family secret, my lord duke,”</span> says Colonel +Esmond: <span class="tei tei-q">“poor Beatrix knew nothing of it: nor did my +lady till a year ago. And I have as good a right to resign +my title as your grace's mother to abdicate hers to you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I should have told everything to the Duke of Hamilton,”</span> +said my mistress, <span class="tei tei-q">“had his grace applied to me for my +daughter's hand, and not to Beatrix. I should have spoken +with you this very day in private, my lord, had not your +words brought about this sudden explanation—and now +'tis fit Beatrix should hear it; and know, as I would +have all the world know, what we owe to our kinsman and +patron.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And then in her touching way, and having hold of her +daughter's hand, and speaking to her rather than my lord +duke, Lady Castlewood told the story which you know +already—lauding up to the skies her kinsman's behaviour. +On his side Mr. Esmond explained the reasons that seemed +quite sufficiently cogent with him, why the succession in +the family, as at present it stood, should not be disturbed; +and he should remain, as he was, Colonel Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And Marquis of Esmond, my lord,”</span> says his grace, with +a low bow. <span class="tei tei-q">“Permit me to ask your lordship's pardon for +words that were uttered in ignorance; and to beg for the +favour of your friendship. To be allied to you, sir, must be +an honour under whatever name you are known”</span> (so his +grace was pleased to say): <span class="tei tei-q">“and in return for the splendid +present you make my wife, your kinswoman, I hope you +will please to command any service that James Douglas +can perform. I shall never be easy until I repay you a part +of my obligations at least; and ere very long, and with the +mission her Majesty hath given me,”</span> says the duke, <span class="tei tei-q">“that +may perhaps be in my power. I shall esteem it as a favour, +my lord, if Colonel Esmond will give away the bride.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page369">[pg 369]</span><a name="Pg369" id="Pg369" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And if he will take the usual payment in advance, he +is welcome,”</span> says Beatrix, stepping up to him; and as +Esmond kissed her, she whispered, <span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, why didn't I know +you before?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord duke was as hot as a flame at this salute, but +said never a word: Beatrix made him a proud curtsy, and +the two ladies quitted the room together. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When does your excellency go for Paris?”</span> asks Colonel +Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As soon after the ceremony as may be,”</span> his grace +answered. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis fixed for the first of December: it cannot +be sooner. The equipage will not be ready till then. The +queen intends the embassy should be very grand—and +I have law business to settle. That ill-omened Mohun has +come, or is coming, to London again: we are in a lawsuit +about my late Lord Gerard's property; and he hath sent +to me to meet him.”</span> +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc81" id="toc81"></a> +<a name="pdf82" id="pdf82"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter V. Mohun Appears For The Last Time In This History</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Besides my Lord Duke of Hamilton and Brandon, who, +for family reasons, had kindly promised his protection and +patronage to Colonel Esmond, he had other great friends +in power now, both able and willing to assist him, and he +might, with such allies, look forward to as fortunate advancement +in civil life at home as he had got rapid promotion +abroad. His grace was magnanimous enough to offer to +take Mr. Esmond as secretary on his Paris embassy, but +no doubt he intended that proposal should be rejected; at +any rate, Esmond could not bear the thoughts of attending +his mistress farther than the church-door after her marriage, +and so declined that offer which his generous rival +made him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Other gentlemen, in power, were liberal at least of compliments +and promises to Colonel Esmond. Mr. Harley, now +become my Lord Oxford and Mortimer, and installed +Knight of the Garter on the same day as his grace of +Hamilton had received the same honour, sent to the +colonel to say that a seat in Parliament should be at his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page370">[pg 370]</span><a name="Pg370" id="Pg370" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +disposal presently, and Mr. St. John held out many flattering +hopes of advancement to the colonel when he should +enter the House. Esmond's friends were all successful, and +the most successful and triumphant of all was his dear old +commander, General Webb, who was now appointed +Lieutenant-General of the Land Forces, and received with +particular honour by the ministry, by the queen, and the +people out of doors, who huzza'd the brave chief when they +used to see him in his chariot, going to the House or to +the Drawing-room, or hobbling on foot to his coach from +St. Stephen's upon his glorious old crutch and stick, and +cheered him as loud as they had ever done Marlborough. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That great duke was utterly disgraced; and honest old +Webb dated all his grace's misfortunes from Wynendael, +and vowed that Fate served the traitor right. Duchess +Sarah had also gone to ruin; she had been forced to give +up her keys, and her places, and her pensions:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Ah, ah!”</span> +says Webb, <span class="tei tei-q">“she would have locked up three millions of +French crowns with her keys had I but been knocked on +the head, but I stopped that convoy at Wynendael.”</span> Our +enemy Cardonnel was turned out of the House of Commons +(along with Mr. Walpole) for malversation of public money. +Cadogan lost his place of Lieutenant of the Tower. Marlborough's +daughters resigned their posts of ladies of the +bedchamber; and so complete was the duke's disgrace, +that his son-in-law, Lord Bridgewater, was absolutely +obliged to give up his lodging at St. James's, and had his +half-pension, as Master of the Horse, taken away. But +I think the lowest depth of Marlborough's fall was when he +humbly sent to ask General Webb when he might wait upon +him; he who had commanded the stout old general, who +had injured him and sneered at him, who had kept him +dangling in his antechamber, who could not even after his +great service condescend to write him a letter in his own +hand. The nation was as eager for peace, as ever it had been +hot for war. The Prince of Savoy came amongst us, had +his audience of the queen, and got his famous Sword of +Honour, and strove with all his force to form a Whig party +together, to bring over the young Prince of Hanover—to +do anything which might prolong the war, and consummate +the ruin of the old sovereign whom he hated so implacably. +But the nation was tired of the struggle; so completely +wearied of it that not even our defeat at Denain could rouse +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page371">[pg 371]</span><a name="Pg371" id="Pg371" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +us into any anger, though such an action so lost two years +before, would have set all England in a fury. 'Twas easy +to see that the great Marlborough was not with the army. +Eugene was obliged to fall back in a rage, and forgo the +dazzling revenge of his life. 'Twas in vain the duke's side +asked, <span class="tei tei-q">“Would we suffer our arms to be insulted? Would +we not send back the only champion who could repair our +honour?”</span> The nation had had its bellyful of fighting; nor +could taunts or outcries goad up our Britons any more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For a statesman, that was always prating of liberty, and +had the grandest philosophic maxims in his mouth, it must +be owned that Mr. St. John sometimes rather acted like +a Turkish than a Greek philosopher, and especially fell foul +of one unfortunate set of men, the men of letters, with +a tyranny a little extraordinary in a man who professed +to respect their calling so much. The literary controversy +at this time was very bitter, the Government side was the +winning one, the popular one, and I think might have been +the merciful one. 'Twas natural that the Opposition should +be peevish and cry out; some men did so from their hearts, +admiring the Duke of Marlborough's prodigious talents, and +deploring the disgrace of the greatest general the world +ever knew: 'twas the stomach that caused other patriots +to grumble, and such men cried out because they were poor, +and paid to do so. Against these my Lord Bolingbroke +never showed the slightest mercy, whipping a dozen into +prison or into the pillory without the least commiseration. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From having been a man of arms Mr. Esmond had now +come to be a man of letters, but on a safer side than that +in which the above-cited poor fellows ventured their liberties +and ears. There was no danger on ours, which was +the winning side; besides, Mr. Esmond pleased himself by +thinking that he writ like a gentleman if he did not always +succeed as a wit. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of the famous wits of that age, who have rendered Queen +Anne's reign illustrious, and whose works will be in all +Englishmen's hands in ages yet to come, Mr. Esmond saw +many, but at public places chiefly; never having a great +intimacy with any of them, except with honest Dick Steele +and Mr. Addison, who parted company with Esmond, however, +when that gentleman became a declared Tory, and +lived on close terms with the leading persons of that party. +Addison kept himself to a few friends, and very rarely +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page372">[pg 372]</span><a name="Pg372" id="Pg372" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +opened himself except in their company. A man more +upright and conscientious than he, it was not possible to +find in public life, and one whose conversation was so +various, easy, and delightful. Writing now in my mature +years, I own that I think Addison's politics were the right, +and were my time to come over again, I would be a Whig +in England and not a Tory; but with people that take +a side in politics, 'tis men rather than principles that +commonly bind them. A kindness or a slight puts a man +under one flag or the other, and he marches with it to the +end of the campaign. Esmond's master in war was injured +by Marlborough, and hated him: and the lieutenant fought +the quarrels of his leader. Webb coming to London was +used as a weapon by Marlborough's enemies (and true steel +he was, that honest chief); nor was his aide de camp, Mr. +Esmond, an unfaithful or unworthy partisan. 'Tis strange +here, and on a foreign soil, and in a land that is independent +in all but the name (for that the North American colonies +shall remain dependants on yonder little island for twenty +years more, I never can think), to remember how the nation +at home seemed to give itself up to the domination of one +or other aristocratic party, and took a Hanoverian king, or +a French one, according as either prevailed. And while +the Tories, the October Club gentlemen, the High Church +parsons that held by the Church of England, were for +having a Papist king, for whom many of their Scottish and +English leaders, firm churchmen all, laid down their lives +with admirable loyalty and devotion; they were governed +by men who had notoriously no religion at all, but used +it as they would use any opinion for the purpose of forwarding +their own ambition. The Whigs, on the other hand, +who professed attachment to religion and liberty too, were +compelled to send to Holland or Hanover for a monarch +around whom they could rally. A strange series of compromises +is that English history; compromise of principle, +compromise of party, compromise of worship! The lovers +of English freedom and independence submitted their +religious consciences to an Act of Parliament; could not +consolidate their liberty without sending to Zell or the +Hague for a king to live under; and could not find amongst +the proudest people in the world a man speaking their own +language, and understanding their laws, to govern them. +The Tory and High Church patriots were ready to die in +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page373">[pg 373]</span><a name="Pg373" id="Pg373" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +defence of a Papist family that had sold us to France; +the great Whig nobles, the sturdy Republican recusants +who had cut off Charles Stuart's head for treason, were fain +to accept a king whose title came to him through a royal +grandmother, whose own royal grandmother's head had +fallen under Queen Bess's hatchet. And our proud English +nobles sent to a petty German town for a monarch to come +and reign in London; and our prelates kissed the ugly +hands of his Dutch mistresses, and thought it no dishonour. +In England you can but belong to one party or t'other, and +you take the house you live in with all its encumbrances, its +retainers, its antique discomforts, and ruins even; you +patch up, but you never build up anew. Will we of the +New World submit much longer, even nominally, to this +ancient British superstition? There are signs of the times +which make me think that ere long we shall care as little +about King George here, and peers temporal and peers +spiritual, as we do for King Canute or the Druids. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This chapter began about the wits, my grandson may +say, and hath wandered very far from their company. +The pleasantest of the wits I knew were the Doctors Garth +and Arbuthnot, and Mr. Gay, the author of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Trivia</span></span>, the +most charming kind soul that ever laughed at a joke or +cracked a bottle. Mr. Prior I saw, and he was the earthen +pot swimming with the pots of brass down the stream, and +always and justly frightened lest he should break in the +voyage. I met him both at London and Paris, where he +was performing piteous congees to the Duke of Shrewsbury, +not having courage to support the dignity which his undeniable +genius and talent had won him, and writing +coaxing letters to Secretary St. John, and thinking about +his plate and his place, and what on earth should become +of him should his party go out. The famous Mr. Congreve +I saw a dozen of times at Button's, a splendid wreck of a +man, magnificently attired, and though gouty, and almost +blind, bearing a brave face against fortune. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The great Mr. Pope (of whose prodigious genius I have +no words to express my admiration) was quite a puny lad +at this time, appearing seldom in public places. There +were hundreds of men, wits, and pretty fellows frequenting +the theatres and coffee-houses of that day—whom <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">nunc +prescribere longum est</span></span>. Indeed I think the most brilliant +of that sort I ever saw was not till fifteen years afterwards, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page374">[pg 374]</span><a name="Pg374" id="Pg374" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +when I paid my last visit in England, and met young Harry +Fielding, son of the Fielding that served in Spain and +afterwards in Flanders with us, and who for fun and humour +seemed to top them all. As for the famous Dr. Swift, +I can say of him, <span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">vidi tantum</span></span>.”</span> He was in London +all these years up to the death of the queen; and in a hundred +public places where I saw him, but no more; he never +missed Court of a Sunday, where once or twice he was +pointed out to your grandfather. He would have sought +me out eagerly enough had I been a great man with a title +to my name, or a star on my coat. At Court the doctor +had no eyes but for the very greatest. Lord Treasurer +and St. John used to call him Jonathan, and they paid him +with this cheap coin for the service they took of him. He +writ their lampoons, fought their enemies, flogged and +bullied in their service, and it must be owned with a consummate +skill and fierceness. 'Tis said he hath lost his +intellect now, and forgotten his wrongs and his rage against +mankind. I have always thought of him and of Marlborough +as the two greatest men of that age. I have read his books +(who doth not know them?) here in our calm woods, and +imagine a giant to myself as I think of him, a lonely +fallen Prometheus, groaning as the vulture tears him. +Prometheus I saw, but when first I ever had any words +with him, the giant stepped out of a sedan-chair in the +Poultry, whither he had come with a tipsy Irish servant +parading before him, who announced him, bawling out his +reverence's name, whilst his master below was as yet +haggling with the chairman. I disliked this Mr. Swift, and +heard many a story about him, of his conduct to men, and +his words to women. He could flatter the great as much +as he could bully the weak; and Mr. Esmond, being younger +and hotter in that day than now, was determined, should +he ever meet this dragon, not to run away from his teeth +and his fire. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Men have all sorts of motives which carry them onwards +in life, and are driven into acts of desperation, or it may be +of distinction, from a hundred different causes. There was +one comrade of Esmond's, an honest little Irish lieutenant +of Handyside's, who owed so much money to a camp sutler, +that he began to make love to the man's daughter, intending +to pay his debt that way; and at the battle of Malplaquet, +flying away from the debt and lady too, he rushed so +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page375">[pg 375]</span><a name="Pg375" id="Pg375" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +desperately on the French lines, that he got his company; +and came a captain out of the action, and had to marry the +sutler's daughter after all, who brought him his cancelled +debt to her father as poor Rogers's fortune. To run out of +the reach of bill and marriage, he ran on the enemy's pikes; +and as these did not kill him he was thrown back upon +t'other horn of his dilemma. Our great duke at the same +battle was fighting, not the French, but the Tories in England; +and risking his life and the army's, not for his country +but for his pay and places; and for fear of his wife at home, +that only being in life whom he dreaded. I have asked +about men in my own company (new drafts of poor country +boys were perpetually coming over to us during the wars, +and brought from the ploughshare to the sword), and found +that a half of them under the flags were driven thither on +account of a woman: one fellow was jilted by his mistress +and took the shilling in despair; another jilted the girl, +and fled from her and the parish to the tents where the +law could not disturb him. Why go on particularizing? +What can the sons of Adam and Eve expect, but to continue +in that course of love and trouble their father and mother +set out on? O my grandson! I am drawing nigh to the +end of that period of my history, when I was acquainted +with the great world of England and Europe, my years +are past the Hebrew poet's limit, and I say unto thee, all +my troubles and joys too, for that matter, have come from +a woman; as thine will when thy destined course begins. +'Twas a woman that made a soldier of me, that set me +intriguing afterwards; I believe I would have spun smocks +for her had she so bidden me; what strength I had in +my head I would have given her; hath not every man +in his degree had his Omphale and Delilah? Mine befooled +me on the banks of the Thames, and in dear old England; +thou mayest find thine own by Rappahannoc. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +To please that woman then I tried to distinguish myself +as a soldier, and afterwards as a wit and a politician; as +to please another I would have put on a black cassock and +a pair of bands, and had done so but that a superior fate +intervened to defeat that project. And I say, I think the +world is like Captain Esmond's company I spoke of anon; +and, could you see every man's career in life, you would +find a woman clogging him; or clinging round his march +and stopping him; or cheering him and goading him; or +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page376">[pg 376]</span><a name="Pg376" id="Pg376" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +beckoning him out of her chariot, so that he goes up to her, +and leaves the race to be run without him; or bringing +him the apple, and saying <span class="tei tei-q">“Eat”</span>; or fetching him the +daggers and whispering <span class="tei tei-q">“Kill! yonder lies Duncan, and +a crown, and an opportunity”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Your grandfather fought with more effect as a politician +than as a wit; and having private animosities and grievances +of his own and his general's against the great duke in command +of the army, and more information on military +matters than most writers, who had never seen beyond the +fire of a tobacco-pipe at Wills's, he was enabled to do good +service for that cause which he embarked in, and for Mr. +St. John and his party. But he disdained the abuse in +which some of the Tory writers indulged; for instance, +Dr. Swift, who actually chose to doubt the Duke of Marlborough's +courage, and was pleased to hint that his grace's +military capacity was doubtful: nor were Esmond's performances +worse for the effect they were intended to produce +(though no doubt they could not injure the Duke of Marlborough +nearly so much in the public eyes as the malignant +attacks of Swift did, which were carefully directed so as +to blacken and degrade him), because they were writ openly +and fairly by Mr. Esmond, who made no disguise of them, +who was now out of the army, and who never attacked +the prodigious courage and talents, only the selfishness and +rapacity, of the chief. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The colonel then, having writ a paper for one of the Tory +journals, called the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Post-Boy</span></span> (a letter upon Bouchain, that +the town talked about for two whole days, when the appearance +of an Italian singer supplied a fresh subject for conversation), +and having business at the Exchange, where +Mrs. Beatrix wanted a pair of gloves or a fan very likely, +Esmond went to correct his paper, and was sitting at the +printer's, when the famous Dr. Swift came in, his Irish +fellow with him that used to walk before his chair, and +bawled out his master's name with great dignity. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond was waiting for the printer too, whose wife +had gone to the tavern to fetch him, and was meantime +engaged in drawing a picture of a soldier on horseback for +a dirty little pretty boy of the printer's wife, whom she +had left behind her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I presume you are the editor of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Post-Boy</span></span>, sir?”</span> +says the doctor, in a grating voice that had an Irish twang; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page377">[pg 377]</span><a name="Pg377" id="Pg377" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and he looked at the colonel from under his two bushy +eyebrows with a pair of very clear blue eyes. His complexion +was muddy, his figure rather fat, his chin double. +He wore a shabby cassock, and a shabby hat over his black +wig, and he pulled out a great gold watch, at which he looks +very fierce. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am but a contributor, Dr. Swift,”</span> says Esmond, with +the little boy still on his knee. He was sitting with his +back in the window, so that the doctor could not see him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who told you I was Dr. Swift?”</span> says the doctor, +eyeing the other very haughtily. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your reverence's valet bawled out your name,”</span> says the +colonel. <span class="tei tei-q">“I should judge you brought him from Ireland.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And pray, sir, what right have you to judge whether +my servant came from Ireland or no? I want to speak +with your employer, Mr. Leach. I'll thank ye go fetch +him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where's your papa, Tommy?”</span> asks the colonel of the +child, a smutty little wretch in a frock. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Instead of answering, the child begins to cry; the doctor's +appearance had no doubt frightened the poor little imp. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Send that squalling little brat about his business, and +do what I bid ye, sir,”</span> says the doctor. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I must finish the picture first for Tommy,”</span> says the +colonel, laughing. <span class="tei tei-q">“Here, Tommy, will you have your +Pandour with whiskers or without?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Whisters,”</span> says Tommy, quite intent on the picture. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who the devil are ye, sir?”</span> cries the doctor; <span class="tei tei-q">“are ye +a printer's man or are ye not?”</span> he pronounced it like <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">naught</span></em>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your reverence needn't raise the devil to ask who I am,”</span> +says Colonel Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“Did you ever hear of Dr. Faustus, +little Tommy? or Friar Bacon, who invented gunpowder, +and set the Thames on fire?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Swift turned quite red, almost purple. <span class="tei tei-q">“I did not +intend any offence, sir,”</span> says he. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I daresay, sir, you offended without meaning,”</span> says the +other drily. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who are ye, sir? Do you know who I am, sir? You +are one of the pack of Grub-Street scribblers that my friend +Mr. Secretary hath laid by the heels. How dare ye, sir, +speak to me in this tone?”</span> cries the doctor, in a great fume. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I beg your honour's humble pardon if I have offended +your honour,”</span> says Esmond, in a tone of great humility. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page378">[pg 378]</span><a name="Pg378" id="Pg378" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Rather than be sent to the Compter, or be put in the +pillory, there's nothing I wouldn't do. But Mrs. Leach, +the printer's lady, told me to mind Tommy whilst she went +for her husband to the tavern, and I daren't leave the child +lest he should fall into the fire; but if your reverence will +hold him——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I take the little beast!”</span> says the doctor, starting back. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am engaged to your betters, fellow. Tell Mr. Leach that +when he makes an appointment with Dr. Swift he had +best keep it, do ye hear? And keep a respectful tongue +in your head, sir, when you address a person like me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I'm but a poor broken-down soldier,”</span> says the colonel, +<span class="tei tei-q">“and I've seen better days, though I am forced now to turn +my hand to writing. We can't help our fate, sir.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You're the person that Mr. Leach hath spoken to me of, +I presume. Have the goodness to speak civilly when you +are spoken to—and tell Leach to call at my lodgings in +Bury Street, and bring the papers with him to-night at ten +o'clock. And the next time you see me, you'll know me, +and be civil, Mr. Kemp.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Poor Kemp, who had been a lieutenant at the beginning +of the war, and fallen into misfortune, was the writer of +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Post-Boy</span></span>, and now took honest Mr. Leach's pay in +place of her Majesty's. Esmond had seen this gentleman, +and a very ingenious, hard-working honest fellow he was, +toiling to give bread to a great family, and watching up +many a long winter night to keep the wolf from his door. +And Mr. St. John, who had liberty always on his tongue, +had just sent a dozen of the Opposition writers into prison, +and one actually into the pillory, for what he called libels, +but libels not half so violent as those writ on our side. +With regard to this very piece of tyranny, Esmond had +remonstrated strongly with the secretary, who laughed and +said, the rascals were served quite right; and told Esmond +a joke of Swift's regarding the matter. Nay, more, this +Irishman, when St. John was about to pardon a poor +wretch condemned to death for rape, absolutely prevented +the secretary from exercising this act of good nature, and +boasted that he had had the man hanged; and great as +the doctor's genius might be, and splendid his ability, +Esmond for one would affect no love for him, and never +desired to make his acquaintance. The doctor was at +Court every Sunday assiduously enough, a place the colonel +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page379">[pg 379]</span><a name="Pg379" id="Pg379" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +frequented but rarely, though he had a great inducement +to go there in the person of a fair maid of honour of her +Majesty's; and the airs and patronage Mr. Swift gave +himself, forgetting gentlemen of his country whom he knew +perfectly, his loud talk at once insolent and servile, nay, +perhaps his very intimacy with lord treasurer and the +secretary, who indulged all his freaks and called him Jonathan, +you may be sure, were remarked by many a person +of whom the proud priest himself took no note, during that +time of his vanity and triumph. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas but three days after the 15th of November, 1712 +(Esmond minds him well of the date), that he went by +invitation to dine with his general, the foot of whose table +he used to take on these festive occasions, as he had done +at many a board, hard and plentiful, during the campaign. +This was a great feast, and of the latter sort; the honest +old gentleman loved to treat his friends splendidly: his +grace of Ormonde, before he joined his army as generalissimo, +my Lord Viscount Bolingbroke, one of her Majesty's +secretaries of state, my Lord Orkney, that had served with +us abroad, being of the party. His grace of Hamilton, +master of the ordnance, and in whose honour the feast had +been given, upon his approaching departure as ambassador +to Paris, had sent an excuse to General Webb at two o'clock, +but an hour before the dinner: nothing but the most +immediate business, his grace said, should have prevented +him having the pleasure of drinking a parting glass to the +health of General Webb. His absence disappointed +Esmond's old chief, who suffered much from his wounds +besides; and though the company was grand, it was rather +gloomy. St. John came last, and brought a friend with +him:—<span class="tei tei-q">“I'm sure,”</span> says my general, bowing very politely, +<span class="tei tei-q">“my table hath always a place for Dr. Swift.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond went up to the doctor with a bow and +a smile:—<span class="tei tei-q">“I gave Dr. Swift's message,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“to the +printer: I hope he brought your pamphlet to your lodgings +in time.”</span> Indeed poor Leach had come to his house very +soon after the doctor left it, being brought away rather +tipsy from the tavern by his thrifty wife; and he talked +of cousin Swift in a maudlin way, though of course Mr. +Esmond did not allude to this relationship. The doctor +scowled, blushed, and was much confused, and said scarce +a word during the whole of dinner. A very little stone will +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page380">[pg 380]</span><a name="Pg380" id="Pg380" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +sometimes knock down these Goliaths of wit; and this one +was often discomfited when met by a man of any spirit; +he took his place sulkily, put water in his wine that the +others drank plentifully, and scarce said a word. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The talk was about the affairs of the day, or rather about +persons than affairs: my Lady Marlborough's fury, her +daughters in old clothes and mob-caps looking out from +their windows and seeing the company pass to the Drawing-room; +the gentleman-usher's horror when the Prince of +Savoy was introduced to her Majesty in a tie-wig, no man +out of a full-bottomed periwig ever having kissed the royal +hand before; about the Mohawks and the damage they +were doing, rushing through the town, killing and murdering. +Some one said the ill-omened face of Mohun had been seen +at the theatre the night before, and Macartney and Meredith +with him. Meant to be a feast, the meeting, in spite of +drink, and talk, was as dismal as a funeral. Every topic +started subsided into gloom. His grace of Ormonde went +away because the conversation got upon Denain, where we +had been defeated in the last campaign. Esmond's general +was affected at the allusion to this action too, for his comrade +of Wynendael, the Count of Nassau-Woudenberg, had been +slain there. Mr. Swift, when Esmond pledged him, said +he drank no wine, and took his hat from the peg and went +away, beckoning my Lord Bolingbroke to follow him; but +the other bade him take his chariot and save his coach-hire, +he had to speak with Colonel Esmond; and when the rest +of the company withdrew to cards, these two remained +behind in the dark. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Bolingbroke always spoke freely when he had drunk +freely. His enemies could get any secret out of him in +that condition; women were even employed to ply him, +and take his words down. I have heard that my Lord +Stair, three years after, when the secretary fled to France +and became the pretender's minister, got all the information +he wanted by putting female spies over St. John in his cups. +He spoke freely now:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Jonathan knows nothing of this +for certain, though he suspects it, and by George, Webb +will take an archbishopric, and Jonathan a—no, damme—Jonathan +will take an archbishopric from James, I warrant +me, gladly enough. Your duke hath the string of the whole +matter in his hand,”</span> the secretary went on. <span class="tei tei-q">“We have that +which will force Marlborough to keep his distance, and he +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page381">[pg 381]</span><a name="Pg381" id="Pg381" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +goes out of London in a fortnight. Prior hath his business; +he left me this morning, and mark me, Harry, should fate +carry off our august, our beloved, our most gouty and plethoric +queen, and defender of the faith, <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">la bonne cause +triomphera. A la santé de la bonne cause!</span></span> Everything good +comes from France. Wine comes from France; give us +another bumper to the <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">bonne cause</span></span>.”</span> +We drank it together. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Will the <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">bonne cause</span></span> turn +Protestant?”</span> asked Mr. Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No, hang it,”</span> says the other, <span class="tei tei-q">“he'll defend our faith as +in duty bound, but he'll stick by his own. The Hind and +the Panther shall run in the same car, by Jove. Righteousness +and peace shall kiss each other; and we'll have Father +Massillon to walk down the aisle of St. Paul's, cheek by +jowl, with Dr. Sacheverel. Give us more wine; here's +a health to the <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">bonne cause</span></span>, +kneeling—damme, let's drink +it kneeling.”</span> He was quite flushed and wild with wine as +he was talking. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And suppose,”</span> says Esmond, who always had this +gloomy apprehension, <span class="tei tei-q">“the <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">bonne cause</span></span> +should give us up +to the French, as his father and uncle did before him?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Give us up to the French!”</span> starts up Bolingbroke; +<span class="tei tei-q">“is there any English gentleman that fears that? You who +have seen Blenheim and Ramillies, afraid of the French! +Your ancestors and mine, and brave old Webb's yonder, +have met them in a hundred fields, and our children will +be ready to do the like. Who's he that wishes for more +men from England? My cousin Westmoreland? Give +us up to the French, pshaw!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“His uncle did,”</span> says Mr. Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And what happened to his grandfather?”</span> broke out +St. John, filling out another bumper. <span class="tei tei-q">“Here's to the +greatest monarch England ever saw; here's to the Englishman +that made a kingdom of her. Our great king came +from Huntingdon, not Hanover; our fathers didn't look +for a Dutchman to rule us. Let him come and we'll keep +him, and we'll show him Whitehall. If he's a traitor let +us have him here to deal with him; and then there are +spirits here as great as any that have gone before. There +are men here that can look at danger in the face and not +be frightened at it. Traitor, treason! what names are +these to scare you and me? Are all Oliver's men dead, +or his glorious name forgotten in fifty years? Are there +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page382">[pg 382]</span><a name="Pg382" id="Pg382" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +no men equal to him, think you, as good—aye, as good? +God save the king! and, if the monarchy fails us, God +save the British republic!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He filled another great bumper, and tossed it up and +drained it wildly, just as the noise of rapid carriage-wheels +approaching was stopped at our door, and after a hurried +knock and a moment's interval, Mr. Swift came into the +hall, ran upstairs to the room we were dining in, and entered +it with a perturbed face. St. John, excited with drink, +was making some wild quotation out of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Macbeth</span></span>, but Swift +stopped him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Drink no more, my lord, for God's sake,”</span> says he, +<span class="tei tei-q">“I come with the most dreadful news.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Is the queen dead?”</span> cries out Bolingbroke, seizing on +a water-glass. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No, Duke Hamilton is dead, he was murdered an hour +ago by Mohun and Macartney; they had a quarrel this +morning; they gave him not so much time as to write +a letter. He went for a couple of his friends, and he is +dead, and Mohun, too, the bloody villain, who was set on +him. They fought in Hyde Park just before sunset; the +duke killed Mohun, and Macartney came up and stabbed +him, and the dog is fled. I have your chariot below; send +to every part of the country and apprehend that villain; +come to the duke's house and see if any life be left in him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“O Beatrix, Beatrix,”</span> thought Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“and here ends +my poor girl's ambition!”</span> +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc83" id="toc83"></a> +<a name="pdf84" id="pdf84"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VI. Poor Beatrix</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There had been no need to urge upon Esmond the necessity +of a separation between him and Beatrix: Fate had done +that completely; and I think from the very moment poor +Beatrix had accepted the duke's offer, she began to assume +the majestic air of a duchess, nay, queen elect, and to +carry herself as one sacred and removed from us common +people. Her mother and kinsman both fell into her ways, +the latter scornfully perhaps, and uttering his usual gibes +at her vanity and his own. There was a certain charm +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page383">[pg 383]</span><a name="Pg383" id="Pg383" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +about this girl of which neither Colonel Esmond nor his +fond mistress could forgo the fascination; in spite of her +faults and her pride and wilfulness, they were forced to +love her; and, indeed, might be set down as the two chief +flatterers of the brilliant creature's court. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Who, in the course of his life, hath not been so bewitched, +and worshipped some idol or another? Years after this +passion hath been dead and buried, along with a thousand +other worldly cares and ambitions, he who felt it can recall +it out of its grave, and admire, almost as fondly as he did +in his youth, that lovely queenly creature. I invoke that +beautiful spirit from the shades and love her still; or rather +I should say such a past is always present to a man; such a +passion once felt forms a part of his whole being, and cannot +be separated from it; it becomes a portion of the man of +to-day, just as any great faith or conviction, the discovery +of poetry, the awakening of religion, ever afterward influence +him; just as the wound I had at Blenheim, and of which +I wear the scar, hath become part of my frame and influenced +my whole body, nay spirit, subsequently, though 'twas got +and healed forty years ago. Parting and forgetting! What +faithful heart can do these? Our great thoughts, our great +affections, the Truths of our life, never leave us. Surely, +they cannot separate from our consciousness; shall follow +it whithersoever that shall go; and are of their nature +divine and immortal. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With the horrible news of this catastrophe, which was +confirmed by the weeping domestics at the duke's own +door, Esmond rode homewards as quick as his lazy coach +would carry him, devising all the time how he should break +the intelligence to the person most concerned in it; and +if a satire upon human vanity could be needed, that poor +soul afforded it in the altered company and occupations +in which Esmond found her. For days before, her chariot +had been rolling the street from mercer to toyshop—from +goldsmith to laceman: her taste was perfect, or at least +the fond bridegroom had thought so, and had given entire +authority over all tradesmen, and for all the plate, furniture, +and equipages, with which his grace the ambassador wished +to adorn his splendid mission. She must have her picture +by Kneller, a duchess not being complete without a portrait, +and a noble one he made, and actually sketched in, on +a cushion, a coronet which she was about to wear. She +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page384">[pg 384]</span><a name="Pg384" id="Pg384" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +vowed she would wear it at King James the Third's coronation, +and never a princess in the land would have become +ermine better. Esmond found the antechamber crowded +with milliners and toyshop women, obsequious goldsmiths +with jewels, salvers, and tankards; and mercer's men with +hangings, and velvets, and brocades. My lady duchess +elect was giving audience to one famous silversmith from +Exeter <span class="tei tei-q">“Change,”</span> who brought with him a great chased salver, +of which he was pointing out the beauties as Colonel Esmond +entered. <span class="tei tei-q">“Come,”</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“cousin, and admire the taste +of this pretty thing.”</span> I think Mars and Venus were lying +in the golden bower, that one gilt Cupid carried off the war-god's +casque—another his sword—another his great buckler, +upon which my Lord Duke Hamilton's arms with ours +were to be engraved—and a fourth was kneeling down to +the reclining goddess with the ducal coronet in his hands, +God help us! The next time Mr. Esmond saw that piece +of plate, the arms were changed, the ducal coronet had been +replaced by a viscount's; it formed part of the fortune of +the thrifty goldsmith's own daughter, when she married +my Lord Viscount Squanderfield two years after. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Isn't this a beautiful piece?”</span> says Beatrix, examining +it, and she pointed out the arch graces of the Cupids, and +the fine carving of the languid prostrate Mars. Esmond +sickened as he thought of the warrior dead in his chamber, +his servants and children weeping around him; and of this +smiling creature attiring herself, as it were, for that nuptial +death-bed. <span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis a pretty piece of vanity,”</span> says he, looking +gloomily at the beautiful creature: there were flambeaux +in the room lighting up the brilliant mistress of it. She +lifted up the great gold salver with her fair arms. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Vanity!”</span> says she haughtily. <span class="tei tei-q">“What is vanity in you, +sir, is propriety in me. You ask a Jewish price for it, Mr. +Graves; but have it I will, if only to spite Mr. Esmond.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“O Beatrix, lay it down!”</span> says Mr. Esmond. <span class="tei tei-q">“Herodias! +you know not what you carry in the charger.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She dropped it with a clang; the eager goldsmith running +to seize his fallen ware. The lady's face caught the fright +from Esmond's pale countenance, and her eyes shone out +like beacons of alarm:—<span class="tei tei-q">“What is it, Henry?”</span> says she, +running to him, and seizing both his hands. <span class="tei tei-q">“What do +you mean by your pale face and gloomy tones?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Come away, come away!”</span> says Esmond, leading her: +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page385">[pg 385]</span><a name="Pg385" id="Pg385" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +she clung frightened to him, and he supported her upon his +heart, bidding the scared goldsmith leave them. The man +went into the next apartment, staring with surprise, and +hugging his precious charger. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“O my Beatrix, my sister!”</span> says Esmond, still holding +in his arms the pallid and affrighted creature, <span class="tei tei-q">“you have +the greatest courage of any woman in the world; prepare +to show it now, for you have a dreadful trial to bear.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She sprang away from the friend who would have protected +her:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Hath he left me?”</span> says she. <span class="tei tei-q">“We had words +this morning: he was very gloomy, and I angered him: +but he dared not, he dared not!”</span> As she spoke a burning +blush flushed over her whole face and bosom. Esmond +saw it reflected in the glass by which she stood, with clenched +hands, pressing her swelling heart. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He has left you,”</span> says Esmond, wondering that rage +rather than sorrow was in her looks. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And he is alive,”</span> cries Beatrix, <span class="tei tei-q">“and you bring me this +commission! He has left me, and you haven't dared to +avenge me! You, that pretend to be the champion of our +house, have let me suffer this insult! Where is Castlewood? +I will go to my brother.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The duke is not alive, Beatrix,”</span> said Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She looked at her cousin wildly, and fell back to the wall +as though shot in the breast:—<span class="tei tei-q">“And you come here, and—and—you +killed him?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No; thank Heaven,”</span> her kinsman said, <span class="tei tei-q">“the blood of +that noble heart doth not stain my sword! In its last +hour it was faithful to thee, Beatrix Esmond. Vain and +cruel woman! kneel and thank the awful Heaven which +awards life and death, and chastises pride, that the noble +Hamilton died true to you; at least that 'twas not your +quarrel, or your pride, or your wicked vanity, that drove +him to his fate. He died by the bloody sword which already +had drank your own father's blood. O woman, O sister! +to that sad field where two corpses are lying—for the murderer +died too by the hand of the man he slew—can you +bring no mourners but your revenge and your vanity? +God help and pardon thee, Beatrix, as He brings this awful +punishment to your hard and rebellious heart.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond had scarce done speaking, when his mistress +came in. The colloquy between him and Beatrix had lasted +but a few minutes, during which time Esmond's servant +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page386">[pg 386]</span><a name="Pg386" id="Pg386" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +had carried the disastrous news through the household. +The army of Vanity Fair, waiting without, gathered up +all their fripperies and fled aghast. Tender Lady Castlewood +had been in talk above with Dean Atterbury, the pious +creature's almoner and director; and the dean had entered +with her as a physician whose place was at a sick-bed. +Beatrix's mother looked at Esmond and ran towards her +daughter, with a pale face and open heart and hands, all +kindness and pity. But Beatrix passed her by, nor would +she have any of the medicaments of the spiritual physician. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am best in my own room and by myself,”</span> she said. Her +eyes were quite dry; nor did Esmond ever see them otherwise, +save once, in respect to that grief. She gave him +a cold hand as she went out: <span class="tei tei-q">“Thank you, brother,”</span> she +said, in a low voice, and with a simplicity more touching +than tears; <span class="tei tei-q">“all you have said is true and kind, and I will +go away and ask pardon.”</span> The three others remained +behind, and talked over the dreadful story. It affected +Dr. Atterbury more even than us, as it seemed. The death +of Mohun, her husband's murderer, was more awful to my +mistress than even the duke's unhappy end. Esmond gave +at length what particulars he knew of their quarrel, and the +cause of it. The two noblemen had long been at war with +respect to the Lord Gerard's property, whose two daughters +my lord duke and Mohun had married. They had met +by appointment that day at the lawyer's in Lincoln's Inn +Fields; had words which, though they appeared very +trifling to those who heard them, were not so to men +exasperated by long and previous enmity. Mohun asked +my lord duke where he could see his grace's friends, and +within an hour had sent two of his own to arrange this +deadly duel. It was pursued with such fierceness, and +sprung from so trifling a cause, that all men agreed at the +time that there was a party, of which these three notorious +brawlers were but agents, who desired to take Duke Hamilton's +life away. They fought three on a side, as in that +tragic meeting twelve years back, which hath been recounted +already, and in which Mohun performed his second murder. +They rushed in, and closed upon each other at once without +any feints or crossing of swords even, and stabbed one at +the other desperately, each receiving many wounds; and +Mohun having his death-wound, and my lord duke lying +by him, Macartney came up and stabbed his grace as he +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page387">[pg 387]</span><a name="Pg387" id="Pg387" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lay on the ground, and gave him the blow of which he died. +Colonel Macartney denied this, of which the horror and +indignation of the whole kingdom would nevertheless have +him guilty, and fled the country, whither he never returned. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What was the real cause of the Duke Hamilton's death—a +paltry quarrel that might easily have been made up, and +with a ruffian so low, base, profligate, and degraded with +former crimes and repeated murders, that a man of such +a renown and princely rank as my lord duke might have disdained +to sully his sword with the blood of such a villain. But +his spirit was so high that those who wished his death knew +that his courage was like his charity, and never turned any +man away; and he died by the hands of Mohun, and the +other two cut-throats that were set on him. The queen's +ambassador to Paris died, the loyal and devoted servant +of the House of Stuart, and a royal prince of Scotland +himself, and carrying the confidence, the repentance of +Queen Anne along with his own open devotion, and the +goodwill of millions in the country more, to the queen's +exiled brother and sovereign. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That party to which Lord Mohun belonged had the +benefit of his service, and now were well rid of such a ruffian. +He, and Meredith, and Macartney, were the Duke of +Marlborough's men; and the two colonels had been broke +but the year before for drinking perdition to the Tories. +His grace was a Whig now and a Hanoverian, and as eager +for war as Prince Eugene himself. I say not that he was +privy to Duke Hamilton's death, I say that his party +profited by it; and that three desperate and bloody instruments +were found to effect that murder. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As Esmond and the dean walked away from Kensington +discoursing of this tragedy, and how fatal it was to the +cause which they both had at heart; the street-criers were +already out with their broadsides, shouting through the +town the full, true, and horrible account of the death of +Lord Mohun and Duke Hamilton in a duel. A fellow had +got to Kensington, and was crying it in the square there +at very early morning, when Mr. Esmond happened to pass +by. He drove the man from under Beatrix's very window, +whereof the casement had been set open. The sun was +shining though 'twas November: he had seen the market-carts +rolling into London, the guard relieved at the Palace, +the labourers trudging to their work in the gardens between +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page388">[pg 388]</span><a name="Pg388" id="Pg388" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Kensington and the City—the wandering merchants and +hawkers filling the air with their cries. The world was +going to its business again, although dukes lay dead and +ladies mourned for them; and kings, very likely, lost their +chances. So night and day pass away, and to-morrow +comes, and our place knows us not. Esmond thought of +the courier, now galloping on the north road to inform +him, who was Earl of Arran yesterday, that he was Duke +of Hamilton to-day, and of a thousand great schemes, +hopes, ambitions, that were alive in the gallant heart, +beating a few hours since, and now in a little dust quiescent. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc85" id="toc85"></a> +<a name="pdf86" id="pdf86"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VII. I Visit Castlewood Once More</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Thus, for a third time, Beatrix's ambitious hopes were +circumvented, and she might well believe that a special +malignant fate watched and pursued her, tearing her prize +out of her hand just as she seemed to grasp it, and leaving +her with only rage and grief for her portion. Whatever +her feelings might have been of anger or of sorrow (and +I fear me that the former emotion was that which most +tore her heart), she would take no confidant, as people of +softer natures would have done under such a calamity; +her mother and her kinsman knew that she would disdain +their pity, and that to offer it would be but to infuriate +the cruel wound which fortune had inflicted. We knew +that her pride was awfully humbled and punished by this +sudden and terrible blow; she wanted no teaching of ours +to point out the sad moral of her story. Her fond mother +could give but her prayers, and her kinsman his faithful +friendship and patience to the unhappy stricken creature; +and it was only by hints, and a word or two uttered months +afterwards, that Beatrix showed she understood their silent +commiseration, and on her part was secretly thankful for +their forbearance. The people about the Court said there +was that in her manner which frightened away scoffing +and condolence: she was above their triumph and their +pity, and acted her part in that dreadful tragedy greatly +and courageously; so that those who liked her least were +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page389">[pg 389]</span><a name="Pg389" id="Pg389" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +yet forced to admire her. We, who watched her after her +disaster, could not but respect the indomitable courage +and majestic calm with which she bore it. <span class="tei tei-q">“I would rather +see her tears than her pride,”</span> her mother said, who was +accustomed to bear her sorrows in a very different way, +and to receive them as the stroke of God, with an awful +submission and meekness. But Beatrix's nature was +different to that tender parent's; she seemed to accept +her grief, and to defy it; nor would she allow it (I believe +not even in private, and in her own chamber) to extort +from her the confession of even a tear of humiliation or +a cry of pain. Friends and children of our race, who +come after me, in which way will you bear your trials? +I know one that prays God will give you love rather than +pride, and that the Eye all-seeing shall find you in the +humble place. Not that we should judge proud spirits +otherwise than charitably. 'Tis nature hath fashioned +some for ambition and dominion, as it hath formed others +for obedience and gentle submission. The leopard follows +his nature as the lamb does, and acts after leopard law; +she can neither help her beauty, nor her courage, nor her +cruelty; nor a single spot on her shining coat; nor the +conquering spirit which impels her; nor the shot which +brings her down. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +During that well-founded panic the Whigs had, lest the +queen should forsake their Hanoverian prince, bound by +oaths and treaties as she was to him, and recall her brother, +who was allied to her by yet stronger ties of nature and +duty; the Prince of Savoy, and the boldest of that party +of the Whigs, were for bringing the young Duke of Cambridge +over, in spite of the queen and the outcry of her +Tory servants, arguing that the electoral prince, a peer +and prince of the blood-royal of this realm too, and in +the line of succession to the crown, had a right to sit in +the Parliament whereof he was a member, and to dwell +in the country which he one day was to govern. Nothing +but the strongest ill will expressed by the queen, and the +people about her, and menaces of the royal resentment, +should this scheme be persisted in, prevented it from being +carried into effect. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The boldest on our side were, in like manner, for having +our prince into the country. The undoubted inheritor of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page390">[pg 390]</span><a name="Pg390" id="Pg390" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the right divine; the feelings of more than half the nation, +of almost all the clergy, of the gentry of England and +Scotland with him; entirely innocent of the crime for +which his father suffered—brave, young, handsome, unfortunate—who +in England would dare to molest the prince +should he come among us, and fling himself upon British +generosity, hospitality, and honour? An invader with an +army of Frenchmen behind him, Englishmen of spirit would +resist to the death, and drive back to the shores whence +he came; but a prince, alone, armed with his right only, +and relying on the loyalty of his people, was sure, many +of his friends argued, of welcome, at least of safety, among +us. The hand of his sister the queen, of the people his +subjects, never could be raised to do him a wrong. But +the queen was timid by nature, and the successive ministers +she had, had private causes for their irresolution. The +bolder and honester men, who had at heart the illustrious +young exile's cause, had no scheme of interest of their own +to prevent them from seeing the right done, and, provided +only he came as an Englishman, were ready to venture +their all to welcome and defend him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +St. John and Harley both had kind words in plenty for +the prince's adherents, and gave him endless promises of +future support; but hints and promises were all they +could be got to give; and some of his friends were for +measures much bolder, more efficacious, and more open. +With a party of these, some of whom are yet alive, and some +whose names Mr. Esmond has no right to mention, he found +himself engaged the year after that miserable death of +Duke Hamilton, which deprived the prince of his most +courageous ally in this country. Dean Atterbury was one +of the friends whom Esmond may mention, as the brave +bishop is now beyond exile and persecution, and to him, +and one or two more, the colonel opened himself of a +scheme of his own, that, backed by a little resolution on +the prince's part, could not fail of bringing about the +accomplishment of their dearest wishes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My young Lord Viscount Castlewood had not come to +England to keep his majority, and had now been absent +from the country for several years. The year when his sister +was to be married and Duke Hamilton died, my lord was +kept at Bruxelles by his wife's lying-in. The gentle +Clotilda could not bear her husband out of her sight; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page391">[pg 391]</span><a name="Pg391" id="Pg391" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +perhaps she mistrusted the young scapegrace should he +ever get loose from her leading-strings; and she kept him +by her side to nurse the baby and administer posset to +the gossips. Many a laugh poor Beatrix had had about +Frank's uxoriousness: his mother would have gone to +Clotilda when her time was coming, but that the mother-in-law +was already in possession, and the negotiations for +poor Beatrix's marriage were begun. A few months after +the horrid catastrophe in Hyde Park, my mistress and her +daughter retired to Castlewood, where my lord, it was +expected, would soon join them. But, to say truth, their +quiet household was little to his taste; he could be got to +come to Walcote but once after his first campaign; and then +the young rogue spent more than half his time in London, +not appearing at Court, or in public under his own name +and title, but frequenting plays, bagnios, and the very +worst company, under the name of Captain Esmond (whereby +his innocent kinsman got more than once into trouble); +and so under various pretexts, and in pursuit of all sorts +of pleasures, until he plunged into the lawful one of marriage, +Frank Castlewood had remained away from this country, +and was unknown, save amongst the gentlemen of the +army, with whom he had served abroad. The fond heart +of his mother was pained by this long absence. 'Twas all +that Henry Esmond could do to soothe her natural mortification, +and find excuses for his kinsman's levity. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the autumn of the year 1713, Lord Castlewood thought +of returning home. His first child had been a daughter; +Clotilda was in the way of gratifying his lordship with +a second, and the pious youth thought that, by bringing +his wife to his ancestral home, by prayers to St. Philip of +Castlewood, and what not, Heaven might be induced to +bless him with a son this time, for whose coming the +expectant mamma was very anxious. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The long-debated peace had been proclaimed this year +at the end of March; and France was open to us. Just +as Frank's poor mother had made all things ready for +Lord Castlewood's reception, and was eagerly expecting +her son, it was by Colonel Esmond's means that the kind +lady was disappointed of her longing, and obliged to defer +once more the darling hope of her heart. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond took horses to Castlewood. He had not seen +its ancient grey towers and well-remembered woods for +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page392">[pg 392]</span><a name="Pg392" id="Pg392" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +nearly fourteen years, and since he rode thence with my +lord, to whom his mistress with her young children by her +side waved an adieu, what ages seem to have passed since +then, what years of action and passion, of care, love, hope, +disaster! The children were grown up now, and had stories +of their own. As for Esmond, he felt to be a hundred +years old; his dear mistress only seemed unchanged; she +looked and welcomed him quite as of old. There was the +fountain in the court babbling its familiar music, the old +hall and its furniture, the carved chair my late lord used, +the very flagon he drank from. Esmond's mistress knew +he would like to sleep in the little room he used to occupy; +'twas made ready for him, and wall-flowers and sweet herbs +set in the adjoining chamber, the chaplain's room. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In tears of not unmanly emotion, with prayers of submission +to the awful Dispenser of death and life, of good +and evil fortune, Mr. Esmond passed a part of that first +night at Castlewood, lying awake for many hours as the +clock kept tolling (in tones so well remembered), looking +back, as all men will, that revisit their home of childhood, +over the great gulf of time, and surveying himself on the +distant bank yonder, a sad little melancholy boy, with his +lord still alive—his dear mistress, a girl yet, her children +sporting around her. Years ago, a boy on that very bed, +when she had blessed him and called him her knight, he +had made a vow to be faithful and never desert her dear +service. Had he kept that fond boyish promise? Yes, +before Heaven; yes, praise be to God! His life had been +hers; his blood, his fortune, his name, his whole heart +ever since had been hers and her children's. All night long +he was dreaming his boyhood over again, and waking +fitfully; he half fancied he heard Father Holt calling to +him from the next chamber, and that he was coming in +and out from the mysterious window. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond rose up before the dawn, passed into the next +room, where the air was heavy with the odour of the wall-flowers; +looked into the brasier where the papers had been +burnt, into the old presses where Holt's books and papers +had been kept, and tried the spring, and whether the +window worked still. The spring had not been touched +for years, but yielded at length, and the whole fabric of +the window sank down. He lifted it and it relapsed into +its frame; no one had ever passed thence since Holt used +it sixteen years ago. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page393">[pg 393]</span><a name="Pg393" id="Pg393" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond remembered his poor lord saying, on the last +day of his life, that Holt used to come in and out of the +house like a ghost, and knew that the father liked these +mysteries, and practised such secret disguises, entrances, +and exits; this was the way the ghost came and went, +his pupil had always conjectured. Esmond closed the casement +up again as the dawn was rising over Castlewood +village; he could hear the clinking at the blacksmith's +forge yonder among the trees, across the green, and past +the river, on which a mist still lay sleeping. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Next Esmond opened that long cupboard over the woodwork +of the mantelpiece, big enough to hold a man, and +in which Mr. Holt used to keep sundry secret properties +of his. The two swords he remembered so well as a boy, +lay actually there still, and Esmond took them out and +wiped them, with a strange curiosity of emotion. There +were a bundle of papers here, too, which no doubt had +been left at Holt's last visit to the place, in my lord +viscount's life, that very day when the priest had been +arrested and taken to Hexham Castle. Esmond made free +with these papers, and found treasonable matter of King +William's reign, the names of Charnock and Perkins, Sir +John Fenwick and Sir John Friend, Rookwood and Lodwick, +Lords Montgomery and Ailesbury, Clarendon and +Yarmouth, that had all been engaged in plots against the +usurper; a letter from the Duke of Berwick too, and one +from the king at St. Germains, offering to confer upon +his trusty and well-beloved Francis Viscount Castlewood +the titles of Earl and Marquis of Esmond, bestowed by +patent royal, and in the fourth year of his reign, upon +Thomas Viscount Castlewood and the heirs male of his +body, in default of which issue the ranks and dignities +were to pass to Francis aforesaid. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This was the paper, whereof my lord had spoken, which +Holt showed him the very day he was arrested, and for +an answer to which he would come back in a week's time. +I put these papers hastily into the crypt whence I had +taken them, being interrupted by a tapping of a light finger +at the ring of the chamber-door: 'twas my kind mistress, +with her face full of love and welcome. She, too, had +passed the night wakefully, no doubt; but neither asked +the other how the hours had been spent. There are things +we divine without speaking, and know though they happen +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page394">[pg 394]</span><a name="Pg394" id="Pg394" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +out of our sight. This fond lady hath told me that she +knew both days when I was wounded abroad. Who shall +say how far sympathy reaches, and how truly love can +prophesy? <span class="tei tei-q">“I looked into your room,”</span> was all she said; +<span class="tei tei-q">“the bed was vacant, the little old bed! I knew I should +find you here.”</span> And tender and blushing faintly with +a benediction in her eyes, the gentle creature kissed him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They walked out, hand-in-hand, through the old court, +and to the terrace-walk, where the grass was glistening +with dew, and the birds in the green woods above were +singing their delicious choruses under the blushing morning +sky. How well all things were remembered! The ancient +towers and gables of the hall darkling against the east, +the purple shadows on the green slopes, the quaint devices +and carvings of the dial, the forest-crowned heights, the +fair yellow plain cheerful with crops and corn, the shining +river rolling through it towards the pearly hills beyond; +all these were before us, along with a thousand beautiful +memories of our youth, beautiful and sad, but as real and +vivid in our minds as that fair and always-remembered +scene our eyes beheld once more. We forget nothing. The +memory sleeps, but awakens again; I often think how it +shall be when, after the last sleep of death, the réveillé +shall arouse us for ever, and the past in one flash of self-consciousness +rush back, like the soul, revivified. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The house would not be up for some hours yet (it was +July, and the dawn was only just awake), and here Esmond +opened himself to his mistress, of the business he had in +hand, and what part Frank was to play in it. He knew +he could confide anything to her, and that the fond soul +would die rather than reveal it; and bidding her keep the +secret from all, he laid it entirely before his mistress (always +as stanch a little loyalist as any in the kingdom), and +indeed was quite sure that any plan of his was secure of +her applause and sympathy. Never was such a glorious +scheme to her partial mind, never such a devoted knight +to execute it. An hour or two may have passed whilst +they were having their colloquy. Beatrix came out to +them just as their talk was over; her tall beautiful form +robed in sable (which she wore without ostentation ever +since last year's catastrophe), sweeping over the green +terrace, and casting its shadows before her across the grass. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She made us one of her grand curtsies smiling, and called +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page395">[pg 395]</span><a name="Pg395" id="Pg395" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +us <span class="tei tei-q">“the young people”</span>. She was older, paler, and more +majestic than in the year before; her mother seemed the +youngest of the two. She never once spoke of her grief, +Lady Castlewood told Esmond, or alluded, save by a quiet +word or two, to the death of her hopes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Beatrix came back to Castlewood she took to +visiting all the cottages and all the sick. She set up a +school of children, and taught singing to some of them. +We had a pair of beautiful old organs in Castlewood Church, +on which she played admirably, so that the music there +became to be known in the country for many miles round, +and no doubt people came to see the fair organist as well +as to hear her. Parson Tusher and his wife were established +at the vicarage, but his wife had brought him no children +wherewith Tom might meet his enemies at the gate. Honest +Tom took care not to have many such, his great shovel-hat +was in his hand for everybody. He was profuse of +bows and compliments. He behaved to Esmond as if the +colonel had been a commander-in-chief; he dined at the +hall that day, being Sunday, and would not partake of +pudding except under extreme pressure. He deplored my +lord's perversion, but drank his lordship's health very +devoutly; and an hour before at church sent the colonel +to sleep, with a long, learned, and refreshing sermon. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's visit home was but for two days; the business +he had in hand calling him away and out of the country. +Ere he went, he saw Beatrix but once alone, and then she +summoned him out of the long tapestry room, where he +and his mistress were sitting, quite as in old times, into +the adjoining chamber, that had been Viscountess Isabel's +sleeping-apartment, and where Esmond perfectly well +remembered seeing the old lady sitting up in the bed, in +her night-rail, that morning when the troop of guard came +to fetch her. The most beautiful woman in England lay +in that bed now, whereof the great damask hangings were +scarce faded since Esmond saw them last. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here stood Beatrix in her black robes, holding a box +in her hand; 'twas that which Esmond had given her +before her marriage, stamped with a coronet which the +disappointed girl was never to wear; and containing his +aunt's legacy of diamonds. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You had best take these with you, Harry,”</span> says she; +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have no need of diamonds any more.”</span> There was not the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page396">[pg 396]</span><a name="Pg396" id="Pg396" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +least token of emotion in her quiet low voice. She held out +the black shagreen-case with her fair arm, that did not +shake in the least. Esmond saw she wore a black velvet +bracelet on it, with my lord duke's picture in enamel; he +had given it her but three days before he fell. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond said the stones were his no longer, and strove to +turn off that proffered restoration with a laugh: <span class="tei tei-q">“Of what +good,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“are they to me? The diamond loop to his +hat did not set off Prince Eugene, and will not make my +yellow face look any handsomer.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You will give them to your wife, cousin,”</span> says she. <span class="tei tei-q">“My +cousin, your wife has a lovely complexion and shape.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Beatrix,”</span> Esmond burst out, the old fire flaming out as +it would at times, <span class="tei tei-q">“will you wear those trinkets at your +marriage? You whispered once you did not know me: you +know me better now: how I sought, what I have sighed +for, for ten years, what forgone!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A price for your constancy, my lord!”</span> says she; <span class="tei tei-q">“such +a <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">preux chevalier</span></span> wants +to be paid. Oh fie, cousin!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Again,”</span> Esmond spoke out, <span class="tei tei-q">“if I do something you have +at heart; something worthy of me and you; something +that shall make me a name with which to endow you; will +you take it? There was a chance for me once, you said; +is it impossible to recall it? Never shake your head, but +hear me: say you will hear me a year hence. If I come +back to you and bring you fame, will that please you? If +I do what you desire most—what he who is dead desired +most—will that soften you?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What is it, Henry?”</span> says she, her face lighting up; +<span class="tei tei-q">“what mean you?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Ask no questions,”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“wait, and give me but time; +if I bring back that you long for, that I have a thousand +times heard you pray for, will you have no reward for +him who has done you that service? Put away those +trinkets, keep them: it shall not be at my marriage, it shall +not be at yours, but if man can do it, I swear a day shall +come when there shall be a feast in your house, and you +shall be proud to wear them. I say no more now; put aside +these words, and lock away yonder box until the day when +I shall remind you of both. All I pray of you now is, to +wait and to remember.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You are going out of the country?”</span> says Beatrix, in +some agitation. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page397">[pg 397]</span><a name="Pg397" id="Pg397" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, to-morrow,”</span> says Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“To Lorraine, cousin?”</span> says Beatrix, laying her hand on +his arm; 'twas the hand on which she wore the duke's +bracelet. <span class="tei tei-q">“Stay, Harry!”</span> continued she, with a tone that +had more despondency in it than she was accustomed to +show. <span class="tei tei-q">“Hear a last word. I do love you. I do admire you—who +would not, that has known such love as yours has +been for us all? But I think I have no heart; at least, +I have never seen the man that could touch it; and, had +I found him, I would have followed him in rags had he been +a private soldier, or to sea, like one of those buccaneers you +used to read to us about when we were children. I would +do anything for such a man, bear anything for him: but +I never found one. You were ever too much of a slave to +win my heart; even my lord duke could not command it. +I had not been happy had I married him. I knew that three +months after our engagement—and was too vain to break +it. O Harry! I cried once or twice, not for him, but with +tears of rage because I could not be sorry for him. I was +frightened to find I was glad of his death; and were I joined +to you, I should have the same sense of servitude, the same +longing to escape. We should both be unhappy, and you +the most, who are as jealous as the duke was himself. +I tried to love him; I tried, indeed I did: affected gladness +when he came: submitted to hear when he was by me, +and tried the wife's part I thought I was to play for the +rest of my days. But half an hour of that complaisance +wearied me, and what would a lifetime be? My thoughts +were away when he was speaking; and I was thinking, +Oh that this man would drop my hand, and rise up from +before my feet! I knew his great and noble qualities, +greater and nobler than mine a thousand times, as yours +are, cousin, I tell you, a million and a million times better. +But 'twas not for these I took him. I took him to have +a great place in the world, and I lost it. I lost it, and do not +deplore him—and I often thought, as I listened to his fond +vows and ardent words, Oh, if I yield to this man, and meet +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">the other</span></span>, I shall hate him and leave him! I am not good, +Harry: my mother is gentle and good like an angel. I wonder +how she should have had such a child. She is weak, but +she would die rather than do a wrong; I am stronger than +she, but I would do it out of defiance. I do not care for +what the parsons tell me with their droning sermons: +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page398">[pg 398]</span><a name="Pg398" id="Pg398" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +I used to see them at Court as mean and as worthless as the +meanest woman there. Oh, I am sick and weary of the +world! I wait but for one thing, and when 'tis done, I will +take Frank's religion and your poor mother's, and go into +a nunnery, and end like her. Shall I wear the diamonds +then?—they say the nuns wear their best trinkets the day +they take the veil. I will put them away as you bid me; +farewell, cousin, mamma is pacing the next room, racking +her little head to know what we have been saying. She is +jealous, all women are. I sometimes think that is the only +womanly quality I have.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Farewell. Farewell, brother!”</span> She gave him her cheek +as a brotherly privilege. The cheek was as cold as marble. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's mistress showed no signs of jealousy when he +returned to the room where she was. She had schooled +herself so as to look quite inscrutably, when she had a mind. +Amongst her other feminine qualities she had that of being +a perfect dissembler. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He rid away from Castlewood to attempt the task he was +bound on, and stand or fall by it; in truth his state of mind +was such, that he was eager for some outward excitement +to counteract that gnawing malady which he was inwardly +enduring. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc87" id="toc87"></a> +<a name="pdf88" id="pdf88"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter VIII. I Travel To France And Bring Home A Portrait Of Rigaud</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond did not think fit to take leave at Court, or to +inform all the world of Pall Mall and the coffee-houses, that +he was about to quit England; and chose to depart in the +most private manner possible. He procured a pass as for +a Frenchman, through Dr. Atterbury, who did that business +for him, getting the signature even from Lord Bolingbroke's +office, without any personal application to the secretary. +Lockwood, his faithful servant, he took with him to Castlewood, +and left behind there: giving out ere he left London +that he himself was sick, and gone to Hampshire for +country air, and so departed as silently as might be upon +his business. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As Frank Castlewood's aid was indispensable for Mr. +Esmond's scheme, his first visit was to Bruxelles (passing +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page399">[pg 399]</span><a name="Pg399" id="Pg399" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +by way of Antwerp, where the Duke of Marlborough was in +exile), and in the first-named place Harry found his dear +young Benedict, the married man, who appeared to be +rather out of humour with his matrimonial chain, and +clogged with the obstinate embraces which Clotilda kept +round his neck. Colonel Esmond was not presented to her; +but Monsieur Simon was, a gentleman of the Royal Cravat +(Esmond bethought him of the regiment of his honest Irishman, +whom he had seen that day after Malplaquet, when +he first set eyes on the young king); and Monsieur Simon +was introduced to the Viscountess Castlewood, +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">née</span></span> Comptesse +Wertheim; to the numerous counts, the Lady Clotilda's +tall brothers; to her father the chamberlain; and +to the lady his wife, Frank's mother-in-law, a tall and +majestic person of large proportions, such as became the +mother of such a company of grenadiers as her warlike sons +formed. The whole race were at free quarters in the +little castle nigh to Bruxelles which Frank had taken; rode +his horses; drank his wine; and lived easily at the poor +lad's charges. Mr. Esmond had always maintained a perfect +fluency in the French, which was his mother tongue; and +if this family (that spoke French with the twang which the +Flemings use) discovered any inaccuracy in Mr. Simon's +pronunciation, 'twas to be attributed to the latter's long +residence in England, where he had married and remained +ever since he was taken prisoner at Blenheim. His story +was perfectly pat; there were none there to doubt it save +honest Frank, and he was charmed with his kinsman's +scheme, when he became acquainted with it; and, in truth, +always admired Colonel Esmond with an affectionate +fidelity, and thought his cousin the wisest and best of all +cousins and men. Frank entered heart and soul into the +plan, and liked it the better as it was to take him to Paris, +out of reach of his brothers, his father, and his mother-in-law, +whose attentions rather fatigued him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Castlewood, I have said, was born in the same year as +the Prince of Wales; had not a little of the prince's air, +height, and figure; and, especially since he had seen the +Chevalier de St. George on the occasion before named, +took no small pride in his resemblance to a person so +illustrious; which likeness he increased by all the means in +his power, wearing fair brown periwigs, such as the prince +wore, and ribbons, and so forth, of the chevalier's colour. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page400">[pg 400]</span><a name="Pg400" id="Pg400" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +This resemblance was, in truth, the circumstance on +which Mr. Esmond's scheme was founded; and, having +secured Frank's secrecy and enthusiasm, he left him to +continue his journey, and see the other personages on whom +its success depended. The place whither Mr. Simon next +travelled was Bar, in Lorraine, where that merchant arrived +with a consignment of broadcloths, valuable laces from +Malines, and letters for his correspondent there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Would you know how a prince, heroic from misfortunes, +and descended from a line of kings, whose race seemed to +be doomed like the Atridae of old—would you know how +he was employed, when the envoy who came to him through +danger and difficulty beheld him for the first time? The +young king, in a flannel jacket, was at tennis with the +gentlemen of his suite, crying out after the balls, and swearing +like the meanest of his subjects. The next time Mr. +Esmond saw him, 'twas when Monsieur Simon took a packet +of laces to Miss Oglethorpe; the prince's antechamber in +those days, at which ignoble door men were forced to knock +for admission to his Majesty. The admission was given, +the envoy found the king and the mistress together; the +pair were at cards, and his Majesty was in liquor. He cared +more for three honours than three kingdoms; and a half-dozen +glasses of ratafia made him forget all his woes and +his losses, his father's crown, and his grandfather's head. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Esmond did not open himself to the prince then. His +Majesty was scarce in a condition to hear him; and he +doubted whether a king who drank so much could keep +a secret in his fuddled head; or whether a hand that shook +so, was strong enough to grasp at a crown. However at +last, and after taking counsel with the prince's advisers, +amongst whom were many gentlemen, honest and faithful, +Esmond's plan was laid before the king, and her actual +Majesty Queen Oglethorpe, in council. The prince liked +the scheme well enough; 'twas easy and daring, and +suited to his reckless gaiety and lively youthful spirit. In +the morning after he had slept his wine off, he was very +gay, lively, and agreeable. His manner had an extreme +charm of archness, and a kind simplicity; and, to do her +justice, her Oglethorpean Majesty was kind, acute, resolute, +and of good counsel; she gave the prince much good advice +that he was too weak to follow, and loved him with a fidelity +which he returned with an ingratitude quite royal. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page401">[pg 401]</span><a name="Pg401" id="Pg401" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Having his own forebodings regarding his scheme should +it ever be fulfilled, and his usual sceptic doubts as to the +benefit which might accrue to the country by bringing +a tipsy young monarch back to it, Colonel Esmond had his +audience of leave and quiet. Monsieur Simon took his +departure. At any rate the youth at Bar was as good as the +older Pretender at Hanover; if the worst came to the worst, +the Englishman could be dealt with as easy as the German. +Monsieur Simon trotted on that long journey from Nancy +to Paris, and saw that famous town, stealthily and like +a spy, as in truth he was; and where, sure, more magnificence +and more misery is heaped together, more rags and +lace, more filth and gilding, than in any city in this world. +Here he was put in communication with the king's best +friend, his half-brother, the famous Duke of Berwick; +Esmond recognized him as the stranger who had visited +Castlewood now near twenty years ago. His grace opened +to him when he found that Mr. Esmond was one of Webb's +brave regiment, that had once been his grace's own. He +was the sword and buckler indeed of the Stuart cause: there +was no stain on his shield except the bar across it, which +Marlborough's sister left him. Had Berwick been his +father's heir, James the Third had assuredly sat on the +English throne. He could dare, endure, strike, speak, be +silent. The fire and genius, perhaps, he had not (that were +given to baser men), but except these he had some of the +best qualities of a leader. His grace knew Esmond's father +and history; and hinted at the latter in such a way as +made the colonel to think he was aware of the particulars +of that story. But Esmond did not choose to enter on it, +nor did the duke press him. Mr. Esmond said, <span class="tei tei-q">“No doubt +he should come by his name if ever greater people came by +theirs.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What confirmed Esmond in his notion that the Duke of +Berwick knew of his case was, that when the colonel went +to pay his duty at St. Germains, her Majesty once addressed +him by the title of Marquis. He took the queen the dutiful +remembrances of her goddaughter, and the lady whom, in +the days of her prosperity, her Majesty had befriended. +The queen remembered Rachel Esmond perfectly well, had +heard of my Lord Castlewood's conversion, and was much +edified by that act of Heaven in his favour. She knew that +others of that family had been of the only true Church too: +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page402">[pg 402]</span><a name="Pg402" id="Pg402" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your father and your mother, +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">monsieur le marquis</span></span>,”</span> her +Majesty said (that was the only time she used the phrase). +Monsieur Simon bowed very low, and said he had found +other parents than his own who had taught him differently; +but these had only one king: on which her Majesty was +pleased to give him a medal blessed by the Pope, which +had been found very efficacious in cases similar to his own, +and to promise she would offer up prayers for his conversion +and that of the family: which no doubt this pious lady did, +though up to the present moment, and after twenty-seven +years, Colonel Esmond is bound to say that neither the +medal nor the prayers have had the slightest known effect +upon his religious convictions. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for the splendour of Versailles, Monsieur Simon, the +merchant, only beheld them as a humble and distant +spectator, seeing the old king but once, when he went to +feed his carps; and asking for no presentation at his +Majesty's Court. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By this time my Lord Viscount Castlewood was got to +Paris, where, as the London prints presently announced, +her ladyship was brought to bed of a son and heir. For +a long while afterwards she was in a delicate state of health, +and ordered by the physicians not to travel; otherwise +'twas well known that the Viscount Castlewood proposed +returning to England, and taking up his residence at his +own seat. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whilst he remained at Paris, my Lord Castlewood had +his picture done by the famous French painter Monsieur +Rigaud, a present for his mother in London; and this piece +Monsieur Simon took back with him when he returned to +that city, which he reached about May, in the year 1714, +very soon after which time my Lady Castlewood and her +daughter, and their kinsman, Colonel Esmond, who had +been at Castlewood all this time, likewise returned to +London; her ladyship occupying her house at Kensington, +Mr. Esmond returning to his lodgings at Knightsbridge, +nearer the town, and once more making his appearance at +all public places, his health greatly improved by his long +stay in the country. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The portrait of my lord, in a handsome gilt frame, was +hung up in the place of honour in her ladyship's drawing-room. +His lordship was represented in his scarlet uniform +of Captain of the Guard, with a light-brown periwig, a cuirass +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page403">[pg 403]</span><a name="Pg403" id="Pg403" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +under his coat, a blue ribbon, and a fall of Bruxelles lace. +Many of her ladyship's friends admired the piece beyond +measure, and flocked to see it; Bishop Atterbury, Mr. Lesly, +good old Mr. Collier, and others amongst the clergy, were +delighted with the performance, and many among the first +quality examined and praised it; only I must own that +Dr. Tusher happening to come up to London, and seeing +the picture (it was ordinarily covered by a curtain, but on +this day Miss Beatrix happened to be looking at it when +the doctor arrived), the Vicar of Castlewood vowed he could +not see any resemblance in the piece to his old pupil, except +perhaps, a little about the chin and the periwig; but we all +of us convinced him, that he had not seen Frank for five +years or more; that he knew no more about the fine arts +than a ploughboy, and that he must be mistaken; and we +sent him home assured that the piece was an excellent likeness. +As for my Lord Bolingbroke, who honoured her +ladyship with a visit occasionally, when Colonel Esmond +showed him the picture he burst out laughing, and asked +what devilry he was engaged on? Esmond owned simply +that the portrait was not that of Viscount Castlewood, +besought the secretary on his honour to keep the secret, +said that the ladies of the house were enthusiastic Jacobites, +as was well known; and confessed that the picture was +that of the Chevalier St. George. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The truth is, that Mr. Simon, waiting upon Lord Castlewood +one day at Monsieur Rigaud's, whilst his lordship was +sitting for his picture, affected to be much struck with +a piece representing the chevalier, whereof the head only +was finished, and purchased it of the painter for a hundred +crowns. It had been intended the artist said, for Miss +Oglethorpe, the prince's mistress, but that young lady +quitting Paris, had left the work on the artist's hands; +and taking this piece home, when my lord's portrait arrived, +Colonel Esmond, alias Monsieur Simon, had copied the +uniform and other accessories from my lord's picture to fill +up Rigaud's incomplete canvas: the colonel all his life +having been a practitioner of painting, and especially +followed it during his long residence in the cities of Flanders, +among the masterpieces of Vandyck and Rubens. My +grandson hath the piece, such as it is, in Virginia now. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At the commencement of the month of June, Miss Beatrix +Esmond, and my lady viscountess, her mother, arrived +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page404">[pg 404]</span><a name="Pg404" id="Pg404" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +from Castlewood; the former to resume her service at +Court, which had been interrupted by the fatal catastrophe +of Duke Hamilton's death. She once more took her place, +then, in her Majesty's suite and at the maids' table, being +always a favourite with Mrs. Masham, the queen's chief +woman, partly perhaps on account of her bitterness against +the Duchess of Marlborough, whom Miss Beatrix loved no +better than her rival did. The gentlemen about the Court, +my Lord Bolingbroke amongst others, owned that the +young lady had come back handsomer than ever, and that +the serious and tragic air, which her face now involuntarily +wore, became her better than her former smiles and archness. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All the old domestics at the little house of Kensington +Square were changed; the old steward that had served the +family any time these five-and-twenty years, since the birth +of the children of the house, was dispatched into the kingdom +of Ireland to see my lord's estate there: the housekeeper, +who had been my lady's woman time out of mind, +and the attendant of the young children, was sent away +grumbling to Walcote, to see to the new painting and preparing +of that house, which my lady dowager intended to +occupy for the future, giving up Castlewood to her daughter-in-law, +that might be expected daily from France. Another +servant the viscountess had was dismissed too—with a +gratuity—on the pretext that her ladyship's train of +domestics must be diminished; so, finally, there was not +left in the household a single person who had belonged to it +during the time my young Lord Castlewood was yet at +home. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For the plan which Colonel Esmond had in view, and the +stroke he intended, 'twas necessary that the very smallest +number of persons should be put in possession of his secret. +It scarce was known, except to three or four out of his +family, and it was kept to a wonder. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the 10th of June, 1714, there came by Mr. Prior's +messenger from Paris, a letter from my Lord Viscount +Castlewood to his mother, saying that he had been foolish +in regard of money matters, that he was ashamed to own +he had lost at play, and by other extravagances; and that +instead of having great entertainments as he had hoped +at Castlewood this year, he must live as quiet as he could, +and make every effort to be saving. So far every word of +poor Frank's letter was true, nor was there a doubt that +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page405">[pg 405]</span><a name="Pg405" id="Pg405" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he and his tall brothers-in-law had spent a great deal more +than they ought, and engaged the revenues of the Castlewood +property, which the fond mother had husbanded and +improved so carefully during the time of her guardianship. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His <span class="tei tei-q">“Clotilda”</span>, Castlewood went on to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“was still +delicate, and the physicians thought her lying-in had best +take place at Paris. He should come without her ladyship, +and be at his mother's house about the 17th or 18th day of +June, proposing to take horse from Paris immediately, and +bringing but a single servant with him; and he requested +that the lawyers of Gray's Inn might be invited to meet +him with their account, and the land-steward come from +Castlewood with his, so that he might settle with them +speedily, raise a sum of money whereof he stood in need, +and be back to his viscountess by the time of her lying-in.”</span> +Then his lordship gave some of the news of the town, sent +his remembrance to kinsfolk, and so the letter ended. +'Twas put in the common post, and no doubt the French +police and the English there had a copy of it, to which they +were exceeding welcome. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Two days after another letter was dispatched by the +public post of France, in the same open way, and this, +after giving news of the fashion at Court there, ended by +the following sentences, in which, but for those that had +the key, 'twould be difficult for any man to find any secret +lurked at all:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +(The king will take) medicine on Thursday. His Majesty is +better than he hath been of late, though incommoded by indigestion +from his too great appetite. Madame Maintenon continues well. +They have performed a play of Mons. Racine at St. Cyr. The +Duke of Shrewsbury and Mr. Prior, our envoy, and all the English +nobility here were present at it. (The Viscount Castlewood's passports) +were refused to him, 'twas said; his lordship being sued by +a goldsmith for </span><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">Vaisselle plate</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%">, and a pearl necklace supplied to +Mademoiselle Meruel of the French Comedy. 'Tis a pity such +news should get abroad (and travel to England) about our young +nobility here. Mademoiselle Meruel has been sent to the Fort +l'Evesque; they say she has ordered not only plate, but furniture, +and a chariot and horses (under that lord's name), of which extravagance +his unfortunate viscountess knows nothing. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +(His majesty will be) eighty-two years of age on his next birthday. +The Court prepares to celebrate it with a great feast. Mr. Prior +is in a sad way about their refusing at home to send him his plate. +All here admired my lord viscount's portrait, and said it was a +masterpiece of Rigaud. Have you seen it? It is (at the Lady +</span><span class="tei tei-pb" id="page406">[pg 406]</span><a name="Pg406" id="Pg406" class="tei tei-anchor"></a><span style="font-size: 90%"> +Castlewood's house in Kensington Square). I think no English +painter could produce such a piece. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +Our poor friend the abbé hath been at the Bastille, but is now +transported to the Conciergerie (where his friends may visit him. +They are to ask for) a remission of his sentence soon. Let us hope +the poor rogue will have repented in prison. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +(The Lord Castlewood) has had the affair of the plate made up, +and departs for England. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +Is not this a dull letter? I have a cursed headache with drinking +with Mat and some more overnight, and tipsy or sober am +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +Thine ever ——. +</span></p> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All this letter, save some dozen of words which I have +put above between brackets, was mere idle talk, though +the substance of the letter was as important as any letter +well could be. It told those that had the key, that <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">the +king will take the Viscount Castlewood's passports and travel +to England under that lord's name. His Majesty will be at +the Lady Castlewood's house in Kensington Square, where +his friends may visit him; they are to ask for the Lord Castlewood</span></em>. +This note may have passed under Mr. Prior's eyes, +and those of our new allies the French, and taught them +nothing; though it explains sufficiently to persons in +London what the event was which was about to happen, +as 'twill show those who read my memoirs a hundred years +hence, what was that errand on which Colonel Esmond +of late had been busy. Silently and swiftly to do that +about which others were conspiring, and thousands of +Jacobites all over the country, clumsily caballing; alone to +effect that which the leaders here were only talking about; +to bring the Prince of Wales into the country openly in +the face of all, under Bolingbroke's very eyes, the walls +placarded with the proclamation signed with the secretary's +name, and offering five hundred pounds reward for his +apprehension: this was a stroke, the playing and winning +of which might well give any adventurous spirit pleasure: +the loss of the stake might involve a heavy penalty, but +all our family were eager to risk that for the glorious chance +of winning the game. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Nor should it be called a game, save perhaps with the +chief player, who was not more or less sceptical than most +public men with whom he had acquaintance in that age. +(Is there ever a public man in England that altogether +believes in his party? Is there one, however doubtful, +that will not fight for it?) Young Frank was ready to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page407">[pg 407]</span><a name="Pg407" id="Pg407" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +fight without much thinking, he was a Jacobite as his +father before him was; all the Esmonds were Royalists. +Give him but the word, he would cry, <span class="tei tei-q">“God save King +James!”</span> before the palace guard, or at the Maypole in +the Strand; and with respect to the women, as is usual +with them, 'twas not a question of party but of faith; +their belief was a passion; either Esmond's mistress or +her daughter would have died for it cheerfully. I have +laughed often, talking of King William's reign, and said +I thought Lady Castlewood was disappointed the king +did not persecute the family more; and those who know +the nature of women may fancy for themselves, what +needs not here be written down, the rapture with which +these neophytes received the mystery when made known +to them; the eagerness with which they looked forward to +its completion; the reverence which they paid the minister +who initiated them into that secret Truth, now known +only to a few, but presently to reign over the world. Sure +there is no bound to the trustingness of women. Look at +Arria worshipping the drunken clodpate of a husband who +beats her; look at Cornelia treasuring as a jewel in her +maternal heart the oaf her son; I have known a woman +preach Jesuit's bark, and afterwards Dr. Berkeley's tar-water, +as though to swallow them were a divine decree, +and to refuse them no better than blasphemy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On his return from France Colonel Esmond put himself +at the head of this little knot of fond conspirators. No +death or torture he knew would frighten them out of their +constancy. When he detailed his plan for bringing the +king back, his elder mistress thought that that restoration +was to be attributed under Heaven to the Castlewood +family and to its chief, and she worshipped and loved +Esmond, if that could be, more than ever she had done. +She doubted not for one moment of the success of his +scheme, to mistrust which would have seemed impious in +her eyes. And as for Beatrix, when she became acquainted +with the plan, and joined it, as she did with all her heart, +she gave Esmond one of her searching bright looks: <span class="tei tei-q">“Ah, +Harry,”</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“why were you not the head of our house? +You are the only one fit to raise it; why do you give +that silly boy the name and the honour? But 'tis so in +the world; those get the prize that don't deserve or care +for it. I wish I could give you <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">your</span></em> silly prize, cousin, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page408">[pg 408]</span><a name="Pg408" id="Pg408" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +but I can't; I have tried and I can't.”</span> And she went away, +shaking her head mournfully, but always, it seemed to +Esmond, that her liking and respect for him was greatly +increased, since she knew what capability he had both to +act and bear; to do and to forgo. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc89" id="toc89"></a> +<a name="pdf90" id="pdf90"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter IX. The Original Of The Portrait Comes To England</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas announced in the family that my Lord Castlewood +would arrive, having a confidential French gentleman in +his suite, who acted as secretary to his lordship, and who +being a Papist, and a foreigner of a good family, though now +in rather a menial place, would have his meals served in +his chamber, and not with the domestics of the house. +The viscountess gave up her bedchamber contiguous to +her daughter's, and having a large convenient closet +attached to it, in which a bed was put up, ostensibly for +Monsieur Baptiste, the Frenchman; though, 'tis needless +to say, when the doors of the apartments were locked, and +the two guests retired within it, the young viscount became +the servant of the illustrious prince whom he entertained, +and gave up gladly the more convenient and airy chamber +and bed to his master. Madam Beatrix also retired to the +upper region, her chamber being converted into a sitting-room +for my lord. The better to carry the deceit, Beatrix +affected to grumble before the servants, and to be jealous that +she was turned out of her chamber to make way for my lord. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +No small preparations were made, you may be sure, and +no slight tremor of expectation caused the hearts of the +gentle ladies of Castlewood to flutter, before the arrival +of the personages who were about to honour their house. +The chamber was ornamented with flowers; the bed +covered with the very finest of linen; the two ladies insisting +on making it themselves, and kneeling down at the +bedside and kissing the sheets out of respect for the web +that was to hold the sacred person of a king. The toilet +was of silver and crystal; there was a copy of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Eikon +Basilike</span></span> laid on the writing-table; a portrait of the +martyred king hung always over the mantel, having +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page409">[pg 409]</span><a name="Pg409" id="Pg409" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a sword of my poor Lord Castlewood underneath it, and +a little picture or emblem which the widow loved always +to have before her eyes on waking, and in which the hair +of her lord and her two children was worked together. +Her books of private devotions, as they were all of the +English Church, she carried away with her to the upper +apartment which she destined for herself. The ladies +showed Mr. Esmond, when they were completed, the fond +preparations they had made. 'Twas then Beatrix knelt +down and kissed the linen sheets. As for her mother, Lady +Castlewood made a curtsy at the door, as she would have +done to the altar on entering a church, and owned that she +considered the chamber in a manner sacred. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The company in the servants' hall never for a moment +supposed that these preparations were made for any other +person than the young viscount, the lord of the house, +whom his fond mother had been for so many years without +seeing. Both ladies were perfect housewives, having the +greatest skill in the making of confections, scented waters, +&c., and keeping a notable superintendence over the +kitchen. Calves enough were killed to feed an army of +prodigal sons, Esmond thought, and laughed when he came +to wait on the ladies, on the day when the guests were to +arrive, to find two pairs of the finest and roundest arms +to be seen in England (my Lady Castlewood was remarkable +for this beauty of her person), covered with flour up above +the elbows, and preparing paste, and turning rolling-pins +in the housekeeper's closet. The guest would not arrive +till supper-time, and my lord would prefer having that +meal in his own chamber. You may be sure the brightest +plate of the house was laid out there, and can understand +why it was that the ladies insisted that they alone would +wait upon the young chief of the family. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Taking horse, Colonel Esmond rode rapidly to Rochester, +and there awaited the king in that very town where his +father had last set his foot on the English shore. A room +had been provided at an inn there for my Lord Castlewood +and his servant; and Colonel Esmond timed his ride so +well that he had scarce been half an hour in the place, +and was looking over the balcony into the yard of the +inn, when two travellers rode in at the inn-gate, and the +colonel running down, the next moment embraced his dear +young lord. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page410">[pg 410]</span><a name="Pg410" id="Pg410" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My lord's companion, acting the part of a domestic, +dismounted, and was for holding the viscount's stirrup; but +Colonel Esmond, calling to his own man, who was in the +court, bade him take the horses and settle with the lad +who had ridden the post along with the two travellers, +crying out in a cavalier tone in the French language to +my lord's companion, and affecting to grumble that my +lord's fellow was a Frenchman, and did not know the +money or habits of the country:—<span class="tei tei-q">“My man will see to +the horses, Baptiste,”</span> says Colonel Esmond: <span class="tei tei-q">“do you +understand English?”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Very leetle.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“So, follow my +lord and wait upon him at dinner in his own room.”</span> The +landlord and his people came up presently bearing the +dishes; 'twas well they made a noise and stir in the gallery, +or they might have found Colonel Esmond on his knee +before Lord Castlewood's servant, welcoming his Majesty +to his kingdom, and kissing the hand of the king. We +told the landlord that the Frenchman would wait on his +master; and Esmond's man was ordered to keep sentry +in the gallery without the door. The prince dined with +a good appetite, laughing and talking very gaily, and +condescendingly bidding his two companions to sit with +him at table. He was in better spirits than poor Frank +Castlewood, who Esmond thought might be wobegone on +account of parting with his divine Clotilda; but the prince +wishing to take a short siesta after dinner, and retiring +to an inner chamber where there was a bed, the cause of +poor Frank's discomfiture came out; and bursting into +tears, with many expressions of fondness, friendship, and +humiliation, the faithful lad gave his kinsman to understand +that he now knew all the truth, and the sacrifices which +Colonel Esmond had made for him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Seeing no good in acquainting poor Frank with that +secret, Mr. Esmond had entreated his mistress also not to +reveal it to her son. The prince had told the poor lad all +as they were riding from Dover: <span class="tei tei-q">“I had as lief he had shot +me, cousin,”</span> Frank said: <span class="tei tei-q">“I knew you were the best and +the bravest, and the kindest of all men”</span> (so the enthusiastic +young fellow went on); <span class="tei tei-q">“but I never thought I owed +you what I do, and can scarce bear the weight of the +obligation.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I stand in the place of your father,”</span> says Mr. Esmond +kindly, <span class="tei tei-q">“and sure a father may dispossess himself in +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page411">[pg 411]</span><a name="Pg411" id="Pg411" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +favour of his son. I abdicate the twopenny crown, and +invest you with the kingdom of Brentford; don't be a fool +and cry; you make a much taller and handsomer viscount +than ever I could.”</span> But the fond boy with oaths and +protestations, laughter and incoherent outbreaks of passionate +emotion, could not be got, for some little time, to +put up with Esmond's raillery; wanted to kneel down to +him, and kissed his hand; asked him and implored him +to order something, to bid Castlewood give his own life up +or take somebody else's; anything, so that he might show +his gratitude for the generosity Esmond showed him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The k——, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">he</span></em> laughed,”</span> Frank said, pointing to the +door where the sleeper was, and speaking in a low tone, +<span class="tei tei-q">“I don't think he should have laughed as he told me the +story. As we rode along from Dover, talking in French, +he spoke about you, and your coming to him at Bar; +he called you <span class="tei tei-q">‘<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">le grand sérieux</span></span>’</span>, +Don Bellianis of Greece, and I don't know what names; mimicking your manner”</span> +(here Castlewood laughed himself)—<span class="tei tei-q">“and he did it very well. +He seems to sneer at everything. He is not like a king: +somehow, Harry, I fancy you are like a king. He does +not seem to think what a stake we are all playing. He +would have stopped at Canterbury to run after a barmaid +there, had I not implored him to come on. He hath +a house at Chaillot where he used to go and bury himself +for weeks away from the queen, and with all sorts of bad +company,”</span> says Frank, with a demure look; <span class="tei tei-q">“you may +smile, but I am not the wild fellow I was; no, no, I have +been taught better,”</span> says Castlewood devoutly, making +a sign on his breast. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thou art my dear brave boy,”</span> says Colonel Esmond, +touched at the young fellow's simplicity, <span class="tei tei-q">“and there will be a +noble gentleman at Castlewood so long as my Frank is there.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The impetuous young lad was for going down on his +knees again, with another explosion of gratitude, but that +we heard the voice from the next chamber of the august +sleeper, just waking, calling out:—<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Eh, +La-Fleur, un verre d'eau</span></span>”</span>; his Majesty came +out yawning:—<span class="tei tei-q">“A pest,”</span> says +he, <span class="tei tei-q">“upon your English ale; 'tis so strong that, +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">ma foi</span></span>, it +hath turned my head.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The effect of the ale was like a spur upon our horses, +and we rode very quickly to London, reaching Kensington +at nightfall. Mr. Esmond's servant was left behind at +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page412">[pg 412]</span><a name="Pg412" id="Pg412" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Rochester, to take care of the tired horses, whilst we had +fresh beasts provided along the road. And galloping by +the prince's side the colonel explained to the Prince of +Wales what his movements had been; who the friends +were that knew of the expedition; whom, as Esmond +conceived, the prince should trust; entreating him, above +all, to maintain the very closest secrecy until the time +should come when his royal highness should appear. The +town swarmed with friends of the prince's cause; there +were scores of correspondents with St. Germains; Jacobites +known and secret; great in station and humble; about +the Court and the queen; in the Parliament, Church, and +among the merchants in the City. The prince had friends +numberless in the army, in the Privy Council, and the +officers of state. The great object, as it seemed, to the +small band of persons who had concerted that bold stroke, +who had brought the queen's brother into his native +country, was, that his visit should remain unknown till +the proper time came, when his presence should surprise +friends and enemies alike; and the latter should be found +so unprepared and disunited, that they should not find +time to attack him. We feared more from his friends than +from his enemies. The lies, and tittle-tattle sent over to +St. Germains by the Jacobite agents about London, had +done an incalculable mischief to his cause, and wofully +misguided him, and it was from these especially, that the +persons engaged in the present venture were anxious to +defend the chief actor in it.<a id="noteref_16" name="noteref_16" href="#note_16"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">16</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The party reached London by nightfall, leaving their +horses at the Posting-House over against Westminster, and +being ferried over the water where Lady Esmond's coach +was already in waiting. In another hour we were all +landed at Kensington, and the mistress of the house had +that satisfaction which her heart had yearned after for +many years, once more to embrace her son, who on his side, +with all his waywardness, ever retained a most tender +affection for his parent. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page413">[pg 413]</span><a name="Pg413" id="Pg413" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She did not refrain from this expression of her feeling, +though the domestics were by, and my Lord Castlewood's +attendant stood in the hall. Esmond had to whisper to +him in French to take his hat off. Monsieur Baptiste was +constantly neglecting his part with an inconceivable levity: +more than once on the ride to London, little observations +of the stranger, light remarks, and words betokening the +greatest ignorance of the country the prince came to govern, +had hurt the susceptibility of the two gentlemen forming +his escort; nor could either help owning in his secret mind +that they would have had his behaviour otherwise, and +that the laughter and the lightness, not to say licence, +which characterized his talk, scarce befitted such a great +prince, and such a solemn occasion. Not but that he +could act at proper times with spirit and dignity. He had +behaved, as we all knew, in a very courageous manner on +the field. Esmond had seen a copy of the letter the prince +writ with his own hand when urged by his friends in +England to abjure his religion, and admired that manly +and magnanimous reply by which he refused to yield to +the temptation. Monsieur Baptiste took off his hat, blushing +at the hint Colonel Esmond ventured to give him, +and said:—<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Tenez, +elle est jolie, la petite mère; Foi-de-Chevalier! +elle est charmante; mais l'autre, qui est cette +nymphe, cet astre qui brille, cette Diane qui descend sur +nous?</span></span>”</span> And he started back, and pushed forward, as +Beatrix was descending the stair. She was in colours for +the first time at her own house; she wore the diamonds +Esmond gave her; it had been agreed between them, that +she should wear these brilliants on the day when the king +should enter the house, and a queen she looked, radiant in +charms, and magnificent and imperial in beauty. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Castlewood himself was startled by that beauty and +splendour; he stepped back and gazed at his sister as +though he had not been aware before (nor was he, very +likely) how perfectly lovely she was, and I thought blushed +as he embraced her. The prince could not keep his eyes +off her; he quite forgot his menial part, though he had +been schooled to it, and a little light portmanteau prepared +expressly that he should carry it. He pressed forward +before my lord viscount. 'Twas lucky the servants' eyes +were busy in other directions, or they must have seen that +this was no servant, or at least a very insolent and rude one. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page414">[pg 414]</span><a name="Pg414" id="Pg414" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Again Colonel Esmond was obliged to cry out, <span class="tei tei-q">“Baptiste”</span>, +in a loud imperious voice, <span class="tei tei-q">“have a care to the valise”</span>; +at which hint the wilful young man ground his teeth +together with something very like a curse between them, +and then gave a brief look of anything but pleasure to his +Mentor. Being reminded, however, he shouldered the +little portmanteau, and carried it up the stair, Esmond +preceding him, and a servant with lighted tapers. He +flung down his burden sulkily in the bedchamber:—<span class="tei tei-q">“A +prince that will wear a crown must wear a mask,”</span> says +Mr. Esmond, in French. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Ah, peste!</span></span> +I see how it is,”</span> says Monsieur Baptiste, +continuing the talk in French. <span class="tei tei-q">“The Great Serious is +seriously”</span>—<span class="tei tei-q">“alarmed for Monsieur Baptiste,”</span> broke in the +colonel. Esmond neither liked the tone with which the +prince spoke of the ladies, nor the eyes with which he regarded +them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The bedchamber and the two rooms adjoining it, the +closet and the apartment which was to be called my lord's +parlour, were already lighted and awaiting their occupier; +and the collation laid for my lord's supper. Lord Castlewood +and his mother and sister came up the stair a minute +afterwards, and, so soon as the domestics had quitted the +apartment, Castlewood and Esmond uncovered, and the +two ladies went down on their knees before the prince, +who graciously gave a hand to each. He looked his part +of prince much more naturally than that of servant, which +he had just been trying, and raised them both with a great +deal of nobility, as well as kindness in his air. <span class="tei tei-q">“Madam,”</span> +says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“my mother will thank your ladyship for your +hospitality to her son; for you, madam,”</span> turning to Beatrix, +<span class="tei tei-q">“I cannot bear to see so much beauty in such a posture. +You will betray Monsieur Baptiste if you kneel to him; +sure 'tis his place rather to kneel to you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A light shone out of her eyes; a gleam bright enough to +kindle passion in any breast. There were times when this +creature was so handsome, that she seemed, as it were, +like Venus revealing herself a goddess in a flash of brightness. +She appeared so now; radiant, and with eyes bright +with a wonderful lustre. A pang, as of rage and jealousy, +shot through Esmond's heart, as he caught the look she +gave the prince; and he clenched his hand involuntarily +and looked across to Castlewood, whose eyes answered his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page415">[pg 415]</span><a name="Pg415" id="Pg415" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +alarm-signal, and were also on the alert. The prince gave +his subjects an audience of a few minutes, and then the two +ladies and Colonel Esmond quitted the chamber. Lady +Castlewood pressed his hand as they descended the stair, +and the three went down to the lower rooms, where they +waited awhile till the travellers above should be refreshed +and ready for their meal. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond looked at Beatrix, blazing with her jewels on +her beautiful neck. <span class="tei tei-q">“I have kept my word,”</span> says he: +<span class="tei tei-q">“And I mine,”</span> says Beatrix, looking down on the diamonds. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Were I the Mogul emperor,”</span> says the colonel, <span class="tei tei-q">“you +should have all that were dug out of Golconda.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“These are a great deal too good for me,”</span> says Beatrix, +dropping her head on her beautiful breast,—<span class="tei tei-q">“so are you +all, all:”</span> and when she looked up again, as she did in a +moment, and after a sigh, her eyes, as they gazed at her +cousin, wore that melancholy and inscrutable look which +'twas always impossible to sound. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the time came for the supper, of which we were +advertised by a knocking overhead, Colonel Esmond and +the two ladies went to the upper apartment, where the prince +already was, and by his side the young viscount, of exactly +the same age, shape, and with features not dissimilar, +though Frank's were the handsomer of the two. The +prince sat down, and bade the ladies sit. The gentlemen +remained standing; there was, indeed, but one more cover +laid at the table:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Which of you will take it?”</span> says he. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The head of our house,”</span> says Lady Castlewood, taking +her son's hand, and looking towards Colonel Esmond with +a bow and a great tremor of the voice; <span class="tei tei-q">“the Marquis of +Esmond will have the honour of serving the king.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I shall have the honour of waiting on his royal highness,”</span> +says Colonel Esmond, filling a cup of wine, and, as the fashion +of that day was, he presented it to the king on his knee. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I drink to my hostess and her family,”</span> says the prince, +with no very well-pleased air; but the cloud passed immediately +off his face, and he talked to the ladies in a lively, +rattling strain, quite undisturbed by poor Mr. Esmond's +yellow countenance, that I dare say looked very glum. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the time came to take leave, Esmond marched +homewards to his lodgings, and met Mr. Addison on the +road that night, walking to a cottage he had at Fulham, +the moon shining on his handsome serene face:—<span class="tei tei-q">“What +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page416">[pg 416]</span><a name="Pg416" id="Pg416" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +cheer, brother?”</span> says Addison, laughing; <span class="tei tei-q">“I thought it +was a footpad advancing in the dark, and behold 'tis an +old friend. We may shake hands, colonel, in the dark, +'tis better than fighting by daylight. Why should we +quarrel, because I am a Whig and thou art a Tory? Turn +thy steps and walk with me to Fulham, where there is +a nightingale still singing in the garden, and a cool bottle +in a cave I know of; you shall drink to the Pretender if +you like, and I will drink my liquor my own way: I have +had enough of good liquor?—no, never! There is no such +word as enough as a stopper for good wine. Thou wilt +not come? Come any day, come soon. You know I remember +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Simois</span></span> and the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sigeia tellus</span></span>, and the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">praelia mixta mero, +mixta mero</span></span>,”</span> he repeated, with ever so slight a touch of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">merum</span></span> in his voice, and walked back a little way on the +road with Esmond, bidding the other remember he was +always his friend, and indebted to him for his aid in the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span> poem. And very likely Mr. Under Secretary +would have stepped in and taken t'other bottle at the +colonel's lodgings, had the latter invited him, but Esmond's +mood was none of the gayest, and he bade his friend an +inhospitable good-night at the door. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have done the deed,”</span> thought he, sleepless, and looking +out into the night; <span class="tei tei-q">“he is here, and I have brought him; +he and Beatrix are sleeping under the same roof now. +Whom did I mean to serve in bringing him? Was it the +prince, was it Henry Esmond? Had I not best have +joined the manly creed of Addison yonder, that scouts the +old doctrine of right divine, that boldly declares that +Parliament and people consecrate the sovereign, not bishops, +nor genealogies, nor oils, nor coronations.”</span> The eager gaze +of the young prince, watching every movement of Beatrix, +haunted Esmond and pursued him. The prince's figure +appeared before him in his feverish dreams many times +that night. He wished the deed undone, for which he had +laboured so. He was not the first that has regretted his +own act, or brought about his own undoing. Undoing? +Should he write that word in his late years? No, on his +knees before Heaven, rather be thankful for what then he +deemed his misfortune, and which hath caused the whole +subsequent happiness of his life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond's man, honest John Lockwood, had served his +master and the family all his life, and the colonel knew that +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page417">[pg 417]</span><a name="Pg417" id="Pg417" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he could answer for John's fidelity as for his own. John +returned with the horses from Rochester betimes the next +morning, and the colonel gave him to understand that on +going to Kensington, where he was free of the servants' +hall, and indeed courting Mrs. Beatrix's maid, he was to +ask no questions, and betray no surprise, but to vouch +stoutly that the young gentleman he should see in a red +coat there was my Lord Viscount Castlewood, and that his +attendant in grey was Monsieur Baptiste the Frenchman. +He was to tell his friends in the kitchen such stories as he +remembered of my lord viscount's youth at Castlewood; +what a wild boy he was; how he used to drill Jack and cane +him, before ever he was a soldier; everything, in fine, he knew +respecting my lord viscount's early days. Jack's ideas of +painting had not been much cultivated during his residence +in Flanders with his master; and, before my young lord's +return, he had been easily got to believe that the picture +brought over from Paris, and now hanging in Lady Castlewood's +drawing-room, was a perfect likeness of her son, the +young lord. And the domestics having all seen the picture +many times, and catching but a momentary imperfect +glimpse of the two strangers on the night of their arrival, +never had a reason to doubt the fidelity of the portrait; +and next day, when they saw the original of the piece +habited exactly as he was represented in the painting, +with the same periwig, ribbon, and uniform of the Guard, +quite naturally addressed the gentleman as my Lord Castlewood, +my lady viscountess's son. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The secretary of the night previous was now the viscount; +the viscount wore the secretary's grey frock; and John +Lockwood was instructed to hint to the world below stairs +that my lord being a Papist, and very devout in that religion, +his attendant might be no other than his chaplain from +Bruxelles; hence, if he took his meals in my lord's company +there was little reason for surprise. Frank was further +cautioned to speak English with a foreign accent, which +task he performed indifferently well, and this caution was +the more necessary because the prince himself scarce spoke +our language like a native of the island; and John Lockwood +laughed with the folks below stairs at the manner in which +my lord, after five years abroad, sometimes forgot his own +tongue and spoke it like a Frenchman. <span class="tei tei-q">“I warrant,”</span> says +he, <span class="tei tei-q">“that with the English beef and beer, his lordship will +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page418">[pg 418]</span><a name="Pg418" id="Pg418" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +soon get back the proper use of his mouth;”</span> and, to do his +new lordship justice, he took to beer and beef very kindly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The prince drank so much, and was so loud and imprudent +in his talk after his drink, that Esmond often trembled for +him. His meals were served as much as possible in his own +chamber, though frequently he made his appearance in +Lady Castlewood's parlour and drawing-room, calling +Beatrix <span class="tei tei-q">“sister”</span>, and her ladyship <span class="tei tei-q">“mother”</span>, or <span class="tei tei-q">“madam”</span>, +before the servants. And, choosing to act entirely up to +the part of brother and son, the prince sometimes saluted +Mrs. Beatrix and Lady Castlewood with a freedom which +his secretary did not like, and which, for his part, set +Colonel Esmond tearing with rage. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The guests had not been three days in the house when +poor Jack Lockwood came with a rueful countenance to +his master, and said: <span class="tei tei-q">“My lord, that is—the gentleman, +has been tampering with Mrs. Lucy”</span> (Jack's sweetheart), +<span class="tei tei-q">“and given her guineas and a kiss.”</span> I fear that Colonel +Esmond's mind was rather relieved than otherwise, when +he found that the ancillary beauty was the one whom the +prince had selected. His royal tastes were known to lie +that way, and continued so in after-life. The heir of one +of the greatest names, of the greatest kingdoms, and of +the greatest misfortunes in Europe, was often content to +lay the dignity of his birth and grief at the wooden shoes +of a French chambermaid, and to repent afterwards (for +he was very devout) in ashes taken from the dustpan. 'Tis +for mortals such as these that nations suffer, that parties +struggle, that warriors fight and bleed. A year afterwards +gallant heads were falling, and Nithsdale in escape, and +Derwentwater on the scaffold; whilst the heedless ingrate, +for whom they risked and lost all, was tippling with his +seraglio of mistresses in his +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">petite maison</span></span> of Chaillot. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Blushing to be forced to bear such an errand, Esmond +had to go to the prince and warn him that the girl whom +his highness was bribing, was John Lockwood's sweetheart, +an honest resolute man, who had served in six campaigns, +and feared nothing, and who knew that the person, calling +himself Lord Castlewood, was not his young master: and +the colonel besought the prince to consider what the effect +of a single man's jealousy might be, and to think of other +designs he had in hand, more important than the seduction +of a waiting-maid, and the humiliation of a brave man. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page419">[pg 419]</span><a name="Pg419" id="Pg419" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Ten times, perhaps, in the course of as many days, Mr. +Esmond had to warn the royal young adventurer of some +imprudence or some freedom. He received these remonstrances +very testily, save perhaps in this affair of poor +Lockwood's, when he deigned to burst out a-laughing, and +said, <span class="tei tei-q">“What! the <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">soubrette</span></span> +has peached to the <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">amoureux</span></span>, +and Crispin is angry, and Crispin has served, and Crispin +has been a corporal, has he? Tell him we will reward his +valour with a pair of colours, and recompense his fidelity.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Colonel Esmond ventured to utter some other words of +entreaty, but the prince, stamping imperiously, cried out, +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Assez, milord: je m'ennuye à la prêche</span></span>; +I am not come to London to go to the sermon.”</span> And he complained afterwards +to Castlewood, that <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">le petit jaune, le noir colonel, +le Marquis Misanthrope</span></span>”</span> (by which facetious names his royal +highness was pleased to designate Colonel Esmond), <span class="tei tei-q">“fatigued +him with his grand airs and virtuous homilies.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Bishop of Rochester, and other gentlemen engaged +in the transaction which had brought the prince over, +waited upon his royal highness, constantly asking for my +Lord Castlewood on their arrival at Kensington, and being +openly conducted to his royal highness in that character, +who received them either in my lady's drawing-room below, +or above in his own apartment; and all implored him to +quit the house as little as possible, and to wait there till +the signal should be given for him to appear. The ladies +entertained him at cards, over which amusement he spent +many hours in each day and night. He passed many hours +more in drinking, during which time he would rattle and talk +very agreeably, and especially if the colonel was absent, +whose presence always seemed to frighten him; and the +poor <span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Colonel Noir</span></span>”</span> took that hint as a command accordingly, +and seldom intruded his black face upon the convivial +hours of this august young prisoner. Except for those +few persons of whom the porter had the list, Lord Castlewood +was denied to all friends of the house who waited +on his lordship. The wound he had received had broke +out again from his journey on horseback, so the world and +the domestics were informed. And Doctor A——,<a id="noteref_17" name="noteref_17" href="#note_17"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">17</span></span></a> his +physician (I shall not mention his name, but he was physician +to the Queen, of the Scots nation, and a man remarkable +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page420">[pg 420]</span><a name="Pg420" id="Pg420" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +for his benevolence as well as his wit), gave orders that he +should be kept perfectly quiet until the wound should heal. +With this gentleman, who was one of the most active and +influential of our party, and the others before spoken of, +the whole secret lay; and it was kept with so much faithfulness, +and the story we told so simple and natural, that +there was no likelihood of a discovery except from the +imprudence of the prince himself, and an adventurous levity +that we had the greatest difficulty to control. As for Lady +Castlewood, although she scarce spoke a word, 'twas easy +to gather from her demeanour, and one or two hints she +dropped, how deep her mortification was at finding the +hero whom she had chosen to worship all her life (and whose +restoration had formed almost the most sacred part of her +prayers), no more than a man, and not a good one. She +thought misfortune might have chastened him; but that +instructress had rather rendered him callous than humble. +His devotion, which was quite real, kept him from no sin +he had a mind to. His talk showed good-humour, gaiety, +even wit enough; but there was a levity in his acts and +words that he had brought from among those libertine +devotees with whom he had been bred, and that shocked +the simplicity and purity of the English lady, whose guest +he was. Esmond spoke his mind to Beatrix pretty freely +about the prince, getting her brother to put in a word of +warning. Beatrix was entirely of their opinion; she thought +he was very light, very light and reckless; she could not +even see the good looks Colonel Esmond had spoken of. +The prince had bad teeth, and a decided squint. How +could we say he did not squint? His eyes were fine, but +there was certainly a cast in them. She rallied him at +table with wonderful wit; she spoke of him invariably +as of a mere boy; she was more fond of Esmond than ever, +praised him to her brother, praised him to the prince, when +his royal highness was pleased to sneer at the colonel, and +warmly espoused his cause: <span class="tei tei-q">“And if your Majesty does not +give him the Garter his father had, when the Marquis of +Esmond comes to your Majesty's Court, I will hang myself +in my own garters, or will cry my eyes out.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Rather than +lose those,”</span> says the prince, <span class="tei tei-q">“he shall be made archbishop +and colonel of the Guard”</span> (it was Frank Castlewood who +told me of this conversation over their supper). +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> cries she, with one of her laughs,—(I fancy I hear +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page421">[pg 421]</span><a name="Pg421" id="Pg421" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +it now; thirty years afterwards I hear that delightful +music)—<span class="tei tei-q">“yes, he shall be Archbishop of Esmond and Marquis +of Canterbury.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And what will your ladyship be?”</span> says the prince; +<span class="tei tei-q">“you have but to choose your place.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I,”</span> says Beatrix, <span class="tei tei-q">“will be mother of the maids to the +queen of his Majesty King James the +Third—<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Vive le Roy!</span></span>”</span> +and she made him a great curtsy, and drank a part of a glass +of wine in his honour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The prince seized hold of the glass and drank the last +drop of it,”</span> Castlewood said, <span class="tei tei-q">“and my mother, looking very +anxious, rose up and asked leave to retire. But that 'Trix +is my mother's daughter, Harry,”</span> Frank continued, <span class="tei tei-q">“I don't +know what a horrid fear I should have of her. I wish—I +wish this business were over. You are older than I am, +and wiser, and better, and I owe you everything, and would +die for you—before George I would; but I wish the end +of this were come.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Neither of us very likely passed a tranquil night; horrible +doubts and torments racked Esmond's soul; 'twas a scheme +of personal ambition, a daring stroke for a selfish end—he +knew it. What cared he, in his heart, who was king? +Were not his very sympathies and secret convictions on +the other side—on the side of People, Parliament, Freedom? +And here was he, engaged for a prince, that had scarce +heard the word <span class="tei tei-q">“liberty”</span>; that priests and women, tyrants +by nature both, made a tool of. The misanthrope was in +no better humour after hearing that story, and his grim +face more black and yellow than ever. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc91" id="toc91"></a> +<a name="pdf92" id="pdf92"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter X. We Entertain A Very Distinguished Guest At Kensington</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Should any clue be found to the dark intrigues at the +latter end of Queen Anne's time, or any historian be inclined +to follow it, 'twill be discovered, I have little doubt, +that not one of the great personages about the queen had +a defined scheme of policy, independent of that private +and selfish interest which each was bent on pursuing; +St. John was for St. John, and Harley for Oxford, and +Marlborough for John Churchill, always; and according +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page422">[pg 422]</span><a name="Pg422" id="Pg422" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as they could get help from St. Germains or Hanover, they +sent over proffers of allegiance to the princes there, or +betrayed one to the other: one cause, or one sovereign, +was as good as another to them, so that they could hold +the best place under him; and like Lockit and Peachem, +the Newgate chiefs in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Rogues' Opera</span></span> Mr. Gay wrote +afterwards, had each in his hand documents and proofs +of treason which would hang the other, only he did not +dare to use the weapon, for fear of that one which his +neighbour also carried in his pocket. Think of the great +Marlborough, the greatest subject in all the world, a conqueror +of princes, that had marched victorious over Germany, +Flanders, and France, that had given the law to sovereigns +abroad, and been worshipped as a divinity at home, forced +to sneak out of England—his credit, honours, places, all +taken from him; his friends in the army broke and ruined; +and flying before Harley, as abject and powerless as a poor +debtor before a bailiff with a writ. A paper, of which +Harley got possession, and showing beyond doubt that the +duke was engaged with the Stuart family, was the weapon +with which the treasurer drove Marlborough out of the +kingdom. He fled to Antwerp, and began intriguing instantly +on the other side, and came back to England, as +all know, a Whig and a Hanoverian. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Though the treasurer turned out of the army and office +every man, military or civil, known to be the duke's friend, +and gave the vacant posts among the Tory party; he, +too, was playing the double game between Hanover and +St. Germains, awaiting the expected catastrophe of the +queen's death to be master of the state, and offer it to either +family that should bribe him best, or that the nation should +declare for. Whichever the king was, Harley's object was +to reign over him; and to this end he supplanted the former +famous favourite, decried the actions of the war which had +made Marlborough's name illustrious, and disdained no +more than the great fallen competitor of his, the meanest +arts, flatteries, intimidations, that would secure his power. +If the greatest satirist the world ever hath seen had writ +against Harley, and not for him, what a history had he +left behind of the last years of Queen Anne's reign! But +Swift, that scorned all mankind, and himself not the least +of all, had this merit of a faithful partisan, that he loved +those chiefs who treated him well, and stuck by Harley +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page423">[pg 423]</span><a name="Pg423" id="Pg423" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +bravely in his fall, as he gallantly had supported him in +his better fortune. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Incomparably more brilliant, more splendid, eloquent, +accomplished, than his rival, the great St. John could be +as selfish as Oxford was, and could act the double part as +skilfully as ambidextrous Churchill. He whose talk was +always of liberty, no more shrunk from using persecution +and the pillory against his opponents, than if he had been +at Lisbon and Grand Inquisitor. This lofty patriot was +on his knees at Hanover and St. Germains too; notoriously +of no religion, he toasted Church and queen as boldly as +the stupid Sacheverel, whom he used and laughed at; and +to serve his turn, and to overthrow his enemy, he could +intrigue, coax, bully, wheedle, fawn on the Court favourite, +and creep up the back-stair as silently as Oxford who +supplanted Marlborough, and whom he himself supplanted. +The crash of my Lord Oxford happened at this very time +whereat my history is now arrived. He was come to the +very last days of his power, and the agent whom he employed +to overthrow the conqueror of Blenheim, was now +engaged to upset the conqueror's conqueror, and hand over +the staff of government to Bolingbroke, who had been +panting to hold it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In expectation of the stroke that was now preparing, +the Irish regiments in the French service were all brought +round about Boulogne in Picardy, to pass over if need +were with the Duke of Berwick; the soldiers of France +no longer, but subjects of James the Third of England and +Ireland King. The fidelity of the great mass of the Scots +(though a most active, resolute, and gallant Whig party, +admirably and energetically ordered and disciplined, was +known to be in Scotland too) was notoriously unshaken +in their king. A very great body of Tory clergy, nobility, +and gentry, were public partisans of the exiled prince; +and the indifferents might be counted on to cry King +George or King James, according as either should prevail. +The queen, especially in her latter days, inclined towards +her own family. The prince was lying actually in London, +within a stone's-cast of his sister's palace; the first minister +toppling to his fall, and so tottering that the weakest push +of a woman's finger would send him down; and as for +Bolingbroke, his successor, we know on whose side his +power and his splendid eloquence would be on the day +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page424">[pg 424]</span><a name="Pg424" id="Pg424" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +when the queen should appear openly before her council +and say:—<span class="tei tei-q">“This, my lords, is my brother; here is my +father's heir, and mine after me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +During the whole of the previous year the queen had +had many and repeated fits of sickness, fever, and lethargy, +and her death had been constantly looked for by all her +attendants. The Elector of Hanover had wished to send +his son, the Duke of Cambridge—to pay his court to his +cousin the queen, the Elector said;—in truth, to be on the +spot when death should close her career. Frightened perhaps +to have such a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">memento mori</span></span> under her royal eyes, +her Majesty had angrily forbidden the young prince's +coming into England. Either she desired to keep the +chances for her brother open yet; or the people about +her did not wish to close with the Whig candidate till +they could make terms with him. The quarrels of her +ministers before her face at the Council board, the pricks +of conscience very likely, the importunities of her ministers, +and constant turmoil and agitation round about her, had +weakened and irritated the princess extremely; her +strength was giving way under these continual trials of +her temper, and from day to day it was expected she must +come to a speedy end of them. Just before Viscount +Castlewood and his companion came from France, her +Majesty was taken ill. The St. Anthony's fire broke out +on the royal legs; there was no hurry for the presentation +of the young lord at Court, or that person who should +appear under his name; and my lord viscount's wound +breaking out opportunely, he was kept conveniently in his +chamber until such time as his physician should allow him +to bend his knee before the queen. At the commencement +of July, that influential lady, with whom it has been mentioned +that our party had relations, came frequently to +visit her young friend, the maid of honour, at Kensington, +and my lord viscount (the real or supposititious), who was +an invalid at Lady Castlewood's house. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the 27th day of July, the lady in question, who held +the most intimate post about the queen, came in her chair +from the palace hard by, bringing to the little party in +Kensington Square, intelligence of the very highest importance. +The final blow had been struck, and my Lord +of Oxford and Mortimer was no longer treasurer. The staff +was as yet given to no successor, though my Lord Bolingbroke +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page425">[pg 425]</span><a name="Pg425" id="Pg425" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +would undoubtedly be the man. And now the time +was come, the queen's Abigail said: and now my Lord +Castlewood ought to be presented to the sovereign. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After that scene which Lord Castlewood witnessed and +described to his cousin, who passed such a miserable night +of mortification and jealousy as he thought over the transaction; +no doubt the three persons who were set by +nature as protectors over Beatrix came to the same conclusion, +that she must be removed from the presence of +a man whose desires towards her were expressed only too +clearly; and who was no more scrupulous in seeking to +gratify them than his father had been before him. I suppose +Esmond's mistress, her son, and the colonel himself, +had been all secretly debating this matter in their minds, for +when Frank broke out, in his blunt way, with:—<span class="tei tei-q">“I think +Beatrix had best be anywhere but here,”</span>—Lady Castlewood +said:—<span class="tei tei-q">“I thank you, Frank, I have thought so too”</span>; and +Mr. Esmond, though he only remarked that it was not for +him to speak, showed plainly, by the delight on his countenance, +how very agreeable that proposal was to him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“One sees that you think with us, Henry,”</span> says the +viscountess, with ever so little of sarcasm in her tone: +<span class="tei tei-q">“Beatrix is best out of this house whilst we have our guest +in it, and as soon as this morning's business is done, she +ought to quit London.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What morning's business?”</span> asked Colonel Esmond, not +knowing what had been arranged, though in fact the stroke +next in importance to that of bringing the prince, and of +having him acknowledged by the queen, was now being +performed at the very moment we three were conversing +together. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Court-lady with whom our plan was concerted, and +who was a chief agent in it, the Court-physician, and the +Bishop of Rochester, who were the other two most active +participators in our plan, had held many councils in our +house at Kensington and elsewhere, as to the means best +to be adopted for presenting our young adventurer to his +sister the queen. The simple and easy plan proposed by +Colonel Esmond had been agreed to by all parties, which +was that on some rather private day, when there were not +many persons about the Court, the prince should appear +there as my Lord Castlewood, should be greeted by his +sister-in-waiting, and led by that other lady into the closet +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page426">[pg 426]</span><a name="Pg426" id="Pg426" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of the queen. And according to her Majesty's health or +humour, and the circumstances that might arise during +the interview; it was to be left to the discretion of those +present at it, and to the prince himself, whether he should +declare that it was the queen's own brother, or the brother +of Beatrix Esmond, who kissed her royal hand. And this +plan being determined on, we were all waiting in very much +anxiety for the day and signal of execution. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Two mornings after that supper, it being the 27th day +of July, the Bishop of Rochester breakfasting with Lady +Castlewood and her family, and the meal scarce over, +Dr. A——'s coach drove up to our house at Kensington, and +the doctor appeared amongst the party there, enlivening +a rather gloomy company; for the mother and daughter +had had words in the morning in respect to the transactions +of that supper, and other adventures perhaps, and on the +day succeeding. Beatrix's haughty spirit brooked remonstrances +from no superior, much less from her mother, the +gentlest of creatures, whom the girl commanded rather +than obeyed. And feeling she was wrong, and that by +a thousand coquetries (which she could no more help +exercising on every man that came near her, than the +sun can help shining on great and small) she had provoked +the prince's dangerous admiration, and allured him to the +expression of it, she was only the more wilful and imperious +the more she felt her error. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +To this party, the prince being served with chocolate +in his bedchamber, where he lay late sleeping away the +fumes of his wine, the doctor came, and by the urgent +and startling nature of his news, dissipated instantly that +private and minor unpleasantry under which the family +of Castlewood was labouring. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He asked for the guest; the guest was above in his +own apartment: he bade <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Monsieur Baptiste</span></em> go up to his +master instantly, and requested that <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">my Lord Viscount +Castlewood</span></em> would straightway put his uniform on, and come +away in the doctor's coach now at the door. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He then informed Madam Beatrix what her part of the +comedy was to be:—<span class="tei tei-q">“In half an hour,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“her +Majesty and her favourite lady will take the air in the +cedar-walk behind the new banqueting-house. Her Majesty +will be drawn in a garden-chair, Madam Beatrix Esmond +and <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">her brother</span></em>, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">my Lord Viscount Castlewood</span></em>, will be +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page427">[pg 427]</span><a name="Pg427" id="Pg427" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +walking in the private garden (here is Lady Masham's +key), and will come unawares upon the royal party. The +man that draws the chair will retire, and leave the queen, +the favourite, and the maid of honour and her brother +together; Mrs. Beatrix will present her brother, and then!—and +then, my lord bishop will pray for the result of the +interview, and his Scots clerk will say Amen! Quick, put +on your hood, Madam Beatrix; why doth not his Majesty +come down? Such another chance may not present itself +for months again.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The prince was late and lazy, and indeed had all but +lost that chance through his indolence. The queen was +actually about to leave the garden just when the party +reached it; the doctor, the bishop, the maid of honour +and her brother went off together in the physician's coach, +and had been gone half an hour when Colonel Esmond +came to Kensington Square. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The news of this errand, on which Beatrix was gone, of +course for a moment put all thoughts of private jealousy +out of Colonel Esmond's head. In half an hour more the +coach returned; the bishop descended from it first, and +gave his arm to Beatrix, who now came out. His lordship +went back into the carriage again, and the maid of honour +entered the house alone. We were all gazing at her from +the upper window, trying to read from her countenance +the result of the interview from which she had just come. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She came into the drawing-room in a great tremor and +very pale; she asked for a glass of water as her mother +went to meet her, and after drinking that and putting off +her hood, she began to speak:—<span class="tei tei-q">“We may all hope for the +best,”</span> says she; <span class="tei tei-q">“it has cost the queen a fit. Her Majesty +was in her chair in the cedar-walk accompanied only by +Lady ——, when we entered by the private wicket from +the west side of the garden, and turned towards her, the +doctor following us. They waited in a side-walk hidden +by the shrubs, as we advanced towards the chair. My +heart throbbed so I scarce could speak; but my prince +whispered, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Courage, Beatrix’</span>, and marched on with a +steady step. His face was a little flushed, but he was not +afraid of the danger. He who fought so bravely at Malplaquet +fears nothing.”</span> Esmond and Castlewood looked at +each other at this compliment, neither liking the sound +of it. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page428">[pg 428]</span><a name="Pg428" id="Pg428" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The prince uncovered,”</span> Beatrix continued, <span class="tei tei-q">“and I saw +the queen turning round to Lady Masham, as if asking +who these two were. Her Majesty looked very pale and ill, +and then flushed up; the favourite made us a signal to +advance, and I went up, leading my prince by the hand, +quite close to the chair: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Your Majesty will give my +lord viscount your hand to kiss,’</span> says her lady, and the +queen put out her hand, which the prince kissed, kneeling +on his knee, he who should kneel to no mortal man or +woman.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘You have been long from England, my lord,’</span> says +the queen: <span class="tei tei-q">‘why were you not here to give a home to +your mother and sister?’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘I am come, madam, to stay now, if the queen desires +me,’</span> says the prince, with another low bow.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘You have taken a foreign wife, my lord, and a foreign +religion; was not that of England good enough for you?’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘In returning to my father's Church,’</span> says the prince, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘I do not love my mother the less, nor am I the less +faithful servant of your Majesty.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Here,”</span> says Beatrix, <span class="tei tei-q">“the favourite gave me a little +signal with her hand to fall back, which I did, though +I died to hear what should pass; and whispered something +to the queen, which made her Majesty start and utter one +or two words in a hurried manner, looking towards the +prince, and catching hold with her hand of the arm of +her chair. He advanced still nearer towards it; he began +to speak very rapidly; I caught the words, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Father, +blessing, forgiveness,’</span>—and then presently the prince fell +on his knees; took from his breast a paper he had there, +handed it to the queen, who, as soon as she saw it, flung +up both her arms with a scream, and took away that hand +nearest the prince, and which he endeavoured to kiss. He +went on speaking with great animation of gesture, now +clasping his hands together on his heart, now opening them +as though to say: <span class="tei tei-q">‘I am here, your brother, in your +power.’</span> Lady Masham ran round on the other side of +the chair, kneeling too, and speaking with great energy. +She clasped the queen's hand on her side, and picked up +the paper her Majesty had let fall. The prince rose and +made a further speech as though he would go; the favourite +on the other hand urging her mistress, and then, running +back to the prince, brought him back once more close to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page429">[pg 429]</span><a name="Pg429" id="Pg429" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the chair. Again he knelt down and took the queen's +hand, which she did not withdraw, kissing it a hundred +times; my lady all the time, with sobs and supplications, +speaking over the chair. This while the queen sat with +a stupefied look, crumpling the paper with one hand, as +my prince embraced the other; then of a sudden she +uttered several piercing shrieks, and burst into a great fit +of hysteric tears and laughter. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Enough, enough, sir, for +this time,’</span> I heard Lady Masham say; and the chairman, +who had withdrawn round the banqueting-room, came back, +alarmed by the cries: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Quick,’</span> says Lady Masham, <span class="tei tei-q">‘get +some help,’</span> and I ran towards the doctor, who, with the +Bishop of Rochester, came up instantly. Lady Masham +whispered the prince he might hope for the very best; +and to be ready to-morrow; and he hath gone away to +the Bishop of Rochester's house, to meet several of his +friends there. And so the great stroke is struck,”</span> says +Beatrix, going down on her knees, and clasping her hands, +<span class="tei tei-q">“God save the King: God save the King!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Beatrix's tale told, and the young lady herself calmed +somewhat of her agitation, we asked with regard to the +prince, who was absent with Bishop Atterbury, and were +informed that 'twas likely he might remain abroad the +whole day. Beatrix's three kinsfolk looked at one another +at this intelligence; 'twas clear the same thought was +passing through the minds of all. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But who should begin to break the news? Monsieur +Baptiste, that is Frank Castlewood, turned very red, and +looked towards Esmond; the colonel bit his lips, and fairly +beat a retreat into the window: it was Lady Castlewood +that opened upon Beatrix with the news which we knew +would do anything but please her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We are glad,”</span> says she, taking her daughter's hand, +and speaking in a gentle voice, <span class="tei tei-q">“that the guest is away.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Beatrix drew back in an instant, looking round her at +us three, and as if divining a danger. <span class="tei tei-q">“Why glad?”</span> says +she, her breast beginning to heave; <span class="tei tei-q">“are you so soon tired +of him?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We think one of us is devilishly too fond of him,”</span> cries +out Frank Castlewood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And which is it—you, my lord, or is it mamma, who +is jealous because he drinks my health? or is it the head +of the family”</span> (here she turned with an imperious look +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page430">[pg 430]</span><a name="Pg430" id="Pg430" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +towards Colonel Esmond), <span class="tei tei-q">“who has taken of late to preach +the king sermons?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We do not say you are too free with his Majesty.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I thank you, madam,”</span> says Beatrix, with a toss of the +head and a curtsy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But her mother continued, with very great calmness and +dignity—<span class="tei tei-q">“At least we have not said so, though we might, +were it possible for a mother to say such words to her own +daughter, your father's daughter.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Eh! mon père</span></span>,”</span> +breaks out Beatrix, <span class="tei tei-q">“was no better +than other persons' fathers;”</span> and again she looked towards +the colonel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We all felt a shock as she uttered those two or three +French words; her manner was exactly imitated from that +of our foreign guest. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You had not learned to speak French a month ago, +Beatrix,”</span> says her mother, sadly, <span class="tei tei-q">“nor to speak ill of your +father.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Beatrix, no doubt, saw that slip she had made in her +flurry, for she blushed crimson: <span class="tei tei-q">“I have learnt to honour +the king,”</span> says she, drawing up, <span class="tei tei-q">“and 'twere as well that +others suspected neither his Majesty nor me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If you respected your mother a little more,”</span> Frank said, +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Trix, you would do yourself no hurt.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am no child,”</span> says she, turning round on him; <span class="tei tei-q">“we +have lived very well these five years without the benefit of +your advice or example, and I intend to take neither now. +Why does not the head of the house speak?”</span> she went on; +<span class="tei tei-q">“he rules everything here. When his chaplain has done +singing the psalms, will his lordship deliver the sermon? +I am tired of the psalms.”</span> The prince had used almost the +very same words, in regard to Colonel Esmond, that the +imprudent girl repeated in her wrath. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You show yourself a very apt scholar, madam,”</span> says the +colonel; and, turning to his mistress, <span class="tei tei-q">“Did your guest use +these words in your ladyship's hearing, or was it to Beatrix +in private that he was pleased to impart his opinion regarding +my tiresome sermon?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Have you seen him alone?”</span> cries my lord, starting up +with an oath: <span class="tei tei-q">“by God, have you seen him alone?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Were he here, you wouldn't dare so to insult me; no, +you would not dare!”</span> cries Frank's sister. <span class="tei tei-q">“Keep your +oaths, my lord, for your wife; we are not used here to such +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page431">[pg 431]</span><a name="Pg431" id="Pg431" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +language. 'Till you came, there used to be kindness between +me and mamma, and I cared for her when you never did, +when you were away for years with your horses, and your +mistress, and your Popish wife.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“By ——,”</span> says my lord, rapping out another oath, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Clotilda is an angel; how dare you say a word against +Clotilda?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Colonel Esmond could not refrain from a smile, to see how +easy Frank's attack was drawn off by that feint:—<span class="tei tei-q">“I fancy +Clotilda is not the subject in hand,”</span> says Mr. Esmond, +rather scornfully; <span class="tei tei-q">“her ladyship is at Paris, a hundred +leagues off, preparing baby-linen. It is about my Lord +Castlewood's sister, and not his wife, the question is.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He is not my Lord Castlewood,”</span> says Beatrix, <span class="tei tei-q">“and he +knows he is not; he is Colonel Francis Esmond's son, and +no more, and he wears a false title; and he lives on another +man's land, and he knows it.”</span> Here was another desperate +sally of the poor beleaguered garrison, and an <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">alerte</span></span> in +another quarter. <span class="tei tei-q">“Again, I beg your pardon,”</span> says Esmond. +<span class="tei tei-q">“If there are no proofs of my claim, I have no claim. If +my father acknowledged no heir, yours was his lawful +successor, and my Lord Castlewood hath as good a right +to his rank and small estate as any man in England. But +that again is not the question, as you know very well: +let us bring our talk back to it, as you will have me meddle +in it. And I will give you frankly my opinion, that a house +where a prince lies all day, who respects no woman, is no +house for a young unmarried lady; that you were better +in the country than here; that he is here on a great end, +from which no folly should divert him; and that having +nobly done your part of this morning, Beatrix, you should +retire off the scene awhile, and leave it to the other actors +of the play.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As the colonel spoke with a perfect calmness and politeness, +such as 'tis to be hoped he hath always shown to +women,<a id="noteref_18" name="noteref_18" href="#note_18"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">18</span></span></a> +his mistress stood by him on one side of the table, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page432">[pg 432]</span><a name="Pg432" id="Pg432" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and Frank Castlewood on the other, hemming in poor +Beatrix, that was behind it, and, as it were, surrounding +her with our approaches. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Having twice sallied out and been beaten back, she now, +as I expected, tried the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">ultima ratio</span></span> of women, and had +recourse to tears. Her beautiful eyes filled with them; +I never could bear in her, nor in any woman, that expression +of pain:—<span class="tei tei-q">“I am alone,”</span> sobbed she; <span class="tei tei-q">“you are three +against me—my brother, my mother, and you. What +have I done, that you should speak and look so unkindly +at me? Is it my fault that the prince should, as you say, +admire me? Did I bring him here? Did I do aught but +what you bade me, in making him welcome? Did you +not tell me that our duty was to die for him? Did you not +teach me, mother, night and morning, to pray for the king, +before even ourselves? What would you have of me, +cousin, for you are the chief of the conspiracy against me; +I know you are, sir, and that my mother and brother are +acting but as you bid them; whither would you have me go?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I would but remove from the prince,”</span> says Esmond +gravely, <span class="tei tei-q">“a dangerous temptation; Heaven forbid I should +say you would yield: I would only have him free of it. +Your honour needs no guardian, please God, but his imprudence +doth. He is so far removed from all women by +his rank, that his pursuit of them cannot but be unlawful. +We would remove the dearest and fairest of our family +from the chance of that insult, and that is why we would +have you go, dear Beatrix.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Harry speaks like a book,”</span> says Frank, with one of his +oaths, <span class="tei tei-q">“and, by ——, every word he saith is true. You +can't help being handsome, 'Trix; no more can the prince +help following you. My council is that you go out of +harm's way; for, by the Lord, were the prince to play +any tricks with you, king as he is, or is to be, Harry +Esmond and I would have justice of him.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page433">[pg 433]</span><a name="Pg433" id="Pg433" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Are not two such champions enough to guard me?”</span> +says Beatrix, something sorrowfully; <span class="tei tei-q">“sure, with you two +watching, no evil could happen to me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“In faith, I think not, Beatrix,”</span> says Colonel Esmond; +<span class="tei tei-q">“nor if the prince knew us would he try.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But does he know you?”</span> interposed Lady Esmond, +very quiet: <span class="tei tei-q">“he comes of a country where the pursuit of +kings is thought no dishonour to a woman. Let us go, +dearest Beatrix. Shall we go to Walcote or to Castlewood? +We are best away from the city; and when the prince is +acknowledged, and our champions have restored him, and +he hath his own house at St. James's or Windsor, we can +come back to ours here. Do you not think so, Harry and +Frank?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Frank and Harry thought with her, you may be sure. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We will go, then,”</span> says Beatrix, turning a little pale; +<span class="tei tei-q">“Lady Masham is to give me warning to-night how her +Majesty is, and to-morrow——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I think we had best go to-day, my dear,”</span> says my Lady +Castlewood; <span class="tei tei-q">“we might have the coach and sleep at +Hounslow, and reach home to-morrow. 'Tis twelve +o'clock; bid the coach, cousin, be ready at one.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“For shame!”</span> burst out Beatrix, in a passion of tears +and mortification. <span class="tei tei-q">“You disgrace me by your cruel precautions; +my own mother is the first to suspect me, and +would take me away as my gaoler. I will not go with you, +mother; I will go as no one's prisoner. If I wanted to +deceive, do you think I could find no means of evading +you? My family suspects me. As those mistrust me that +ought to love me most, let me leave them; I will go, but +I will go alone: to Castlewood, be it. I have been unhappy +there and lonely enough; let me go back, but spare me at +least the humiliation of setting a watch over my misery, +which is a trial I can't bear. Let me go when you will, +but alone, or not at all. You three can stay and triumph +over my unhappiness, and I will bear it as I have borne it +before. Let my gaoler-in-chief go order the coach that +is to take me away. I thank you, Henry Esmond, for +your share in the conspiracy. All my life long I'll thank +you, and remember you; and you, brother, and you, +mother, how shall I show my gratitude to you for your +careful defence of my honour?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She swept out of the room with the air of an empress, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page434">[pg 434]</span><a name="Pg434" id="Pg434" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +flinging glances of defiance at us all, and leaving us conquerors +of the field, but scared, and almost ashamed of +our victory. It did indeed seem hard and cruel that we +three should have conspired the banishment and humiliation +of that fair creature. We looked at each other in silence; +'twas not the first stroke by many of our actions in that +unlucky time, which, being done, we wished undone. We +agreed it was best she should go alone, speaking stealthily +to one another, and under our breaths, like persons engaged +in an act they felt ashamed in doing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In a half-hour, it might be, after our talk she came back, +her countenance wearing the same defiant air which it had +borne when she left us. She held a shagreen-case in her +hand; Esmond knew it as containing his diamonds which +he had given to her for her marriage with Duke Hamilton, +and which she had worn so splendidly on the inauspicious +night of the prince's arrival. <span class="tei tei-q">“I have brought back,”</span> says +she, <span class="tei tei-q">“to the Marquis of Esmond the present he deigned to +make me in days when he trusted me better than now. +I will never accept a benefit or a kindness from Henry +Esmond more, and I give back these family diamonds, +which belonged to one king's mistress, to the gentleman +that suspected I would be another. Have you been upon +your message of coach-caller, my lord marquis; will you +send your valet to see that I do not run away?”</span> We were +right, yet, by her manner, she had put us all in the wrong; +we were conquerors, yet the honours of the day seemed +to be with the poor oppressed girl. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That luckless box containing the stones had first been +ornamented with a baron's coronet, when Beatrix was +engaged to the young gentleman from whom she parted, +and afterwards the gilt crown of a duchess figured on the +cover, which also poor Beatrix was destined never to wear. +Lady Castlewood opened the case mechanically and scarce +thinking what she did; and behold, besides the diamonds, +Esmond's present, there lay in the box the enamelled +miniature of the late duke, which Beatrix had laid aside +with her mourning when the king came into the house; +and which the poor heedless thing very likely had forgotten. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Do you leave this, too, Beatrix?”</span> says her mother, +taking the miniature out and with a cruelty she did not +very often show; but there are some moments when the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page435">[pg 435]</span><a name="Pg435" id="Pg435" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +tenderest women are cruel, and some triumphs which +angels can't forgo.<a id="noteref_19" name="noteref_19" href="#note_19"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">19</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Having delivered this stab, Lady Esmond was frightened +at the effect of her blow. It went to poor Beatrix's heart; +she flushed up and passed a handkerchief across her eyes, +and kissed the miniature, and put it into her bosom:—<span class="tei tei-q">“I +had forgot it,”</span> says she; <span class="tei tei-q">“my injury made me forget +my grief, my mother has recalled both to me. Farewell, +mother, I think I never can forgive you; something hath +broke between us that no tears nor years can repair. +I always said I was alone; you never loved me, never—and +were jealous of me from the time I sat on my father's +knee. Let me go away, the sooner the better; I can bear +to be with you no more.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Go, child,”</span> says her mother, still very stern; <span class="tei tei-q">“go and +bend your proud knees and ask forgiveness; go, pray in +solitude for humility and repentance. 'Tis not your +reproaches that make me unhappy, 'tis your hard heart, +my poor Beatrix; may God soften it, and teach you one +day to feel for your mother!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If my mistress was cruel, at least she never could be got +to own as much. Her haughtiness quite overtopped +Beatrix's; and, if the girl had a proud spirit, I very much +fear it came to her by inheritance. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc93" id="toc93"></a> +<a name="pdf94" id="pdf94"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XI. Our Guest Quits Us As Not Being Hospitable Enough</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Beatrix's departure took place within an hour, her maid +going with her in the post-chaise, and a man armed on the +coach-box to prevent any danger of the road. Esmond +and Frank thought of escorting the carriage, but she +indignantly refused their company, and another man was +sent to follow the coach, and not to leave it till it had +passed over Hounslow Heath on the next day. And these +two forming the whole of Lady Castle wood's male domestics, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page436">[pg 436]</span><a name="Pg436" id="Pg436" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Mr. Esmond's faithful John Lockwood came to wait on +his mistress during their absence, though he would have +preferred to escort Mrs. Lucy, his sweetheart, on her +journey into the country. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We had a gloomy and silent meal; it seemed as if a +darkness was over the house, since the bright face of +Beatrix had been withdrawn from it. In the afternoon +came a message from the favourite to relieve us somewhat +from this despondency. <span class="tei tei-q">“The queen hath been much +shaken,”</span> the note said; <span class="tei tei-q">“she is better now, and all things +will go well. Let <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">my Lord Castlewood</span></em> be ready against we +send for him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At night there came a second billet: <span class="tei tei-q">“There hath been +a great battle in Council; lord treasurer hath broke his +staff, and hath fallen never to rise again; no successor is +appointed. Lord B—— receives a great Whig company +to-night at Golden Square. If he is trimming, others are +true; the queen hath no more fits, but is abed now, and +more quiet. Be ready against morning, when I still hope +all will be well.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The prince came home shortly after the messenger who +bore this billet had left the house. His royal highness was +so much the better for the bishop's liquor, that to talk affairs +to him now was of little service. He was helped to the +royal bed; he called Castlewood familiarly by his own +name; he quite forgot the part upon the acting of which +his crown, his safety, depended. 'Twas lucky that my Lady +Castlewood's servants were out of the way, and only those +heard him who would not betray him. He inquired after +the adorable Beatrix, with a royal hiccup in his voice; +he was easily got to bed, and in a minute or two plunged +in that deep slumber and forgetfulness with which Bacchus +rewards the votaries of that god. We wished Beatrix had +been there to see him in his cups. We regretted, perhaps, +that she was gone. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One of the party at Kensington Square was fool enough +to ride to Hounslow that night, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">coram latronibus</span></span>, and to +the inn which the family used ordinarily in their journeys +out of London. Esmond desired my landlord not to +acquaint Madam Beatrix with his coming, and had the +grim satisfaction of passing by the door of the chamber +where she lay with her maid, and of watching her chariot +set forth in the early morning. He saw her smile and slip +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page437">[pg 437]</span><a name="Pg437" id="Pg437" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +money into the man's hand who was ordered to ride behind +the coach as far as Bagshot. The road being open, and +the other servant armed, it appeared she dispensed with +the escort of a second domestic; and this fellow, bidding +his young mistress adieu with many bows, went and took +a pot of ale in the kitchen, and returned in company with +his brother servant, John Coachman, and his horses, back +to London. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They were not a mile out of Hounslow when the two +worthies stopped for more drink, and here they were +scared by seeing Colonel Esmond gallop by them. The +man said in reply to Colonel Esmond's stern question, that +his young mistress had sent her duty; only that, no other +message: she had had a very good night, and would +reach Castlewood by nightfall. The colonel had no time +for further colloquy, and galloped on swiftly to London, +having business of great importance there, as my reader +very well knoweth. The thought of Beatrix riding away +from the danger soothed his mind not a little. His horse +was at Kensington Square (honest Dapple knew the way +thither well enough) before the tipsy guest of last night +was awake and sober. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The account of the previous evening was known all over +the town early next day. A violent altercation had taken +place before the queen in the Council-chamber; and all the +coffee-houses had their version of the quarrel. The news +brought my lord bishop early to Kensington Square, where +he awaited the waking of his royal master above stairs, +and spoke confidently of having him proclaimed as Prince +of Wales and heir to the throne before that day was over. +The bishop had entertained on the previous afternoon +certain of the most influential gentlemen of the true British +party. His royal highness had charmed all, both Scots +and English, Papists and Churchmen: <span class="tei tei-q">“Even Quakers,”</span> +says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“were at our meeting; and, if the stranger took +a little too much British punch and ale, he will soon grow +more accustomed to those liquors; and my Lord Castlewood,”</span> +says the bishop, with a laugh, <span class="tei tei-q">“must bear the cruel +charge of having been for once in his life a little tipsy. He +toasted your lovely sister a dozen times, at which we all +laughed,”</span> says the bishop, <span class="tei tei-q">“admiring so much fraternal +affection.—Where is that charming nymph, and why doth +she not adorn your ladyship's tea-table with her bright eyes?”</span> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page438">[pg 438]</span><a name="Pg438" id="Pg438" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Her ladyship said, drily, that Beatrix was not at home +that morning; my lord bishop was too busy with great +affairs to trouble himself much about the presence or +absence of any lady, however beautiful. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We were yet at table when Dr. A—— came from the +Palace with a look of great alarm; the shocks the queen +had had the day before had acted on her severely; he had +been sent for, and had ordered her to be blooded. The +surgeon of Long Acre had come to cup the queen, and her +Majesty was now more easy and breathed more freely. +What made us start at the name of Mr. Aymé? <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Il faut +être aimable pour être aimé</span></span>,”</span> says the merry doctor; Esmond +pulled his sleeve, and bade him hush. It was to Aymé's +house, after his fatal duel, that my dear Lord Castlewood, +Frank's father, had been carried to die. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +No second visit could be paid to the queen on that day +at any rate; and when our guest above gave his signal +that he was awake, the doctor, the bishop, and Colonel +Esmond waited upon the prince's levee, and brought him +their news, cheerful or dubious. The doctor had to go +away presently, but promised to keep the prince constantly +acquainted with what was taking place at the palace hard +by. His counsel was, and the bishop's, that as soon as +ever the queen's malady took a favourable turn, the prince +should be introduced to her bedside; the Council summoned; +the guard at Kensington and St. James's, of which two +regiments were to be entirely relied on, and one known not +to be hostile, would declare for the prince, as the queen +would before the lords of her Council, designating him as +the heir to her throne. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With locked doors, and Colonel Esmond acting as secretary, +the prince and his lordship of Rochester passed many +hours of this day composing Proclamations and Addresses +to the Country, to the Scots, to the Clergy, to the People +of London and England; announcing the arrival of the +exile descendant of three sovereigns, and his acknowledgement +by his sister as heir to the throne. Every safeguard +for their liberties the Church and People could ask was +promised to them. The bishop could answer for the +adhesion of very many prelates, who besought of their flocks +and brother ecclesiastics to recognize the sacred right of +the future sovereign, and to purge the country of the sin +of rebellion. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page439">[pg 439]</span><a name="Pg439" id="Pg439" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +During the composition of these papers, more messengers +than one came from the Palace regarding the state of the +august patient there lying. At midday she was somewhat +better; at evening the torpor again seized her, and she +wandered in her mind. At night Dr. A—— was with us +again, with a report rather more favourable: no instant +danger at any rate was apprehended. In the course of +the last two years her Majesty had had many attacks +similar, but more severe. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By this time we had finished a half-dozen of Proclamations +(the wording of them so as to offend no parties, and +not to give umbrage to Whigs or Dissenters, required very +great caution), and the young prince, who had indeed +shown, during a long day's labour, both alacrity at seizing +the information given him, and ingenuity and skill in turning +the phrases which were to go out signed by his name, here +exhibited a good humour and thoughtfulness that ought +to be set down to his credit. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Were these papers to be mislaid,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“or our +scheme to come to mishap, my Lord Esmond's writing +would bring him to a place where I heartily hope never +to see him; and so, by your leave, I will copy the papers +myself, though I am not very strong in spelling; and if +they are found they will implicate none but the person +they most concern;”</span> and so, having carefully copied the +Proclamations out, the prince burned those in Colonel +Esmond's handwriting: <span class="tei tei-q">“And now, and now, gentlemen,”</span> +says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“let us go to supper, and drink a glass with the +ladies. My Lord Esmond, you will sup with us to-night; +you have given us of late too little of your company.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The prince's meals were commonly served in the chamber +which had been Beatrix's bedroom, adjoining that in which +he slept. And the dutiful practice of his entertainers was +to wait until their royal guest bade them take their places +at table before they sat down to partake of the meal. On +this night, as you may suppose, only Frank Castlewood +and his mother were in waiting when the supper was +announced to receive the prince; who had passed the +whole of the day in his own apartment, with the bishop +as his minister of state, and Colonel Esmond officiating as +secretary of his Council. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The prince's countenance wore an expression by no +means pleasant; +when looking towards the little company +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page440">[pg 440]</span><a name="Pg440" id="Pg440" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +assembled, and waiting for him, he did not see Beatrix's bright +face there as usual to greet him. He asked Lady Esmond +for his fair introducer of yesterday: her ladyship only cast +her eyes down, and said quietly, Beatrix could not be of the +supper that night; nor did she show the least sign of +confusion, whereas Castlewood turned red, and Esmond +was no less embarrassed. I think women have an instinct +of dissimulation; they know by nature how to disguise +their emotions far better than the most consummate male +courtiers can do. Is not the better part of the life of many +of them spent in hiding their feelings, in cajoling their +tyrants, in masking over with fond smiles and artful gaiety +their doubt, or their grief, or their terror? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our guest swallowed his supper very sulky; it was not +till the second bottle his highness began to rally. When +Lady Castlewood asked leave to depart, he sent a message +to Beatrix, hoping she would be present at the next day's +dinner, and applied himself to drink, and to talk afterwards, +for which there was subject in plenty. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The next day, we heard from our informer at Kensington +that the queen was somewhat better, and had been up for +an hour, though she was not well enough yet to receive +any visitor. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At dinner a single cover was laid for his royal highness; +and the two gentlemen alone waited on him. We had +had a consultation in the morning with Lady Castlewood, +in which it had been determined that, should his highness +ask further questions about Beatrix, he should be answered +by the gentlemen of the house. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He was evidently disturbed and uneasy, looking towards +the door constantly, as if expecting some one. There came, +however, nobody, except honest John Lockwood, when he +knocked with a dish, which those within took from him; +so the meals were always arranged, and I believe the council +in the kitchen were of opinion that my young lord had +brought over a priest, who had converted us all into Papists, +and that Papists were like Jews, eating together, and not +choosing to take their meals in the sight of Christians. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The prince tried to cover his displeasure; he was but +a clumsy dissembler at that time, and when out of humour +could with difficulty keep a serene countenance; and having +made some foolish attempts at trivial talk, he came to his +point presently, and in as easy a manner as he could, saying +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page441">[pg 441]</span><a name="Pg441" id="Pg441" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to Lord Castlewood, he hoped, he requested, his lordship's +mother and sister would be of the supper that night. As +the time hung heavy on him, and he must not go abroad, +would not Miss Beatrix hold him company at a game of +cards? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At this, looking up at Esmond, and taking the signal +from him, Lord Castlewood informed his royal highness<a id="noteref_20" name="noteref_20" href="#note_20"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">20</span></span></a> +that his sister Beatrix was not at Kensington; and that +her family had thought it best she should quit the town. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Not at Kensington!”</span> says he; <span class="tei tei-q">“is she ill? she was +well yesterday; wherefore should she quit the town? +Is it at your orders, my lord, or Colonel Esmond's, who +seems the master of this house?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Not of this, sir,”</span> says Frank very nobly, <span class="tei tei-q">“only of our house +in the country, which he hath given to us. This is my +mother's house, and Walcote is my father's, and the Marquis +of Esmond knows he hath but to give his word, and I return +his to him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The Marquis of Esmond!—the Marquis of Esmond,”</span> +says the prince, tossing off a glass, <span class="tei tei-q">“meddles too much with +my affairs, and presumes on the service he hath done me. +If you want to carry your suit with Beatrix, my lord, by +blocking her up in gaol, let me tell you that is not the way +to win a woman.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I was not aware, sir, that I had spoken of my suit to +Madam Beatrix to your royal highness.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Bah, bah, monsieur! we need not be a conjurer to see +that. It makes itself seen at all moments. You are +jealous, my lord, and the maid of honour cannot look at +another face without yours beginning to scowl. That +which you do is unworthy, monsieur; is inhospitable—is, +is <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">lâche</span></span>, yes +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">lâche</span></span>:”</span> (he spoke rapidly in French, his +rage carrying him away with each phrase:) <span class="tei tei-q">“I come to your +house; I risk my life; I pass it in ennui; I repose myself +on your fidelity; I have no company but your lordship's +sermons or the conversations of that adorable young lady, +and you take her from me; and you, you rest! <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Merci, +monsieur!</span></span> I shall thank you when I have the means; +I shall know to recompense a devotion a little importunate, +my lord—a little importunate. For a month past your +airs of protector have annoyed me beyond measure. You +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page442">[pg 442]</span><a name="Pg442" id="Pg442" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +deign to offer me the crown, and bid me take it on my +knees like King John—eh! I know my history, monsieur, +and mock myself of frowning barons. I admire your +mistress, and you send her to a Bastile of the Province; +I enter your house, and you mistrust me. I will leave it, +monsieur; from to-night I will leave it. I have other +friends whose loyalty will not be so ready to question mine. +If I have Garters to give away, 'tis to noblemen who are +not so ready to think evil. Bring me a coach and let me +quit this place, or let the fair Beatrix return to it. I will +not have your hospitality at the expense of the freedom +of that fair creature.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This harangue was uttered with rapid gesticulations such +as the French use, and in the language of that nation. +The prince striding up and down the room; his face flushed, +and his hands trembling with anger. He was very thin +and frail from repeated illness and a life of pleasure. Either +Castlewood or Esmond could have broke him across their +knee, and in half a minute's struggle put an end to him; +and here he was insulting us both, and scarce deigning to +hide from the two, whose honour it most concerned, the +passion he felt for the young lady of our family. My Lord +Castlewood replied to the prince's tirade very nobly and +simply. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“your royal highness is pleased to forget +that others risk their lives, and for your cause. Very few +Englishmen, please God, would dare to lay hands on your +sacred person, though none would ever think of respecting +ours. Our family's lives are at your service, and everything +we have except our honour.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Honour! bah, sir, who ever thought of hurting your +honour?”</span> says the prince, with a peevish air. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We implore your royal highness never to think of hurting +it,”</span> says Lord Castlewood, with a low bow. The night being +warm, the windows were open both towards the gardens +and the square. Colonel Esmond heard through the closed +door the voice of the watchman calling the hour, in the +square on the other side. He opened the door communicating +with the prince's room; Martin, the servant that had +rode with Beatrix to Hounslow, was just going out of the +chamber as Esmond entered it, and when the fellow was +gone, and the watchman again sang his cry of <span class="tei tei-q">“Past ten +o'clock, and a starlight night,”</span> Esmond spoke to the prince +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page443">[pg 443]</span><a name="Pg443" id="Pg443" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +in a low voice, and said—<span class="tei tei-q">“Your royal highness hears that +man?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Après, monsieur?</span></span>”</span> says the prince. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have but to beckon him from the window, and send +him fifty yards, and he returns with a guard of men, and +I deliver up to him the body of the person calling himself +James the Third, for whose capture Parliament hath offered +a reward of 5,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, as your royal highness saw on our ride +from Rochester. I have but to say the word, and, by the +Heaven that made me, I would say it if I thought the prince, +for his honour's sake, would not desist from insulting ours. +But the first gentleman of England knows his duty too +well to forget himself with the humblest, or peril his crown +for a deed that were shameful if it were done.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Has your lordship anything to say,”</span> says the prince, +turning to Frank Castlewood, and quite pale with anger; +<span class="tei tei-q">“any threat or any insult, with which you would like to +end this agreeable night's entertainment?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I follow the head of our house,”</span> says Castlewood, bowing +gravely. <span class="tei tei-q">“At what time shall it please the prince that we +should wait upon him in the morning?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You will wait on the Bishop of Rochester early, you will +bid him bring his coach hither; and prepare an apartment +for me in his own house, or in a place of safety. The king +will reward you handsomely, never fear, for all you have +done in his behalf. I wish you a good night, and shall go +to bed, unless it pleases the Marquis of Esmond to call +his colleague, the watchman, and that I should pass the +night with the Kensington guard. Fare you well, be sure +I will remember you. My Lord Castlewood, I can go to +bed to-night without need of a chamberlain.”</span> And the +prince dismissed us with a grim bow, locking one door as +he spoke, that into the supping-room, and the other through +which we passed, after us. It led into the small chamber +which Frank Castlewood or <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Monsieur Baptiste</span></span> occupied, +and by which Martin entered when Colonel Esmond but +now saw him in the chamber. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At an early hour next morning the bishop arrived, and +was closeted for some time with his master in his own +apartment, where the prince laid open to his counsellor +the wrongs which, according to his version, he had received +from the gentlemen of the Esmond family. The worthy +prelate came out from the conference with an air of great +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page444">[pg 444]</span><a name="Pg444" id="Pg444" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +satisfaction; he was a man full of resources, and of a most +assured fidelity, and possessed of genius, and a hundred +good qualities; but captious and of a most jealous temper, +that could not help exulting at the downfall of any favourite; +and he was pleased in spite of himself to hear that the +Esmond ministry was at an end. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have soothed your guest,”</span> says he, coming out to +the two gentlemen and the widow, who had been made +acquainted with somewhat of the dispute of the night +before. (By the version we gave her, the prince was only +made to exhibit anger because we doubted of his intentions +in respect to Beatrix; and to leave us, because we questioned +his honour.) <span class="tei tei-q">“But I think, all things considered, +'tis as well he should leave this house; and then, my Lady +Castlewood,”</span> says the bishop, <span class="tei tei-q">“my pretty Beatrix may +come back to it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She is quite as well at home at Castlewood,”</span> Esmond's +mistress said, <span class="tei tei-q">“till everything is over.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You shall have your title, Esmond, that I promise you,”</span> +says the good bishop, assuming the airs of a prime minister. +<span class="tei tei-q">“The prince hath expressed himself most nobly in regard +of the little difference of last night, and I promise you he +hath listened to my sermon, as well as to that of other folks,”</span> +says the doctor archly; <span class="tei tei-q">“he hath every great and generous +quality, with perhaps a weakness for the sex which belongs +to his family, and hath been known in scores of popular +sovereigns from King David downwards.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord, my lord,”</span> breaks out Lady Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“the levity +with which you speak of such conduct towards our sex +shocks me, and what you call weakness I call deplorable sin.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sin it is, my dear creature,”</span> says the bishop, with a shrug, +taking snuff; <span class="tei tei-q">“but consider what a sinner King Solomon +was, and in spite of a thousand of wives too.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Enough of this, my lord,”</span> says Lady Castlewood, with +a fine blush, and walked out of the room very stately. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The prince entered it presently with a smile on his face, +and if he felt any offence against us on the previous night, +at present exhibited none. He offered a hand to each +gentleman with great courtesy. <span class="tei tei-q">“If all your bishops preach +so well as Dr. Atterbury,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“I don't know, gentlemen, +what may happen to me. I spoke very hastily, +my lords, last night, and ask pardon of both of you. But +I must not stay any longer,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“giving umbrage to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page445">[pg 445]</span><a name="Pg445" id="Pg445" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +good friends, or keeping pretty girls away from their homes. +My lord bishop hath found a safe place for me, hard by at +a curate's house, whom the bishop can trust, and whose +wife is so ugly as to be beyond all danger; we will decamp +into those new quarters, and I leave you, thanking you +for a hundred kindnesses here. Where is my hostess, that +I may bid her farewell? to welcome her in a house of my +own, soon I trust, where my friends shall have no cause to +quarrel with me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Lady Castlewood arrived presently, blushing with great +grace, and tears filling her eyes as the prince graciously +saluted her. She looked so charming and young, that the +doctor, in his bantering way, could not help speaking of +her beauty to the prince; whose compliment made her +blush, and look more charming still. +</p> + +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc95" id="toc95"></a> +<a name="pdf96" id="pdf96"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XII. A Great Scheme, And Who Balked It</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As characters written with a secret ink come out with the +application of fire, and disappear again and leave the paper +white, so soon as it is cool, a hundred names of men, high +in repute and favouring the prince's cause, that were writ +in our private lists, would have been visible enough on the +great roll of the conspiracy, had it ever been laid open under +the sun. What crowds would have pressed forward, and +subscribed their names and protested their loyalty, when +the danger was over! What a number of Whigs, now high +in place and creatures of the all-powerful minister, scorned +Mr. Walpole then! If ever a match was gained by the +manliness and decision of a few at a moment of danger; if +ever one was lost by the treachery and imbecility of those +that had the cards in their hands, and might have played +them, it was in that momentous game which was enacted +in the next three days, and of which the noblest crown in +the world was the stake. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From the conduct of my Lord Bolingbroke, those who +were interested in the scheme we had in hand, saw pretty +well that he was not to be trusted. Should the prince +prevail, it was his lordship's gracious intention to declare +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page446">[pg 446]</span><a name="Pg446" id="Pg446" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +for him: should the Hanoverian party bring in their +sovereign, who more ready to go on his knee, and cry <span class="tei tei-q">“God +save King George”</span>? And he betrayed the one prince and +the other; but exactly at the wrong time. When he +should have struck for King James, he faltered and coquetted +with the Whigs; and having committed himself by the +most monstrous professions of devotion, which the Elector +rightly scorned, he proved the justness of their contempt +for him by flying and taking renegado service with St. Germains, +just when he should have kept aloof: and that +Court despised him, as the manly and resolute men who +established the Elector in England had before done. He +signed his own name to every accusation of insincerity his +enemies made against him; and the king and the pretender +alike could show proofs of St. John's treachery under his +own hand and seal. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our friends kept a pretty close watch upon his motions, +as on those of the brave and hearty Whig party, that made +little concealment of theirs. They would have in the +Elector, and used every means in their power to effect their +end. My Lord Marlborough was now with them. His +expulsion from power by the Tories had thrown that great +captain at once on the Whig side. We heard he was coming +from Antwerp; and in fact, on the day of the queen's death, +he once more landed on English shore. A great part of the +army was always with their illustrious leader; even the +Tories in it were indignant at the injustice of the persecution +which the Whig officers were made to undergo. The chiefs +of these were in London, and at the head of them one of +the most intrepid men in the world, the Scots Duke of +Argyle, whose conduct, on the second day after that to +which I have now brought down my history, ended, as such +honesty and bravery deserved to end, by establishing the +present royal race on the English throne. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Meanwhile there was no slight difference of opinion +amongst the councillors surrounding the prince, as to the +plan his highness should pursue. His female minister at +Court, fancying she saw some amelioration in the queen, +was for waiting a few days, or hours it might be, until he +could be brought to her bedside, and acknowledged as her +heir. Mr. Esmond was for having him march thither, +escorted by a couple of troops of Horse Guards, and openly +presenting himself to the Council. During the whole of the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page447">[pg 447]</span><a name="Pg447" id="Pg447" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +night of the 29th-30th July, the colonel was engaged with +gentlemen of the military profession, whom 'tis needless +here to name; suffice it to say that several of them had +exceeding high rank in the army, and one of them in +especial was a general, who, when he heard the Duke of +Marlborough was coming on the other side, waved his crutch +over his head with a huzzah, at the idea that he should +march out and engage him. Of the three secretaries of +state, we knew that one was devoted to us. The Governor +of the Tower was ours: the two companies on duty at +Kensington barrack were safe; and we had intelligence, +very speedy and accurate, of all that took place at the +Palace within. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At noon, on the 30th of July, a message came to the +prince's friends that the Committee of Council was sitting +at Kensington Palace, their graces of Ormonde and Shrewsbury, +the Archbishop of Canterbury and the three Secretaries +of State, being there assembled. In an hour afterwards, +hurried news was brought that the two great Whig +dukes, Argyle and Somerset, had broke into the Council-chamber +without a summons, and taken their seat at table. +After holding a debate there, the whole party proceeded to +the chamber of the queen, who was lying in great weakness, +but still sensible, and the lords recommended his grace of +Shrewsbury as the fittest person to take the vacant place +of lord treasurer; her Majesty gave him the staff, as all +know. <span class="tei tei-q">“And now,”</span> writ my messenger from Court, <span class="tei tei-q">“<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">now +or never is the time</span></em>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Now or never was the time indeed. In spite of the Whig +dukes, our side had still the majority in the Council, and +Esmond, to whom the message had been brought (the personage +at Court not being aware that the prince had quitted +his lodging in Kensington Square), and Esmond's gallant +young aide de camp, Frank Castlewood, putting on sword +and uniform, took a brief leave of their dear lady, who +embraced and blessed them both; and went to her chamber +to pray for the issue of the great event which was then +pending. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Castlewood sped to the barrack to give warning to the +captain of the guard there; and then went to the <span class="tei tei-q">“King's +Arms”</span> tavern at Kensington, where our friends were assembled, +having come by parties of twos and threes, riding or +in coaches, and were got together in the upper chamber, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page448">[pg 448]</span><a name="Pg448" id="Pg448" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +fifty-three of them; their servants, who had been instructed +to bring arms likewise, being below in the garden of the +tavern, where they were served with drink. Out of this +garden is a little door that leads into the road of the Palace, +and through this it was arranged that masters and servants +were to march; when that signal was given, and that +Personage appeared, for whom all were waiting. There was +in our company the famous officer next in command to the +Captain-General of the Forces, his grace the Duke of +Ormonde, who was within at the Council. There were with +him two more lieutenant-generals, nine major-generals and +brigadiers, seven colonels, eleven peers of Parliament, and +twenty-one members of the House of Commons. The guard +was with us within and without the Palace: the queen was +with us; the Council (save the two Whig dukes, that must +have succumbed); the day was our own, and with a beating +heart Esmond walked rapidly to the Mall of Kensington, +where he had parted with the prince on the night before. +For three nights the colonel had not been to bed: the last +had been passed summoning the prince's friends together, +of whom the great majority had no sort of inkling of the +transaction pending until they were told that he was actually +on the spot, and were summoned to strike the blow. The +night before and after the altercation with the prince, my +gentleman, having suspicions of his royal highness, and +fearing lest he should be minded to give us the slip, and fly +off after his fugitive beauty, had spent, if the truth must +be told, at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Greyhound”</span> tavern, over against my Lady +Esmond's house in Kensington Square, with an eye on the +door, lest the prince should escape from it. The night before +that he had passed in his boots at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Crown”</span> at Hounslow, +where he must watch forsooth all night, in order to get one +moment's glimpse of Beatrix in the morning. And fate had +decreed that he was to have a fourth night's ride and wakefulness +before his business was ended. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He ran to the curate's house in Kensington Mall, and +asked for Mr. Bates, the name the prince went by. The +curate's wife said Mr. Bates had gone abroad very early in +the morning in his boots, saying he was going to the Bishop +of Rochester's house at Chelsea. But the bishop had been +at Kensington himself two hours ago to seek for Mr. Bates, +and had returned in his coach to his own house, when he +heard that the gentleman was gone thither to seek him. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page449">[pg 449]</span><a name="Pg449" id="Pg449" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This absence was most unpropitious, for an hour's delay +might cost a kingdom; Esmond had nothing for it but to +hasten to the <span class="tei tei-q">“King's Arms”</span>, and tell the gentlemen there +assembled that Mr. George (as we called the prince there) +was not at home, but that Esmond would go fetch him; +and taking a general's coach that happened to be there, +Esmond drove across the country to Chelsea, to the bishop's +house there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The porter said two gentlemen were with his lordship, +and Esmond ran past this sentry up to the locked door of +the bishop's study, at which he rattled, and was admitted +presently. Of the bishop's guests one was a brother prelate, +and the other the Abbé G——. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where is Mr. George?”</span> says Mr. Esmond; <span class="tei tei-q">“now is the +time.”</span> The bishop looked scared; <span class="tei tei-q">“I went to his lodging,”</span> +he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“and they told me he was come hither. I returned +as quick as coach would carry me; and he hath not been +here.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The colonel burst out with an oath; that was all he could +say to their reverences; ran down the stairs again, and +bidding the coachman, an old friend and fellow-campaigner, +drive as if he was charging the French with his master at +Wynendael—they were back at Kensington in half an hour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Again Esmond went to the curate's house. Mr. George +had not returned. The colonel had to go with this blank +errand to the gentlemen at the <span class="tei tei-q">“King's Arms”</span>, that were +grown very impatient by this time. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Out of the window of the tavern, and looking over the +garden-wall, you can see the green before Kensington +Palace, the Palace gate (round which the ministers' coaches +were standing), and the barrack building. As we were +looking out from this window in gloomy discourse, we heard +presently trumpets blowing, and some of us ran to the +window of the front room, looking into the High Street of +Kensington, and saw a regiment of horse coming. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It's Ormonde's Guards,”</span> says one. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“No, by God, it's Argyle's old regiment!”</span> says my +general, clapping down his crutch. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was, indeed, Argyle's regiment that was brought from +Westminster, and that took the place of the regiment at +Kensington on which we could rely. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oh, Harry!”</span> says one of the generals there present, +<span class="tei tei-q">“you were born under an unlucky star; I begin to think +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page450">[pg 450]</span><a name="Pg450" id="Pg450" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +that there's no Mr. George, nor Mr. Dragon either. 'Tis +not the peerage I care for, for our name is so ancient and +famous, that merely to be called Lord Lydiard would do +me no good; but 'tis the chance you promised me of +fighting Marlborough.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As we were talking, Castlewood entered the room with +a disturbed air. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What news, Frank?”</span> says the colonel, <span class="tei tei-q">“is Mr. George +coming at last?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Damn him, look here!”</span> says Castlewood, holding out +a paper. <span class="tei tei-q">“I found it in the book—the what you call it, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Eikum Basilikum</span></span>,—that villain Martin put it there—he +said his young mistress bade him. It was directed to me, +but it was meant for him I know, and I broke the seal +and read it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The whole assembly of officers seemed to swim away +before Esmond's eyes as he read the paper; all that was +written on it was:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Beatrix Esmond is sent away to +prison, to Castlewood, where she will pray for happier days.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Can you guess where he is?”</span> says Castlewood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> says Colonel Esmond. He knew full well, Frank +knew full well: our instinct told whither that traitor +had fled. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He had courage to turn to the company and say, <span class="tei tei-q">“Gentlemen, +I fear very much that Mr. George will not be here +to-day; something hath happened—and—and—I very +much fear some accident may befall him, which must keep +him out of the way. Having had your noon's draught, +you had best pay the reckoning and go home; there can +be no game where there is no one to play it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Some of the gentlemen went away without a word, others +called to pay their duty to her Majesty and ask for her +health. The little army disappeared into the darkness out +of which it had been called; there had been no writings, +no paper to implicate any man. Some few officers and +members of Parliament had been invited overnight to +breakfast at the <span class="tei tei-q">“King's Arms”</span>, at Kensington; and they +had called for their bill and gone home. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page451">[pg 451]</span><a name="Pg451" id="Pg451" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc97" id="toc97"></a> +<a name="pdf98" id="pdf98"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">Chapter XIII. August 1st, 1714</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Does my mistress know of this?”</span> Esmond asked of +Frank, as they walked along. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My mother found the letter in the book, on the toilet-table. +She had writ it ere she had left home,”</span> Frank +said. <span class="tei tei-q">“Mother met her on the stairs, with her hand upon +the door, trying to enter, and never left her after that till +she went away. He did not think of looking at it there, +nor had Martin the chance of telling him. I believe the +poor devil meant no harm, though I half killed him; he +thought 'twas to Beatrix's brother he was bringing the +letter.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Frank never said a word of reproach to me, for having +brought the villain amongst us. As we knocked at the +door I said; <span class="tei tei-q">“When will the horses be ready?”</span> Frank +pointed with his cane, they were turning the street that +moment. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We went up and bade adieu to our mistress; she was +in a dreadful state of agitation by this time, and that +bishop was with her whose company she was so fond of. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Did you tell him, my lord,”</span> says Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“that Beatrix +was at Castlewood?”</span> The bishop blushed and stammered: +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“I——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You served the villain right,”</span> broke out Mr. Esmond, +<span class="tei tei-q">“and he has lost a crown by what you told him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +My mistress turned quite white. <span class="tei tei-q">“Henry, Henry,”</span> says +she, <span class="tei tei-q">“do not kill him.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It may not be too late,”</span> says Esmond; <span class="tei tei-q">“he may not +have gone to Castlewood; pray God, it is not too late.”</span> +The bishop was breaking out with some <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">banales</span></span> phrases +about loyalty and the sacredness of the sovereign's person; +but Esmond sternly bade him hold his tongue, burn all +papers, and take care of Lady Castlewood; and in five +minutes he and Frank were in the saddle, John Lockwood +behind them, riding towards Castlewood at a rapid pace. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We were just got to Alton, when who should meet us +but old Lockwood, the porter from Castlewood, John's +father, walking by the side of the Hexham flying-coach, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page452">[pg 452]</span><a name="Pg452" id="Pg452" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +who slept the night at Alton. Lockwood said his young +mistress had arrived at home on Wednesday night, and +this morning, Friday, had dispatched him with a packet +for my lady at Kensington, saying the letter was of great +importance. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We took the freedom to break it, while Lockwood stared +with wonder, and cried out his <span class="tei tei-q">“Lord bless me's”</span>, and +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who'd a thought it's”</span>, at the sight of his young lord, +whom he had not seen these seven years. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The packet from Beatrix contained no news of importance +at all. It was written in a jocular strain, affecting to make +light of her captivity. She asked whether she might have +leave to visit Mrs. Tusher, or to walk beyond the court +and the garden-wall. She gave news of the peacocks, and +a fawn she had there. She bade her mother send her +certain gowns and smocks by old Lockwood; she sent her +duty to a certain person, if certain other persons permitted +her to take such a freedom; how that, as she was not +able to play cards with him, she hoped he would read +good books, such as Dr. Atterbury's sermons and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Eikon +Basilike</span></span>: she was going to read good books: she thought +her pretty mamma would like to know she was not crying +her eyes out. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who is in the house besides you, Lockwood?”</span> says the +colonel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There be the laundry-maid, and the kitchen-maid, +Madam Beatrix's maid, the man from London, and that +be all; and he sleepeth in my lodge away from the maids,”</span> +says old Lockwood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Esmond scribbled a line with a pencil on the note, giving +it to the old man, and bidding him go on to his lady. We +knew why Beatrix had been so dutiful on a sudden, and +why she spoke of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Eikon Basilike</span></span>. She writ this letter to +put the prince on the scent, and the porter out of the way. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We have a fine moonlight night for riding on,”</span> says +Esmond; <span class="tei tei-q">“Frank, we may reach Castlewood in time yet.”</span> +All the way along they made inquiries at the post-houses, +when a tall young gentleman in a grey suit, with a light-brown +periwig, just the colour of my lord's, had been seen +to pass. He had set off at six that morning, and we at +three in the afternoon. He rode almost as quickly as we +had done; he was seven hours ahead of us still when we +reached the last stage. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page453">[pg 453]</span><a name="Pg453" id="Pg453" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We rode over Castlewood Downs before the breaking of +dawn. We passed the very spot where the car was upset +fourteen years since; and Mohun lay. The village was +not up yet, nor the forge lighted, as we rode through it, +passing by the elms, where the rooks were still roosting, +and by the church, and over the bridge. We got off our +horses at the bridge and walked up to the gate. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If she is safe,”</span> says Frank, trembling, and his honest +eyes filling with tears, <span class="tei tei-q">“a silver statue to Our Lady!”</span> +He was going to rattle at the great iron knocker on the +oak gate; but Esmond stopped his kinsman's hand. He +had his own fears, his own hopes, his own despairs and +griefs, too: but he spoke not a word of these to his companion, +or showed any signs of emotion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He went and tapped at the little window at the porter's +lodge, gently, but repeatedly, until the man came to the bars. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Who's there?”</span> says he, looking out; it was the servant +from Kensington. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My Lord Castlewood and Colonel Esmond,”</span> we said, +from below. <span class="tei tei-q">“Open the gate and let us in without any +noise.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My Lord Castlewood?”</span> says the other; <span class="tei tei-q">“my lord's +here, and in bed.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Open, d—n you,”</span> says Castlewood, with a curse. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I shall open to no one,”</span> says the man, shutting the +glass window as Frank drew a pistol. He would have fired +at the porter, but Esmond again held his hand. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There are more ways than one,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“of entering +such a great house as this.”</span> Frank grumbled that the west +gate was half a mile round. <span class="tei tei-q">“But I know of a way that's +not a hundred yards off,”</span> says Mr. Esmond; and leading +his kinsman close along the wall, and by the shrubs, which +had now grown thick on what had been an old moat about +the house, they came to the buttress, at the side of which +the little window was, which was Father Holt's private +door. Esmond climbed up to this easily, broke a pane +that had been mended, and touched the spring inside, and +the two gentlemen passed in that way, treading as lightly +as they could; and so going through the passage into the +court, over which the dawn was now reddening, and where +the fountain plashed in the silence. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They sped instantly to the porter's lodge, where the +fellow had not fastened his door that led into the court; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page454">[pg 454]</span><a name="Pg454" id="Pg454" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and pistol in hand came upon the terrified wretch, and +bade him be silent. Then they asked him (Esmond's head +reeled, and he almost fell as he spoke) when Lord Castlewood +had arrived? He said on the previous evening, +about eight of the clock.—<span class="tei tei-q">“And what then?”</span>—His lordship +supped with his sister.—<span class="tei tei-q">“Did the man wait?”</span> Yes, +he and my lady's maid both waited: the other servants +made the supper; and there was no wine, and they could +give his lordship but milk, at which he grumbled; and—and +Madam Beatrix kept Miss Lucy always in the room +with her. And there being a bed across the court in the +chaplain's room, she had arranged my lord was to sleep +there. Madam Beatrix had come downstairs laughing with +the maids, and had locked herself in, and my lord had +stood for a while talking to her through the door, and +she laughing at him. And then he paced the court awhile, +and she came again to the upper window; and my lord +implored her to come down and walk in the room; but +she would not, and laughed at him again, and shut the +window; and so my lord uttering what seemed curses, but +in a foreign language, went to the chaplain's room to bed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Was this all?”</span>—<span class="tei tei-q">“All,”</span> the man swore upon his honour; +<span class="tei tei-q">“all as he hoped to be saved.—Stop, there was one thing +more. My lord, on arriving, and once or twice during +supper, did kiss his sister as was natural, and she kissed +him.”</span> At this Esmond ground his teeth with rage, and +wellnigh throttled the amazed miscreant who was speaking, +whereas Castlewood, seizing hold of his cousin's hand, burst +into a great fit of laughter. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If it amuses thee,”</span> says Esmond in French, <span class="tei tei-q">“that your +sister should be exchanging of kisses with a stranger, I fear +poor Beatrix will give thee plenty of sport.”</span>—Esmond +darkly thought, how Hamilton, Ashburnham, had before +been masters of those roses that the young prince's lips +were now feeding on. He sickened at that notion. Her +cheek was desecrated, her beauty tarnished; shame and +honour stood between it and him. The love was dead +within him; had she a crown to bring him with her love, +he felt that both would degrade him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But this wrath against Beatrix did not lessen the angry +feelings of the colonel against the man who had been the +occasion if not the cause of the evil. Frank sat down on +a stone bench in the courtyard, and fairly fell asleep, while +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page455">[pg 455]</span><a name="Pg455" id="Pg455" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Esmond paced up and down the court, debating what +should ensue. What mattered how much or how little had +passed between the prince and the poor faithless girl? +They were arrived in time perhaps to rescue her person, +but not her mind; had she not instigated the young prince +to come to her; suborned servants, dismissed others, so +that she might communicate with him? The treacherous +heart within her had surrendered, though the place was +safe; and it was to win this that he had given a life's +struggle and devotion; this, that she was ready to give +away for the bribe of a coronet or a wink of the prince's +eye. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When he had thought his thoughts out he shook up poor +Frank from his sleep, who rose yawning, and said he had +been dreaming of Clotilda. <span class="tei tei-q">“You must back me,”</span> says +Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“in what I am going to do. I have been thinking +that yonder scoundrel may have been instructed to tell +that story, and that the whole of it may be a lie; if it +be, we shall find it out from the gentleman who is asleep +yonder. See if the door leading to my lady's rooms”</span> (so +we called the rooms at the north-west angle of the house), +<span class="tei tei-q">“see if the door is barred as he saith.”</span> We tried; it was +indeed as the lackey had said, closed within. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It may have been open and shut afterwards,”</span> says poor +Esmond; <span class="tei tei-q">“the foundress of our family let our ancestor +in that way.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What will you do, Harry, if—if what that fellow saith +should turn out untrue?”</span> The young man looked scared +and frightened into his kinsman's face; I dare say it wore +no very pleasant expression. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Let us first go see whether the two stories agree,”</span> says +Esmond; and went in at the passage and opened the door +into what had been his own chamber now for wellnigh +five-and-twenty years. A candle was still burning, and the +prince asleep dressed on the bed—Esmond did not care +for making a noise. The prince started up in his bed, +seeing two men in his chamber: +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Qui est là?</span></span>”</span> says he, +and took a pistol from under his pillow. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It is the Marquis of Esmond,”</span> says the colonel, <span class="tei tei-q">“come +to welcome his Majesty to his house of Castlewood, and +to report of what hath happened in London. Pursuant +to the king's orders, I passed the night before last, after +leaving his Majesty, in waiting upon the friends of the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page456">[pg 456]</span><a name="Pg456" id="Pg456" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +king. It is a pity that his Majesty's desire to see the +country and to visit our poor house should have caused +the king to quit London without notice yesterday, when +the opportunity happened which in all human probability +may not occur again; and had the king not chosen to +ride to Castlewood, the Prince of Wales might have slept +at St. James's.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Sdeath! gentlemen,”</span> says the prince, starting off his +bed, whereon he was lying in his clothes, <span class="tei tei-q">“the doctor +was with me yesterday morning, and after watching by +my sister all night, told me I might not hope to see the +queen.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It would have been otherwise,”</span> says Esmond, with another +bow; <span class="tei tei-q">“as, by this time, the queen may be dead in spite +of the doctor. The Council was met, a new treasurer was +appointed, the troops were devoted to the king's cause; +and fifty loyal gentlemen of the greatest names of this +kingdom were assembled to accompany the Prince of Wales, +who might have been the acknowledged heir of the throne, +or the possessor of it by this time, had your Majesty not +chosen to take the air. We were ready; there was only +one person that failed us, your Majesty's gracious——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Morbleu! monsieur</span></span>, +you give me too much Majesty,”</span> +said the prince; who had now risen up and seemed to be +looking to one of us to help him to his coat. But neither +stirred. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We shall take care,”</span> says Esmond, <span class="tei tei-q">“not much oftener +to offend in that particular.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What mean you, my lord?”</span> says the prince, and +muttered something about a <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">guet-à-pens</span></span>, +which Esmond caught up. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The snare, sir,”</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">“was not of our laying; it is +not we that invited you. We came to avenge, and not to +compass, the dishonour of our family.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dishonour! <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Morbleu!</span></span> +there has been no dishonour,”</span> +says the prince, turning scarlet, <span class="tei tei-q">“only a little harmless +playing.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“That was meant to end seriously.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I swear,”</span> the prince broke out impetuously, <span class="tei tei-q">“upon the +honour of a gentleman, my lords——”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“That we arrived in time. No wrong hath been done, +Frank,”</span> says Colonel Esmond, turning round to young +Castlewood, who stood at the door as the talk was going +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page457">[pg 457]</span><a name="Pg457" id="Pg457" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +on. <span class="tei tei-q">“See! here is a paper whereon his Majesty hath +deigned to commence some verses in honour, or dishonour, +of Beatrix. Here is <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">madame</span></span> and +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">flamme</span></span>, +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">cruelle</span></span> and +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">rebelle</span></span>, and +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">amour</span></span> and +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">jour</span></span>, in the royal writing and +spelling. Had the gracious lover been happy, he had not +passed his time in sighing.”</span> In fact, and actually as he +was speaking, Esmond cast his eyes down towards the +table, and saw a paper on which my young prince had +been scrawling a madrigal, that was to finish his charmer +on the morrow. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir,”</span> says the prince, burning with rage (he had assumed +his royal coat unassisted by this time), <span class="tei tei-q">“did I come here +to receive insults?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“To confer them, may it please your Majesty,”</span> says the +colonel, with a very low bow, <span class="tei tei-q">“and the gentlemen of our +family are come to thank you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Malédiction!</span></span>”</span> +says the young man, tears starting into +his eyes with helpless rage and mortification. <span class="tei tei-q">“What will +you with me, gentlemen?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If your Majesty will please to enter the next apartment,”</span> +says Esmond, preserving his grave tone, <span class="tei tei-q">“I have some +papers there which I would gladly submit to you, and by +your permission I will lead the way;”</span> and, taking the +taper up, and backing before the prince with very great +ceremony, Mr. Esmond passed into the little chaplain's +room, through which we had just entered into the house:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Please +to set a chair for his Majesty, Frank,”</span> says the +colonel to his companion, who wondered almost as much +at this scene, and was as much puzzled by it, as the other +actor in it. Then going to the crypt over the mantelpiece, +the colonel opened it, and drew thence the papers which so +long had lain there. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Here, may it please your Majesty,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“is the +patent of Marquis sent over by your royal father at St. +Germains to Viscount Castlewood, my father: here is the +witnessed certificate of my father's marriage to my mother, +and of my birth and christening; I was christened of that +religion of which your sainted sire gave all through life so +shining example. These are my titles, dear Frank, and this +what I do with them: here go baptism and marriage, +and here the marquisate and the august sign-manual, with +which your predecessor was pleased to honour our race.”</span> +And as Esmond spoke he set the papers burning in the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page458">[pg 458]</span><a name="Pg458" id="Pg458" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +brasier. <span class="tei tei-q">“You will please, sir, to remember,”</span> he continued, +<span class="tei tei-q">“that our family hath ruined itself by fidelity to yours: +that my grandfather spent his estate, and gave his blood +and his son to die for your service; that my dear lord's +grandfather (for lord you are now, Frank, by right and +title too) died for the same cause; that my poor kinswoman, +my father's second wife, after giving away her honour to +your wicked perjured race, sent all her wealth to the king; +and got in return that precious title that lies in ashes, and +this inestimable yard of blue ribbon. I lay this at your +feet and stamp upon it: I draw this sword, and break it +and deny you; and, had you completed the wrong you +designed us, by Heaven I would have driven it through +your heart, and no more pardoned you than your father +pardoned Monmouth. Frank will do the same, won't you, +cousin?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Frank, who had been looking on with a stupid air at the +papers as they flamed in the old brasier, took out his sword +and broke it, holding his head down:—<span class="tei tei-q">“I go with my +cousin,”</span> says he, giving Esmond a grasp of the hand. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Marquis or not, by ——, I stand by him any day. I beg +your Majesty's pardon for swearing; that is—that is—I'm +for the Elector of Hanover. It's all your Majesty's own +fault. The queen's dead most likely by this time. And +you might have been king if you hadn't come dangling +after 'Trix”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thus to lose a crown,”</span> says the young prince, starting +up, and speaking French in his eager way; <span class="tei tei-q">“to lose the +loveliest woman in the world; to lose the loyalty of such +hearts as yours, is not this, my lords, enough of humiliation?—Marquis, +if I go on my knees will you pardon me?—No, +I can't do that, but I can offer you reparation, that +of honour, that of gentlemen. Favour me by crossing the +sword with mine: yours is broke—see, yonder in the +armoire are two;”</span> and the prince took them out as eager +as a boy, and held them towards Esmond:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Ah! you will? +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Merci, monsieur, merci!</span></span>”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Extremely touched by this immense mark of condescension +and repentance for wrong done, Colonel Esmond bowed +down so low as almost to kiss the gracious young hand +that conferred on him such an honour, and took his guard +in silence. The swords were no sooner met, than Castlewood +knocked up Esmond's with the blade of his own, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page459">[pg 459]</span><a name="Pg459" id="Pg459" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +which he had broke off short at the shell; and the colonel +falling back a step dropped his point with another very +low bow, and declared himself perfectly satisfied. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Eh bien, vicomte</span></span>,”</span> +says the young prince, who was a boy, and a French boy, +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">il ne nous reste qu'une chose +à faire</span></span>:”</span> he placed his sword upon the table, and the fingers +of his two hands upon his breast:—<span class="tei tei-q">“We have one more +thing to do,”</span> says he; <span class="tei tei-q">“you do not divine it?”</span> He stretched +out his arms:—<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Embrassons nous!</span></span>”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The talk was scarce over when Beatrix entered the +room:—What came she to seek there? She started and +turned pale at the sight of her brother and kinsman, drawn +swords, broken sword-blades, and papers yet smouldering +in the brasier. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Charming Beatrix,”</span> says the prince, with a blush which +became him very well, <span class="tei tei-q">“these lords have come a-horseback +from London, where my sister lies in a despaired state, and +where her successor makes himself desired. Pardon me +for my escapade of last evening. I had been so long a +prisoner, that I seized the occasion of a promenade on +horseback, and my horse naturally bore me towards you. +I found you a queen in your little court, where you deigned +to entertain me. Present my homages to your maids of +honour. I sighed as you slept, under the window of your +chamber, and then retired to seek rest in my own. It was +there that these gentlemen agreeably roused me. Yes, +milords, for that is a happy day that makes a prince +acquainted, at whatever cost to his vanity, with such a noble +heart as that of the Marquis of Esmond. Mademoiselle, +may we take your coach to town? I saw it in the hangar, +and this poor marquis must be dropping with sleep.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Will it please the king to breakfast before he goes?”</span> +was all Beatrix could say. The roses had shuddered out +of her cheeks; her eyes were glaring; she looked quite old. +She came up to Esmond and hissed out a word or two:—<span class="tei tei-q">“If +I did not love you before, cousin,”</span> says she, <span class="tei tei-q">“think how +I love you now.”</span> If words could stab, no doubt she would +have killed Esmond; she looked at him as if she could. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But her keen words gave no wound to Mr. Esmond; his +heart was too hard. As he looked at her, he wondered +that he could ever have loved her. His love of ten years +was over; it fell down dead on the spot, at the Kensington +tavern, where Frank brought him the note out of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Eikon +</span><span class="tei tei-pb" id="page460">[pg 460]</span><a name="Pg460" id="Pg460" class="tei tei-anchor"></a><span style="font-style: italic"> +Basilike</span></span>. The prince blushed and bowed low, as she gazed +at him, and quitted the chamber. I have never seen her +from that day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Horses were fetched and put to the chariot presently. +My lord rode outside, and as for Esmond he was so tired +that he was no sooner in the carriage than he fell asleep, +and never woke till night, as the coach came into Alton. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As we drove to the <span class="tei tei-q">“Bell Inn”</span> comes a mitred coach with +our old friend Lockwood beside the coachman. My Lady +Castlewood and the bishop were inside; she gave a little +scream when she saw us. The two coaches entered the inn +almost together; the landlord and people coming out with +lights to welcome the visitors. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We in our coach sprang out of it, as soon as ever we saw +the dear lady, and above all, the doctor in his cassock. What +was the news? Was there yet time? Was the queen alive? +These questions were put hurriedly, as Boniface stood waiting +before his noble guests to bow them up the stair. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Is she safe?”</span> was what Lady Castlewood whispered in +a flutter to Esmond. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“All's well, thank God,”</span> says he, as the fond lady took +his hand and kissed it, and called him her preserver and her +dear. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">She</span></em> wasn't thinking of queens and crowns. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The bishop's news was reassuring: at least all was not +lost; the queen yet breathed or was alive when they left +London, six hours since. (<span class="tei tei-q">“It was Lady Castlewood who +insisted on coming,”</span> the doctor said;) Argyle had marched +up regiments from Portsmouth, and sent abroad for more; +the Whigs were on the alert, a pest on them (I am not sure +but the bishop swore as he spoke), and so too were our people. +And all might be saved, if only the prince could be at +London in time. We called for horses, instantly to return +to London. We never went up poor crestfallen Boniface's +stairs, but into our coaches again. The prince and his +prime minister in one, Esmond in the other, with only his +dear mistress as a companion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Castlewood galloped forwards on horseback to gather the +prince's friends, and warn them of his coming. We travelled +through the night. Esmond discoursing to his mistress of +the events of the last twenty-four hours; of Castlewood's +ride and his; of the prince's generous behaviour and their +reconciliation. The night seemed short enough; and the +starlit hours passed away serenely in that fond company. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page461">[pg 461]</span><a name="Pg461" id="Pg461" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So we came along the road; the bishop's coach heading +ours; and, with some delays in procuring horses, we got +to Hammersmith about four o'clock on Sunday morning, +the first of August, and half an hour after, it being then +bright day, we rode by my Lady Warwick's house, and so +down the street of Kensington. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Early as the hour was, there was a bustle in the street, and +many people moving to and fro. Round the gate leading +to the palace, where the guard is, there was especially +a great crowd. And the coach ahead of us stopped, and +the bishop's man got down to know what the concourse +meant? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There presently came from out of the gate: Horse Guards +with their trumpets, and a company of heralds with their +tabards. The trumpets blew, and the herald-at-arms came +forward and proclaimed <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">George</span></span>, by the grace of God, of +Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the +Faith. And the people shouted, <span class="tei tei-q">“God save the King!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Among the crowd shouting and waving their hats, I +caught sight of one sad face, which I had known all my life, +and seen under many disguises. It was no other than poor +Mr. Holt's, who had slipped over to England to witness +the triumph of the good cause; and now beheld its enemies +victorious, amidst the acclamations of the English people. +The poor fellow had forgot to huzzah or to take his hat off, +until his neighbours in the crowd remarked his want of +loyalty, and cursed him for a Jesuit in disguise, when he +ruefully uncovered and began to cheer. Sure he was the +most unlucky of men: he never played a game but he lost +it; or engaged in a conspiracy but 'twas certain to end in +defeat. I saw him in Flanders after this, whence he went +to Rome to the head quarters of his Order; and actually +reappeared among us in America, very old, and busy, and +hopeful. I am not sure that he did not assume the hatchet +and moccasins there; and, attired in a blanket and warpaint, +skulk about a missionary amongst the Indians. He +lies buried in our neighbouring province of Maryland now, +with a cross over him, and a mound of earth above him; +under which that unquiet spirit is for ever at peace. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With the sound of King George's trumpets, all the vain +hopes of the weak and foolish young pretender were blown +away; and with that music, too, I may say, the drama +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page462">[pg 462]</span><a name="Pg462" id="Pg462" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of my own life was ended. That happiness, which hath +subsequently crowned it, cannot be written in words; 'tis +of its nature sacred and secret, and not to be spoken of, +though the heart be ever so full of thankfulness, save to +Heaven and the One Ear alone—to one fond being, the +truest and tenderest and purest wife ever man was blessed +with. As I think of the immense happiness which was in +store for me, and of the depth and intensity of that love +which, for so many years, hath blessed me, I own to a transport +of wonder and gratitude for such a boon—nay, am +thankful to have been endowed with a heart capable of +feeling and knowing the immense beauty and value of the +gift which God hath bestowed upon me. Sure, love <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">vincit +omnia</span></span>; is immeasurably above all ambition, more precious +than wealth, more noble than name. He knows not life +who knows not that: he hath not felt the highest faculty +of the soul who hath not enjoyed it. In the name of my +wife I write the completion of hope, and the summit of +happiness. To have such a love is the one blessing, in comparison +of which all earthly joy is of no value; and to think +of her, is to praise God. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was at Bruxelles, whither we retreated after the failure +of our plot—our Whig friends advising us to keep out of the +way—that the great joy of my life was bestowed upon me, +and that my dear mistress became my wife. We had been +so accustomed to an extreme intimacy and confidence, and +had lived so long and tenderly together, that we might have +gone on to the end without thinking of a closer tie; but +circumstances brought about that event which so prodigiously +multiplied my happiness and hers (for which +I humbly thank Heaven), although a calamity befell us, +which, I blush to think, hath occurred more than once in +our house. I know not what infatuation of ambition urged +the beautiful and wayward woman, whose name hath +occupied so many of these pages, and who was served by me +with ten years of such a constant fidelity and passion; but +ever after that day at Castlewood, when we rescued her, she +persisted in holding all her family as her enemies, and left +us, and escaped to France, to what a fate I disdain to tell. +Nor was her son's house a home for my dear mistress; my +poor Frank was weak, as perhaps all our race hath been, +and led by women. Those around him were imperious, and +in a terror of his mother's influence over him, lest he should +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page463">[pg 463]</span><a name="Pg463" id="Pg463" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +recant, and deny the creed which he had adopted by their +persuasion. The difference of their religion separated the +son and the mother: my dearest mistress felt that she +was severed from her children and alone in the world—alone +but for one constant servant on whose fidelity, praised +be Heaven, she could count. 'Twas after a scene of ignoble +quarrel on the part of Frank's wife and mother (for the +poor lad had been made to marry the whole of that German +family with whom he had connected himself), that I found +my mistress one day in tears, and then besought her to +confide herself to the care and devotion of one who, by +God's help, would never forsake her. And then the tender +matron, as beautiful in her autumn, and as pure as virgins +in their spring, with blushes of love and <span class="tei tei-q">“eyes of meek +surrender”</span>, yielded to my respectful importunity, and consented +to share my home. Let the last words I write thank +her, and bless her who hath blessed it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +By the kindness of Mr. Addison, all danger of prosecution, +and every obstacle against our return to England, was +removed; and my son Frank's gallantry in Scotland made +his peace with the king's Government. But we two cared +no longer to live in England; and Frank formally and +joyfully yielded over to us the possession of that estate +which we now occupy, far away from Europe and its troubles, +on the beautiful banks of the Potomac, where we have built +a new Castlewood, and think with grateful hearts of our old +home. In our Transatlantic country we have a season, the +calmest and most delightful of the year, which we call the +Indian summer: I often say the autumn of our life resembles +that happy and serene weather, and am thankful for +its rest and its sweet sunshine. Heaven hath blessed us +with a child, which each parent loves for her resemblance +to the other. Our diamonds are turned into ploughs and +axes for our plantations; and into negroes, the happiest and +merriest, I think, in all this country: and the only jewel +by which my wife sets any store, and from which she hath +never parted, is that gold button she took from my arm +on the day when she visited me in prison, and which she +wore ever after, as she told me, on the tenderest heart in +the world. +</p> + +</div> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page464">[pg 464]</span><a name="Pg464" id="Pg464" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc99" id="toc99"></a> +<a name="pdf100" id="pdf100"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Appendix</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Book I, chap, viii, p. 80, line 9: <span class="tei tei-q">“mist”</span> was wrongly altered in +revised edition to <span class="tei tei-q">“midst”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Book I, chap, xii, p. 130, line 2 from foot: <span class="tei tei-q">“through”</span> was wrongly +altered in revised edition to <span class="tei tei-q">“to”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Book II, chap, ii, p. 179, line 7 from foot: <span class="tei tei-q">“guests,”</span> though never +altered, should clearly be <span class="tei tei-q">“hosts”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Book II, chap, xv, p. 307, line 8: the following passage was +omitted in the edition of 1858:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">I always thought that paper was Mr. Congreve's,</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%"> cries +Mr. St. John, showing that he knew more about the subject +than he pretended to Mr. Steele, and who was the original +Mr. Bickerstaffe drew. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">Tom Boxer said so in his </span><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">Observator</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%">. But Tom's +oracle is often making blunders,</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%"> cries Steele. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">Mr. Boxer and my husband were friends once, and when +the captain was ill with the fever, no man could be kinder +than Mr. Boxer, who used to come to his bedside every +day, and actually brought Dr. Arbuthnot who cured him,</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%"> +whispered Mrs. Steele. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">Indeed, madam! How very interesting,</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%"> says Mr. +St. John. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">But when the captain's last comedy came out, Mr. +Boxer took no notice of it—you know he is Mr. Congreve's +man, and won't ever give a word to the other house—and +this made my husband angry.</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">Oh! Mr. Boxer is Mr. Congreve's man!</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%"> says Mr. +St. John. +</span></p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">Mr. Congreve has wit enough of his own,</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%"> cries out +Mr. Steele. </span><span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">No one ever heard me grudge him or any +other man his share.</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span> +</p> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Book III, chap, i, p. 326, line 19: for <span class="tei tei-q">“Frank”</span>, Thackeray by +an interesting reminiscence of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pendennis</span></span> wrote <span class="tei tei-q">“Arthur”</span>. +</p> + +</div> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page465">[pg 465]</span><a name="Pg465" id="Pg465" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> +<a name="toc101" id="toc101"></a> +<a name="pdf102" id="pdf102"></a> +<h1 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 3.46em; margin-top: 3.46em"><span style="font-size: 173%">The English Humourists Of The Eighteenth Century</span></h1> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +THE ENGLISH HUMOURISTS +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +OF THE +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +EIGHTEENTH CENTURY +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A Series of Lectures +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +DELIVERED IN ENGLAND, SCOTLAND, AND THE UNITED STATES +OF AMERICA +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +[First edition, 1853; second edition, revised, 1853] +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page469">[pg 469]</span><a name="Pg469" id="Pg469" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc103" id="toc103"></a> +<a name="pdf104" id="pdf104"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Lecture The First. Swift</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In treating of the English humourists of the past age, it +is of the men and of their lives, rather than of their books, +that I ask permission to speak to you; and in doing so, +you are aware that I cannot hope to entertain you with +a merely humorous or facetious story. Harlequin without +his mask is known to present a very sober countenance, +and was himself, the story goes, the melancholy patient +whom the Doctor advised to go and see Harlequin<a id="noteref_21" name="noteref_21" href="#note_21"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">21</span></span></a>—a +man full of cares and perplexities like the rest of us, +whose Self must always be serious to him, under whatever +mask, or disguise, or uniform he presents it to the public. +And as all of you here must needs be grave when you +think of your own past and present, you will not look to +find, in the histories of those whose lives and feelings I am +going to try and describe to you, a story that is otherwise +than serious, and often very sad. If Humour only meant +laughter, you would scarcely feel more interest about +humorous writers than about the private life of poor +Harlequin just mentioned, who possesses in common with +these the power of making you laugh. But the men +regarding whose lives and stories your kind presence here +shows that you have curiosity and sympathy, appeal to +a great number of our other faculties, besides our mere +sense of ridicule. The humorous writer professes to +awaken and direct your love, your pity, your kindness—your +scorn for untruth, pretension, imposture—your +tenderness for the weak, the poor, the oppressed, the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page470">[pg 470]</span><a name="Pg470" id="Pg470" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +unhappy. To the best of his means and ability he comments +on all the ordinary actions and passions of life +almost. He takes upon himself to be the week-day +preacher, so to speak. Accordingly, as he finds, and +speaks, and feels the truth best, we regard him, esteem +him—sometimes love him. And, as his business is to +mark other people's lives and peculiarities, we moralize +upon <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">his</span></em> life when he is gone—and yesterday's preacher +becomes the text for to-day's sermon. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of English parents, and of a good English family of +clergymen,<a id="noteref_22" name="noteref_22" href="#note_22"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">22</span></span></a> Swift was born in Dublin in 1667, seven months +after the death of his father, who had come to practise +there as a lawyer. The boy went to school at Kilkenny, +and afterwards to Trinity College, Dublin, where he got +a degree with difficulty, and was wild, and witty, and poor. +In 1688, by the recommendation of his mother, Swift was +received into the family of Sir William Temple, who had +known Mrs. Swift in Ireland. He left his patron in 1693, +and the next year took orders in Dublin. But he threw +up the small Irish preferment which he got and returned +to Temple, in whose family he remained until Sir William's +death in 1699. His hopes of advancement in England +failing, Swift returned to Ireland, and took the living of +Laracor. Hither he invited Hester Johnson,<a id="noteref_23" name="noteref_23" href="#note_23"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">23</span></span></a> Temple's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page471">[pg 471]</span><a name="Pg471" id="Pg471" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +natural daughter, with whom he had contracted a tender +friendship, while they were both dependants of Temple's. +And with an occasional visit to England, Swift now passed +nine years at home. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In 1709 he came to England, and, with a brief visit to +Ireland, during which he took possession of his deanery of +St. Patrick, he now passed five years in England, taking +the most distinguished part in the political transactions +which terminated with the death of Queen Anne. After +her death, his party disgraced, and his hopes of ambition +over, Swift returned to Dublin, where he remained twelve +years. In this time he wrote the famous <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Drapier's Letters</span></span> +and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gulliver's Travels</span></span>. He married Hester Johnson (Stella) +and buried Esther Vanhomrigh (Vanessa) who had followed +him to Ireland from London, where she had contracted +a violent passion for him. In 1726 and 1727 Swift was in +England, which he quitted for the last time on hearing of +his wife's illness. Stella died in January, 1728, and Swift +not until 1745, having passed the last five of the seventy-eight +years of his life with an impaired intellect and keepers +to watch him.<a id="noteref_24" name="noteref_24" href="#note_24"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">24</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +You know, of course, that Swift has had many biographers; +his life has been told by the kindest and most +good-natured of men, Scott, who admires but can't bring +himself to love him; and by stout old Johnson,<a id="noteref_25" name="noteref_25" href="#note_25"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">25</span></span></a> who, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page472">[pg 472]</span><a name="Pg472" id="Pg472" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +forced to admit him into the company of poets, receives +the famous Irishman, and takes off his hat to him with +a bow of surly recognition, scans him from head to foot, +and passes over to the other side of the street. Dr. Wilde, +of Dublin,<a id="noteref_26" name="noteref_26" href="#note_26"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">26</span></span></a> who has written a most interesting volume on +the closing years of Swift's life, calls Johnson <span class="tei tei-q">“the most +malignant of his biographers”</span>: it is not easy for an +English critic to please Irishmen—perhaps to try and +please them. And yet Johnson truly admires Swift: +Johnson does not quarrel with Swift's change of politics, +or doubt his sincerity of religion: about the famous Stella +and Vanessa controversy the Doctor does not bear very +hardly on Swift. But he could not give the Dean that +honest hand of his; the stout old man puts it into his +breast, and moves off from him.<a id="noteref_27" name="noteref_27" href="#note_27"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">27</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Would we have liked to live with him? That is a question +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page473">[pg 473]</span><a name="Pg473" id="Pg473" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +which, in dealing with these people's works, and +thinking of their lives and peculiarities, every reader of +biographies must put to himself. Would you have liked +to be a friend of the great Dean? I should like to have +been Shakespeare's shoeblack—just to have lived in his +house, just to have worshipped him—to have run on his +errands, and seen that sweet serene face. I should like, +as a young man, to have lived on Fielding's staircase in +the Temple, and after helping him up to bed perhaps, and +opening his door with his latchkey, to have shaken hands +with him in the morning, and heard him talk and crack +jokes over his breakfast and his mug of small beer. Who +would not give something to pass a night at the club with +Johnson, and Goldsmith, and James Boswell, Esq., of +Auchinleck? The charm of Addison's companionship and +conversation has passed to us by fond tradition—but +Swift? If you had been his inferior in parts (and that, +with a great respect for all persons present, I fear is only +very likely), his equal in mere social station, he would have +bullied, scorned, and insulted you; if, undeterred by his +great reputation, you had met him like a man, he would, +have quailed before you,<a id="noteref_28" name="noteref_28" href="#note_28"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">28</span></span></a> and not had the pluck to reply, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page474">[pg 474]</span><a name="Pg474" id="Pg474" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and gone home, and years after written a foul epigram +about you—watched for you in a sewer, and come out to +assail you with a coward's blow and a dirty bludgeon. If +you had been a lord with a blue ribbon, who flattered his +vanity, or could help his ambition, he would have been +the most delightful company in the world. He would +have been so manly, so sarcastic, so bright, odd, and +original, that you might think he had no object in view +but the indulgence of his humour, and that he was the most +reckless, simple creature in the world. How he would +have torn your enemies to pieces for you! and made fun +of the Opposition! His servility was so boisterous that it +looked like independence;<a id="noteref_29" name="noteref_29" href="#note_29"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">29</span></span></a> he would have done your +errands, but with the air of patronizing you, and after +fighting your battles masked in the street or the press, +would have kept on his hat before your wife and daughters +in the drawing-room, content to take that sort of pay for +his tremendous services as a bravo.<a id="noteref_30" name="noteref_30" href="#note_30"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">30</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page475">[pg 475]</span><a name="Pg475" id="Pg475" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He says as much himself in one of his letters to Bolingbroke:—<span class="tei tei-q">“All +my endeavours to distinguish myself were +only for want of a great title and fortune, that I might be +used like a lord by those who have an opinion of my parts; +whether right or wrong is no great matter. And so the +reputation of wit and great learning does the office of +a blue ribbon or a coach-and-six.”</span><a id="noteref_31" name="noteref_31" href="#note_31"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">31</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Could there be a greater candour? It is an outlaw, +who says, <span class="tei tei-q">“These are my brains; with these I'll win +titles and compete with fortune. These are my bullets; +these I'll turn into gold”</span>; and he hears the sound of +coaches-and-six, takes the road like Macheath, and makes +society stand and deliver. They are all on their knees +before him. Down go my lord bishop's apron, and his +grace's blue ribbon, and my lady's brocade petticoat in +the mud. He eases the one of a living, the other of a +patent place, the third of a little snug post about the +Court, and gives them over to followers of his own. The +great prize has not come yet. The coach with the mitre +and crosier in it, which he intends to have for <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">his</span></em> share, +has been delayed on the way from St. James's; and he +waits and waits until nightfall, when his runners come and +tell him that the coach has taken a different road, and +escaped him. So he fires his pistols into the air with +a curse, and rides away into his own country.<a id="noteref_32" name="noteref_32" href="#note_32"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">32</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page476">[pg 476]</span><a name="Pg476" id="Pg476" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Swift's seems to me to be as good a name to point a moral +or adorn a tale of ambition, as any hero's that ever lived +and failed. But we must remember that the morality +was lax—that other gentlemen besides himself took the +road in his day—that public society was in a strange +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page477">[pg 477]</span><a name="Pg477" id="Pg477" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +disordered condition, and the State was ravaged by other +condottieri. The Boyne was being fought and won, and +lost—the bells rung in William's victory, in the very same +tone with which they would have pealed for James's. +Men were loose upon politics, and had to shift for themselves. +They, as well as old beliefs and institutions, had +lost their moorings and gone adrift in the storm. As in +the South Sea Bubble almost everybody gambled; as in +the Railway mania—not many centuries ago—almost every +one took his unlucky share; a man of that time, of the +vast talents and ambition of Swift, could scarce do otherwise +than grasp at his prize, and make his spring at his +opportunity. His bitterness, his scorn, his rage, his subsequent +misanthropy, are ascribed by some panegyrists to +a deliberate conviction of mankind's unworthiness, and +a desire to amend them by castigating. His youth was +bitter, as that of a great genius bound down by ignoble +ties, and powerless in a mean dependence; his age was +bitter,<a id="noteref_33" name="noteref_33" href="#note_33"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">33</span></span></a> like that of a great genius that had fought the +battle and nearly won it, and lost it, and thought of it +afterwards writhing in a lonely exile. A man may attribute +to the gods, if he likes, what is caused by his own fury, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page478">[pg 478]</span><a name="Pg478" id="Pg478" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +or disappointment, or self-will. What public man—what +statesman projecting a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">coup</span></span>—what king determined +on an invasion of his neighbour—what satirist meditating an +onslaught on society or an individual, can't give a pretext +for his move? There was a French general the other day +who proposed to march into this country and put it to +sack and pillage, in revenge for humanity outraged by our +conduct at Copenhagen—there is always some excuse for +men of the aggressive turn. They are of their nature warlike, +predatory, eager for fight, plunder, dominion.<a id="noteref_34" name="noteref_34" href="#note_34"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">34</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As fierce a beak and talon as ever struck—as strong +a wing as ever beat, belonged to Swift. I am glad, for +one, that fate wrested the prey out of his claws, and cut +his wings and chained him. One can gaze, and not without +awe and pity, at the lonely eagle chained behind the +bars. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That Swift was born at No. 7, Hoey's Court, Dublin, on +the 30th November, 1667, is a certain fact, of which nobody +will deny the sister island the honour and glory, but, it +seems to me, he was no more an Irishman than a man +born of English parents at Calcutta is a Hindoo.<a id="noteref_35" name="noteref_35" href="#note_35"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">35</span></span></a> Goldsmith +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page479">[pg 479]</span><a name="Pg479" id="Pg479" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +was an Irishman, and always an Irishman: Steele +was an Irishman, and always an Irishman: Swift's heart +was English and in England, his habits English, his logic +eminently English; his statement is elaborately simple; +he shuns tropes and metaphors, and uses his ideas and +words with a wise thrift and economy, as he used his +money; with which he could be generous and splendid +upon great occasions, but which he husbanded when there +was no need to spend it. He never indulges in needless +extravagance of rhetoric, lavish epithets, profuse imagery. +He lays his opinion before you with a grave simplicity +and a perfect neatness.<a id="noteref_36" name="noteref_36" href="#note_36"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">36</span></span></a> Dreading ridicule too, as a man +of his humour—above all an Englishman of his humour—certainly +would, he is afraid to use the poetical power +which he really possessed; one often fancies in reading +him that he dares not be eloquent when he might; that +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page480">[pg 480]</span><a name="Pg480" id="Pg480" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he does not speak above his voice, as if were, and the +tone of society. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His initiation into politics, his knowledge of business, +his knowledge of polite life, his acquaintance with literature +even, which he could not have pursued very sedulously +during that reckless career at Dublin, Swift got under the +roof of Sir William Temple. He was fond of telling in +after-life what quantities of books he devoured there, and +how King William taught him to cut asparagus in the +Dutch fashion. It was at Shene and at Moor Park, with +a salary of twenty pounds and a dinner at the upper +servants' table, that this great and lonely Swift passed +a ten years' apprenticeship—wore a cassock that was only +not a livery—bent down a knee as proud as Lucifer's to +supplicate my lady's good graces, or run on his honour's +errands.<a id="noteref_37" name="noteref_37" href="#note_37"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">37</span></span></a> It was here, as he was writing at Temple's table, +or following his patron's walk, that he saw and heard the +men who had governed the great world—measured himself +with them, looking up from his silent corner, gauged their +brains, weighed their wits, turned them, and tried them, +and marked them. Ah, what platitudes he must have +heard! what feeble jokes! what pompous commonplaces! +what small men they must have seemed under those enormous +periwigs, to the swarthy, uncouth, silent Irish secretary. +I wonder whether it ever struck Temple that that +Irishman was his master? I suppose that dismal conviction +did not present itself under the ambrosial wig, or +Temple could never have lived with Swift. Swift sickened, +rebelled, left the service—ate humble pie and came back +again; and so for ten years went on, gathering learning, +swallowing scorn, and submitting with a stealthy rage to +his fortune. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Temple's style is the perfection of practised and easy +good-breeding. If he does not penetrate very deeply into +a subject, he professes a very gentlemanly acquaintance +with it; if he makes rather a parade of Latin, it was the +custom of his day, as it was the custom for a gentleman +to envelop his head in a periwig and his hands in lace +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page481">[pg 481]</span><a name="Pg481" id="Pg481" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +ruffles. If he wears buckles and square-toed shoes, he +steps in them with a consummate grace, and you never +hear their creak, or find them treading upon any lady's +train or any rival's heels in the Court crowd. When that +grows too hot or too agitated for him, he politely leaves +it. He retires to his retreat of Shene or Moor Park; and +lets the King's party, and the Prince of Orange's party +battle it out among themselves. He reveres the Sovereign +(and no man perhaps ever testified to his loyalty by so +elegant a bow); he admires the Prince of Orange; but +there is one person whose ease and comfort he loves more +than all the princes in Christendom, and that valuable +member of society is himself, Gulielmus Temple, Baronettus. +One sees him in his retreat; between his study-chair and +his tulip-beds,<a id="noteref_38" name="noteref_38" href="#note_38"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">38</span></span></a> clipping his apricots and pruning his essays,—the +statesman, the ambassador no more; but the philosopher, +the Epicurean, the fine gentleman and courtier at +St. James's as at Shene; where, in place of kings and fair +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page482">[pg 482]</span><a name="Pg482" id="Pg482" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +ladies, he pays his court to the Ciceronian majesty; or +walks a minuet with the Epic Muse; or dallies by the south +wall with the ruddy nymph of gardens. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Temple seems to have received and exacted a prodigious +deal of veneration from his household, and to have been +coaxed, and warmed, and cuddled by the people round +about him, as delicately as any of the plants which he +loved. When he fell ill in 1693, the household was aghast +at his indisposition; mild Dorothea, his wife, the best +companion of the best of men— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Mild Dorothea, peaceful, wise, and great,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Trembling beheld the doubtful hand of fate.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for Dorinda, his sister,— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Those who would grief describe, might come and trace</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Its watery footsteps in Dorinda's face.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To see her weep, joy every face forsook,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And grief flung sables on each menial look.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The humble tribe mourned for the quickening soul,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">That furnished life and spirit through the whole.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Isn't that line in which grief is described as putting the +menials into a mourning livery, a fine image? One of the +menials wrote it, who did not like that Temple livery nor +those twenty-pound wages. Cannot one fancy the uncouth +young servitor, with downcast eyes, books and papers in +hand, following at his Honour's heels in the garden walk; +or taking his Honour's orders as he stands by the great +chair, where Sir William has the gout, and his feet all +blistered with moxa? When Sir William has the gout or +scolds it must be hard work at the second +table;<a id="noteref_39" name="noteref_39" href="#note_39"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">39</span></span></a> the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page483">[pg 483]</span><a name="Pg483" id="Pg483" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Irish secretary owned as much afterwards: and when he +came to dinner, how he must have lashed and growled +and torn the household with his gibes and scorn! What +would the steward say about the pride of them Irish +schollards—and this one had got no great credit even at +his Irish college, if the truth were known—and what a +contempt his Excellency's own gentleman must have had +for Parson Teague from Dublin. (The valets and chaplains +were always at war. It is hard to say which Swift +thought the more contemptible.) And what must have +been the sadness, the sadness and terror, of the housekeeper's +little daughter with the curling black ringlets and +the sweet smiling face, when the secretary who teaches her +to read and write, and whom she loves and reverences +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page484">[pg 484]</span><a name="Pg484" id="Pg484" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +above all things—above mother, above mild Dorothea, +above that tremendous Sir William in his square-toes and +periwig,—when <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Mr. Swift</span></em> comes down from his master with +rage in his heart, and has not a kind word even for little +Hester Johnson? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Perhaps, for the Irish secretary, his Excellency's condescension +was even more cruel than his frowns. Sir +William <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">would</span></em> perpetually quote Latin and the ancient +classics à propos of his gardens and his Dutch statues and +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">plates-bandes</span></span>, and talk about Epicurus and Diogenes +Laertius, Julius Caesar, Semiramis, and the gardens of the +Hesperides, Maecenas, Strabo describing Jericho, and the +Assyrian kings. A propos of beans, he would mention +Pythagoras's precept to abstain from beans, and that this +precept probably meant that wise men should abstain from +public affairs. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">He</span></em> is a placid Epicurean; <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">he</span></em> is a Pythagorean +philosopher; <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">he</span></em> is a wise man—that is the deduction. +Does not Swift think so? One can imagine the +downcast eyes lifted up for a moment, and the flash of +scorn which they emit. Swift's eyes were as azure as the +heavens; Pope says nobly (as everything Pope said and +thought of his friend was good and noble), <span class="tei tei-q">“His eyes are +as azure as the heavens, and have a charming archness in +them.”</span> And one person in that household, that pompous, +stately, kindly Moor Park, saw heaven nowhere else. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the Temple amenities and solemnities did not agree +with Swift. He was half-killed with a surfeit of Shene +pippins; and in a garden-seat which he devised for himself +at Moor Park, and where he devoured greedily the stock +of books within his reach, he caught a vertigo and deafness +which punished and tormented him through life. He could +not bear the place or the servitude. Even in that poem +of courtly condolence, from which we have quoted a few +lines of mock melancholy, he breaks out of the funereal +procession with a mad shriek, as it were, and rushes away +crying his own grief, cursing his own fate, foreboding madness, +and forsaken by fortune, and even hope. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I don't know anything more melancholy than the letter +to Temple, in which, after having broke from his bondage, +the poor wretch crouches piteously towards his cage again, +and deprecates his master's anger. He asks for testimonials +for orders. <span class="tei tei-q">“The particulars required of me are what relate +to morals and learning—and the reasons of quitting your +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page485">[pg 485]</span><a name="Pg485" id="Pg485" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Honour's family—that is, whether the last was occasioned +by any ill action. They are left entirely to your Honour's +mercy, though in the first I think I cannot reproach myself +for anything further than for <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">infirmities</span></em>. This is all I dare +at present beg from your Honour, under circumstances of +life not worth your regard: what is left me to wish (next +to the health and prosperity of your Honour and family) +is that Heaven would one day allow me the opportunity of +leaving my acknowledgements at your feet. I beg my +most humble duty and service be presented to my ladies, +your Honour's lady and sister.”</span>—Can prostration fall +deeper? Could a slave bow lower?<a id="noteref_40" name="noteref_40" href="#note_40"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">40</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Twenty years afterwards, Bishop Kennet, describing the +same man, says, <span class="tei tei-q">“Dr. Swift came into the coffee-house and +had a bow from everybody but me. When I came to the +antechamber [at Court] to wait before prayers, Dr. Swift +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page486">[pg 486]</span><a name="Pg486" id="Pg486" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +was the principal man of talk and business. He was +soliciting the Earl of Arran to speak to his brother, the +Duke of Ormond, to get a place for a clergyman. He +was promising Mr. Thorold to undertake, with my Lord +Treasurer, that he should obtain a salary of 200<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> per +annum as member of the English Church at Rotterdam. +He stopped F. Gwynne, Esq., going in to the Queen with +the red bag, and told him aloud, he had something to say +to him from my Lord Treasurer. He took out his gold +watch, and telling the time of day, complained that it was +very late. A gentleman said he was too fast. <span class="tei tei-q">‘How can +I help it,’</span> says the doctor, <span class="tei tei-q">‘if the courtiers give me a +watch that won't go right?’</span> Then he instructed a young +nobleman, that the best poet in England was Mr. Pope +(a Papist), who had begun a translation of Homer into +English, for which he would have them all subscribe; +<span class="tei tei-q">‘For,’</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘he shall not begin to print till I have +a thousand guineas for him.’</span><a id="noteref_41" name="noteref_41" href="#note_41"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">41</span></span></a> Lord Treasurer, after +leaving the Queen, came through the room, beckoning +Dr. Swift to follow him,—both went off just before prayers.”</span> +There's a little malice in the Bishop's <span class="tei tei-q">“just before prayers”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This picture of the great Dean seems a true one, and is +harsh, though not altogether unpleasant. He was doing +good, and to deserving men too, in the midst of these +intrigues and triumphs. His journals and a thousand anecdotes +of him relate his kind acts and rough manners. His +hand was constantly stretched out to relieve an honest +man—he was cautious about his money, but ready.—If +you were in a strait would you like such a benefactor? +I think I would rather have had a potato and a friendly +word from Goldsmith than have been beholden to the +Dean for a guinea and a dinner.<a id="noteref_42" name="noteref_42" href="#note_42"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">42</span></span></a> He insulted a man as +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page487">[pg 487]</span><a name="Pg487" id="Pg487" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he served him, made women cry, guests look foolish, bullied +unlucky friends, and flung his benefactions into poor men's +faces. No; the Dean was no Irishman—no Irishman ever +gave but with a kind word and a kind heart. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is told, as if it were to Swift's credit, that the Dean of +St. Patrick's performed his family devotions every morning +regularly, but with such secrecy, that the guests in his +house were never in the least aware of the ceremony. There +was no need surely why a church dignitary should assemble +his family privily in a crypt, and as if he was afraid of +heathen persecution. But I think the world was right, +and the bishops who advised Queen Anne, when they counselled +her not to appoint the author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tale of a Tub</span></span> +to a bishopric, gave perfectly good advice. The man who +wrote the arguments and illustrations in that wild book, +could not but be aware what must be the sequel of the +propositions which he laid down. The boon companion +of Pope and Bolingbroke, who chose these as the friends +of his life, and the recipients of his confidence and affection, +must have heard many an argument, and joined in many +a conversation over Pope's port, or St. John's burgundy, +which would not bear to be repeated at other men's boards. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I know of few things more conclusive as to the sincerity +of Swift's religion than his advice to poor John Gay to turn +clergyman, and look out for a seat on the Bench. Gay, +the author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Beggar's Opera</span></span>—Gay, the wildest of the +wits about town—it was this man that Jonathan Swift +advised to take orders—to invest in a cassock and bands—just +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page488">[pg 488]</span><a name="Pg488" id="Pg488" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as he advised him to husband his shillings and put his +thousand pounds out at interest.<a id="noteref_43" name="noteref_43" href="#note_43"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">43</span></span></a> The Queen, and the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page489">[pg 489]</span><a name="Pg489" id="Pg489" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +bishops, and the world, were right in mistrusting the +religion of that man. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I am not here, of course, to speak of any man's religious +views, except in so far as they influence his literary character, +his life, his humour. The most notorious sinners of all +those fellow mortals whom it is our business to discuss—Harry +Fielding and Dick Steele, were especially loud, and +I believe really fervent, in their expressions of belief; they +belaboured freethinkers, and stoned imaginary atheists on +all sorts of occasions, going out of their way to bawl their +own creed, and persecute their neighbour's, and if they +sinned and stumbled, as they constantly did with debt, +with drink, with all sorts of bad behaviour, they got up on +their knees, and cried <span class="tei tei-q">“Peccavi”</span> with a most sonorous +orthodoxy. Yes; poor Harry Fielding and poor Dick +Steele were trusty and undoubting Church of England men; +they abhorred Popery, atheism, and wooden shoes, and +idolatries in general; and hiccupped <span class="tei tei-q">“Church and State”</span> +with fervour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But Swift? <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">His</span></em> mind had had a different schooling, +and possessed a very different logical power. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">He</span></em> was not +bred up in a tipsy guard-room, and did not learn to reason +in a Covent Garden tavern. He could conduct an argument +from beginning to end. He could see forward with a fatal +clearness. In his old age, looking at the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tale of a Tub</span></span>, +when he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Good God, what a genius I had when +I wrote that book!”</span> I think he was admiring not the +genius, but the consequences to which the genius had brought +him—a vast genius, a magnificent genius, a genius wonderfully +bright, and dazzling, and strong,—to seize, to know, +to see, to flash upon falsehood and scorch it into perdition, +to penetrate into the hidden motives, and expose the black +thoughts of men,—an awful, an evil spirit. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Ah, man! you, educated in Epicurean Temple's library, +you whose friends were Pope and St. John—what made +you to swear to fatal vows, and bind yourself to a lifelong +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page490">[pg 490]</span><a name="Pg490" id="Pg490" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +hypocrisy before the Heaven which you adored with such +real wonder, humility, and reverence? For Swift was +a reverent, was a pious spirit—for Swift could love and +could pray. Through the storms and tempests of his +furious mind, the stars of religion and love break out in +the blue, shining serenely, though hidden by the driving +clouds and the maddened hurricane of his life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is my belief that he suffered frightfully from the +consciousness of his own scepticism, and that he had bent +his pride so far down as to put his apostasy out to hire.<a id="noteref_44" name="noteref_44" href="#note_44"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">44</span></span></a> +The paper left behind him, called <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Thoughts on Religion</span></span>, +is merely a set of excuses for not professing disbelief. He +says of his sermons that he preached pamphlets: they +have scarce a Christian characteristic; they might be +preached from the steps of a synagogue, or the floor of +a mosque, or the box of a coffee-house almost. There is +little or no cant—he is too great and too proud for that; +and, in so far as the badness of his sermons goes, he is +honest. But having put that cassock on, it poisoned him: +he was strangled in his bands. He goes through life, +tearing, like a man possessed with a devil. Like Abudah +in the Arabian story, he is always looking out for the Fury, +and knows that the night will come and the inevitable hag +with it. What a night, my God, it was! what a lonely +rage and long agony—what a vulture that tore the heart +of that giant!<a id="noteref_45" name="noteref_45" href="#note_45"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">45</span></span></a> +It is awful to think of the great sufferings +of this great man. Through life he always seems alone, +somehow. Goethe was so. I can't fancy Shakespeare otherwise. +The giants must live apart. The kings can have +no company. But this man suffered so; and deserved so +to suffer. One hardly reads anywhere of such a pain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The <span class="tei tei-q">“saeva indignatio”</span> of which he spoke as lacerating +his heart, and which he dares to inscribe on his tombstone—as +if the wretch who lay under that stone waiting God's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page491">[pg 491]</span><a name="Pg491" id="Pg491" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +judgement had a right to be angry—breaks out from him +in a thousand pages of his writing, and tears and rends +him. Against men in office, he having been overthrown; +against men in England, he having lost his chance of preferment +there, the furious exile never fails to rage and curse. +Is it fair to call the famous <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Drapier's Letters</span></span> patriotism? +They are masterpieces of dreadful humour and invective: +they are reasoned logically enough too, but the proposition +is as monstrous and fabulous as the Lilliputian island. It +is not that the grievance is so great, but there is his enemy—the +assault is wonderful for its activity and terrible rage. +It is Samson, with a bone in his hand, rushing on his enemies +and felling them: one admires not the cause so much as +the strength, the anger, the fury of the champion. As is +the case with madmen, certain subjects provoke him, and +awaken his fits of wrath. Marriage is one of these; in +a hundred passages in his writings he rages against it; +rages against children; an object of constant satire, even +more contemptible in his eyes than a lord's chaplain, is +a poor curate with a large family. The idea of this luckless +paternity never fails to bring down from him gibes and +foul language. Could Dick Steele, or Goldsmith, or Fielding, +in his most reckless moment of satire, have written anything +like the Dean's famous <span class="tei tei-q">“modest proposal”</span> for eating +children? Not one of these but melts at the thoughts of +childhood, fondles and caresses it. Mr. Dean has no such +softness, and enters the nursery with the tread and gaiety +of an ogre.<a id="noteref_46" name="noteref_46" href="#note_46"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">46</span></span></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have been assured,”</span> says he in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Modest +Proposal</span></span>, <span class="tei tei-q">“by a very knowing American of my acquaintance +in London, that a young healthy child, well nursed, is, at +a year old, a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome +food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and +I make no doubt it will equally serve in a +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">ragoût</span></span>.”</span> And +taking up this pretty joke, as his way is, he argues it with +perfect gravity and logic. He turns and twists this subject +in a score of different ways: he hashes it; and he serves +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page492">[pg 492]</span><a name="Pg492" id="Pg492" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +it up cold; and he garnishes it; and relishes it always. +He describes the little animal as <span class="tei tei-q">“dropped from its dam'”</span> +advising that the mother should let it suck plentifully in +the last month, so as to render it plump and fat for a good +table! <span class="tei tei-q">“A child,”</span> says his reverence, <span class="tei tei-q">“will make two dishes +at an entertainment for friends; and when the family dines +alone, the fore or hind quarter will make a reasonable dish,”</span> +and so on; and, the subject being so delightful that he +can't leave it—he proceeds to recommend, in place of venison +for squires' tables, <span class="tei tei-q">“the bodies of young lads and maidens +not exceeding fourteen or under twelve.”</span> Amiable humourist! +laughing castigator of morals! There was a process +well known and practised in the Dean's gay days: when +a lout entered the coffee-house, the wags proceeded to what +they called <span class="tei tei-q">“roasting”</span> him. This is roasting a subject +with a vengeance. The Dean had a native genius for it. +As the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Almanach des Gourmands</span></span> says, +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">On nait rôtisseur</span></span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And it was not merely by the sarcastic method that Swift +exposed the unreasonableness of loving and having children. +In Gulliver, the folly of love and marriage is urged by graver +arguments and advice. In the famous Lilliputian kingdom, +Swift speaks with approval of the practice of instantly +removing children from their parents and educating them +by the State; and amongst his favourite horses, a pair +of foals are stated to be the very utmost a well-regulated +equine couple would permit themselves. In fact, our great +satirist was of opinion that conjugal love was unadvisable, +and illustrated the theory by his own practice and example—God +help him—which made him about the most wretched +being in God's world.<a id="noteref_47" name="noteref_47" href="#note_47"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">47</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The grave and logical conduct of an absurd proposition, +as exemplified in the cannibal proposal just mentioned, +is our author's constant method through all his works of +humour. Given a country of people six inches or sixty +feet high, and by the mere process of the logic, a thousand +wonderful absurdities are evolved, at so many stages of +the calculation. Turning to the first minister who waited +behind him with a white staff near as tall as the mainmast +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Royal Sovereign</span></span>, the King of Brobdingnag observes +how contemptible a thing human grandeur is, as represented +by such a contemptible little creature as Gulliver. <span class="tei tei-q">“The +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page493">[pg 493]</span><a name="Pg493" id="Pg493" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Emperor of Lilliput's features are strong and masculine”</span> +(what a surprising humour there is in this description!)—<span class="tei tei-q">“the +Emperor's features,”</span> Gulliver says, <span class="tei tei-q">“are strong and masculine, +with an Austrian lip, an arched nose, his complexion +olive, his countenance erect, his body and limbs well-proportioned, +and his deportment majestic. He is taller <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">by +the breadth of my nail</span></em> than any of his court, which alone is +enough to strike an awe into beholders.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What a surprising humour there is in these descriptions! +How noble the satire is here! how just and honest! How +perfect the image! Mr. Macaulay has quoted the charming +lines of the poet, where the king of the pygmies is measured +by the same standard. We have all read in Milton of the +spear that was like <span class="tei tei-q">“the mast of some tall admiral”</span>, but +these images are surely likely to come to the comic poet +originally. The subject is before him. He is turning it +in a thousand ways. He is full of it. The figure suggests +itself naturally to him, and comes out of his subject, as in +that wonderful passage, when Gulliver's box having been +dropped by the eagle into the sea, and Gulliver having been +received into the ship's cabin, he calls upon the crew to +bring the box into the cabin, and put it on the table, the +cabin being only a quarter the size of the box. It is the +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">veracity</span></em> of the blunder which is so admirable. Had a man +come from such a country as Brobdingnag he would have +blundered so. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the best stroke of humour, if there be a best in that +abounding book, is that where Gulliver, in the unpronounceable +country, describes his parting from his master the +horse.<a id="noteref_48" name="noteref_48" href="#note_48"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">48</span></span></a> <span class="tei tei-q">“I took,”</span> he says, <span class="tei tei-q">“a second leave of my master, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page494">[pg 494]</span><a name="Pg494" id="Pg494" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +but as I was going to prostrate myself to kiss his hoof, he +did me the honour to raise it gently to my mouth. I am +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page495">[pg 495]</span><a name="Pg495" id="Pg495" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +not ignorant how much I have been censured for mentioning +this last particular. Detractors are pleased to think it +improbable that so illustrious a person should descend to +give so great a mark of distinction to a creature so inferior +as I. Neither am I ignorant how apt some travellers are +to boast of extraordinary favours they have received. But +if these censurers were better acquainted with the noble +and courteous disposition of the Houyhnhnms they would +soon change their opinion.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The surprise here, the audacity of circumstantial evidence, +the astounding gravity of the speaker, who is not ignorant +how much he has been censured, the nature of the favour +conferred, and the respectful exultation at the receipt of it, +are surely complete; it is truth topsy-turvy, entirely logical +and absurd. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for the humour and conduct of this famous fable, +I suppose there is no person who reads but must admire; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page496">[pg 496]</span><a name="Pg496" id="Pg496" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as for the moral, I think it horrible, shameful, unmanly, +blasphemous; and giant and great as this Dean is, I say +we should hoot him. Some of this audience mayn't have +read the last part of Gulliver, and to such I would recall +the advice of the venerable Mr. Punch to persons about +to marry, and say <span class="tei tei-q">“Don't”</span>. When Gulliver first lands +among the Yahoos, the naked howling wretches clamber +up trees and assault him, and he describes himself as <span class="tei tei-q">“almost +stifled with the filth which fell about him”</span>. The reader +of the fourth part of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gulliver's Travels</span></span> is like the hero +himself in this instance. It is Yahoo language; a monster +gibbering shrieks, and gnashing imprecations against mankind—tearing +down all shreds of modesty, past all sense +of manliness and shame; filthy in word, filthy in thought, +furious, raging, obscene. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And dreadful it is to think that Swift knew the tendency +of his creed—the fatal rocks towards which his logic +desperately drifted. That last part of Gulliver is only a consequence +of what has gone before; and the worthlessness +of all mankind, the pettiness, cruelty, pride, imbecility, the +general vanity, the foolish pretension, the mock greatness, +the pompous dullness, the mean aims, the base successes—all +these were present to him; it was with the din of these +curses of the world, blasphemies against Heaven, shrieking +in his ears, that he began to write his dreadful allegory—of +which the meaning is that man is utterly wicked, desperate, +and imbecile, and his passions are so monstrous, and his +boasted powers so mean, that he is and deserves to be the +slave of brutes, and ignorance is better than his vaunted +reason. What had this man done? what secret remorse +was rankling at his heart? what fever was boiling in him, +that he should see all the world bloodshot? We view the +world with our own eyes, each of us; and we make from +within us the world we see. A weary heart gets no gladness +out of sunshine; a selfish man is sceptical about friendship, +as a man with no ear doesn't care for music. A frightful +self-consciousness it must have been, which looked on mankind +so darkly through those keen eyes of Swift. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A remarkable story is told by Scott, of Delany, who +interrupted Archbishop King and Swift in a conversation +which left the prelate in tears, and from which Swift rushed +away with marks of strong terror and agitation in his +countenance, upon which the archbishop said to Delany, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page497">[pg 497]</span><a name="Pg497" id="Pg497" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You have just met the most unhappy man on earth; +but on the subject of his wretchedness you must never +ask a question.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The most unhappy man on earth;—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Miserrimus</span></span>—what +a character of him! And at this time all the great wits of +England had been at his feet. All Ireland had shouted after +him, and worshipped as a liberator, a saviour, the greatest +Irish patriot and citizen. Dean Drapier Bickerstaff Gulliver—the +most famous statesmen, and the greatest poets of his +day, had applauded him, and done him homage; and at +this time writing over to Bolingbroke, from Ireland, he +says, <span class="tei tei-q">“It is time for me to have done with the world, and +so I would if I could get into a better before I was called +into the best, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">and not to die here in a rage, like a poisoned +rat in a hole</span></em>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We have spoken about the men, and Swift's behaviour +to them; and now it behoves us not to forget that there are +certain other persons in the creation who had rather intimate +relations with the great Dean.<a id="noteref_49" name="noteref_49" href="#note_49"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">49</span></span></a> Two women whom he loved +and injured are known by every reader of books so familiarly +that if we had seen them, or if they had been relatives of +our own, we scarcely could have known them better. Who +hasn't in his mind an image of Stella? Who does not love +her? Fair and tender creature: pure and affectionate +heart! Boots it to you, now that you have been at rest +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page498">[pg 498]</span><a name="Pg498" id="Pg498" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +for a hundred and twenty years, not divided in death from +the cold heart which caused yours, whilst it beat, such +faithful pangs of love and grief—boots it to you now, that +the whole world loves and deplores you? Scarce any man, +I believe, ever thought of that grave, that did not cast +a flower of pity on it, and write over it a sweet epitaph. +Gentle lady, so lovely, so loving, so unhappy! you have +had countless champions; millions of manly hearts mourning +for you. From generation to generation we take up the +fond tradition of your beauty; we watch and follow your +tragedy, your bright morning love and purity, your constancy, +your grief, your sweet martyrdom. We know your +legend by heart. You are one of the saints of English story. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And if Stella's love and innocence are charming to contemplate, +I will say that in spite of ill-usage, in spite of +drawbacks, in spite of mysterious separation and union, of +hope delayed and sickened heart—in the teeth of Vanessa, +and that little episodical aberration which plunged Swift +into such woful pitfalls and quagmires of amorous perplexity—in +spite of the verdicts of most women, I believe, +who, as far as my experience and conversation go, generally +take Vanessa's part in the controversy—in spite of the tears +which Swift caused Stella to shed, and the rocks and barriers +which fate and temper interposed, and which prevented the +pure course of that true love from running smoothly—the +brightest part of Swift's story, the pure star in that dark +and tempestuous life of Swift's, is his love for Hester +Johnson. It has been my business, professionally of course, +to go through a deal of sentimental reading in my time, and +to acquaint myself with love-making, as it has been described +in various languages, and at various ages of the world; and +I know of nothing more manly, more tender, more exquisitely +touching, than some of these brief notes, written +in what Swift calls <span class="tei tei-q">“his little language”</span> in his journal to +Stella.<a id="noteref_50" name="noteref_50" href="#note_50"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">50</span></span></a> He writes to her night and morning often. He +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page499">[pg 499]</span><a name="Pg499" id="Pg499" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +never sends away a letter to her but he begins a new one +on the same day. He can't bear to let go her kind little +hand, as it were. He knows that she is thinking of him, +and longing for him far away in Dublin yonder. He +takes her letters from under his pillow and talks to them, +familiarly, paternally, with fond epithets and pretty +caresses—as he would to the sweet and artless creature +who loved him. <span class="tei tei-q">“Stay,”</span> he writes one morning—it is the +14th of December, 1710—<span class="tei tei-q">“stay, I will answer some of your +letter this morning in bed—let me see. Come and appear, +little letter! Here I am, says he, and what say you to Stella +this morning fresh and fasting? And can Stella read this +writing without hurting her dear eyes?”</span> he goes on, after +more kind prattle and fond whispering. The dear eyes shine +clearly upon him then—the good angel of his life is with +him and blessing him. Ah, it was a hard fate that wrung +from them so many tears, and stabbed pitilessly that pure +and tender bosom. A hard fate: but would she have +changed it? I have heard a woman say that she +would have taken Swift's cruelty to have had his tenderness. +He had a sort of worship for her whilst he wounded her. +He speaks of her after she is gone; of her wit, of her kindness, +of her grace, of her beauty, with a simple love and +reverence that are indescribably touching; in contemplation +of her goodness his hard heart melts into pathos; his +cold rhyme kindles and glows into poetry, and he falls down +on his knees, so to speak, before the angel, whose life he had +embittered, confesses his own wretchedness and unworthiness, +and adores her with cries of remorse and love:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">When on my sickly couch I lay,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Impatient both of night and day,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And groaning in unmanly strains,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Called every power to ease my pains,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Then Stella ran to my relief,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With cheerful face and inward grief,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And though by Heaven's severe decree</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">She suffers hourly more than me,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">No cruel master could require</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">From slaves employed for daily hire,</span></div> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page500">[pg 500]</span><a name="Pg500" id="Pg500" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">What Stella, by her friendship warmed,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With vigour and delight performed.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Now, with a soft and silent tread,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Unheard she moves about my bed:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My sinking spirits now supplies</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With cordials in her hands and eyes.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Best patron of true friends! beware;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">You pay too dearly for your care</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">If, while your tenderness secures</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My life, it must endanger yours:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">For such a fool was never found</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Who pulled a palace to the ground,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Only to have the ruins made</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Materials for a house decayed.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One little triumph Stella had in her life—one dear little +piece of injustice was performed in her favour, for which +I confess, for my part, I can't help thanking fate and the +Dean. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">That other person</span></em> was sacrificed to her—that—that +young woman, who lived five doors from Dr. Swift's lodgings +in Bury Street, and who flattered him, and made love to +him in such an outrageous manner—Vanessa was thrown +over. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Swift did not keep Stella's letters to him in reply to those +he wrote to her.<a id="noteref_51" name="noteref_51" href="#note_51"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">51</span></span></a> He kept Bolingbroke's, and Pope's, and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page501">[pg 501]</span><a name="Pg501" id="Pg501" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Harley's, and Peterborough's: but Stella, <span class="tei tei-q">“very carefully,”</span> +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lives</span></span> say, kept Swift's. Of course: that is the way of +the world: and so we cannot tell what her style was, or of +what sort were the little letters which the doctor placed +there at night, and bade to appear from under his pillow +of a morning. But in Letter IV of that famous collection +he describes his lodging in Bury Street, where he has the +first floor, a dining-room and bedchamber, at eight shillings +a week; and in Letter VI he says <span class="tei tei-q">“he has visited a lady just +come to town”</span>, whose name somehow is not mentioned; +and in Letter VIII he enters a query of Stella's—<span class="tei tei-q">“What do +you mean <span class="tei tei-q">‘that boards near me, that I dine with now and +then?’</span> What the deuce! You know whom I have dined +with every day since I left you, better than I do.”</span> Of course +she does. Of course Swift has not the slightest idea of what +she means. But in a few letters more it turns out that the +doctor has been to dine <span class="tei tei-q">“gravely”</span> with a Mrs. Vanhomrigh: +then that he has been to <span class="tei tei-q">“his neighbour”</span>: then that he +has been unwell, and means to dine for the whole week +with his neighbour! Stella was quite right in her previsions. +She saw from the very first hint what was going +to happen; and scented Vanessa in the air.<a id="noteref_52" name="noteref_52" href="#note_52"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">52</span></span></a> The rival is +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page502">[pg 502]</span><a name="Pg502" id="Pg502" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +at the Dean's feet. The pupil and teacher are reading +together, and drinking tea together, and going to prayers +together, and learning Latin together, and conjugating +<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">amo</span></span>, +<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">amas</span></span>, +<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">amavi</span></span> together. +The <span class="tei tei-q">“little language”</span> is over for poor +Stella. By the rule of grammar and the course of conjugation, +doesn't <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">amavi</span></span> come after +<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">amo</span></span> and +<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">amas</span></span>? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The loves of Cadenus and Vanessa<a id="noteref_53" name="noteref_53" href="#note_53"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">53</span></span></a> you may peruse in +Cadenus's own poem on the subject, and in poor Vanessa's +vehement expostulatory verses and letters to him; she +adores him, implores him, admires him, thinks him something +godlike, and only prays to be admitted to lie at +his feet.<a id="noteref_54" name="noteref_54" href="#note_54"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">54</span></span></a> As they are bringing him home from church, +those divine feet of Dr. Swift's are found pretty often in +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page503">[pg 503]</span><a name="Pg503" id="Pg503" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Vannessa's parlour. He likes to be admired and adored. He +finds Miss Vanhomrigh to be a woman of great taste and +spirit, and beauty and wit, and a fortune too. He sees her +every day; he does not tell Stella about the business: +until the impetuous Vanessa becomes too fond of him, until +the doctor is quite frightened by the young woman's ardour, +and confounded by her warmth. He wanted to marry +neither of them—that I believe was the truth; but if he +had not married Stella, Vanessa would have had him in +spite of himself. When he went back to Ireland, his +Ariadne, not content to remain in her isle, pursued the +fugitive Dean. In vain he protested, he vowed, he soothed, +and bullied; the news of the Dean's marriage with Stella +at last came to her, and it killed her—she died of that +passion.<a id="noteref_55" name="noteref_55" href="#note_55"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">55</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page504">[pg 504]</span><a name="Pg504" id="Pg504" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And when she died, and Stella heard that Swift had +written beautifully regarding her, <span class="tei tei-q">“That doesn't surprise +me,”</span> said Mrs. Stella, <span class="tei tei-q">“for we all know the Dean could write +beautifully about a broomstick.”</span> A woman—a true woman! +Would you have had one of them forgive the other? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In a note in his biography, Scott says that his friend +Dr. Tuke, of Dublin, has a lock of Stella's hair, enclosed in +a paper by Swift, on which are written in the Dean's hand, +the words: <span class="tei tei-q">“<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Only a woman's hair</span></em>.”</span> An instance, says Scott, +of the Dean's desire to veil his feelings under the mask of +cynical indifference. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page505">[pg 505]</span><a name="Pg505" id="Pg505" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +See the various notions of critics! Do those words +indicate indifference or an attempt to hide feeling? Did +you ever hear or read four words more pathetic? Only +a woman's hair; only love, only fidelity, only purity, +innocence, beauty; only the tenderest heart in the world +stricken and wounded, and passed away now out of reach +of pangs of hope deferred, love insulted, and pitiless desertion:—only +that lock of hair left; and memory and remorse, +for the guilty, lonely wretch, shuddering over the +grave of his victim. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And yet to have had so much love, he must have given +some. Treasures of wit and wisdom, and tenderness, too, +must that man have had locked up in the caverns of his +gloomy heart, and shown fitfully to one or two whom he took +in there. But it was not good to visit that place. People +did not remain there long, and suffered for having been +there.<a id="noteref_56" name="noteref_56" href="#note_56"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">56</span></span></a> +He shrank away from all affections sooner or later. +Stella and Vanessa both died near him, and away from +him. He had not heart enough to see them die. He broke +from his fastest friend, Sheridan; he slunk away from his +fondest admirer, Pope. His laugh jars on one's ear after +sevenscore years. He was always alone—alone and gnashing +in the darkness, except when Stella's sweet smile came +and shone upon him. When that went, silence and utter +night closed over him. An immense genius: an awful downfall +and ruin. So great a man he seems to me, that thinking +of him is like thinking of an empire falling. We have other +great names to mention—none, I think, however, so great +or so gloomy. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page506">[pg 506]</span><a name="Pg506" id="Pg506" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc105" id="toc105"></a> +<a name="pdf106" id="pdf106"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Lecture The Second. Congreve And Addison</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A great number of years ago, before the passing of the +Reform Bill, there existed at Cambridge a certain debating +club, called the <span class="tei tei-q">“Union”</span>; and I remember that there was +a tradition amongst the undergraduates who frequented +that renowned school of oratory, that the great leaders of +the Opposition and Government had their eyes upon the +University Debating Club, and that if a man distinguished +himself there he ran some chance of being returned to +Parliament as a great nobleman's nominee. So Jones of +John's, or Thomson of Trinity, would rise in their might, +and draping themselves in their gowns, rally round the +monarchy, or hurl defiance at priests and kings, with the +majesty of Pitt or the fire of Mirabeau, fancying all the +while that the great nobleman's emissary was listening to the +debate from the back benches, where he was sitting with +the family seat in his pocket. Indeed, the legend said that +one or two young Cambridge men, orators of the Union, +were actually caught up thence, and carried down to +Cornwall or old Sarum, and so into Parliament. And many +a young fellow deserted the jogtrot University curriculum, +to hang on in the dust behind the fervid wheels of the +Parliamentary chariot. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Where, I have often wondered, were the sons of peers +and Members of Parliament in Anne's and George's time? +Were they all in the army, or hunting in the country, or +boxing the watch? How was it that the young gentlemen +from the University got such a prodigious number of places? +A lad composed a neat copy of verses at Christchurch or +Trinity, in which the death of a great personage was bemoaned, +the French king assailed, the Dutch or Prince +Eugene complimented, or the reverse; and the party in +power was presently to provide for the young poet; and +a commissionership, or a post in the Stamps, or the secretaryship +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page507">[pg 507]</span><a name="Pg507" id="Pg507" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of an embassy, or a clerkship in the Treasury, came +into the bard's possession. A wonderful fruit-bearing rod +was that of Busby's. What have men of letters got in <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">our</span></em> +time? Think, not only of Swift, a king fit to rule in any +time or empire—but Addison, Steele, Prior, Tickell, Congreve, +John Gay, John Dennis, and many others, who got +public employment, and pretty little pickings out of the +public purse.<a id="noteref_57" name="noteref_57" href="#note_57"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">57</span></span></a> The wits of whose names we shall treat in +this lecture and two following, all (save one) touched the +king's coin, and had, at some period of their lives, a happy +quarter-day coming round for them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They all began at school or college in the regular way, +producing panegyrics upon public characters, what were +called odes upon public events, battles, sieges, court +marriages and deaths, in which the gods of Olympus and +the tragic muse were fatigued with invocations, according +to the fashion of the time in France and in England. <span class="tei tei-q">“Aid +us Mars, Bacchus, Apollo,”</span> cried Addison, or Congreve, +singing of William or Marlborough. <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Accourez, chastes +nymphes de Parnasse</span></span>,”</span> says Boileau, celebrating the Grand +Monarch. <span class="tei tei-q">“<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Des sons que ma lyre enfante</span></em>, marquez-en bien +la cadence, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">et vous, vents, faites silence! je vais parler de +</span><span class="tei tei-pb" id="page508">[pg 508]</span><a name="Pg508" id="Pg508" class="tei tei-anchor"></a><span style="font-style: italic"> +Louis!</span></em>”</span> Schoolboys' themes and foundation exercises are +the only relics left now of this scholastic fashion. The +Olympians are left quite undisturbed in their mountain. +What man of note, what contributor to the poetry of +a country newspaper, would now think of writing a congratulatory +ode on the birth of the heir to a dukedom, or +the marriage of a nobleman? In the past century the young +gentlemen of the Universities all exercised themselves at +these queer compositions; and some got fame, and some +gained patrons and places for life, and many more took +nothing by these efforts of what they were pleased to call +their muses. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +William Congreve's<a id="noteref_58" name="noteref_58" href="#note_58"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">58</span></span></a> Pindaric Odes are still to be found +in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Johnson's Poets</span></span>, that now unfrequented poets' corner, +in which so many forgotten bigwigs have a niche—but +though he was also voted to be one of the greatest tragic +poets of any day, it was Congreve's wit and humour which +first recommended him to courtly fortune. And it is +recorded, that his first play, the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Old Bachelor</span></span>, brought our +author to the notice of that great patron of English muses, +Charles Montague Lord Halifax, who being desirous to +place so eminent a wit in a state of ease and tranquillity, +instantly made him one of the Commissioners for licensing +hackney-coaches, bestowed on him soon after a place in the +Pipe-office, and likewise a post in the Custom-house of the +value of 600<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A commissionership of hackney-coaches—a post in the +Custom-house—a place in the Pipe-office, and all for writing +a comedy! Doesn't it sound like a fable, that place in the +Pipe-office?<a id="noteref_59" name="noteref_59" href="#note_59"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">59</span></span></a> +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Ah, l'heureux temps que celui de ces fables!</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page509">[pg 509]</span><a name="Pg509" id="Pg509" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Men of letters there still be: but I doubt whether any Pipe-offices +are left. The public has smoked them long ago. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Words, like men, pass current for a while with the +public, and being known everywhere abroad, at length +take their places in society; so even the most secluded +and refined ladies here present will have heard the phrase +from their sons or brothers at school, and will permit me +to call William Congreve, Esquire, the most eminent +literary <span class="tei tei-q">“swell”</span> of his age. In my copy of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Johnson's +Lives</span></span> Congreve's wig is the tallest, and put on with the +jauntiest air of all the laurelled worthies. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am the great +Mr. Congreve,”</span> he seems to say, looking out from his +voluminous curls. People called him the great Mr. Congreve.<a id="noteref_60" name="noteref_60" href="#note_60"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">60</span></span></a> +From the beginning of his career until the end +everybody admired him. Having got his education in +Ireland, at the same school and college with Swift, he +came to live in the Middle Temple, London, where he +luckily bestowed no attention to the law; but splendidly +frequented the coffee-houses and theatres, and appeared +in the side-box, the tavern, the Piazza, and the Mall, +brilliant, beautiful, and victorious from the first. Everybody +acknowledged the young chieftain. The great Mr. +Dryden<a id="noteref_61" name="noteref_61" href="#note_61"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">61</span></span></a> declared that he was equal to Shakespeare, and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page510">[pg 510]</span><a name="Pg510" id="Pg510" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +bequeathed to him his own undisputed poetical crown, +and writes of him, <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Congreve has done me the favour +to review the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Aeneis</span></span>, and compare my version with the +original. I shall never be ashamed to own that this +excellent young man has showed me many faults which +I have endeavoured to correct.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The <span class="tei tei-q">“excellent young man”</span> was but three- or four-and-twenty +when the great Dryden thus spoke of him: the +greatest literary chief in England, the veteran field-marshal +of letters, himself the marked man of all Europe, and the +centre of a school of wits, who daily gathered round his chair +and tobacco-pipe at Will's. Pope dedicated his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Iliad</span></span> to +him;<a id="noteref_62" name="noteref_62" href="#note_62"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">62</span></span></a> Swift, Addison, Steele, all acknowledge Congreve's +rank, and lavish compliments upon him. Voltaire went to +wait upon him as on one of the Representatives of Literature—and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page511">[pg 511]</span><a name="Pg511" id="Pg511" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the man who scarce praises any other living person, +who flung abuse at Pope, and Swift, and Steele, and Addison—the +Grub Street Timon, old John Dennis,<a id="noteref_63" name="noteref_63" href="#note_63"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">63</span></span></a> was hat +in hand to Mr. Congreve; and said, that when he retired +from the stage, Comedy went with him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Nor was he less victorious elsewhere. He was admired +in the drawing-rooms as well as the coffee-houses; as much +beloved in the side-box as on the stage. He loved, and +conquered, and jilted the beautiful Bracegirdle,<a id="noteref_64" name="noteref_64" href="#note_64"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">64</span></span></a> the +heroine of all his plays, the favourite of all the town of +her day—and the Duchess of Marlborough, Marlborough's +daughter, had such an admiration of him, that when he +died she had an ivory figure made to imitate him,<a id="noteref_65" name="noteref_65" href="#note_65"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">65</span></span></a> and +a large wax doll with gouty feet to be dressed just as the +great Congreve's gouty feet were dressed in his great lifetime. +He saved some money by his Pipe-office, and his +Custom-house office, and his Hackney-coach office, and +nobly left it, not to Bracegirdle, who wanted it,<a id="noteref_66" name="noteref_66" href="#note_66"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">66</span></span></a> but to the +Duchess of Marlborough, who didn't.<a id="noteref_67" name="noteref_67" href="#note_67"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">67</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page512">[pg 512]</span><a name="Pg512" id="Pg512" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How can I introduce to you that merry and shameless +Comic Muse who won him such a reputation? Nell +Gwynn's servant fought the other footman for having +called his mistress a bad name; and in like manner, and +with pretty like epithets, Jeremy Collier attacked that +godless, reckless Jezebel, the English comedy of his time, +and called her what Nell Gwynn's man's fellow-servants +called Nell Gwynn's man's mistress. The servants of the +theatre, Dryden, Congreve,<a id="noteref_68" name="noteref_68" href="#note_68"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">68</span></span></a> and others, defended themselves +with the same success, and for the same cause which +set Nell's lackey fighting. She was a disreputable, daring, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page513">[pg 513]</span><a name="Pg513" id="Pg513" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +laughing, painted French baggage, that Comic Muse. She +came over from the Continent with Charles (who chose +many more of his female friends there) at the Restoration—a +wild, dishevelled Laïs, with eyes bright with wit and +wine—a saucy court-favourite that sat at the king's +knees, and laughed in his face, and when she showed her +bold cheeks at her chariot-window, had some of the noblest +and most famous people of the land bowing round her +wheel. She was kind and popular enough, that daring +Comedy, that audacious poor Nell—she was gay and +generous, kind, frank, as such people can afford to be: +and the men who lived with her and laughed with her, +took her pay and drank her wine, turned out when the +Puritans hooted her, to fight and defend her. But the +jade was indefensible, and it is pretty certain her servants +knew it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There is life and death going on in everything: truth +and lies always at battle. Pleasure is always warring +against self-restraint. Doubt is always crying Psha, and +sneering. A man in life, a humourist in writing about +life, sways over to one principle or the other, and laughs +with the reverence for right and the love of truth in his +heart, or laughs at these from the other side. Didn't +I tell you that dancing was a serious business to Harlequin? +I have read two or three of Congreve's plays over before +speaking of him; and my feelings were rather like those, +which I daresay most of us here have had, at Pompeii, +looking at Sallust's house and the relics of an orgy, a dried +wine-jar or two, a charred supper-table, the breast of a +dancing girl pressed against the ashes, the laughing skull +of a jester, a perfect stillness round about, as the cicerone +twangs his moral, and the blue sky shines calmly over the +ruin. The Congreve muse is dead, and her song choked +in Time's ashes. We gaze at the skeleton, and wonder +at the life which once revelled in its mad veins. We take +the skull up, and muse over the frolic and daring, the wit, +scorn, passion, hope, desire, with which that empty bowl +once fermented. We think of the glances that allured, the +tears that melted, of the bright eyes that shone in those +vacant sockets; and of lips whispering love, and cheeks +dimpling with smiles, that once covered yon ghastly yellow +framework. They used to call those teeth pearls once. +See! there's the cup she drank from, the gold chain she +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page514">[pg 514]</span><a name="Pg514" id="Pg514" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +wore on her neck, the vase which held the rouge for her +cheeks, her looking-glass, and the harp she used to dance +to. Instead of a feast we find a gravestone, and in place of +a mistress, a few bones! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Reading in these plays now, is like shutting your ears +and looking at people dancing. What does it mean? the +measures, the grimaces, the bowing, shuffling and retreating, +the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">cavalier seul</span></span> advancing upon those ladies—those +ladies and men twirling round at the end in a mad galop, +after which everybody bows and the quaint rite is celebrated. +Without the music we can't understand that +comic dance of the last century—its strange gravity and +gaiety, its decorum or its indecorum. It has a jargon of +its own quite unlike life; a sort of moral of its own quite +unlike life too. I'm afraid it's a heathen mystery, symbolizing +a Pagan doctrine; protesting, as the Pompeians +very likely were, assembled at their theatre and laughing +at their games—as Sallust and his friends, and their +mistresses protested—crowned with flowers, with cups in +their hands, against the new, hard, ascetic, pleasure-hating +doctrine, whose gaunt disciples, lately passed over from +the Asian shores of the Mediterranean, were for breaking +the fair images of Venus, and flinging the altars of Bacchus +down. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I fancy poor Congreve's theatre is a temple of Pagan +delights, and mysteries not permitted except among +heathens. I fear the theatre carries down that ancient +tradition and worship, as masons have carried their secret +signs and rites from temple to temple. When the libertine +hero carries off the beauty in the play, and the dotard is +laughed to scorn for having the young wife: in the ballad, +when the poet bid his mistress to gather roses while she +may, and warns her that old Time is still a-flying: in the +ballet, when honest Corydon courts Phillis under the +treillage of the pasteboard cottage, and leers at her over +the head of grandpapa in red stockings, who is opportunely +asleep; and when seduced by the invitations of the rosy +youth she comes forward to the footlights, and they perform +on each other's tiptoes that <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">pas</span></span> which you all know, +and which is only interrupted by old grandpapa awaking +from his doze at the pasteboard chalet (whither he returns +to take another nap in case the young people get an encore): +when Harlequin, splendid in youth, strength, and agility, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page515">[pg 515]</span><a name="Pg515" id="Pg515" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +arrayed in gold and a thousand colours, springs over the +heads of countless perils, leaps down the throat of bewildered +giants, and, dauntless and splendid, dances danger down: +when Mr. Punch, that godless old rebel, breaks every law +and laughs at it with odious triumph, outwits his lawyer, +bullies the beadle, knocks his wife about the head, and +hangs the hangman—don't you see in the comedy, in the +song, in the dance, in the ragged little Punch's puppet-show—the +Pagan protest? Doesn't it seem as if Life puts +in its plea and sings its comment? Look how the lovers +walk and hold each other's hands and whisper! Sings the +chorus—<span class="tei tei-q">“There is nothing like love, there is nothing like +youth, there is nothing like beauty of your spring-time. +Look! how old age tries to meddle with merry sport! +Beat him with his own crutch, the wrinkled old dotard! +There is nothing like youth, there is nothing like beauty, +there is nothing like strength. Strength and valour win +beauty and youth. Be brave and conquer. Be young +and happy. Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy! Would you know the +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">segreto per esser felice</span></span>? Here it is, in a smiling +mistress and a cup of Falernian.”</span> As the boy tosses the cup and +sings his song—hark! what is that chaunt coming nearer +and nearer? What is that dirge which <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">will</span></em> disturb us? +The lights of the festival burn dim—the cheeks turn pale—the +voice quavers—and the cup drops on the floor. Who's +there? Death and Fate are at the gate, and they <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">will</span></em> +come in. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Congreve's comic feast flares with lights, and round the +table, emptying their flaming bowls of drink, and exchanging +the wildest jests and ribaldry, sit men and women, +waited on by rascally valets and attendants as dissolute +as their mistresses—perhaps the very worst company in +the world. There doesn't seem to be a pretence of morals. +At the head of the table sits Mirabel or Belmour (dressed +in the French fashion and waited on by English imitators +of Scapin and Frontin). Their calling is to be irresistible, +and to conquer everywhere. Like the heroes of the chivalry +story, whose long-winded loves and combats they were +sending out of fashion, they are always splendid and +triumphant—overcome all dangers, vanquish all enemies, +and win the beauty at the end. Fathers, husbands, +usurers are the foes these champions contend with. They +are merciless in old age, invariably, and an old man plays +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page516">[pg 516]</span><a name="Pg516" id="Pg516" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the part in the dramas, which the wicked enchanter or the +great blundering giant performs in the chivalry tales, who +threatens and grumbles and resists—a huge stupid obstacle +always overcome by the knight. It is an old man with +a money-box: Sir Belmour his son or nephew spends his +money and laughs at him. It is an old man with a young +wife whom he locks up: Sir Mirabel robs him of his wife, +trips up his gouty old heels and leaves the old hunx—the +old fool, what business has he to hoard his money, or to +lock up blushing eighteen? Money is for youth, love is +for youth; away with the old people. When Millamant is +sixty, having of course divorced the first Lady Millamant, +and married his friend Doricourt's granddaughter out of +the nursery—it will be his turn; and young Belmour will +make a fool of him. All this pretty morality you have in +the comedies of William Congreve, Esq. They are full of +wit. Such manners as he observes, he observes with great +humour; but ah! it's a weary feast that banquet of wit +where no love is. It palls very soon; sad indigestions +follow it and lonely blank headaches in the morning. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I can't pretend to quote scenes from the splendid Congreve's +plays<a id="noteref_69" name="noteref_69" href="#note_69"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">69</span></span></a>—which are undeniably bright, witty, and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page517">[pg 517]</span><a name="Pg517" id="Pg517" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +daring—any more than I could ask you to hear the dialogue +of a witty bargeman and a brilliant fishwoman exchanging +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page518">[pg 518]</span><a name="Pg518" id="Pg518" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +compliments at Billingsgate; but some of his verses—they +were amongst the most famous lyrics of the time, and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page519">[pg 519]</span><a name="Pg519" id="Pg519" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +pronounced equal to Horace by his contemporaries—may +give an idea of his power, of his grace, of his daring manner, +his magnificence in compliment, and his polished sarcasm. +He writes as if he was so accustomed to conquer, that he +has a poor opinion of his victims. Nothing's new except +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page520">[pg 520]</span><a name="Pg520" id="Pg520" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +their faces, says he: <span class="tei tei-q">“every woman is the same.”</span> He says +this in his first comedy, which he wrote languidly<a id="noteref_70" name="noteref_70" href="#note_70"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">70</span></span></a> in +illness, when he was an <span class="tei tei-q">“excellent young man”</span>. Richelieu +at eighty could have hardly said a more excellent thing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When he advances to make one of his conquests it is +with a splendid gallantry, in full uniform and with the +fiddles playing, like Grammont's French dandies attacking +the breach of Lerida. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Cease, cease to ask her name,”</span> he writes of a young lady +at the Wells at Tunbridge, whom he salutes with a magnificent +compliment— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Cease, cease to ask her name,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The crowned Muse's noblest theme,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Whose glory by immortal fame</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Shall only sounded be.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But if you long to know,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Then look round yonder dazzling row,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Who most does like an angel show</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">You may be sure 'tis she.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here are lines about another beauty, who perhaps was +not so well pleased at the poet's manner of celebrating +her— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">When Lesbia first I saw, so heavenly fair,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With eyes so bright and with that awful air,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I thought my heart would durst so high aspire</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">As bold as his who snatched celestial fire.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But soon as e'er the beauteous idiot spoke,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Forth from her coral lips such folly broke;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Like balm the trickling nonsense heal'd my wound,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And what her eyes enthralled, her tongue unbound.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Amoret is a cleverer woman than the lovely Lesbia, but +the poet does not seem to respect one much more than +the other; and describes both with exquisite satirical +humour— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Fair Amoret is gone astray,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Pursue and seek her every lover;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I'll tell the signs by which you may</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">The wandering shepherdess discover.</span></div> +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page521">[pg 521]</span><a name="Pg521" id="Pg521" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Coquet and coy at once her air,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Both studied, though both seem neglected;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Careless she is with artful care,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Affecting to be unaffected.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With skill her eyes dart every glance,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Yet change so soon you'd ne'er suspect them;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">For she'd persuade they wound by chance,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Though certain aim and art direct them.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">She likes herself, yet others hates</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">For that which in herself she prizes;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And, while she laughs at them, forgets</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">She is the thing which she despises.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What could Amoret have done to bring down such +shafts of ridicule upon her? Could she have resisted the +irresistible Mr. Congreve? Could anybody? Could +Sabina, when she woke and heard such a bard singing +under her window. See, he writes— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">See! see, she wakes—Sabina wakes!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And now the sun begins to rise:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Less glorious is the morn, that breaks</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">From his bright beams, than her fair eyes.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With light united day they give;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">But different fates ere night fulfil:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">How many by his warmth will live!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">How many will her coldness kill!</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Are you melted? Don't you think him a divine man? +If not touched by the brilliant Sabina, hear the devout +Selinda:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Pious Selinda goes to prayers,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">If I but ask her favour;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And yet the silly fool's in tears,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">If she believes I'll leave her:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Would I were free from this restraint,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Or else had hopes to win her:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Would she could make of me a saint,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Or I of her a sinner!</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What a conquering air there is about these! What an +irresistible Mr. Congreve it is! Sinner! of course he will +be a sinner, the delightful rascal! Win her; of course +he will win her, the victorious rogue! He knows he will: +he must—with such a grace, with such a fashion, with such +a splendid embroidered suit—you see him with red-heeled +shoes deliciously turned out, passing a fair jewelled hand +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page522">[pg 522]</span><a name="Pg522" id="Pg522" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +through his dishevelled periwig, and delivering a killing +ogle along with his scented billet. And Sabina? What +a comparison that is between the nymph and the sun! +The sun gives Sabina the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">pas</span></span>, and does not venture to +rise before her ladyship: the morn's <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">bright beams</span></em> are less +glorious than her <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">fair eyes</span></em>: but before night everybody +will be frozen by her glances: everybody but one lucky +rogue who shall be nameless: Louis Quatorze in all his +glory is hardly more splendid than our Phoebus Apollo of +the Mall and Spring Garden.<a id="noteref_71" name="noteref_71" href="#note_71"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">71</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Voltaire came to visit the great Congreve, the +latter rather affected to despise his literary reputation, and +in this perhaps the great Congreve was not far wrong.<a id="noteref_72" name="noteref_72" href="#note_72"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">72</span></span></a> +A touch of Steele's tenderness is worth all his finery—a +flash of Swift's lightning—a beam of Addison's pure +sunshine, and his tawdry play-house taper is invisible. +But the ladies loved him, and he was undoubtedly a pretty +fellow.<a id="noteref_73" name="noteref_73" href="#note_73"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">73</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page523">[pg 523]</span><a name="Pg523" id="Pg523" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We have seen in Swift a humorous philosopher, whose +truth frightens one, and whose laughter makes one melancholy. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page524">[pg 524]</span><a name="Pg524" id="Pg524" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +We have had in Congreve a humorous observer +of another school, to whom the world seems to have no +moral at all, and whose ghastly doctrine seems to be that +we should eat, drink, and be merry when we can, and go +to the deuce (if there be a deuce) when the time comes. +We come now to a humour that flows from quite a different +heart and spirit—a wit that makes us laugh and leaves us +good and happy; to one of the kindest benefactors that +society has ever had, and I believe you have divined already +that I am about to mention Addison's honoured name. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From reading over his writings, and the biographies +which we have of him, amongst which the famous article +in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Edinburgh Review</span></span><a id="noteref_74" name="noteref_74" href="#note_74"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">74</span></span></a> may be cited as a magnificent +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page525">[pg 525]</span><a name="Pg525" id="Pg525" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +statue of the great writer and moralist of the last age, +raised by the love and the marvellous skill and genius of +one of the most illustrious artists of our own; looking at +that calm, fair face, and clear countenance—those chiselled +features pure and cold, I can't but fancy that this great +man, in this respect, like him of whom we spoke in the +last lecture, was also one of the lonely ones of the world. +Such men have very few equals, and they don't herd with +those. It is in the nature of such lords of intellect to be +solitary—they are in the world but not of it; and our +minor struggles, brawls, successes, pass under them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Kind, just, serene, impartial, his fortitude not tried +beyond easy endurance, his affections not much used, for +his books were his family, and his society was in public; +admirably wiser, wittier, calmer, and more instructed than +almost every man with whom he met, how could Addison +suffer, desire, admire, feel much? I may expect a child +to admire me for being taller or writing more cleverly than +she; but how can I ask my superior to say that I am +a wonder when he knows better than I? In Addison's +days you could scarcely show him a literary performance, +a sermon, or a poem, or a piece of literary criticism, but +he felt he could do better. His justice must have made +him indifferent. He didn't praise, because he measured +his compeers by a higher standard than common people +have.<a id="noteref_75" name="noteref_75" href="#note_75"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">75</span></span></a> +How was he who was so tall to look up to any +but the loftiest genius? He must have stooped to put +himself on a level with most men. By that profusion of +graciousness and smiles, with which Goethe or Scott, for +instance, greeted almost every literary beginner, every +small literary adventurer who came to his court and went +away charmed from the great king's audience, and cuddling +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page526">[pg 526]</span><a name="Pg526" id="Pg526" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to his heart the compliment which his literary majesty had +paid him—each of the two good-natured potentates of +letters brought their star and ribbon into discredit. Everybody +had his majesty's orders. Everybody had his +Majesty's cheap portrait, on a box surrounded with diamonds +worth twopence a-piece. A very great and just +and wise man ought not to praise indiscriminately, but +give his idea of the truth. Addison praises the ingenious +Mr. Pinkethman: Addison praises the ingenious Mr. +Doggett the actor, whose benefit is coming off that night: +Addison praises Don Saltero: Addison praises Milton with +all his heart, bends his knee and frankly pays homage to +that imperial genius.<a id="noteref_76" name="noteref_76" href="#note_76"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">76</span></span></a> But between those degrees of his +men his praise is very scanty. I don't think the great +Mr. Addison liked young Mr. Pope, the Papist, much; +I don't think he abused him. But when Mr. Addison's +men abused Mr. Pope, I don't think Addison took his pipe +out of his mouth to contradict them.<a id="noteref_77" name="noteref_77" href="#note_77"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">77</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Addison's father was a clergyman of good repute in +Wiltshire, and rose in the Church.<a id="noteref_78" name="noteref_78" href="#note_78"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">78</span></span></a> His famous son never +lost his clerical training and scholastic gravity, and was +called <span class="tei tei-q">“a parson in a tye-wig”</span><a id="noteref_79" name="noteref_79" href="#note_79"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">79</span></span></a> in London afterwards at +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page527">[pg 527]</span><a name="Pg527" id="Pg527" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a time when tye-wigs were only worn by the laity, and the +fathers of theology did not think it decent to appear except +in a full bottom. Having been at school at Salisbury, and +the Charterhouse, in 1687, when he was fifteen years old +he went to Queen's College, Oxford, where he speedily +began to distinguish himself by the making of Latin verses. +The beautiful and fanciful poem of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Pigmies and the +Cranes</span></span> is still read by lovers of that sort of exercise; and +verses are extant in honour of King William, by which it +appears that it was the loyal youth's custom to toast that +sovereign in bumpers of purple Lyaeus; and many more +works are in the collection, including one on the Peace of +Ryswick, in 1697, which was so good that Montague got +him a pension of 300<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> a year, on which Addison set out +on his travels. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +During his ten years at Oxford, Addison had deeply +imbued himself with the Latin poetical literature, and had +these poets at his fingers' ends when he travelled in Italy.<a id="noteref_80" name="noteref_80" href="#note_80"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">80</span></span></a> +His patron went out of office, and his pension was unpaid: +and hearing that this great scholar, now eminent and +known to the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">literati</span></span> of Europe +(the great Boileau,<a id="noteref_81" name="noteref_81" href="#note_81"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">81</span></span></a> upon +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page528">[pg 528]</span><a name="Pg528" id="Pg528" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +perusal of Mr. Addison's elegant hexameters, was first +made aware that England was not altogether a barbarous +nation)—hearing that the celebrated Mr. Addison, of +Oxford, proposed to travel as governor to a young gentleman +on the grand tour, the great Duke of Somerset proposed +to Mr. Addison to accompany his son, Lord Hartford. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Addison was delighted to be of use to his grace and +his lordship, his grace's son, and expressed himself ready +to set forth. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His grace the Duke of Somerset now announced to one +of the most famous scholars of Oxford and Europe that +it was his gracious intention to allow my Lord Hartford's +tutor one hundred guineas per annum. Mr. Addison wrote +back that his services were his grace's, but he by no +means found his account in the recompense for them. The +negotiation was broken off. They parted with a profusion +of <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">congees</span></span> on one side and the other. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Addison remained abroad for some time, living in the +best society of Europe. How could he do otherwise? He +must have been one of the finest gentlemen the world ever +saw: at all moments of life serene and courteous, cheerful +and calm.<a id="noteref_82" name="noteref_82" href="#note_82"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">82</span></span></a> +He could scarcely ever have had a degrading +thought. He might have omitted a virtue or two, or many, +but could not have had many faults committed for which +he need blush or turn pale. When warmed into confidence, +his conversation appears to have been so delightful that +the greatest wits sat wrapt and charmed to listen to him. +No man bore poverty and narrow fortune with a more +lofty cheerfulness. His letters to his friends at this period +of his life, when he had lost his Government pension and +given up his college chances, are full of courage and a gay +confidence and philosophy: and they are none the worse in +my eyes, and I hope not in those of his last and greatest +biographer (though Mr. Macaulay is bound to own and +lament a certain weakness for wine, which the great and +good Joseph Addison notoriously possessed, in common +with countless gentlemen of his time), because some of the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page529">[pg 529]</span><a name="Pg529" id="Pg529" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +letters are written when his honest hand was shaking a +little in the morning after libations to purple Lyaeus overnight. +He was fond of drinking the healths of his friends: +he writes to Wyche,<a id="noteref_83" name="noteref_83" href="#note_83"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">83</span></span></a> of Hamburgh, gratefully remembering +Wyche's <span class="tei tei-q">“hoc”</span>. <span class="tei tei-q">“I have been drinking your health to-day +with Sir Richard Shirley,”</span> he writes to Bathurst. <span class="tei tei-q">“I have +lately had the honour to meet my Lord Effingham at +Amsterdam, where we have drunk Mr. Wood's health a +hundred times in excellent champagne,”</span> he writes again. +Swift<a id="noteref_84" name="noteref_84" href="#note_84"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">84</span></span></a> describes him over his cups, when Joseph yielded +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page530">[pg 530]</span><a name="Pg530" id="Pg530" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to a temptation which Jonathan resisted. Joseph was of +a cold nature, and needed perhaps the fire of wine to warm +his blood. If he was a parson, he wore a tye-wig, recollect. +A better and more Christian man scarcely ever breathed +than Joseph Addison. If he had not that little weakness +for wine—why, we could scarcely have found a fault with +him, and could not have liked him as we do.<a id="noteref_85" name="noteref_85" href="#note_85"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">85</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At thirty-three years of age, this most distinguished wit, +scholar, and gentleman was without a profession and an +income. His book of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Travels</span></span> had +failed: his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dialogues on +Medals</span></span> had had no particular success: his Latin verses, +even though reported the best since Virgil, or Statius at +any rate, had not brought him a Government place, and +Addison was living up two shabby pair of stairs in the +Haymarket (in a poverty over which old Samuel Johnson +rather chuckles), when in these shabby rooms an emissary +from Government and Fortune came and found him.<a id="noteref_86" name="noteref_86" href="#note_86"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">86</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page531">[pg 531]</span><a name="Pg531" id="Pg531" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A poem was wanted about the Duke of Marlborough's +victory of Blenheim. Would Mr. Addison write one? +Mr. Boyle, afterwards Lord Carleton, took back the reply +to the Lord Treasurer Godolphin, that Mr. Addison would. +When the poem had reached a certain stage, it was carried +to Godolphin; and the last lines which he read were these: +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But O my muse! what numbers wilt thou find</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To sing the furious troops in battle join'd?</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Methinks I hear the drum's tumultuous sound,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The victors' shouts and dying groans confound;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The dreadful burst of cannon rend the skies,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And all the thunders of the battle rise.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">'Twas then great Marlborough's mighty soul was proved,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">That, in the shock of charging hosts unmoved,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Amidst confusion, horror, and despair,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Examined all the dreadful scenes of war:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In peaceful thought the field of death surveyed,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To fainting squadrons lent the timely aid,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Inspired repulsed battalions to engage,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And taught the doubtful battle where to rage.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">So when an angel by divine command,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">With rising tempests shakes a guilty land</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">(Such as of late o'er pale Britannia passed),</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Calm and serene he drives the furious blast;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Rides on the whirlwind and directs the storm.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Addison left off at a good moment. That simile was +pronounced to be of the greatest ever produced in poetry. +That angel, that good angel, flew off with Mr. Addison, +and landed him in the place of Commissioner of Appeals—vice +Mr. Locke providentially promoted. In the following +year, Mr. Addison went to Hanover with Lord Halifax, +and the year after was made Under-Secretary of State. +O angel visits! you come <span class="tei tei-q">“few and far between”</span> to literary +gentlemen's lodgings! Your wings seldom quiver at second-floor +windows now! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +You laugh? You think it is in the power of few writers +nowadays to call up such an angel? Well, perhaps not; +but permit us to comfort ourselves by pointing out that +there are in the poem of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span> some as bad lines +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page532">[pg 532]</span><a name="Pg532" id="Pg532" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as heart can desire: and to hint that Mr. Addison did +very wisely in not going further with my Lord Godolphin +than that angelical simile. Do allow me, just for a little +harmless mischief, to read you some of the lines which +follow. Here is the interview between the Duke and the +King of the Romans after the battle:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Austria's young monarch, whose imperial sway</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Sceptres and thrones are destined to obey,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Whose boasted ancestry so high extends</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">That in the pagan gods his lineage ends,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Comes from afar, in gratitude to own</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The great supporter of his father's throne.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">What tides of glory to his bosom ran</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Clasped in th' embraces of the godlike man!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">How were his eyes with pleasing wonder fixt,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To see such fire with so much sweetness mixt!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Such easy greatness, such a graceful port,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">So learned and finished for the camp or court!</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How many fourth-form boys at Mr. Addison's school of +Charterhouse could write as well as that now? The +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span> has blunders, triumphant as it was; and +weak points like all campaigns.<a id="noteref_87" name="noteref_87" href="#note_87"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">87</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the year 1718 <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cato</span></span> came out. Swift has left a +description of the first night of the performance. All the +laurels of Europe were scarcely sufficient for the author of +this prodigious poem.<a id="noteref_88" name="noteref_88" href="#note_88"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">88</span></span></a> Laudations of Whig and Tory +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page533">[pg 533]</span><a name="Pg533" id="Pg533" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +chiefs, popular ovations, complimentary garlands from +literary men, translations in all languages, delight and +homage from all—save from John Dennis in a minority +of one—Mr. Addison was called the <span class="tei tei-q">“great Mr. Addison”</span> +after this. The Coffee-house Senate saluted him Divus: +it was heresy to question that decree. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Meanwhile he was writing political papers and advancing +in the political profession. He went Secretary to Ireland. +He was appointed Secretary of State in 1717. And letters +of his are extant, bearing date some year or two before, +and written to young Lord Warwick, in which he addresses +him as <span class="tei tei-q">“my dearest lord”</span>, and asks affectionately about +his studies, and writes very prettily about nightingales, +and birds'-nests, which he has found at Fulham for his +lordship. Those nightingales were intended to warble in +the ear of Lord Warwick's mamma. Addison married her +ladyship in 1716; and died at Holland House three years +after that splendid but dismal union.<a id="noteref_89" name="noteref_89" href="#note_89"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">89</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page534">[pg 534]</span><a name="Pg534" id="Pg534" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But it is not for his reputation as the great author of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cato</span></span> and the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span>, or for his merits +as Secretary of State, or for his rank and high distinction as my Lady +Warwick's husband, or for his eminence as an Examiner +of political questions on the Whig side, or a Guardian of +British liberties, that we admire Joseph Addison. It is as +a Tatler of small talk and a Spectator of mankind, that +we cherish and love him, and owe as much pleasure to +him as to any human being that ever wrote. He came +in that artificial age, and began to speak with his noble, +natural voice. He came, the gentle satirist, who hit no +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page535">[pg 535]</span><a name="Pg535" id="Pg535" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +unfair blow; the kind judge who castigated only in smiling. +While Swift went about, hanging and ruthless—a literary +Jeffries—in Addison's kind court only minor cases were +tried: only peccadilloes and small sins against society: +only a dangerous libertinism in tuckers and hoops;<a id="noteref_90" name="noteref_90" href="#note_90"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">90</span></span></a> or +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page536">[pg 536]</span><a name="Pg536" id="Pg536" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a nuisance in the abuse of beaux' canes and snuff-boxes. +It may be a lady is tried for breaking the peace of our +sovereign lady Queen Anne, and ogling too dangerously +from the side-box: or a Templar for beating the watch, +or breaking Priscian's head: or a citizen's wife for caring +too much for the puppet-show, and too little for her husband +and children: every one of the little sinners brought before +him is amusing, and he dismisses each with the pleasantest +penalties and the most charming words of admonition. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Addison wrote his papers as gaily as if he was going +out for a holiday. When Steele's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span> first began his +prattle, Addison, then in Ireland, caught at his friend's +notion, poured in paper after paper, and contributed the +stores of his mind, the sweet fruits of his reading, the +delightful gleanings of his daily observation, with a wonderful +profusion, and as it seemed an almost endless fecundity. +He was six-and-thirty years old: full and ripe. He had +not worked crop after crop from his brain, manuring +hastily, subsoiling indifferently, cutting and sowing and +cutting again, like other luckless cultivators of letters. He +had not done much as yet; a few Latin poems—graceful +prolusions; a polite book of travels; a dissertation on +medals, not very deep; four acts of a tragedy, a great +classical exercise; and the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Campaign</span></span>, a large prize poem +that won an enormous prize. But with his friend's discovery +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>, Addison's calling was found, and the +most delightful talker in the world began to speak. He +does not go very deep: let gentlemen of a profound genius, +critics accustomed to the plunge of the bathos, console +themselves by thinking that he <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">couldn't</span></em> go very deep. +There are no traces of suffering in his writing. He was so +good, so honest, so healthy, so cheerfully selfish, if I must +use the word. There is no deep sentiment. I doubt, until +after his marriage, perhaps, whether he ever lost his night's +rest or his day's tranquillity about any woman in his life:<a id="noteref_91" name="noteref_91" href="#note_91"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">91</span></span></a> +whereas poor Dick Steele had capacity enough to melt, and +to languish, and to sigh, and to cry his honest old eyes +out, for a dozen. His writings do not show insight into +or reverence for the love of women, which I take to be, +one the consequence of the other. He walks about the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page537">[pg 537]</span><a name="Pg537" id="Pg537" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +world watching their pretty humours, fashions, follies, +flirtations, rivalries; and noting them with the most charming +archness. He sees them in public, in the theatre, or +the assembly, or the puppet-show; or at the toy-shop +higgling for gloves and lace; or at the auction, battling +together over a blue porcelain dragon, or a darling monster +in japan; or at church, eyeing the width of their rivals' +hoops, or the breadth of their laces, as they sweep down +the aisles. Or he looks out of his window at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Garter”</span> +in St. James's Street, at Ardelia's coach, as she blazes to +the Drawing-room with her coronet and six footmen; and +remembering that her father was a Turkey merchant in +the City, calculates how many sponges went to purchase +her ear-ring, and how many drums of figs to build her +coach-box; or he demurely watches behind a tree in Spring +Garden as Saccharissa (whom he knows under her mask) +trips out of her chair to the alley where Sir Fopling is +waiting. He sees only the public life of women. Addison +was one of the most resolute club-men of his day. He +passed many hours daily in those haunts. Besides drinking, +which, alas! is past praying for; you must know it, he +owned, too, ladies that he indulged in that odious practice +of smoking. Poor fellow! He was a man's man, remember. +The only woman he <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">did</span></em> know, he didn't write about. I take +it there would not have been much humour in that story. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He likes to go and sit in the smoking-room at the Grecian, +or the Devil; to pace <span class="tei tei-q">“Change and the Mall”</span><a id="noteref_92" name="noteref_92" href="#note_92"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">92</span></span></a>—to mingle +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page538">[pg 538]</span><a name="Pg538" id="Pg538" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +in that great club of the world—sitting alone in it somehow: +having goodwill and kindness for every single man +and woman in it—having need of some habit and custom +binding him to some few; never doing any man a wrong +(unless it be a wrong to hint a little doubt about a man's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page539">[pg 539]</span><a name="Pg539" id="Pg539" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +parts, and to damn him with faint praise); and so he +looks on the world and plays with the ceaseless humours +of all of us—laughs the kindest laugh—points our neighbour's +foible or eccentricity out to us with the most good-natured, +smiling confidence; and then, turning over his +shoulder, whispers <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">our</span></em> foibles to our neighbour. What +would Sir Roger de Coverley be without his follies and his +charming little brain-cracks?<a id="noteref_93" name="noteref_93" href="#note_93"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">93</span></span></a> If the good +knight did not call out to the people sleeping in church, and say <span class="tei tei-q">“Amen”</span> +with such a delightful pomposity: if he did not make +a speech in the assize-court <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">à propos de bottes</span></span>, and +merely to show his dignity to Mr. Spectator:<a id="noteref_94" name="noteref_94" href="#note_94"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">94</span></span></a> if he did not +mistake Madam Doll Tearsheet for a lady of quality in +Temple Garden: if he were wiser than he is: if he had +not his humour to salt his life, and were but a mere English +gentleman and game-preserver—of what worth were he to +us? We love him for his vanities as much as his virtues. +What is ridiculous is delightful in him: we are so fond +of him because we laugh at him so. And out of that +laughter, and out of that sweet weakness, and out of those +harmless eccentricities and follies, and out of that touched +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page540">[pg 540]</span><a name="Pg540" id="Pg540" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +brain, and out of that honest manhood and simplicity—we +get a result of happiness, goodness, tenderness, pity, +piety; such as, if my audience will think their reading +and hearing over, doctors and divines but seldom have +the fortune to inspire. And why not? Is the glory of +Heaven to be sung only by gentlemen in black coats? +Must the truth be only expounded in gown and surplice, +and out of those two vestments can nobody preach it? +Commend me to this dear preacher without orders—this +parson in the tye-wig. When this man looks from the +world, whose weaknesses he describes so benevolently, up +to the Heaven which shines over us all, I can hardly fancy +a human face lighted up with a more serene rapture: +a human intellect thrilling with a purer love and adoration +than Joseph Addison's. Listen to him: from your childhood +you have known the verses: but who can hear their +sacred music without love and awe? +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Soon as the evening shades prevail,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The moon takes up the wondrous tale,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And nightly to the listening earth,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Repeats the story of her birth;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And all the stars that round her burn,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And all the planets in their turn,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Confirm the tidings as they roll,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And spread the truth from pole to pole.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">What though, in solemn silence, all</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Move round this dark terrestrial ball;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">What though no real voice nor sound,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Among their radiant orbs be found;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In reason's ear they all rejoice,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And utter forth a glorious voice,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">For ever singing as they shine,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The hand that made us is divine.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It seems to me those verses shine like the stars. They +shine out of a great deep calm. When he turns to Heaven, +a Sabbath comes over that man's mind: and his face +lights up from it with a glory of thanks and prayer. His +sense of religion stirs through his whole being. In the +fields, in the town: looking at the birds in the trees: at +the children in the streets: in the morning or in the moonlight: +over his books in his own room: in a happy party +at a country merry-making or a town assembly, goodwill +and peace to God's creatures, and love and awe of Him +who made them, fill his pure heart and shine from his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page541">[pg 541]</span><a name="Pg541" id="Pg541" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +kind face. If Swift's life was the most wretched, I think +Addison's was one of the most enviable. A life prosperous +and beautiful—a calm death—an immense fame and affection +afterwards for his happy and spotless name.<a id="noteref_95" name="noteref_95" href="#note_95"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">95</span></span></a> +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page542">[pg 542]</span><a name="Pg542" id="Pg542" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc107" id="toc107"></a> +<a name="pdf108" id="pdf108"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Lecture The Third. Steele</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What do we look for in studying the history of a past age? +Is it to learn the political transactions and characters of +the leading public men? Is it to make ourselves acquainted +with the life and being of the time? If we set out with +the former grave purpose, where is the truth, and who +believes that he has it entire? What character of what +great man is known to you? You can but make guesses +as to character more or less happy. In common life don't +you often judge and misjudge a man's whole conduct, +setting out from a wrong impression? The tone of a voice, +a word said in joke, or a trifle in behaviour—the cut of his +hair or the tie of his neckcloth may disfigure him in your eyes, +or poison your good opinion; or at the end of years of +intimacy it may be your closest friend says something, +reveals something which had previously been a secret, +which alters all your views about him, and shows that he +has been acting on quite a different motive to that which +you fancied you knew. And if it is so with those you know, +how much more with those you don't know? Say, for +example, that I want to understand the character of the +Duke of Marlborough. I read Swift's history of the times +in which he took a part; the shrewdest of observers and +initiated, one would think, into the politics of the age—he +hints to me that Marlborough was a coward, and even +of doubtful military capacity: he speaks of Walpole as +a contemptible boor, and scarcely mentions, except to flout +it, the great intrigue of the Queen's latter days, which was +to have ended in bringing back the Pretender. Again, +I read Marlborough's life by a copious archdeacon, who +has the command of immense papers, of sonorous language, +of what is called the best information; and I get little or +no insight into this secret motive which, I believe, influenced +the whole of Marlborough's career, which caused his turnings +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page543">[pg 543]</span><a name="Pg543" id="Pg543" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and windings, his opportune fidelity and treason, stopped +his army almost at Paris gate, and landed him finally on +the Hanoverian side—the winning side; I get, I say, no +truth, or only a portion of it, in the narrative of either +writer, and believe that Coxe's portrait or Swift's portrait +is quite unlike the real Churchill. I take this as a single +instance, prepared to be as sceptical about any other, and +say to the Muse of History, <span class="tei tei-q">“O venerable daughter of +Mnemosyne, I doubt every single statement you ever made +since your ladyship was a Muse! For all your grave airs +and high pretensions, you are not a whit more trustworthy +than some of your lighter sisters on whom your partisans +look down. You bid me listen to a general's oration to +his soldiers: Nonsense! He no more made it than Turpin +made his dying speech at Newgate. You pronounce a +panegyric of a hero: I doubt it, and say you flatter outrageously. +You utter the condemnation of a loose character: +I doubt it, and think you are prejudiced and take +the side of the Dons. You offer me an autobiography: +I doubt all autobiographies I ever read except those, perhaps, +of Mr. Robinson Crusoe, Mariner, and writers of his class. +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">These</span></em> have no object in setting themselves right with the +public or their own consciences; these have no motive for +concealment or half-truths; these call for no more confidence +than I can cheerfully give, and do not force me to +tax my credulity or to fortify it by evidence. I take up +a volume of Dr. Smollett, or a volume of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, and +say the fiction carries a greater amount of truth in solution +than the volume which purports to be all true. Out of +the fictitious book I get the expression of the life of the +time; of the manners, of the movement, the dress, the +pleasures, the laughter, the ridicules of society—the old +times live again, and I travel in the old country of England. +Can the heaviest historian do more for me?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As we read in these delightful volumes of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span> and +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, the past age returns, the England of our ancestors +is revivified. The Maypole rises in the Strand again in +London; the churches are thronged with daily worshippers; +the beaux are gathering in the coffee-houses; the gentry +are going to the Drawing-room; the ladies are thronging +to the toy-shops; the chairmen are jostling in the streets; +the footmen are running with links before the chariots, +or fighting round the theatre doors. In the country I see +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page544">[pg 544]</span><a name="Pg544" id="Pg544" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the young Squire riding to Eton with his servants behind +him, and Will Wimble, the friend of the family, to see him +safe. To make that journey from the Squire's and back, +Will is a week on horseback. The coach takes five days +between London and Bath. The judges and the bar ride +the circuit. If my lady comes to town in her post-chariot, +her people carry pistols to fire a salute on Captain Macheath +if he should appear, and her couriers ride ahead to prepare +apartments for her at the great caravanserais on the road; +Boniface receives her under the creaking sign of the <span class="tei tei-q">“Bell”</span> +or the <span class="tei tei-q">“Ram”</span>, and he and his chamberlains bow her up the +great stair to the state-apartments, whilst her carriage +rumbles into the courtyard, where the Exeter <span class="tei tei-q">“Fly”</span> is housed +that performs the journey in eight days, God willing, having +achieved its daily flight of twenty miles, and landed its +passengers for supper and sleep. The curate is taking his +pipe in the kitchen, where the Captain's man—having hung +up his master's half-pike—is at his bacon and eggs, bragging +of Ramillies and Malplaquet to the townsfolk, who have +their club in the chimney-corner. The Captain is ogling +the chambermaid in the wooden gallery, or bribing her to +know who is the pretty young mistress that has come in +the coach? The pack-horses are in the great stable, and +the drivers and ostlers carousing in the tap. And in Mrs. +Landlady's bar, over a glass of strong waters, sits a gentleman +of military appearance, who travels with pistols, as +all the rest of the world does, and has a rattling grey mare +in the stables which will be saddled and away with its owner +half an hour before the <span class="tei tei-q">“Fly”</span> sets out on its last day's +flight. And some five miles on the road, as the Exeter <span class="tei tei-q">“Fly”</span> +comes jingling and creaking onwards, it will suddenly be +brought to a halt by a gentleman on a grey mare, with +a black vizard on his face, who thrusts a long pistol into +the coach window, and bids the company to hand out their +purses.... It must have been no small pleasure even +to sit in the great kitchen in those days, and see the tide +of humankind pass by. We arrive at places now, but we +travel no more. Addison talks jocularly of a difference of +manner and costume being quite perceivable at Staines, +where there passed a young fellow <span class="tei tei-q">“with a very tolerable +periwig”</span>, though, to be sure, his hat was out of fashion, and +had a Ramillies cock. I would have liked to travel in those +days (being of that class of travellers who are proverbially +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page545">[pg 545]</span><a name="Pg545" id="Pg545" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +pretty easy <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">coram latronibus</span></span>) and have seen my friend +with the grey mare and the black vizard. Alas! there always +came a day in the life of that warrior when it was the +fashion to accompany him as he passed—without his black +mask, and with a nosegay in his hand, accompanied by +halberdiers and attended by the sheriff,—in a carriage without +springs, and a clergyman jolting beside him to a spot +close by Cumberland Gate and the Marble Arch, where +a stone still records that here Tyburn turnpike stood. +What a change in a century; in a few years! Within +a few yards of that gate the fields began: the fields of his +exploits, behind the hedges of which he lurked and robbed. +A great and wealthy city has grown over those meadows. +Were a man brought to die there now, the windows would +be closed and the inhabitants keep their houses in sickening +horror. A hundred years back, people crowded to see that +last act of a highwayman's life, and make jokes on it. +Swift laughed at him, grimly advising him to provide a +Holland shirt and white cap crowned with a crimson or +black ribbon for his exit, to mount the cart cheerfully—shake +hands with the hangman, and so—farewell. Gay +wrote the most delightful ballads, and made merry over +the same hero. Contrast these with the writings of our +present humourists! Compare those morals and ours—those +manners and ours! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We can't tell—you would not bear to be told the whole +truth regarding those men and manners. You could no +more suffer in a British drawing-room, under the reign of +Queen Victoria, a fine gentleman or fine lady of Queen +Anne's time, or hear what they heard and said, than you +would receive an ancient Briton. It is as one reads about +savages, that one contemplates the wild ways, the barbarous +feasts, the terrific pastimes, of the men of pleasure of that +age. We have our fine gentlemen, and our <span class="tei tei-q">“fast men”</span>; +permit me to give you an idea of one particularly fast +nobleman of Queen Anne's days, whose biography has been +preserved to us by the law reporters. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In 1691, when Steele was a boy at school, my Lord +Mohun was tried by his peers for the murder of William +Mountford, comedian. In Howell's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">State Trials</span></span>, the reader +will find not only an edifying account of this exceedingly +fast nobleman, but of the times and manners of those +days. My lord's friend, a Captain Hill, smitten with the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page546">[pg 546]</span><a name="Pg546" id="Pg546" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +charms of the beautiful Mrs. Bracegirdle, and anxious +to marry her at all hazards, determined to carry her off, +and for this purpose hired a hackney-coach with six +horses, and a half-dozen of soldiers, to aid him in the +storm. The coach with a pair of horses (the four leaders +being in waiting elsewhere) took its station opposite my +Lord Craven's house in Drury Lane, by which door Mrs. +Bracegirdle was to pass on her way from the theatre. As +she passed in company of her mamma and a friend, Mr. +Page, the Captain seized her by the hand, the soldiers +hustled Mr. Page and attacked him sword in hand, and +Captain Hill and his noble friend endeavoured to force +Madam Bracegirdle into the coach. Mr. Page called for +help: the population of Drury Lane rose: it was impossible +to effect the capture; and bidding the soldiers go about +their business, and the coach to drive off, Hill let go of his +prey sulkily, and he waited for other opportunities of revenge. +The man of whom he was most jealous was Will Mountford, +the comedian; Will removed, he thought Mrs. Bracegirdle +might be his: and accordingly the Captain and his lordship +lay that night in wait for Will, and as he was coming out +of a house in Norfolk Street, while Mohun engaged him in +talk, Hill, in the words of the Attorney-General, made a +pass and run him clean through the body. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Sixty-one of my lord's peers finding him not guilty of +murder, while but fourteen found him guilty, this very +fast nobleman was discharged: and made his appearance +seven years after in another trial for murder—when he, +my Lord Warwick, and three gentlemen of the military +profession were concerned in the fight which ended in the +death of Captain Coote. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This jolly company were drinking together at Lockit's +in Charing Cross, when angry words arose between Captain +Coote and Captain French; whom my Lord Mohun and +my lord the Earl of Warwick<a id="noteref_96" name="noteref_96" href="#note_96"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">96</span></span></a> and Holland endeavoured +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page547">[pg 547]</span><a name="Pg547" id="Pg547" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to pacify. My Lord Warwick was a dear friend of Captain +Coote, lent him a hundred pounds to buy his commission +in the Guards; once when the captain was arrested for 13<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l</span></span>. +by his tailor, my lord lent him five guineas, often paid his +reckoning for him, and showed him other offices of friendship. +On this evening the disputants, French and Coote, +being separated whilst they were upstairs, unluckily stopped +to drink ale again at the bar of Lockit's. The row began +afresh—Coote lunged at French over the bar, and at last +all six called for chairs, and went to Leicester Fields, where +they fell to. Their lordships engaged on the side of Captain +Coote. My Lord of Warwick was severely wounded in the +hand, Mr. French also was stabbed, but honest Captain +Coote got a couple of wounds—one especially, <span class="tei tei-q">“a wound in +the left side just under the short ribs, and piercing through +the diaphragma,”</span> which did for Captain Coote. Hence the +trials of my Lords Warwick and Mohun: hence the assemblage +of peers, the report of the transaction, in which these +defunct fast men still live for the observation of the curious. +My Lord of Warwick is brought to the bar by the Deputy +Governor of the Tower of London, having the axe carried +before him by the gentleman gaoler, who stood with it at +the bar at the right hand of the prisoner, turning the edge +from him; the prisoner, at his approach, making three +bows, one to his grace the Lord High Steward, the other to +the peers on each hand; and his grace and the peers return +the salute. And besides these great personages, august +in periwigs, and nodding to the right and left, a host of the +small come up out of the past and pass before us—the jolly +captains brawling in the tavern, and laughing and cursing +over their cups—the drawer that serves, the bar-girl that +waits, the bailiff on the prowl, the chairmen trudging +through the black lampless streets, and smoking their pipes +by the railings, whilst swords are clashing in the garden +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page548">[pg 548]</span><a name="Pg548" id="Pg548" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +within. <span class="tei tei-q">“Help there! a gentleman is hurt”</span>: the chairmen +put up their pipes, and help the gentleman over the railings, +and carry him, ghastly and bleeding, to the bagnio in Long +Acre, where they knock up the surgeon—a pretty tall gentleman—but +that wound under the short ribs has done for +him. Surgeon, lords, captains, bailiffs, chairmen, and +gentleman gaoler with your axe, where be you now? The +gentleman axeman's head is off his own shoulders; the +lords and judges can wag theirs no longer; the bailiff's +writs have ceased to run; the honest chairmen's pipes are +put out, and with their brawny calves they have walked +away into Hades—all as irrecoverably done for as Will +Mountford or Captain Coote. The subject of our night's +lecture saw all these people—rode in Captain Coote's company +of the Guards very probably—wrote and sighed for +Bracegirdle, went home tipsy in many a chair, after many +a bottle, in many a tavern—fled from many a bailiff. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In 1709, when the publication of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span> began, our +great-great-grandfathers must have seized upon that new +and delightful paper with much such eagerness as lovers +of light literature in a later day exhibited when the Waverley +novels appeared, upon which the public rushed, forsaking +that feeble entertainment of which the Miss Porters, the +Anne of Swanseas, and worthy Mrs. Radcliffe herself, with +her dreary castles and exploded old ghosts, had had pretty +much the monopoly. I have looked over many of the comic +books with which our ancestors amused themselves, from +the novels of Swift's coadjutrix, Mrs. Manley, the delectable +author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">New Atlantis</span></span>, to the facetious productions +of Tom Durfey, and Tom Brown, and Ned Ward, writer of +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">London Spy</span></span> and several other volumes of ribaldry. +The slang of the taverns and ordinaries, the wit of the +bagnios, form the strongest part of the farrago of which +these libels are composed. In the excellent newspaper +collection at the British Museum, you may see, besides the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Craftsman</span></span> and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Post Boy</span></span>, specimens, and +queer specimens they are, of the higher literature of Queen Anne's time. Here is +an abstract from a notable journal bearing date, Wednesday, +October 13th, 1708, and entitled <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The British Apollo; +or, Curious Amusements for the Ingenious, by a Society of +Gentlemen</span></span>. The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">British Apollo</span></span> invited and professed to +answer questions upon all subjects of wit, morality, science, +and even religion; and two out of its four pages are filled +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page549">[pg 549]</span><a name="Pg549" id="Pg549" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +with queries and replies much like some of the oracular +penny prints of the present time. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One of the first querists, referring to the passage that +a bishop should be the husband of one wife, argues that +polygamy is justifiable in the laity. The society of gentlemen +conducting the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">British Apollo</span></span> are posed by this +casuist, and promise to give him an answer. Celinda then +wishes to know from <span class="tei tei-q">“the gentlemen”</span>, concerning the souls +of the dead, whether they shall have the satisfaction to +know those whom they most valued in this transitory life. +The gentlemen of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Apollo</span></span> give but cold comfort to poor +Celinda. They are inclined to think not: for, say they, +since every inhabitant of those regions will be infinitely +dearer than here are our nearest relatives—what have we +to do with a partial friendship in that happy place? Poor +Celinda! it may have been a child or a lover whom she +had lost, and was pining after, when the oracle of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">British +Apollo</span></span> gave her this dismal answer. She has solved the +question for herself by this time, and knows quite as well +as the society of gentlemen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From theology we come to physics, and Q. asks, <span class="tei tei-q">“Why +does hot water freeze sooner than cold?”</span> Apollo replies, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hot water cannot be said to freeze sooner than cold, but +water once heated and cold, may be subject to freeze by +the evaporation of the spirituous parts of the water, which +renders it less able to withstand the power of frosty weather.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The next query is rather a delicate one. <span class="tei tei-q">“You, Mr. Apollo, +who are said to be the God of Wisdom, pray give us the +reason why kissing is so much in fashion: what benefit +one receives by it, and who was the inventor, and you will +oblige Corinna.”</span> To this queer demand the lips of Phoebus, +smiling, answer: <span class="tei tei-q">“Pretty, innocent Corinna! Apollo owns +that he was a little surprised by your kissing question, +particularly at that part of it where you desire to know +the benefit you receive by it. Ah! madam, had you a +lover, you would not come to Apollo for a solution; since +there is no dispute but the kisses of mutual lovers give +infinite satisfaction. As to its invention, 'tis certain nature +was its author, and it began with the first courtship.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After a column more of questions, follow nearly two +pages of poems, signed by Philander, Armenia, and the +like, and chiefly on the tender passion; and the paper +wound up with a letter from Leghorn, an account of the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page550">[pg 550]</span><a name="Pg550" id="Pg550" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene before Lille, and +proposals for publishing two sheets on the present state +of Aethiopia, by Mr. Hill; all of which is printed for the +authors by J. Mayo, at the Printing Press against Water +Lane in Fleet Street. What a change it must have been—how +Apollo's oracles must have been struck dumb, when +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span> appeared, and scholars, gentlemen, men of the +world, men of genius, began to speak! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Shortly before the Boyne was fought, and young Swift +had begun to make acquaintance with English Court +manners and English servitude, in Sir William Temple's +family, another Irish youth was brought to learn his +humanities at the old school of Charterhouse, near Smithfield; +to which foundation he had been appointed by +James Duke of Ormond, a governor of the House, and +a patron of the lad's family. The boy was an orphan, +and described, twenty years after, with a sweet pathos +and simplicity, some of the earliest recollections of a life +which was destined to be chequered by a strange variety +of good and evil fortune. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I am afraid no good report could be given by his masters +and ushers of that thick-set, square-faced, black-eyed, soft-hearted +little Irish boy. He was very idle. He was +whipped deservedly a great number of times. Though he +had very good parts of his own, he got other boys to do +his lessons for him, and only took just as much trouble +as should enable him to scuffle through his exercises, and +by good fortune escape the flogging block. One hundred +and fifty years after, I have myself inspected, but only +as an amateur, that instrument of righteous torture still +existing, and in occasional use, in a secluded private apartment +of the old Charterhouse School; and have no doubt +it is the very counterpart, if not the ancient and interesting +machine itself, at which poor Dick Steele submitted himself +to the tormentors. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Besides being very kind, lazy, and good-natured, this +boy went invariably into debt with the tart-woman; ran +out of bounds, and entered into pecuniary, or rather promissory, +engagements with the neighbouring lollipop-vendors +and piemen—exhibited an early fondness and +capacity for drinking mum and sack, and borrowed from +all his comrades who had money to lend. I have no sort +of authority for the statements here made of Steele's early +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page551">[pg 551]</span><a name="Pg551" id="Pg551" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +life; but if the child is father of the man, the father of +young Steele of Merton, who left Oxford without taking +a degree, and entered the Life Guards—the father of +Captain Steele of Lucas's Fusiliers, who got his company +through the patronage of my Lord Cutts—the father of +Mr. Steele the Commissioner of Stamps, the editor of the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>, +and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, the expelled Member of +Parliament, and the author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tender Husband</span></span> and +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Conscious Lovers</span></span>; if man and boy resembled each +other, Dick Steele the schoolboy must have been one of +the most generous, good-for-nothing, amiable little creatures +that ever conjugated the verb <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">tupto</span></span>, +I beat, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">tuptomai</span></span>, I am +whipped, in any school in Great Britain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Almost every gentleman who does me the honour to +hear me will remember that the very greatest character +which he has seen in the course of his life, and the person +to whom he has looked up with the greatest wonder and +reverence, was the head boy at his school. The schoolmaster +himself hardly inspires such an awe. The head boy +construes as well as the schoolmaster himself. When he +begins to speak the hall is hushed, and every little boy +listens. He writes off copies of Latin verses as melodiously +as Virgil. He is good-natured, and, his own masterpieces +achieved, pours out other copies of verses for other boys +with an astonishing ease and fluency; the idle ones only +trembling lest they should be discovered on giving in their +exercises, and whipped because their poems were too good. +I have seen great men in my time, but never such a great +one as that head boy of my childhood: we all thought he +must be Prime Minister, and I was disappointed on meeting +him in after-life to find he was no more than six feet high. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Dick Steele, the Charterhouse gownboy, contracted such +an admiration in the years of his childhood, and retained +it faithfully through his life. Through the school and +through the world, whithersoever his strange fortune led +this erring, wayward, affectionate creature, Joseph Addison +was always his head boy. Addison wrote his exercises. +Addison did his best themes. He ran on Addison's messages: +fagged for him and blacked his shoes: to be in +Joe's company was Dick's greatest pleasure; and he took +a sermon or a caning from his monitor with the most +boundless reverence, acquiescence, and affection.<a id="noteref_97" name="noteref_97" href="#note_97"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">97</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page552">[pg 552]</span><a name="Pg552" id="Pg552" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Steele found Addison a stately college Don at Oxford, +and himself did not make much figure at this place. He +wrote a comedy, which, by the advice of a friend, the +humble fellow burned there; and some verses, which I dare +say are as sublime as other gentlemen's composition at +that age; but being smitten with a sudden love for military +glory, he threw up the cap and gown for the saddle and +bridle, and rode privately in the Horse Guards, in the +Duke of Ormond's troop—the second—and, probably, with +the rest of the gentlemen of his troop, <span class="tei tei-q">“all mounted on +black horses with white feathers in their hats, and scarlet +coats richly laced,”</span> marched by King William, in Hyde +Park, in November, 1699, and a great show of the nobility, +besides twenty thousand people, and above a thousand +coaches. <span class="tei tei-q">“The Guards had just got their new clothes,”</span> +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">London Post</span></span> said: <span class="tei tei-q">“they are extraordinary grand, and +thought to be the finest body of horse in the world.”</span> But +Steele could hardly have seen any actual service. He who +wrote about himself, his mother, his wife, his loves, his +debts, his friends, and the wine he drank, would have told +us of his battles if he had seen any. His old patron, +Ormond, probably got him his cornetcy in the Guards, +from which he was promoted to be a captain in Lucas's +Fusiliers, getting his company through the patronage of +Lord Cutts, whose secretary he was, and to whom he +dedicated his work called the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Christian Hero</span></span>. As for Dick, +whilst writing this ardent devotional work, he was deep +in debt, in drink, and in all the follies of the town; it +is related that all the officers of Lucas's, and the gentlemen +of the Guards, laughed at Dick.<a id="noteref_98" name="noteref_98" href="#note_98"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">98</span></span></a> And in truth a theologian +in liquor is not a respectable object, and a hermit, +though he may be out at elbows, must not be in debt to +the tailor. Steele says of himself that he was always +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page553">[pg 553]</span><a name="Pg553" id="Pg553" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +sinning and repenting. He beat his breast and cried most +piteously when he <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">did</span></em> repent: but as soon as crying had +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page554">[pg 554]</span><a name="Pg554" id="Pg554" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +made him thirsty, he fell to sinning again. In that charming +paper in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>, in which he records his father's death, +his mother's griefs, his own most solemn and tender emotions, +he says he is interrupted by the arrival of a hamper +of wine, <span class="tei tei-q">“the same as is to be sold at Garraway's, next +week,”</span> upon the receipt of which he sends for three friends, +and they fall to instantly, <span class="tei tei-q">“drinking two bottles apiece, +with great benefit to themselves, and not separating till +two o'clock in the morning.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His life was so. Jack the drawer was always interrupting +it, bringing him a bottle from the <span class="tei tei-q">“Rose”</span>, or inviting him +over to a bout there with Sir Plume and Mr. Diver; and +Dick wiped his eyes, which were whimpering over his +papers, took down his laced hat, put on his sword and +wig, kissed his wife and children, told them a lie about +pressing business, and went off to the <span class="tei tei-q">“Rose”</span> to the jolly +fellows. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +While Mr. Addison was abroad, and after he came home +in rather a dismal way to wait upon Providence in his +shabby lodging in the Haymarket, young Captain Steele +was cutting a much smarter figure than that of his classical +friend of Charterhouse Cloister and Maudlin Walk. Could +not some painter give an interview between the gallant +captain of Lucas's, with his hat cocked, and his lace, and +his face too, a trifle tarnished with drink, and that poet, +that philosopher, pale, proud, and poor, his friend and +monitor of schooldays, of all days? How Dick must +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page555">[pg 555]</span><a name="Pg555" id="Pg555" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +have bragged about his chances and his hopes, and the +fine company he kept, and the charms of the reigning +toasts and popular actresses, and the number of bottles +that he and my lord and some other pretty fellows had +cracked overnight at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Devil”</span>, or the <span class="tei tei-q">“Garter”</span>! Cannot +one fancy Joseph Addison's calm smile and cold grey +eyes following Dick for an instant, as he struts down the +Mall, to dine with the Guard at St. James's, before he +turns, with his sober pace and threadbare suit, to walk +back to his lodgings up the two pair of stairs? Steele's +name was down for promotion, Dick always said himself, +in the glorious, pious, and immortal William's last table-book. +Jonathan Swift's name had been written there by +the same hand too. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our worthy friend, the author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Christian Hero</span></span>, +continued to make no small figure about town by the use +of his wits.<a id="noteref_99" name="noteref_99" href="#note_99"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">99</span></span></a> He was appointed Gazetteer: he wrote, in +1703, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Tender Husband</span></span>, his second play, in which there +is some delightful farcical writing, and of which he fondly +owned in after-life, and when Addison was no more, that +there were <span class="tei tei-q">“many applauded strokes”</span> from Addison's +beloved hand.<a id="noteref_100" name="noteref_100" href="#note_100"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">100</span></span></a> Is it not a pleasant partnership to remember? +Can't one fancy Steele full of spirits and youth, +leaving his gay company to go to Addison's lodging, where +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page556">[pg 556]</span><a name="Pg556" id="Pg556" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his friend sits in the shabby sitting-room, quite serene, +and cheerful, and poor? In 1704, Steele came on the town +with another comedy, and behold it was so moral and +religious, as poor Dick insisted, so dull the town thought, +that the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lying Lover</span></span> was damned. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Addison's hour of success now came, and he was able +to help our friend, the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Christian Hero</span></span>, in such a way, that, +if there had been any chance of keeping that poor tipsy +champion upon his legs, his fortune was safe, and his +competence assured. Steele procured the place of Commissioner +of Stamps: he wrote so richly, so gracefully +often, so kindly always, with such a pleasant wit and easy +frankness, with such a gush of good spirits and good +humour, that his early papers may be compared to Addison's +own, and are to be read, by a male reader at least, +with quite an equal pleasure.<a id="noteref_101" name="noteref_101" href="#note_101"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">101</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page557">[pg 557]</span><a name="Pg557" id="Pg557" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>, in 1711, the famous +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> made its +appearance, and this was followed, at various intervals, by +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page558">[pg 558]</span><a name="Pg558" id="Pg558" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +many periodicals under the same editor—the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Guardian</span></span>—the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Englishman</span></span>—the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lover</span></span>, +whose love was rather insipid—the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page559">[pg 559]</span><a name="Pg559" id="Pg559" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Reader</span></span>, of whom the public saw no more after his +second appearance—the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Theatre</span></span>, under the pseudonym of +Sir John Edgar, which Steele wrote, while Governor of the +Royal Company of Comedians, to which post, and to that +of Surveyor of the Royal Stables at Hampton Court, and +to the Commission of the Peace for Middlesex, and to the +honour of knighthood, Steele had been preferred soon after +the accession of George I, whose cause honest Dick had +nobly fought, through disgrace and danger, against the +most formidable enemies, against traitors and bullies, +against Bolingbroke and Swift in the last reign. With +the arrival of the King, that splendid conspiracy broke up; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page560">[pg 560]</span><a name="Pg560" id="Pg560" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and a golden opportunity came to Dick Steele, whose hand, +alas, was too careless to grip it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Steele married twice; and outlived his places, his schemes, +his wife, his income, his health, and almost everything but +his kind heart. That ceased to trouble him in 1729, when +he died, worn out and almost forgotten by his contemporaries, +in Wales, where he had the remnant of a property. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Posterity has been kinder to this amiable creature; all +women especially are bound to be grateful to Steele, as +he was the first of our writers who really seemed to admire +and respect them. Congreve the Great, who alludes to +the low estimation in which women were held in Elizabeth's +time, as a reason why the women of Shakespeare make so +small a figure in the poet's dialogues, though he can himself +pay splendid compliments to women, yet looks on +them as mere instruments of gallantry, and destined, like +the most consummate fortifications, to fall, after a certain +time, before the arts and bravery of the besieger, man. +There is a letter of Swift's, entitled <span class="tei tei-q">“Advice to a very +Young Married Lady”</span>, which shows the Dean's opinion of +the female society of his day, and that if he despised man +he utterly scorned women too. No lady of our time could +be treated by any man, were he ever so much a wit or +Dean, in such a tone of insolent patronage and vulgar +protection. In this performance, Swift hardly takes pains +to hide his opinion that a woman is a fool: tells her to +read books, as if reading was a novel accomplishment; +and informs her that <span class="tei tei-q">“not one gentleman's daughter in +a thousand has been brought to read or understand her +own natural tongue”</span>. Addison laughs at women equally; +but, with the gentleness and politeness of his nature, smiles +at them and watches them, as if they were harmless, halfwitted, +amusing, pretty creatures, only made to be men's +playthings. It was Steele who first began to pay a manly +homage to their goodness and understanding, as well as +to their tenderness and beauty.<a id="noteref_102" name="noteref_102" href="#note_102"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">102</span></span></a> In his comedies, the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page561">[pg 561]</span><a name="Pg561" id="Pg561" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +heroes do not rant and rave about the divine beauties of +Gloriana or Statira, as the characters were made to do in +the chivalry romances and the high-flown dramas just going +out of vogue, but Steele admires women's virtue, acknowledges +their sense, and adores their purity and beauty, with +an ardour and strength which should win the goodwill of +all women to their hearty and respectful champion. It is +this ardour, this respect, this manliness, which makes his +comedies so pleasant and their heroes such fine gentlemen. +He paid the finest compliment to a woman that perhaps +ever was offered. Of one woman, whom Congreve had +also admired and celebrated, Steele says, that <span class="tei tei-q">“to have +loved her was a liberal education”</span>. <span class="tei tei-q">“How often,”</span> he says, +dedicating a volume to his wife, <span class="tei tei-q">“how often has your +tenderness removed pain from my sick head, how often +anguish from my afflicted heart! If there are such beings +as guardian angels, they are thus employed. I cannot +believe one of them to be more good in inclination, or more +charming in form than my wife.”</span> His breast seems to +warm and his eyes to kindle when he meets with a good +and beautiful woman, and it is with his heart as well as +with his hat that he salutes her. About children, and all +that relates to home, he is not less tender, and more than +once speaks in apology of what he calls his softness. He +would have been nothing without that delightful weakness. +It is that which gives his works their worth and his style +its charm. It, like his life, is full of faults and careless +blunders; and redeemed, like that, by his sweet and compassionate +nature. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We possess of poor Steele's wild and chequered life some +of the most curious memoranda that ever were left of +a man's biography.<a id="noteref_103" name="noteref_103" href="#note_103"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">103</span></span></a> Most men's letters, from Cicero down +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page562">[pg 562]</span><a name="Pg562" id="Pg562" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to Walpole, or down to the great men of our own time, +if you will, are doctored compositions, and written with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page563">[pg 563]</span><a name="Pg563" id="Pg563" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +an eye suspicious towards posterity. That dedication of +Steele's to his wife is an artificial performance, possibly; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page564">[pg 564]</span><a name="Pg564" id="Pg564" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +at least, it is written with that degree of artifice which an +orator uses in arranging a statement for the House, or +a poet employs in preparing a sentiment in verse or for +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page565">[pg 565]</span><a name="Pg565" id="Pg565" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the stage. But there are some 400 letters of Dick Steele'e +to his wife, which that thrifty woman preserved accurately, +and which could have been written but for her and her +alone. They contain details of the business, pleasures, +quarrels, reconciliations of the pair; they have all the +genuineness of conversation; they are as artless as a child's +prattle, and as confidential as a curtain-lecture. Some are +written from the printing-office, where he is waiting for +the proofsheets of his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, +or his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>; some are +written from the tavern, whence he promises to come to +his wife <span class="tei tei-q">“within a pint of wine”</span>, and where he has given +a rendezvous to a friend, or a money-lender: some are +composed in a high state of vinous excitement, when his +head is flustered with burgundy, and his heart abounds +with amorous warmth for his darling Prue: some are under +the influence of the dismal headache and repentance next +morning: some, alas, are from the lock-up house, where +the lawyers have impounded him, and where he is waiting +for bail. You trace many years of the poor fellow's career +in these letters. In September, 1707, from which day she +began to save the letters, he married the beautiful Mistress +Scurlock. You have his passionate protestations to the +lady; his respectful proposals to her mamma; his private +prayer to Heaven when the union so ardently desired was +completed; his fond professions of contrition and promises +of amendment, when, immediately after his marriage, there +began to be just cause for the one and need for the +other. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Captain Steele took a house for his lady upon their +marriage, <span class="tei tei-q">“the third door from Germain Street, left hand +of Berry Street,”</span> and the next year he presented his wife +with a country house at Hampton. It appears she had +a chariot and pair, and sometimes four horses: he himself +enjoyed a little horse for his own riding. He paid, or +promised to pay, his barber fifty pounds a year, and always +went abroad in a laced coat and a large black-buckled +periwig, that must have cost somebody fifty guineas. He +was rather a well-to-do gentleman, Captain Steele, with +the proceeds of his estates in Barbadoes (left to him by +his first wife), his income as a writer of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>, and +his office of gentleman waiter to his Royal Highness Prince +George. His second wife brought him a fortune too. But +it is melancholy to relate, that with these houses and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page566">[pg 566]</span><a name="Pg566" id="Pg566" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +chariots and horses and income, the Captain was constantly +in want of money, for which his beloved bride was asking +as constantly. In the course of a few pages we begin to +find the shoemaker calling for money, and some directions +from the Captain, who has not thirty pounds to spare. +He sends his wife, <span class="tei tei-q">“the beautifullest object in the world,”</span> +as he calls her, and evidently in reply to applications of +her own, which have gone the way of all waste paper, and +lighted Dick's pipes, which were smoked a hundred and +forty years ago—he sends his wife now a guinea, then +a half-guinea, then a couple of guineas, then half a pound +of tea; and again no money and no tea at all, but a promise +that his darling Prue shall have some in a day or two: +or a request, perhaps, that she will send over his night-gown +and shaving-plate to the temporary lodging where +the nomadic captain is lying, hidden from the bailiffs. Oh +that a Christian hero and late captain in Lucas's should +be afraid of a dirty sheriff's officer! That the pink and +pride of chivalry should turn pale before a writ! It stands +to record in poor Dick's own handwriting; the queer +collection is preserved at the British Museum to this present +day; that the rent of the nuptial house in Jermyn Street, +sacred to unutterable tenderness and Prue, and three doors +from Bury Street, was not paid until after the landlord +had put in an execution on Captain Steele's furniture. +Addison sold the house and furniture at Hampton, and, +after deducting the sum in which his incorrigible friend was +indebted to him, handed over the residue of the proceeds +of the sale to poor Dick, who wasn't in the least angry at +Addison's summary proceeding, and I dare say was very +glad of any sale or execution, the result of which was to +give him a little ready money. Having a small house in +Jermyn Street for which he couldn't pay, and a country +house at Hampton on which he had borrowed money, +nothing must content Captain Dick but the taking, in 1712, +a much finer, larger, and grander house, in Bloomsbury +Square; where his unhappy landlord got no better satisfaction +than his friend in St. James's, and where it is +recorded that Dick, giving a grand entertainment, had +a half-dozen queer-looking fellows in livery to wait upon +his noble guests, and confessed that his servants were +bailiffs to a man. <span class="tei tei-q">“I fared like a distressed prince,”</span> the +kindly prodigal writes, generously complimenting Addison +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page567">[pg 567]</span><a name="Pg567" id="Pg567" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +for his assistance in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>,—<span class="tei tei-q">“I +fared like a distressed +prince, who calls in a powerful neighbour to his aid. I was +undone by my auxiliary; when I had once called him in, +I could not subsist without dependence on him.”</span> Poor, +needy Prince of Bloomsbury! think of him in his palace, +with his allies from Chancery Lane ominously guarding +him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All sorts of stories are told indicative of his recklessness +and his good humour. One narrated by Dr. Hoadly is +exceedingly characteristic; it shows the life of the time: +and our poor friend very weak, but very kind both in and +out of his cups. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My father”</span> (says Dr. John Hoadly, the bishop's son)—<span class="tei tei-q">“when +Bishop of Bangor, was, by invitation, present at +one of the Whig meetings, held at the <span class="tei tei-q">‘Trumpet’</span>, in Shire +Lane, when Sir Richard, in his zeal, rather exposed himself, +having the double duty of the day upon him, as well +to celebrate the immortal memory of King William, it being +the 4th of November, as to drink his friend Addison up +to conversation pitch, whose phlegmatic constitution was +hardly warmed for society by that time. Steele was not +fit for it. Two remarkable circumstances happened. John +Sly, the hatter of facetious memory, was in the house; +and John, pretty mellow, took it into his head to come +into the company on his knees, with a tankard of ale in +his hand to drink off to the <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">immortal memory</span></em>, and to return +in the same manner. Steele, sitting next my father, +whispered him—<span class="tei tei-q">‘<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Do laugh. It is humanity to laugh.</span></em>’</span> Sir +Richard, in the evening, being too much in the same condition, +was put into a chair, and sent home. Nothing +would serve him but being carried to the Bishop of Bangor's, +late as it was. However, the chairmen carried him home, +and got him upstairs, when his great complaisance would +wait on them downstairs, which he did, and then was got +quietly to bed.”</span><a id="noteref_104" name="noteref_104" href="#note_104"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">104</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There is another amusing story which, I believe, that +renowned collector, Mr. Joseph Miller, or his successors, +have incorporated into their work. Sir Richard Steele, at +a time when he was much occupied with theatrical affairs, +built himself a pretty private theatre, and, before it was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page568">[pg 568]</span><a name="Pg568" id="Pg568" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +opened to his friends and guests, was anxious to try whether +the hall was well adapted for hearing. Accordingly he +placed himself in the most remote part of the gallery, and +begged the carpenter who had built the house to speak up +from the stage. The man at first said that he was unaccustomed +to public speaking, and did not know what to say +to his honour; but the good-natured knight called out to +him to say whatever was uppermost; and, after a moment, +the carpenter began, in a voice perfectly audible: <span class="tei tei-q">“Sir +Richard Steele!”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“for three months past me and +my men has been a-working in this theatre, and we've never +seen the colour of your honour's money: we will be very +much obliged if you'll pay it directly, for until you do we +won't drive in another nail.”</span> Sir Richard said that his +friend's elocution was perfect, but that he didn't like his +subject much. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The great charm of Steele's writing is its naturalness. +He wrote so quickly and carelessly, that he was forced to +make the reader his confidant, and had not the time to +deceive him. He had a small share of book-learning, but +a vast acquaintance with the world. He had known men +and taverns. He had lived with gownsmen, with troopers, +with gentleman ushers of the Court, with men and women +of fashion; with authors and wits, with the inmates of the +spunging-houses, and with the frequenters of all the clubs +and coffee-houses in the town. He was liked in all company +because he liked it; and you like to see his enjoyment as +you like to see the glee of a box full of children at the +pantomime. He was not of those lonely ones of the earth +whose greatness obliged them to be solitary; on the contrary, +he admired, I think, more than any man who ever +wrote; and full of hearty applause and sympathy, wins +upon you by calling you to share his delight and good +humour. His laugh rings through the whole house. He +must have been invaluable at a tragedy, and have cried +as much as the most tender young lady in the boxes. He +has a relish for beauty and goodness wherever he meets it. +He admired Shakespeare affectionately, and more than any +man of his time; and, according to his generous expansive +nature, called upon all his company to like what he liked +himself. He did not damn with faint praise: he was in +the world and of it; and his enjoyment of life presents +the strangest contrast to Swift's savage indignation and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page569">[pg 569]</span><a name="Pg569" id="Pg569" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Addison's lonely serenity.<a id="noteref_105" name="noteref_105" href="#note_105"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">105</span></span></a> Permit me to read to you a passage +from each writer, curiously indicative of his peculiar +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page570">[pg 570]</span><a name="Pg570" id="Pg570" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +humour: the subject is the same, and the mood the very +gravest. We have said that upon all the actions of man, +the most trifling and the most solemn, the humourist takes +upon himself to comment. All readers of our old masters +know the terrible lines of Swift, in which he hints at his +philosophy and describes the end of mankind:—<a id="noteref_106" name="noteref_106" href="#note_106"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">106</span></span></a> +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Amazed, confused, its fate unknown,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The world stood trembling at Jove's throne;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">While each pale sinner hung his head,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Jove, nodding, shook the heavens and said:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">'Offending race of human kind,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">By nature, reason, learning, blind;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">You who through frailty stepped aside,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And you who never err'd through pride;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">You who in different sects were shamm'd,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And come to see each other damn'd</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">(So some folk told you, but they knew</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">No more of Jove's designs than you).</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The world's mad business now is o'er,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And I resent your freaks no more;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><em class="tei tei-emph" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%; font-style: italic">I</span></em><span style="font-size: 90%"> to such blockheads set my wit,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I damn such fools—go, go, you're bit!'</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Addison, speaking on the very same theme, but with +how different a voice, says, in his famous paper on Westminster +Abbey (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, No. 26):—<span class="tei tei-q">“For my own part, +though I am always serious, I do not know what it is to be +melancholy, and can therefore take a view of nature in her +deep and solemn scenes with the same pleasure as in her +most gay and delightful ones. When I look upon the tombs +of the great, every emotion of envy dies within me; when +I read the epitaphs of the beautiful, every inordinate desire +goes out; when I meet with the grief of parents on a tombstone, +my heart melts with compassion; when I see the +tomb of the parents themselves, I consider the vanity of +grieving for those we must quickly follow.”</span> (I have owned +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page571">[pg 571]</span><a name="Pg571" id="Pg571" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +that I do not think Addison's heart melted very much, or +that he indulged very inordinately in the <span class="tei tei-q">“vanity of grieving”</span>.) +<span class="tei tei-q">“When,”</span> he goes on, <span class="tei tei-q">“when I see kings lying by +those who deposed them: when I consider rival wits +placed side by side, or the holy men that divided the world +with their contests and disputes,—I reflect with sorrow and +astonishment on the little competitions, factions, and +debates of mankind. And, when I read the several dates +on the tombs of some that died yesterday and some 600 years +ago, I consider that Great Day when we shall all of us be +contemporaries, and make our appearance together.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our third humourist comes to speak upon the same +subject. You will have observed in the previous extracts +the characteristic humour of each writer—the subject and +the contrast—the fact of Death, and the play of individual +thought, by which each comments on it, and now hear the +third writer—death, sorrow, and the grave, being for the +moment also his theme. <span class="tei tei-q">“The first sense of sorrow I ever +knew,”</span> Steele says in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>, <span class="tei tei-q">“was upon the death of my +father, at which time I was not quite five years of age: but +was rather amazed at what all the house meant, than +possessed of a real understanding why nobody would play +with us. I remember I went into the room where his body +lay, and my mother sat weeping alone by it. I had my +battledore in my hand, and fell a-beating the coffin, and +calling papa; for, I know not how, I had some idea that +he was locked up there. My mother caught me in her arms, +and, transported beyond all patience of the silent grief she +was before in, she almost smothered me in her embraces, +and told me in a flood of tears, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Papa could not hear me, +and would play with me no more: for they were going to +put him under ground, whence he would never come to us +again.’</span> She was a very beautiful woman, of a noble spirit, +and there was a dignity in her grief amidst all the wildness +of her transport, which methought struck me with an instinct +of sorrow that, before I was sensible what it was to grieve, +seized my very soul, and has made pity the weakness of +my heart ever since.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Can there be three more characteristic moods of minds +and men? <span class="tei tei-q">“Fools, do you know anything of this mystery?”</span> +says Swift, stamping on a grave and carrying his scorn for +mankind actually beyond it. <span class="tei tei-q">“Miserable, purblind wretches, +how dare you to pretend to comprehend the Inscrutable, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page572">[pg 572]</span><a name="Pg572" id="Pg572" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and how can your dim eyes pierce the unfathomable depths +of yonder boundless heaven?”</span> Addison, in a much kinder +language and gentler voice, utters much the same sentiment: +and speaks of the rivalry of wits, and the contests of holy +men, with the same sceptic placidity. <span class="tei tei-q">“Look what a little +vain dust we are;”</span> he says, smiling over the tombstones, +and catching, as is his wont, quite a divine effulgence as +he looks heavenward, he speaks in words of inspiration +almost, of <span class="tei tei-q">“the Great Day, when we shall all of us be contemporaries, +and make our appearance together”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The third, whose theme is Death, too, and who will speak +his word of moral as Heaven teaches him, leads you up to +his father's coffin, and shows you his beautiful mother +weeping, and himself an unconscious little boy wondering +at her side. His own natural tears flow as he takes your +hand and confidingly asks your sympathy. <span class="tei tei-q">“See how good +and innocent and beautiful women are,”</span> he says, <span class="tei tei-q">“how +tender little children! Let us love these and one another, +brother—God knows we have need of love and pardon.”</span> +So it is each man looks with his own eyes, speaks with his +own voice, and prays his own prayer. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Steele asks your sympathy for the actors in that +charming scene of Love and Grief and Death, who can +refuse it? One yields to it as to the frank advance of +a child, or to the appeal of a woman. A man is seldom +more manly than when he is what you call unmanned—the +source of his emotion is championship, pity, and courage; +the instinctive desire to cherish those who are innocent and +unhappy, and defend those who are tender and weak. If +Steele is not our friend he is nothing. He is by no means +the most brilliant of wits nor the deepest of thinkers: but +he is our friend: we love him, as children love their love +with an A, because he is amiable. Who likes a man best +because he is the cleverest or the wisest of mankind; or +a woman because she is the most virtuous, or talks French; +or plays the piano better than the rest of her sex? I own +to liking Dick Steele the man, and Dick Steele the author, +much better than much better men and much better authors. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The misfortune regarding Steele is, that most part of the +company here present must take his amiability upon hearsay, +and certainly can't make his intimate acquaintance. +Not that Steele was worse than his time; on the contrary, +a far better, truer, and higher-hearted man than most who +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page573">[pg 573]</span><a name="Pg573" id="Pg573" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lived in it. But things were done in that society, and names +were named, which would make you shudder now. What +would be the sensation of a polite youth of the present day, +if at a ball he saw the young object of his affections taking +a box out of her pocket and a pinch of snuff: or if at dinner, +by the charmer's side, she deliberately put her knife into +her mouth? If she cut her mother's throat with it, mamma +would scarcely be more shocked. I allude to these peculiarities +of bygone times as an excuse for my favourite, Steele, +who was not worse, and often much more delicate than his +neighbours. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There exists a curious document descriptive of the manners +of the last age, which describes most minutely the amusements +and occupations of persons of fashion in London at +the time of which we are speaking; the time of Swift, and +Addison, and Steele. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Lord Sparkish, Tom Neverout, and Colonel Alwit, +the immortal personages of Swift's polite conversation, +came to breakfast with my Lady Smart, at eleven o'clock +in the morning, my Lord Smart was absent at the Levée. +His lordship was at home to dinner at three o'clock to +receive his guests; and we may sit down to this meal, like +the Barmecide's, and see the fops of the last century before +us. Seven of them sat down at dinner, and were joined by +a country baronet, who told them they kept Court hours. +These persons of fashion began their dinner with a sirloin +of beef, fish, a shoulder of veal, and a tongue. My Lady +Smart carved the sirloin, my Lady Answerwell helped the +fish, and the gallant colonel cut the shoulder of veal. All +made a considerable inroad on the sirloin and the shoulder +of veal with the exception of Sir John, who had no appetite, +having already partaken of a beefsteak and two mugs of ale, +besides a tankard of March beer as soon as he got out of +bed. They drank claret, which the master of the house +said should always be drunk after fish; and my Lord Smart +particularly recommended some excellent cider to my Lord +Sparkish, which occasioned some brilliant remarks from +that nobleman. When the host called for wine, he nodded +to one or other of his guests, and said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Tom Neverout, my +service to you.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the first course came almond pudding, fritters, +which the colonel took with his hands out of the dish, in +order to help the brilliant Miss Notable; chickens, black +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page574">[pg 574]</span><a name="Pg574" id="Pg574" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +puddings, and soup; and Lady Smart, the elegant mistress +of the mansion, finding a skewer in a dish, placed it in her +plate with directions that it should be carried down to the +cook and dressed for the cook's own dinner. Wine and +small beer were drunk during this second course; and when +the colonel called for beer, he called the butler, Friend, and +asked whether the beer was good. Various jocular remarks +passed from the gentlefolks to the servants; at breakfast +several persons had a word and a joke for Mrs. Betty, my +lady's maid, who warmed the cream and had charge of the +canister (the tea cost thirty shillings a pound in those days). +When my Lady Sparkish sent her footman out to my Lady +Match to come at six o'clock and play at quadrille, her +ladyship warned the man to follow his nose, and if he fell +by the way not to stay to get up again. And when the +gentlemen asked the hall-porter if his lady was at home, +that functionary replied, with manly waggishness, <span class="tei tei-q">“She was +at home just now, but she's not gone out yet.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the puddings, sweet and black, the fritters and +soup, came the third course, of which the chief dish was +a hot venison pasty, which was put before Lord Smart, and +carved by that nobleman. Besides the pasty, there was +a hare, a rabbit, some pigeons, partridges, a goose, and +a ham. Beer and wine were freely imbibed during this +course, the gentlemen always pledging somebody with every +glass which they drank; and by this time the conversation +between Tom Neverout and Miss Notable had grown so +brisk and lively, that the Derbyshire baronet began to think +the young gentlewoman was Tom's sweetheart; on which +Miss remarked, that she loved Tom <span class="tei tei-q">“like pie”</span>. After the +goose, some of the gentlemen took a dram of brandy, <span class="tei tei-q">“which +was very good for the wholesomes,”</span> Sir John said; and +now having had a tolerably substantial dinner, honest Lord +Smart bade the butler bring up the great tankard full of +October to Sir John. The great tankard was passed from +hand to hand and mouth to mouth, but when pressed by +the noble host upon the gallant Tom Neverout, he said, +<span class="tei tei-q">“No faith, my lord, I like your wine, and won't put a churl +upon a gentleman. Your honour's claret is good enough +for me.”</span> And so, the dinner over, the host said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Hang +saving, bring us up a ha'porth of cheese.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The cloth was now taken away, and a bottle of burgundy +was set down, of which the ladies were invited to partake +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page575">[pg 575]</span><a name="Pg575" id="Pg575" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +before they went to their tea. When they withdrew, the +gentlemen promised to join them in an hour; fresh bottles +were brought, the <span class="tei tei-q">“dead men”</span>, meaning the empty bottles, +removed; and <span class="tei tei-q">“D'you hear, John? bring clean glasses”</span>, +my Lord Smart said. On which the gallant Colonel Alwit +said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I'll keep my glass; for wine is the best liquor to +wash glasses in.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After an hour the gentlemen joined the ladies, and then +they all sat and played quadrille until three o'clock in the +morning, when the chairs and the flambeaux came, and +this noble company went to bed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Such were manners six or seven score years ago. I draw +no inference from this queer picture—let all moralists here +present deduce their own. Fancy the moral condition of +that society in which a lady of fashion joked with a footman, +and carved a great shoulder of veal, and provided besides +a sirloin, a goose, hare, rabbit, chickens, partridges, black-puddings, +and a ham for a dinner for eight Christians. What—what +could have been the condition of that polite world +in which people openly ate goose after almond pudding, +and took their soup in the middle of dinner? Fancy a +colonel in the Guards putting his hand into a dish of <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">beignets +d'abricot</span></span>, and helping his neighbour, a young lady <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">du +monde</span></span>! Fancy a noble lord calling out to the servants, +before the ladies at his table, <span class="tei tei-q">“Hang expense, bring us +a ha'porth of cheese!”</span> Such were the ladies of St. +James's—such were the frequenters of White's Chocolate-house, +when Swift used to visit it, and Steele described it +as the centre of pleasure, gallantry, and entertainment, +a hundred and forty years ago! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Dennis, who ran amuck at the literary society of his day, +falls foul of poor Steele, and thus depicts him,—<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir John +Edgar, of the county of —— in Ireland, is of a middle +stature, broad shoulders, thick legs, a shape like the picture +of somebody over a farmer's chimney—a short chin, a short +nose, a short forehead, a broad, flat face, and a dusky +countenance. Yet with such a face and such a shape, he +discovered at sixty that he took himself for a beauty, and +appeared to be more mortified at being told that he was +ugly, than he was by any reflection made upon his honour +or understanding.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He is a gentleman born, witness himself, of very honourable +family; certainly of a very ancient one, for his ancestors +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page576">[pg 576]</span><a name="Pg576" id="Pg576" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +flourished in Tipperary long before the English ever set foot +in Ireland. He has testimony of this more authentic than +the Heralds' Office, or any human testimony. For God has +marked him more abundantly than he did Cain, and +stamped his native country on his face, his understanding, +his writings, his actions, his passions, and, above all, his +vanity. The Hibernian brogue is still upon all these, though long +habit and length of days have worn it off his tongue.”</span><a id="noteref_107" name="noteref_107" href="#note_107"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">107</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Although this portrait is the work of a man who was +neither the friend of Steele nor of any other man alive, yet +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page577">[pg 577]</span><a name="Pg577" id="Pg577" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +there is a dreadful resemblance to the original in the savage +and exaggerated traits of the caricature, and everybody +who knows him must recognize Dick Steele. Dick set about +almost all the undertakings of his life with inadequate +means, and, as he took and furnished a house with the most +generous intentions towards his friends, the most tender +gallantry towards his wife, and with this only drawback, +that he had not wherewithal to pay the rent when quarter-day +came,—so, in his life he proposed to himself the most +magnificent schemes of virtue, forbearance, public and +private good, and the advancement of his own and the +national religion; but when he had to pay for these articles—so +difficult to purchase and so costly to maintain—poor +Dick's money was not forthcoming: and when Virtue +called with her little bill, Dick made a shuffling excuse that +he could not see her that morning, having a headache from +being tipsy overnight; or when stern Duty rapped at the +door with his account, Dick was absent and not ready to +pay. He was shirking at the tavern; or had some particular +business (of somebody's else) at the ordinary; or he was +in hiding, or worse than in hiding, in the lock-up house. +What a situation for a man!—for a philanthropist—for +a lover of right and truth—for a magnificent designer +and schemer! Not to dare to look in the face the +Religion which he adored and which he had offended; +to have to shirk down back lanes and alleys, so as to +avoid the friend whom he loved and who had trusted +him—to have the house which he had intended for his wife, +whom he loved passionately, and for her ladyship's company +which he wished to entertain splendidly, in the possession +of a bailiff's man, with a crowd of little creditors,—grocers, +butchers, and small-coal men, lingering round the door with +their bills and jeering at him. Alas! for poor Dick Steele! +For nobody else, of course. There is no man or woman in +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">our</span></em> time who makes fine projects and gives them up from +idleness or want of means. When Duty calls upon <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">us</span></em>, we no +doubt are always at home and ready to pay that grim tax-gatherer. +When <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">we</span></em> are stricken with remorse and promise +reform, we keep our promise, and are never angry, or idle, +or extravagant any more. There are no chambers in <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">our</span></em> +hearts, destined for family friends and affections, and now +occupied by some Sin's emissary and bailiff in possession. +There are no little sins, shabby peccadilloes, importunate +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page578">[pg 578]</span><a name="Pg578" id="Pg578" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +remembrances, or disappointed holders of our promises to +reform, hovering at our steps, or knocking at our door! Of +course not. We are living in the nineteenth century, and +poor Dick Steele stumbled and got up again, and got into +jail and out again, and sinned and repented; and loved +and suffered; and lived and died scores of years ago. Peace +be with him! Let us think gently of one who was so gentle: +let us speak kindly of one whose own breast exuberated +with human kindness. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page579">[pg 579]</span><a name="Pg579" id="Pg579" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc109" id="toc109"></a> +<a name="pdf110" id="pdf110"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Lecture The Fourth. Prior, Gay, And Pope</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Matthew Prior was one of those famous and lucky wits +of the auspicious reign of Queen Anne, whose name it +behoves us not to pass over. Mat was a world-philosopher +of no small genius, good nature, and acumen.<a id="noteref_108" name="noteref_108" href="#note_108"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">108</span></span></a> He loved, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page580">[pg 580]</span><a name="Pg580" id="Pg580" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he drank, he sang. He describes himself, in one of his +lyrics, <span class="tei tei-q">“in a little Dutch chaise on a Saturday night; on +his left hand his Horace, and a friend on his right,”</span> going +out of town from the Hague to pass that evening and the +ensuing Sunday, boozing at a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spielhaus</span></span> with his companions, +perhaps bobbing for perch in a Dutch canal, and +noting down, in a strain and with a grace not unworthy of his +Epicurean master, the charms of his idleness, his retreat, +and his Batavian Chloe. A vintner's son in Whitehall, and +a distinguished pupil of Busby of the Rod, Prior attracted +some notice by writing verses at St. John's College, Cambridge, +and, coming up to town, aided Montague<a id="noteref_109" name="noteref_109" href="#note_109"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">109</span></span></a> in an +attack on the noble old English lion John Dryden, in +ridicule of whose work, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Hind and the Panther</span></span>, he brought +out that remarkable and famous burlesque, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Town and +Country Mouse</span></span>. Aren't you all acquainted with it? Have +you not all got it by heart? What! have you never heard +of it? See what fame is made of! The wonderful part +of the satire was, that, as a natural consequence of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +Town and Country Mouse</span></span>, Matthew Prior was made Secretary +of Embassy at the Hague! I believe it is dancing, +rather than singing, which distinguishes the young English +diplomatists of the present day; and have seen them in +various parts perform that part of their duty very finely. +In Prior's time it appears a different accomplishment led +to preferment. Could you write a copy of Alcaics? that +was the question. Could you turn out a neat epigram or +two? Could you compose <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Town and Country Mouse</span></span>? +It is manifest that, by the possession of this faculty, the +most difficult treaties, the laws of foreign nations, and the +interests of our own, are easily understood. Prior rose in +the diplomatic service, and said good things that proved +his sense and his spirit. When the apartments at Versailles +were shown to him, with the victories of Louis XIV painted +on the walls, and Prior was asked whether the palace of +the King of England had any such decorations, <span class="tei tei-q">“The monuments +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page581">[pg 581]</span><a name="Pg581" id="Pg581" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of my master's actions,”</span> Mat said, of William, whom +he cordially revered, <span class="tei tei-q">“are to be seen everywhere except in +his own house.”</span> Bravo, Mat! Prior rose to be full ambassador +at Paris,<a id="noteref_110" name="noteref_110" href="#note_110"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">110</span></span></a> where he somehow was cheated out of his +ambassadorial plate; and in a heroic poem, addressed by +him to her late lamented Majesty Queen Anne, Mat makes +some magnificent allusions to these dishes and spoons, of +which Fate had deprived him. All that he wants, he says, +is her Majesty's picture; without that he can't be happy. +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Thee, gracious Anne, thee present I adore:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Thee, Queen of Peace, if Time and Fate have power</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Higher to raise the glories of thy reign,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In words sublimer and a nobler strain.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">May future bards the mighty theme rehearse.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Here, Stator Jove, and Phoebus, king of verse,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The votive tablet I suspend.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With that word the poem stops abruptly. The votive +tablet is suspended for ever like Mahomet's coffin. News +came that the queen was dead. Stator Jove, and Phoebus, +king of verse, were left there, hovering to this day, over +the votive tablet. The picture was never got any more +than the spoons and dishes—the inspiration ceased—the +verses were not wanted—the ambassador wasn't wanted. +Poor Mat was recalled from his embassy, suffered disgrace +along with his patrons, lived under a sort of cloud ever +after, and disappeared in Essex. When deprived of all +his pensions and emoluments, the hearty and generous +Oxford pensioned him. They played for gallant stakes—the +bold men of those days—and lived and gave splendidly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Johnson quotes from Spence a legend, that Prior, after +spending an evening with Harley, St. John, Pope, and Swift, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page582">[pg 582]</span><a name="Pg582" id="Pg582" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +would go off and smoke a pipe with a couple of friends of +his, a soldier and his wife, in Long Acre. Those who have +not read his late excellency's poems should be warned that +they smack not a little of the conversation of his Long +Acre friends. Johnson speaks slightingly of his lyrics; +but with due deference to the great Samuel, Prior's seem +to me amongst the easiest, the richest, the most charmingly +humorous of English lyrical poems.<a id="noteref_111" name="noteref_111" href="#note_111"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">111</span></span></a> Horace is always +in his mind, and his song, and his philosophy, his good +sense, his happy easy turns and melody, his loves, and his +Epicureanism, bear a great resemblance to that most delightful +and accomplished master. In reading his works, one +is struck with their modern air, as well as by their happy +similarity to the songs of the charming owner of the Sabine +farm. In his verses addressed to Halifax, he says, writing +of that endless theme to poets, the vanity of human wishes— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">So when in fevered dreams we sink,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And, waking, taste what we desire,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">The real draught but feeds the fire,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The dream is better than the drink.</span></div> +</div> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page583">[pg 583]</span><a name="Pg583" id="Pg583" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Our hopes like towering falcons aim</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">At objects in an airy height:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">To stand aloof and view the flight,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Is all the pleasure of the game.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Would not you fancy that a poet of our own days was +singing? and, in the verses of Chloe weeping and reproaching +him for his inconstancy, where he says— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The God of us verse-men, you know, child, the Sun,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">How after his journey, he sets up his rest.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">If at morning o'er earth 'tis his fancy to run,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">At night he declines on his Thetis's breast.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">So, when I am wearied with wandering all day,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">To thee, my delight, in the evening I come:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">No matter what beauties I saw in my way;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">They were but my visits, but thou art my home!</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Then finish, dear Chloe, this pastoral war,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And let us like Horace and Lydia agree;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">For thou art a girl as much brighter than her,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">As he was a poet sublimer than me.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If Prior read Horace, did not Thomas Moore study Prior? +Love and pleasure find singers in all days. Roses are always +blowing and fading—to-day as in that pretty time when +Prior sang of them, and of Chloe lamenting their decay— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">She sighed, she smiled, and to the flowers</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Pointing, the lovely moralist said;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">See, friend, in some few leisure hours,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">See yonder what a change is made!</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Ah, me! the blooming pride of May,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And that of Beauty are but one:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">At morn both flourisht, bright and gay,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Both fade at evening, pale and gone.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">At dawn poor Stella danced and sung,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">The amorous youth around her bowed,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">At night her fatal knell was rung;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">I saw, and kissed her in her shroud.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Such as she is who died to-day,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Such I, alas, may be to-morrow:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Go, Damon, bid the Muse display</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">The justice of thy Chloe's sorrow.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Damon's knell was rung in 1721. May his turf lie lightly +on him! <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">Deus sit propitius huic +potatori</span></span>, as Walter de +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page584">[pg 584]</span><a name="Pg584" id="Pg584" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Mapes sang.<a id="noteref_112" name="noteref_112" href="#note_112"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">112</span></span></a> Perhaps Samuel Johnson, who spoke slightingly +of Prior's verses, enjoyed them more than he was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page585">[pg 585]</span><a name="Pg585" id="Pg585" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +willing to own. The old moralist had studied them as well +as Mr. Thomas Moore, and defended them, and showed +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page586">[pg 586]</span><a name="Pg586" id="Pg586" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +that he remembered them very well too on an occasion +when their morality was called in question by that noted +puritan, James Boswell, Esq., of Auchinleck.<a id="noteref_113" name="noteref_113" href="#note_113"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">113</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the great society of the wits, John Gay deserved to +be a favourite, and to have a good place.<a id="noteref_114" name="noteref_114" href="#note_114"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">114</span></span></a> In his set all +were fond of him. His success offended nobody. He +missed a fortune once or twice. He was talked of for Court +favour, and hoped to win it; but the Court favour jilted +him. Craggs gave him some South-Sea Stock; and at one +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page587">[pg 587]</span><a name="Pg587" id="Pg587" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +time Gay had very nearly made his fortune. But Fortune +shook her swift wings and jilted him too: and so his friends, +instead of being angry with him, and jealous of him, were +kind and fond of honest Gay. In the portraits of the +literary worthies of the early part of the last century, +Gay's face is the pleasantest perhaps of all. It appears +adorned with neither periwig nor nightcap (the full dress +and <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">negligée</span></span> +of learning, without which the painters of those +days scarcely ever portrayed wits), and he laughs at you +over his shoulder with an honest boyish glee—an artless +sweet humour. He was so kind, so gentle, so jocular, so +delightfully brisk at times, so dismally woebegone at others, +such a natural good creature that the Giants loved him. +The great Swift was gentle and sportive with him,<a id="noteref_115" name="noteref_115" href="#note_115"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">115</span></span></a> as the +enormous Brobdingnag maids of honour were with little +Gulliver. He could frisk and fondle round Pope,<a id="noteref_116" name="noteref_116" href="#note_116"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">116</span></span></a> and +sport, and bark, and caper without offending the most thin-skinned +of poets and men; and when he was jilted in +that little Court affair of which we have spoken, his warm-hearted +patrons the Duke and Duchess of Queensberry<a id="noteref_117" name="noteref_117" href="#note_117"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">117</span></span></a> (the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page588">[pg 588]</span><a name="Pg588" id="Pg588" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Kitty, beautiful and young”</span>, of Prior) pleaded his cause +with indignation, and quitted the Court in a huff, carrying +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page589">[pg 589]</span><a name="Pg589" id="Pg589" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +off with them into their retirement their kind gentle protégé. +With these kind lordly folks, a real Duke and Duchess, as +delightful as those who harboured Don Quixote, and loved +that dear old Sancho, Gay lived, and was lapped in cotton, +and had his plate of chicken, and his saucer of cream, and +frisked, and barked, and wheezed, and grew fat, and so +ended.<a id="noteref_118" name="noteref_118" href="#note_118"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">118</span></span></a> He became very melancholy and lazy, sadly +plethoric, and only occasionally diverting in his latter days. +But everybody loved him, and the remembrance of his +pretty little tricks; and the raging old Dean of St. Patrick's, +chafing in his banishment, was afraid to open the letter +which Pope wrote him, announcing the sad news of the +death of Gay.<a id="noteref_119" name="noteref_119" href="#note_119"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">119</span></span></a></p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page590">[pg 590]</span><a name="Pg590" id="Pg590" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Swift's letters to him are beautiful; and having no purpose +but kindness in writing to him, no party aim to advocate, +or slight or anger to wreak, every word the Dean says +to his favourite is natural, trustworthy, and kindly. His +admiration for Gay's parts and honesty, and his laughter +at his weaknesses, were alike just and genuine. He paints +his character in wonderful pleasant traits of jocular satire. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I writ lately to Mr. Pope,”</span> Swift says, writing to Gay; +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wish you had a little villakin in his neighbourhood; but +you are yet too volatile, and any lady with a coach and +six horses would carry you to Japan.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“If your ramble,”</span> +says Swift, in another letter, <span class="tei tei-q">“was on horseback, I am glad +of it, on account of your health; but I know your arts of +patching up a journey between stage-coaches and friends”</span> +coaches—for you are as arrant a Cockney as any hosier in +Cheapside. I have often had it in my head to put it into +yours, that you ought to have some great work in scheme, +which may take up seven years to finish, besides two or +three under-ones that may add another thousand pounds +to your stock, and then I shall be in less pain about you. +I know you can find dinners, but you love twelvepenny +coaches too well, without considering that the interest of +a whole thousand pounds brings you but half a crown a +day:' and then Swift goes off from Gay to pay some grand +compliments to her Grace the Duchess of Queensberry, in +whose sunshine Mr. Gay was basking, and in whose radiance +the Dean would have liked to warm himself too. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But we have Gay here before us, in these letters—lazy, +kindly, uncommonly idle; rather slovenly, I'm afraid; for +ever eating and saying good things; a little, round, French +abbé of a man, sleek, soft-handed, and soft-hearted. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our object in these lectures is rather to describe the +men than their works; or to deal with the latter only in +as far as they seem to illustrate the character of their +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page591">[pg 591]</span><a name="Pg591" id="Pg591" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +writers. Mr. Gay's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Fables</span></span>, which were written to benefit +that amiable prince, the Duke of Cumberland, the warrior +of Dettingen and Culloden, I have not, I own, been able to +peruse since a period of very early youth; and it must be +confessed that they did not effect much benefit upon the +illustrious young prince, whose manners they were intended +to mollify, and whose natural ferocity our gentle-hearted +Satirist perhaps proposed to restrain. But the six pastorals +called the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Shepherd's Week</span></span>, and the burlesque poem of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Trivia</span></span> any man fond of lazy literature will find delightful, +at the present day, and must read from beginning to end +with pleasure. They are to poetry what charming little +Dresden china figures are to sculpture: graceful, minikin, +fantastic; with a certain beauty always accompanying +them. The pretty little personages of the pastoral, with +gold clocks to their stockings, and fresh satin ribbons to +their crooks and waistcoats and bodices, dance their loves +to a minuet-tune played on a bird-organ, approach the +charmer, or rush from the false one daintily on their red-heeled +tiptoes, and die of despair or rapture, with the most +pathetic little grins and ogles; or repose, simpering at +each other, under an arbour of pea-green crockery; or +piping to pretty flocks that have just been washed with the +best Naples in a stream of Bergamot. Gay's gay plan +seems to me far pleasanter than that of Philips—his rival +and Pope's—a serious and dreary idyllic Cockney; not +that Gay's <span class="tei tei-q">“Bumkinets and Hobnelias”</span> are a whit more +natural than the would-be serious characters of the other +posture-master; but the quality of this true humourist +was to laugh and make laugh, though always with a secret +kindness and tenderness, to perform the drollest little +antics and capers, but always with a certain grace, and +to sweet music—as you may have seen a Savoyard boy +abroad, with a hurdy-gurdy and a monkey, turning over +head and heels, or clattering and piroueting in a pair of +wooden shoes, yet always with a look of love and appeal +in his bright eyes, and a smile that asks and wins affection +and protection. Happy they who have that sweet gift of +nature! It was this which made the great folks and Court +ladies free and friendly with John Gay—which made Pope +and Arbuthnot love him—which melted the savage heart +of Swift when he thought of him—and drove away, for +a moment or two, the dark frenzies which obscured the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page592">[pg 592]</span><a name="Pg592" id="Pg592" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +lonely tyrant's brain, as he heard Gay's voice with its +simple melody and artless ringing laughter. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What used to be said about Rubini, <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">qu'il avait des +larmes dans la voix</span></span>, may be said of Gay,<a id="noteref_120" name="noteref_120" href="#note_120"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">120</span></span></a> and of one other +humourist of whom we shall have to speak. In almost +every ballad of his, however slight,<a id="noteref_121" name="noteref_121" href="#note_121"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">121</span></span></a> +in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Beggar's +</span><span class="tei tei-pb" id="page593">[pg 593]</span><a name="Pg593" id="Pg593" class="tei tei-anchor"></a><span style="font-style: italic"> +Opera</span></span><a id="noteref_122" name="noteref_122" href="#note_122"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">122</span></span></a> +and in its wearisome continuation (where the +verses are to the full as pretty as in the first piece, however), +there is a peculiar, hinted, pathetic sweetness and +melody. It charms and melts you. It's indefinable, but +it exists; and is the property of John Gay's and Oliver +Goldsmith's best verse, as fragrance is of a violet, or +freshness of a rose. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Let me read a piece from one of his letters, which is so +famous that most people here are no doubt familiar with it, +but so delightful that it is always pleasant to hear:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">I have just passed part of this summer at an old romantic +seat of my Lord Harcourt's, which he lent me. It overlooks a +common hayfield, where, under the shade of a haycock, sat two +lovers—as constant as ever were found in romance—beneath a +spreading bush. The name of the one (let it sound as it will) was +</span><span class="tei tei-pb" id="page594">[pg 594]</span><a name="Pg594" id="Pg594" class="tei tei-anchor"></a><span style="font-size: 90%"> +John Hewet; of the other Sarah Drew. John was a well-set man, +about five-and-twenty; Sarah, a brave woman of eighteen. John +had for several months borne the labour of the day in the same +field with Sarah; when she milked, it was his morning and evening +charge to bring the cows to her pails. Their love was the talk, +but not the scandal, of the whole neighbourhood, for all they aimed +at was the blameless possession of each other in marriage. It was +but this very morning that he had obtained her parents' consent, +and it was but till the next week that they were to wait to be +happy. Perhaps this very day, in the intervals of their work, they +were talking of their wedding clothes; and John was now matching +several kinds of poppies and field-flowers, to make her a present +of knots for the day. While they were thus employed (it was +on the last of July), a terrible storm of thunder and lightning +arose, that drove the labourers to what shelter the trees or hedges +afforded. Sarah, frightened and out of breath, sunk on a hay-cock; +and John (who never separated from her) sat by her side, +having raked two or three heaps together, to secure her. Immediately, +there was heard so loud a crash, as if heaven had burst +asunder. The labourers, all solicitous for each other's safety, called +to one another: those that were nearest our lovers, hearing no +answer, stepped to the place where they lay: they first saw a little +smoke, and after, this faithful pair—John, with one arm about his +Sarah's neck, and the other held over her face, as if to screen her +from the lightning. They were struck dead, and already grown +stiff and cold in this tender posture. There was no mark or discolouring +on their bodies—only that Sarah's eyebrow was a little +singed, and a small spot between her breasts. They were buried +the next day in one grave!</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And the proof that this description is delightful and +beautiful is, that the great Mr. Pope admired it so much +that he thought proper to steal it and to send it off to +a certain lady and wit, with whom he pretended to be in +love in those days—my Lord Duke of Kingston's daughter, +and married to Mr. Wortley Montagu, then his Majesty's +Ambassador at Constantinople. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We are now come to the greatest name on our list—the +highest among the poets, the highest among the English +wits and humourists with whom we have to rank him. +If the author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dunciad</span></span> be not a humourist, if the +poet of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Rape of the Lock</span></span> be not a wit, who deserves +to be called so? Besides that brilliant genius and immense +fame, for both of which we should respect him, men of +letters should admire him as being the greatest literary +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">artist</span></em> that England has seen. He polished, he refined, he +thought; he took thoughts from other works to adorn and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page595">[pg 595]</span><a name="Pg595" id="Pg595" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +complete his own; borrowing an idea or a cadence from +another poet as he would a figure or a simile from a flower, +river, stream, or any object which struck him in his +walk, or contemplation of Nature. He began to imitate +at an early age;<a id="noteref_123" name="noteref_123" href="#note_123"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">123</span></span></a> and taught himself to write by copying +printed books. Then he passed into the hands of the +priests, and from his first clerical master, who came to +him when he was eight years old, he went to a school at +Twyford, and another school at Hyde Park, at which +places he unlearned all that he had got from his first instructor. +At twelve years old, he went with his father +into Windsor Forest, and there learned for a few months +under a fourth priest. <span class="tei tei-q">“And this was all the teaching +I ever had,”</span> he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“and God knows it extended a very +little way.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When he had done with his priests he took to reading +by himself, for which he had a very great eagerness and +enthusiasm, especially for poetry. He learned versification +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page596">[pg 596]</span><a name="Pg596" id="Pg596" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +from Dryden, he said. In his youthful poem of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Alcander</span></span>, +he imitated every poet, Cowley, Milton, Spenser, Statius, +Homer, Virgil. In a few years he had dipped into a great +number of the English, French, Italian, Latin, and Greek +poets. <span class="tei tei-q">“This I did,”</span> he says, <span class="tei tei-q">“without any design, except +to amuse myself; and got the languages by hunting after +the stories in the several poets I read, rather than read +the books to get the languages. I followed everywhere +as my fancy led me, and was like a boy gathering flowers +in the fields and woods, just as they fell in his way. These +five or six years I looked upon as the happiest in my life.”</span> +Is not here a beautiful holiday picture? The forest and +the fairy story-book—the boy spelling Ariosto or Virgil +under the trees, battling with the Cid for the love of +Chimène, or dreaming of Armida's garden—peace and +sunshine round about—the kindest love and tenderness +waiting for him at his quiet home yonder—and Genius +throbbing in his young heart, and whispering to him, <span class="tei tei-q">“You +shall be great; you shall be famous; you, too, shall love +and sing; you will sing her so nobly that some kind heart +shall forget you are weak and ill-formed. Every poet had +a love. Fate must give one to you too,”</span>—and day by day +he walks the forest, very likely looking out for that charmer. +<span class="tei tei-q">“They were the happiest days of his life,”</span> he says, when he +was only dreaming of his fame: when he had gained that +mistress she was no consoler. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That charmer made her appearance, it would seem, +about the year 1705, when Pope was seventeen. Letters +of his are extant, addressed to a certain Lady M——, +whom the youth courted, and to whom he expressed his +ardour in language, to say no worse of it, that is entirely +pert, odious, and affected. He imitated love compositions +as he had been imitating love poems just before—it was +a sham mistress he courted, and a sham passion, expressed +as became it. These unlucky letters found their way into +print years afterwards, and were sold to the congenial Mr. +Curll. If any of my hearers, as I hope they may, should +take a fancy to look at Pope's correspondence, let them +pass over that first part of it; over, perhaps, almost all +Pope's letters to women; in which there is a tone of not +pleasant gallantry, and, amidst a profusion of compliments +and politenesses, a something which makes one distrust the +little pert, prurient bard. There is very little indeed to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page597">[pg 597]</span><a name="Pg597" id="Pg597" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +say about his loves, and that little not edifying. He wrote +flames and raptures and elaborate verse and prose for +Lady Mary Wortley Montagu; but that passion probably +came to a climax in an impertinence and was extinguished +by a box on the ear, or some such rebuff, and he began on +a sudden to hate her with a fervour much more genuine +than that of his love had been. It was a feeble, puny +grimace of love, and paltering with passion. After Mr. +Pope had sent off one of his fine compositions to Lady +Mary, he made a second draft from the rough copy, and +favoured some other friend with it. He was so charmed +with the letter of Gay's, that I have just quoted, that he +had copied that and amended it, and sent it to Lady Mary +as his own. A gentleman who writes letters +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">à deux fins</span></span>, and +after having poured out his heart to the beloved, serves +up the same dish <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">rechauffé</span></span> to a friend, is not very much in +earnest about his loves, however much he may be in his +piques and vanities when his impertinence gets its due. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But, save that unlucky part of the Pope Correspondence, +I do not know, in the range of our literature, volumes more +delightful.<a id="noteref_124" name="noteref_124" href="#note_124"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">124</span></span></a> You live in them in the finest company in +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page598">[pg 598]</span><a name="Pg598" id="Pg598" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the world. A little stately, perhaps; a little <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">apprêté</span></span> +and conscious that they are speaking to whole generations who +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page599">[pg 599]</span><a name="Pg599" id="Pg599" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +are listening; but in the tone of their voices—pitched, +as no doubt they are, beyond the mere conversation key—in +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page600">[pg 600]</span><a name="Pg600" id="Pg600" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the expression of their thoughts, their various views and +natures, there is something generous, and cheering, and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page601">[pg 601]</span><a name="Pg601" id="Pg601" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +ennobling. You are in the society of men who have filled +the greatest parts in the world's story—you are with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page602">[pg 602]</span><a name="Pg602" id="Pg602" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +St. John the statesman; Peterborough the conqueror; Swift, +the greatest wit of all times; Gay, the kindliest laugher—it +is a privilege to sit in that company. Delightful and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page603">[pg 603]</span><a name="Pg603" id="Pg603" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +generous banquet! with a little faith and a little fancy +any one of us here may enjoy it, and conjure up those great +figures out of the past, and listen to their wit and wisdom. +Mind that there is always a certain <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">cachet</span></span> about great +men—they may be as mean on many points as you or I, +but they carry their great air—they speak of common life +more largely and generously than common men do—they +regard the world with a manlier countenance, and see its +real features more fairly than the timid shufflers who only +dare to look up at life through blinkers, or to have an +opinion when there is a crowd to back it. He who reads +these noble records of a past age, salutes and reverences +the great spirits who adorn it. You may go home now and +talk with St. John; you may take a volume from your +library and listen to Swift and Pope. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Might I give counsel to any young hearer, I would say +to him, Try to frequent the company of your betters. In +books and life that is the most wholesome society; learn +to admire rightly; the great pleasure of life is that. Note +what the great men admired; they admired great things: +narrow spirits admire basely, and worship meanly. I know +nothing in any story more gallant and cheering, than the +love and friendship which this company of famous men +bore towards one another. There never has been a society +of men more friendly, as there never was one more illustrious. +Who dares quarrel with Mr. Pope, great and famous himself, +for liking the society of men great and famous? and for +liking them for the qualities which made them so? A mere +pretty fellow from White's could not have written the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Patriot King</span></span>, and would very likely have despised little +Mr. Pope, the decrepit Papist, whom the great St. John +held to be one of the best and greatest of men: a mere +nobleman of the Court could no more have won Barcelona, +than he could have written Peterborough's letters to Pope,<a id="noteref_125" name="noteref_125" href="#note_125"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">125</span></span></a> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page604">[pg 604]</span><a name="Pg604" id="Pg604" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +which are as witty as Congreve: a mere Irish Dean could +not have written <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gulliver</span></span>; and all these men loved Pope, +and Pope loved all these men. To name his friends is to +name the best men of his time. Addison had a senate; +Pope reverenced his equals. He spoke of Swift with respect +and admiration always. His admiration for Bolingbroke +was so great, that when some one said of his friend, <span class="tei tei-q">“There +is something in that great man which looks as if he was +placed here by mistake,”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> Pope answered, <span class="tei tei-q">“and when +the comet appeared to us a month or two ago, I had sometimes +an imagination that it might possibly be come to +carry him home, as a coach comes to one's door for visitors.”</span> +So these great spirits spoke of one another. Show me six +of the dullest middle-aged gentlemen that ever dawdled +round a club-table, so faithful and so friendly. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We have said before that the chief wits of this time, +with the exception of Congreve, were what we should now +call men's men. They spent many hours of the four-and-twenty, +a fourth part of each day nearly, in clubs and +coffee-houses, where they dined, drank, and smoked. Wit +and news went by word of mouth; a journal of 1710 +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page605">[pg 605]</span><a name="Pg605" id="Pg605" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +contained the very smallest portion of one or the other. +The chiefs spoke, the faithful <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">habitués</span></span> +sat round; strangers +came to wonder and listen. Old Dryden had his head quarters +at Will's, in Russell Street, at the corner of Bow Street, +at which place Pope saw him when he was twelve years +old. The company used to assemble on the first floor—what +was called the dining-room floor in those days—and +sat at various tables smoking their pipes. It is recorded +that the beaux of the day thought it a great honour to be +allowed to take a pinch out of Dryden's snuff-box. When +Addison began to reign, he with a certain crafty propriety—a +policy let us call it—which belonged to his nature, set +up his court, and appointed the officers of his royal house. +His palace was Button's, opposite Will's.<a id="noteref_126" name="noteref_126" href="#note_126"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">126</span></span></a> A quiet opposition, +a silent assertion of empire, distinguished this great +man. Addison's ministers were Budgell, Tickell, Philips, +Carey; his master of the horse, honest Dick Steele, who +was what Duroc was to Napoleon, or Hardy to Nelson; +the man who performed his master's bidding, and would +have cheerfully died in his quarrel. Addison lived with +these people for seven or eight hours every day. The male +society passed over their punch-bowls and tobacco-pipes +about as much time as ladies of that age spent over Spadille +and Manille. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For a brief space, upon coming up to town, Pope formed +part of King Joseph's court, and was his rather too eager +and obsequious humble servant.<a id="noteref_127" name="noteref_127" href="#note_127"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">127</span></span></a> Dick Steele, the editor +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page606">[pg 606]</span><a name="Pg606" id="Pg606" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>, Mr. Addison's man, and his own man too—a +person of no little figure in the world of letters, patronized +the young poet, and set him a task or two. Young Mr. +Pope did the tasks very quickly and smartly (he had been +at the feet quite as a boy of Wycherley's decrepit reputation, +and propped up for a year that doting old wit): he was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page607">[pg 607]</span><a name="Pg607" id="Pg607" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +anxious to be well with the men of letters, to get a footing +and a recognition. He thought it an honour to be admitted +into their company; to have the confidence of Mr. Addison's +friend, Captain Steele. His eminent parts obtained for +him the honour of heralding Addison's triumph of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cato</span></span> +with his admirable prologue, and heading the victorious +procession as it were. Not content with this act of homage +and admiration, he wanted to distinguish himself by assaulting +Addison's enemies, and attacked John Dennis with +a prose lampoon, which highly offended his lofty patron. +Mr. Steele was instructed to write to Mr. Dennis and inform +him that Mr. Pope's pamphlet against him was written +quite without Mr. Addison's approval.<a id="noteref_128" name="noteref_128" href="#note_128"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">128</span></span></a> Indeed, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +Narrative of Dr. Robert Norris on the Phrenzy of J. D.</span></span> +is a vulgar and mean satire, and such a blow as the magnificent +Addison could never desire to see any partisan of his +strike in any literary quarrel. Pope was closely allied with +Swift when he wrote this pamphlet. It is so dirty that it +has been printed in Swift's works, too. It bears the foul +marks of the master hand. Swift admired and enjoyed +with all his heart the prodigious genius of the young Papist +lad out of Windsor Forest, who had never seen a university +in his life, and came and conquered the Dons and the +doctors with his wit. He applauded, and loved him, too, +and protected him, and taught him mischief. I wish +Addison could have loved him better. The best satire +that ever has been penned would never have been written +then; and one of the best characters the world ever knew +would have been without a flaw. But he who had so few equals +could not bear one, and Pope was more than that. +When Pope, trying for himself, and soaring on his immortal +young wings, found that his, too, was a genius, which no +opinion of that age could follow, he rose and left Addison's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page608">[pg 608]</span><a name="Pg608" id="Pg608" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +company, settling on his own eminence, and singing his +own song. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was not possible that Pope should remain a retainer of +Mr. Addison; nor likely that after escaping from his +vassalage and assuming an independent crown, the sovereign +whose allegiance he quitted should view him amicably.<a id="noteref_129" name="noteref_129" href="#note_129"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">129</span></span></a> +They did not do wrong to mislike each other. They but +followed the impulse of nature, and the consequence of +position. When Bernadotte became heir to a throne, the +Prince Royal of Sweden was naturally Napoleon's enemy. +<span class="tei tei-q">“There are many passions and tempers of mankind,”</span> says +Mr. Addison in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, speaking a couple of years +before their little differences between him and Mr. Pope +took place, <span class="tei tei-q">“which naturally dispose us to depress and vilify +the merit of one rising in the esteem of mankind. All those +who made their entrance into the world with the same +advantages, and were once looked on as his equals, are apt +to think the fame of his merits a reflection on their own +deserts. Those who were once his equals envy and defame +him, because they now see him the superior; and those +who were once his superiors, because they look upon him +as their equal.”</span> Did Mr. Addison, justly perhaps thinking +that, as young Mr. Pope had not had the benefit of a university +education, he couldn't know Greek, therefore he couldn't +translate Homer, encourage his young friend Mr. Tickell, +of Queen's, to translate that poet, and aid him with his +own known scholarship and skill?<a id="noteref_130" name="noteref_130" href="#note_130"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">130</span></span></a> +It was natural that +Mr. Addison should doubt of the learning of an amateur +Grecian, should have a high opinion of Mr. Tickell, of Queen's, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page609">[pg 609]</span><a name="Pg609" id="Pg609" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and should help that ingenious young man. It was natural, +on the other hand, that Mr. Pope and Mr. Pope's friends +should believe that this counter-translation, suddenly +advertised and so long written, though Tickell's college +friends had never heard of it—though, when Pope first +wrote to Addison regarding his scheme, Mr. Addison knew +nothing of the similar project of Tickell, of Queen's—it +was natural that Mr. Pope and his friends, having interests, +passions, and prejudices of their own, should believe that +Tickell's translation was but an act of opposition against +Pope, and that they should call Mr. Tickell's emulation +Mr. Addison's envy—if envy it were. +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 5.40em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And were there one whose fires</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">True genius kindles and fair fame inspires,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Blest with each talent and each art to please,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And born to write, converse, and live with ease;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Should such a man, too fond to rule alone,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Bear like the Turk no brother near the throne;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">View him with scornful yet with jealous eyes,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And hate, for arts that caused himself to rise;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And without sneering, teach the rest to sneer;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Alike reserved to blame as to commend,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">A timorous foe and a suspicious friend;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Dreading even fools, by flatterers besieged,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And so obliging that he ne'er obliged;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Like Cato give his little senate laws,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And sit attentive to his own applause;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">While wits and templars every sentence raise,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And wonder with a foolish face of praise;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Who but must laugh if such a man there be,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Who would not weep if Atticus were he?</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I sent the verses to Mr. Addison,”</span> said Pope, <span class="tei tei-q">“and +he used me very civilly ever after.”</span> No wonder he did. +It was shame very likely more than fear that silenced him. +Johnson recounts an interview between Pope and Addison +after their quarrel, in which Pope was angry, and Addison +tried to be contemptuous and calm. Such a weapon as +Pope's must have pierced any scorn. It flashes for ever, +and quivers in Addison's memory. His great figure looks +out on us from the past—stainless but for that—pale, calm, +and beautiful; it bleeds from that black wound. He +should be drawn, like St. Sebastian, with that arrow in +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page610">[pg 610]</span><a name="Pg610" id="Pg610" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his side. As he sent to Gay and asked his pardon, as he +bade his stepson come and see his death, be sure he had +forgiven Pope, when he made ready to show how a Christian +could die. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Pope then formed part of the Addisonian court for +a short time, and describes himself in his letters as sitting +with that coterie until two o'clock in the morning over +punch and burgundy amidst the fumes of tobacco. To +use an expression of the present day, the <span class="tei tei-q">“pace”</span> of those +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">viveurs</span></span> of the former age was awful. Peterborough lived +into the very jaws of death; Godolphin laboured all day +and gambled at night; Bolingbroke,<a id="noteref_131" name="noteref_131" href="#note_131"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">131</span></span></a> writing to Swift, +from Dawley, in his retirement, dating his letter at six +o'clock in the morning, and rising, as he says, refreshed, +serene, and calm, calls to mind the time of his London life; +when about that hour he used to be going to bed, surfeited +with pleasure, and jaded with business; his head often +full of schemes, and his heart as often full of anxiety. +It was too hard, too coarse a life for the sensitive, sickly +Pope. He was the only wit of the day, a friend writes +to me, who wasn't fat.<a id="noteref_132" name="noteref_132" href="#note_132"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">132</span></span></a> Swift was fat; Addison was +fat; Steele was fat; Gay and Thomson were preposterously +fat—all that fuddling and punch-drinking, that +club and coffee-house boozing, shortened the lives and +enlarged the waistcoats of the men of that age. Pope +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page611">[pg 611]</span><a name="Pg611" id="Pg611" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +withdrew in a great measure from this boisterous London +company, and being put into an independence by the gallant +exertions of Swift<a id="noteref_133" name="noteref_133" href="#note_133"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">133</span></span></a> and his private friends, and by the +enthusiastic national admiration which justly rewarded his +great achievement of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Iliad</span></span>, purchased that famous villa +of Twickenham which his song and life celebrated; duteously +bringing his old parents to live and die there, entertaining +his friends there, and making occasional visits to +London in his little chariot, in which Atterbury compared +him to <span class="tei tei-q">“Homer in a nutshell”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Dryden was not a genteel man,”</span> Pope quaintly said +to Spence, speaking of the manner and habits of the famous +old patriarch of Will's. With regard to Pope's own manners, +we have the best contemporary authority that they +were singularly refined and polished. With his extraordinary +sensibility, with his known tastes, with his delicate +frame, with his power and dread of ridicule, Pope could have +been no other than what we call a highly-bred person. +His closest friends, with the exception of Swift, were +among the delights and ornaments of the polished society +of their age. Garth,<a id="noteref_134" name="noteref_134" href="#note_134"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">134</span></span></a> the accomplished and benevolent, +whom Steele has described so charmingly, of whom Codrington +said that his character was <span class="tei tei-q">“all beauty”</span>, and whom +Pope himself called the best of Christians without knowing +it; Arbuthnot,<a id="noteref_135" name="noteref_135" href="#note_135"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">135</span></span></a> one of the wisest, wittiest, most accomplished, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page612">[pg 612]</span><a name="Pg612" id="Pg612" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +gentlest of mankind; Bolingbroke, the Alcibiades +of his age; the generous Oxford; the magnificent, the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page613">[pg 613]</span><a name="Pg613" id="Pg613" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +witty, the famous, and chivalrous Peterborough: these +were the fast and faithful friends of Pope, the most brilliant +company of friends, let us repeat, that the world has ever +seen. The favourite recreation of his leisure hours was the +society of painters, whose art he practised. In his correspondence +are letters between him and Jervas, whose pupil +he loved to be—Richardson, a celebrated artist of his time, +and who painted for him a portrait of his old mother, and +for whose picture he asked and thanked Richardson in one +of the most delightful letters that ever was penned,<a id="noteref_136" name="noteref_136" href="#note_136"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">136</span></span></a>—and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page614">[pg 614]</span><a name="Pg614" id="Pg614" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the wonderful Kneller, who bragged more, spelt worse, and +painted better than any artist of his day.<a id="noteref_137" name="noteref_137" href="#note_137"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">137</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is affecting to note, through Pope's correspondence, +the marked way in which his friends, the greatest, the most +famous, and wittiest men of the time—generals and statesmen, +philosophers and divines—all have a kind word, and +a kind thought for the good simple old mother, whom Pope +tended so affectionately. Those men would have scarcely +valued her, but that they knew how much he loved her, +and that they pleased him by thinking of her. If his +early letters to women are affected and insincere, whenever +he speaks about this one, it is with a childish tenderness +and an almost sacred simplicity. In 1713, when young +Mr. Pope had, by a series of the most astonishing victories +and dazzling achievements, seized the crown of poetry; and +the town was in an uproar of admiration, or hostility, for +the young chief; when Pope was issuing his famous decrees +for the translation of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Iliad</span></span>; when Dennis and the +lower critics were hooting and assailing him; when Addison +and the gentlemen of his court were sneering with sickening +hearts at the prodigious triumphs of the young conqueror; +when Pope, in a fever of victory, and genius, and hope, +and anger, was struggling through the crowd of shouting +friends and furious detractors to his temple of Fame, his +old mother writes from the country, <span class="tei tei-q">“My deare,”</span> says she, +<span class="tei tei-q">“my deare, there's Mr. Blount, of Mapel Durom, dead the +same day that Mr. Inglefield died. Your sister is well; +but your brother is sick. My service to Mrs. Blount, and +all that ask of me. I hope to hear from you, and that +you are well, which is my daily prayer; and this with my +blessing.”</span> The triumph marches by, and the car of the +young conqueror, the hero of a hundred brilliant victories—the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page615">[pg 615]</span><a name="Pg615" id="Pg615" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +fond mother sits in the quiet cottage at home, and +says, <span class="tei tei-q">“I send you my daily prayers, and I bless you, my +deare”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In our estimate of Pope's character, let us always take +into account that constant tenderness and fidelity of +affection which pervaded and sanctified his life, and never +forget that maternal benediction.<a id="noteref_138" name="noteref_138" href="#note_138"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">138</span></span></a> It accompanied him +always: his life seems purified by those artless and heartfelt +prayers. And he seems to have received and deserved +the fond attachment of the other members of his family. +It is not a little touching to read in Spence of the enthusiastic +admiration with which his half-sister regarded him, +and the simple anecdote by which she illustrates her love. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I think no man was ever so little fond of money.”</span> Mrs. +Rackett says about her brother, <span class="tei tei-q">“I think my brother when +he was young read more books than any man in the world”</span>; +and she falls to telling stories of his schooldays, and the +manner in which his master at Twyford ill-used him. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I don't think my brother knew what fear was,”</span> she continues; +and the accounts of Pope's friends bear out this +character for courage. When he had exasperated the +dunces, and threats of violence and personal assault were +brought to him, the dauntless little champion never for +one instant allowed fear to disturb him, or condescended +to take any guard in his daily walks, except occasionally +his faithful dog to bear him company. <span class="tei tei-q">“I had rather die +at once,”</span> said the gallant little cripple, <span class="tei tei-q">“than live in fear +of those rascals.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for his death, it was what the noble Arbuthnot asked +and enjoyed for himself—a euthanasia—a beautiful end. +A perfect benevolence, affection, serenity, hallowed the +departure of that high soul. Even in the very hallucinations +of his brain, and weaknesses of his delirium, there +was something almost sacred. Spence describes him in his +last days, looking up, and with a rapt gaze as if something +had suddenly passed before him. He said to me, <span class="tei tei-q">“What's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page616">[pg 616]</span><a name="Pg616" id="Pg616" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +that?”</span> pointing into the air with a very steady regard, +and then looked down and said, with a smile of the greatest +softness, <span class="tei tei-q">“'twas a vision!”</span> He laughed scarcely ever, but +his companions describe his countenance as often illuminated +by a peculiar sweet smile. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When,”</span> said Spence,<a id="noteref_139" name="noteref_139" href="#note_139"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">139</span></span></a> the kind anecdotist whom Johnson +despised, <span class="tei tei-q">“when I was telling Lord Bolingbroke that Mr. +Pope, on every catching and recovery of his mind, was +always saying something kindly of his present or absent +friends; and that this was so surprising, as it seemed to +me as if humanity had outlasted understanding, Lord +Bolingbroke said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘It has so,’</span> and then added, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I never +in my life knew a man who had so tender a heart for his +particular friends, or a more general friendship for mankind. +I have known him these thirty years, and value myself +more for that man's love than——’</span> Here,”</span> Spence says, +<span class="tei tei-q">“St. John sunk his head, and lost his voice in tears.”</span> The +sob which finishes the epitaph is finer than words. It is +the cloak thrown over the father's face in the famous Greek +picture which hides the grief and heightens it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In Johnson's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life of Pope</span></span>, you will find described with +rather a malicious minuteness some of the personal habits +and infirmities of the great little Pope. His body was +crooked, he was so short that it was necessary to raise his +chair in order to place him on a level with other people at +table.<a id="noteref_140" name="noteref_140" href="#note_140"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">140</span></span></a> He was sewed up in a buckram suit every morning +and required a nurse like a child. His contemporaries +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page617">[pg 617]</span><a name="Pg617" id="Pg617" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +reviled these misfortunes with a strange acrimony, and +made his poor deformed person the butt for many a bolt +of heavy wit. The facetious Mr. Dennis, in speaking of +him, says, <span class="tei tei-q">“If you take the first letter of Mr. Alexander +Pope's Christian name, and the first and last letters of his +surname, you have A. P. E.”</span> Pope catalogues, at the end +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dunciad</span></span>, with a rueful precision, other pretty names, +besides Ape, which Dennis called him. That great critic +pronounced Mr. Pope was a little ass, a fool, a coward, +a Papist, and therefore a hater of Scripture, and so forth. +It must be remembered that the pillory was a flourishing +and popular institution in those days. Authors stood in it +in the body sometimes: and dragged their enemies thither +morally, hooted them with foul abuse, and assailed them +with garbage of the gutter. Poor Pope's figure was an +easy one for those clumsy caricaturists to draw. Any +stupid hand could draw a hunchback, and write Pope +underneath. They did. A libel was published against +Pope, with such a frontispiece. This kind of rude jesting +was an evidence not only of an ill nature, but a dull one. +When a child makes a pun, or a lout breaks out into a +laugh, it is some very obvious combination of words, or +discrepancy of objects, which provokes the infantine satirist, +or tickles the boorish wag; and many of Pope's revilers +laughed, not so much because they were wicked, as because +they knew no better. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Without the utmost sensibility, Pope could not have been +the poet he was; and through his life, however much he +protested that he disregarded their abuse, the coarse ridicule +of his opponents stung and tore him. One of Cibber's +pamphlets coming into Pope's hands, whilst Richardson +the painter was with him, Pope turned round and said, +<span class="tei tei-q">“These things are my diversions;”</span> and Richardson, sitting +by whilst Pope perused the libel, said he saw his features +<span class="tei tei-q">“writhing with anguish”</span>. How little human nature changes! +Can't one see that little figure? Can't one fancy one is +reading Horace? Can't one fancy one is speaking of +to-day? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The tastes and sensibilities of Pope, which led him to +cultivate the society of persons of fine manners, or wit, or +taste, or beauty, caused him to shrink equally from that +shabby and boisterous crew which formed the rank and +file of literature in his time: and he was as unjust to these +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page618">[pg 618]</span><a name="Pg618" id="Pg618" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +men as they to him. The delicate little creature sickened +at habits and company which were quite tolerable to +robuster men: and in the famous feud between Pope and +the Dunces, and without attributing any peculiar wrong +to either, one can quite understand how the two parties +should so hate each other. As I fancy, it was a sort of +necessity that when Pope's triumph passed, Mr. Addison +and his men should look rather contemptuously down on +it from their balcony; so it was natural for Dennis and +Tibbald, and Welsted, and Cibber, and the worn and hungry +pressmen in the crowd below, to howl at him and assail +him. And Pope was more savage to Grub Street than +Grub Street was to Pope. The thong with which he lashed +them was dreadful; he fired upon that howling crew such +shafts of flame and poison, he slew and wounded so fiercely, +that in reading the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dunciad</span></span> and the prose lampoons of +Pope, one feels disposed to side against the ruthless little +tyrant, at least to pity those wretched folks upon whom +he was so unmerciful. It was Pope, and Swift to aid him, +who established among us the Grub Street tradition. He +revels in base descriptions of poor men's want; he gloats +over poor Dennis's garret, and flannel nightcap, and red +stockings; he gives instructions how to find Curll's authors, +the historian at the tallow-chandler's under the blind arch +in Petty France, the two translators in bed together, the +poet in the cock-loft in Budge Row, whose landlady keeps +the ladder. It was Pope, I fear, who contributed, more +than any man who ever lived, to depreciate the literary +calling. It was not an unprosperous one before that time, +as we have seen; at least there were great prizes in the +profession which had made Addison a minister, and Prior +an ambassador, and Steele a commissioner, and Swift all +but a bishop. The profession of letters was ruined by that +libel of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dunciad</span></span>. If authors were wretched and poor +before, if some of them lived in haylofts, of which their +landladies kept the ladders, at least nobody came to disturb +them in their straw; if three of them had but one coat +between them, the two remained invisible in the garret, +the third, at any rate, appeared decently at the coffee-house, +and paid his twopence like a gentleman. It was +Pope that dragged into light all this poverty and meanness, +and held up those wretched shifts and rags to public +ridicule. It was Pope that has made generations of the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page619">[pg 619]</span><a name="Pg619" id="Pg619" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +reading world (delighted with the mischief, as who would +not be that reads it?) believe that author and wretch, +author and rags, author and dirt, author and drink, gin, +cowheel, tripe, poverty, duns, bailiffs, squalling children +and clamorous landladies, were always associated together. +The condition of authorship began to fall from the days +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dunciad</span></span>: and I believe in my heart that much of +that obloquy which has since pursued our calling was +occasioned by Pope's libels and wicked wit. Everybody +read those. Everybody was familiarized with the idea of +the poor devil, the author. The manner is so captivating +that young authors practise it, and begin their career with +satire. It is so easy to write, and so pleasant to read! +to fire a shot that makes a giant wince, perhaps; and +fancy one's self his conqueror. It is easy to shoot—but +not as Pope did—the shafts of his satire rise sublimely: +no poet's verse ever mounted higher than that wonderful +flight with which the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dunciad</span></span> concludes<a id="noteref_141" name="noteref_141" href="#note_141"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">141</span></span></a>:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">She comes, she comes! the sable throne behold!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Of Night primaeval and of Chaos old;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Before her, Fancy's gilded clouds decay,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And all its varying rainbows die away;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Wit shoots in vain its momentary fires,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The meteor drops, and in a flash expires.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">As, one by one, at dread Medea's strain</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The sick'ning stars fade off the ethereal plain;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">As Argus' eyes, by Hermes' wand oppress'd,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Closed one by one to everlasting rest;—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Thus, at her fell approach and secret might,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Art after Art goes out, and all is night.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">See skulking Faith to her old cavern fled,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Mountains of casuistry heaped o'er her head;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Philosophy, that leaned on Heaven before,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Shrinks to her second cause and is no more.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Religion, blushing, veils her sacred fires,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And, unawares, Morality expires.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Nor public flame, nor private, dares to shine,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Nor human spark is left, nor glimpse divine.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Lo! thy dread empire, Chaos, is restored,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Light dies before thy uncreating word;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Thy hand, great Anarch, lets the curtain fall,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And universal darkness buries all.</span><a id="noteref_142" name="noteref_142" href="#note_142"><span class="tei tei-noteref" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">142</span></span></a></div> +</div> +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page620">[pg 620]</span><a name="Pg620" id="Pg620" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In these astonishing lines Pope reaches, I think, to the +very greatest height which his sublime art has attained, +and shows himself the equal of all poets of all times. It +is the brightest ardour, the loftiest assertion of truth, the +most generous wisdom, illustrated by the noblest poetic +figure, and spoken in words the aptest, grandest, and most +harmonious. It is heroic courage speaking: a splendid +declaration of righteous wrath and war. It is the gage +flung down, and the silver trumpet ringing defiance to +falsehood and tyranny, deceit, dullness, superstition. It is +Truth, the champion, shining and intrepid, and fronting +the great world-tyrant with armies of slaves at his back. +It is a wonderful and victorious single combat, in that +great battle, which has always been waging since society +began. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In speaking of a work of consummate art one does not +try to show what it actually is, for that were vain; but +what it is like, and what are the sensations produced in +the mind of him who views it. And in considering Pope's +admirable career, I am forced into similitudes drawn from +other courage and greatness, and into comparing him with +those who achieved triumphs in actual war. I think of +the works of young Pope as I do of the actions of young +Bonaparte or young Nelson. In their common life you +will find frailties and meannesses, as great as the vices +and follies of the meanest men. But in the presence of +the great occasion, the great soul flashes out, and conquers +transcendent. In thinking of the splendour of Pope's young +victories, of his merit, unequalled as his renown, I hail and +salute the achieving genius, and do homage to the pen of +a hero. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page621">[pg 621]</span><a name="Pg621" id="Pg621" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc111" id="toc111"></a> +<a name="pdf112" id="pdf112"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Lecture The Fifth. Hogarth, Smollett, And Fielding</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I suppose as long as novels last and authors aim at +interesting their public, there must always be in the story +a virtuous and gallant hero, a wicked monster his opposite, +and a pretty girl who finds a champion; bravery and +virtue conquer beauty: and vice, after seeming to triumph +through a certain number of pages, is sure to be discomfited +in the last volume, when justice overtakes him and honest +folks come by their own. There never was perhaps a +greatly popular story but this simple plot was carried +through it: mere satiric wit is addressed to a class of +readers and thinkers quite different to those simple souls +who laugh and weep over the novel. I fancy very few +ladies indeed, for instance, could be brought to like <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gulliver</span></span> +heartily, and (putting the coarseness and difference of +manners out of the question) to relish the wonderful satire +of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Jonathan Wild</span></span>. In that strange apologue, the author +takes for a hero the greatest rascal, coward, traitor, tyrant, +hypocrite, that his wit and experience, both large in this +matter, could enable him to devise or depict; he accompanies +this villain through all the actions of his life, with +a grinning deference and a wonderful mock respect: and +doesn't leave him, till he is dangling at the gallows, when +the satirist makes him a low bow and wishes the scoundrel +good day. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was not by satire of this sort, or by scorn and contempt, +that Hogarth achieved his vast popularity and +acquired his reputation.<a id="noteref_143" name="noteref_143" href="#note_143"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">143</span></span></a> +His art is quite simple,<a id="noteref_144" name="noteref_144" href="#note_144"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">144</span></span></a> he speaks +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page622">[pg 622]</span><a name="Pg622" id="Pg622" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +popular parables to interest simple hearts and to inspire +them with pleasure or pity or warning and terror. Not +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page623">[pg 623]</span><a name="Pg623" id="Pg623" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +one of his tales but is as easy as <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Goody Two Shoes</span></span>; it +is the moral of Tommy was a naughty boy and the master +flogged him, and Jacky was a good boy and had plum +cake, which pervades the whole works of the homely and +famous English moralist. And if the moral is written in +rather too large letters after the fable, we must remember +how simple the scholars and schoolmaster both were, and +like neither the less because they are so artless and honest. +<span class="tei tei-q">“It was a maxim of Dr. Harrison's,”</span> Fielding says in +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Amelia</span></span>, speaking of the benevolent divine and philosopher +who represents the good principle in that novel—<span class="tei tei-q">“that no +man can descend below himself, in doing any act which may +contribute to protect an innocent person, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">or to bring a rogue +to the gallows</span></em>.”</span> The moralists of that age had no compunction +you see; they had not begun to be sceptical about +the theory of punishment, and thought that the hanging +of a thief was a spectacle for edification. Masters sent +their apprentices, fathers took their children, to see Jack +Sheppard or Jonathan Wild hanged, and it was as undoubting +subscribers to this moral law, that Fielding wrote +and Hogarth painted. Except in one instance, where in +the mad-house scene in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Rake's Progress</span></span>, the girl whom +he has ruined is represented as still tending and weeping +over him in his insanity, a glimpse of pity for his rogues +never seems to enter honest Hogarth's mind. There's not +the slightest doubt in the breast of the jolly Draco. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The famous set of pictures called <span class="tei tei-q">“Marriage à la Mode”</span>, +and which are exhibited at Marlborough House [1853], in +London, contains the most important and highly wrought of +the Hogarth comedies. The care and method with which the +moral grounds of these pictures are laid is as remarkable +as the wit and skill of the observing and dexterous artist. +He has to describe the negotiations for a marriage pending +between the daughter of a rich citizen Alderman and young +Lord Viscount Squanderfield, the dissipated son of a gouty +old earl. Pride and pomposity appear in every accessory +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page624">[pg 624]</span><a name="Pg624" id="Pg624" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +surrounding the earl. He sits in gold lace and velvet—as +how should such an earl wear anything but velvet and +gold lace? His coronet is everywhere: on his footstool +on which reposes one gouty toe turned out; on the sconces +and looking-glasses; on the dogs; on his lordship's very +crutches; on his great chair of state and the great baldaquin +behind him; under which he sits pointing majestically to +his pedigree, which shows that his race is sprung from the +loins of William the Conqueror, and confronting the old +alderman from the City, who has mounted his sword for +the occasion, and wears his alderman's chain, and has +brought a bag full of money, mortgage-deeds, and thousand-pound +notes, for the arrangement of the transaction pending +between them. Whilst the steward (a Methodist, therefore +a hypocrite and cheat, for Hogarth scorned a Papist and a +Dissenter) is negotiating between the old couple, their +children sit together, united but apart. My lord is admiring +his countenance in the glass, while his bride is twiddling +her marriage ring on her pocket-handkerchief; and listening +with rueful countenance to Counsellor Silvertongue, who +has been drawing the settlements. The girl is pretty, but +the painter, with a curious watchfulness, has taken care +to give her a likeness to her father, as in the young viscount's +face you see a resemblance to the earl, his noble sire. The +sense of the coronet pervades the picture, as it is supposed +to do the mind of its wearer. The pictures round the room +are sly hints indicating the situation of the parties about +to marry. A martyr is led to the fire; Andromeda is +offered to sacrifice; Judith is going to slay Holofernes. +There is the ancestor of the house (in the picture it is the +earl himself as a young man), with a comet over his head, +indicating that the career of the family is to be brilliant +and brief. In the second picture, the old lord must be dead, +for madam has now the countess's coronet over her bed and +toilet-glass, and sits listening to that dangerous Counsellor +Silvertongue, whose portrait now actually hangs up in her +room, whilst the counsellor takes his ease on the sofa by +her side, evidently the familiar of the house, and the confidant +of the mistress. My lord takes his pleasure elsewhere +than at home, whither he returns jaded and tipsy from the +<span class="tei tei-q">“Rose”</span>, to find his wife yawning in her drawing-room, her +whist-party over, and the daylight streaming in; or he +amuses himself with the very worst company abroad, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page625">[pg 625]</span><a name="Pg625" id="Pg625" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +whilst his wife sits at home listening to foreign singers, +or wastes her money at auctions, or, worse still, seeks amusement +at masquerades. The dismal end is known. My +lord draws upon the counsellor, who kills him, and is +apprehended whilst endeavouring to escape. My lady goes +back perforce to the alderman in the City, and faints upon +reading Counsellor Silvertongue's dying speech at Tyburn, +where the counsellor has been executed for sending his +lordship out of the world. Moral:—Don't listen to evil +silver-tongued counsellors: don't marry a man for his +rank, or a woman for her money: don't frequent foolish +auctions and masquerade balls unknown to your husband: +don't have wicked companions abroad and neglect your +wife, otherwise you will be run through the body, and ruin +will ensue, and disgrace, and Tyburn. The people are all +naughty, and Bogey carries them all off. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Rake's Progress</span></span>, a loose life is ended by a similar +sad catastrophe. It is the spendthrift coming into possession +of the wealth of the paternal miser; the prodigal surrounded +by flatterers, and wasting his substance on the very worst +company; the bailiffs, the gambling-house, and Bedlam +for an end. In the famous story of Industry and Idleness, +the moral is pointed in a manner similarly clear. Fair-haired +Frank Goodchild smiles at his work, whilst naughty +Tom Idle snores over his loom. Frank reads the edifying +ballads of Whittington and the London 'Prentice, whilst that +reprobate Tom Idle prefers Moll Flanders, and drinks +hugely of beer. Frank goes to church of a Sunday, and +warbles hymns from the gallery; while Tom lies on a tombstone +outside playing at halfpenny-under-the-hat, with +street blackguards, and is deservedly caned by the beadle; +Frank is made overseer of the business, whilst Tom is sent +to sea. Frank is taken into partnership and marries his +master's daughter, sends out broken victuals to the poor, +and listens in his nightcap and gown with the lovely Mrs. +Goodchild by his side, to the nuptial music of the City +bands and the marrow-bones and cleavers; whilst idle +Tom, returned from sea, shudders in a garret lest the +officers are coming to take him for picking pockets. The +Worshipful Francis Goodchild, Esq., becomes Sheriff of +London, and partakes of the most splendid dinners which +money can purchase or alderman devour; whilst poor +Tom is taken up in a night-cellar, with that one-eyed and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page626">[pg 626]</span><a name="Pg626" id="Pg626" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +disreputable accomplice who first taught him to play chuck-farthing +on a Sunday. What happens next? Tom is +brought up before the justice of his country, in the person +of Mr. Alderman Goodchild, who weeps as he recognizes +his old brother 'prentice, as Tom's one-eyed friend peaches +on him, and the clerk makes out the poor rogue's ticket +for Newgate. Then the end comes. Tom goes to Tyburn +in a cart with a coffin in it; whilst the Right Honourable +Francis Goodchild, Lord Mayor of London, proceeds to his +Mansion House, in his gilt coach with four footmen and +a sword-bearer, whilst the Companies of London march in +the august procession, whilst the trainbands of the City +fire their pieces and get drunk in his honour; and O +crowning delight and glory of all, whilst his Majesty the +King looks out from his royal balcony, with his ribbon on +his breast, and his Queen and his star by his side, at the +corner house of St. Paul's Churchyard, where the toy-shop +is now. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How the times have changed! The new Post Office now +not disadvantageously occupies that spot where the scaffolding +is in the picture, where the tipsy trainband-man is +lurching against the post, with his wig over one eye, and +the 'prentice-boy is trying to kiss the pretty girl in the +gallery. Passed away 'prentice-boy and pretty girl! Passed +away tipsy trainband-man with wig and bandolier! On +the spot where Tom Idle (for whom I have an unaffected +pity) made his exit from this wicked world, and where you +see the hangman smoking his pipe as he reclines on the +gibbet and views the hills of Harrow or Hampstead beyond—a +splendid marble arch, a vast and modern city—clean, +airy, painted drab, populous with nursery-maids and +children, the abodes of wealth and comfort—the elegant, +the prosperous, the polite Tyburnia rises, the most respectable +district in the habitable globe! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In that last plate of the London Apprentices, in which +the apotheosis of the Right Honourable Francis Goodchild +is drawn, a ragged fellow is represented in the corner of +the simple kindly piece, offering for sale a broadside, purporting +to contain an account of the appearance of the +ghost of Tom Idle, executed at Tyburn. Could Tom's +ghost have made its appearance in 1847, and not in 1747, +what changes would have been remarked by that astonished +escaped criminal! Over that road which the hangman used +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page627">[pg 627]</span><a name="Pg627" id="Pg627" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to travel constantly, and the Oxford stage twice a week, +go ten thousand carriages every day: over yonder road, +by which Dick Turpin fled to Windsor, and Squire Western +journeyed into town, when he came to take up his quarters +at the Hercules Pillars on the outskirts of London, what +a rush of civilization and order flows now! What armies +of gentlemen with umbrellas march to banks, and chambers, +and counting-houses! What regiments of nursery-maids +and pretty infantry; what peaceful processions of policemen, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page628">[pg 628]</span><a name="Pg628" id="Pg628" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +what light broughams and what gay carriages, what +swarms of busy apprentices and artificers, riding on omnibus-roofs, +pass daily and hourly! Tom Idle's times are quite +changed: many of the institutions gone into disuse which +were admired in his day. There's more pity and kindness +and a better chance for poor Tom's successors now than +at that simpler period when Fielding hanged him and +Hogarth drew him. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page629">[pg 629]</span><a name="Pg629" id="Pg629" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +To the student of history, these admirable works must +be invaluable, as they give us the most complete and truthful +picture of the manners, and even the thoughts, of the +past century. We look, and see pass before us the England +of a hundred years ago—the peer in his drawing-room, the +lady of fashion in her apartment, foreign singers surrounding +her, and the chamber filled with gewgaws in the mode +of that day; the church, with its quaint florid architecture +and singing congregation; the parson with his great wig, +and the beadle with his cane: all these are represented +before us, and we are sure of the truth of the portrait. +We see how the Lord Mayor dines in state; how the prodigal +drinks and sports at the bagnio; how the poor girl beats +hemp in Bridewell; how the thief divides his booty and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page630">[pg 630]</span><a name="Pg630" id="Pg630" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +drinks his punch at the night-cellar, and how he finishes +his career at the gibbet. We may depend upon the +perfect accuracy of these strange and varied portraits of +the bygone generation: we see one of Walpole's Members +of Parliament chaired after his election, and the lieges +celebrating the event, and drinking confusion to the Pretender: +we see the grenadiers and trainbands of the City +marching out to meet the enemy; and have before us, +with sword and firelock, and white Hanoverian horse embroidered +on the cap, the very figures of the men who ran +away with Johnny Cope, and who conquered at Culloden. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Posterity has not quite confirmed honest Hogarth's +opinion about his talents for the sublime. Although Swift +could not see the difference between tweedle-dee and +tweedle-dum, posterity has not shared the Dean's contempt +for Handel; the world has discovered a difference between +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page631">[pg 631]</span><a name="Pg631" id="Pg631" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum, and given a hearty applause +and admiration to Hogarth, too, but not exactly as a painter +of scriptural subjects, or as a rival of Correggio. It does not +take away from one's liking for the man, or from the moral +of his story, or the humour of it—from one's admiration +for the prodigious merit of his performances, to remember +that he persisted to the last in believing that the world +was in a conspiracy against him with respect to his talents +as an historical painter, and that a set of miscreants, as he +called them, were employed to run his genius down. They +say it was Liston's firm belief, that he was a great and +neglected tragic actor; they say that every one of us +believes in his heart, or would like to have others believe, +that he is something which he is not. One of the most +notorious of the <span class="tei tei-q">“miscreants”</span>, Hogarth says, was Wilkes, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page632">[pg 632]</span><a name="Pg632" id="Pg632" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +who assailed him in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">North Briton</span></span>; the other was +Churchill, who put the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">North Briton</span></span> attack into heroic verse, +and published his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Epistle to Hogarth</span></span>. Hogarth replied by +that caricature of Wilkes, in which the patriot still figures +before us, with his Satanic grin and squint, and by a caricature +of Churchill, in which he is represented as a bear with +a staff, on which, <span class="tei tei-q">“Lie the first”</span>, <span class="tei tei-q">“Lie the second”</span>, <span class="tei tei-q">“Lie the +tenth”</span>, are engraved in unmistakable letters. There is very +little mistake about honest Hogarth's satire: if he has to +paint a man with his throat cut, he draws him with his head +almost off; and he tried to do the same for his enemies in +this little controversy. <span class="tei tei-q">“Having an old plate by me,”</span> says +he, <span class="tei tei-q">“with some parts ready, such as the background, and +a dog, I began to consider how I could turn so much work +laid aside to some account, and so patched up a print of +Master Churchill, in the character of a bear; the pleasure +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page633">[pg 633]</span><a name="Pg633" id="Pg633" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and pecuniary advantage which I derived from these two +engravings, together with occasionally riding on horseback, +restored me to as much health as I can expect at my time +of life.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And so he concludes his queer little book of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Anecdotes</span></span>: +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have gone through the circumstances of a life which till +lately passed pretty much to my own satisfaction, and I hope +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page634">[pg 634]</span><a name="Pg634" id="Pg634" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +in no respect injurious to any other man. This I may safely +assert, that I have done my best to make those about me +tolerably happy, and my greatest enemy cannot say I ever +did an intentional injury. What may follow, God knows.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A queer account still exists of a holiday jaunt taken by +Hogarth and four friends of his, who set out, like the redoubted +Mr. Pickwick and his companions, but just a +hundred years before those heroes; and made an excursion +to Gravesend, Rochester, Sheerness; and adjacent places.<a id="noteref_145" name="noteref_145" href="#note_145"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">145</span></span></a> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page635">[pg 635]</span><a name="Pg635" id="Pg635" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +One of the gentlemen noted down the proceedings of the +journey, for which Hogarth and a brother artist made +drawings. The book is chiefly curious at this moment from +showing the citizen life of those days, and the rough, jolly +style of merriment, not of the five companions merely, +but of thousands of jolly fellows of their time. Hogarth +and his friends, quitting the <span class="tei tei-q">“Bedford Arms”</span>, Covent Garden, +with a song, took water to Billingsgate, exchanging compliments +with the bargemen as they went down the river. +At Billingsgate, Hogarth made a <span class="tei tei-q">“caracatura”</span> of a facetious +porter, called the Duke of Puddledock, who agreeably entertained +the party with the humours of the place. Hence +they took a Gravesend boat for themselves; had straw to +lie upon, and a tilt over their heads, they say, and went +down the river at night, sleeping and singing jolly choruses. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They arrived at Gravesend at six, when they washed +their faces and hands, and had their wigs powdered. Then +they sallied forth for Rochester on foot, and drank by the +way three pots of ale. At one o'clock they went to dinner +with excellent port, and a quantity more beer, and afterwards +Hogarth and Scott played at hopscotch in the town +hall. It would appear that they slept most of them in one +room, and the chronicler of the party describes them all as +waking at seven o'clock, and telling each other their dreams. +You have rough sketches by Hogarth of the incidents of +this holiday excursion. The sturdy little painter is seen +sprawling over a plank to a boat at Gravesend; the whole +company are represented in one design, in a fisherman's +room, where they had all passed the night. One gentleman +in a nightcap is shaving himself; another is being shaved +by the fisherman; a third, with a handkerchief over his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page636">[pg 636]</span><a name="Pg636" id="Pg636" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +bald pate, is taking his breakfast; and Hogarth is sketching +the whole scene. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They describe at night how they returned to their +quarters, drank to their friends, as usual, emptied several +cans of good flip, all singing merrily. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is a jolly party of tradesmen engaged at high-jinks. +These were the manners and pleasures of Hogarth, of his +time very likely, of men not very refined, but honest and +merry. It is a brave London citizen, with John Bull +habits, prejudices, and pleasures.<a id="noteref_146" name="noteref_146" href="#note_146"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">146</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Smollett's</span></span> associates and manner of life the author +of the admirable <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Humphry Clinker</span></span> has given us an interesting +account, in that most amusing of novels.<a id="noteref_147" name="noteref_147" href="#note_147"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">147</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page637">[pg 637]</span><a name="Pg637" id="Pg637" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I have no doubt that the above picture is as faithful a one +as any from the pencil of his kindred humourist, Hogarth. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page638">[pg 638]</span><a name="Pg638" id="Pg638" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We have before us, and painted by his own hand, Tobias +Smollett, the manly, kindly, honest, and irascible; worn +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page639">[pg 639]</span><a name="Pg639" id="Pg639" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and battered, but still brave and full of heart, after a long +struggle against a hard fortune. His brain had been busied +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page640">[pg 640]</span><a name="Pg640" id="Pg640" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +with a hundred different schemes; he had been reviewer +and historian, critic, medical writer, poet, pamphleteer. +He had fought endless literary battles; and braved and +wielded for years the cudgels of controversy. It was a hard +and savage fight in those days, and a niggard pay. He was +oppressed by illness, age, narrow fortune; but his spirit +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page641">[pg 641]</span><a name="Pg641" id="Pg641" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +was still resolute, and his courage steady; the battle over, +he could do justice to the enemy with whom he had been +so fiercely engaged, and give a not unfriendly grasp to the +hand that had mauled him. He is like one of those Scotch +cadets, of whom history gives us so many examples, and +whom, with a national fidelity, the great Scotch novelist +has painted so charmingly. Of gentle birth<a id="noteref_148" name="noteref_148" href="#note_148"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">148</span></span></a> and narrow +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page642">[pg 642]</span><a name="Pg642" id="Pg642" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +means, going out from his northern home to win his fortune +in the world, and to fight his way, armed with courage, +hunger, and keen wits. His crest is a shattered oak-tree, +with green leaves yet springing from it. On his ancient +coat-of-arms there is a lion and a horn; this shield of his +was battered and dinted in a hundred fights and brawls,<a id="noteref_149" name="noteref_149" href="#note_149"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">149</span></span></a> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page643">[pg 643]</span><a name="Pg643" id="Pg643" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +through which the stout Scotchman bore it courageously. +You see somehow that he is a gentleman, through all his +battling and struggling, his poverty, his hard-fought successes, +and his defeats. His novels are recollections of his +own adventures; his characters drawn, as I should think, +from personages with whom he became acquainted in his +own career of life. Strange companions he must have had; +queer acquaintances he made in the Glasgow College—in +the country apothecary's shop; in the gun-room of the +man-of-war where he served as surgeon, and in the hard +life on shore, where the sturdy adventurer struggled for +fortune. He did not invent much, as I fancy, but had the +keenest perceptive faculty, and described what he saw with +wonderful relish and delightful broad humour. I think +Uncle Bowling, in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Roderick Random</span></span>, is as good a character +as Squire Western himself; and Mr. Morgan, the Welsh +apothecary, is as pleasant as Dr. Caius. What man who +has made his inestimable acquaintance—what novel-reader +who loves Don Quixote and Major Dalgetty—will refuse his +most cordial acknowledgements to the admirable Lieutenant +Lismahago? The novel of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Humphry Clinker</span></span> is, I do think, +the most laughable story that has ever been written since +the goodly art of novel-writing began. Winifred Jenkins +and Tabitha Bramble must keep Englishmen on the grin +for ages yet to come; and in their letters and the story of +their loves there is a perpetual fount of sparkling laughter, +as inexhaustible as Bladud's well. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Fielding, too, has described, though with a greater hand, +the characters and scenes which he knew and saw. He had +more than ordinary opportunities for becoming acquainted +with life. His family and education, first—his fortunes and +misfortunes afterwards, brought him into the society of +every rank and condition of man. He is himself the hero +of his books: he is wild Tom Jones, he is wild Captain +Booth, less wild, I am glad to think, than his predecessor, +at least heartily conscious of demerit, and anxious to +amend. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Fielding first came upon the town in 1727, the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page644">[pg 644]</span><a name="Pg644" id="Pg644" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +recollection of the great wits was still fresh in the coffee-houses +and assemblies, and the judges there declared that +young Harry Fielding had more spirits and wit than Congreve +or any of his brilliant successors. His figure was +tall and stalwart; his face handsome, manly, and noble-looking; +to the very last days of his life he retained a +grandeur of air, and, although worn down by disease, his +aspect and presence imposed respect upon the people round +about him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A dispute took place between Mr. Fielding and the +captain<a id="noteref_150" name="noteref_150" href="#note_150"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">150</span></span></a> of the ship in which he was making his last +voyage, and Fielding relates how the man finally went +down on his knees and begged his passenger's pardon. He +was living up to the last days of his life, and his spirit +never gave in. His vital power must have been immensely +strong. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu<a id="noteref_151" name="noteref_151" href="#note_151"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">151</span></span></a> +prettily characterizes +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page645">[pg 645]</span><a name="Pg645" id="Pg645" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Fielding and this capacity for happiness which he +possessed, in a little notice of his death, when she compares +him to Steele, who was as improvident and as happy +as he was, and says that both should have gone on living +for ever. One can fancy the eagerness and gusto with +which a man of Fielding's frame, with his vast health and +robust appetite, his ardent spirits, his joyful humour, and +his keen and hearty relish for life, must have seized and +drunk that cup of pleasure which the town offered to him. +Can any of my hearers remember the youthful feats of +a college breakfast—the meats devoured and the cups +quaffed in that Homeric feast? I can call to mind some +of the heroes of those youthful banquets, and fancy young +Fielding from Leyden rushing upon the feast, with his +great laugh and immense healthy young appetite, eager +and vigorous to enjoy. The young man's wit and manners +made him friends everywhere: he lived with the grand +Man's society of those days; he was courted by peers and +men of wealth and fashion. As he had a paternal allowance +from his father, General Fielding, which, to use Henry's +own phrase, any man might pay who would; as he liked +good wine, good clothes, and good company, which are all +expensive articles to purchase, Harry Fielding began to +run into debt, and borrow money in that easy manner in +which Captain Booth borrows money in the novel: was +in nowise particular in accepting a few pieces from the +purses of his rich friends, and bore down upon more than +one of them, as Walpole tells us only too truly, for a dinner +or a guinea. To supply himself with the latter, he began +to write theatrical pieces, having already, no doubt, a considerable +acquaintance amongst the Oldfields and Bracegirdles +behind the scenes. He laughed at these pieces and +scorned them. When the audience upon one occasion began +to hiss a scene which he was too lazy to correct, and +regarding which, when Garrick remonstrated with him, he +said that the public was too stupid to find out the badness +of his work;—when the audience began to hiss, Fielding +said, with characteristic coolness—<span class="tei tei-q">“They have found it +out, have they?”</span> He did not prepare his novels in this +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page646">[pg 646]</span><a name="Pg646" id="Pg646" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +way, and with a very different care and interest laid the +foundations and built up the edifices of his future fame. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Time and shower have very little damaged those. The +fashion and ornaments are, perhaps, of the architecture of +that age; but the buildings remain strong and lofty, and +of admirable proportions—masterpieces of genius and monuments +of workmanlike skill. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I cannot offer or hope to make a hero of Harry Fielding. +Why hide his faults? Why conceal his weaknesses in +a cloud of periphrases? Why not show him, like him as +he is, not robed in a marble toga, and draped and polished +in a heroic attitude, but with inked ruffles, and claret +stains on his tarnished laced coat, and on his manly face +the marks of good fellowship, of illness, of kindness, of +care, and wine. Stained as you see him, and worn by +care and dissipation, that man retains some of the most +precious and splendid human qualities and endowments. +He has an admirable natural love of truth, the keenest +instinctive antipathy to hypocrisy, the happiest satirical +gift of laughing it to scorn. His wit is wonderfully wise +and detective; it flashes upon a rogue and lightens up +a rascal like a policeman's lantern. He is one of the +manliest and kindliest of human beings: in the midst of +all his imperfections, he respects female innocence and +infantine tenderness, as you would suppose such a great-hearted, +courageous soul would respect and care for them. +He could not be so brave, generous, truth-telling as he is, +were he not infinitely merciful, pitiful, and tender. He +will give any man his purse—he can't help kindness and +profusion. He may have low tastes, but not a mean mind; +he admires with all his heart good and virtuous men, stoops +to no flattery, bears no rancour, disdains all disloyal arts, +does his public duty uprightly, is fondly loved by his +family, and dies at his work.<a id="noteref_152" name="noteref_152" href="#note_152"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">152</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If that theory be—and I have no doubt it is—the right +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page647">[pg 647]</span><a name="Pg647" id="Pg647" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and safe one, that human nature is always pleased with +the spectacle of innocence rescued by fidelity, purity, and +courage; I suppose that of the heroes of Fielding's three +novels, we should like honest Joseph Andrews the best, +and Captain Booth the second, and Tom Jones the third.<a id="noteref_153" name="noteref_153" href="#note_153"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">153</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Joseph Andrews, though he wears Lady Booby's cast-off +livery, is, I think, to the full as polite as Tom Jones in +his fustian suit, or Captain Booth in regimentals. He has, +like those heroes, large calves, broad shoulders, a high +courage, and a handsome face. The accounts of Joseph's +bravery and good qualities; his voice, too musical to +halloo to the dogs; his bravery in riding races for the +gentlemen of the county, and his constancy in refusing +bribes and temptation, have something affecting in their +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">naiveté</span></span> and freshness, and prepossess one in favour of +that handsome young hero. The rustic bloom of Fanny, and +the delightful simplicity of Parson Adams are described +with a friendliness which wins the reader of their story; +we part with them with more regret than from Booth and +Jones. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Fielding, no doubt, began to write this novel in ridicule +of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pamela</span></span>, for which work one can understand the hearty +contempt and antipathy which such an athletic and boisterous +genius as Fielding's must have entertained. He +couldn't do otherwise than laugh at the puny Cockney +bookseller, pouring out endless volumes of sentimental +twaddle, and hold him up to scorn as a moll-coddle and +a milksop. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">His</span></em> genius had been nursed on sack-posset, +and not on dishes of tea. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">His</span></em> muse had sung the loudest +in tavern choruses, had seen the daylight streaming in +over thousands of emptied bowls, and reeled home to +chambers on the shoulders of the watchman. Richardson's +goddess was attended by old maids and dowagers, and fed +on muffins and bohea. <span class="tei tei-q">“Milksop!”</span> roars Harry Fielding, +clattering at the timid shop-shutters. <span class="tei tei-q">“Wretch! Monster! +Mohock!”</span> shrieks the sentimental author of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pamela</span></span>;<a id="noteref_154" name="noteref_154" href="#note_154"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">154</span></span></a> and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page648">[pg 648]</span><a name="Pg648" id="Pg648" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +all the ladies of his court cackle out an affrighted chorus. +Fielding proposes to write a book in ridicule of the author, +whom he disliked and utterly scorned and laughed at; but +he is himself of so generous, jovial, and kindly a turn that +he begins to like the characters which he invents, can't +help making them manly and pleasant as well as ridiculous, +and before he has done with them all loves them heartily +every one. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Richardson's sickening antipathy for Harry Fielding is +quite as natural as the other's laughter and contempt at +the sentimentalist. I have not learned that these likings +and dislikings have ceased in the present day: and every +author must lay his account not only to misrepresentation +but to honest enmity among critics, and to being hated +and abused for good as well as for bad reasons. Richardson +disliked Fielding's works quite honestly: Walpole quite +honestly spoke of them as vulgar and stupid. Their +squeamish stomachs sickened at the rough fare and the +rough guests assembled at Fielding's jolly revel. Indeed +the cloth might have been cleaner: and the dinner and +the company were scarce such as suited a dandy. The +kind and wise old Johnson would not sit down with him.<a id="noteref_155" name="noteref_155" href="#note_155"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">155</span></span></a> +But a greater scholar than Johnson could afford to admire +that astonishing genius of Harry Fielding: and we all +know the lofty panegyric which Gibbon wrote of him, and +which remains a towering monument to the great novelist's +memory. <span class="tei tei-q">“Our immortal Fielding,”</span> Gibbon writes, <span class="tei tei-q">“was +of the younger branch of the Earls of Denbigh, who drew +their origin from the Counts of Hapsburgh. The successors +of Charles V may disdain their brethren of England: but +the romance of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tom Jones</span></span>, that exquisite picture of human +manners, will outlive the palace of the Escurial and the +Imperial Eagle of Austria.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There can be no gainsaying the sentence of this great +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page649">[pg 649]</span><a name="Pg649" id="Pg649" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +judge. To have your name mentioned by Gibbon, is like +having it written on the dome of St. Peter's. Pilgrims +from all the world admire and behold it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As a picture of manners, the novel of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tom Jones</span></span> is indeed +exquisite: as a work of construction quite a wonder: the +by-play of wisdom; the power of observation; the multiplied +felicitous turns and thoughts; the varied character +of the great Comic Epic keep the reader in a perpetual +admiration and curiosity.<a id="noteref_156" name="noteref_156" href="#note_156"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">156</span></span></a> +But against Mr. Thomas Jones +himself we have a right to put in a protest, and quarrel +with the esteem the author evidently has for that character. +Charles Lamb says finely of Jones, that a single hearty +laugh from him <span class="tei tei-q">“clears the air”</span>—but then it is in a certain +state of the atmosphere. It might clear the air when such +personages as Blifil or Lady Bellaston poison it. But I fear +very much that (except until the very last scene of the +story), when Mr. Jones enters Sophia's drawing-room, the +pure air there is rather tainted with the young gentleman's +tobacco-pipe and punch. I can't say that I think Mr. Jones +a virtuous character; I can't say but that I think Fielding's +evident liking and admiration for Mr. Jones, shows that +the great humourist's moral sense was blunted by his life, +and that here in Art and Ethics, there is a great error. +If it is right to have a hero whom we may admire, let us +at least take care that he is admirable: if, as is the plan +of some authors (a plan decidedly against their interests, +be it said), it is propounded that there exists in life no +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page650">[pg 650]</span><a name="Pg650" id="Pg650" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +such being, and therefore that in novels, the picture of life, +there should appear no such character; then Mr. Thomas +Jones becomes an admissible person, and we examine his +defects and good qualities, as we do those of Parson +Thwackum, or Miss Seagrim. But a hero with a flawed +reputation; a hero spunging for a guinea; a hero who +can't pay his landlady, and is obliged to let his honour +out to hire, is absurd, and his claim to heroic rank untenable. +I protest against Mr. Thomas Jones holding such +rank at all. I protest even against his being considered +a more than ordinary young fellow, ruddy-cheeked, broad-shouldered, +and fond of wine and pleasure. He would not +rob a church, but that is all; and a pretty long argument +may be debated, as to which of these old types, the spendthrift, +the hypocrite, Jones and Blifil, Charles and Joseph +Surface,—is the worst member of society and the most +deserving of censure. The prodigal Captain Booth is a +better man than his predecessor Mr. Jones, in so far as +he thinks much more humbly of himself than Jones did: +goes down on his knees, and owns his weaknesses, and +cries out, <span class="tei tei-q">“Not for my sake, but for the sake of my pure +and sweet and beautiful wife Amelia, I pray you, O critical +reader, to forgive me.”</span> That stern moralist regards him +from the bench (the judge's practice out of court is not +here the question), and says, <span class="tei tei-q">“Captain Booth, it is perfectly +true that your life has been disreputable, and that on many +occasions you have shown yourself to be no better than +a scamp—you have been tippling at the tavern, when the +kindest and sweetest lady in the world has cooked your +little supper of boiled mutton and awaited you all the +night; you have spoilt the little dish of boiled mutton +thereby, and caused pangs and pains to Amelia's tender +heart.<a id="noteref_157" name="noteref_157" href="#note_157"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">157</span></span></a> You have got into debt without the means of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page651">[pg 651]</span><a name="Pg651" id="Pg651" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +paying it. You have gambled the money with which you +ought to have paid your rent. You have spent in drink +or in worse amusements the sums which your poor wife +has raised upon her little home treasures, her own ornaments, +and the toys of her children. But, you rascal! +you own humbly that you are no better than you should be; +you never for one moment pretend that you are anything +but a miserable weak-minded rogue. You do in your heart +adore that angelic woman, your wife, and for her sake, +sirrah, you shall have your discharge. Lucky for you and +for others like you, that in spite of your failings and imperfections, +pure hearts pity and love you. For your wife's +sake you are permitted to go hence without a remand; +and I beg you, by the way, to carry to that angelical lady +the expression of the cordial respect and admiration of this +court.”</span> Amelia pleads for her husband Will Booth: Amelia +pleads for her reckless kindly old father, Harry Fielding. +To have invented that character, is not only a triumph of +art but it is a good action. They say it was in his own +home that Fielding knew her and loved her: and from +his own wife that he drew the most charming character +in English fiction—Fiction! why fiction? why not history? +I know Amelia just as well as Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. +I believe in Colonel Bath almost as much as in Colonel +Gardiner or the Duke of Cumberland. I admire the author +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page652">[pg 652]</span><a name="Pg652" id="Pg652" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Amelia</span></span>, and thank the kind master who introduced me +to that sweet and delightful companion and friend. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Amelia</span></span> +perhaps is not a better story than <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tom Jones</span></span>, but it has +the better ethics; the prodigal repents at least, before +forgiveness,—whereas that odious broad-backed Mr. Jones +carries off his beauty with scarce an interval of remorse +for his manifold errors and shortcomings; and is not half +punished enough before the great prize of fortune and love +falls to his share. I am angry with Jones. Too much of +the plum-cake and rewards of life fall to that boisterous, +swaggering young scapegrace. Sophia actually surrenders +without a proper sense of decorum; the fond, foolish, +palpitating little creature,—<span class="tei tei-q">“Indeed, Mr. Jones,”</span> she says,—<span class="tei tei-q">“it +rests with you to appoint the day.”</span> I suppose Sophia +is drawn from life as well as Amelia; and many a young +fellow, no better than Mr. Thomas Jones, has carried by +a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">coup de main</span></span> the heart of many a kind girl who was +a great deal too good for him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What a wonderful art! What an admirable gift of +nature, was it by which the author of these tales was +endowed, and which enabled him to fix our interest, to +waken our sympathy, to seize upon our credulity, so that +we believe in his people—speculate gravely upon their +faults or their excellences, prefer this one or that, deplore +Jones's fondness for drink and play, Booth's fondness for +play and drink, and the unfortunate position of the wives +of both gentlemen—love and admire those ladies with all +our hearts, and talk about them as faithfully as if we had +breakfasted with them this morning in their actual drawing-rooms, +or should meet them this afternoon in the Park! +What a genius! what a vigour! what a bright-eyed +intelligence and observation! what a wholesome hatred +for meanness and knavery! what a vast sympathy! what +a cheerfulness! what a manly relish of life! what a +love of human kind! what a poet is here!—watching, +meditating, brooding, creating! What multitudes of truths +has that man left behind him! What generations he has +taught to laugh wisely and fairly! What scholars he has +formed and accustomed to the exercise of thoughtful +humour and the manly play of wit! What a courage he +had!<a id="noteref_158" name="noteref_158" href="#note_158"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">158</span></span></a> What a dauntless and constant cheerfulness of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page653">[pg 653]</span><a name="Pg653" id="Pg653" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +intellect, that burned bright and steady through all the +storms of his life, and never deserted its last wreck! It +is wonderful to think of the pains and misery which the +man suffered; the pressure of want, illness, remorse which +he endured; and that the writer was neither malignant +nor melancholy, his view of truth never warped, and his +generous human kindness never surrendered.<a id="noteref_159" name="noteref_159" href="#note_159"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">159</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page654">[pg 654]</span><a name="Pg654" id="Pg654" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the quarrel mentioned before, which happened on +Fielding's last voyage to Lisbon, and when the stout +captain of the ship fell down on his knees and asked the sick +man's pardon—<span class="tei tei-q">“I did not suffer,”</span> Fielding says, in his +hearty, manly way, his eyes lighting up as it were with +their old fire—<span class="tei tei-q">“I did not suffer a brave man and an old +man to remain a moment in that posture, but immediately +forgave him.”</span> Indeed, I think, with his noble spirit and +unconquerable generosity, Fielding reminds one of those +brave men of whom one reads in stories of English shipwrecks +and disasters—of the officer on the African shore, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page655">[pg 655]</span><a name="Pg655" id="Pg655" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +when disease has destroyed the crew, and he himself is +seized by fever, who throws the lead with a death-stricken +hand, takes the soundings, carries the ship out of the river +or off the dangerous coast, and dies in the manly endeavour—of +the wounded captain, when the vessel founders, who +never loses his heart, who eyes the danger steadily, and +has a cheery word for all, until the inevitable fate overwhelms +him, and the gallant ship goes down. Such +a brave and gentle heart, such an intrepid and courageous +spirit, I love to recognize in the manly, the English Harry +Fielding. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page656">[pg 656]</span><a name="Pg656" id="Pg656" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc113" id="toc113"></a> +<a name="pdf114" id="pdf114"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Lecture The Sixth. Sterne And Goldsmith</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Roger Sterne, Sterne's father, was the second son of +a numerous race, descendants of Richard Sterne, Archbishop +of York, in the reign of James II; and children of +Simon Sterne and Mary Jaques, his wife, heiress of Elvington, +near York.<a id="noteref_160" name="noteref_160" href="#note_160"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">160</span></span></a> +Roger was a lieutenant in Handyside's +regiment, and engaged in Flanders in Queen Anne's wars. +He married the daughter of a noted sutler—<span class="tei tei-q">“N.B., he +was in debt to him,”</span> his son writes, pursuing the paternal +biography—and marched through the world with this +companion following the regiment and bringing many +children to poor Roger Sterne. The captain was an +irascible but kind and simple little man, Sterne says, and +informs us that his sire was run through the body at +Gibraltar, by a brother officer, in a duel, which arose out of +a dispute about a goose. Roger never entirely recovered +from the effects of this rencontre, but died presently +at Jamaica, whither he had followed the drum. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Laurence, his second child, was born at Clonmel, in +Ireland, in 1713, and travelled for the first ten years of his +life, on his father's march, from barrack to transport, from +Ireland to England.<a id="noteref_161" name="noteref_161" href="#note_161"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">161</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +One relative of his mother's took her and her family +under shelter for ten months at Mullingar: another +collateral descendant of the Archbishop's housed them for +a year at his castle near Carrickfergus. Larry Sterne was +put to school at Halifax in England, finally was adopted +by his kinsman of Elvington, and parted company with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page657">[pg 657]</span><a name="Pg657" id="Pg657" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +his father, the Captain, who marched on his path of life +till he met the fatal goose, which closed his career. The +most picturesque and delightful parts of Laurence Sterne's +writings, we owe to his recollections of the military life. +Trim's montero cap, and Le Fevre's sword, and dear Uncle +Toby's roquelaure, are doubtless reminiscences of the boy, +who had lived with the followers of William and Marlborough, +and had beat time with his little feet to the fifes +of Ramillies in Dublin barrack-yard, or played with the +torn flags and halberds of Malplaquet on the parade-ground +at Clonmel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Laurence remained at Halifax school till he was eighteen +years old. His wit and cleverness appear to have acquired +the respect of his master here: for when the usher whipped +Laurence for writing his name on the newly whitewashed +schoolroom ceiling, the pedagogue in chief rebuked the +under-strapper, and said that the name should never be +effaced, for Sterne was a boy of genius, and would come +to preferment. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His cousin, the Squire of Elvington, sent Sterne to +Jesus College, Cambridge, where he remained five years, +and taking orders, got, through his uncle's interest, the +living of Sutton and the prebendary of York. Through +his wife's connexions, he got the living of Stillington. He +married her in 1741; having ardently courted the young +lady for some years previously. It was not until the +young lady fancied herself dying, that she made Sterne +acquainted with the extent of her liking for him. One +evening when he was sitting with her, with an almost +broken heart to see her so ill (the Rev. Mr. Sterne's heart +was a good deal broken in the course of his life), she said—<span class="tei tei-q">“My +dear Laurey, I never can be yours, for I verily believe +I have not long to live, but I have left you every shilling +of my fortune,”</span> a generosity which overpowered Sterne: +she recovered: and so they were married, and grew heartily +tired of each other before many years were over. <span class="tei tei-q">“Nescio +quid est materia cum me,”</span> Sterne writes to one of his +friends (in dog-Latin, and very sad dog-Latin too), <span class="tei tei-q">“sed +sum fatigatus et aegrotus de mea uxore plus quam unquam,”</span> +which means, I am sorry to say, <span class="tei tei-q">“I don't know what is +the matter with me: but I am more tired and sick of my +wife than ever.”</span><a id="noteref_162" name="noteref_162" href="#note_162"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">162</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page658">[pg 658]</span><a name="Pg658" id="Pg658" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This to be sure was five-and-twenty years after Laurey +had been overcome by her generosity and she by Laurey's +love. Then he wrote to her of the delights of marriage, +saying—<span class="tei tei-q">“We will be as merry and as innocent as our first +parents in Paradise, before the arch-fiend entered that +indescribable scene. The kindest affections will have room +to expand in our retirement—let the human tempest and +hurricane rage at a distance, the desolation is beyond the +horizon of peace. My L. has seen a polyanthus blow in +December?—Some friendly wall has sheltered it from the +biting wind—no planetary influence shall reach us, but +that which presides and cherishes the sweetest flowers. +The gloomy family of care and distrust shall be banished +from our dwelling, guarded by thy kind and tutelar deity—we +will sing our choral songs of gratitude and rejoice to the +end of our pilgrimage. Adieu, my L. Return to one who +languishes for thy society!—As I take up my pen, my poor +pulse quickens, my pale face glows, and tears are trickling +down on my paper as I trace the word L.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And it is about this woman, with whom he finds no +fault, but that she bores him, that our philanthropist +writes, <span class="tei tei-q">“Sum fatigatus et aegrotus”</span>—<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">Sum +mortaliter in amore</span></span> with somebody else! That fine flower of love, that +polyanthus over which Sterne snivelled so many tears, +could not last for a quarter of a century! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Or rather it could not be expected that a gentleman with +such a fountain at command, should keep it to <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">arroser</span></span> one +homely old lady, when a score of younger and prettier +people might be refreshed from the same gushing source.<a id="noteref_163" name="noteref_163" href="#note_163"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">163</span></span></a></p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page659">[pg 659]</span><a name="Pg659" id="Pg659" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was in December, 1767, that the Rev. Laurence Sterne, +the famous Shandean, the charming Yorick, the delight +of the fashionable world, the delicious divine, for whose +sermons the whole polite world was +subscribing,<a id="noteref_164" name="noteref_164" href="#note_164"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">164</span></span></a> the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page660">[pg 660]</span><a name="Pg660" id="Pg660" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +occupier of Rabelais's easy chair, only fresh stuffed and +more elegant than when in possession of the cynical old +curate of Meudon<a id="noteref_165" name="noteref_165" href="#note_165"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">165</span></span></a>—the more than rival of the Dean of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page661">[pg 661]</span><a name="Pg661" id="Pg661" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +St. Patrick's, wrote the above-quoted respectable letter to +his friend in London: and it was in April of the same year, +that he was pouring out his fond heart to Mrs. Elizabeth +Draper, wife of <span class="tei tei-q">“Daniel Draper, Esq., Counsellor of Bombay, +and, in 1775, chief of the factory of Surat—a gentleman +very much respected in that quarter of the globe”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I got thy letter last night, Eliza,”</span> Sterne writes, <span class="tei tei-q">“on +my return from Lord Bathurst's, where I dined”</span> (the +letter has this merit in it that it contains a pleasant reminiscence +of better men than Sterne, and introduces us to +a portrait of a kind old gentleman)—<span class="tei tei-q">“I got thy letter last +night, Eliza, on my return from Lord Bathurst's; and +where I was heard—as I talked of thee an hour without +intermission—with so much pleasure and attention, that +the good old lord toasted your health three different times; +and now he is in his 85th year, says he hopes to live long +enough to be introduced as a friend to my fair Indian +disciple, and to see her eclipse all other Nabobesses as +much in wealth, as she does already in exterior, and what +is far better”</span> (for Sterne is nothing without his morality)—<span class="tei tei-q">“and +what is far better, in interior merit. This nobleman is +an old friend of mine. You know he was always the +protector of men of wit and genius, and has had those of +the last century, Addison, Steele, Pope, Swift, Prior, &c., +always at his table. The manner in which his notice began +of me was as singular as it was polite. He came up to +me one day as I was at the Princess of Wales's court, and +said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I want to know you, Mr. Sterne, but it is fit you +also should know who it is that wishes this pleasure. You +have heard of an old Lord Bathurst, of whom your Popes +and Swifts have sung and spoken so much? I have lived +my life with geniuses of that cast; but have survived +them; and, despairing ever to find their equals, it is some +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page662">[pg 662]</span><a name="Pg662" id="Pg662" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +years since I have shut up my books and closed my accounts; +but you have kindled a desire in me of opening them once +more before I die: which I now do: so go home and dine +with me.’</span> This nobleman, I say, is a prodigy, for he has +all the wit and promptness of a man of thirty; a disposition +to be pleased, and a power to please others, beyond whatever +I knew: added to which a man of learning, courtesy, +and feeling.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He heard me talk of thee, Eliza, with uncommon satisfaction—for +there was only a third person, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">and of sensibility</span></em>, +with us: and a most sentimental afternoon till nine +o'clock have we passed!<a id="noteref_166" name="noteref_166" href="#note_166"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">166</span></span></a> But thou, Eliza! wert the star +that conducted and enlivened the discourse! And when +I talked not of thee, still didst thou fill my mind, and +warm every thought I uttered, for I am not ashamed to +acknowledge I greatly miss thee. Best of all good girls!—the +sufferings I have sustained all night in consequence of +thine, Eliza, are beyond the power of words.... And +so thou hast fixed thy Bramin's portrait over thy writing +desk, and will consult it in all doubts and difficulties?—Grateful +and good girl! Yorick smiles contentedly over +all thou dost: his picture does not do justice to his own +complacency. I am glad your shipmates are friendly +beings”</span> (Eliza was at Deal, going back to the Counsellor at +Bombay, and indeed it was high time she should be off). +<span class="tei tei-q">“You could least dispense with what is contrary to your +own nature, which is soft and gentle, Eliza; it would +civilize savages—though pity were it thou shouldst be +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page663">[pg 663]</span><a name="Pg663" id="Pg663" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +tainted with the office. Write to me, my child, thy +delicious letters. Let them speak the easy carelessness of +a heart that opens itself anyhow, every how. Such, Eliza, +I write to thee!”</span> (The artless rogue, of course he did!) +<span class="tei tei-q">“And so I should ever love thee, most artlessly, most +affectionately, if Providence permitted thy residence in +the same section of the globe: for I am all that honour and +affection can make me <span class="tei tei-q">‘<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Thy Bramin</span></span>’</span>.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Bramin continues addressing Mrs. Draper until the +departure of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Earl of Chatham</span></span>, Indiaman, from Deal, +on the 2nd of April, 1767. He is amiably anxious about +the fresh paint for Eliza's cabin; he is uncommonly solicitous +about her companions on board: <span class="tei tei-q">“I fear the best of +your shipmates are only genteel by comparison with the +contrasted crew with which thou beholdest them. So was—you +know who—from the same fallacy which was put +upon your judgement when—but I will not mortify you!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You know who”</span> was, of course, Daniel Draper, Esq., +of Bombay—a gentleman very much respected in that +quarter of the globe, and about whose probable health our +worthy Bramin writes with delightful candour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I honour you, Eliza, for keeping secret some things +which, if explained, had been a panegyric on yourself. +There is a dignity in venerable affliction which will not +allow it to appeal to the world for pity or redress. Well +have you supported that character, my amiable, my philosophic +friend! And indeed, I begin to think you have as +many virtues as my Uncle Toby's widow. Talking of +widows—pray, Eliza, if ever you are such, do not think of +giving yourself to some wealthy Nabob, because I design +to marry you myself. My wife cannot live long, and I +know not the woman I should like so well for her substitute +as yourself. 'Tis true I am ninety-five in constitution, and +you but twenty-five; but what I want in youth, I will +make up in wit and good humour. Not Swift so loved +his Stella, Scarron his Maintenon, or Waller his Saccharissa. +Tell me, in answer to this, that you approve and honour +the proposal.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Approve and honour the proposal! The coward was +writing gay letters to his friends this while, with sneering +allusions to this poor foolish <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Bramine</span></span>. Her ship was not +out of the Downs, and the charming Sterne was at the +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mount”</span> Coffee-house, with a sheet of gilt-edged paper before +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page664">[pg 664]</span><a name="Pg664" id="Pg664" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +him, offering that precious treasure his heart to Lady P——, +asking whether it gave her pleasure to see him unhappy? +whether it added to her triumph that her eyes and lips +had turned a man into a fool?—quoting the Lord's Prayer, +with a horrible baseness of blasphemy, as a proof that he +had desired not to be led into temptation, and swearing +himself the most tender and sincere fool in the world. It +was from his home at Coxwould that he wrote the Latin +letter, which, I suppose, he was ashamed to put into English. +I find in my copy of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters</span></span>, that there is a note of +I can't call it admiration, at Letter 112, which seems to +announce that there was a No. 3 to whom the wretched +worn-out old scamp was paying his addresses;<a id="noteref_167" name="noteref_167" href="#note_167"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">167</span></span></a> and the +year after, having come back to his lodgings in Bond Street, +with his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sentimental Journey</span></span> to launch upon the town, +eager as ever for praise and pleasure; as vain, as wicked, +as witty, as false as he had ever been, death at length +seized the feeble wretch, and, on the 18th of March, 1768, +that <span class="tei tei-q">“bale of cadaverous goods”</span>, as he calls his body, was +consigned to Pluto.<a id="noteref_168" name="noteref_168" href="#note_168"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">168</span></span></a> In his last letter there is one sign +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page665">[pg 665]</span><a name="Pg665" id="Pg665" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of grace—the real affection with which he entreats a friend +to be a guardian to his daughter Lydia.<a id="noteref_169" name="noteref_169" href="#note_169"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">169</span></span></a> All his letters +to her are artless, kind, affectionate, and <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">not</span></em> sentimental; +as a hundred pages in his writings are beautiful, and full, +not of surprising humour merely, but of genuine love and +kindness. A perilous trade, indeed, is that of a man who +has to bring his tears and laughter, his recollections, his +personal griefs and joys, his private thoughts and feelings +to market, to write them on paper, and sell them for money. +Does he exaggerate his grief, so as to get his reader's pity +for a false sensibility? feign indignation, so as to establish +a character for virtue? elaborate repartees, so that he may +pass for a wit? steal from other authors, and put down +the theft to the credit side of his own reputation for ingenuity +and learning? feign originality? affect benevolence or +misanthropy? appeal to the gallery gods with claptraps +and vulgar baits to catch applause? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How much of the paint and emphasis is necessary for +the fair business of the stage, and how much of the rant +and rouge is put on for the vanity of the actor? His audience +trusts him: can he trust himself? How much was deliberate +calculation and imposture—how much was false +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page666">[pg 666]</span><a name="Pg666" id="Pg666" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +sensibility—and how much true feeling? Where did the +lie begin, and did he know where? and where did the +truth end in the art and scheme of this man of genius, this +actor, this quack? Some time since, I was in the company +of a French actor, who began after dinner, and at his own +request, to sing French songs of the sort called +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">des chansons +grivoises</span></span>, and which he performed admirably, and to the +dissatisfaction of most persons present. Having finished +these, he commenced a sentimental ballad—it was so +charmingly sung that it touched all persons present, and +especially the singer himself, whose voice trembled, whose +eyes filled with emotion, and who was snivelling and weeping +quite genuine tears by the time his own ditty was over. +I suppose Sterne had this artistical sensibility; he used to +blubber perpetually in his study, and finding his tears +infectious, and that they brought him a great popularity, +he exercised the lucrative gift of weeping; he utilized it, +and cried on every occasion. I own that I don't value or +respect much the cheap dribble of those fountains. He +fatigues me with his perpetual disquiet and his uneasy +appeals to my risible or sentimental faculties. He is always +looking in my face, watching his effect, uncertain whether +I think him an impostor or not; posture-making, coaxing, +and imploring me. <span class="tei tei-q">“See what sensibility I have—own +now that I'm very clever—do cry now, you can't resist this.”</span> +The humour of Swift and Rabelais, whom he pretended to +succeed, poured from them as naturally as song does from +a bird; they lose no manly dignity with it, but laugh +their hearty great laugh out of their broad chests as nature +bade them. But this man—who can make you laugh, who +can make you cry, too—never lets his reader alone, or will +permit his audience repose: when you are quiet, he fancies +he must rouse you, and turns over head and heels, or sidles +up and whispers a nasty story. The man is a great jester, +not a great humourist. He goes to work systematically +and of cold blood; paints his face, puts on his ruff and +motley clothes, and lays down his carpet and tumbles on it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For instance, take the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sentimental Journey</span></span>, and see in +the writer the deliberate propensity to make points and +seek applause. He gets to Dessein's Hotel, he wants a +carriage to travel to Paris, he goes to the inn-yard, and +begins what the actors call <span class="tei tei-q">“business”</span> at once. There is +that little carriage the <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">désobligeant</span></span>. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Four months had +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page667">[pg 667]</span><a name="Pg667" id="Pg667" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +elapsed since it had finished its career of Europe in the +corner of Monsieur Dessein's courtyard, and having sallied +out thence but a vamped-up business at first, though it +had been twice taken to pieces on Mount Sennis, it had +not profited much by its adventures, but by none so little +as the standing so many months unpitied in the corner of +Monsieur Dessein's coachyard. Much, indeed, was not to +be said for it—but something might—and when a few +words will rescue misery out of her distress, I hate the +man who can be a churl of them.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Le tour est fait!</span></span> +Paillasse has tumbled! Paillasse has jumped over the +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">désobligeant</span></span>, cleared it, hood and all, and +bows to the noble company. Does anybody believe that +this is a real Sentiment? that this luxury of generosity, +this gallant rescue of Misery—out of an old cab, is genuine +feeling? It is as genuine as the virtuous oratory of Joseph +Surface when he begins, <span class="tei tei-q">“The man who,”</span> &c. &c., and +wishes to pass off for a saint with his credulous, good-humoured +dupes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our friend purchases the carriage—after turning that +notorious old monk to good account, and effecting (like +a soft and good-natured Paillasse as he was, and very free +with his money when he had it), an exchange of snuff-boxes +with the old Franciscan, jogs out of Calais; sets down in +immense figures on the credit side of his account the sous +he gives away to the Montreuil beggars; and, at Nampont, +gets out of the chaise and whimpers over that famous dead +donkey, for which any sentimentalist may cry who will. +It is agreeably and skilfully done—that dead jackass; like +M. de Soubise's cook, on the campaign, Sterne dresses it, +and serves it up quite tender and with a very piquante +sauce. But tears, and fine feelings, and a white pocket-handkerchief, +and a funeral sermon, and horses and feathers, +and a procession of mutes, and a hearse with a dead donkey +inside! Psha! Mountebank! I'll not give thee one penny +more for that trick, donkey and all! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This donkey had appeared once before with signal effect. +In 1765, three years before the publication of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sentimental +Journey</span></span>, the seventh and eighth volumes of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tristram Shandy</span></span> +were given to the world, and the famous Lyons donkey +makes his entry in those volumes (pp. 315, 316):— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas by a poor ass, with a couple of large panniers +at his back, who had just turned in to collect eleemosynary +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page668">[pg 668]</span><a name="Pg668" id="Pg668" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +turnip-tops and cabbage-leaves, and stood dubious, with +his two forefeet at the inside of the threshold, and with his +two hinder feet towards the street, as not knowing very well +whether he was to go in or no.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Now 'tis an animal (be in what hurry I may) I cannot +bear to strike; there is a patient endurance of suffering +wrote so unaffectedly in his looks and carriage which pleads +so mightily for him, that it always disarms me, and to that +degree that I do not like to speak unkindly to him: on the +contrary, meet him where I will, whether in town or country, +in cart or under panniers, whether in liberty or bondage, +I have ever something civil to say to him on my part; and, +as one word begets another (if he has as little to do as I), +I generally fall into conversation with him; and surely +never is my imagination so busy as in framing responses +from the etchings of his countenance; and where those +carry me not deep enough, in flying from my own heart +into his, and seeing what is natural for an ass to think—as +well as a man, upon the occasion. In truth, it is the +only creature of all the classes of beings below me with +whom I can do this.... With an ass I can commune for +ever.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Come, Honesty,’</span> said I, seeing it was impracticable +to pass betwixt him and the gate, <span class="tei tei-q">‘art thou for coming +in or going out?’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The ass twisted his head round to look up the street.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Well!’</span> replied I, <span class="tei tei-q">‘we'll wait a minute for thy driver.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He turned his head thoughtful about, and looked wistfully +the opposite way.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘I understand thee perfectly,’</span> answered I: <span class="tei tei-q">‘if thou +takest a wrong step in this affair, he will cudgel thee to +death. Well! a minute is but a minute; and if it saves +a fellow creature a drubbing, it shall not be set down as +ill spent.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He was eating the stem of an artichoke as this discourse +went on, and, in the little peevish contentions between +hunger and unsavouriness, had dropped it out of his mouth +half a dozen times, and had picked it up again. <span class="tei tei-q">‘God +help thee, Jack!’</span> said I, <span class="tei tei-q">‘thou hast a bitter breakfast +on't—and many a bitter day's labour, and many a bitter +blow, I fear, for its wages! 'Tis all, all bitterness to thee—whatever +life is to others! And now thy mouth, if one +knew the truth of it, is as bitter. I dare say, as soot’</span> (for +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page669">[pg 669]</span><a name="Pg669" id="Pg669" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he had cast aside the stem), <span class="tei tei-q">‘and thou hast not a friend +perhaps in all this world that will give thee a macaroon.’</span> +In saying this, I pulled out a paper of 'em, which I had just +bought, and gave him one;—and, at this moment that I am +telling it, my heart smites me that there was more of +pleasantry in the conceit of seeing <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">how</span></em> an ass would eat a +macaroon than of benevolence in giving him one, which +presided in the act.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When the ass had eaten his macaroon, I pressed him +to come in. The poor beast was heavy loaded—his legs +seemed to tremble under him—he hung rather backward, +and, as I pulled at his halter, it broke in my hand. He +looked up pensive in my face: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Don't thrash me with it: +but if you will you may.’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘If I do,’</span> said I, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I'll be +d——.’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A critic who refuses to see in this charming description +wit, humour, pathos, a kind nature speaking, and a real +sentiment, must be hard indeed to move and to please. +A page or two farther we come to a description not less +beautiful—a landscape and figures, deliciously painted by +one who had the keenest enjoyment and the most tremulous +sensibility:— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Twas in the road between Nismes and Lunel, where +is the best Muscatto wine in all France: the sun was set, +they had done their work; the nymphs had tied up their +hair afresh, and the swains were preparing for a carousal. +My mule made a dead point. <span class="tei tei-q">‘'Tis the pipe and tambourine,’</span> +said I—<span class="tei tei-q">‘I never will argue a point with one of +your family as long as I live;’</span> so leaping off his back, and +kicking off one boot into this ditch and t'other into that, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘I'll take a dance,’</span> said I, <span class="tei tei-q">‘so stay you here.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A sunburnt daughter of labour rose up from the group +to meet me as I advanced towards them; her hair, which +was of a dark chestnut approaching to a black, was tied +up in a knot, all but a single tress.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘We want a cavalier,’</span> said she, holding out both her +hands, as if to offer them. <span class="tei tei-q">‘And a cavalier you shall +have,’</span> said I, taking hold of both of them. <span class="tei tei-q">‘We could +not have done without you,’</span> said she, letting go one hand, +with self-taught politeness, and leading me up with the +other.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A lame youth, whom Apollo had recompensed with +a pipe, and to which he had added a tambourine of his +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page670">[pg 670]</span><a name="Pg670" id="Pg670" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +own accord, ran sweetly over the prelude, as he sat upon +the bank. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Tie me up this tress instantly,’</span> said Nannette, +putting a piece of string into my hand. It taught me to +forget I was a stranger. The whole knot fell down—we +had been seven years acquainted. The youth struck the +note upon the tambourine, his pipe followed, and off we +bounded.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The sister of the youth—who had stolen her voice from +Heaven—sang alternately with her brother. 'Twas a +Gascoigne roundelay. <span class="tei tei-q">‘<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Viva la +joia, fidon la tristessa!</span></span>’</span>—the +nymphs joined in unison, and their swains an octave +below them.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Viva la joia</span></span> +was in Nannette's lips, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">viva la joia</span></span> in her +eyes. A transient spark of amity shot across the space +betwixt us. She looked amiable. Why could I not live +and end my days thus? <span class="tei tei-q">‘Just Disposer of our joys and +sorrows!’</span> cried I, <span class="tei tei-q">‘why could not a man sit down in the +lap of content here, and dance, and sing, and say his prayers, +and go to heaven with this nut-brown maid?’</span> Capriciously +did she bend her head on one side, and dance up insidious. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Then 'tis time to dance off,’</span> quoth I.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And with this pretty dance and chorus, the volume +artfully concludes. Even here one can't give the whole +description. There is not a page in Sterne's writing but +has something that were better away, a latent corruption—a +hint, as of an impure presence.<a id="noteref_170" name="noteref_170" href="#note_170"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">170</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page671">[pg 671]</span><a name="Pg671" id="Pg671" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Some of that dreary <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">double entendre</span></span> may be attributed +to freer times and manners than ours, but not all. The +foul Satyr's eyes leer out of the leaves constantly: the last +words the famous author wrote were bad and wicked—the +last lines the poor stricken wretch penned were for pity +and pardon. I think of these past writers and of one who +lives amongst us now, and am grateful for the innocent +laughter and the sweet and unsullied page which the author +of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">David Copperfield</span></span> gives to my children. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Jeté sur cette boule,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Laid, chétif et souffrant;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Étouffé dans la foule,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Faute d'être assez grand;</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Une plainte touchante</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">De ma bouche sortit;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Le bon Dieu me dit: Chante,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Chante, pauvre petit!</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Chanter, ou je m'abuse,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Est ma tâche ici-bas.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Tous ceux qu'ainsi j'amuse,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Ne m'aimeront-ils pas?</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In those charming lines of Béranger, one may fancy +described the career, the sufferings, the genius, the gentle +nature of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Goldsmith</span></span>, and the esteem in which we hold him. +Who, of the millions whom he has amused, doesn't love him? +To be the most beloved of English writers, what a title that +is for a man!<a id="noteref_171" name="noteref_171" href="#note_171"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">171</span></span></a> A wild youth, wayward, but full of tenderness +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page672">[pg 672]</span><a name="Pg672" id="Pg672" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and affection, quits the country village where his +boyhood has been passed in happy musing, in idle shelter, +in fond longing to see the great world out of doors, and +achieve name and fortune—and after years of dire struggle, +and neglect and poverty, his heart turning back as fondly +to his native place, as it had longed eagerly for change when +sheltered there, he writes a book and a poem, full of the +recollections and feelings of home—he paints the friends +and scenes of his youth, and peoples Auburn and Wakefield +with remembrances of Lissoy. Wander he must, but he +carries away a home-relic with him, and dies with it on his +breast. His nature is truant; in repose it longs for change: +as on the journey it looks back for friends and quiet. He +passes to-day in building an air-castle for to-morrow, or in +writing yesterday's elegy; and he would fly away this hour, +but that a cage and necessity keep him. What is the charm +of his verse, of his style, and humour? His sweet regrets, +his delicate compassion, his soft smile, his tremulous +sympathy, the weakness which he owns? Your love for +him is half pity. You come hot and tired from the day's +battle, and this sweet minstrel sings to you. Who could +harm the kind vagrant harper? Whom did he ever hurt? +He carries no weapon—save the harp on which he plays to +you; and with which he delights great and humble, young +and old, the captains in the tents, or the soldiers round the +fire, or the women and children in the villages, at whose +porches he stops and sings his simple songs of love and +beauty. With that sweet story of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Vicar of +Wakefield</span></span>,<a id="noteref_172" name="noteref_172" href="#note_172"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">172</span></span></a> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page673">[pg 673]</span><a name="Pg673" id="Pg673" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he has found entry into every castle and every hamlet in +Europe. Not one of us, however busy or hard, but once or +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page674">[pg 674]</span><a name="Pg674" id="Pg674" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +twice in our lives has passed an evening with him, and +undergone the charm of his delightful music. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Goldsmith's father was no doubt the good Doctor Primrose, +whom we all of us know.<a id="noteref_173" name="noteref_173" href="#note_173"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">173</span></span></a> Swift was yet alive, when +the little Oliver was born at Pallas, or Pallasmore, in the +county of Longford, in Ireland. In 1730, two years after +the child's birth, Charles Goldsmith removed his family to +Lissoy, in the county Westmeath, that sweet <span class="tei tei-q">“Auburn”</span> +which every person who hears me has seen in fancy. Here +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page675">[pg 675]</span><a name="Pg675" id="Pg675" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the kind parson<a id="noteref_174" name="noteref_174" href="#note_174"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">174</span></span></a> brought up his eight children; and +loving all the world, as his son says, fancied all the world +loved him. He had a crowd of poor dependants besides +those hungry children. He kept an open table; round +which sat flatterers and poor friends, who laughed at the +honest rector's many jokes, and ate the produce of his +seventy acres of farm. Those who have seen an Irish house +in the present day can fancy that one of Lissoy. The old +beggar still has his allotted corner by the kitchen turf; +the maimed old soldier still gets his potatoes and buttermilk; +the poor cottier still asks his honour's charity, and +prays God bless his Reverence for the sixpence; the ragged +pensioner still takes his place by right and sufferance. +There's still a crowd in the kitchen, and a crowd round the +parlour-table, profusion, confusion, kindness, poverty. If +an Irishman comes to London to make his fortune, he has +a half-dozen of Irish dependants who take a percentage of +his earnings. The good Charles Goldsmith<a id="noteref_175" name="noteref_175" href="#note_175"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">175</span></span></a> left but little +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page676">[pg 676]</span><a name="Pg676" id="Pg676" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +provision for his hungry race when death summoned him; +and one of his daughters being engaged to a squire of rather +superior dignity, Charles Goldsmith impoverished the rest +of his family to provide the girl with a dowry. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The small-pox, which scourged all Europe at that time, +and ravaged the roses off the cheeks of half the world, fell +foul of poor little Oliver's face, when the child was eight +years old, and left him scarred and disfigured for his life. +An old woman in his father's village taught him his letters, +and pronounced him a dunce: Paddy Byrne, the hedge-schoolmaster, +took him in hand; and from Paddy Byrne, +he was transmitted to a clergyman at Elphin. When a child +was sent to school in those days, the classic phrase was that +he was placed under Mr. So-and-so's <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">ferule</span></span>. Poor little +ancestors! It is hard to think how ruthlessly you were +birched; and how much of needless whipping and tears +our small forefathers had to undergo! A relative—kind +Uncle Contarine, took the main charge of little Noll; who +went through his school-days righteously doing as little +work as he could: robbing orchards, playing at ball, and +making his pocket-money fly about whenever fortune sent +it to him. Everybody knows the story of that famous +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mistake of a Night”</span>, when the young schoolboy, provided +with a guinea and a nag, rode up to the <span class="tei tei-q">“best house”</span> in +Ardagh, called for the landlord's company over a bottle of +wine at supper, and for a hot cake for breakfast in the +morning; and found, when he asked for the bill, that the +best house was Squire Featherstone's, and not the inn for +which he mistook it. Who does not know every story about +Goldsmith? That is a delightful and fantastic picture of +the child dancing and capering about in the kitchen at +home, when the old fiddler gibed at him for his ugliness—and +called him Aesop, and little Noll made his repartee of +<span class="tei tei-q">“Heralds proclaim aloud this saying—See Aesop dancing +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page677">[pg 677]</span><a name="Pg677" id="Pg677" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and his monkey playing”</span>. One can fancy a queer pitiful look +of humour and appeal upon that little scarred face—the +funny little dancing figure, the funny little brogue. In his +life, and his writings, which are the honest expression of it, +he is constantly bewailing that homely face and person; +anon, he surveys them in the glass ruefully; and presently +assumes the most comical dignity. He likes to deck out his +little person in splendour and fine colours. He presented +himself to be examined for ordination in a pair of scarlet +breeches, and said honestly that he did not like to go into +the Church, because he was fond of coloured clothes. When +he tried to practise as a doctor, he got by hook or by crook +a black velvet suit, and looked as big and grand as he could, +and kept his hat over a patch on the old coat: in better +days he bloomed out in plum-colour, in blue silk, and in +new velvet. For some of those splendours the heirs and +assignees of Mr. Filby, the tailor, have never been paid to +this day; perhaps the kind tailor and his creditor have met +and settled the little account in Hades.<a id="noteref_176" name="noteref_176" href="#note_176"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">176</span></span></a> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They showed until lately a window at Trinity College, +Dublin, on which the name of O. Goldsmith was engraved +with a diamond. Whose diamond was it? Not the young +sizar's, who made but a poor figure in that place of learning. +He was idle, penniless, and fond of pleasure:<a id="noteref_177" name="noteref_177" href="#note_177"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">177</span></span></a> he learned +his way early to the pawnbroker's shop. He wrote ballads, +they say, for the street-singers, who paid him a crown for +a poem: and his pleasure was to steal out at night and +hear his verses sung. He was chastised by his tutor for +giving a dance in his rooms, and took the box on the ear +so much to heart, that he packed up his all, pawned his +books and little property, and disappeared from college and +family. He said he intended to go to America, but when +his money was spent, the young prodigal came home ruefully, +and the good folks there killed their calf—it was but +a lean one—and welcomed him back. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page678">[pg 678]</span><a name="Pg678" id="Pg678" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After college, he hung about his mother's house, and +lived for some years the life of a buckeen—passed a month +with this relation and that, a year with one patron, a great +deal of time at the public-house.<a id="noteref_178" name="noteref_178" href="#note_178"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">178</span></span></a> Tired of this life, it was +resolved that he should go to London, and study at the +Temple; but he got no farther on the road to London and +the woolsack than Dublin, where he gambled away the +fifty pounds given to him for his outfit, and whence he +returned to the indefatigable forgiveness of home. Then +he determined to be a doctor, and Uncle Contarine helped +him to a couple of years at Edinburgh. Then from Edinburgh +he felt that he ought to hear the famous professors +of Leyden and Paris, and wrote most amusing pompous +letters to his uncle about the great Farheim, Du Petit, and +Duhamel du Monceau, whose lectures he proposed to follow. +If Uncle Contarine believed those letters—if Oliver's mother +believed that story which the youth related of his going to +Cork, with the purpose of embarking for America, of his +having paid his passage-money, and having sent his kit on +board; of the anonymous captain sailing away with Oliver's +valuable luggage in a nameless ship, never to return; if +Uncle Contarine and the mother at Ballymahon believed +his stories, they must have been a very simple pair; as it +was a very simple rogue indeed who cheated them. When +the lad, after failing in his clerical examination, after failing +in his plan for studying the law, took leave of these projects +and of his parents, and set out for Edinburgh, he saw +mother, and uncle, and lazy Ballymahon, and green native +turf, and sparkling river for the last time. He was never +to look on old Ireland more, and only in fancy revisit her. +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But me not destined such delights to share,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My prime of life in wandering spent and care,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Impelled, with step unceasing, to pursue</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Some fleeting good that mocks me with the view;</span></div> +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page679">[pg 679]</span><a name="Pg679" id="Pg679" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">That like the circle bounding earth and skies</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Allures from far, yet, as I follow, flies:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My fortune leads to traverse realms unknown,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And find no spot of all the world my own.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I spoke in a former lecture of that high courage which +enabled Fielding, in spite of disease, remorse, and poverty, +always to retain a cheerful spirit and to keep his manly +benevolence and love of truth intact, as if these treasures +had been confided to him for the public benefit, and he was +accountable to posterity for their honourable employ; and +a constancy equally happy and admirable I think was +shown by Goldsmith, whose sweet and friendly nature +bloomed kindly always in the midst of a life's storm, and +rain, and bitter weather.<a id="noteref_179" name="noteref_179" href="#note_179"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">179</span></span></a> The poor fellow was +never so friendless but he could befriend some one; never so pinched +and wretched but he could give of his crust, and speak his +word of compassion. If he had but his flute left, he could +give that, and make the children happy in the dreary +London court. He could give the coals in that queer coal-scuttle +we read of to his poor neighbour: he could give +away his blankets in college to the poor widow, and warm +himself as he best might in the feathers: he could pawn +his coat to save his landlord from gaol: when he was +a school-usher, he spent his earnings in treats for the boys, +and the good-natured schoolmaster's wife said justly that +she ought to keep Mr. Goldsmith's money as well as the +young gentlemen's. When he met his pupils in later life, +nothing would satisfy the Doctor but he must treat them +still. <span class="tei tei-q">“Have you seen the print of me after Sir Joshua +Reynolds?”</span> he asked of one of his old pupils. <span class="tei tei-q">“Not seen +it? not bought it? Sure, Jack, if your picture had been +published, I'd not have been without it half an hour.”</span> His +purse and his heart were everybody's, and his friends' as +much as his own. When he was at the height of his reputation, +and the Earl of Northumberland, going as Lord +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page680">[pg 680]</span><a name="Pg680" id="Pg680" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Lieutenant to Ireland, asked if he could be of any service +to Dr. Goldsmith, Goldsmith recommended his brother, and +not himself, to the great man. <span class="tei tei-q">“My patrons,”</span> he gallantly +said, <span class="tei tei-q">“are the booksellers, and I want no +others.”</span><a id="noteref_180" name="noteref_180" href="#note_180"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">180</span></span></a> Hard +patrons they were, and hard work he did; but he did not +complain much: if in his early writings some bitter words +escaped him, some allusions to neglect and poverty, he +withdrew these expressions when his works were republished, +and better days seemed to open for him; and he did +not care to complain that printer or publisher had overlooked +his merit, or left him poor. The Court face was +turned from honest Oliver, the Court patronized Beattie; +the fashion did not shine on him—fashion adored +Sterne.<a id="noteref_181" name="noteref_181" href="#note_181"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">181</span></span></a> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page681">[pg 681]</span><a name="Pg681" id="Pg681" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Fashion pronounced Kelly to be the great writer of comedy +of his day. A little—not ill humour, but plaintiveness—a +little betrayal of wounded pride which he showed render +him not the less amiable. The author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Vicar of Wakefield</span></span> +had a right to protest when Newbery kept back the +MS. for two years; had a right to be a little peevish with +Sterne; a little angry when Colman's actors declined their +parts in his delightful comedy, when the manager refused +to have a scene painted for it, and pronounced its damnation +before hearing. He had not the great public with him; +but he had the noble Johnson, and the admirable Reynolds, +and the great Gibbon, and the great Burke, and the great +Fox—friends and admirers illustrious indeed, as famous as +those who, fifty years before, sat round Pope's table. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Nobody knows, and I dare say Goldsmith's buoyant +temper kept no account of all the pains which he endured +during the early period of his literary career. Should any +man of letters in our day have to bear up against such, +Heaven grant he may come out of the period of misfortune +with such a pure kind heart as that which Goldsmith +obstinately bore in his breast. The insults to which he had +to submit are shocking to read of—slander, contumely, +vulgar satire, brutal malignity perverting his commonest +motives and actions: he had his share of these, and one's +anger is roused at reading of them, as it is at seeing a woman +insulted or a child assaulted, at the notion that a creature +so very gentle and weak, and full of love, should have had +to suffer so. And he had worse than insult to undergo—to +own to fault, and deprecate the anger of ruffians. There +is a letter of his extant to one Griffiths, a bookseller, in +which poor Goldsmith is forced to confess that certain +books sent by Griffiths are in the hands of a friend from +whom Goldsmith had been forced to borrow money. <span class="tei tei-q">“He +was wild, sir,”</span> Johnson said, speaking of Goldsmith to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page682">[pg 682]</span><a name="Pg682" id="Pg682" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Boswell, with his great, wise benevolence and noble mercifulness +of heart, <span class="tei tei-q">“Dr. Goldsmith was wild, sir; but he is +so no more.”</span> Ah! if we pity the good and weak man who +suffers undeservedly, let us deal very gently with him from +whom misery extorts not only tears, but shame; let us +think humbly and charitably of the human nature that +suffers so sadly and falls so low. Whose turn may it be tomorrow? +What weak heart, confident before trial, may +not succumb under temptation invincible? Cover the good +man who has been vanquished—cover his face and pass on. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +For the last half-dozen years of his life, Goldsmith was +far removed from the pressure of any ignoble necessity: +and in the receipt, indeed, of a pretty large income from the +booksellers, his patrons. Had he lived but a few years +more, his public fame would have been as great as his +private reputation, and he might have enjoyed alive a part +of that esteem which his country has ever since paid to +the vivid and versatile genius who has touched on almost +every subject of literature, and touched nothing that he +did not adorn. Except in rare instances, a man is known +in our profession, and esteemed as a skilful workman, +years before the lucky hit which trebles his usual gains, +and stamps him a popular author. In the strength of his +age, and the dawn of his reputation, having for backers +and friends the most illustrious literary men of his time,<a id="noteref_182" name="noteref_182" href="#note_182"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">182</span></span></a> +fame and prosperity might have been in store for Goldsmith, +had fate so willed it; and, at forty-six, had not +sudden disease carried him off. I say prosperity rather +than competence, for it is probable that no sum could +have put order into his affairs or sufficed for his irreclaimable +habits of dissipation. It must be remembered that +he owed 2,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> when he died. <span class="tei tei-q">“Was ever poet,”</span> Johnson +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page683">[pg 683]</span><a name="Pg683" id="Pg683" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +asked, <span class="tei tei-q">“so trusted before?”</span> As has been the case with +many another good fellow of his nation, his life was tracked +and his substance wasted by crowds of hungry beggars, and +lazy dependants. If they came at a lucky time (and be +sure they knew his affairs better than he did himself, and +watched his pay-day), he gave them of his money: if they +begged on empty-purse days he gave them his promissory +bills: or he treated them to a tavern where he had credit; +or he obliged them with an order upon honest Mr. Filby +for coats, for which he paid as long as he could earn, and +until the shears of Filby were to cut for him no more. +Staggering under a load of debt and labour, tracked by +bailiffs and reproachful creditors, running from a hundred +poor dependants, whose appealing looks were perhaps the +hardest of all pains for him to bear, devising fevered plans +for the morrow, new histories, new comedies, all sorts of +new literary schemes, flying from all these into seclusion, +and out of seclusion into pleasure—at last, at five-and-forty, +death seized him and closed his career.<a id="noteref_183" name="noteref_183" href="#note_183"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">183</span></span></a> +I have +been many a time in the chambers in the Temple which +were his, and passed up the staircase, which Johnson, and +Burke, and Reynolds trod to see their friend, their poet, +their kind Goldsmith—the stair on which the poor women +sat weeping bitterly when they heard that the greatest and +most generous of all men was dead within the black oak +door.<a id="noteref_184" name="noteref_184" href="#note_184"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">184</span></span></a> Ah, it was a different lot from that for which the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page684">[pg 684]</span><a name="Pg684" id="Pg684" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +poor fellow sighed, when he wrote with heart yearning for +home those most charming of all fond verses, in which he +fancies he revisits Auburn— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Here as I take my solitary rounds,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Amidst thy tangled walks and ruined grounds,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And, many a year elapsed, return to view</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Remembrance wakes, with all her busy train,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Swells at my heart, and turns the past to pain.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In all my wanderings round this world of care</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In all my griefs—and God has given my share,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I still had hopes my latest hours to crown,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To husband out life's taper at the close,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And keep the flame from wasting by repose;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I still had hopes—for pride attends us still—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Amidst the swains to show my book-learned skill,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Around my fire an evening group to draw,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And tell of all I felt and all I saw;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Pants to the place from whence at first she flew—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I still had hopes—my long vexations past,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Here to return, and die at home at last.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">O blest retirement, friend to life's decline!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Retreats from care that never must be mine—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">How blest is he who crowns in shades like these,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">A youth of labour with an age of ease;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Who quits a world where strong temptations try,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And, since 'tis hard to combat, learns to fly!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">For him no wretches born to work and weep</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Explore the mine or tempt the dangerous deep;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">No surly porter stands in guilty state</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">To spurn imploring famine from his gate:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But on he moves to meet his latter end,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Angels around befriending virtue's friend;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Whilst resignation gently slopes the way;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And all his prospects brightening at the last,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">His heaven commences ere the world be past.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In these verses, I need not say with what melody, with +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page685">[pg 685]</span><a name="Pg685" id="Pg685" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +what touching truth, with what exquisite beauty of comparison—as +indeed in hundreds more pages of the writings +of this honest soul—the whole character of the man is +told—his humble confession of faults and weakness; his +pleasant little vanity, and desire that his village should +admire him; his simple scheme of good in which everybody +was to be happy—no beggar was to be refused his +dinner—nobody in fact was to work much, and he to be +the harmless chief of the Utopia, and the monarch of the +Irish Yvetôt. He would have told again, and without +fear of their failing, those famous jokes<a id="noteref_185" name="noteref_185" href="#note_185"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">185</span></span></a> which had hung +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page686">[pg 686]</span><a name="Pg686" id="Pg686" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +fire in London; he would have talked of his great friends +of the Club—of my Lord Clare and my Lord Bishop, my +Lord Nugent—sure he knew them intimately, and was +hand and glove with some of the best men in town—and +he would have spoken of Johnson and of Burke, from +Cork, and of Sir Joshua who had painted him—and he +would have told wonderful sly stories of Ranelagh and the +Pantheon, and the masquerades at Madame Cornelys'; +and he would have toasted, with a sigh, the Jessamy +Bride—the lovely Mary Horneck. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The figure of that charming young lady forms one of +the prettiest recollections of Goldsmith's life. She and her +beautiful sister, who married Bunbury, the graceful and +humorous amateur artist of those days, when Gilray had +but just begun to try his powers, were among the kindest +and dearest of Goldsmith's many friends, cheered and +pitied him, travelled abroad with him; made him welcome +at their home, and gave him many a pleasant holiday. He +bought his finest clothes to figure at their country house at +Barton—he wrote them droll verses. They loved him, +laughed at him, played him tricks and made him happy. +He asked for a loan from Garrick, and Garrick kindly +supplied him, to enable him to go to Barton—but there +were to be no more holidays, and only one brief struggle +more for poor Goldsmith—a lock of his hair was taken +from the coffin and given to the Jessamy Bride. She lived +quite into our time. Hazlitt saw her an old lady, but +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page687">[pg 687]</span><a name="Pg687" id="Pg687" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +beautiful still, in Northcote's painting-room, who told the +eager critic how proud she always was that Goldsmith had +admired her. The younger Colman has left a touching +reminiscence of him (vol. i. 63, 64). +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I was only five years old,”</span> he says, <span class="tei tei-q">“when Goldsmith +took me on his knee one evening whilst he was drinking +coffee with my father, and began to play with me, which +amiable act I returned, with the ingratitude of a peevish +brat, by giving him a very smart slap on the face: it +must have been a tingler, for it left the marks of my spiteful +paw on his cheek. This infantile outrage was followed by +summary justice, and I was locked up by my indignant +father in an adjoining room to undergo solitary imprisonment +in the dark. Here I began to howl and scream most +abominably, which was no bad step towards my liberation, +since those who were not inclined to pity me might be likely +to set me free for the purpose of abating a nuisance.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At length a generous friend appeared to extricate me +from jeopardy, and that generous friend was no other +than the man I had so wantonly molested by assault and +battery—it was the tender-hearted Doctor himself, with +a lighted candle in his hand, and a smile upon his countenance, +which was still partially red from the effects of my +petulance. I sulked and sobbed as he fondled and soothed, +till I began to brighten. Goldsmith seized the propitious +moment of returning good humour, when he put down the +candle and began to conjure. He placed three hats, which +happened to be in the room, and a shilling under each. +The shillings he told me were England, France, and Spain. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Hey presto cockalorum!’</span> cried the Doctor, and lo, on +uncovering the shillings, which had been dispersed each +beneath a separate hat, they were all found congregated +under one. I was no politician at five years old, and +therefore might not have wondered at the sudden revolution +which brought England, France, and Spain all under +one crown; but, as also I was no conjurer, it amazed me +beyond measure.... From that time, whenever the +Doctor came to visit my father, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I plucked his gown to +share the good man's smile’</span>; a game at romps constantly +ensued, and we were always cordial friends and merry +playfellows. Our unequal companionship varied somewhat +as to sports as I grew older; but it did not last long: +my senior playmate died in his forty-fifth year, when I had +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page688">[pg 688]</span><a name="Pg688" id="Pg688" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +attained my eleventh.... In all the numerous accounts +of his virtues and foibles, his genius and absurdities, his +knowledge of nature and ignorance of the world, his <span class="tei tei-q">‘compassion +for another's woe’</span> was always predominant; and +my trivial story of his humouring a froward child weighs +but as a feather in the recorded scale of his benevolence.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Think of him reckless, thriftless, vain if you like—but +merciful, gentle, generous, full of love and pity. He passes +out of our life, and goes to render his account beyond it. +Think of the poor pensioners weeping at his grave; think +of the noble spirits that admired and deplored him; think +of the righteous pen that wrote his epitaph—and of the +wonderful and unanimous response of affection with which +the world has paid back the love he gave it. His humour +delighting us still: his song fresh and beautiful as when +first he charmed with it: his words in all our mouths: +his very weaknesses beloved and familiar—his benevolent +spirit seems still to smile upon us: to do gentle kindnesses: +to succour with sweet charity: to soothe, caress, +and forgive: to plead with the fortunate for the unhappy +and the poor. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His name is the last in the list of those men of humour +who have formed the themes of the discourses which you +have heard so kindly. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Long before I had ever hoped for such an audience, or +dreamed of the possibility of the good fortune which has +brought me so many friends, I was at issue with some of +my literary brethren upon a point—which they held from +tradition I think rather than experience—that our profession +was neglected in this country; and that men of +letters were ill-received and held in slight esteem. It +would hardly be grateful of me now to alter my old opinion +that we do meet with goodwill and kindness, with generous +helping hands in the time of our necessity, with cordial +and friendly recognition. What claim had any one of these +of whom I have been speaking, but genius? What return +of gratitude, fame, affection, did it not bring to all? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What punishment befell those who were unfortunate +among them, but that which follows reckless habits and +careless lives? For these faults a wit must suffer like the +dullest prodigal that ever ran in debt. He must pay the +tailor if he wears the coat; his children must go in rags +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page689">[pg 689]</span><a name="Pg689" id="Pg689" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +if he spends his money at the tavern; he can't come to +London and be made Lord Chancellor if he stops on the +road and gambles away his last shilling at Dublin. And +he must pay the social penalty of these follies too, and +expect that the world will shun the man of bad habits, +that women will avoid the man of loose life, that prudent +folks will close their doors as a precaution, and before +a demand should be made on their pockets by the needy +prodigal. With what difficulty had any one of these men +to contend, save that eternal and mechanical one of want +of means and lack of capital, and of which thousands of +young lawyers, young doctors, young soldiers and sailors, +of inventors, manufacturers, shopkeepers, have to complain? +Hearts as brave and resolute as ever beat in the breast of +any wit or poet, sicken and break daily in the vain endeavour +and unavailing struggle against life's difficulty. Don't we +see daily ruined inventors, grey-haired midshipmen, balked +heroes, blighted curates, barristers pining a hungry life out +in chambers, the attorneys never mounting to their garrets, +whilst scores of them are rapping at the door of the successful +quack below? If these suffer, who is the author, that +he should be exempt? Let us bear our ills with the same +constancy with which others endure them, accept our manly +part in life, hold our own, and ask no more. I can conceive +of no kings or laws causing or curing Goldsmith's +improvidence, or Fielding's fatal love of pleasure, or Dick +Steele's mania for running races with the constable. You +never can outrun that sure-footed officer—not by any swiftness +or by dodges devised by any genius, however great; +and he carries off the Tatler to the spunging-house, or taps +the Citizen of the World on the shoulder as he would any +other mortal. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Does society look down on a man because he is an +author? I suppose if people want a buffoon they tolerate +him only in so far as he is amusing; it can hardly be +expected that they should respect him as an equal. Is +there to be a guard of honour provided for the author of +the last new novel or poem? how long is he to reign, and +keep other potentates out of possession? He retires, +grumbles, and prints a lamentation that literature is despised. +If Captain A. is left out of Lady B.'s parties he +does not state that the army is despised: if Lord C. no +longer asks Counsellor D. to dinner, Counsellor D. does not +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page690">[pg 690]</span><a name="Pg690" id="Pg690" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +announce that the Bar is insulted. He is not fair to society +if he enters it with this suspicion hankering about him; +if he is doubtful about his reception, how hold up his head +honestly, and look frankly in the face that world about +which he is full of suspicion? Is he place-hunting, and +thinking in his mind that he ought to be made an Ambassador, +like Prior, or a Secretary of State, like Addison? +his pretence of equality falls to the ground at once: he +is scheming for a patron, not shaking the hand of a friend, +when he meets the world. Treat such a man as he deserves; +laugh at his buffoonery, and give him a dinner and a <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">bon +jour</span></span>; laugh at his self-sufficiency and absurd assumptions +of superiority, and his equally ludicrous airs of martyrdom: +laugh at his flattery and his scheming, and buy it, if it's +worth the having. Let the wag have his dinner and the +hireling his pay, if you want him, and make a profound +bow to the <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">grand homme incompris</span></span>, and the +boisterous martyr, and show him the door. The great world, the +great aggregate experience, has its good sense, as it has +its good humour. It detects a pretender, as it trusts +a loyal heart. It is kind in the main: how should it +be otherwise than kind, when it is so wise and clear-headed? +To any literary man who says, <span class="tei tei-q">“It despises my profession,”</span> +I say, with all my might—no, no, no. It may pass over +your individual case—how many a brave fellow has failed +in the race, and perished unknown in the struggle!—but +it treats you as you merit in the main. If you serve it, +it is not unthankful; if you please it, it is pleased; if you +cringe to it, it detects you, and scorns you if you are mean; +it returns your cheerfulness with its good humour; it deals +not ungenerously with your weaknesses; it recognizes most +kindly your merits; it gives you a fair place and fair play. +To any one of those men of whom we have spoken was it +in the main ungrateful? A king might refuse Goldsmith +a pension, as a publisher might keep his masterpiece and +the delight of all the world in his desk for two years; but +it was mistake, and not ill will. Noble and illustrious +names of Swift, and Pope, and Addison! dear and honoured +memories of Goldsmith and Fielding! kind friends, teachers, +benefactors! who shall say that our country, which continues +to bring you such an unceasing tribute of applause, +admiration, love, sympathy, does not do honour to the +literary calling in the honour which it bestows upon <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">you!</span></em> +</p> + +</div> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page693">[pg 693]</span><a name="Pg693" id="Pg693" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> +<a name="toc115" id="toc115"></a> +<a name="pdf116" id="pdf116"></a> +<h1 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 3.46em; margin-top: 3.46em"><span style="font-size: 173%">The Georges</span></h1> + +<div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc117" id="toc117"></a> +<a name="pdf118" id="pdf118"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">The Poems</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +[<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Punch</span></span>, October 11, 1845] +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As the statues of these beloved Monarchs are to be put up in the +Parliament palace—we have been favoured by a young lady (connected +with the Court) with copies of the inscriptions which are +to be engraven under the images of those Stars of Brunswick. +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +GEORGE I—STAR OF BRUNSWICK +</span></p> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 9.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%">He preferred Hanover to England,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 8.10em"><span style="font-size: 90%">He preferred two hideous Mistresses</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 9.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%">To a beautiful and innocent Wife.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 8.10em"><span style="font-size: 90%">He hated Arts and despised Literature;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 9.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%">But He liked train-oil in his salads,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And gave an enlightened patronage to bad oysters.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 8.10em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And he had Walpole as a Minister:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Consistent in his Preference for every kind of Corruption.</span></div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +GEORGE II +</span></p> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In most things I did as my father had done,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I was false to my wife and I hated my son:</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My spending was small and my avarice much,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My kingdom was English, my heart was High Dutch:</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">At Dettingen fight I was known not to blench</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I butchered the Scotch, and I bearded the French:</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I neither had morals, nor manners, nor wit;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I wasn't much missed when I died in a fit.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Here set up my statue, and make it complete—With</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Pitt on his knees at my dirty old feet.</span></div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +GEORGE III +</span></p> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Give me a royal niche—it is my due,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The virtuousest king the realm e'er knew.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I, through a decent reputable life,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Was constant to plain food and a plain wife.</span></div> +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page694">[pg 694]</span><a name="Pg694" id="Pg694" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Ireland I risked, and lost America;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But dined on legs of mutton every day.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My brain, perhaps, might be a feeble part;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But yet I think I had an English heart.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">When all the kings were prostrate, I alone</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Stood face to face against Napoleon;</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Nor ever could the ruthless Frenchman forge</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">A fetter for Old England and Old George:</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I let loose flaming Nelson on his fleets;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I met his troops with Wellesley's bayonets.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Triumphant waved my flag on land and sea:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Where was the king in Europe like to me?</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Monarchs exiled found shelter on my shores;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My bounty rescued kings and emperors.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But what boots victory by land or sea?</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">What boots that kings found refuge at my knee?</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I was a conqueror, but yet not proud;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And careless, even though Napoleon bow'd.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The rescued kings came kiss my garments' hem:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The rescued kings I never heeded them.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">My guns roar'd triumph, but I never heard:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">All England thrilled with joy, I never stirred.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">What care had I of pomp, or fame, or power,—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">A crazy old blind man in Windsor Tower?</span></div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +GEORGIUS ULTIMUS +</span></p> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">He left an example for age and for youth</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 12.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">To avoid.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">He never acted well by Man or Woman,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And was as false to his Mistress as to his Wife.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">He deserted his Friends and his Principles.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">He was so ignorant that he could scarcely Spell;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">But he had some Skill in Cutting out Coats,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 7.20em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And an undeniable Taste for Cookery.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">He built the Palaces of Brighton and of Buckingham,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 5.40em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And for these Qualities and Proofs of Genius,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 14.40em"><span style="font-size: 90%">An admiring Aristocracy</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Christened him the </span><span class="tei tei-q" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">“</span><span style="font-size: 90%">First Gentleman in Europe</span><span style="font-size: 90%">”</span></span><span style="font-size: 90%">.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Friends, respect the King whose Statue is here,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And the generous Aristocracy who admired him.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page695">[pg 695]</span><a name="Pg695" id="Pg695" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"> +<a name="toc119" id="toc119"></a> +<a name="pdf120" id="pdf120"></a> +<h2 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.88em; margin-top: 2.88em"><span style="font-size: 144%">Sketches Of Manners, Morals, Court And Town Life</span></h2> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +[<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cornhill Magazine</span></span>, 1860; first edition in book form, 1861] +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page699">[pg 699]</span><a name="Pg699" id="Pg699" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc121" id="toc121"></a> +<a name="pdf122" id="pdf122"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">George The First</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A very few years since, I +knew familiarly a lady, who +had been asked in marriage +by Horace Walpole, who +had been patted on the +head by George I. This +lady had knocked at +Johnson's door; had been +intimate with Fox, the +beautiful Georgina of +Devonshire, and that brilliant +Whig society of the +reign of George III; had +known the Duchess of +Queensberry, the patroness +of Gay and Prior, the +admired young beauty of +the Court of Queen Anne. +I often thought as I took +my kind old friend's hand, +how with it I held on to +the old society of wits and +men of the world. I could +travel back for sevenscore +years of time—have glimpses of Brummell, Selwyn, Chesterfield +and the men of pleasure; of Walpole and Conway; +of Johnson, Reynolds, Goldsmith; of North, Chatham, +Newcastle; of the fair maids of honour of George II's +Court; of the German retainers of George I's; where +Addison was secretary of state; where Dick Steele held +a place; whither the great Marlborough came with his +fiery spouse; when Pope, and Swift, and Bolingbroke yet +lived and wrote. Of a society so vast, busy, brilliant, it is +impossible in four brief chapters to give a complete notion; +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page700">[pg 700]</span><a name="Pg700" id="Pg700" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +but we may peep here and there into that bygone world +of the Georges, see what they and their Courts were like; +glance at the people round about them; look at past +manners, fashions, pleasures, and contrast them with our +own. I have to say thus much by way of preface, because +the subject of these lectures has been misunderstood, and +I have been taken to task for not having given grave +historical treatises, which it never was my intention to +attempt. Not about battles, about politics, about statesmen +and measures of state, did I ever think to lecture you: +but to sketch the manners and life of the old world; to +amuse for a few hours with talk about the old society; +and, with the result of many a day's and night's pleasant +reading, to try and wile away a few winter evenings for +my hearers. +</p> + +<div class="tei tei-tb"><hr style="width: 50%" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Among the German princes who sat under Luther at +Wittenberg, was Duke Ernest of Celle, whose younger son, +William of Lüneburg, was the progenitor of the illustrious +Hanoverian house at present reigning in Great Britain. +Duke William held his Court at Celle, a little town of ten +thousand people that lies on the railway line between +Hamburg and Hanover, in the midst of great plains of +sand, upon the river Aller. When Duke William had it, +it was a very humble wood-built place, with a great brick +church, which he sedulously frequented, and in which he +and others of his house lie buried. He was a very religious +lord, and called William the Pious by his small circle of +subjects, over whom he ruled till fate deprived him both +of sight and reason. Sometimes, in his latter days, the +good duke had glimpses of mental light, when he would +bid his musicians play the psalm-tunes which he loved. +One thinks of a descendant of his, two hundred years +afterwards, blind, old, and lost of wits, singing Handel in +Windsor Tower. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +William the Pious had fifteen children, eight daughters +and seven sons, who, as the property left among them was +small, drew lots to determine which one of them should +marry, and continue the stout race of the Guelphs. The +lot fell on Duke George, the sixth brother. The others +remained single, or contracted left-handed marriages after +the princely fashion of those days. It is a queer picture—that +of the old prince dying in his little wood-built capital, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page701">[pg 701]</span><a name="Pg701" id="Pg701" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and his seven sons tossing up which should inherit and +transmit the crown of Brentford. Duke George, the lucky +prizeman, made the tour of Europe, during which he +visited the Court of Queen Elizabeth; and in the year +1617, came back and settled at Zell, with a wife out of +Darmstadt. His remaining brothers all kept their house +at Zell, for economy's sake. And presently, in due course, +they all died—all the honest dukes; Ernest, and Christian, +and Augustus, and Magnus, and George, and John—and +they are buried in the brick church of Brentford yonder, +by the sandy banks of the Aller. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Dr. Vehse gives a pleasant glimpse of the way of life +of our dukes in Zell. <span class="tei tei-q">“When the trumpeter on the tower +has blown,”</span> Duke Christian orders—viz. at nine o'clock in +the morning, and four in the evening, every one must be +present at meals, and those who are not must go without. +None of the servants, unless it be a knave who has been +ordered to ride out, shall eat or drink in the kitchen or +cellar; or, without special leave, fodder his horses at the +prince's cost. When the meal is served in the Court-room, +a page shall go round and bid every one be quiet and +orderly, forbidding all cursing, swearing, and rudeness; +all throwing about of bread, bones, or roast, or pocketing +of the same. Every morning, at seven, the squires shall +have their morning soup, along with which, and dinner, +they shall be served with their under-drink—every morning, +except Friday morning, when there was sermon, and no +drink. Every evening they shall have their beer, and at +night their sleep-drink. The butler is especially warned +not to allow noble or simple to go into the cellar: wine +shall only be served at the prince's or councillor's table; +and every Monday, the honest old Duke Christian ordains +the accounts shall be ready, and the expenses in the +kitchen, the wine and beer cellar, the bakehouse and stable, +made out. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Duke George, the marrying duke, did not stop at home +to partake of the beer and wine, and the sermons. He +went about fighting wherever there was profit to be had. +He served as general in the army of the circle of Lower +Saxony, the Protestant army; then he went over to the +emperor, and fought in his armies in Germany and Italy; +and when Gustavus Adolphus appeared in Germany, +George took service as a Swedish general, and seized the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page702">[pg 702]</span><a name="Pg702" id="Pg702" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Abbey of Hildesheim, as his share of the plunder. Here, +in the year 1641, Duke George died, leaving four sons +behind him, from the youngest of whom descend our +royal Georges. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Under these children of Duke George, the old God-fearing, +simple ways of Zell appear to have gone out of +mode. The second brother was constantly visiting Venice, +and leading a jolly, wicked life there. It was the most +jovial of all places at the end of the seventeenth century; +and military men, after a campaign, rushed thither, as the +warriors of the Allies rushed to Paris in 1814, to gamble, +and rejoice, and partake of all sorts of godless delights. +This prince, then, loving Venice and its pleasures, brought +Italian singers and dancers back with him to quiet old +Zell; and, worse still, demeaned himself by marrying +a French lady of birth quite inferior to his own—Eleanor +d'Olbreuse, from whom our queen is descended. Eleanor +had a pretty daughter, who inherited a great fortune, which +inflamed her cousin, George Louis of Hanover, with a desire +to marry her; and so, with her beauty and her riches, she +came to a sad end. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is too long to tell how the four sons of Duke George +divided his territories amongst them, and how, finally, +they came into possession of the son of the youngest of +the four. In this generation the Protestant faith was very +nearly extinguished in the family: and then where should +we in England have gone for a king? The third brother +also took delight in Italy, where the priests converted him +and his Protestant chaplain too. Mass was said in Hanover +once more; and Italian soprani piped their Latin rhymes +in place of the hymns which William the Pious and Dr. +Luther sang. Louis XIV gave this and other converts +a splendid pension. Crowds of Frenchmen and brilliant +French fashions came into his Court. It is incalculable +how much that royal bigwig cost Germany. Every prince +imitated the French king, and had his Versailles, his +Wilhelmshöhe or Ludwigslust; his court and its splendours; +his gardens laid out with statues; his fountains, +and waterworks, and Tritons; his actors, and dancers, +and singers, and fiddlers; his harem, with its inhabitants; +his diamonds and duchies for these latter; his enormous +festivities, his gaming-tables, tournaments, masquerades, +and banquets lasting a week long, for which the people +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page703">[pg 703]</span><a name="Pg703" id="Pg703" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +paid with their money, when the poor wretches had it; +with their bodies and very blood when they had none; +being sold in thousands by their lords and masters, who +gaily dealt in soldiers, staked a regiment upon the red at +the gambling-table; swapped a battalion against a dancing-girl's +diamond necklace; and, as it were, pocketed their +people. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As one views Europe, through contemporary books of +travel in the early part of the last century, the landscape +is awful—wretched wastes, beggarly and plundered; half-burned +cottages and trembling peasants gathering piteous +harvests; gangs of such tramping along with bayonets +behind them, and corporals with canes and cats-of-nine-tails +to flog them to barracks. By these passes my lord's +gilt carriage floundering through the ruts, as he swears +at the postilions, and toils on to the Residenz. Hard by, +but away from the noise and brawling of the citizens and +buyers, is Wilhelmslust or Ludwigsruhe, or Monbijou, or +Versailles—it scarcely matters which—near to the city, +shut out by woods from the beggared country, the enormous, +hideous, gilded, monstrous marble palace, where the +prince is, and the Court, and the trim gardens, and huge +fountains, and the forest where the ragged peasants are +beating the game in (it is death to them to touch a feather); +and the jolly hunt sweeps by with its uniform of crimson +and gold; and the prince gallops ahead puffing his royal +horn; and his lords and mistresses ride after him; and +the stag is pulled down; and the grand huntsman gives +the knife in the midst of a chorus of bugles; and 'tis time +the Court go home to dinner; and our noble traveller, it +may be the Baron of Pöllnitz, or the Count de Königsmarck, +or the excellent Chevalier de Seingalt, sees the +procession gleaming through the trim avenues of the wood, +and hastens to the inn, and sends his noble name to the +marshal of the Court. Then our nobleman arrays himself +in green and gold, or pink and silver, in the richest Paris +mode, and is introduced by the chamberlain, and makes +his bow to the jolly prince, and the gracious princess; and +is presented to the chief lords and ladies, and then comes +supper and a bank at faro, where he loses or wins a thousand +pieces by daylight. If it is a German Court, you may +add not a little drunkenness to this picture of high life; +but German, or French, or Spanish, if you can see out of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page704">[pg 704]</span><a name="Pg704" id="Pg704" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +your palace-windows beyond the trim-cut forest vistas, +misery is lying outside; hunger is stalking about the bare +villages, listlessly following precarious husbandry; ploughing +stony fields with starved cattle; or fearfully taking in +scanty harvests. Augustus is fat and jolly on his throne; +he can knock down an ox, and eat one almost; his mistress +Aurora von Königsmarck is the loveliest, the wittiest +creature; his diamonds are the biggest and most brilliant +in the world, and his feasts as splendid as those of Versailles. +As for Louis the Great, he is more than mortal. Lift up +your glances respectfully, and mark him eyeing Madame +de Fontanges or Madame de Montespan from under his +sublime periwig, as he passes through the great gallery +where Villars and Vendôme, and Berwick, and Bossuet, +and Massillon are waiting. Can Court be more splendid; +nobles and knights more gallant and superb; ladies more +lovely? A grander monarch, or a more miserable starved +wretch than the peasant his subject, you cannot look on. +Let us bear both these types in mind, if we wish to estimate +the old society properly. Remember the glory and the +chivalry? Yes! Remember the grace and beauty, the +splendour and lofty politeness; the gallant courtesy of +Fontenoy, where the French line bids the gentlemen of +the English guard to fire first; the noble constancy of the +old king and Villars his general, who fits out the last army +with the last crown-piece from the treasury, and goes to +meet the enemy and die or conquer for France at Denain. +But round all that royal splendour lies a nation enslaved +and ruined: there are people robbed of their rights—communities +laid waste—faith, justice, commerce trampled +upon, and wellnigh destroyed—nay, in the very centre of +royalty itself, what horrible stains and meanness, crime and +shame! It is but to a silly harlot that some of the noblest +gentlemen, and some of the proudest women in the world, +are bowing down; it is the price of a miserable province +that the king ties in diamonds round his mistress's white +neck. In the first half of the last century, I say, this is +going on all Europe over. Saxony is a waste as well as +Picardy or Artois; and Versailles is only larger and not +worse than Herrenhausen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/portraits.png" width="700" height="596" alt="Illustration" title="Two Portraits" /><div class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em">Two Portraits</div></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was the first Elector of Hanover who made the +fortunate match which bestowed the race of Hanoverian +Sovereigns upon us Britons. Nine years after Charles +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page705">[pg 705]</span><a name="Pg705" id="Pg705" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Stuart lost his head, his niece Sophia, one of many children +of another luckless dethroned sovereign, the Elector +Palatine, married Ernest Augustus of Brunswick, and +brought the reversion to the crown of the three kingdoms +in her scanty trousseau. One of the handsomest, the most +cheerful, sensible, shrewd, accomplished of women was +Sophia,<a id="noteref_186" name="noteref_186" href="#note_186"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">186</span></span></a> +daughter of poor Frederick, the winter king of +Bohemia. The other daughters of lovely, unhappy Elizabeth +Stuart went off into the Catholic Church; this one, +luckily for her family, remained, I cannot say faithful to +the Reformed Religion, but at least she adopted no other. +An agent of the French king's, Gourville, a convert himself, +strove to bring her and her husband to a sense of the +truth; and tells us that he one day asked madame the +Duchess of Hanover, of what religion her daughter was, +then a pretty girl of thirteen years old. The duchess +replied that the princess <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">was of no religion as yet</span></em>. They +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page706">[pg 706]</span><a name="Pg706" id="Pg706" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +were waiting to know of what religion her husband would +be, Protestant or Catholic, before instructing her! And +the Duke of Hanover having heard all Gourville's proposal, +said that a change would be advantageous to his house, +but that he himself was too old to change. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This shrewd woman had such keen eyes that she knew +how to shut them upon occasion, and was blind to many +faults which it appeared that her husband the Bishop of +Osnaburg and Duke of Hanover committed. He loved to +take his pleasure like other sovereigns—was a merry +prince, fond of dinner and the bottle; liked to go to Italy, +as his brothers had done before him; and we read how he +jovially sold 6,700 of his Hanoverians to the seigniory of +Venice. They went bravely off to the Morea, under +command of Ernest's son, Prince Max, and only 1,400 of +them ever came home again. The German princes sold +a good deal of this kind of stock. You may remember +how George III's Government purchased Hessians, and +the use we made of them during the War of Independence. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The ducats Duke Ernest got for his soldiers he spent in +a series of the most brilliant entertainments. Nevertheless, +the jovial prince was economical, and kept a steady eye +upon his own interests. He achieved the electoral dignity +for himself: he married his eldest son George to his beautiful +cousin of Zell; and sending his sons out in command of +armies to fight—now on this side, now on that—he lived on, +taking his pleasure, and scheming his schemes, a merry, +wise prince enough, not, I fear, a moral prince, of which +kind we shall have but very few specimens in the course +of these lectures. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Ernest Augustus had seven children in all, some of +whom were scapegraces, and rebelled against the parental +system of primogeniture and non-division of property which +the Elector ordained. <span class="tei tei-q">“Gustchen,”</span> the Electress writes about +her second son:—<span class="tei tei-q">“Poor Gus is thrust out, and his father +will give him no more keep. I laugh in the day, and cry +all night about it; for I am a fool with my children.”</span> +Three of the six died fighting against Turks, Tartars, +Frenchmen. One of them conspired, revolted, fled to +Rome, leaving an agent behind him, whose head was taken +off. The daughter, of whose early education we have +made mention, was married to the Elector of Brandenburg, +and so her religion settled finally on the Protestant side. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page707">[pg 707]</span><a name="Pg707" id="Pg707" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A niece of the Electress Sophia—who had been made to +change her religion, and marry the Duke of Orleans, brother +of the French king; a woman whose honest heart was +always with her friends and dear old Deutschland, though +her fat little body was confined at Paris or Marly, or Versailles—has +left us, in her enormous correspondence (part of which +has been printed in German and French), recollections of +the Electress, and of George her son. Elizabeth Charlotte +was at Osnaburg when George was born (1660). She +narrowly escaped a whipping for being in the way on that +auspicious day. She seems not to have liked little George, +nor George grown up; and represents him as odiously hard, +cold, and silent. Silent he may have been: not a jolly +prince like his father before him, but a prudent, quiet, +selfish potentate, going his own way, managing his own +affairs, and understanding his own interests remarkably well. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In his father's lifetime, and at the head of the Hanover +forces of 8,000 or 10,000 men, George served the Emperor, +on the Danube against Turks, at the siege of Vienna, in +Italy, and on the Rhine. When he succeeded to the +Electorate, he handled its affairs with great prudence and +dexterity. He was very much liked by his people of +Hanover. He did not show his feelings much, but he cried +heartily on leaving them; as they used for joy when he +came back. He showed an uncommon prudence and coolness +of behaviour when he came into his kingdom; exhibiting +no elation; reasonably doubtful whether he should not +be turned out some day; looking upon himself only as +a lodger, and making the most of his brief tenure of St. +James's and Hampton Court; plundering, it is true, somewhat, +and dividing amongst his German followers; but +what could be expected of a sovereign who at home could +sell his subjects at so many ducats per head, and made +no scruple in so disposing of them? I fancy a considerable +shrewdness, prudence, and even moderation in his ways. +The German Protestant was a cheaper, and better, and +kinder king than the Catholic Stuart in whose chair he +sat, and so far loyal to England, that he let England govern +herself. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Having these lectures in view I made it my business to +visit that ugly cradle in which our Georges were nursed. +The old town of Hanover must look still pretty much as +in the time when George Louis left it. The gardens and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page708">[pg 708]</span><a name="Pg708" id="Pg708" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +pavilions of Herrenhausen are scarce changed since the day +when the stout old Electress Sophia fell down in her last +walk there, preceding but by a few weeks to the tomb +James II's daughter, whose death made way for the +Brunswick Stuarts in England. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The two first royal Georges, and their father, Ernest +Augustus, had quite royal notions regarding marriage; and +Louis XIV and Charles II scarce distinguished themselves +more at Versailles or St. James's, than these German sultans +in their little city on the banks of the Leine. You may see +at Herrenhausen the very rustic theatre in which the Platens +danced and performed masques, and sang before the Elector +and his sons. There are the very fauns and dryads of +stone still glimmering through the branches, still grinning +and piping their ditties of no tone, as in the days when +painted nymphs hung garlands round them; appeared +under their leafy arcades with gilt crooks, guiding rams +with gilt horns; descended from <span class="tei tei-q">“machines”</span> in the guise +of Diana or Minerva; and delivered immense allegorical +compliments to the princes returned home from the campaign. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That was a curious state of morals and politics in Europe; +a queer consequence of the triumph of the monarchical +principle. Feudalism was beaten down. The nobility, in +its quarrels with the crown, had pretty well succumbed, +and the monarch was all in all. He became almost divine: +the proudest and most ancient gentry of the land did +menial service for him. Who should carry Louis XIV's +candle when he went to bed? What prince of the blood +should hold the king's shirt when his Most Christian Majesty +changed that garment?—the French memoirs of the seventeenth +century are full of such details and squabbles. The +tradition is not yet extinct in Europe. Any of you who +were present, as myriads were, at that splendid pageant, +the opening of our Crystal Palace in London, must have +seen two noble lords, great officers of the household, with +ancient pedigrees, with embroidered coats, and stars on their +breasts and wands in their hands, walking backwards for +near the space of a mile, while the royal procession made +its progress. Shall we wonder—shall we be angry—shall +we laugh at these old-world ceremonies? View them as +you will, according to your mood; and with scorn or with +respect, or with anger and sorrow, as your temper leads you. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page709">[pg 709]</span><a name="Pg709" id="Pg709" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Up goes Gesler's hat upon the pole. Salute that symbol +of sovereignty with heartfelt awe; or with a sulky shrug +of acquiescence, or with a grinning obeisance; or with +a stout rebellious No—clap your own beaver down on your +pate, and refuse to doff it, to that spangled velvet and +flaunting feather. I make no comment upon the spectators' +behaviour; all I say is, that Gesler's cap is still up in the +market-place of Europe, and not a few folks are still kneeling +to it. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Put clumsy, High Dutch statues in place of the marbles +of Versailles: fancy Herrenhausen waterworks in place of +those of Marly: spread the tables with +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Schweinskopf</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Specksuppe</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Leberkuchen</span></span>, and the like delicacies, in place +of the French <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">cuisine</span></span>; and fancy Frau von +Kielmansegge dancing with Count Kammerjunker Quirini, or singing +French songs with the most awful German accent: imagine +a coarse Versailles, and we have a Hanover before us. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am now got into the region of beauty,”</span> writes Mary +Wortley, from Hanover in 1716; <span class="tei tei-q">“all the women have +literally rosy cheeks, snowy foreheads and necks, jet eyebrows, +to which may generally be added coal-black hair. +These perfections never leave them to the day of their +death, and have a very fine effect by candlelight; but +I could wish they were handsome with a little variety. +They resemble one another as Mrs. Salmon's Court of Great +Britain, and are in as much danger of melting away by too +nearly approaching the fire.”</span> The sly Mary Wortley saw +this painted seraglio of the first George at Hanover, the +year after his accession to the British throne. There were +great doings and feasts there. Here Lady Mary saw +George II too. <span class="tei tei-q">“I can tell you, without flattery or partiality,”</span> +she says, <span class="tei tei-q">“that our young prince has all the accomplishments +that it is possible to have at his age, with an air +of sprightliness and understanding, and a something so very +engaging in his behaviour that needs not the advantage +of his rank to appear charming.”</span> I find elsewhere similar +panegyrics upon Frederick Prince of Wales, George II's +son; and upon George III, of course, and upon George IV +in an eminent degree. It was the rule to be dazzled by +princes, and people's eyes winked quite honestly at that +royal radiance. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Electoral Court of Hanover was numerous—pretty +well paid, as times went; above all, paid with a regularity +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page710">[pg 710]</span><a name="Pg710" id="Pg710" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +which few other European Courts could boast of. Perhaps +you will be amused to know how the Electoral Court was +composed. There were the princes of the house in the first +class; in the second, the single field-marshal of the army +(the contingent was 18,000, Pöllnitz says, and the Elector +had other 14,000 troops in his pay). Then follow, in due +order, the authorities civil and military, the working privy +councillors, the generals of cavalry and infantry, in the +third class; the high chamberlain, high marshals of the +Court, high masters of the horse, the major-generals of +cavalry and infantry, in the fourth class; down to the +majors, the Hofjunkers or pages, the secretaries or assessors, +of the tenth class, of whom all were noble. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We find the master of the horse had 1,090 thalers of pay; +the high chamberlain, 2,000—a thaler being about three +shillings of our money. There were two chamberlains, and +one for the princess; five gentlemen of the chamber, and +five gentlemen ushers; eleven pages and personages to +educate these young noblemen—such as a governor, a +preceptor, a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Fechtmeister</span></span>, or fencing-master, and a +dancing ditto, this latter with a handsome salary of 400 thalers. +There were three body and Court physicians, with 800 and +500 thalers; a Court barber, 600 thalers; a Court organist; +two <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Musikanten</span></span>; four French fiddlers; twelve trumpeters, +and a bugler; so that there was plenty of music, profane +and pious, in Hanover. There were ten chamber waiters, +and twenty-four lackeys in livery; a +<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">maitre-d'hôtel</span></span>, and +attendants of the kitchen; a French cook; a body cook; +ten cooks; six cooks' assistants; two <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Braten</span></span> masters, or +masters of the roast—(one fancies enormous spits turning +slowly, and the honest masters of the roast beladling the +dripping); a pastry baker; a pie baker; and finally, +three scullions, at the modest remuneration of eleven +thalers. In the sugar-chamber there were four pastry-cooks +(for the ladies, no doubt); seven officers in the wine +and beer cellars; four bread bakers; and five men in the +plate-room. There were 600 horses in the Serene stables—no +less than twenty teams of princely carriage horses, +eight to a team; sixteen coachmen; fourteen postilions; +nineteen ostlers; thirteen helps, besides smiths, carriage-masters, +horse-doctors, and other attendants of the stable. +The female attendants were not so numerous: I grieve +to find but a dozen or fourteen of them about the Electoral +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page711">[pg 711]</span><a name="Pg711" id="Pg711" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +premises, and only two washerwomen for all the Court. +These functionaries had not so much to do as in the present +age. I own to finding a pleasure in these small-beer +chronicles. I like to people the old world, with its everyday +figures and inhabitants—not so much with heroes +fighting immense battles and inspiring repulsed battalions +to engage; or statesmen locked up in darkling cabinets +and meditating ponderous laws or dire conspiracies—as +with people occupied with their every-day work or pleasure: +my lord and lady hunting in the forest, or dancing in the +Court, or bowing to their serene highnesses as they pass in +to dinner; John Cook and his procession bringing the +meal from the kitchen; the jolly butlers bearing in the +flagons from the cellar; the stout coachman driving the +ponderous gilt wagon, with eight cream-coloured horses in +housings of scarlet velvet and morocco leather; a postilion +on the leaders, and a pair or a half-dozen of running footmen +scudding along by the side of the vehicle, with conical +caps, long silver-headed maces, which they poised as they +ran, and splendid jackets laced all over with silver and gold. +I fancy the citizens' wives and their daughters looking out +from the balconies; and the burghers over their beer and +mumm, rising up, cap in hand, as the cavalcade passes +through the town with torchbearers, trumpeters blowing +their lusty cheeks out, and squadrons of jack-booted life-guardsmen, +girt with shining cuirasses, and bestriding +thundering chargers, escorting his highness's coach from +Hanover to Herrenhausen: or halting, mayhap, at Madame +Platen's country house of Monplaisir, which lies half-way +between the summer palace and the Residenz. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the good old times of which I am treating, whilst +common men were driven off by herds, and sold to fight +the emperor's enemies on the Danube, or to bayonet King +Louis's troops of common men on the Rhine, noblemen +passed from Court to Court, seeking service with one prince +or the other, and naturally taking command of the ignoble +vulgar of soldiery which battled and died almost without +hope of promotion. Noble adventurers travelled from +Court to Court in search of employment; not merely noble +males, but noble females too; and if these latter were +beauties, and obtained the favourable notice of princes, +they stopped in the Courts, became the favourites of their +serene or royal highnesses; and received great sums of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page712">[pg 712]</span><a name="Pg712" id="Pg712" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +money and splendid diamonds; and were promoted to be +duchesses, marchionesses, and the like; and did not fall +much in public esteem for the manner in which they won +their advancement. In this way Mdlle. de Querouailles, +a beautiful French lady, came to London on a special +mission of Louis XIV, and was adopted by our grateful +country and sovereign, and figured as Duchess of Portsmouth. +In this way the beautiful Aurora of Königsmarck +travelling about found favour in the eyes of Augustus of +Saxony, and became the mother of Marshal Saxe, who gave +us a beating at Fontenoy; and in this manner the lovely +sisters Elizabeth and Melusina of Meissenbach (who had +actually been driven out of Paris, whither they had travelled +on a like errand, by the wise jealousy of the female favourite +there in possession) journeyed to Hanover, and became +favourites of the serene house there reigning. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +That beautiful Aurora von Königsmarck and her brother +are wonderful as types of bygone manners, and strange +illustrations of the morals of old days. The Königsmarcks +were descended from an ancient noble family of Brandenburgh, +a branch of which passed into Sweden, where it +enriched itself and produced several mighty men of valour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The founder of the race was Hans Christof, a famous +warrior and plunderer of the Thirty Years' War. One of +Hans's sons, Otto, appeared as ambassador at the Court of +Louis XIV, and had to make a Swedish speech at his +reception before the Most Christian King. Otto was a +famous dandy and warrior, but he forgot the speech, and +what do you think he did? Far from being disconcerted, +he recited a portion of the Swedish Catechism to His Most +Christian Majesty and his Court, not one of whom understood +his lingo with the exception of his own suite, who had +to keep their gravity as best they might. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Otto's nephew, Aurora's elder brother, Carl Johann of +Königsmarck, a favourite of Charles II, a beauty, a dandy, +a warrior, a rascal of more than ordinary mark, escaped +but deserved being hanged in England, for the murder of +Tom Thynne of Longleat. He had a little brother in +London with him at this time,—as great a beauty, as +great a dandy, as great a villain as his elder. This +lad, Philip of Königsmarck, also was implicated in the +affair; and perhaps it is a pity he ever brought his pretty +neck out of it. He went over to Hanover, and was +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page713">[pg 713]</span><a name="Pg713" id="Pg713" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +soon appointed colonel of a regiment of H. E. Highness's +dragoons. In early life he had been page in the Court of +Celle; and it was said that he and the pretty Princess +Sophia Dorothea, who by this time was married to her +cousin George the Electoral prince, had been in love with +each other as children. Their loves were now to be renewed, +not innocently, and to come to a fearful end. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A biography of the wife of George I, by Dr. Doran, has +lately appeared, and I confess I am astounded at the +verdict which that writer has delivered, and at his acquittal +of this most unfortunate lady. That she had a cold selfish +libertine of a husband no one can doubt; but that the +bad husband had a bad wife is equally clear. She was +married to her cousin for money or convenience, as all +princesses were married. She was most beautiful, lively, +witty, accomplished: his brutality outraged her: his silence +and coldness chilled her: his cruelty insulted her. No +wonder she did not love him. How could love be a part +of the compact in such a marriage as that? With this +unlucky heart to dispose of, the poor creature bestowed it +on Philip of Königsmarck, than whom a greater scamp +does not walk the history of the seventeenth century. +A hundred and eighty years after the fellow was thrust +into his unknown grave, a Swedish professor lights upon +a box of letters in the University Library at Upsala, written +by Philip and Dorothea to each other, and telling their +miserable story. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The bewitching Königsmarck had conquered two female +hearts in Hanover. Besides the Electoral prince's lovely +young wife Sophia Dorothea, Philip had inspired a passion +in a hideous old Court lady, the Countess of Platen. The +princess seems to have pursued him with the fidelity of +many years. Heaps of letters followed him on his campaigns, +and were answered by the daring adventurer. The +princess wanted to fly with him; to quit her odious husband +at any rate. She besought her parents to receive her +back; had a notion of taking refuge in France and going +over to the Catholic religion; had absolutely packed her +jewels for flight, and very likely arranged its details with +her lover, in that last long night's interview, after which +Philip of Königsmarck was seen no more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Königsmarck, inflamed with drink—there is scarcely any +vice of which, according to his own showing, this gentleman +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page714">[pg 714]</span><a name="Pg714" id="Pg714" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +was not a practitioner—had boasted at a supper at +Dresden of his intimacy with the two Hanoverian ladies, +not only with the princess, but with another lady powerful +in Hanover. The Countess Platen, the old favourite of the +Elector, hated the young Electoral princess. The young +lady had a lively wit, and constantly made fun of the old +one. The princess's jokes were conveyed to the old Platen +just as our idle words are carried about at this present day: +and so they both hated each other. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The characters in the tragedy, of which the curtain was +now about to fall, are about as dark a set as eye ever rested +on. There is the jolly prince, shrewd, selfish, scheming, +loving his cups and his ease (I think his good humour makes +the tragedy but darker); his princess, who speaks little +but observes all; his old, painted Jezebel of a mistress; +his son, the Electoral prince, shrewd too, quiet, selfish, not +ill-humoured, and generally silent, except when goaded +into fury by the intolerable tongue of his lovely wife; there +is poor Sophia Dorothea, with her coquetry and her wrongs, +and her passionate attachment to her scamp of a lover, and +her wild imprudences, and her mad artifices, and her insane +fidelity, and her furious jealousy regarding her husband +(though she loathed and cheated him), and her prodigious +falsehoods; and the confidante, of course, into whose hands +the letters are slipped; and there is Lothario, finally, than +whom, as I have said, one can't imagine a more handsome, +wicked, worthless reprobate. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/dark-deed.png" width="462" height="700" alt="Illustration" title="A Deed Of Darkness" /><div class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em">A Deed Of Darkness</div></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How that perverse fidelity of passion pursues the villain! +How madly true the woman is, and how astoundingly she +lies! She has bewitched two or three persons who have +taken her up, and they won't believe in her wrong. Like +Mary of Scotland, she finds adherents ready to conspire for +her even in history, and people who have to deal with her +are charmed, and fascinated, and bedevilled. How devotedly +Miss Strickland has stood by Mary's innocence! +Are there not scores of ladies in this audience who persist +in it too? Innocent! I remember as a boy how a great +party persisted in declaring Caroline of Brunswick was +a martyred angel. So was Helen of Greece innocent. She +never ran away with Paris, the dangerous young Trojan. +Menelaus, her husband, ill-used her, and there never was +any siege of Troy at all. So was Bluebeard's wife innocent. +She never peeped into the closet where the other wives were +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page717">[pg 717]</span><a name="Pg717" id="Pg717" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +with their heads off. She never dropped the key, or stained +it with blood; and her brothers were quite right in finishing +Bluebeard, the cowardly brute! Yes, Caroline of Brunswick +was innocent: and Madame Laffarge never poisoned +her husband; and Mary of Scotland never blew up hers; +and poor Sophia Dorothea was never unfaithful; and Eve +never took the apple—it was a cowardly fabrication of the +serpent's. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +George Louis has been held up to execration as a murderous +Bluebeard, whereas the Electoral prince had no +share in the transaction in which Philip of Königsmarck +was scuffled out of this mortal scene. The prince was +absent when the catastrophe came. The princess had had +a hundred warnings; mild hints from her husband's +parents; grim remonstrances from himself—but took no +more heed of this advice than such besotted poor wretches +do. On the night of Sunday, the 1st of July, 1694, Königsmarck +paid a long visit to the princess, and left her to get +ready for flight. Her husband was away at Berlin; her +carriages and horses were prepared and ready for the +elopement. Meanwhile, the spies of Countess Platen had +brought the news to their mistress. She went to Ernest +Augustus, and procured from the Elector an order for the +arrest of the Swede. On the way by which he was to come, +four guards were commissioned to take him. He strove to +cut his way through the four men, and wounded more than +one of them. They fell upon him; cut him down; and, +as he was lying wounded on the ground, the countess, his +enemy, whom he had betrayed and insulted, came out and +beheld him prostrate. He cursed her with his dying lips, +and the furious woman stamped upon his mouth with her +heel. He was dispatched presently; his body burnt the +next day; and all traces of the man disappeared. The +guards who killed him were enjoined silence under severe +penalties. The princess was reported to be ill in her apartments, +from which she was taken in October of the same +year, being then eight-and-twenty years old, and consigned +to the castle of Ahlden, where she remained a prisoner for +no less than thirty-two years. A separation had been +pronounced previously between her and her husband. She +was called henceforth the <span class="tei tei-q">“Princess of Ahlden”</span>, and her +silent husband no more uttered her name. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Four years after the Königsmarck catastrophe, Ernest +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page718">[pg 718]</span><a name="Pg718" id="Pg718" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Augustus, the first Elector of Hanover, died, and George +Louis, his son, reigned in his stead. Sixteen years he +reigned in Hanover, after which he became, as we know, +King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, Defender of +the Faith. The wicked old Countess Platen died in the +year 1706. She had lost her sight, but nevertheless the +legend says that she constantly saw Königsmarck's ghost +by her wicked old bed. And so there was an end of her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the year 1700, the little Duke of Gloucester, the last +of poor Queen Anne's children, died, and the folks of +Hanover straightway became of prodigious importance in +England. The Electress Sophia was declared the next in +succession to the English throne. George Louis was created +Duke of Cambridge; grand deputations were sent over +from our country to Deutschland; but Queen Anne, whose +weak heart hankered after her relatives at St. Germains, +never could be got to allow her cousin, the Elector Duke of +Cambridge, to come and pay his respects to her Majesty, +and take his seat in her House of Peers. Had the queen +lasted a month longer; had the English Tories been as bold +and resolute as they were clever and crafty; had the prince +whom the nation loved and pitied been equal to his fortune, +George Louis had never talked German in St. James's +Chapel Royal. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the crown did come to George Louis he was in no +hurry about putting it on. He waited at home for awhile; +took an affecting farewell of his dear Hanover and Herrenhausen; +and set out in the most leisurely manner to ascend +<span class="tei tei-q">“the throne of his ancestors”</span>, as he called it in his first +speech to Parliament. He brought with him a compact body +of Germans, whose society he loved, and whom he kept +round the royal person. He had his faithful German +chamberlains; his German secretaries; his negroes, captives +of his bow and spear in Turkish wars; his two ugly, +elderly German favourites, Mesdames of Kielmansegge and +Schulenberg, whom he created respectively Countess of +Darlington and Duchess of Kendal. The duchess was tall, +and lean of stature, and hence was irreverently nicknamed +the Maypole. The countess was a large-sized noblewoman, +and this elevated personage was denominated the Elephant. +Both of these ladies loved Hanover and its delights; clung +round the linden-trees of the great Herrenhausen avenue, +and at first would not quit the place. Schulenberg, in fact, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page719">[pg 719]</span><a name="Pg719" id="Pg719" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +could not come on account of her debts; but finding the +Maypole would not come, the Elephant packed up her +trunk and slipped out of Hanover unwieldy as she was. +On this the Maypole straightway put herself in motion, and +followed her beloved George Louis. One seems to be +speaking of Captain Macheath, and Polly, and Lucy. The +king we had selected; the courtiers who came in his train; +the English nobles who came to welcome him, and on many +of whom the shrewd old cynic turned his back—I protest +it is a wonderful satirical picture. I am a citizen waiting +at Greenwich pier, say, and crying hurrah for King George; +and yet I can scarcely keep my countenance, and help +laughing at the enormous absurdity of this advent! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here we are, all on our knees. Here is the Archbishop +of Canterbury prostrating himself to the head of his Church, +with Kielmansegge and Schulenberg with their raddled +cheeks grinning behind the Defender of the Faith. Here is +my Lord Duke of Marlborough kneeling too, the greatest +warrior of all times; he who betrayed King William—betrayed +King James II—betrayed Queen Anne—betrayed +England to the French, the Elector to the Pretender, the +Pretender to the Elector; and here are my Lords Oxford +and Bolingbroke, the latter of whom has just tripped up +the heels of the former; and if a month's more time had +been allowed him, would have had King James at Westminster. +The great Whig gentlemen made their bows and +congees with proper decorum and ceremony; but yonder +keen old schemer knows the value of their loyalty. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Loyalty,”</span> he must think, <span class="tei tei-q">“as applied to me—it is absurd! +There are fifty nearer heirs to the throne than I am. I am +but an accident, and you fine Whig gentlemen take me for +your own sake, not for mine. You Tories hate me; you +archbishop, smirking on your knees, and prating about +Heaven, you know I don't care a fig for your Thirty-nine +Articles, and can't understand a word of your stupid +sermons. You, my Lords Bolingbroke and Oxford—you +know you were conspiring against me a month ago; and +you, my Lord Duke of Marlborough—you would sell me or +any man else, if you found your advantage in it. Come, +my good Melusina, come, my honest Sophia, let us go into +my private room, and have some oysters and some Rhine +wine, and some pipes afterwards: let us make the best +of our situation; let us take what we can get, and leave +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page720">[pg 720]</span><a name="Pg720" id="Pg720" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +these bawling, brawling, lying English to shout, and fight, +and cheat, in their own way!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If Swift had not been committed to the statesmen of the +losing side, what a fine satirical picture we might have had +of that general <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">sauve qui peut</span></span> +amongst the Tory party! +How mum the Tories became; how the House of Lords +and House of Commons chopped round; and how decorously +the majorities welcomed King George! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Bolingbroke, making his last speech in the House of +Lords, pointed out the shame of peerage, where several +lords concurred to condemn in one general vote all that +they had approved in former Parliaments by many particular +resolutions. And so their conduct was shameful. St. John +had the best of the argument, but the worst of the vote. +Bad times were come for him. He talked philosophy, and +professed innocence. He courted retirement, and was +ready to meet persecution; but, hearing that honest +Mat Prior, who had been recalled from Paris, was about to +peach regarding the past transactions, the philosopher +bolted, and took that magnificent head of his out of the +ugly reach of the axe. Oxford, the lazy and good-humoured, +had more courage, and awaited the storm at home. He +and Mat Prior both had lodgings in the Tower, and both +brought their heads safe out of that dangerous menagerie. +When Atterbury was carried off to the same den a few years +afterwards, and it was asked, what next should be done +with him? <span class="tei tei-q">“Done with him? Fling him to the lions,”</span> +Cadogan said, Marlborough's lieutenant. But the British +lion of those days did not care much for drinking the blood +of peaceful peers and poets, or crunching the bones of +bishops. Only four men were executed in London for the +rebellion of 1715; and twenty-two in Lancashire. Above +a thousand taken in arms, submitted to the king's mercy, +and petitioned to be transported to his Majesty's colonies +in America. I have heard that their descendants took the +loyalist side in the disputes which arose sixty years after. +It is pleasant to find that a friend of ours, worthy Dick +Steele, was for letting off the rebels with their lives. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As one thinks of what might have been, how amusing +the speculation is! We know how the doomed Scottish +gentlemen came out at Lord Mar's summons, mounted the +white cockade, that has been a flower of sad poetry ever +since, and rallied round the ill-omened Stuart standard at +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page721">[pg 721]</span><a name="Pg721" id="Pg721" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Braemar. Mar, with 8,000 men, and but 1,500 opposed to +him, might have driven the enemy over the Tweed, and +taken possession of the whole of Scotland; but that the +Pretender's duke did not venture to move when the day was +his own. Edinburgh Castle might have been in King +James's hands; but that the men who were to escalade it +stayed to drink his health at the tavern, and arrived two +hours too late at the rendezvous under the castle wall. +There was sympathy enough in the town—the projected +attack seems to have been known there—Lord Mahon +quotes Sinclair's account of a gentleman not concerned, +who told Sinclair, that he was in a house that evening +where eighteen of them were drinking, as the facetious +landlady said, <span class="tei tei-q">“powdering their hair,”</span> for the attack of the +castle. Suppose they had not stopped to powder their +hair? Edinburgh Castle, and town, and all Scotland were +King James's. The north of England rises, and marches +over Barnet Heath upon London. Wyndham is up in +Somersetshire; Packington in Worcestershire; and Vivian +in Cornwall. The Elector of Hanover, and his hideous +mistresses, pack up the plate, and perhaps the crown jewels +in London, and are off <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">via</span></span> Harwich and Helvoetsluys, for +dear old Deutschland. The king—God save him!—lands +at Dover, with tumultuous applause; shouting multitudes, +roaring cannon, the Duke of Marlborough weeping tears of +joy, and all the bishops kneeling in the mud. In a few +years, mass is said in St. Paul's; matins and vespers are +sung in York Minster; and Dr. Swift is turned out of his +stall and deanery house at St. Patrick's, to give place to +Father Dominic, from Salamanca. All these changes were +possible then, and once thirty years afterwards—all this we +might have had, but for the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">pulveris +exigui jactu</span></span>, that little +toss of powder for the hair which the Scotch conspirators +stopped to take at the tavern. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +You understand the distinction I would draw between +history—of which I do not aspire to be an expounder—and +manners and life such as these sketches would describe. +The rebellion breaks out in the north; its story is before +you in a hundred volumes, in none more fairly than in +the excellent narrative of Lord Mahon, The clans are up +in Scotland; Derwentwater, Nithsdale and Forster are in +arms in Northumberland—these are matters of history, for +which you are referred to the due chroniclers. The Guards +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page722">[pg 722]</span><a name="Pg722" id="Pg722" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +are set to watch the streets, and prevent the people wearing +white roses. I read presently of a couple of soldiers almost +flogged to death for wearing oak boughs in their hats on +the 29th of May—another badge of the beloved Stuarts. +It is with these we have to do, rather than the marches +and battles of the armies to which the poor fellows belonged—with +statesmen, and how they looked, and how they +lived, rather than with measures of state, which belong +to history alone. For example, at the close of the old +queen's reign, it is known the Duke of Marlborough left +the kingdom—after what menaces, after what prayers, lies, +bribes offered, taken, refused, accepted; after what dark +doubling and tacking, let history, if she can or dare, say. +The queen dead; who so eager to return as my lord +duke? Who shouts God save the king! so lustily as the +great conqueror of Blenheim and Malplaquet? (By the +way, he will send over some more money for the Pretender +yet, on the sly.) Who lays his hand on his blue ribbon, +and lifts his eyes more gracefully to heaven than this hero? +He makes a quasi-triumphal entrance into London, by +Temple Bar, in his enormous gilt coach—and the enormous +gilt coach breaks down somewhere by Chancery Lane, and +his highness is obliged to get another. There it is we have +him. We are with the mob in the crowd, not with the great +folks in the procession. We are not the Historic Muse, +but her ladyship's attendant, tale-bearer—valet de chambre—for +whom no man is a hero; and, as yonder one steps +from his carriage to the next handy conveyance, we take +the number of the hack; we look all over at his stars, +ribbons, embroidery; we think within ourselves, O you +unfathomable schemer! O you warrior invincible! O you +beautiful smiling Judas! What master would you not kiss +or betray? What traitor's head, blackening on the spikes +on yonder gate, ever hatched a tithe of the treason which +has worked under your periwig? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We have brought our Georges to London city, and if we +would behold its aspect, may see it in Hogarth's lively +perspective of Cheapside, or read of it in a hundred contemporary +books which paint the manners of that age. +Our dear old <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> looks smiling upon the streets, with +their innumerable signs, and describes them with his +charming humour. <span class="tei tei-q">“Our streets are filled with <span class="tei tei-q">‘Blue Boars’</span>, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Black Swans’</span>, and <span class="tei tei-q">‘Red Lions’</span>, not to mention <span class="tei tei-q">‘Flying +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page723">[pg 723]</span><a name="Pg723" id="Pg723" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Pigs’</span> and <span class="tei tei-q">‘Hogs in Armour’</span>, with other creatures more +extraordinary than any in the deserts of Africa.”</span> A few of +these quaint old figures still remain in London town. You +may still see there, and over its old hostel in Ludgate Hill, +the <span class="tei tei-q">“Belle Sauvage”</span> to whom the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> so pleasantly +alludes in that paper; and who was, probably, no other +than the sweet American Pocahontas, who rescued from +death the daring Captain Smith. There is the <span class="tei tei-q">“Lion's Head'”</span> +down whose jaws the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator's</span></span> own letters were passed; +and over a great banker's in Fleet Street, the effigy of the +wallet, which the founder of the firm bore when he came +into London a country boy. People this street, so ornamented +with crowds of swinging chairmen, with servants +bawling to clear the way, with Mr. Dean in his cassock, +his lackey marching before him; or Mrs. Dinah in her +sack, tripping to chapel, her footboy carrying her ladyship's +great Prayer-book; with itinerant tradesmen, singing +their hundred cries (I remember forty years ago, as a boy +in London city, a score of cheery, familiar cries that are +silent now). Fancy the beaux thronging to the chocolate-houses, +tapping their snuff-boxes as they issue thence, their +periwigs appearing over the red curtains. Fancy Saccharissa +beckoning and smiling from the upper windows, and +a crowd of soldiers brawling and bustling at the door—gentlemen +of the Life Guards, clad in scarlet, with blue +facings, and laced with gold at the seams; gentlemen of +the Horse Grenadiers, in their caps of sky-blue cloth, with +the garter embroidered on the front in gold and silver; +men of the Halberdiers, in their long red coats, as bluff Harry +left them, with their ruffs and velvet flat caps. Perhaps +the king's Majesty himself is going to St. James's as we +pass. If he is going to Parliament, he is in his coach-and-eight, +surrounded by his guards and the high officers of his +crown. Otherwise his Majesty only uses a chair, with six +footmen walking before, and six yeomen of the guard at +the sides of the sedan. The officers in waiting follow the +king in coaches. It must be rather slow work. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Our <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span> are full of +delightful glimpses of the town life of those days. In the company of that +charming guide, we may go to the opera, the comedy, the +puppet show, the auction, even the cockpit: we can take +boat at Temple Stairs, and accompany Sir Roger de Coverley +and Mr. Spectator to Spring Garden—it will be called +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page724">[pg 724]</span><a name="Pg724" id="Pg724" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Vauxhall a few years since, when Hogarth will paint for +it. Would you not like to step back into the past, and +be introduced to Mr. Addison?—not the Right Honourable +Joseph Addison, Esq., George I's Secretary of State, but +to the delightful painter of contemporary manners; the +man who, when in good humour himself, was the pleasantest +companion in all England. I should like to go into Lockit's +with him, and drink a bowl along with Sir R. Steele (who +has just been knighted by King George, and who does not +happen to have any money to pay his share of the reckoning). +I should not care to follow Mr. Addison to his secretary's +office in Whitehall. There we get into politics. Our business +is pleasure, and the town, and the coffee-house, and +the theatre, and the Mall. Delightful <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator!</span></span> kind +friend of leisure hours! happy companion! true Christian +gentleman! How much greater, better, you are than the +king Mr. Secretary kneels to! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +You can have foreign testimony about old-world London, +if you like; and my before-quoted friend, Charles Louis, +Baron de Pöllnitz, will conduct us to it. <span class="tei tei-q">“A man of +sense,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“or a fine gentleman, is never at a loss +for company in London, and this is the way the latter +passes his time. He rises late, puts on a frock, and, leaving +his sword at home, takes his cane, and goes where he +pleases. The Park is commonly the place where he walks, +because 'tis the Exchange for men of quality. 'Tis the +same thing as the Tuileries at Paris, only the Park has +a certain beauty of simplicity which cannot be described. +The grand walk is called the Mall; is full of people at +every hour of the day, but especially at morning and +evening, when their Majesties often walk with the royal +family, who are attended only by a half-dozen yeomen of +the guard, and permit all persons to walk at the same +time with them. The ladies and gentlemen always appear +in rich dresses, for the English, who, twenty years ago, +did not wear gold lace but in their army, are now embroidered +and bedaubed as much as the French. I speak +of persons of quality; for the citizen still contents himself +with a suit of fine cloth, a good hat and wig, and fine linen. +Everybody is well clothed here, and even the beggars don't +make so ragged an appearance as they do elsewhere.”</span> After +our friend, the man of quality, has had his morning or +undress walk in the Mall, he goes home to dress, and then +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page725">[pg 725]</span><a name="Pg725" id="Pg725" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +saunters to some coffee-house or chocolate-house frequented +by the persons he would see. <span class="tei tei-q">“For 'tis a rule with the +English to go once a day at least to houses of this sort, +where they talk of business and news, read the papers, +and often look at one another without opening their lips. +And 'tis very well they are so mute: for were they all as +talkative as people of other nations, the coffee-houses would +be intolerable, and there would be no hearing what one +man said where they are so many. The chocolate-house +in St. James's Street, where I go every morning to pass +away the time, is always so full that a man can scarce +turn about in it.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Delightful as London city was, King George I liked to +be out of it as much as ever he could; and when there, +passed all his time with his Germans. It was with them +as with Blücher 100 years afterwards, when the bold old +Reiter looked down from St. Paul's, and sighed out, +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="de" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="de"><span style="font-style: italic">Was für Plunder!</span></span>”</span> +The German women plundered; the German +secretaries plundered; the German cooks and intendants +plundered; even Mustapha and Mahomet, the German +negroes, had a share of the booty. Take what you can +get, was the old monarch's maxim. He was not a lofty +monarch, certainly: he was not a patron of the fine arts: +but he was not a hypocrite, he was not revengeful, he was +not extravagant. Though a despot in Hanover, he was +a moderate ruler in England. His aim was to leave it to +itself as much as possible, and to live out of it as much +as he could. His heart was in Hanover. When taken ill +on his last journey, as he was passing through Holland, +he thrust his livid head out of the coach-window, and +gasped out, <span class="tei tei-q">“Osnaburg, Osnaburg!”</span> He was more than +fifty years of age when he came amongst us: we took +him because we wanted him, because he served our turn; +we laughed at his uncouth German ways, and sneered at +him. He took our loyalty for what it was worth; laid +hands on what money he could; kept us assuredly from +Popery and wooden shoes. I, for one, would have been +on his side in those days. Cynical, and selfish, as he was, +he was better than a king out of St. Germains with the +French king's orders in his pocket, and a swarm of Jesuits +in his train. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Fates are supposed to interest themselves about +royal personages; and so this one had omens and prophecies +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page726">[pg 726]</span><a name="Pg726" id="Pg726" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +specially regarding him. He was said to be much disturbed +at a prophecy that he should die very soon after his wife; +and sure enough, pallid Death, having seized upon the +luckless princess in her castle of Ahlden, presently pounced +upon H.M. King George I, in his travelling chariot, on the +Hanover road. What postilion can outride that pale horseman? +It is said, George promised one of his left-handed +widows to come to her after death, if leave were granted +to him to revisit the glimpses of the moon; and soon +after his demise, a great raven actually flying or hopping +in at the Duchess of Kendal's window at Twickenham, she +chose to imagine the king's spirit inhabited these plumes, +and took special care of her sable visitor. Affecting metempsychosis—funereal +royal bird! How pathetic is the idea +of the duchess weeping over it! When this chaste addition +to our English aristocracy died, all her jewels, her plate, +her plunder went over to her relations in Hanover. I +wonder whether her heirs took the bird, and whether it +is still flapping its wings over Herrenhausen? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The days are over in England of that strange religion +of king-worship, when priests flattered princes in the Temple +of God; when servility was held to be ennobling duty; +when beauty and youth tried eagerly for royal favour; +and woman's shame was held to be no dishonour. Mended +morals and mended manners in Courts and people, are +among the priceless consequences of the freedom which +George I came to rescue and secure. He kept his compact +with his English subjects; and if he escaped no more than +other men and monarchs from the vices of his age, at least +we may thank him for preserving and transmitting the +liberties of ours. In our free air, royal and humble homes +have alike been purified; and Truth, the birthright of high +and low among us, which quite fearlessly judges our greatest +personages, can only speak of them now in words of respect +and regard. There are stains in the portrait of the first +George, and traits in it which none of us need admire; +but, among the nobler features are justice, courage, moderation—and +these we may recognize ere we turn the picture +to the wall. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page727">[pg 727]</span><a name="Pg727" id="Pg727" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc123" id="toc123"></a> +<a name="pdf124" id="pdf124"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">George The Second</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the afternoon of the +14th of June, 1727, two +horsemen might have +been perceived galloping +along the road +from Chelsea to Richmond. +The foremost, +cased in the jackboots +of the period, was +a broad-faced, jolly-looking, +and very corpulent +cavalier; but, +by the manner in which +he urged his horse, +you might see that +he was a bold as well as a skilful rider. Indeed, no +man loved sport better; and in the hunting-fields of Norfolk, +no squire rode more boldly after the fox, or cheered +Ringwood and Sweettips more lustily, than he who now +thundered over the Richmond road. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He speedily reached Richmond Lodge, and asked to see +the owner of the mansion. The mistress of the house and +her ladies, to whom our friend was admitted, said he could +not be introduced to the master, however pressing the +business might be. The master was asleep after his dinner; +he always slept after his dinner: and woe be to the person +who interrupted him! Nevertheless, our stout friend of +the jackboots put the affrighted ladies aside, opened the +forbidden door of the bedroom, wherein upon the bed lay +a little gentleman; and here the eager messenger knelt +down in his jackboots. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He on the bed started up, and with many oaths and +a strong German accent asked who was there, and who +dared to disturb him? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am Sir Robert Walpole,”</span> said the messenger. The +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page728">[pg 728]</span><a name="Pg728" id="Pg728" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +awakened sleeper hated Sir Robert Walpole. <span class="tei tei-q">“I have the +honour to announce to your Majesty that your royal father, +King George I, died at Osnaburg, on Saturday last, the +10th inst.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Dat is one big lie!</span></em>”</span> roared out his sacred Majesty King +George II: but Sir Robert Walpole stated the fact, and +from that day until three-and-thirty years after, George, +the second of the name, ruled over England. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How the king made away with his father's will under +the astonished nose of the Archbishop of Canterbury; how +he was a choleric little sovereign; how he shook his fist +in the face of his father's courtiers; how he kicked his +coat and wig about in his rages, and called everybody thief, +liar, rascal, with whom he differed: you will read in all +the history books; and how he speedily and shrewdly +reconciled himself with the bold minister, whom he had +hated during his father's life, and by whom he was served +during fifteen years of his own with admirable prudence, +fidelity, and success. But for Sir Robert Walpole, we +should have had the Pretender back again. But for his +obstinate love of peace, we should have had wars, which +the nation was not strong enough nor united enough to +endure. But for his resolute counsels and good-humoured +resistance we might have had German despots attempting +a Hanoverian regimen over us: we should have had revolt, +commotion, want, and tyrannous misrule, in place of a +quarter of a century of peace, freedom, and material prosperity, +such as the country never enjoyed, until that +corrupter of Parliaments, that dissolute tipsy cynic, that +courageous lover of peace and liberty, that great citizen, +patriot, and statesman governed it. In religion he was +little better than a heathen; cracked ribald jokes at bigwigs +and bishops, and laughed at High Church and Low. +In private life the old pagan revelled in the lowest pleasures: +he passed his Sundays tippling at Richmond; and his +holidays bawling after dogs, or boozing at Houghton with +boors over beef and punch. He cared for letters no more +than his master did: he judged human nature so meanly +that one is ashamed to have to own that he was right, +and that men could be corrupted by means so base. But, +with his hireling House of Commons, he defended liberty +for us; with his incredulity he kept Church-craft down. There +were parsons at Oxford as double-dealing and dangerous +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page731">[pg 731]</span><a name="Pg731" id="Pg731" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as any priests out of Rome, and he routed them both. +He gave Englishmen no conquests, but he gave them peace, +and ease, and freedom; the three per cents nearly at par; +and wheat at five-and six-and-twenty shillings a quarter. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/ave-caesar.png" width="502" height="700" alt="Illustration" title="Ave Caesar" /><div class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em">Ave Caesar</div></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was lucky for us that our first Georges were not more +high-minded men; especially fortunate that they loved +Hanover so much as to leave England to have her own +way. Our chief troubles began when we got a king who +gloried in the name of Briton, and, being born in the +country, proposed to rule it. He was no more fit to govern +England than his grandfather and great-grandfather, who +did not try. It was righting itself during their occupation. +The dangerous, noble old spirit of cavalier loyalty was +dying out; the stately old English High Church was +emptying itself: the questions dropping, which, on one +side and the other;—the side of loyalty, prerogative, +church, and king;—the side of right, truth, civil and religious +freedom,—had set generations of brave men in +arms. By the time when George III came to the throne, +the combat between loyalty and liberty was come to an +end; and Charles Edward, old, tipsy, and childless, was +dying in Italy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Those who are curious about European Court history of +the last age know the memoirs of the Margravine of Bayreuth, +and what a Court was that of Berlin, where George II's +cousins ruled sovereign. Frederick the Great's father +knocked down his sons, daughters, officers of state; he +kidnapped big men all Europe over to make grenadiers of; +his feasts, his parades, his wine parties, his tobacco parties, +are all described. Jonathan Wild the Great in language, +pleasures, and behaviour, is scarcely more delicate than +this German sovereign. Louis XV, his life, and reign, and +doings, are told in a thousand French memoirs. Our +George II, at least, was not a worse king than his neighbours. +He claimed and took the royal exemption from +doing right which sovereigns assumed. A dull little man +of low tastes he appears to us in England; yet Hervey +tells us that this choleric prince was a great sentimentalist, +and that his letters—of which he wrote prodigious quantities—were +quite dangerous in their powers of fascination. He +kept his sentimentalities for his Germans and his queen. +With us English, he never chose to be familiar. He has +been accused of avarice, yet he did not give much money, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page732">[pg 732]</span><a name="Pg732" id="Pg732" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and did not leave much behind him. He did not love the +fine arts, but he did not pretend to love them. He was +no more a hypocrite about religion than his father. He +judged men by a low standard; yet, with such men as +were near him, was he wrong in judging as he did? He +readily detected lying and flattery, and liars and flatterers +were perforce his companions. Had he been more of +a dupe he might have been more amiable. A dismal +experience made him cynical. No boon was it to him to +be clear-sighted, and see only selfishness and flattery round +about him. What could Walpole tell him about his Lords +and Commons, but that they were all venal? Did not +his clergy, his courtiers, bring him the same story? Dealing +with men and women in his rude, sceptical way, he +comes to doubt about honour, male and female, about +patriotism, about religion. <span class="tei tei-q">“He is wild, but he fights like +a man,”</span> George I, the taciturn, said of his son and successor. +Courage George II certainly had. The Electoral Prince, +at the head of his father's contingent, had approved himself +a good and brave soldier under Eugene and Marlborough. +At Oudenarde he specially distinguished himself. At +Malplaquet the other claimant to the English throne won +but little honour. There was always a question about +James's courage. Neither then in Flanders, nor afterwards +in his own ancient kingdom of Scotland, did the luckless +Pretender show much resolution. But dapper little George +had a famous tough spirit of his own, and fought like +a Trojan. He called out his brother of Prussia, with +sword and pistol; and I wish, for the interest of romancers +in general, that that famous duel could have taken place. +The two sovereigns hated each other with all their might; +their seconds were appointed; the place of meeting was +settled; and the duel was only prevented by strong representations +made to the two, of the European laughter which +would have been caused by such a transaction. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whenever we hear of dapper George at war, it is certain +that he demeaned himself like a little man of valour. At +Dettingen his horse ran away with him, and with difficulty +was stopped from carrying him into the enemy's lines. +The king, dismounting from the fiery quadruped, said +bravely: <span class="tei tei-q">“Now I know I shall not run away;”</span> and +placed himself at the head of the foot, drew his sword, +brandishing it at the whole of the French army, and calling +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page733">[pg 733]</span><a name="Pg733" id="Pg733" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +out to his own men to come on, in bad English, but with +the most famous pluck and spirit. In '45, when the +Pretender was at Derby, and many people began to look +pale, the king never lost his courage—not he. <span class="tei tei-q">“Pooh! +don't talk to me that stuff!”</span> he said, like a gallant little +prince as he was, and never for one moment allowed his +equanimity, or his business, or his pleasures, or his travels, +to be disturbed. On public festivals he always appeared +in the hat and coat he wore on the famous day of Oudenarde; +and the people laughed, but kindly, at the odd old garment, +for bravery never goes out of fashion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In private life the prince showed himself a worthy +descendant of his father. In this respect, so much has +been said about the first George's manners, that we need +not enter into a description of the son's German harem. +In 1705 he married a princess remarkable for beauty, for +cleverness, for learning, for good temper—one of the truest +and fondest wives ever prince was blessed with, and who +loved him and was faithful to him, and he, in his coarse +fashion, loved her to the last. It must be told to the +honour of Caroline of Anspach, that, at the time when +German princes thought no more of changing their religion +than you of altering your cap, she refused to give up Protestantism +for the other creed, although an Archduke, +afterwards to be an Emperor, was offered to her for a bridegroom. +Her Protestant relations in Berlin were angry at +her rebellious spirit; it was they who tried to convert her +(it is droll to think that Frederick the Great, who had no +religion at all, was known for a long time in England as +the Protestant hero), and these good Protestants set upon +Caroline a certain Father Urban, a very skilful Jesuit, and +famous winner of souls. But she routed the Jesuit; and +she refused Charles VI; and she married the little Electoral +Prince of Hanover, whom she tended with love, and with +every manner of sacrifice, with artful kindness, with tender +flattery, with entire self-devotion, thenceforward until her +life's end. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When George I made his first visit to Hanover, his son +was appointed regent during the royal absence. But this +honour was never again conferred on the Prince of Wales; +he and his father fell out presently. On the occasion of +the christening of his second son, a royal row took place, +and the prince, shaking his fist in the Duke of Newcastle's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page734">[pg 734]</span><a name="Pg734" id="Pg734" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +face, called him a rogue, and provoked his august father. +He and his wife were turned out of St. James's, and their +princely children taken from them, by order of the royal +head of the family. Father and mother wept piteously at +parting from their little ones. The young ones sent some +cherries, with their love, to papa and mamma; the parents +watered the fruit with tears. They had no tears thirty-five +years afterwards, when Prince Frederick died—their +eldest son, their heir, their enemy. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The king called his daughter-in-law <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">cette diablesse +madame la princesse</span></span>”</span>. The frequenters of the latter's Court +were forbidden to appear at the king's: their royal highnesses +going to Bath, we read how the courtiers followed +them thither, and paid that homage in Somersetshire which +was forbidden in London. That phrase of <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">cette +diablesse madame la princesse</span></span>”</span> explains one cause of the wrath of +her royal papa. She was a very clever woman: she had +a keen sense of humour: she had a dreadful tongue: she +turned into ridicule the antiquated sultan and his hideous +harem. She wrote savage letters about him home to +members of her family. So, driven out from the royal +presence, the prince and princess set up for themselves in +Leicester Fields, <span class="tei tei-q">“where,”</span> says Walpole, <span class="tei tei-q">“the most promising +of the young gentlemen of the next party, and the +prettiest and liveliest of the young ladies, formed the new +Court.”</span> Besides Leicester House, they had their lodge at +Richmond, frequented by some of the pleasantest company +of those days. There were the Herveys, and Chesterfield, +and little Mr. Pope from Twickenham, and with him, +sometimes, the savage Dean of St. Patrick's, and quite +a bevy of young ladies, whose pretty faces smile on us +out of history. There was Lepell, famous in ballad song; +and the saucy, charming Mary Bellenden, who would have +none of the Prince of Wales's fine compliments, who folded +her arms across her breast, and bade H.R.H. keep off; +and knocked his purse of guineas into his face, and told +him she was tired of seeing him count them. He was +not an august monarch, this Augustus. Walpole tells +how, one night at the royal card-table, the playful princesses +pulled a chair away from under Lady Deloraine, who, in +revenge, pulled the king's from under him, so that his +Majesty fell on the carpet. In whatever posture one sees +this royal George, he is ludicrous somehow; even at +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page735">[pg 735]</span><a name="Pg735" id="Pg735" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Dettingen, where he fought so bravely, his figure is absurd—calling +out in his broken English, and lunging with his +rapier, like a fencing-master. In contemporary caricatures, +George's son, <span class="tei tei-q">“the Hero of Culloden,”</span> is also made an +object of considerable fun, as witness the following picture +of him defeated by the French (1757) at Hastenbeck: +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/defeat.png" width="700" height="676" alt="Illustration" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I refrain to quote from Walpole regarding George—for +those charming volumes are in the hands of all who love +the gossip of the last century. Nothing can be more +cheery than Horace's letters. Fiddles sing all through +them: wax-lights, fine dresses, fine jokes, fine plate, fine +equipages, glitter and sparkle there: never was such a +brilliant, jigging, smirking Vanity Fair as that through +which he leads us. Hervey, the next great authority, is +a darker spirit. About him there is something frightful: +a few years since his heirs opened the lid of the Ickworth +box; it was as if a Pompeii was opened to us—the last +century dug up, with its temples and its games, its chariots, +its public places—lupanaria. Wandering through that city +of the dead, that dreadfully selfish time, through those +godless intrigues and feasts, through those crowds, pushing, +and eager, and struggling—rouged, and lying, and fawning—I +have wanted some one to be friends with. I have said +to friends conversant with that history, Show me some +good person about that Court; find me, among those +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page736">[pg 736]</span><a name="Pg736" id="Pg736" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +selfish courtiers, those dissolute, gay people, some one +being that I can love and regard. There is that strutting +little sultan, George II; there is that hunchbacked, beetle-browed +Lord Chesterfield; there is John Hervey, with his +deadly smile, and ghastly, painted face—I hate them. +There is Hoadly, cringing from one bishopric to another: +yonder comes little Mr. Pope, from Twickenham, with his +friend, the Irish dean, in his new cassock, bowing too, but +with rage flashing from under his bushy eyebrows, and +scorn and hate quivering in his smile. Can you be fond +of these? Of Pope I might: at least I might love his +genius, his wit, his greatness, his sensibility—with a certain +conviction that at some fancied slight, some sneer which he +imagined, he would turn upon me and stab me. Can you +trust the queen? She is not of our order: their very +position makes kings and queens lonely. One inscrutable +attachment that inscrutable woman has. To that she is +faithful, through all trial, neglect, pain, and time. Save +her husband, she really cares for no created being. She +is good enough to her children, and even fond enough of +them: but she would chop them all up into little pieces +to please him. In her intercourse with all around her, +she was perfectly kind, gracious, and natural; but friends +may die, daughters may depart, she will be as perfectly +kind and gracious to the next set. If the king wants her, +she will smile upon him, be she ever so sad; and walk +with him, be she ever so weary; and laugh at his brutal +jokes, be she in ever so much pain of body or heart. Caroline's +devotion to her husband is a prodigy to read of. +What charm had the little man? What was there in +those wonderful letters of thirty pages long, which he +wrote to her when he was absent, and to his mistresses at +Hanover, when he was in London with his wife? Why +did Caroline, the most lovely and accomplished princess +of Germany, take a little red-faced staring princeling for +a husband, and refuse an emperor? Why, to her last hour, +did she love him so? She killed herself because she +loved him so. She had the gout, and would plunge +her feet in cold water in order to walk with him. With +the film of death over her eyes, writhing in intolerable +pain, she yet had a livid smile and a gentle word for her +master. You have read the wonderful history of that +death-bed? How she bade him marry again, and the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page737">[pg 737]</span><a name="Pg737" id="Pg737" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +reply the old king blubbered out, <span class="tei tei-q">“<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Non, non: j'aurai +des maitresses</span></span>.”</span> There never was such a ghastly farce. I watch +the astonishing scene—I stand by that awful bedside, +wondering at the ways in which God has ordained the +lives, loves, rewards, successes, passions, actions, ends of +his creatures—and can't but laugh, in the presence of +death, and with the saddest heart. In that often-quoted +passage from Lord Hervey, in which the queen's death-bed +is described, the grotesque horror of the details surpasses +all satire: the dreadful humour of the scene is more terrible +than Swift's blackest pages, or Fielding's fiercest irony. +The man who wrote the story had something diabolical +about him: the terrible verses which Pope wrote respecting +Hervey, in one of his own moods of almost fiendish malignity, +I fear are true. I am frightened as I look back into the +past, and fancy I behold that ghastly, beautiful face; +as I think of the queen writhing on her death-bed, and crying +out, <span class="tei tei-q">“Pray!—pray!”</span>—of the royal old sinner by her +side, who kisses her dead lips with frantic grief, and leaves +her to sin more;—of the bevy of courtly clergymen, and +the archbishop, whose prayers she rejects, and who are +obliged for propriety's sake to shuffle off the anxious +inquiries of the public, and vow that her Majesty quitted +this life <span class="tei tei-q">“in a heavenly frame of mind”</span>. What a life!—to +what ends devoted! What a vanity of vanities! It is +a theme for another pulpit than the lecturer's. For a +pulpit?—I think the part which pulpits play in the deaths +of kings is the most ghastly of all the ceremonial: the +lying eulogies, the blinking of disagreeable truths, the +sickening flatteries, the simulated grief, the falsehood and +sycophancies—all uttered in the name of Heaven in our +State churches: these monstrous threnodies have been +sung from time immemorial over kings and queens, good, +bad, wicked, licentious. The State parson must bring +out his commonplaces; his apparatus of rhetorical black-hangings. +Dead king or live king, the clergyman must +flatter him—announce his piety whilst living, and when +dead, perform the obsequies of <span class="tei tei-q">“our most religious and +gracious king”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I read that Lady Yarmouth (my most religious and +gracious king's favourite) sold a bishopric to a clergyman +for 5,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> (She betted him 5,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> +that he would not be made a bishop, and he lost, and paid her.) Was he the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page738">[pg 738]</span><a name="Pg738" id="Pg738" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +only prelate of his time led up by such hands for consecration? +As I peep into George II's St. James's, I see crowds +of cassocks rustling up the back-stairs of the ladies of the +Court; stealthy clergy slipping purses into their laps; +that godless old king yawning under his canopy in his +Chapel Royal, as the chaplain before him is discoursing. +Discoursing about what?—about righteousness and judgement? +Whilst the chaplain is preaching, the king is +chattering in German almost as loud as the preacher; +so loud that the clergyman—it may be one Dr. Young, he +who wrote <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Night Thoughts</span></span>, and discoursed on the splendours +of the stars, the glories of heaven, and utter vanities +of this world—actually burst out crying in his pulpit +because the Defender of the Faith and dispenser of bishoprics +would not listen to him! No wonder that the clergy were +corrupt and indifferent amidst this indifference and corruption. +No wonder that sceptics multiplied and morals +degenerated, so far as they depended on the influence of +such a king. No wonder that Whitfield cried out in the +wilderness, that Wesley quitted the insulted temple to +pray on the hillside. I look with reverence on those men at +that time. Which is the sublimer spectacle—the good +John Wesley, surrounded by his congregation of miners +at the pit's mouth, or the queen's chaplains mumbling +through their morning office in their ante-room, under the +picture of the great Venus, with the door opened into the +adjoining chamber, where the queen is dressing, talking +scandal to Lord Hervey, or uttering sneers at Lady Suffolk, +who is kneeling with the basin at her mistress's side? +I say I am scared as I look round at this society—at this +king, at these courtiers, at these politicians, at these +bishops—at this flaunting vice and levity. Whereabouts +in this Court is the honest man? Where is the pure +person one may like? The air stifles one with its sickly +perfumes. There are some old-world follies and some +absurd ceremonials about our Court of the present day, +which I laugh at, but as an Englishman, contrasting it +with the past, shall I not acknowledge the change of to-day? +As the mistress of St. James's passes me now, I salute the +sovereign, wise, moderate, exemplary of life; the good +mother; the good wife; the accomplished lady; the +enlightened friend of art; the tender sympathizer in her +people's glories and sorrows. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page739">[pg 739]</span><a name="Pg739" id="Pg739" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of all the Court of George and Caroline, I find no +one but Lady Suffolk with whom it seems pleasant and +kindly to hold converse. Even the misogynist Croker, who +edited her letters, loves her, and has that regard for her +with which her sweet graciousness seems to have inspired +almost all men and some women who came near her. +I have noted many little traits which go to prove the +charms of her character (it is not merely because she is +charming, but because she is characteristic, that I allude +to her). She writes delightfully sober letters. Addressing +Mr. Gay at Tunbridge (he was, you know, a poet, penniless +and in disgrace), she says: <span class="tei tei-q">“The place you are in, has +strangely filled your head with physicians and cures; but, +take my word for it, many a fine lady has gone there to +drink the waters without being sick; and many a man +has complained of the loss of his heart, who had it in his +own possession. I desire you will keep yours; for I shall +not be very fond of a friend without one, and I have a great +mind you should be in the number of mine.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When Lord Peterborough was seventy years old, that +indomitable youth addressed some flaming love-, or rather +gallantry-, letters to Mrs. Howard—curious relics they are +of the romantic manner of wooing sometimes in use in +those days. It is not passion; it is not love; it is gallantry: +a mixture of earnest and acting; high-flown compliments, +profound bows, vows, sighs, and ogles, in the manner of +the Clelie romances, and Millamont and Doricourt in the +comedy. There was a vast elaboration of ceremonies and +etiquette, of raptures—a regulated form for kneeling and +wooing which has quite passed out of our downright +manners. Henrietta Howard accepted the noble old earl's +philandering; answered the queer love-letters with due +acknowledgement; made a profound curtsey to Peterborough's +profound bow; and got John Gay to help her +in the composition of her letters in reply to her old knight. +He wrote her charming verses, in which there was truth as +well as grace. <span class="tei tei-q">“O wonderful creature!”</span> he writes:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">O wonderful creature, a woman of reason!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Never grave out of pride, never gay out of season!</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">When so easy to guess who this angel should be,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Who would think Mrs. Howard ne'er dreamt it was she?</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The great Mr. Pope also celebrated her in lines not less +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page740">[pg 740]</span><a name="Pg740" id="Pg740" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +pleasant, and painted a portrait of what must certainly +have been a delightful lady:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I know a thing that's most uncommon—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Envy, be silent and attend!—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I know a reasonable woman,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Handsome, yet witty, and a friend:</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Not warp'd by passion, aw'd by rumour,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Not grave through pride, or gay through folly:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">An equal mixture of good humour</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And exquisite soft melancholy.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Has she no faults, then (Envy says), sir?</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Yes, she has one, I must aver—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">When all the world conspires to praise her,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">The woman's deaf, and does not hear!</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Even the women concurred in praising and loving her. +The Duchess of Queensberry bears testimony to her amiable +qualities, and writes to her: <span class="tei tei-q">“I tell you so and so, because +you love children, and to have children love you.”</span> The +beautiful, jolly Mary Bellenden, represented by contemporaries +as <span class="tei tei-q">“the most perfect creature ever known”</span>, writes +very pleasantly to her <span class="tei tei-q">“dear Howard”</span>, her <span class="tei tei-q">“dear Swiss”</span>, +from the country, whither Mary had retired after her +marriage, and when she gave up being a maid of honour. +<span class="tei tei-q">“How do you do, Mrs. Howard?”</span> Mary breaks out. +<span class="tei tei-q">“How do you do, Mrs. Howard? that is all I have to say. +This afternoon I am taken with a fit of writing; but as to +matter, I have nothing better to entertain you, than news +of my farm. I therefore give you the following list of the +stock of eatables that I am fatting for my private tooth. +It is well known to the whole county of Kent, that I have +four fat calves, two fat hogs, fit for killing, twelve promising +black pigs, two young chickens, three fine geese, with +thirteen eggs under each (several being duck-eggs, else the +others do not come to maturity); all this, with rabbits, +and pigeons, and carp in plenty, beef and mutton at reasonable +rates. Now, Howard, if you have a mind to stick +a knife into anything I have named, say so!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A jolly set must they have been, those maids of honour. +Pope introduces us to a whole bevy of them, in a pleasant +letter. <span class="tei tei-q">“I went,”</span> he says, <span class="tei tei-q">“by water to Hampton Court, +and met the Prince, with all his ladies, on horseback, coming +from hunting. Mrs. Bellenden and Mrs. Lepell took me +into protection, contrary to the laws against harbouring +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page741">[pg 741]</span><a name="Pg741" id="Pg741" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Papists, and gave me a dinner, with something I liked +better, an opportunity of conversation with Mrs. Howard. +We all agreed that the life of a maid of honour was of all +things the most miserable, and wished that all women who +envied it had a specimen of it. To eat Westphalia ham of +a morning, ride over hedges and ditches on borrowed hacks, +come home in the heat of the day with a fever, and (what +is worse a hundred times) with a red mark on the forehead +from an uneasy hat—all this may qualify them to make +excellent wives for hunters. As soon as they wipe off the +heat of the day, they must simper an hour and catch cold +in the princess's apartment; from thence to dinner with +what appetite they may; and after that till midnight, work, +walk, or think which way they please. No lone house in +Wales, with a mountain and rookery, is more contemplative +than this Court. Miss Lepell walked with me three or four +hours by moonlight, and we met no creature of any quality +but the king, who gave audience to the vice-chamberlain +all alone under the garden wall.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I fancy it was a merrier England, that of our ancestors, +than the island which we inhabit. People high and low +amused themselves very much more. I have calculated +the manner in which statesmen and persons of condition +passed their time—and what with drinking, and dining, +and supping, and cards, wonder how they got through their +business at all. They played all sorts of games, which, with +the exception of cricket and tennis, have quite gone out of +our manners now. In the old prints of St. James's Park, +you still see the marks along the walk, to note the balls +when the Court played at Mall. Fancy Birdcage Walk now +so laid out, and Lord John and Lord Palmerston knocking +balls up and down the avenue! Most of those jolly sports +belong to the past, and the good old games of England are +only to be found in old novels, in old ballads, or the columns +of dingy old newspapers, which say how a main of cocks is +to be fought at Winchester between the Winchester men +and the Hampton men; or how the Cornwall men and the +Devon men are going to hold a great wrestling match at +Totnes, and so on. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A hundred and twenty years ago there were not only +country towns in England, but people who inhabited them. +We were very much more gregarious; we were amused by +very simple pleasures. Every town had its fair, every +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page742">[pg 742]</span><a name="Pg742" id="Pg742" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +village its wake. The old poets have sung a hundred jolly +ditties about great cudgel-playings, famous grinning through +horse-collars, great maypole meetings, and morris-dances. +The girls used to run races clad in very light attire; and +the kind gentry and good parsons thought no shame in +looking on. Dancing bears went about the country with +pipe and tabor. Certain well-known tunes were sung all +over the land for hundreds of years, and high and low +rejoiced in that simple music. Gentlemen who wished to +entertain their female friends constantly sent for a band. +When Beau Fielding, a mighty fine gentleman, was courting +the lady whom he married, he treated her and her companion +at his lodgings to a supper from the tavern, and +after supper they sent out for a fiddler—three of them. +Fancy the three, in a great wainscoted room, in Covent +Garden or Soho, lighted by two or three candles in silver +sconces, some grapes and a bottle of Florence wine on the +table, and the honest fiddler playing old tunes in quaint +old minor keys, as the Beau takes out one lady after the +other, and solemnly dances with her! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The very great folks, young noblemen, with their +governors, and the like, went abroad and made the great +tour; the home satirists jeered at the Frenchified and +Italian ways which they brought back; but the greater +number of people never left the country. The jolly squire +often had never been twenty miles from home. Those who +did go went to the baths, to Harrogate, or Scarborough, or +Bath, or Epsom. Old letters are full of these places of +pleasure. Gay writes to us about the fiddlers at Tunbridge; +of the ladies having merry little private balls amongst +themselves; and the gentlemen entertaining them by turns +with tea and music. One of the young beauties whom he +met did not care for tea: <span class="tei tei-q">“We have a young lady here,”</span> he +says, <span class="tei tei-q">“that is very particular in her desires. I have known +some young ladies, who, if ever they prayed, would ask for +some equipage or title, a husband or matadores: but this +lady, who is but seventeen, and has 30,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> to her fortune, +places all her wishes on a pot of good ale. When her friends, +for the sake of her shape and complexion, would dissuade +her from it, she answers, with the truest sincerity, that by +the loss of shape and complexion she could only lose a husband, +whereas ale is her passion.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Every country town had its assembly-room—mouldy old +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page743">[pg 743]</span><a name="Pg743" id="Pg743" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +tenements, which we may still see in deserted inn-yards, in +decayed provincial cities, out of which the great wen of +London has sucked all the life. York, at assize time, and +throughout the winter, harboured a large society of northern +gentry. Shrewsbury was celebrated for its festivities. At +Newmarket, I read of <span class="tei tei-q">“a vast deal of good company, +besides rogues and blacklegs”</span>; at Norwich, of two assemblies, +with a prodigious crowd in the hall, the rooms, and the +gallery. In Cheshire (it is a maid of honour of Queen Caroline +who writes, and who is longing to be back at Hampton +Court, and the fun there) I peep into a country house, and +see a very merry party: <span class="tei tei-q">“We meet in the work-room before +nine, eat and break a joke or two till twelve, then we repair +to our own chambers and make ourselves ready, for it cannot +be called dressing. At noon the great bell fetches us into +a parlour, adorned with all sorts of fine arms, poisoned darts, +several pair of old boots and shoes worn by men of might, +with the stirrups of King Charles I, taken from him at +Edgehill,”</span>—and there they have their dinner, after which +comes dancing and supper. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for Bath, all history went and bathed and drank there. +George II and his queen, Prince Frederick and his Court, +scarce a character one can mention of the early last century, +but was seen in that famous Pump-room where Beau Nash +presided, and his picture hung between the busts of Newton +and Pope: +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">This picture, placed these busts between,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Gives satire all its strength:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Wisdom and Wit are little seen,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">But Folly at full length.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I should like to have seen the Folly. It was a splendid, +embroidered, be-ruffled, snuff-boxed, red-heeled, impertinent +Folly, and knew how to make itself respected. I should +like to have seen that noble old madcap Peterborough in +his boots (he actually had the audacity to walk about Bath +in boots!), with his blue ribbon and stars, and a cabbage +under each arm, and a chicken in his hand, which he had +been cheapening for his dinner. Chesterfield came there +many a time and gambled for hundreds, and grinned +through his gout. Mary Wortley was there, young and +beautiful; and Mary Wortley, old, hideous, and snuffy. +Miss Chudleigh came there, slipping away from one husband, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page744">[pg 744]</span><a name="Pg744" id="Pg744" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and on the look-out for another. Walpole passed many +a day there; sickly, supercilious, absurdly dandified, and +affected; with a brilliant wit, a delightful sensibility; and +for his friends, a most tender, generous, and faithful heart. +And if you and I had been alive then, and strolling down +Milsom Street—hush! we should have taken our hats off, +as an awful, long, lean, gaunt figure, swathed in flannels, +passed by in its chair, and a livid face looked out from the +window—great fierce eyes staring from under a bushy, +powdered wig, a terrible frown, a terrible Roman nose—and +we whisper to one another, <span class="tei tei-q">“There he is! There's the +great commoner! There is Mr. Pitt!”</span> As we walk away, +the abbey bells are set a-ringing; and we meet our testy +friend Toby Smollett, on the arm of James Quin the actor, +who tells us that the bells ring for Mr. Bullock, an eminent +cowkeeper from Tottenham, who has just arrived to drink +the waters; and Toby shakes his cane at the door of +Colonel Ringworm—the Creole gentleman's lodgings next +his own—where the colonel's two negroes are practising on +the French horn. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When we try to recall social England, we must fancy it +playing at cards for many hours every day. The custom is +wellnigh gone out among us now, but fifty years ago was +general, fifty years before that almost universal, in the +country. <span class="tei tei-q">“Gaming has become so much the fashion,”</span> writes +Seymour, the author of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Court Gamester</span></span>, <span class="tei tei-q">“that he who in +company should be ignorant of the games in vogue, would be +reckoned low-bred, and hardly fit for conversation.”</span> There +were cards everywhere. It was considered ill-bred to read in +company. <span class="tei tei-q">“Books were not fit articles for drawing-rooms,”</span> +old ladies used to say. People were jealous, as it were, and +angry with them. You will find in Hervey that George II +was always furious at the sight of books; and his queen, +who loved reading, had to practise it in secret in her closet. +But cards were the resource of all the world. Every night, +for hours, kings and queens of England sat down and +handled their majesties of spades and diamonds. In +European Courts, I believe the practice still remains, not +for gambling, but for pastime. Our ancestors generally +adopted it. <span class="tei tei-q">“Books! prithee, don't talk to me about +books,”</span> said old Sarah Marlborough. <span class="tei tei-q">“The only books +I know are men and cards.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Dear old Sir Roger de Coverley +sent all his tenants a string of hogs' puddings and a pack +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page745">[pg 745]</span><a name="Pg745" id="Pg745" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of cards at Christmas,”</span> says the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, wishing to depict +a kind landlord. One of the good old lady writers in whose +letters I have been dipping cries out, <span class="tei tei-q">“Sure, cards have kept +us women from a great deal of scandal!”</span> Wise old Johnson +regretted that he had not learnt to play. <span class="tei tei-q">“It is very useful +in life,”</span> he says; <span class="tei tei-q">“it generates kindness, and consolidates +society.”</span> David Hume never went to bed without his whist. +We have Walpole, in one of his letters, in a transport of +gratitude for the cards. <span class="tei tei-q">“I shall build an order to Pam,”</span> +says he, in his pleasant dandified way, <span class="tei tei-q">“for the escape of +my charming Duchess of Grafton.”</span> The duchess had been +playing cards at Rome, when she ought to have been at +a cardinal's concert, where the floor fell in, and all the +monsignors were precipitated into the cellar. Even the +Nonconformist clergy looked not unkindly on the practice. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I do not think,”</span> says one of them, <span class="tei tei-q">“that honest Martin +Luther committed sin by playing at backgammon for an +hour or two after dinner, in order by unbending his mind to +promote digestion.”</span> As for the High Church parsons, they +all played, bishops and all. On Twelfth Day the Court +used to play in state. <span class="tei tei-q">“This being Twelfth Day, his Majesty, +the Prince of Wales, and the Knights Companions of the +Garter, Thistle, and Bath, appeared in the collars of their +respective orders. Their Majesties, the Prince of Wales, +and three eldest Princesses, went to the Chapel Royal, +preceded by the heralds. The Duke of Manchester carried +the sword of state. The king and prince made offering at +the altar of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, according to +the annual custom. At night their Majesties played at +hazard with the nobility, for the benefit of the groom-porter; +and 'twas said the king won 600 guineas; the queen, 360; +Princess Amelia, twenty; Princess Caroline, ten; the +Duke of Grafton and the Earl of Portmore, several +thousands.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Let us glance at the same chronicle, which is of the +year 1731, and see how others of our forefathers were +engaged. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Cork, 15th January.—This day, one Tim Croneen was, +for the murder and robbery of Mr. St. Leger and his wife, +sentenced to be hanged two minutes, then his head to be +cut off, and his body divided in four quarters, to be placed +in four crossways. He was servant to Mr. St. Leger, and +committed the murder with the privity of the servant-maid, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page746">[pg 746]</span><a name="Pg746" id="Pg746" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +who was sentenced to be burned; also of the gardener, +whom he knocked on the head, to deprive him of his share +of the booty.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“January 3.—A postboy was shot by an Irish gentleman +on the road near Stone, in Staffordshire, who died in two +days, for which the gentleman was imprisoned.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A poor man was found hanging in a gentleman's stables +at Bungay, in Norfolk, by a person who cut him down, and +running for assistance, left his penknife behind him. The +poor man recovering, cut his throat with the knife; and +a river being nigh, jumped into it; but company coming, +he was dragged out alive, and was like to remain so.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The Honourable Thomas Finch, brother to the Earl of +Nottingham, is appointed ambassador at the Hague, in the +room of the Earl of Chesterfield, who is on his return home.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“William Cowper, Esq., and the Rev. Mr. John Cowper, +chaplain in ordinary to her Majesty, and rector of Great +Berkhampstead, in the county of Hertford, are appointed +clerks of the commissioners of bankruptcy.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Charles Creagh, Esq., and —— Macnamara, Esq., between +whom an old grudge of three years had subsisted, which +had occasioned their being bound over about fifty times +for breaking the peace, meeting in company with Mr. Eyres, +of Galloway, they discharged their pistols, and all three +were killed on the spot—to the great joy of their peaceful +neighbours, say the Irish papers.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Wheat is 26<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">s.</span></span> to 28<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">s.</span></span>, and barley +20<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">s.</span></span> to 22<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">s.</span></span> a quarter; +three per cents, 92; best loaf sugar, 9-1/4<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">d.</span></span>; Bohea, +12<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">s.</span></span> to 14<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">s.</span></span>; Pekoe, +18<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">s.</span></span>, and Hyson, 35<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">s.</span></span> per pound.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At Exon was celebrated with great magnificence the +birthday of the son of Sir W. Courtney, Bart., at which +more than 1,000 persons were present. A bullock was +roasted whole; a butt of wine and several tuns of beer +and cider were given to the populace. At the same time +Sir William delivered to his son, then of age, Powdram +Castle, and a great estate.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Charlesworth and Cox, two solicitors, convicted of +forgery, stood on the pillory at the Royal Exchange. The +first was severely handled by the populace, but the other +was very much favoured, and protected by six or seven +fellows who got on the pillory to protect him from the +insults of the mob.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A boy killed by falling upon iron spikes, from a lamppost, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page747">[pg 747]</span><a name="Pg747" id="Pg747" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +which he climbed to see Mother Needham stand in +the pillory.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mary Lynn was burned to ashes at the stake for being +concerned in the murder of her mistress.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Alexander Russell, the foot soldier, who was capitally +convicted for a street robbery in January sessions, was +reprieved for transportation; but having an estate fallen +to him, obtained a free pardon.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The Lord John Russell married to the Lady Diana +Spencer, at Marlborough House. He has a fortune of +30,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> down, and is to have +100,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> at the death of the +Duchess Dowager of Marlborough, his grandmother.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“March 1 being the anniversary of the queen's birthday, +when her Majesty entered the forty-ninth year of her age, +there was a splendid appearance of nobility at St. James's. +Her Majesty was magnificently dressed, and wore a flowered +muslin head-edging, as did also her Royal Highness. The +Lord Portmore was said to have had the richest dress, +though an Italian Count had twenty-four diamonds instead +of buttons.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +New clothes on the birthday were the fashion for all loyal +people. Swift mentions the custom several times. Walpole +is constantly speaking of it; laughing at the practice, but +having the very finest clothes from Paris, nevertheless. +If the king and queen were unpopular, there were very few +new clothes at the Drawing-room. In a paper in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">True +Patriot</span></span>, No. 3, written to attack the Pretender, the Scotch, +French, and Popery, Fielding supposes the Scotch and the +Pretender in possession of London, and himself about to be +hanged for loyalty,—when, just as the rope is round his +neck, he says: <span class="tei tei-q">“My little girl entered my bedchamber, +and put an end to my dream by pulling open my eyes, and +telling me that the tailor had just brought home my clothes +for his Majesty's birthday.”</span> In his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Temple Beau</span></span>, the beau +is dunned for a birthday suit of velvet, 40<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> Be sure that +Mr. Harry Fielding was dunned too. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The public days, no doubt, were splendid, but the private +Court life must have been awfully wearisome. <span class="tei tei-q">“I will not +trouble you,”</span> writes Hervey to Lady Sundon, <span class="tei tei-q">“with any +account of our occupations at Hampton Court. No mill-horse +ever went in a more constant track, or a more unchanging +circle; so that by the assistance of an almanac for the +day of the week, and a watch for the hour of the day, you +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page748">[pg 748]</span><a name="Pg748" id="Pg748" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +may inform yourself fully, without any other intelligence +but your memory, of every transaction within the verge +of the Court. Walking, chaises, levées, and audiences fill +the morning. At night the king plays at commerce and +backgammon, and the queen at quadrille, where poor Lady +Charlotte runs her usual nightly gauntlet, the queen pulling +her hood, and the Princess Royal rapping her knuckles. +The Duke of Grafton takes his nightly opiate of lottery, and +sleeps as usual between the Princesses Amelia and Caroline. +Lord Grantham strolls from one room to another (as Dryden +says), like some discontented ghost that oft appears, and +is forbid to speak; and stirs himself about as people stir +a fire, not with any design, but in hopes to make it burn +brisker. At last the king gets up; the pool finishes; and +everybody has their dismission. Their Majesties retire to +Lady Charlotte and my Lord Lifford; my Lord Grantham, +to Lady Frances and Mr. Clark: some to supper, some to +bed; and thus the evening and the morning make the day.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The king's fondness for Hanover occasioned all sorts of +rough jokes among his English subjects, to whom +<span lang="de" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="de"><span style="font-style: italic">Sauerkraut</span></span> +and sausages have ever been ridiculous objects. +When our present Prince Consort came among us, the +people bawled out songs in the streets indicative of the +absurdity of Germany in general. The sausage-shops produced +enormous sausages which we might suppose were the +daily food and delight of German princes. I remember +the caricatures at the marriage of Prince Leopold with the +Princess Charlotte. The bridegroom was drawn in rags. +George III's wife was called by the people a beggarly +German duchess; the British idea being that all princes +were beggarly except British princes. King George paid +us back. He thought there were no manners out of Germany. +Sarah Marlborough once coming to visit the +princess, whilst her Royal Highness was whipping one of +the roaring royal children, <span class="tei tei-q">“Ah!”</span> says George, who was +standing by, <span class="tei tei-q">“you have no good manners in England, +because you are not properly brought up when you are +young.”</span> He insisted that no English cooks could roast, no +English coachman could drive: he actually questioned the +superiority of our nobility, our horses, and our roast beef! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whilst he was away from his beloved Hanover, everything +remained there exactly as in the prince's presence. +There were 800 horses in the stables, there was all the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page749">[pg 749]</span><a name="Pg749" id="Pg749" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +apparatus of chamberlains, Court-marshals, and equerries; +and Court assemblies were held every Saturday, where all +the nobility of Hanover assembled at what I can't but +think a fine and touching ceremony. A large armchair +was placed in the assembly-room, and on it the king's +portrait. The nobility advanced, and made a bow to the +armchair, and to the image which Nebuchadnezzar the +king had set up; and spoke under their voices before the +august picture, just as they would have done had the King +Churfürst been present himself. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He was always going back to Hanover. In the year 1729, +he went for two whole years, during which Caroline reigned +for him in England, and he was not in the least missed by +his British subjects. He went again in '35 and '36; and +between the years 1740 and 1755 was no less than eight times +on the Continent, which amusement he was obliged to give +up at the outbreak of the Seven Years' War. Here every +day's amusement was the same. <span class="tei tei-q">“Our life is as uniform +as that of a monastery,”</span> writes a courtier whom Vehse +quotes. <span class="tei tei-q">“Every morning at eleven, and every evening at +six, we drive in the heat to Herrenhausen, through an +enormous linden avenue; and twice a day cover our coats +and coaches with dust. In the king's society there never +is the least change. At table, and at cards, he sees always +the same faces, and at the end of the game retires into his +chamber. Twice a week there is a French theatre; the +other days there is play in the gallery. In this way, were +the king always to stop in Hanover, one could make a ten +years' calendar of his proceedings; and settle beforehand +what his time of business, meals, and pleasure would be.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The old pagan kept his promise to his dying wife. Lady +Yarmouth was now in full favour, and treated with profound +respect by the Hanover society, though it appears rather +neglected in England when she came among us. In 1740, +a couple of the king's daughters went to see him at Hanover; +Anna, the Princess of Orange (about whom, and whose +husband and marriage-day, Walpole and Hervey have left +us the most ludicrous descriptions), and Maria of Hesse-Cassel, +with their respective lords. This made the Hanover +Court very brilliant. In honour of his high guests, the king +gave several fêtes; among others, a magnificent masked +ball, in the green theatre at Herrenhausen—the garden +theatre, with linden and box for screen, and grass for +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page750">[pg 750]</span><a name="Pg750" id="Pg750" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +a carpet, where the Platens had danced to George and his +father the late sultan. The stage and a great part of the +garden were illuminated with coloured lamps. Almost the +whole Court appeared in white dominos, <span class="tei tei-q">“like,”</span> says the +describer of the scene, <span class="tei tei-q">“like spirits in the Elysian fields. +At night, supper was served in the gallery with three great +tables, and the king was very merry. After supper dancing +was resumed, and I did not get home till five o'clock by +full daylight to Hanover. Some days afterwards we had +in the opera-house at Hanover, a great assembly. The +king appeared in a Turkish dress; his turban was ornamented +with a magnificent agraffe of diamonds; the Lady +Yarmouth was dressed as a sultana; nobody was more +beautiful than the Princess of Hesse.”</span> So, while poor +Caroline was resting in her coffin, dapper little George, +with his red face and his white eyebrows and goggle-eyes, +at sixty years of age, is dancing a pretty dance with +Madame Walmoden, and capering about dressed up like +a Turk! For twenty years more, that little old Bajazet went +on in this Turkish fashion, until the fit came which choked +the old man, when he ordered the side of his coffin to be +taken out, as well as that of poor Caroline's who had preceded +him, so that his sinful old bones and ashes might +mingle with those of the faithful creature. O strutting +Turkey-cock of Herrenhausen! O naughty little Mahomet! +in what Turkish paradise are you now, and where be your +painted houris? So Countess Yarmouth appeared as a +sultana, and his Majesty in a Turkish dress wore an agraffe +of diamonds, and was very merry, was he? Friends! he +was your fathers' king as well as mine—let us drop a respectful +tear over his grave. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He said of his wife that he never knew a woman who was +worthy to buckle her shoe: he would sit alone weeping +before her portrait, and when he had dried his eyes, he +would go off to his Walmoden and talk of her. On the +25th day of October, 1760, he being then in the seventy-seventh +year of his age, and the thirty-fourth of his reign, +his page went to take him his royal chocolate, and behold! +the most religious and gracious king was lying dead on the +floor. They went and fetched Walmoden; but Walmoden +could not wake him. The sacred Majesty was but a lifeless +corpse. The king was dead; God save the king! But, +of course, poets and clergymen decorously bewailed the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page751">[pg 751]</span><a name="Pg751" id="Pg751" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +late one. Here are some artless verses, in which an English +divine deplored the famous departed hero, and over which +you may cry or you may laugh, exactly as your humour +suits:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">While at his feet expiring Faction lay,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">No contest left but who should best obey;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Saw in his offspring all himself renewed;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The same fair path of glory still pursued;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Saw to young George Augusta's care impart</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Whate'er could raise and humanize the heart;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Blend all his grandsire's virtues with his own,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And form their mingled radiance for the throne—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">No farther blessing could on earth be given—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The next degree of happiness was—heaven!</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If he had been good, if he had been just, if he had been +pure in life, and wise in council, could the poet have said +much more? It was a parson who came and wept over +this grave, with Walmoden sitting on it, and claimed heaven +for the poor old man slumbering below. Here was one +who had neither dignity, learning, morals, nor wit—who +tainted a great society by a bad example; who in youth, +manhood, old age, was gross, low, and sensual; and Mr. +Porteus, afterwards my Lord Bishop Porteus, says the +earth was not good enough for him, and that his only place +was heaven! Bravo, Mr. Porteus! The divine who wept +these tears over George II's memory wore George III's +lawn. I don't know whether people still admire his poetry +or his sermons. +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page752">[pg 752]</span><a name="Pg752" id="Pg752" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc125" id="toc125"></a> +<a name="pdf126" id="pdf126"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">George The Third</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We have to glance over +sixty years in as many +minutes. To read the +mere catalogue of characters +who figured during +that long period, +would occupy our allotted +time, and we should +have all text and no +sermon. England has +to undergo the revolt of +the American colonies; +to submit to defeat and +separation; to shake +under the volcano of +the French Revolution; +to grapple and fight for +the life with her gigantic +enemy Napoleon; to +gasp and rally after that +tremendous struggle. The old society, with its courtly +splendours, has to pass away; generations of statesmen +to rise and disappear; Pitt to follow Chatham to the +tomb; the memory of Rodney and Wolfe to be superseded +by Nelson's and Wellington's glory; the old poets who +unite us to Queen Anne's time to sink into their graves; +Johnson to die, and Scott and Byron to arise; Garrick +to delight the world with his dazzling dramatic genius, and +Kean to leap on the stage and take possession of the astonished +theatre. Steam has to be invented; kings to be +beheaded, banished, deposed, restored. Napoleon to be +but an episode, and George III is to be alive through all +these varied changes, to accompany his people through all +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page753">[pg 753]</span><a name="Pg753" id="Pg753" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +these revolutions of thought, government, society; to +survive out of the old world into ours. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When I first saw England, she was in mourning for the +young Princess Charlotte, the hope of the empire. I came +from India as a child, and our ship touched at an island +on the way home, where my black servant took me a long +walk over rocks and hills until we reached a garden, where +we saw a man walking. <span class="tei tei-q">“That is he,”</span> said the black man: +<span class="tei tei-q">“that is Bonaparte! He eats three sheep every day, and +all the little children he can lay hands on!”</span> There +were people in the British dominions besides that poor +Calcutta serving-man, with an equal horror of the Corsican +ogre. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With the same childish attendant, I remember peeping +through the colonnade at Carlton House, and seeing the +abode of the great Prince Regent. I can see yet the Guards +pacing before the gates of the place. The place? What +place? The palace exists no more than the palace of +Nebuchadnezzar. It is but a name now. Where be the +sentries who used to salute as the Royal chariots drove in +and out? The chariots, with the kings inside, have driven +to the realms of Pluto; the tall Guards have marched into +darkness, and the echoes of their drums are rolling in Hades. +Where the palace once stood, a hundred little children are +paddling up and down the steps to St. James's Park. +A score of grave gentlemen are taking their tea at the +Athenaeum Club; as many grizzly warriors are garrisoning +the United Service Club opposite. Pall Mall is the great +social Exchange of London now—the mart of news, of +politics, of scandal, of rumour—the English forum, so to +speak, where men discuss the last dispatch from the Crimea, +the last speech of Lord Derby, the next move of Lord John. +And, now and then, to a few antiquarians, whose thoughts +are with the past rather than with the present, it is a +memorial of old times and old people, and Pall Mall is our +Palmyra. Look! About this spot, Tom of Ten Thousand +was killed by Königsmarck's gang. In that great red +house Gainsborough lived, and Culloden Cumberland, +George III's uncle. Yonder is Sarah Marlborough's palace, +just as it stood when that termagant occupied it. At 25, +Walter Scott used to live; at the house, now No. 79, and +occupied by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel +in Foreign Parts, resided Mrs. Eleanor Gwynn, comedian. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page754">[pg 754]</span><a name="Pg754" id="Pg754" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How often has Queen Caroline's chair issued from under +yonder arch! All the men of the Georges have passed up +and down the street. It has seen Walpole's chariot and +Chatham's sedan; and Fox, Gibbon, Sheridan, on their +way to Brookes's; and stately William Pitt stalking on +the arm of Dundas; and Hanger and Tom Sheridan +reeling out of Raggett's; and Byron limping into Wattier's; +and Swift striding out of Bury Street; and Mr. Addison +and Dick Steele, both perhaps a little the better for liquor; +and the Prince of Wales and the Duke of York clattering +over the pavement; and Johnson counting the posts along +the streets, after dawdling before Dodsley's window; and +Horry Walpole hobbling into his carriage, with a gimcrack +just bought out at Christie's; and George Selwyn sauntering +into White's. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the published letters to George Selwyn we get a mass +of correspondence by no means so brilliant and witty as +Walpole's, or so bitter and bright as Hervey's, but as +interesting, and even more descriptive of the time, because +the letters are the work of many hands. You hear more +voices speaking, as it were, and more natural than Horace's +dandified treble, and Sporus's malignant whisper. As one +reads the Selwyn letters—as one looks at Reynolds's noble +pictures illustrative of those magnificent times and voluptuous +people—one almost hears the voice of the dead past; +the laughter and the chorus; the toast called over the +brimming cups; the shout at the racecourse or the +gaming-table; the merry joke frankly spoken to the +laughing fine lady. How fine those ladies were, those +ladies who heard and spoke such coarse jokes; how grand +those gentlemen! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I fancy that peculiar product of the past, the fine gentleman, +has almost vanished off the face of the earth, and is +disappearing like the beaver or the Red Indian. We can't +have fine gentlemen any more, because we can't have the +society in which they lived. The people will not obey: +the parasites will not be as obsequious as formerly: children +do not go down on their knees to beg their parents' blessing: +chaplains do not say grace and retire before the pudding: +servants do not say <span class="tei tei-q">“your honour”</span> and <span class="tei tei-q">“your worship”</span> at +every moment: tradesmen do not stand hat in hand as +the gentleman passes: authors do not wait for hours in +gentlemen's ante-rooms with a fulsome dedication, for which +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page755">[pg 755]</span><a name="Pg755" id="Pg755" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +they hope to get five guineas from his lordship. In the +days when there were fine gentlemen, Mr. Secretary Pitt's +under-secretaries did not dare to sit down before him; but +Mr. Pitt, in his turn, went down on his gouty knees to +George II; and when George III spoke a few kind words +to him, Lord Chatham burst into tears of reverential joy +and gratitude; so awful was the idea of the monarch, and +so great the distinctions of rank. Fancy Lord John Russell +or Lord Palmerston on their knees whilst the sovereign +was reading a dispatch, or beginning to cry because Prince +Albert said something civil! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At the accession of George III, the patricians were yet +at the height of their good fortune. Society recognized +their superiority, which they themselves pretty calmly took +for granted. They inherited not only titles and estates, +and seats in the House of Peers, but seats in the House +of Commons. There were a multitude of Government +places, and not merely these, but bribes of actual 500<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> +notes, which Members of the House took not much shame +in assuming. Fox went into Parliament at 20: Pitt was +just of age: his father not much older. It was the good +time for Patricians. Small blame to them if they took +and enjoyed, and over-enjoyed, the prizes of politics, the +pleasures of social life. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In these letters to Selwyn, we are made acquainted with +a whole society of these defunct fine gentlemen: and can +watch with a curious interest a life, which the novel-writers +of that time, I think, have scarce touched upon. To +Smollett, to Fielding even, a lord was a lord: a gorgeous +being with a blue ribbon, a coroneted chair, and an immense +star on his bosom, to whom commoners paid reverence. +Richardson, a man of humbler birth than either of the +above two, owned that he was ignorant regarding the +manners of the aristocracy, and besought Mrs. Donnellan, +a lady who had lived in the great world, to examine a +volume of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sir Charles Grandison</span></span>, and point out any errors +which she might see in this particular. Mrs. Donnellan +found so many faults, that Richardson changed colour; +shut up the book; and muttered that it were best to +throw it in the fire. Here, in Selwyn, we have the real +original men and women of fashion of the early time of +George III. We can follow them to the new club at +Almack's: we can travel over Europe with them: we can +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page756">[pg 756]</span><a name="Pg756" id="Pg756" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +accompany them not only to the public places, but to their +country-houses and private society. Here is a whole company +of them; wits and prodigals; some persevering in +their bad ways; some repentant, but relapsing; beautiful +ladies, parasites, humble chaplains, led captains. Those +fair creatures whom we love in Reynolds's portraits, and +who still look out on us from his canvases with their sweet +calm faces and gracious smiles—those fine gentlemen who +did us the honour to govern us; who inherited their +boroughs; took their ease in their patent places; and +slipped Lord North's bribes so elegantly under their ruffles—we +make acquaintance with a hundred of these fine folks, +hear their talk and laughter, read of their loves, quarrels, +intrigues, debts, duels, divorces; can fancy them alive if +we read the book long enough. We can attend at Duke +Hamilton's wedding, and behold him marry his bride with +the curtain-ring: we can peep into her poor sister's death-bed: +we can see Charles Fox cursing over the cards, or +March bawling out the odds at Newmarket: we can +imagine Burgoyne tripping off from St. James's Street to +conquer the Americans, and slinking back into the club +somewhat crestfallen after his beating: we can see the young +king dressing himself for the Drawing-room and asking ten +thousand questions regarding all the gentlemen: we can +have high life or low, the struggle at the Opera to behold +the Violetta or the Zamperini—the Macaronis and fine +ladies in their chairs trooping to the masquerade or Madame +Cornelys's—the crowd at Drury Lane to look at the body +of Miss Ray, whom Parson Hackman has just pistolled—or +we can peep into Newgate, where poor Mr. Rice the +forger is waiting his fate and his supper. <span class="tei tei-q">“You need not +be particular about the sauce for his fowl,”</span> says one turnkey +to another: <span class="tei tei-q">“for you know he is to be hanged in the +morning.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Yes,”</span> replies the second janitor, <span class="tei tei-q">“but the +chaplain sups with him, and he is a terrible fellow for +melted butter.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Selwyn has a chaplain and parasite, one Dr. Warner, +than whom Plautus, or Ben Jonson, or Hogarth, never +painted a better character. In letter after letter he adds +fresh strokes to the portrait of himself, and completes +a portrait not a little curious to look at now that the man +has passed away; all the foul pleasures and gambols in +which he revelled, played out; all the rouged faces into +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page757">[pg 757]</span><a name="Pg757" id="Pg757" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +which he leered, worms and skulls; all the fine gentlemen +whose shoebuckles he kissed, laid in their coffins. This +worthy clergyman takes care to tell us that he does not +believe in his religion, though, thank Heaven, he is not so +great a rogue as a lawyer. He goes on Mr. Selwyn's +errands, any errands, and is proud, he says, to be that +gentleman's proveditor. He waits upon the Duke of +Queensberry—old Q.—and exchanges pretty stories with +that aristocrat. He comes home <span class="tei tei-q">“after a hard day's +christening”</span>, as he says, and writes to his patron before +sitting down to whist and partridges for supper. He revels +in the thoughts of ox-cheek and burgundy—he is a boisterous, +uproarious parasite, licks his master's shoes with +explosions of laughter and cunning smack and gusto, and +likes the taste of that blacking as much as the best claret +in old Q.'s cellar. He has Rabelais and Horace at his +greasy fingers' ends. He is inexpressibly mean, curiously +jolly; kindly and good-natured in secret—a tender-hearted +knave, not a venomous lickspittle. Jesse says, that at his +chapel in Long Acre, <span class="tei tei-q">“he attained a considerable popularity +by the pleasing, manly, and eloquent style of his delivery.”</span> +Was infidelity endemic, and corruption in the air? Around +a young king, himself of the most exemplary life and +undoubted piety, lived a Court society as dissolute as our +country ever knew. George II's bad morals bore their +fruit in George III's early years; as I believe that a knowledge +of that good man's example, his moderation, his +frugal simplicity, and God-fearing life, tended infinitely to +improve the morals of the country and purify the whole +nation. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After Warner, the most interesting of Selwyn's correspondents +is the Earl of Carlisle, grandfather of the amiable +nobleman at present Viceroy in Ireland. The grandfather, +too, was Irish Viceroy, having previously been treasurer +of the king's household; and, in 1778, the principal commissioner +for treating, consulting, and agreeing upon the +means of quieting the divisions subsisting in his Majesty's +colonies, plantations, and possessions in North America. +You may read his lordship's manifestos in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Royal +New York Gazette</span></span>. He returned to England, having +by no means quieted the colonies; and speedily afterwards +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Royal New York Gazette</span></span> somehow ceased to be +published. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page758">[pg 758]</span><a name="Pg758" id="Pg758" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This good, clever, kind, highly-bred Lord Carlisle was +one of the English fine gentlemen who were wellnigh ruined +by the awful debauchery and extravagance which prevailed +in the great English society of those days. Its dissoluteness +was awful: it had swarmed over Europe after the +Peace; it had danced, and raced, and gambled in all the +Courts. It had made its bow at Versailles; it had run +its horses on the plain of Sablons, near Paris, and created +the Anglomania there: it had exported vast quantities +of pictures and marbles from Rome and Florence: it had +ruined itself by building great galleries and palaces for the +reception of the statues and pictures: it had brought over +singing-women and dancing-women from all the operas of +Europe, on whom my lords lavished their thousands, whilst +they left their honest wives and honest children languishing +in the lonely, deserted splendours of the castle and park +at home. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Besides the great London society of those days, there +was another unacknowledged world, extravagant beyond +measure, tearing about in the pursuit of pleasure; dancing, +gambling, drinking, singing; meeting the real society in +the public places (at Ranelaghs, Vauxhalls, and Ridottos, +about which our old novelists talk so constantly), and +outvying the real leaders of fashion, in luxury, and splendour, +and beauty. For instance, when the famous Miss +Gunning visited Paris as Lady Coventry, where she expected +that her beauty would meet with the applause +which had followed her and her sister through England, +it appears she was put to flight by an English lady still +more lovely in the eyes of the Parisians. A certain Mrs. Pitt +took a box at the opera opposite the countess; and was +so much handsomer than her ladyship, that the parterre +cried out that this was the real English angel, whereupon +Lady Coventry quitted Paris in a huff. The poor thing +died presently of consumption, accelerated, it was said, by +the red and white paint with which she plastered those +luckless charms of hers. (We must represent to ourselves +all fashionable female Europe, at that time, as plastered +with white, and raddled with red.) She left two daughters +behind her, whom George Selwyn loved (he was curiously +fond of little children), and who are described very drolly +and pathetically in these letters, in their little nursery, +where passionate little Lady Fanny, if she had not good +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page759">[pg 759]</span><a name="Pg759" id="Pg759" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +cards, flung hers into Lady Mary's face; and where they +sat conspiring how they should receive a new mother-in-law +whom their papa presently brought home. They got +on very well with their mother-in-law, who was very kind +to them; and they grew up, and they were married, and +they were both divorced afterwards—poor little souls! +Poor painted mother, poor society, ghastly in its pleasures, +its loves, its revelries! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As for my lord commissioner, we can afford to speak +about him: because, though he was a wild and weak +commissioner at one time, though he hurt his estate, though +he gambled and lost ten thousand pounds at a sitting—<span class="tei tei-q">“five +times more,”</span> says the unlucky gentleman, <span class="tei tei-q">“than I ever +lost before;”</span> though he swore he never would touch a +card again; and yet, strange to say, went back to the +table and lost still more: yet he repented of his errors, +sobered down, and became a worthy peer and a good +country gentleman, and returned to the good wife and the +good children whom he had always loved with the best +part of his heart. He had married at one-and-twenty. +He found himself, in the midst of a dissolute society, at +the head of a great fortune. Forced into luxury, and +obliged to be a great lord and a great idler, he yielded to +some temptations, and paid for them a bitter penalty of +manly remorse; from some others he fled wisely, and +ended by conquering them nobly. But he always had the +good wife and children in his mind, and they saved him. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am very glad you did not come to me the morning +I left London,”</span> he writes to G. Selwyn, as he is embarking +for America. <span class="tei tei-q">“I can only say, I never knew till that +moment of parting, what grief was.”</span> There is no parting +now, where they are. The faithful wife, the kind, generous +gentleman, have left a noble race behind them: an inheritor +of his name and titles, who is beloved as widely +as he is known; a man most kind, accomplished, gentle, +friendly, and pure; and female descendants occupying +high stations and embellishing great names; some renowned +for beauty, and all for spotless lives, and pious matronly +virtues. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Another of Selwyn's correspondents is the Earl of March, +afterwards Duke of Queensberry, whose life lasted into this +century; and who certainly as earl or duke, young man +or greybeard, was not an ornament to any possible society. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page760">[pg 760]</span><a name="Pg760" id="Pg760" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +The legends about old Q. are awful. In <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Selwyn</span></span>, +in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Wraxall</span></span>, +and contemporary chronicles, the observer of human nature +may follow him, drinking, gambling, intriguing to the end +of his career; when the wrinkled, palsied, toothless old +Don Juan died, as wicked and unrepentant as he had been +at the hottest season of youth and passion. There is a +house in Piccadilly, where they used to show a certain +low window at which old Q. sat to his very last +days, ogling through his senile glasses the women as they +passed by. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There must have been a great deal of good about this +lazy, sleepy George Selwyn, which, no doubt, is set to his +present credit. <span class="tei tei-q">“Your friendship,”</span> writes Carlisle to him, +<span class="tei tei-q">“is so different from anything I have ever met with or seen +in the world, that when I recollect the extraordinary proofs +of your kindness, it seems to me like a dream.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“I have +lost my oldest friend, and acquaintance, G. Selwyn,”</span> writes +Walpole to Miss Berry: <span class="tei tei-q">“I really loved him, not only for +his infinite wit, but for a thousand good qualities.”</span> I am +glad, for my part, that such a lover of cakes and ale should +have had a thousand good qualities—that he should have +been friendly, generous, warm-hearted, trustworthy. <span class="tei tei-q">“I rise +at six,”</span> writes Carlisle to him, from Spa (a great resort of +fashionable people in our ancestors' days), <span class="tei tei-q">“play at +cricket till dinner, and dance in the evening, till I can +scarcely crawl to bed at eleven. There is a life for you! +You get up at nine; play with Raton your dog till twelve, +in your dressing-gown; then creep down to White's; are +five hours at table; sleep till supper-time; and then make +two wretches carry you in a sedan-chair, with three pints +of claret in you, three miles for a shilling.”</span> Occasionally, +instead of sleeping at White's, George went down and +snoozed in the House of Commons by the side of Lord +North. He represented Gloucester for many years, and +had a borough of his own, Ludgershall, for which, when +he was too lazy to contest Gloucester, he sat himself. +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have given directions for the election of Ludgershall to +be of Lord Melbourne and myself,”</span> he writes to the Premier, +whose friend he was, and who was himself as sleepy, as +witty, and as good-natured as George. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +If, in looking at the lives of princes, courtiers, men of +rank and fashion, we must perforce depict them as idle, +profligate, and criminal, we must make allowances for the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page761">[pg 761]</span><a name="Pg761" id="Pg761" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +rich men's failings, and recollect that we, too, were very +likely indolent and voluptuous, had we no motive for work, +a mortal's natural taste for pleasure, and the daily temptation +of a large income. What could a great peer, with +a great castle and park, and a great fortune, do but be +splendid and idle? In these letters of Lord Carlisle's from +which I have been quoting, there is many a just complaint +made by the kind-hearted young nobleman of the state +which he is obliged to keep; the magnificence in which +he must live; the idleness to which his position as a peer +of England bound him. Better for him had he been a +lawyer at his desk, or a clerk in his office;—a thousand +times better chance for happiness, education, employment, +security from temptation. A few years since the profession +of arms was the only one which our nobles could follow. +The Church, the Bar, medicine, literature, the arts, commerce, +were below them. It is to the middle class we +must look for the safety of England: the working educated +men, away from Lord North's bribery in the senate; the +good clergy not corrupted into parasites by hopes of preferment; +the tradesmen rising into manly opulence; the +painters pursuing their gentle calling; the men of letters +in their quiet studies; these are the men whom we love +and like to read of in the last age. How small the grandees +and the men of pleasure look beside them! how contemptible +the story of the George III Court squabbles are +beside the recorded talk of dear old Johnson! What is +the grandest entertainment at Windsor, compared to a +night at the club over its modest cups, with Percy and +Langton, and Goldsmith, and poor Bozzy at the table? +I declare I think, of all the polite men of that age, Joshua +Reynolds was the finest gentleman. And they were good, +as well as witty and wise, those dear old friends of the +past. Their minds were not debauched by excess, or +effeminate with luxury. They toiled their noble day's +labour: they rested, and took their kindly pleasure: they +cheered their holiday meetings with generous wit and +hearty interchange of thought: they were no prudes, but +no blush need follow their conversation: they were merry, +but no riot came out of their cups. Ah! I would have +liked a night at the <span class="tei tei-q">“Turk's Head”</span>, even though bad news +had arrived from the colonies, and Doctor Johnson was +growling against the rebels; to have sat with him and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page762">[pg 762]</span><a name="Pg762" id="Pg762" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Goldy; and to have heard Burke, the finest talker in the +world; and to have had Garrick flashing in with a story +from his theatre!—I like, I say, to think of that society; +and not merely how pleasant and how wise, but how <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">good</span></em> +they were. I think it was on going home one night from +the club that Edmund Burke—his noble soul full of great +thoughts, be sure, for they never left him; his heart full +of gentleness—was accosted by a poor wandering woman, +to whom he spoke words of kindness; and moved by the +tears of this Magdalen, perhaps having caused them by the +good words he spoke to her, he took her home to the house +of his wife and children, and never left her until he had +found the means of restoring her to honesty and labour. +O you fine gentlemen! you Marches, and Selwyns, and +Chesterfields, how small you look by the side of these great +men! Good-natured Carlisle plays at cricket all day, and +dances in the evening <span class="tei tei-q">“till he can scarcely crawl”</span>, gaily +contrasting his superior virtue with George Selwyn's +<span class="tei tei-q">“carried to bed by two wretches at midnight with three +pints of claret in him”</span>. Do you remember the verses—the +sacred verses—which Johnson wrote on the death of +his humble friend, Levett? +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Well tried through many a varying year,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">See Levett to the grave descend;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Officious, innocent, sincere,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Of every friendless name the friend.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In misery's darkest cavern known,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">His useful care was ever nigh,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Where hopeless anguish poured the groan,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">And lonely want retired to die.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">No summons mocked by chill delay,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">No petty gain disdained by pride,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The modest wants of every day</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">The toil of every day supplied.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">His virtues walked their narrow round,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Nor made a pause, nor left a void:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And sure the Eternal Master found</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">His single talent well employed.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whose name looks the brightest now, that of Queensberry +the wealthy duke, or Selwyn the wit, or Levett the poor +physician? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I hold old Johnson (and shall we not pardon James +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page763">[pg 763]</span><a name="Pg763" id="Pg763" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Boswell some errors for embalming him for us?) to be the +great supporter of the British Monarchy and Church during +the last age—better than whole benches of bishops, better +than Pitts, Norths, and the great Burke himself. Johnson +had the ear of the nation: his immense authority reconciled +it to loyalty, and shamed it out of irreligion. When +George III talked with him, and the people heard the +great author's good opinion of the sovereign, whole generations +rallied to the king. Johnson was revered as a sort +of oracle; and the oracle declared for Church and King. +What a humanity the old man had! He was a kindly +partaker of all honest pleasures: a fierce foe to all sin, +but a gentle enemy to all sinners. <span class="tei tei-q">“What, boys, are you +for a frolic?”</span> he cries, when Topham Beauclerc comes and +wakes him up at midnight: <span class="tei tei-q">“I'm with you,”</span> And away +he goes, tumbles on his homely old clothes, and trundles +through Covent Garden with the young fellows. When he +used to frequent Garrick's theatre, and had <span class="tei tei-q">“the liberty +of the scenes”</span>, he says, <span class="tei tei-q">“all the actresses knew me, and +dropped me a curtsy as they passed to the stage.”</span> That +would make a pretty picture: it is a pretty picture in my +mind, of youth, folly, gaiety, tenderly surveyed by wisdom's +merciful, pure eyes. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +George III and his queen lived in a very unpretending +but elegant-looking house, on the site of the hideous pile +under which his granddaughter at present reposes. The +king's mother inhabited Carlton House, which contemporary +prints represent with a perfect paradise of a garden, +with trim lawns, green arcades, and vistas of classic statues. +She admired these in company with my Lord Bute, who +had a fine classic taste, and sometimes counsel took and +sometimes tea in the pleasant green arbours along with +that polite nobleman. Bute was hated with a rage of +which there have been few examples in English history. +He was the butt for everybody's abuse; for Wilkes's +devilish mischief; for Churchill's slashing satire; for the +hooting of the mob that roasted the boot, his emblem, in +a thousand bonfires; that hated him because he was a +favourite and a Scotchman, calling him <span class="tei tei-q">“Mortimer”</span>, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Lothario”</span>, I know not what names, and accusing his royal +mistress of all sorts of crimes—the grave, lean, demure, +elderly woman, who, I dare say, was quite as good as her +neighbours. Chatham lent the aid of his great malice to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page764">[pg 764]</span><a name="Pg764" id="Pg764" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +influence the popular sentiment against her. He assailed, +in the House of Lords, <span class="tei tei-q">“the secret influence, more mighty +than the Throne itself, which betrayed and clogged every +administration.”</span> The most furious pamphlets echoed the +cry. <span class="tei tei-q">“Impeach the king's mother,”</span> was scribbled over +every wall at the Court end of the town, Walpole tells us. +What had she done? What had Frederick, Prince of +Wales, George's father, done, that he was so loathed +by George II and never mentioned by George III? +Let us not seek for stones to batter that forgotten +grave, but acquiesce in the contemporary epitaph over +him:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Here lies Fred,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Who was alive, and is dead.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Had it been his father,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I had much rather.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Had it been his brother,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Still better than another.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Had it been his sister,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">No one would have missed her.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Had it been the whole generation,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Still better for the nation.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But since 'tis only Fred,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Who was alive, and is dead,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">There's no more to be said.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The widow with eight children round her, prudently +reconciled herself with the king, and won the old man's +confidence and goodwill. A shrewd, hard, domineering, +narrow-minded woman, she educated her children according +to her lights, and spoke of the eldest as a dull, good +boy: she kept him very close: she held the tightest +rein over him: she had curious prejudices and bigotries. +His uncle, the burly Cumberland, taking down a sabre +once, and drawing it to amuse the child—the boy +started back and turned pale. The prince felt a generous +shock: <span class="tei tei-q">“What must they have told him about me?”</span> he +asked. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +His mother's bigotry and hatred he inherited with the +courageous obstinacy of his own race; but he was a firm +believer where his fathers had been freethinkers, and a +true and fond supporter of the Church, of which he was +the titular defender. Like other dull men, the king was +all his life suspicious of superior people. He did not like +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page765">[pg 765]</span><a name="Pg765" id="Pg765" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Fox; he did not like Reynolds; he did not like Nelson, +Chatham, Burke; he was testy at the idea of all innovations, +and suspicious of all innovators. He loved mediocrities; +Benjamin West was his favourite painter; Beattie +was his poet. The king lamented, not without pathos, in +his after-life, that his education had been neglected. He +was a dull lad brought up by narrow-minded people. The +cleverest tutors in the world could have done little probably +to expand that small intellect, though they might have +improved his tastes, and taught his perceptions some +generosity. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But he admired as well as he could. There is little doubt +that a letter, written by the little Princess Charlotte of +Mecklenburg-Strelitz,—a letter containing the most feeble +commonplaces about the horrors of war, and the most +trivial remarks on the blessings of peace, struck the young +monarch greatly, and decided him upon selecting the young +princess as the sharer of his throne, I pass over the +stories of his juvenile loves—of Hannah Lightfoot, the +Quaker, to whom they say he was actually married +(though I don't know who has ever seen the register)—of +lovely black-haired Sarah Lennox, about whose beauty +Walpole has written in raptures, and who used to lie in +wait for the young prince, and make hay at him on the +lawn of Holland House. He sighed and he longed, but +he rode away from her. Her picture still hangs in Holland +House, a magnificent masterpiece of Reynolds, a canvas +worthy of Titian. She looks from the castle window, +holding a bird in her hand, at black-eyed young Charles +Fox, her nephew. The royal bird flew away from lovely +Sarah. She had to figure as bridesmaid at her little Mecklenburg +rival's wedding, and died in our own time a quiet +old lady, who had become the mother of the heroic +Napiers. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They say the little princess who had written the fine +letter about the horrors of war—a beautiful letter without +a single blot, for which she was to be rewarded, like the +heroine of the old spelling-book story—was at play one +day with some of her young companions in the gardens of +Strelitz, and that the young ladies' conversation was, +strange to say, about husbands. <span class="tei tei-q">“Who will take such +a poor little princess as me?”</span> Charlotte said to her friend, +Ida von Bulow, and at that very moment the postman's +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page766">[pg 766]</span><a name="Pg766" id="Pg766" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +horn sounded, and Ida said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Princess! there is the sweetheart.”</span> +As she said, so it actually turned out. The postman +brought letters from the splendid young King of all +England, who said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Princess! because you have written +such a beautiful letter, which does credit to your head and +heart, come and be Queen of Great Britain, France, and +Ireland, and the true wife of your most obedient servant, +George!”</span> So she jumped for joy; and went upstairs and +packed all her little trunks; and set off straightway for +her kingdom in a beautiful yacht, with a harpsichord on +board for her to play upon, and around her a beautiful +fleet, all covered with flags and streamers, and the distinguished +Madame Auerbach complimented her with an ode, +a translation of which may be read in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gentleman's +Magazine</span></span> to the present day:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Her gallant navy through the main,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Now cleaves its liquid way.</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">There to their queen a chosen train</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Of nymphs due reverence pay.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Europa, when conveyed by Jove</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">To Crete's distinguished shore,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Greater attention scarce could prove,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left; margin-left: 1.80em"><span style="font-size: 90%">Or be respected more.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They met, and they were married, and for years they +led the happiest, simplest lives sure ever led by married +couple. It is said the king winced when he first saw his +homely little bride; but, however that may be, he was +a true and faithful husband to her, as she was a faithful +and loving wife. They had the simplest pleasures—the +very mildest and simplest—little country dances, to which +a dozen couple were invited, and where the honest king +would stand up and dance for three hours at a time to one +tune; after which delicious excitement they would go to +bed without any supper (the Court people grumbling sadly +at that absence of supper), and get up quite early the next +morning, and perhaps the next night have another dance; +or the queen would play on the spinet—she played pretty +well, Haydn said—or the king would read to her a paper +out of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, or perhaps one of Ogden's sermons. +O Arcadia! what a life it must have been! There used to +be Sunday drawing-rooms at Court; but the young +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page767">[pg 767]</span><a name="Pg767" id="Pg767" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +king stopped these, as he stopped all that godless gambling +whereof we have made mention. Not that George was +averse to any innocent pleasures, or pleasures which he +thought innocent. He was a patron of the arts, after his +fashion; kind and gracious to the artists whom he favoured, +and respectful to their calling. He wanted once to establish +an Order of Minerva for literary and scientific characters; +the knights were to take rank after the knights of the Bath, +and to sport a straw-coloured ribbon and a star of sixteen +points. But there was such a row amongst the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">literati</span></span> as +to the persons who should be appointed, that the plan was +given up, and Minerva and her star never came down +amongst us. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He objected to painting St. Paul's, as Popish practice; +accordingly, the most clumsy heathen sculptures decorate +that edifice at present. It is fortunate that the paintings, +too, were spared, for painting and drawing were wofully +unsound at the close of the last century; and it is far +better for our eyes to contemplate whitewash (when we +turn them away from the clergyman) than to look at +Opie's pitchy canvases, or Fuseli's livid monsters. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And yet there is one day in the year—a day when old +George loved with all his heart to attend it—when I think +St. Paul's presents the noblest sight in the whole world: +when five thousand charity children, with cheeks like nosegays, +and sweet, fresh voices, sing the hymn which makes +every heart thrill with praise and happiness. I have seen +a hundred grand sights in the world—coronations, Parisian +splendours, Crystal Palace openings, Pope's chapels with +their processions of long-tailed cardinals and quavering +choirs of fat soprani—but think in all Christendom there +is no such sight as Charity Children's Day. <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Non Angli, sed +angeli</span></span>. As one looks at that beautiful multitude of innocents: +as the first note strikes: indeed one may almost +fancy that cherubs are singing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of church music the king was always very fond, showing +skill in it both as a critic and a performer. Many stories, +mirthful and affecting, are told of his behaviour at the +concerts which he ordered. When he was blind and ill he +chose the music for the Ancient Concerts once, and the +music and words which he selected were from <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Samson +Agonistes</span></span>, and all had reference to his blindness, his captivity, +and his affliction. He would beat time with his music-roll +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page768">[pg 768]</span><a name="Pg768" id="Pg768" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +as they sang the anthem in the Chapel Royal. If the page +below was talkative or inattentive, down would come the +music-roll on young scapegrace's powdered head. The +theatre was always his delight. His bishops and clergy +used to attend it, thinking it no shame to appear where +that good man was seen. He is said not to have cared for +Shakespeare or tragedy much; farces and pantomimes were +his joy; and especially when clown swallowed a carrot +or a string of sausages, he would laugh so outrageously +that the lovely princess by his side would have to say, +<span class="tei tei-q">“My gracious monarch, do compose yourself.”</span> But he +continued to laugh, and at the very smallest farces, as long +as his poor wits were left him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There is something to me exceedingly touching in that +simple early life of the king's. As long as his mother lived—a +dozen years after his marriage with the little spinet-player—he +was a great, shy, awkward boy, under the +tutelage of that hard parent. She must have been a clever, +domineering, cruel woman. She kept her household lonely +and in gloom, mistrusting almost all people who came +about her children. Seeing the young Duke of Gloucester +silent and unhappy once, she sharply asked him the cause +of his silence. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am thinking,”</span> said the poor child. <span class="tei tei-q">“Thinking, +sir! and of what?”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“I am thinking if ever I have +a son I will not make him so unhappy as you make me.”</span> +The other sons were all wild, except George. Dutifully +every evening George and Charlotte paid their visit to the +king's mother at Carlton House. She had a throat complaint, +of which she died; but to the last persisted in +driving about the streets to show she was alive. The night +before her death the resolute woman talked with her son +and daughter-in-law as usual, went to bed, and was found +dead there in the morning. <span class="tei tei-q">“George, be a king!”</span> were the +words which she was for ever croaking in the ears of her +son: and a king the simple, stubborn, affectionate, bigoted +man tried to be. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He did his best; he worked according to his lights; what +virtue he knew, he tried to practise; what knowledge he +could master, he strove to acquire. He was for ever +drawing maps, for example, and learned geography with +no small care and industry. He knew all about the family +histories and genealogies of his gentry, and pretty histories +he must have known. He knew the whole <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Army +</span><span class="tei tei-pb" id="page769">[pg 769]</span><a name="Pg769" id="Pg769" class="tei tei-anchor"></a><span style="font-style: italic"> +List</span></span>; and all the facings, and the exact number of the +buttons, and all the tags and laces, and the cut of all the +cocked hats, pigtails, and gaiters in his army. He knew +the <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">personnel</span></em> of the Universities; what doctors were +inclined to Socinianism, and who were sound Churchmen; +he knew the etiquettes of his own and his grandfather's +Courts to a nicety, and the smallest particulars regarding +the routine of ministers, secretaries, embassies, audiences; +the humblest page in the ante-room, or the meanest helper +in the stables or kitchen. These parts of the royal business +he was capable of learning, and he learned. But, as one +thinks of an office, almost divine, performed by any mortal +man—of any single being pretending to control the thoughts, +to direct the faith, to order the implicit obedience of brother +millions, to compel them into war at his offence or quarrel; +to command, <span class="tei tei-q">“In this way you shall trade, in this way you +shall think; these neighbours shall be your allies whom +you shall help, these others your enemies whom you +shall slay at my orders; in this way you shall worship +God;”</span>—who can wonder that, when such a man as George +took such an office on himself, punishment and humiliation +should fall upon people and chief? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Yet there is something grand about his courage. The +battle of the king with his aristocracy remains yet to be +told by the historian who shall view the reign of George +more justly than the trumpery panegyrists who wrote +immediately after his decease. It was he, with the people +to back him, who made the war with America; it was he +and the people who refused justice to the Roman Catholics; +and on both questions he beat the patricians. He bribed: +he bullied: he darkly dissembled on occasion: he exercised +a slippery perseverance, and a vindictive resolution, which +one almost admires as one thinks his character over. His +courage was never to be beat. It trampled North under +foot: it bent the stiff neck of the younger Pitt: even his +illness never conquered that indomitable spirit. As soon +as his brain was clear, it resumed the scheme, only laid +aside when his reason left him: as soon as his hands were +out of the strait-waistcoat, they took up the pen and the +plan which had engaged him up to the moment of his +malady. I believe it is by persons believing themselves +in the right that nine-tenths of the tyranny of this world +has been perpetrated. Arguing on that convenient premiss, +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page770">[pg 770]</span><a name="Pg770" id="Pg770" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +the Dey of Algiers would cut off twenty heads of a morning; +Father Dominic would burn a score of Jews in the presence +of the most Catholic King, and the Archbishops of Toledo +and Salamanca sing Amen. Protestants were roasted, +Jesuits hung and quartered at Smithfield, and witches +burned at Salem, and all by worthy people, who believed +they had the best authority for their actions. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And so, with respect to old George, even Americans, +whom he hated and who conquered him, may give him +credit for having quite honest reasons for oppressing them. +Appended to Lord Brougham's biographical sketch of Lord +North are some autograph notes of the king, which let us +most curiously into the state of his mind. <span class="tei tei-q">“The times +certainly require,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“the concurrence of all who +wish to prevent anarchy. I have no wish but the prosperity +of my own dominions, therefore I must look upon all who +would not heartily assist me as bad men, as well as bad +subjects.”</span> That is the way he reasoned. <span class="tei tei-q">“I wish nothing +but good, therefore every man who does not agree with +me is a traitor and a scoundrel.”</span> Remember that he believed +himself anointed by a Divine commission; remember that +he was a man of slow parts and imperfect education; that +the same awful will of Heaven which placed a crown upon +his head, which made him tender to his family, pure in +his life, courageous and honest, made him dull of comprehension, +obstinate of will, and at many times deprived +him of reason. He was the father of his people; his rebellious +children must be flogged into obedience. He was the +defender of the Protestant faith; he would rather lay that +stout head upon the block than that Catholics should have +a share in the government of England. And you do not +suppose that there are not honest bigots enough in all +countries to back kings in this kind of statesmanship? +Without doubt the American war was popular in England. +In 1775 the address in favour of coercing the colonies was +carried by 304 to 105 in the Commons, by 104 to 29 in +the House of Lords. Popular?—so was the Revocation of +the Edict of Nantes popular in France: so was the massacre +of St. Bartholomew: so was the Inquisition exceedingly +popular in Spain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Wars and revolutions are, however, the politician's +province. The great events of this long reign, the statesmen +and orators who illustrated it, I do not pretend to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page771">[pg 771]</span><a name="Pg771" id="Pg771" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +make the subjects of an hour's light talk.<a id="noteref_187" name="noteref_187" href="#note_187"><span class="tei tei-noteref"><span style="font-size: 60%; vertical-align: super">187</span></span></a> Let us return +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page772">[pg 772]</span><a name="Pg772" id="Pg772" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +to our humbler duty of Court gossip. Yonder sits our little +queen, surrounded by many stout sons and fair daughters +whom she bore to her faithful George. The history of the +daughters, as little Miss Burney has painted them to us, +is delightful. They were handsome—she calls them beautiful; +they were most kind, loving, and ladylike; they +were gracious to every person, high and low, who served +them. They had many little accomplishments of their own. +This one drew: that one played the piano: they all worked +most prodigiously, and fitted up whole suites of rooms—pretty, +smiling Penelopes,—with their busy little needles. +As we picture to ourselves the society of eighty years ago, +we must imagine hundreds of thousands of groups of women +in great high caps, tight bodies, and full skirts, needling +away, whilst one of the number, or perhaps a favoured +gentleman in a pigtail, reads out a novel to the company. +Peep into the cottage at Olney, for example, and see there +Mrs. Unwin and Lady Hesketh, those high-bred ladies, +those sweet, pious women, and William Cowper, that delicate +wit, that trembling pietist, that refined gentleman, absolutely +reading out <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Jonathan Wild</span></span> to the ladies! What +a change in our manners, in our amusements, since then! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/north-fox.png" width="700" height="628" alt="Illustration" title="Lord North, Mr. Fox" /><div class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em">Lord North, Mr. Fox</div></div> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/pitt-burke.png" width="700" height="507" alt="Illustration" title="Mr. Pitt, Mr. Burke" /><div class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em">Mr. Pitt, Mr. Burke</div></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +King George's household was a model of an English +gentleman's household. It was early; it was kindly; it +was charitable; it was frugal; it was orderly; it must +have been stupid to a degree which I shudder now to +contemplate. No wonder all the princes ran away from +the lap of that dreary domestic virtue. It always rose, +rode, dined at stated intervals. Day after day was the +same. At the same hour at night the king kissed his +daughters' jolly cheeks; the princesses kissed their mother's +hand; and Madame Thielke brought the royal nightcap. +At the same hour the equerries and women in waiting had +their little dinner, and cackled over their tea. The king +had his backgammon or his evening concert; the equerries +yawned themselves to death in the ante-room; or the king +and his family walked on Windsor slopes, the king holding +his darling little princess Amelia by the hand; and the +people crowded round quite good-naturedly; and the Eton +boys thrust their chubby cheeks under the crowd's elbows; +and the concert over, the king never failed to take his +enormous cocked-hat off, and salute his band, and say, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thank you, gentlemen.”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page774">[pg 774]</span><a name="Pg774" id="Pg774" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/rebel.png" width="495" height="700" alt="Illustration" title="A Little Rebel" /><div class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em">A Little Rebel</div></div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page775">[pg 775]</span><a name="Pg775" id="Pg775" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A quieter household, a more prosaic life than this of +Kew or Windsor, cannot be imagined. Rain or shine, the +king rode every day for hours; poked his red face into +hundreds of cottages round about, and showed that shovel +hat and Windsor uniform to farmers, to pig-boys, to old +women making apple dumplings; to all sorts of people, +gentle and simple, about whom countless stories are told. +Nothing can be more undignified than these stories. When +Haroun Alraschid visits a subject incog., the latter is sure +to be very much the better for the caliph's magnificence. +Old George showed no such royal splendour. He used +to give a guinea sometimes: sometimes feel in his pockets +and find he had no money: often ask a man a hundred +questions: about the number of his family, about his oats +and beans, about the rent he paid for his house, and ride +on. On one occasion he played the part of King Alfred, +and turned a piece of meat with a string at a cottager's +house. When the old woman came home, she found a paper +with an enclosure of money, and a note written by the royal +pencil: <span class="tei tei-q">“Five guineas to buy a jack.”</span> It was not splendid, +but it was kind and worthy of Farmer George. One day, +when the king and queen were walking together, they met +a little boy—they were always fond of children, the good +folks—and patted the little white head. <span class="tei tei-q">“Whose little boy +are you?”</span> asks the Windsor uniform. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am the king's +beefeater's little boy,”</span> replied the child. On which the +king said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Then kneel down, and kiss the queen's hand.”</span> +But the innocent offspring of the beefeater declined this +treat. <span class="tei tei-q">“No,”</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">“I won't kneel, for if I do, I shall +spoil my new breeches.”</span> The thrifty king ought to have +hugged him and knighted him on the spot. George's +admirers wrote pages and pages of such stories about him. +One morning, before anybody else was up, the king walked +about Gloucester town; pushed over Molly the housemaid +who was scrubbing the doorsteps with her pail; ran upstairs +and woke all the equerries in their bedrooms; and then +trotted down to the bridge, where, by this time, a dozen +of louts were assembled. <span class="tei tei-q">“What! is this Gloucester New +Bridge?”</span> asked our gracious monarch; and the people +answered him, <span class="tei tei-q">“Yes, your Majesty.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Why, then, my boys,”</span> +said he, <span class="tei tei-q">“let us have a huzzay!”</span> After giving them which +intellectual gratification, he went home to breakfast. Our +fathers read these simple tales with fond pleasure; laughed +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page776">[pg 776]</span><a name="Pg776" id="Pg776" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +at these very small jokes; liked the old man who poked +his nose into every cottage; who lived on plain wholesome +roast and boiled; who despised your French kickshaws; +who was a true hearty old English gentleman. You may +have seen Gilray's famous print of him—in the old wig, +in the stout old hideous Windsor uniform—as the King of +Brobdingnag, peering at a little Gulliver, whom he holds +up in his hand, whilst in the other he has an opera-glass, +through which he surveys the pygmy? Our fathers chose +to set up George as the type of a great king; and the +little Gulliver was the great Napoleon. We prided ourselves +on our prejudices; we blustered and bragged with absurd +vainglory; we dealt to our enemy a monstrous injustice +of contempt and scorn; we fought him with all weapons, +mean as well as heroic. There was no lie we would not +believe; no charge of crime which our furious prejudice +would not credit. I thought at one time of making a collection +of the lies which the French had written against us, +and we had published against them during the war: it +would be a strange memorial of popular falsehood. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Their majesties were very sociable potentates: and the +Court Chronicler tells of numerous visits which they paid +to their subjects, gentle and simple: with whom they +dined; at whose great country-houses they stopped; or +at whose poorer lodgings they affably partook of tea and +bread-and-butter. Some of the great folks spent enormous +sums in entertaining their sovereigns. As marks of special +favour, the king and queen sometimes stood as sponsors +for the children of the nobility. We find Lady Salisbury +was so honoured in the year 1786; and in the year 1802, +Lady Chesterfield. The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Court News</span></span> relates how her ladyship +received their Majesties on a state bed <span class="tei tei-q">“dressed with +white satin and a profusion of lace: the counterpane of +white satin embroidered with gold, and the bed of crimson +satin lined with white”</span>. The child was first brought by +the nurse to the Marchioness of Bath, who presided as +chief nurse. Then the marchioness handed baby to the +queen. Then the queen handed the little darling to the +Bishop of Norwich, the officiating clergyman; and, the +ceremony over, a cup of caudle was presented by the earl +to his Majesty on one knee, on a large gold waiter, placed +on a crimson velvet cushion. Misfortunes would occur in +these interesting genuflectory ceremonies of royal worship. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page777">[pg 777]</span><a name="Pg777" id="Pg777" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Bubb Dodington, Lord Melcombe, a very fat, puffy man, +in a most gorgeous Court suit, had to kneel, Cumberland +says, and was so fat and so tight that he could not get up +again. <span class="tei tei-q">“Kneel, sir, kneel!”</span> cried my lord in waiting to +a country mayor who had to read an address, but who went +on with his compliment standing. <span class="tei tei-q">“Kneel, sir, kneel!”</span> +cries my lord, in dreadful alarm. <span class="tei tei-q">“I can't!”</span> says the +mayor, turning round; <span class="tei tei-q">“don't you see I have got a wooden +leg?”</span> In the capital <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Burney Diary and Letters</span></span>, the home +and Court life of good old King George and good old Queen +Charlotte are presented at portentous length. The king +rose every morning at six: and had two hours to himself. +He thought it effeminate to have a carpet in his bedroom. +Shortly before eight, the queen and the royal family were +always ready for him, and they proceeded to the king's +chapel in the castle. There were no fires in the passages: +the chapel was scarcely alight; princesses, governesses, +equerries grumbled and caught cold: but cold or hot, it +was their duty to go: and, wet or dry, light or dark, the +stout old George was always in his place to say Amen to +the chaplain. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The queen's character is represented in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Burney</span></span> at full +length. She was a sensible, most decorous woman; +a very grand lady on state occasions, simple enough in +ordinary life; well read as times went, and giving shrewd +opinions about books; stingy, but not unjust; not +generally unkind to her dependants, but invincible in her +notions of etiquette, and quite angry if her people suffered +ill-health in her service. She gave Miss Burney a shabby +pittance, and led the poor young woman a life which well-nigh +killed her. She never thought but that she was +doing Burney the greatest favour, in taking her from +freedom, fame, and competence, and killing her off with +languor in that dreary Court. It was not dreary to her. +Had she been servant instead of mistress, her spirit would +never have broken down: she never would have put a pin +out of place, or been a moment from her duty. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">She</span></em> was +not weak, and she could not pardon those who were. She +was perfectly correct in life, and she hated poor sinners +with a rancour such as virtue sometimes has. She must +have had awful private trials of her own: not merely with +her children, but with her husband, in those long days +about which nobody will ever know anything now; when +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page778">[pg 778]</span><a name="Pg778" id="Pg778" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +he was not quite insane; when his incessant tongue was +babbling folly, rage, persecution; and she had to smile +and be respectful and attentive under this intolerable +ennui. The queen bore all her duties stoutly, as she +expected others to bear them. At a state christening, +the lady who held the infant was tired and looked unwell, +and the Princess of Wales asked permission for her to sit +down. <span class="tei tei-q">“Let her stand,”</span> said the queen, flicking the snuff +off her sleeve. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">She</span></em> would have stood, the resolute old +woman, if she had had to hold the child till his beard was +grown. <span class="tei tei-q">“I am seventy years of age,”</span> the queen said, facing +a mob of ruffians who stopped her sedan: <span class="tei tei-q">“I have been +fifty years Queen of England, and I never was insulted +before.”</span> Fearless, rigid, unforgiving little queen! I don't +wonder that her sons revolted from her. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of all the figures in that large family group which surrounds +George and his queen, the prettiest, I think, is the +father's darling, the Princess Amelia, pathetic for her +beauty, her sweetness, her early death, and for the extreme +passionate tenderness with which her father loved her. +This was his favourite amongst all the children: of his +sons, he loved the Duke of York best. Burney tells a sad +story of the poor old man at Weymouth, and how eager +he was to have this darling son with him. The king's +house was not big enough to hold the prince; and his +father had a portable house erected close to his own, and +at huge pains, so that his dear Frederick should be near +him. He clung on his arm all the time of his visit: talked +to no one else; had talked of no one else for some time +before. The prince, so long expected, stayed but a single +night. He had business in London the next day, he said. +The dullness of the old king's Court stupefied York and the +other big sons of George III. They scared equerries and +ladies, frightened the modest little circle, with their coarse +spirits and loud talk. Of little comfort, indeed, were the +king's sons to the king. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the pretty Amelia was his darling; and the little +maiden, prattling and smiling in the fond arms of that +old father, is a sweet image to look on. There is a family +picture in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Burney</span></span>, which a man must be very hard-hearted +not to like. She describes an after-dinner walk of the +royal family at Windsor:—<span class="tei tei-q">“It was really a mighty pretty +procession,”</span> she says. <span class="tei tei-q">“The little princess, just turned of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page779">[pg 779]</span><a name="Pg779" id="Pg779" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +three years old, in a robe-coat covered with fine muslin, +a dressed close cap, white gloves, and fan, walked on alone +and first, highly delighted with the parade, and turning +from side to side to see everybody as she passed; for all +the terracers stand up against the walls, to make a clear +passage for the royal family the moment they come in +sight. Then followed the king and queen, no less delighted +with the joy of their little darling. The Princess Royal +leaning on Lady Elizabeth Waldegrave, the Princess +Augusta holding by the Duchess of Ancaster, the Princess +Elizabeth led by Lady Charlotte Bertie, followed. Office +here takes place of rank,”</span> says Burney,—to explain how +it was that Lady E. Waldegrave, as lady of the bed-chamber, +walked before a duchess;—<span class="tei tei-q">“General Budé, and +the Duke of Montague, and Major Price as equerry, brought +up the rear of the procession.”</span> One sees it; the band +playing its old music, the sun shining on the happy, loyal +crowd; and lighting the ancient battlements, the rich +elms, and purple landscape, and bright greensward; the +royal standard drooping from the great tower yonder; as +old George passes, followed by his race, preceded by the +charming infant, who caresses the crowd with her innocent +smiles. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“On sight of Mrs. Delany, the king instantly stopped to +speak to her; the queen, of course, and the little princess, +and all the rest, stood still. They talked a good while +with the sweet old lady, during which time the king once +or twice addressed himself to me. I caught the queen's +eye, and saw in it a little surprise, but by no means any +displeasure, to see me of the party. The little princess +went up to Mrs. Delany, of whom she is very fond, and +behaved like a little angel to her. She then, with a look +of inquiry and recollection, came behind Mrs. Delany to +look at me. <span class="tei tei-q">‘I am afraid,’</span> said I, in a whisper, and +stooping down, <span class="tei tei-q">‘your Royal Highness does not remember +me?’</span> Her answer was an arch little smile, and a nearer +approach, with her lips pouted out to kiss me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The princess wrote verses herself, and there are some +pretty plaintive lines attributed to her, which are more +touching than better poetry:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Unthinking, idle, wild, and young,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I laughed, and danced, and talked, and sung:</span></div> +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page780">[pg 780]</span><a name="Pg780" id="Pg780" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And, proud of health, of freedom vain,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Dreamed not of sorrow, care, or pain:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Concluding, in those hours of glee,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">That all the world was made for me.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But when the hour of trial came,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">When sickness shook this trembling frame,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">When folly's gay pursuits were o'er,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">And I could sing and dance no more,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">It then occurred, how sad 'twould be</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Were this world only made for me.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The poor soul quitted it—and ere yet she was dead the +agonized father was in such a state, that the officers round +about him were obliged to set watchers over him, and +from November, 1810, George III ceased to reign. All the +world knows the story of his malady: all history presents +no sadder figure than that of the old man, blind and +deprived of reason, wandering through the rooms of his +palace, addressing imaginary Parliaments, reviewing fancied +troops, holding ghostly Courts. I have seen his picture +as it was taken at this time, hanging in the apartment of +his daughter, the Landgravine of Hesse-Hombourg—amidst +books and Windsor furniture, and a hundred fond reminiscences +of her English home. The poor old father is +represented in a purple gown, his snowy beard falling over +his breast—the star of his famous Order still idly shining +on it. He was not only sightless: he became utterly deaf. +All light, all reason, all sound of human voices, all the +pleasures of this world of God, were taken from him. +Some slight lucid moments he had; in one of which, the +queen, desiring to see him, entered the room, and found +him singing a hymn, and accompanying himself at the +harpsichord. When he had finished, he knelt down and +prayed aloud for her, and then for his family, and then for +the nation, concluding with a prayer for himself, that it +might please God to avert his heavy calamity from him, +but if not, to give him resignation to submit. He then +burst into tears, and his reason again fled. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What preacher need moralize on this story; what +words save the simplest are requisite to tell it? It is too +terrible for tears. The thought of such a misery smites +me down in submission before the Ruler of kings and men, +the Monarch Supreme over empires and republics, the +inscrutable Dispenser of life, death, happiness, victory. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page781">[pg 781]</span><a name="Pg781" id="Pg781" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +<span class="tei tei-q">“O brothers,”</span> I said to those who heard me first in America—<span class="tei tei-q">“O +brothers! speaking the same dear mother tongue—O +comrades! enemies no more, let us take a mournful hand +together as we stand by this royal corpse, and call a truce +to battle! Low he lies to whom the proudest used to +kneel once, and who was cast lower than the poorest: +dead, whom millions prayed for in vain. Driven off his +throne; buffeted by rude hands; with his children in +revolt; the darling of his old age killed before him untimely; +our Lear hangs over her breathless lips and cries, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Cordelia, Cordelia, stay a little!’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Vex not his ghost—oh! let him pass—he hates him</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">That would upon the rack of this tough world</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Stretch him out longer!</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Hush, Strife and Quarrel, over the solemn grave! Sound, +trumpets, a mournful march! Fall, dark curtain, upon +his pageant, his pride, his grief, his awful tragedy! +</p> + +</div> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page782">[pg 782]</span><a name="Pg782" id="Pg782" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<hr class="page" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"> +<a name="toc127" id="toc127"></a> +<a name="pdf128" id="pdf128"></a> +<h3 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 2.40em; margin-top: 2.40em"><span style="font-size: 120%">George The Fourth</span></h3> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In Twiss's amusing <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life +of Eldon</span></span>, we read how, +on the death of the +Duke of York, the old +chancellor became possessed +of a lock of the +defunct prince's hair; +and so careful was +he respecting the authenticity +of the relic, +that Bessy Eldon his +wife sat in the room +with the young man +from Hamlet's, who +distributed the ringlet +into separate lockets, +which each of the Eldon +family afterwards wore. +You know how, when +George IV came to +Edinburgh, a better +man than he went on board the royal yacht to welcome +the king to his kingdom of Scotland, seized a goblet from +which his majesty had just drunk, vowed it should remain +for ever as an heirloom in his family, clapped the precious +glass in his pocket, and sat down on it and broke it when +he got home. Suppose the good sheriff's prize unbroken +now at Abbotsford, should we not smile with something +like pity as we beheld it? Suppose one of those lockets +of the No-Popery prince's hair offered for sale at Christie's, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">quot libras e duce summo invenies?</span></span> how many pounds +would you find for the illustrious duke? Madame Tussaud +has got King George's coronation robes; is there any +man now alive who would kiss the hem of that trumpery? +He sleeps since thirty years: do not any of you, who +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page783">[pg 783]</span><a name="Pg783" id="Pg783" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +remember him, wonder that you once respected and huzza'd +and admired him? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +To make a portrait of him at first seemed a matter of +small difficulty. There is his coat, his star, his wig, his +countenance simpering under it: with a slate and a piece +of chalk, I could at this very desk perform a recognizable +likeness of him. And yet after reading of him in scores of +volumes, hunting him through old magazines and newspapers, +having him here at a ball, there at a public dinner, +there at races and so forth, you find you have nothing—nothing +but a coat and wig and a mask smiling below it—nothing +but a great simulacrum. His sire and grandsires +were men. One knows what they were like: what they +would do in given circumstances: that on occasion they +fought and demeaned themselves like tough good soldiers. +They had friends whom they liked according to their +natures; enemies whom they hated fiercely; passions, and +actions, and individualities of their own. The sailor king +who came after George was a man: the Duke of York +was a man, big, burly, loud, jolly, cursing, courageous. +But this George, what was he? I look through all his life, +and recognize but a bow and a grin. I try and take him +to pieces, and find silk stockings, padding, stays, a coat +with frogs and a fur collar, a star and blue ribbon, a pocket-handkerchief +prodigiously scented, one of Truefitt's best +nutty brown wigs reeking with oil, a set of teeth and a huge +black stock, under-waistcoats, more under-waistcoats, and +then nothing. I know of no sentiment that he ever distinctly +uttered. Documents are published under his name, +but people wrote them—private letters, but people spelt +them. He put a great <span class="tei tei-q">“George P.”</span> or <span class="tei tei-q">“George R.”</span> at the +bottom of the page and fancied he had written the paper: +some bookseller's clerk, some poor author, some <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">man</span></em> did +the work; saw to the spelling, cleaned up the slovenly +sentences, and gave the lax maudlin slipslop a sort of +consistency. He must have had an individuality: the +dancing-master whom he emulated, nay, surpassed—the +wig-maker who curled his toupee for him—the tailor who +cut his coats, had that. But, about George, one can get +at nothing actual. That outside, I am certain, is pad and +tailor's work; there may be something behind, but what? +We cannot get at the character; no doubt never shall. +Will men of the future have nothing better to do than to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page784">[pg 784]</span><a name="Pg784" id="Pg784" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +unswathe and interpret that royal old mummy? I own +I once used to think it would be good sport to pursue him, +fasten on him, and pull him down. But now I am ashamed +to mount and lay good dogs on, to summon a full field, +and then to hunt the poor game. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the 12th August, 1762, the forty-seventh anniversary +of the accession of the House of Brunswick to the English +throne, all the bells in London pealed in gratulation, and +announced that an heir to George III was born. Five days +afterwards the king was pleased to pass letters patent under +the great seal, creating H.R.H. the Prince of Great Britain, +Electoral Prince of Brunswick-Lüneburg, Duke of Cornwall +and Rothsay, Earl of Carrick, Baron of Renfrew, Lord of +the Isles, and Great Steward of Scotland, Prince of Wales +and Earl of Chester. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All the people at his birth thronged to see this lovely +child; and behind a gilt china-screen railing in St. James's +Palace, in a cradle surmounted by the three princely ostrich +feathers, the royal infant was laid to delight the eyes of the +lieges. Among the earliest instances of homage paid to +him, I read that <span class="tei tei-q">“a curious Indian bow and arrows were +sent to the prince from his father's faithful subjects in +New York”</span>. He was fond of playing with these toys: an +old statesman, orator, and wit of his grandfather's and +great-grandfather's time, never tired of his business, still +eager in his old age to be well at Court, used to play with +the little prince, and pretend to fall down dead when the +prince shot at him with his toy bow and arrows—and get +up and fall down dead over and over again—to the increased +delight of the child. So that he was flattered from his cradle +upwards; and before his little feet could walk, statesmen +and courtiers were busy kissing them. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There is a pretty picture of the royal infant—a beautiful +buxom child—asleep in his mother's lap; who turns round +and holds a finger to her lip, as if she would bid the courtiers +around respect the baby's slumbers. From that day until +his decease, sixty-eight years after, I suppose there were +more pictures taken of that personage than of any other +human being who ever was born and died—in every kind +of uniform and every possible Court dress—in long fair +hair, with powder, with and without a pigtail—in every +conceivable cocked-hat—in dragoon uniform—in Windsor +uniform—in a field-marshal's clothes—in a Scotch kilt and +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page785">[pg 785]</span><a name="Pg785" id="Pg785" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +tartans, with dirk and claymore (a stupendous figure)—in +a frogged frock-coat with a fur collar and tight breeches +and silk stockings—in wigs of every colour, fair, brown, +and black—in his famous coronation robes finally, with +which performance he was so much in love that he distributed +copies of the picture to all the Courts and British +embassies in Europe, and to numberless clubs, town-halls, +and private friends. I remember as a young man how +almost every dining-room had his portrait. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/prince.png" width="597" height="700" alt="Illustration" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There is plenty of biographical tattle about the prince's +boyhood. It is told with what astonishing rapidity he +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page786">[pg 786]</span><a name="Pg786" id="Pg786" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +learned all languages, ancient and modern; how he rode +beautifully, sang charmingly, and played elegantly on the +violoncello. That he was beautiful was patent to all eyes. +He had a high spirit: and once, when he had had a difference +with his father, burst into the royal closet and called out, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Wilkes and liberty for ever!”</span> He was so clever, that he +confounded his very governors in learning; and one of +them, Lord Bruce, having made a false quantity in quoting +Greek, the admirable young prince instantly corrected him. +Lord Bruce could not remain a governor after this humiliation; +resigned his office, and, to soothe his feelings, was +actually promoted to be an earl! It is the most wonderful +reason for promoting a man that ever I heard. Lord Bruce +was made an earl for a blunder in prosody; and Nelson was +made a baron for the victory of the Nile. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Lovers of long sums have added up the millions and +millions which in the course of his brilliant existence this +single prince consumed. Besides his income of 50,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, +70,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, 100,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, +120,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> a year, we read of three applications +to Parliament: debts to the amount of 160,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, +of 650,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>; besides mysterious foreign loans, whereof he +pocketed the proceeds. What did he do for all this money? +Why was he to have it? If he had been a manufacturing +town, or a populous rural district, or an army of five +thousand men, he would not have cost more. He, one +solitary stout man, who did not toil, nor spin, nor fight,—what +had any mortal done that he should be pampered so? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In 1784, when he was twenty-one years of age, Carlton +Palace was given to him, and furnished by the nation with +as much luxury as could be devised. His pockets were +filled with money: he said it was not enough; he flung it +out of window: he spent 10,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> a year for the coats on +his back. The nation gave him more money, and more, +and more. The sum is past counting. He was a prince, +most lovely to look on, and christened Prince Florizel on +his first appearance in the world. That he was the handsomest +prince in the whole world was agreed by men, and +alas! by many women. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I suppose he must have been very graceful. There are +so many testimonies to the charm of his manner, that we +must allow him great elegance and powers of fascination. +He, and the King of France's brother, the Count d'Artois, +a charming young prince who danced deliciously on the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page787">[pg 787]</span><a name="Pg787" id="Pg787" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +tight-rope—a poor old tottering exiled king, who asked +hospitality of King George's successor, and lived awhile in +the palace of Mary Stuart—divided in their youth the title +of first gentleman of Europe. We in England of course +gave the prize to <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">our</span></em> gentleman. Until George's death the +propriety of that award was scarce questioned or the +doubters voted rebels and traitors. Only the other day +I was reading in the reprint of the delightful <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Noctes</span></span> of +Christopher North. The health of THE KING is drunk in +large capitals by the loyal Scotsman. You would fancy him +a hero, a sage, a statesman, a pattern for kings and men. +It was Walter Scott who had that accident with the broken +glass I spoke of anon. He was the king's Scottish champion, +rallied all Scotland to him, made loyalty the fashion, and +laid about him fiercely with his claymore upon all the +prince's enemies. The Brunswicks had no such defenders +as those two Jacobite commoners, old Sam Johnson the +Lichfield chapman's son, and Walter Scott, the Edinburgh +lawyer's. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Nature and circumstance had done their utmost to prepare +the prince for being spoiled: the dreadful dullness of +papa's Court, its stupid amusements, its dreary occupations, +the maddening humdrum, the stifling sobriety of its routine, +would have made a scapegrace of a much less lively prince. +All the big princes bolted from that castle of ennui where +old King George sat, posting up his books and droning over +his Handel; and old Queen Charlotte over her snuff and +her tambour-frame. Most of the sturdy, gallant sons settled +down after sowing their wild oats, and became sober subjects +of their father and brother—not ill liked by the nation, +which pardons youthful irregularities readily enough, for +the sake of pluck, and unaffectedness, and good humour. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The boy is father of the man. Our prince signalized his +entrance into the world by a feat worthy of his future life. +He invented a new shoebuckle. It was an inch long and +five inches broad. <span class="tei tei-q">“It covered almost the whole instep, +reaching down to the ground on either side of the foot.”</span> +A sweet invention! lovely and useful as the prince on +whose foot it sparkled. At his first appearance at a Court +ball, we read that <span class="tei tei-q">“his coat was pink silk, with white cuffs; +his waistcoat white silk, embroidered with various-coloured +foil, and adorned with a profusion of French paste. And +his hat was ornamented with two rows of steel beads, five +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page788">[pg 788]</span><a name="Pg788" id="Pg788" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +thousand in number, with a button and loop of the same +metal, and cocked in a new military style”</span>. What a Florizel! +Do these details seem trivial? They are the grave incidents +of his life. His biographers say that when he commenced +housekeeping in that splendid new palace of his, the +Prince of Wales had some windy projects of encouraging +literature, science, and the arts; of having assemblies of +literary characters; and societies for the encouragement +of geography, astronomy, and botany. Astronomy, +geography, and botany! Fiddlesticks! French ballet-dancers, +French cooks, horse-jockeys, buffoons, procurers, +tailors, boxers, fencing-masters, china, jewel, and gimcrack +merchants—these were his real companions. At first he +made a pretence of having Burke and Pitt and Sheridan +for his friends. But how could such men be serious before +such an empty scapegrace as this lad? Fox might talk +dice with him, and Sheridan wine; but what else had these +men of genius in common with their tawdry young host of +Carlton House? That ribble the leader of such men as +Fox and Burke! That man's opinions about the constitution, +the India Bill, justice to the Catholics—about any +question graver than the button for a waistcoat or the sauce +for a partridge—worth anything! The friendship between +the prince and the Whig chiefs was impossible. They were +hypocrites in pretending to respect him, and if he broke the +hollow compact between them, who shall blame him? His +natural companions were dandies and parasites. He could +talk to a tailor or a cook; but, as the equal of great statesmen, +to set up a creature, lazy, weak, indolent, besotted, +of monstrous vanity, and levity incurable—it is absurd. +They thought to use him, and did for awhile; but they +must have known how timid he was; how entirely heartless +and treacherous, and have expected his desertion. His next +set of friends were mere table companions, of whom he grew +tired too; then we hear of him with a very few select +toadies, mere boys from school or the Guards, whose +sprightliness tickled the fancy of the worn-out voluptuary. +What matters what friends he had? He dropped all his +friends; he never could have real friends. An heir to the +throne has flatterers, adventurers who hang about him, +ambitious men who use him; but friendship is denied him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And women, I suppose, are as false and selfish in their +dealings with such a character as men. Shall we take the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page789">[pg 789]</span><a name="Pg789" id="Pg789" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Leporello part, flourish a catalogue of the conquests of this +royal Don Juan, and tell the names of the favourites to +whom, one after the other, George Prince flung his pocket-handkerchief? +What purpose would it answer to say how +Perdita was pursued, won, deserted, and by whom succeeded? +What good in knowing that he did actually +marry Mrs. FitzHerbert according to the rites of the Roman +Catholic Church; that her marriage settlements have been +seen in London; that the names of the witnesses to her +marriage are known. This sort of vice that we are now +come to presents no new or fleeting trait of manners. +Debauchees, dissolute, heartless, fickle, cowardly, have +been ever since the world began. This one had more +temptations than most, and so much may be said in extenuation +for him. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It was an unlucky thing for this doomed one, and tending +to lead him yet farther on the road to the deuce, that, +besides being lovely, so that women were fascinated by +him; and heir apparent, so that all the world flattered +him; he should have a beautiful voice, which led him +directly in the way of drink: and thus all the pleasant +devils were coaxing on poor Florizel; desire, and idleness, +and vanity, and drunkenness, all clashing their merry +cymbals and bidding him come on. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We first hear of his warbling sentimental ditties under +the walls of Kew Palace by the moonlight banks of Thames, +with Lord Viscount Leporello keeping watch lest the music +should be disturbed. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Singing after dinner and supper was the universal fashion +of the day. You may fancy all England sounding with +choruses, some ribald, some harmless, but all occasioning +the consumption of a prodigious deal of fermented liquor. +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">The jolly Muse her wings to try no frolic flights need take,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But round the bowl would dip and fly, like swallows round a lake,</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +sang Morris in one of his gallant Anacreontics, to which the +prince many a time joined in chorus, and of which the +burden is,— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%"> +And that I think's a reason fair to drink and fill again. +</span></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This delightful boon companion of the prince's found +<span class="tei tei-q">“a reason fair”</span> to forgo filling and drinking, saw the error +of his ways, gave up the bowl and chorus, and died retired +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page790">[pg 790]</span><a name="Pg790" id="Pg790" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +and religious. The prince's table no doubt was a very +tempting one. The wits came and did their utmost to +amuse him. It is wonderful how the spirits rise, the wit +brightens, the wine has an aroma, when a great man is at +the head of the table. Scott, the loyal cavalier, the king's +true liegeman, the very best <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">raconteur</span></span> of his time, +poured out with an endless generosity his store of old-world learning, +kindness, and humour. Grattan contributed to it his +wondrous eloquence, fancy, feeling. Tom Moore perched +upon it for awhile, and piped his most exquisite little love-tunes +on it, flying away in a twitter of indignation afterwards, +and attacking the prince with bill and claw. In such +society, no wonder the sitting was long, and the butler tired +of drawing corks. Remember what the usages of the time +were, and that William Pitt, coming to the House of +Commons after having drunk a bottle of port wine at his +own house, would go into Bellamy's with Dundas, and help +finish a couple more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +You peruse volumes after volumes about our prince, and +find some half-dozen stock stories—indeed not many more—common +to all the histories. He was good-natured; an +indolent, voluptuous prince, not unkindly. One story, the +most favourable to him of all, perhaps, is that as Prince +Regent he was eager to hear all that could be said in behalf +of prisoners condemned to death, and anxious, if possible, +to remit the capital sentence. He was kind to his servants. +There is a story common to all the biographies, of Molly +the housemaid, who, when his household was to be broken +up, owing to some reforms which he tried absurdly to +practise, was discovered crying as she dusted the chairs +because she was to leave a master who had a kind word +for all his servants. Another tale is that of a groom of the +prince's being discovered in corn and oat peculations, and +dismissed by the personage at the head of the stables; the +prince had word of John's disgrace, remonstrated with him +very kindly, generously reinstated him, and bade him +promise to sin no more—a promise which John kept. +Another story is very fondly told of the prince as a young +man hearing of an officer's family in distress, and how he +straightway borrowed six or eight hundred pounds, put his +long fair hair under his hat, and so disguised carried the +money to the starving family. He sent money, too, to +Sheridan on his death-bed, and would have sent more had +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page791">[pg 791]</span><a name="Pg791" id="Pg791" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +not death ended the career of that man of genius. Besides +these, there are a few pretty speeches, kind and graceful, +to persons with whom he was brought in contact. But he +turned upon twenty friends. He was fond and familiar +with them one day, and he passed them on the next without +recognition. He used them, liked them, loved them +perhaps in his way, and then separated from them. On +Monday he kissed and fondled poor Perdita, and on Tuesday +he met her and did not know her. On Wednesday he was +very affectionate with that wretched Brummell, and on +Thursday forgot him; cheated him even out of a snuff-box +which he owed the poor dandy; saw him years afterwards +in his downfall and poverty, when the bankrupt Beau +sent him another snuff-box with some of the snuff he used +to love, as a piteous token of remembrance and submission, +and the king took the snuff, and ordered his horses and +drove on, and had not the grace to notice his old companion, +favourite, rival, enemy, superior. In <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Wraxall</span></span> there is some +gossip about him. When the charming, beautiful, generous +Duchess of Devonshire died—the lovely lady whom he used +to call his dearest duchess once, and pretend to admire as all +English society admired her—he said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Then we have lost +the best-bred woman in England.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Then we have lost the +kindest heart in England,”</span> said noble Charles Fox. On +another occasion, when three noblemen were to receive the +Garter, says <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Wraxall</span></span>, <span class="tei tei-q">“a great personage observed that +never did three men receive the order in so characteristic +a manner. The Duke of A. advanced to the sovereign with +a phlegmatic, cold, awkward air like a clown; Lord B. +came forward fawning and smiling like a courtier; Lord C. +presented himself easy, unembarrassed, like a gentleman!”</span> +These are the stories one has to recall about the prince and +king—kindness to a housemaid, generosity to a groom, +criticism on a bow. There <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">are</span></em> no better stories about him: +they are mean and trivial, and they characterize him. The +great war of empires and giants goes on. Day by day +victories are won and lost by the brave. Torn, smoky flags +and battered eagles are wrenched from the heroic enemy +and laid at his feet; and he sits there on his throne and +smiles, and gives the guerdon of valour to the conqueror. +He! Elliston the actor, when the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Coronation</span></span> was performed, +in which he took the principal part, used to fancy himself +the king, burst into tears, and hiccup a blessing on the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page792">[pg 792]</span><a name="Pg792" id="Pg792" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +people. I believe it is certain about George IV, that he had +heard so much of the war, knighted so many people, and +worn such a prodigious quantity of marshal's uniforms, +cocked-hats, cock's feathers, scarlet and bullion in general, +that he actually fancied he had been present in some campaigns, +and, under the name of General Brock, led a tremendous +charge of the German legion at Waterloo. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He is dead but thirty years, and one asks how a great +society could have tolerated him? Would we bear him +now? In this quarter of a century, what a silent revolution +has been working! how it has separated us from old +times and manners! How it has changed men themselves! +I can see old gentlemen now among us, of perfect good +breeding, of quiet lives, with venerable grey heads, fondling +their grandchildren; and look at them, and wonder at +what they were once. That gentleman of the grand old +school, when he was in the 10th Hussars, and dined at +the prince's table, would fall under it night after night. +Night after night, that gentleman sat at Brookes's or +Raggett's over the dice. If, in the petulance of play or +drink, that gentleman spoke a sharp word to his neighbour, +he and the other would infallibly go out and try to shoot +each other the next morning. That gentleman would drive +his friend Richmond the black boxer down to Moulsey, +and hold his coat, and shout and swear, and hurrah with +delight, whilst the black man was beating Dutch Sam the +Jew. That gentleman would take a manly pleasure in +pulling his own coat off, and thrashing a bargeman in a +street row. That gentleman has been in a watchhouse. +That gentleman, so exquisitely polite with ladies in a +drawing-room, so loftily courteous, if he talked now as he +used among men in his youth, would swear so as to make +your hair stand on end. I met lately a very old German +gentleman, who had served in our army at the beginning +of the century. Since then he has lived on his own estate, +but rarely meeting with an Englishman, whose language—the +language of fifty years ago that is—he possesses perfectly. +When this highly bred old man began to speak +English to me, almost every other word he uttered was +an oath: as they used it (they swore dreadfully in Flanders) +with the Duke of York before Valenciennes, or at Carlton +House over the supper and cards. Read Byron's letters. +So accustomed is the young man to oaths that he employs +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page793">[pg 793]</span><a name="Pg793" id="Pg793" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +them even in writing to his friends, and swears by the +post. Read his account of the doings of young men at +Cambridge, of the ribald professors, one of whom <span class="tei tei-q">“could +pour out Greek like a drunken helot”</span>, and whose excesses +surpassed even those of the young men. Read Matthews's +description of the boyish lordling's housekeeping at Newstead, +the skull-cup passed round, the monks' dresses from +the masquerade warehouse, in which the young scapegraces +used to sit until daylight, chanting appropriate songs round +their wine. <span class="tei tei-q">“We come to breakfast at two or three o'clock,”</span> +Matthews says. <span class="tei tei-q">“There are gloves and foils for those who +like to amuse themselves, or we fire pistols at a mark in +the hall, or we worry the wolf.”</span> A jolly life truly! The +noble young owner of the mansion writes about such affairs +himself in letters to his friend, Mr. John Jackson, pugilist, +in London. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All the prince's time tells a similar strange story of +manners and pleasure. In <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Wraxall</span></span> we find the prime +minister himself, the redoubted William Pitt, engaged in +high jinks with personages of no less importance than +Lord Thurlow the lord chancellor, and Mr. Dundas the +treasurer of the navy. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Wraxall</span></span> relates how these three +statesmen, returning after dinner from Addiscombe, found +a turnpike open and galloped through it without paying +the toll. The turnpike man, fancying they were highwaymen, +fired a blunderbuss after them, but missed them; +and the poet sang,— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">How as Pitt wandered darkling o'er the plain,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">His reason drown'd in Jenkinson's champagne,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">A rustic's hand, but righteous fate withstood,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Had shed a premier's for a robber's blood.</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here we have the treasurer of the navy, the lord high +chancellor, and the prime minister, all engaged in a most +undoubted lark. In Eldon's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Memoirs</span></span>, about the very same +time, I read that the Bar loved wine, as well as the woolsack. +Not John Scott himself; he was a good boy always; +and though he loved port wine, loved his business and his +duty and his fees a great deal better. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He has a Northern Circuit story of those days, about +a party at the house of a certain Lawyer Fawcett, who +gave a dinner every year to the counsel. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“On one occasion,”</span> related Lord Eldon, <span class="tei tei-q">“I heard Lee +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page794">[pg 794]</span><a name="Pg794" id="Pg794" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +say, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I cannot leave Fawcett's wine. Mind, Davenport, +you will go home immediately after dinner, to read the +brief in that cause that we have to conduct to-morrow.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Not I,’</span> said Davenport. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Leave my dinner and my +wine to read a brief! No, no, Lee; that won't do.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Then,’</span> said Lee, <span class="tei tei-q">‘what is to be done? who else is +employed?’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Davenport.</span></span>—<span class="tei tei-q">‘Oh! young Scott.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Lee.—<span class="tei tei-q">‘Oh! he must go. Mr. Scott, you must go +home immediately, and make yourself acquainted with +that cause, before our consultation this evening.’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“This was very hard upon me; but I did go, and there +was an attorney from Cumberland, and one from Northumberland, +and I do not know how many other persons. +Pretty late, in came Jack Lee, as drunk as he could be.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘I cannot consult to-night; I must go to bed,’</span> he +exclaimed, and away he went. Then came Sir Thomas +Davenport.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘We cannot have a consultation to-night, Mr. Wordsworth’</span> +(Wordsworth, I think, was the name; it was +a Cumberland name), shouted Davenport. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Don't you +see how drunk Mr. Scott is? it is impossible to consult.’</span> +Poor me! who had scarce had any dinner, and lost all +my wine—I was so drunk that I could not consult! Well, +a verdict was given against us, and it was all owing to +Lawyer Fawcett's dinner. We moved for a new trial; and +I must say, for the honour of the Bar, that those two +gentlemen, Jack Lee and Sir Thomas Davenport, paid all +the expenses between them of the first trial. It is the +only instance I ever knew, but they did. We moved for +a new trial (on the ground, I suppose, of the counsel not +being in their senses), and it was granted. When it came +on, the following year, the judge rose and said,—</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Gentlemen, did any of you dine with Lawyer Fawcett +yesterday? for, if you did, I will not hear this cause till +next year.’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There was great laughter. We gained the cause that +time.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On another occasion, at Lancaster, where poor Bozzy +must needs be going the Northern Circuit, <span class="tei tei-q">“we found him,”</span> +says Mr. Scott, <span class="tei tei-q">“lying upon the pavement inebriated. We +subscribed a guinea at supper for him, and a half-crown +for his clerk”</span>—(no doubt there was a large Bar, and that +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page795">[pg 795]</span><a name="Pg795" id="Pg795" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Scott's joke did not cost him much),—<span class="tei tei-q">“and sent him, when +he waked next morning, a brief, with instructions to move +for what we denominated the writ of +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">quare adhaesit pavimento?</span></span> +with observations duly calculated to induce him +to think that it required great learning to explain the +necessity of granting it, to the judge before whom he was +to move.”</span> Boswell sent all round the town to attorneys +for books, that might enable him to distinguish himself—but +in vain. He moved, however, for the writ, making +the best use he could of the observations in the brief. +The judge was perfectly astonished, and the audience +amazed. The judge said, <span class="tei tei-q">“I never heard of such a writ—what +can it be that adheres <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">pavimento</span></span>? Are any of you +gentlemen at the Bar able to explain this?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Bar laughed. At last one of them said,— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My lord, Mr. Boswell last night <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">adhaesit pavimento</span></span>. +There was no moving him for some time. At last he was +carried to bed, and he has been dreaming about himself +and the pavement.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The canny old gentleman relishes these jokes. When +the Bishop of Lincoln was moving from the deanery of +St. Paul's, he says he asked a learned friend of his, by +name Will Hay, how he should move some especially fine +claret, about which he was anxious. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Pray, my lord bishop,”</span> says Hay, <span class="tei tei-q">“how much of the +wine have you?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The bishop said six dozen. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If that is all,”</span> Hay answered, <span class="tei tei-q">“you have but to ask +me six times to dinner, and I will carry it all away myself.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There were giants in those days; but this joke about +wine is not so fearful as one perpetrated by Orator Thelwall, +in the heat of the French Revolution, ten years later, +over a frothing pot of porter. He blew the head off, and +said, <span class="tei tei-q">“This is the way I would serve all kings.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Now we come to yet higher personages, and find their +doings recorded in the blushing pages of timid little Miss +Burney's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Memoirs</span></span>. She represents a prince of the blood +in quite a royal condition. The loudness, the bigness, +boisterousness, creaking boots and rattling oaths, of the +young princes, appeared to have frightened the prim household +of Windsor, and set all the tea-cups twittering on the +tray. On the night of a ball and birthday, when one of +the pretty, kind princesses was to come out, it was agreed +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page796">[pg 796]</span><a name="Pg796" id="Pg796" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +that her brother, Prince William Henry, should dance the +opening minuet with her, and he came to visit the household +at their dinner. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At dinner, Mrs. Schwellenberg presided, attired magnificently; +Miss Goldsworthy, Mrs. Stanforth, Messrs. Du +Luc and Stanhope, dined with us; and while we were still +eating fruit, the Duke of Clarence entered.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He was just risen from the king's table, and waiting +for his equipage to go home and prepare for the ball. To +give you an idea of the energy of his royal highness's +language, I ought to set apart an objection to writing, or +rather intimating, certain forcible words, and beg leave to +show you in genuine colours a royal sailor.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We all rose, of course, upon his entrance, and the two +gentlemen placed themselves behind their chairs, while the +footmen left the room. But he ordered us all to sit down, +and called the men back to hand about some wine. He +was in exceeding high spirits, and in the utmost good +humour. He placed himself at the head of the table, next +Mrs. Schwellenberg, and looked remarkably well, gay, and +full of sport and mischief; yet clever withal, as well as +comical.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Well, this is the first day I have ever dined with the +king at St. James's on his birthday. Pray, have you all +drunk his majesty's health?’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘No, your royal highness; your royal highness might +make dem do dat,’</span> said Mrs. Schwellenberg.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Oh, by ——, I will! Here, you’</span> (to the footman). +<span class="tei tei-q">‘bring champagne; I'll drink the king's health again, if +I die for it. Yes, I have done it pretty well already; +so has the king, I promise you! I believe his majesty was +never taken such good care of before; we have kept his +spirits up, I promise you; we have enabled him to go +through his fatigues; and I should have done more still, +but for the ball and Mary;—I have promised to dance with +Mary. I must keep sober for Mary.’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Indefatigable Miss Burney continues for a dozen pages +reporting H.R.H.'s conversation, and indicating, with a +humour not unworthy of the clever little author of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Evelina</span></span>, +the increasing state of excitement of the young sailor +prince, who drank more and more champagne, stopped old +Mrs. Schwellenberg's remonstrances by giving the old lady +a kiss, and telling her to hold her potato-trap, and who +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page797">[pg 797]</span><a name="Pg797" id="Pg797" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +did not <span class="tei tei-q">“keep sober for Mary”</span>. Mary had to find another +partner that night, for the royal William Henry could not +keep his legs. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Will you have a picture of the amusements of another +royal prince? It is the Duke of York, the blundering +general, the beloved commander-in-chief of the army, the +brother with whom George IV had had many a midnight +carouse, and who continued his habits of pleasure almost +till death seized his stout body. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In Pückler Muskau's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters</span></span>, that German prince describes +a bout with H.R.H., who in his best time was such +a powerful toper that <span class="tei tei-q">“six bottles of claret after dinner +scarce made a perceptible change in his countenance”</span>. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I remember,”</span> says Pückler, <span class="tei tei-q">“that one evening,—indeed, +it was past midnight,—he took some of his guests, among +whom were the Austrian ambassador, Count Meervelt, +Count Beroldingen, and myself, into his beautiful armoury. +We tried to swing several Turkish sabres, but none of us +had a very firm grasp; whence it happened that the duke +and Meervelt both scratched themselves with a sort of +straight Indian sword so as to draw blood. Meervelt then +wished to try if the sword cut as well as a Damascus, +and attempted to cut through one of the wax candles that +stood on the table. The experiment answered so ill, that +both the candles, candlesticks and all, fell to the ground +and were extinguished. While we were groping in the dark +and trying to find the door, the duke's aide de camp +stammered out in great agitation, <span class="tei tei-q">‘By G——, sir, I remember +the sword is poisoned.!’</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You may conceive the agreeable feelings of the wounded +at this intelligence! Happily, on further examination, it +appeared that claret, and not poison, was at the bottom +of the colonel's exclamation.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And now I have one more story of the bacchanalian +sort, in which Clarence and York, and the very highest +personage of the realm, the great Prince Regent, all play +parts. The feast took place at the Pavilion at Brighton, +and was described to me by a gentleman who was present +at the scene. In Gilray's caricatures, and amongst Fox's +jolly associates, there figures a great nobleman, the Duke +of Norfolk, called Jockey of Norfolk in his time, and +celebrated for his table exploits. He had quarrelled with +the prince, like the rest of the Whigs; but a sort of reconciliation +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page798">[pg 798]</span><a name="Pg798" id="Pg798" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +had taken place; and now, being a very old man, +the prince invited him to dine and sleep at the Pavilion, +and the old duke drove over from his castle of Arundel +with his famous equipage of grey horses, still remembered +in Sussex. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Prince of Wales had concocted with his royal brothers +a notable scheme for making the old man drunk. Every +person at table was enjoined to drink wine with the duke—a +challenge which the old toper did not refuse. He soon +began to see that there was a conspiracy against him; he +drank glass for glass; he overthrew many of the brave. +At last the First Gentleman of Europe proposed bumpers +of brandy. One of the royal brothers filled a great glass +for the duke. He stood up and tossed off the drink. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Now,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“I will have my carriage, and go home.”</span> +The prince urged upon him his previous promise to sleep +under the roof where he had been so generously entertained. +<span class="tei tei-q">“No,”</span> he said, he had had enough of such hospitality. +A trap had been set for him; he would leave +the place at once and never enter its doors more. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The carriage was called, and came; but, in the half-hour's +interval, the liquor had proved too potent for the +old man; his host's generous purpose was answered, and +the duke's old grey head lay stupefied on the table. Nevertheless, +when his post-chaise was announced, he staggered +to it as well as he could, and stumbling in, bade the postilions +drive to Arundel. They drove him for half an hour +round and round the Pavilion lawn; the poor old man +fancied he was going home. When he awoke that morning +he was in bed at the prince's hideous house at Brighton. +You may see the place now for sixpence: they have +fiddlers there every day; and sometimes buffoons and +mountebanks hire the Riding House and do their tricks +and tumbling there. The trees are still there, and the +gravel walks round which the poor old sinner was trotted. +I can fancy the flushed faces of the royal princes as they +support themselves at the portico pillars, and look on at +old Norfolk's disgrace; but I can't fancy how the man who +perpetrated it continued to be called a gentleman. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +From drinking, the pleased Muse now turns to gambling, +of which in his youth our prince was a great practitioner. +He was a famous pigeon for the play-men; they lived +upon him. Egalité Orleans, it was believed, punished him +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page799">[pg 799]</span><a name="Pg799" id="Pg799" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +severely. A noble lord, whom we shall call the Marquis +of Steyne, is said to have mulcted him in immense sums. +He frequented the clubs, where play was then almost +universal; and, as it was known his debts of honour were +sacred, whilst he was gambling Jews waited outside to +purchase his notes of hand. His transactions on the turf +were unlucky as well as discreditable: though I believe +he, and his jockey, and his horse Escape, were all innocent +in that affair which created so much scandal. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Arthur's, Almack's, Bootle's, and White's were the chief +clubs of the young men of fashion. There was play at all, +and decayed noblemen and broken-down senators fleeced +the unwary there. In Selwyn's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters</span></span> we find Carlisle, +Devonshire, Coventry, Queensberry, all undergoing the +probation. Charles Fox, a dreadful gambler, was cheated +in very late times—lost 200,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> at play. Gibbon tells +of his playing for twenty-two hours at a sitting, and losing +500<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> an hour. That indomitable punter said that the +greatest pleasure in life, after winning, was losing. What +hours, what nights, what health did he waste over the +devil's books! I was going to say what peace of mind; +but he took his losses very philosophically. After an +awful night's play, and the enjoyment of the greatest +pleasure but <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">one</span></em> in life, he was found on a sofa tranquilly +reading an Eclogue of Virgil. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Play survived long after the wild prince and Fox had +given up the dice-box. The dandies continued it. Byron, +Brummell—how many names could I mention of men of +the world who have suffered by it! In 1837 occurred +a famous trial which pretty nigh put an end to gambling +in England. A peer of the realm was found cheating at +whist, and repeatedly seen to practise the trick called +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">sauter la coupe</span></span>. His friends at the clubs saw him cheat, +and went on playing with him. One greenhorn, who had +discovered his foul play, asked an old hand what he should +do. <span class="tei tei-q">“Do!”</span> said the Mammon of Unrighteousness, <span class="tei tei-q">“<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">back +him, you fool</span></em>.”</span> The best efforts were made to screen him. +People wrote him anonymous letters and warned him; +but he would cheat, and they were obliged to find him out. +Since that day, when my lord's shame was made public, +the gaming-table has lost all its splendour. Shabby Jews +and blacklegs prowl about racecourses and tavern parlours, +and now and then inveigle silly yokels with greasy packs of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page800">[pg 800]</span><a name="Pg800" id="Pg800" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +cards in railroad ears; but Play is a deposed goddess, her +worshippers bankrupt, and her table in rags. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So is another famous British institution gone to decay—the +Ring: the noble practice of British boxing, which in my +youth was still almost flourishing. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The prince, in his early days, was a great patron of this +national sport, as his grand-uncle Culloden Cumberland +had been before him; but, being present at a fight at +Brighton, where one of the combatants was killed, the +prince pensioned the boxer's widow, and declared he never +would attend another battle. <span class="tei tei-q">“But, nevertheless,”</span>—I read +in the noble language of Pierce Egan (whose smaller work +on Pugilism I have the honour to possess),—<span class="tei tei-q">“he thought +it a manly and decided English feature, which ought not +to be destroyed. His majesty had a drawing of the sporting +characters in the Fives Court placed in his boudoir, to +remind him of his former attachment and support of true +courage; and when any fight of note occurred after he +was king, accounts of it were read to him by his desire.”</span> +That gives one a fine image of a king taking his recreation;—at +ease in a royal dressing-gown;—too majestic to read +himself, ordering the prime minister to read him accounts +of battles: how Cribb punched Molyneux's eye, or Jack +Randall thrashed the Game Chicken. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Where my prince <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">did</span></em> actually distinguish himself was +in driving. He drove once in four hours and a half from +Brighton to Carlton House—fifty-six miles. All the young +men of that day were fond of that sport. But the fashion +of rapid driving deserted England; and, I believe, trotted +over to America. Where are the amusements of our +youth? I hear of no gambling now but amongst obscure +ruffians; of no boxing but amongst the lowest rabble. +One solitary four-in-hand still drove round the parks in +London last year; but that charioteer must soon disappear. +He was very old; he was attired after the fashion of the +year 1825. He must drive to the banks of Styx ere long,—where +the ferry-boat waits to carry him over to the defunct +revellers, who boxed and gambled and drank and drove +with King George. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The bravery of the Brunswicks, that all the family must +have it, that George possessed it, are points which all +English writers have agreed to admit; and yet I cannot +see how George IV should have been endowed with this +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page801">[pg 801]</span><a name="Pg801" id="Pg801" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +quality. Swaddled in feather-beds all his life, lazy, obese, +perpetually eating and drinking, his education was quite +unlike that of his tough old progenitors. His grandsires +had confronted hardship and war, and ridden up and fired +their pistols undaunted into the face of death. His father +had conquered luxury, and overcome indolence. Here +was one who never resisted any temptation; never had +a desire but he coddled and pampered it; if ever he had +any nerve, frittered it away among cooks, and tailors, and +barbers, and furniture-mongers, and opera dancers. What +muscle would not grow flaccid in such a life—a life that +was never strung up to any action—an endless Capua +without any campaign—all fiddling, and flowers, and +feasting, and flattery, and folly? When George III was +pressed by the Catholic question and the India Bill, he +said he would retire to Hanover rather than yield upon +either point; and he would have done what he said. But, +before yielding, he was determined to fight his ministers +and Parliament; and he did, and he beat them. The +time came when George IV was pressed too upon the +Catholic claims: the cautious Peel had slipped over to +that side; the grim old Wellington had joined it; and +Peel tells us, in his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Memoirs</span></span>, what was the conduct of the +king. He at first refused to submit; whereupon Peel and +the duke offered their resignations, which their gracious +master accepted. He did these two gentlemen the honour, +Peel says, to kiss them both when they went away. (Fancy +old Arthur's grim countenance and eagle beak as the +monarch kisses it!) When they were gone he sent after +them, surrendered, and wrote to them a letter begging +them to remain in office, and allowing them to have their +way. Then his Majesty had a meeting with Eldon, which +is related at curious length in the latter's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Memoirs</span></span>. He +told Eldon what was not true about his interview with the +new Catholic converts; utterly misled the old ex-chancellor; +cried, whimpered, fell on his neck, and kissed him too. We +know old Eldon's own tears were pumped very freely. +Did these two fountains gush together? I can't fancy +a behaviour more unmanly, imbecile, pitiable. This a +Defender of the Faith! This a chief in the crisis of a great +nation! This an inheritor of the courage of the Georges! +Many of my hearers no doubt have journeyed to the +pretty old town of Brunswick, in company with that most +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page802">[pg 802]</span><a name="Pg802" id="Pg802" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +worthy, prudent, and polite gentleman, the Earl of Malmesbury, +and fetched away Princess Caroline for her longing +husband, the Prince of Wales, Old Queen Charlotte would +have had her eldest son marry a niece of her own, that +famous Louisa of Strelitz, afterwards Queen of Prussia, +and who shares with Marie Antoinette in the last age the +sad pre-eminence of beauty and misfortune. But George +III had a niece at Brunswick: she was a richer princess +than her Serene Highness of Strelitz:—in fine, the Princess +Caroline was selected to marry the heir to the English +throne. We follow my Lord Malmesbury in quest of her; +we are introduced to her illustrious father and royal mother; +we witness the balls and fêtes of the old Court; we are +presented to the princess herself, with her fair hair, her +blue eyes, and her impertinent shoulders—a lively, bouncing, +romping princess, who takes the advice of her courtly +English mentor most generously and kindly. We can be +present at her very toilette, if we like, regarding which, +and for very good reasons, the British courtier implores +her to be particular. What a strange Court! What a +queer privacy of morals and manners do we look into! +Shall we regard it as preachers and moralists, and cry, +Woe, against the open vice and selfishness and corruption; +or look at it as we do at the king in the pantomime, with +his pantomime wife, and pantomime courtiers, whose big +heads he knocks together, whom he pokes with his pantomime +sceptre, whom he orders to prison under the guard +of his pantomime beefeaters, as he sits down to dine on +his pantomime pudding? It is grave, it is sad, it is theme +most curious for moral and political speculation; it is +monstrous, grotesque, laughable, with its prodigious littlenesses, +etiquettes, ceremonials, sham moralities; it is as +serious as a sermon, and as absurd and outrageous as +Punch's puppet-show. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Malmesbury tells us of the private life of the duke, +Princess Caroline's father, who was to die, like his warlike +son, in arms against the French; presents us to his courtiers, +his favourite; his duchess, George III's sister, a grim old +princess, who took the British envoy aside, and told him +wicked old stories of wicked old dead people and times; +who came to England afterwards when her nephew was +regent, and lived in a shabby furnished lodging, old, and +dingy, and deserted, and grotesque, but somehow royal. +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page803">[pg 803]</span><a name="Pg803" id="Pg803" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +And we go with him to the duke to demand the princess's +hand in form, and we hear the Brunswick guns fire their +adieux of salute, as H.R.H. the Princess of Wales departs +in the frost and snow; and we visit the domains of the +Prince Bishop of Osnaburg—the Duke of York of our +early time; and we dodge about from the French revolutionists, +whose ragged legions are pouring over Holland +and Germany, and gaily trampling down the old world to +the tune of <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">Ça ira</span></span>; and we take shipping at Slade, and +we land at Greenwich, where the princess's ladies and the +prince's ladies are in waiting to receive her royal highness. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="text-align: center; margin-bottom: 1.00em"> + </p><div class="tei tei-figure" style="width: 70%; text-align: center"><img src="images/couple.png" width="565" height="700" alt="Illustration" /></div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What a history follows! Arrived in London, the bridegroom +hastened eagerly to receive his bride. When she +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page804">[pg 804]</span><a name="Pg804" id="Pg804" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +was first presented to him, Lord Malmesbury says she +very properly attempted to kneel. He raised her gracefully +enough, embraced her, and turning round to me, +said,— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Harris, I am not well; pray get me a glass of brandy.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I said, <span class="tei tei-q">“Sir, had you not better have a glass of water?”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Upon which, much out of humour, he said, with an oath, +<span class="tei tei-q">“No; I will go to the queen.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What could be expected from a wedding which had such +a beginning—from such a bridegroom and such a bride? +I am not going to carry you through the scandal of that +story, or follow the poor princess through all her vagaries; +her balls and her dances, her travels to Jerusalem and +Naples, her jigs, and her junketings, and her tears. As +I read her trial in history, I vote she is not guilty. I don't +say it is an impartial verdict; but as one reads her story +the heart bleeds for the kindly, generous, outraged creature. +If wrong there be, let it lie at his door who wickedly thrust +her from it. Spite of her follies, the great, hearty people +of England loved, and protected, and pitied her. <span class="tei tei-q">“God +bless you! we will bring your husband back to you,”</span> said +a mechanic one day, as she told Lady Charlotte Bury with +tears streaming down her cheeks. They could not bring +that husband back; they could not cleanse that selfish +heart. Was hers the only one he had wounded? Steeped +in selfishness, impotent for faithful attachment and manly +enduring love,—had it not survived remorse, was it not +accustomed to desertion? +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Malmesbury gives us the beginning of the marriage +story;—how the prince reeled into chapel to be married; +how he hiccupped out his vows of fidelity—you know how +he kept them; how he pursued the woman whom he had +married; to what a state he brought her; with what +blows he struck her; with what malignity he pursued her; +what his treatment of his daughter was; and what his +own life. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">He</span></em> the first gentleman of Europe! There is no +stronger satire on the proud English society of that day, +than that they admired George. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +No, thank God, we can tell of better gentlemen; and +whilst our eyes turn away, shocked, from this monstrous +image of pride, vanity, weakness, they may see in that +England over which the last George pretended to reign, +some who merit indeed the title of gentlemen, some who +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page805">[pg 805]</span><a name="Pg805" id="Pg805" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +make our hearts beat when we hear their names, and whose +memory we fondly salute when that of yonder imperial +manikin is tumbled into oblivion. I will take men of my +own profession of letters. I will take Walter Scott, who +loved the king, and who was his sword and buckler, and +championed him like that brave Highlander in his own +story, who fights round his craven chief. What a good +gentleman! What a friendly soul, what a generous hand, +what an amiable life was that of the noble Sir Walter! +I will take another man of letters, whose life I admire +even more,—an English worthy, doing his duty for fifty +noble years of labour, day by day storing up learning, day +by day working for scant wages, most charitable out of +his small means, bravely faithful to the calling which he +had chosen, refusing to turn from his path for popular +praise or princes' favour;—I mean <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Robert Southey</span></span>. We +have left his old political landmarks miles and miles behind; +we protest against his dogmatism; nay, we begin to +forget it and his politics: but I hope his life will not be +forgotten, for it is sublime in its simplicity, its energy, +its honour, its affection. In the combat between Time +and Thalaba, I suspect the former destroyer has conquered. +Kehama's curse frightens very few readers now; but +Southey's private letters are worth piles of epics, and are +sure to last among us, as long as kind hearts like to sympathize +with goodness and purity, and love and upright +life. <span class="tei tei-q">“If your feelings are like mine,”</span> he writes to his wife, +<span class="tei tei-q">“I will not go to Lisbon without you, or I will stay at +home, and not part from you. For though not unhappy +when away, still without you I am not happy. For your +sake, as well as my own and little Edith's, I will not consent +to any separation; the growth of a year's love between +her and me, if it please God she should live, is a thing too +delightful in itself, and too valuable in its consequences, +to be given up for any light inconvenience on your part +or mine.... On these things we will talk at leisure; +only, dear, dear Edith, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">we must not part!</span></em>”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This was a poor literary gentleman. The First Gentleman +in Europe had a wife and daughter too. Did he love +them so? Was he faithful to them? Did he sacrifice +ease for them, or show them the sacred examples of religion +and honour? Heaven gave the Great English Prodigal no +such good fortune. Peel proposed to make a baronet of +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page806">[pg 806]</span><a name="Pg806" id="Pg806" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Southey; and to this advancement the king agreed. The +poet nobly rejected the offered promotion. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have,”</span> he wrote, <span class="tei tei-q">“a pension of 200<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> a year, conferred +upon me by the good offices of my old friend C. Wynn, and +I have the laureateship. The salary of the latter was +immediately appropriated, as far as it went, to a life insurance +for 3,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, which, with an earlier insurance, is the sole +provision I have made for my family. All beyond must be +derived from my own industry. Writing for a livelihood, a +livelihood is all that I have gained; for, having also something +better in view, and never, therefore, having courted +popularity, nor written for the mere sake of gain, it has +not been possible for me to lay by anything. Last year, +for the first time in my life, I was provided with a year's +expenditure beforehand. This exposition may show how +unbecoming and unwise it would be to accept the rank +which, so greatly to my honour, you have solicited for me.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How noble his poverty is, compared to the wealth of his +master! His acceptance even of a pension was made the +object of his opponents' satire: but think of the merit and +modesty of this state pensioner; and that other enormous +drawer of public money, who receives 100,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> a year, +and comes to Parliament with a request for 650,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> more! +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Another true knight of those days was Cuthbert Collingwood; +and I think, since Heaven made gentlemen, there +is no record of a better one than that. Of brighter deeds, +I grant you, we may read performed by others; but where +of a nobler, kinder, more beautiful life of duty, of a gentler, +truer heart? Beyond dazzle of success and blaze of genius, +I fancy shining a hundred and a hundred times higher, the +sublime purity of Collingwood's gentle glory. His heroism +stirs British hearts when we recall it. His love, and goodness, +and piety make one thrill with happy emotion. As +one reads of him and his great comrade going into the victory +with which their names are immortally connected, how the +old English word comes up, and that old English feeling of +what I should like to call Christian honour! What gentlemen +they were, what great hearts they had! <span class="tei tei-q">“We can, my +dear Coll,”</span> writes Nelson to him, <span class="tei tei-q">“have no little jealousies; +we have only one great object in view,—that of meeting +the enemy, and getting a glorious peace for our country.”</span> +At Trafalgar, when the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Royal Sovereign</span></span> was pressing alone +into the midst of the combined fleets, Lord Nelson said to +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page807">[pg 807]</span><a name="Pg807" id="Pg807" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +Captain Blackwood: <span class="tei tei-q">“See how that noble fellow Collingwood +takes his ship into action! How I envy him!”</span> +The very same throb and impulse of heroic generosity was +beating in Collingwood's honest bosom. As he led into the +fight, he said: <span class="tei tei-q">“What would Nelson give to be here!”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After the action of the 1st of June, he writes:—<span class="tei tei-q">“We +cruised for a few days, like disappointed people looking for +what they could not find, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">until the morning of little Sarah's +birthday</span></em>, between eight and nine o'clock, when the French +fleet, of twenty-five sail of the line, was discovered to windward. +We chased them, and they bore down within about +five miles of us. The night was spent in watching and preparation +for the succeeding day; and many a blessing did +I send forth to my Sarah, lest I should never bless her +more. At dawn, we made our approach on the enemy, +then drew up, dressed our ranks, and it was about eight +when the admiral made the signal for each ship to engage +her opponent, and bring her to close action; and then +down we went under a crowd of sail, and in a manner that +would have animated the coldest heart, and struck terror +into the most intrepid enemy. The ship we were to engage +was two ahead of the French admiral, so we had to go +through his fire and that of two ships next to him, and +received all their broadsides two or three times, before we +fired a gun. It was then near ten o'clock. I observed to +the admiral, that about that time our wives were going to +church, but that I thought the peal we should ring about +the Frenchman's ears would outdo their parish bells.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There are no words to tell what the heart feels in reading +the simple phrases of such a hero. Here is victory and +courage, but love sublimer and superior. Here is a Christian +soldier spending the night before battle in watching and +preparing for the succeeding day, thinking of his dearest +home, and sending many blessings forth to his Sarah, <span class="tei tei-q">“lest +he should never bless her more.”</span> Who would not say +Amen to his supplication? It was a benediction to his +country—the prayer of that intrepid loving heart. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +We have spoken of a good soldier and good men of letters +as specimens of English gentlemen of the age just past: +may we not also—many of my elder hearers, I am sure, +have read, and fondly remember his delightful story—speak +of a good divine, and mention Reginald Heber as one of +the best of English gentlemen? The charming poet, the +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page808">[pg 808]</span><a name="Pg808" id="Pg808" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +happy possessor of all sorts of gifts and accomplishments, +birth, wit, fame, high character, competence—he was the +beloved parish priest in his own home of Hoderel, <span class="tei tei-q">“counselling +his people in their troubles, advising them in their +difficulties, comforting them in distress, kneeling often at +their sick-beds at the hazard of his own life; exhorting, +encouraging where there was need; where there was strife +the peacemaker; where there was want the free giver.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +When the Indian bishopric was offered to him he refused +at first; but after communing with himself (and committing +his case to the quarter whither such pious men are wont +to carry their doubts), he withdrew his refusal, and prepared +himself for his mission and to leave his beloved parish. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Little children, love one another, and forgive one another,”</span> +were the last sacred words he said to his weeping people. +He parted with them, knowing, perhaps, he should see them +no more. Like those other good men of whom we have +just spoken, love and duty were his life's aim. Happy he, +happy they who were so gloriously faithful to both! He +writes to his wife those charming lines on his journey:— +</p> + +<div class="block tei tei-quote" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"> +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">If thou, my love, wert by my side, my babies at my knee,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">How gladly would our pinnace glide o'er Gunga's mimic sea!</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I miss thee at the dawning grey, when, on our deck reclined,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">In careless ease my limbs I lay and woo the cooler wind.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I miss thee when by Gunga's stream my twilight steps I guide;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But most beneath the lamp's pale beam I miss thee by my side.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I spread my books, my pencil try, the lingering noon to cheer;</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But miss thy kind approving eye, thy meek attentive ear.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But when of morn and eve the star beholds me on my knee,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">I feel, though thou art distant far, thy prayers ascend for me.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Then on! then on! where duty leads my course be onward still,—</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">O'er broad Hindostan's sultry meads, o'er bleak Almorah's hill.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">That course nor Delhi's kingly gates, nor wild Malwah detain,</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">For sweet the bliss us both awaits by yonder western main.</span></div> +</div> + +<div class="tei tei-lg" style="margin-bottom: 0.90em; margin-top: 0.90em"> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">Thy towers, Bombay, gleam bright, they say, across the dark blue sea:</span></div> +<div class="tei tei-l" style="text-align: left"><span style="font-size: 90%">But ne'er were hearts so blithe and gay as there shall meet in thee!</span></div> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Is it not Collingwood and Sarah, and Southey and Edith? +His affection is part of his life. What were life without it? +Without love, I can fancy no gentleman. +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page809">[pg 809]</span><a name="Pg809" id="Pg809" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How touching is a remark Heber makes in his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Travels +through India</span></span>, that on inquiring of the natives at a town, +which of the governors of India stood highest in the opinion +of the people, he found that, though Lord Wellesley and +Warren Hastings were honoured as the two greatest men +who had ever ruled this part of the world, the people spoke +with chief affection of Judge Cleaveland, who had died, aged +twenty-nine, in 1784. The people have built a monument +over him, and still hold a religious feast in his memory. +So does his own country still tend with a heart's regard the +memory of the gentle Heber. +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And Cleaveland died in 1784, and is still loved by the +heathen, is he? Why, that year 1784 was remarkable in +the life of our friend the First Gentleman of Europe. Do +you not know that he was twenty-one in that year, and +opened Carlton House with a grand ball to the nobility and +gentry, and doubtless wore that lovely pink coat which we +have described. I was eager to read about the ball, and +looked to the old magazines for information. The entertainment +took place on the 10th February. In the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">European +Magazine</span></span> of March, 1784, I came straightway upon it:— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The alterations at Carlton House being finished, we lay +before our readers a description of the state apartments +as they appeared on the 10th instant, when H.R.H. gave +a grand ball to the principal nobility and gentry.... +The entrance to the state room fills the mind with an +inexpressible idea of greatness and splendour.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The state chair is of a gold frame, covered with crimson +damask; on each corner of the feet is a lion's head, expressive +of fortitude and strength; the feet of the chair +have serpents twining round them, to denote wisdom. +Facing the throne, appears the helmet of Minerva; and +over the windows, glory is represented by St. George with +a superb gloria.</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But the saloon may be styled the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">chef-d'œuvre</span></span>, and in +every ornament discovers great invention. It is hung with +a figured lemon satin. The window-curtains, sofas, and +chairs are of the same colour. The ceiling is ornamented +with emblematical paintings, representing the Graces and +Muses, together with Jupiter, Mercury, Apollo, and Paris. +Two ormolu chandeliers are placed here. It is impossible +by expression to do justice to the extraordinary workmanship, +as well as design, of the ornaments. They each consist +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page810">[pg 810]</span><a name="Pg810" id="Pg810" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> +of a palm, branching out in five directions for the reception +of lights. A beautiful figure of a rural nymph is +represented entwining the stems of the tree with wreaths +of flowers. In the centre of the room is a rich chandelier. +To see this apartment <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">dans son plus beau jour</span></span>, it +should be viewed in the glass over the chimney-piece. The range of +apartments from the saloon to the ballroom, when the doors +are open, formed one of the grandest spectacles that ever +was beheld.”</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gentleman's Magazine</span></span>, for the very same month +and year—March, 1784—is an account of another festival, +in which another great gentleman of English extraction is +represented as taking a principal share:— +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“According to order, H.E. the Commander-in-Chief was +admitted to a public audience of Congress; and, being +seated, the president, after a pause, informed him that the +United States assembled were ready to receive his communications. +Whereupon he arose, and spoke as follows:—</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Mr. President,—The great events on which my resignation +depended having at length taken place, I present myself +before Congress to surrender into their hands the trust +committed to me, and to claim the indulgence of retiring +from the service of my country.</span></span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Happy in the confirmation of our independence and +sovereignty, I resign the appointment I accepted with +diffidence; which, however, was superseded by a confidence +in the rectitude of our cause, the support of the supreme +power of the nation, and the patronage of Heaven. I close +this last act of my official life, by commending the interests +of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty +God, and those who have the superintendence of them to +His holy keeping. Having finished the work assigned me, +I retire from the great theatre of action; and, bidding an +affectionate farewell to this august body, under whose orders +I have so long acted, I here offer my commission and take +my leave of the employments of my public life.’</span> To which +the President replied:—</span> +</p> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Sir, having defended the standard of liberty in the +New World, having taught a lesson useful to those who +inflict and those who feel oppression, you retire with the +blessings of your fellow citizens; though the glory of your +virtues will not terminate with your military command, +but will descend to remotest ages.’</span> ”</span> +</p> + +<span class="tei tei-pb" id="page811">[pg 811]</span><a name="Pg811" id="Pg811" class="tei tei-anchor"></a> + +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Which was the most splendid spectacle ever witnessed:—the +opening feast of Prince George in London, or the +resignation of Washington? Which is the noble character +for after-ages to admire;—yon fribble dancing in lace and +spangles, or yonder hero who sheathes his sword after a life +of spotless honour, a purity unreproached, a courage indomitable, +and a consummate victory? Which of these is +the true gentleman? What is it to be a gentleman? Is it +to have lofty aims, to lead a pure life, to keep your honour +virgin; to have the esteem of your fellow citizens, and the +love of your fireside; to bear good fortune meekly; to +suffer evil with constancy; and through evil or good to +maintain truth always? Show me the happy man whose +life exhibits these qualities, and him we will salute as gentleman, +whatever his rank may be; show me the prince who +possesses them, and he may be sure of our love and loyalty. +The heart of Britain still beats kindly for George III,—not +because he was wise and just, but because he was pure +in life, honest in intent, and because according to his lights +he worshipped Heaven. I think we acknowledge in the +inheritrix of his sceptre, a wiser rule, and a life as honourable +and pure; and I am sure the future painter of our manners +will pay a willing allegiance to that good life, and be loyal +to the memory of that unsullied virtue. +</p> + +</div> +</div> +</div> +</div> +<hr class="doublepage" /><div class="tei tei-back" style="margin-bottom: 2.00em; margin-top: 6.00em"> + <div id="footnotes" class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> + <a name="toc129" id="toc129"></a> + <a name="pdf130" id="pdf130"></a> + <h1 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 3.46em; margin-top: 3.46em"><span style="font-size: 173%">Footnotes</span></h1> + <dl class="tei tei-list-footnotes"><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_1" name="note_1" href="#noteref_1">1.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">The influence +of Scott on Thackeray is undoubted and freely +confessed. But I cannot fall in with <span class="tei tei-q">“certain persons of distinction”</span> +in making <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> very specially indebted to +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Woodstock</span></span>. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Woodstock</span></span> +is a very great book in itself and amazing when one +knows its circumstances: but it is, even for Scott, very specially +and exclusively <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">objective</span></em>. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> +is subjective also in the highest degree.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_2" name="note_2" href="#noteref_2">2.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">This form, +which he used elsewhere than in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Biographia +Literaria</span></span>, is better than <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">esemplastic</span></em> which he +employed there.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_3" name="note_3" href="#noteref_3">3.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">The +justice or accuracy of his individual presentments and +even of his general view of the time is quite another matter. We +may touch on part of it presently. But the real point is that the +whole is of a piece at least <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">in +potentia</span></span>: that it gives a world that +might have existed.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_4" name="note_4" href="#noteref_4">4.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">The lectures on the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Humourists</span></span> were, of course, delivered before +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> was published; but, in another +sense, they are only aftercrops or by-products. +The notes, sometimes very interesting, are James +Hannay's.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_5" name="note_5" href="#noteref_5">5.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">As might +perhaps have been expected from its original appearance, +not piecemeal but in the regular three-volume form, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Esmond</span></span> +was not very much altered by its author in later issues. There +was, indeed, a <span class="tei tei-q">“revised”</span> edition in 1858, in which a considerable +number of minor changes, nearly all for the better, were made. +These have been carefully considered, but in practically every case +there was really nothing to do but to follow them silently. For it +would be absurd, in the present edition, to chronicle solemnly the +rectification of mere misprints like <span class="tei tei-q">“H<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">o</span></em>xton”</span> for +<span class="tei tei-q">“H<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">e</span></em>xton”</span>, or the change from <span class="tei tei-q">“was never”</span> +to <span class="tei tei-q">“never was”</span>. In some points of orthography +<span class="tei tei-q">“Chelse<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">a</span></em>”</span> and <span class="tei tei-q">“Chelse<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">y</span></em>”</span>, +for instance, Thackeray +never reached full consistency, and he has sometimes been caught +in the intricacies of the Castlewood relations and nomenclature, &c. +So, too, Walcote, which is near <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Wells</span></span> at first, moves to the +neighbourhood of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Winchester</span></span> later; and there are other +characteristic oversights. But, on the whole, there is little need of comment, and +none of variants, save in a very few instances, where the <span class="tei tei-q">“revised”</span> +edition seems to have been altered for the worse. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On the other hand, in recent editions of Thackeray, published by his representatives, +considerable alterations to <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The English Humourists</span></span>, +&c., in text and notes have been introduced, dates being changed +in accordance with later researches, quotations (in which Thackeray +was pretty lax) adjusted to their originals, and so forth. As the +chief authorities consulted in making these alterations were the +late Sir Leslie Stephen, Mr. Austin Dobson, and Mr. Sidney Lee, +there need not be much question as to their accuracy: and it +perhaps shows undue hardihood in the present editor not to adopt +them. But it seems to him that Thackeray's books are not so much +text-books of history, literary and other, where accuracy is the +first point, as literature, where it is not. Such corrections could +be most properly introduced in the notes of a fuller commentated +edition: less so, it may seem, in an almost unannotated text. In +particular, Thackeray's <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">mis</span></em>quotations (they are not seldom +distinct improvements) sometimes directly form the basis of his +own remarks, which become less apposite if the citations are +corrected. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As the text of this volume has few original illustrations some +miscellaneous sketches are added to it. +</p> +</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_6" name="note_6" href="#noteref_6">6.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Lionel Tipton, created Baron Bergamot, ann. 1686, Gentleman +Usher of the Back Stairs, and afterwards appointed Warden of the +Butteries and Groom of the King's Posset (on the decease of George, +second Viscount Castlewood), accompanied his Majesty to St. +Germains, where he died without issue. No Groom of the Posset +was appointed by the Prince of Orange, nor hath there been such an +officer in any succeeding reign.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_7" name="note_7" href="#noteref_7">7.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">To have +this rank of marquis restored in the family had always +been my lady viscountess's ambition; and her old maiden aunt, +Barbara Topham, the goldsmith's daughter, dying about this time, +and leaving all her property to Lady Castlewood, I have heard that +her ladyship sent almost the whole of the money to King James, a +proceeding which so irritated my Lord Castlewood that he actually +went to the parish church, and was only appeased by the marquis's +title which his exiled majesty sent to him in return for the +15,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> his faithful subject lent him.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_8" name="note_8" href="#noteref_8">8.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Ὄ +πόποι, οἷον δή νυ θεοὺς βροτοὶ αἰτιόωνται, +ἐξ ἡμέων γάρ φασι κάκ᾽ ἔμμεναι; οἱ δὲ καὶ αὐτοὶ +σφῇσιν ἀτασθαλίῃσιν ὑπὲρ μόρον ἄλγε᾽ ἔχουσιν. +</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_9" name="note_9" href="#noteref_9">9.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">My +mistress before I went this campaign sent me John Lockwood +out of Walcote, who hath ever since remained with me.—H. +E.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_10" name="note_10" href="#noteref_10">10.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">This passage in the memoirs of Esmond is written on a leaf +inserted into the MS. book, and dated 1744, probably after he had +heard of the duchess's death.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_11" name="note_11" href="#noteref_11">11.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Our +grandfather's hatred of the Duke of Marlborough appears +all through his account of these campaigns. He always persisted +that the duke was the greatest traitor and soldier history ever told +of: and declared that he took bribes on all hands during the war. +My lord marquis (for so we may call him here, though he never went +by any other name than Colonel Esmond) was in the habit of telling +many stories which he did not set down in his memoirs, and which +he had from his friend the Jesuit, who was not always correctly +informed, and who persisted that Marlborough was looking for a +bribe of two millions of crowns before the campaign of Ramillies. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And our grandmother used to tell us children, that on his first +presentation to my lord duke, the duke turned his back upon my +grandfather; and said to the duchess, who told my lady dowager +at Chelsea, who afterwards told Colonel Esmond—<span class="tei tei-q">“Tom Esmond's +bastard has been to my levee: he has the hang-dog look of his +rogue of a father”</span>—an expression which my grandfather never +forgave. He was as constant in his dislikes as in his attachments; +and exceedingly partial to Webb, whose side he took against the +more celebrated general. We have General Webb's portrait now at +Castlewood, Va.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_12" name="note_12" href="#noteref_12">12.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">'Tis not thus <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">woman loves</span></em>: +Col. E. hath owned to this folly for a <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">score of women</span></em> +besides.—R.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_13" name="note_13" href="#noteref_13">13.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">And, +indeed, so was his to them, a thousand, thousand times more +charming, for where was his equal?—R.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_14" name="note_14" href="#noteref_14">14.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">See Appendix, p. +<a href="#Pg464" class="tei tei-ref">464</a>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_15" name="note_15" href="#noteref_15">15.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">What indeed? Ps. xci. 2. 3, 7.—R. +E.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_16" name="note_16" href="#noteref_16">16.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">The +managers were the bishop, who cannot be hurt by having +his name mentioned, a very active and loyal Nonconformist divine, +a lady in the highest favour at Court, with whom Beatrix Esmond +had communication, and two noblemen of the greatest rank, and +a Member of the House of Commons, who was implicated in more +transactions than one in behalf of the Stuart family.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_17" name="note_17" href="#noteref_17">17.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">There +can be very little doubt that the doctor, mentioned by +my dear father, was the famous Dr. Arbuthnot.—R. E. W.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_18" name="note_18" href="#noteref_18">18.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">My dear father saith quite truly, that his manner towards our +sex was uniformly courteous. From my infancy upwards, he +treated me with an extreme gentleness, as though I was a little lady. +I can scarce remember (though I tried him often) ever hearing a rough +word from him, nor was he less grave and kind in his manner to the +humblest negresses on his estate. He was familiar with no one +except my mother, and it was delightful to witness up to the very +last days the confidence between them. He was obeyed eagerly by +all under him; and my mother and all her household lived in a constant +emulation to please him, and quite a terror lest in any way they +should offend him. He was the humblest man, with all this; the +least exacting, the most easily contented; and Mr. Benson, our +minister at Castlewood, who attended him at the last, ever said—<span class="tei tei-q">“I +know not what Colonel Esmond's doctrine was, but his life and +death were those of a devout Christian.”</span>—R. E. W.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_19" name="note_19" href="#noteref_19">19.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">This remark shows how unjustly and contemptuously +even the best of men will sometimes judge of our sex. Lady Esmond had no +intention of triumphing over her daughter; but from a sense of duty +alone pointed out her deplorable wrong.—R. E.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_20" name="note_20" href="#noteref_20">20.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">In +London we addressed the prince as royal highness invariably; +though the women persisted in giving him the title of king.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_21" name="note_21" href="#noteref_21">21.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">The +anecdote is frequently told of our performer, Rich.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_22" name="note_22" href="#noteref_22">22.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">He +was from a younger branch of the Swifts of Yorkshire. +His grandfather, the Rev. Thomas Swift, Vicar of Goodrich, in +Herefordshire, suffered for his loyalty in Charles I's time. That +gentleman married Elizabeth Dryden, a member of the family of +the poet. Sir Walter Scott gives, with his characteristic minuteness +in such points, the exact relationship between these famous +men. Swift was <span class="tei tei-q">“the son of Dryden's second cousin”</span>. Swift, too, +was the enemy of Dryden's reputation. Witness the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Battle of +the Books</span></span>:—<span class="tei tei-q">“The difference was greatest among the horse”</span> says +he of the moderns, <span class="tei tei-q">“where every private trooper pretended to the +command, from Tasso and Milton to Dryden and Withers.”</span> And +in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Poetry, a Rhapsody</span></span>, he advises the poetaster to— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Read all the Prefaces of Dryden,<br /> +For these our critics much confide in,<br /> +Though merely writ, at first, for filling,<br /> +To raise the volume's price a shilling. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Cousin Swift, you will never be a poet,”</span> was the phrase of Dryden +to his kinsman, which remained alive in a memory tenacious of +such matters.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_23" name="note_23" href="#noteref_23">23.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Miss +Hetty”</span> she was called in the family—where her face, +and her dress, and Sir William's treatment of her, all made the +real fact about her birth plain enough. Sir William left her a +thousand pounds.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_24" name="note_24" href="#noteref_24">24.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Sometimes, +during his mental affliction, he continued walking +about the house for many consecutive hours; sometimes he remained +in a kind of torpor. At times, he would seem to struggle to bring +into distinct consciousness, and shape into expression, the intellect +that lay smothering under gloomy obstruction in him. A pier-glass +falling by accident, nearly fell on him. He said, he wished it had! +He once repeated, slowly, several times, <span class="tei tei-q">“I am what I am.”</span> The +last thing he wrote was an epigram on the building of a magazine +for arms and stores, which was pointed out to him as he went +abroad during his mental disease:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Behold a proof of Irish sense:<br /> +Here Irish wit is seen;<br /> +When nothing's left that's worth defence,<br /> +They build a magazine! +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_25" name="note_25" href="#noteref_25">25.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Besides +these famous books of Scott's and Johnson's, there is +a copious <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life</span></span> by Thomas Sheridan (Dr. Johnson's <span class="tei tei-q">“Sherry”</span>), +father of Richard Brinsley, and son of that good-natured, clever, +Irish Doctor, Thomas Sheridan, Swift's intimate, who lost his chaplaincy +by so unluckily choosing for a text on the king's birthday, +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof!”</span> Not to mention less +important works, there is also the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Remarks on the Life and Writings +of Dr. Jonathan Swift</span></span>, by that polite and dignified writer, the Earl +of Orrery. His lordship is said to have striven for literary renown, +chiefly that he might make up for the slight passed on him by his +father, who left his library away from him. It is to be feared that +the ink he used to wash out that stain only made it look bigger. +He had, however, known Swift, and corresponded with people who +knew him. His work (which appeared in 1751) provoked a good +deal of controversy, calling out, among other brochures, the interesting +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Observations on Lord Orrery's Remarks</span></span>, &c., of Dr. +Delany.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_26" name="note_26" href="#noteref_26">26.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Dr. Wilde's +book was written on the occasion of the remains +of Swift and Stella being brought to the light of day—a thing +which happened in 1835, when certain works going on in St. Patrick's +Cathedral, Dublin, afforded an opportunity of their being examined. +One hears with surprise of these skulls <span class="tei tei-q">“going the rounds”</span> of houses, +and being made the objects of <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">dilettante</span></span> +curiosity. The larynx of +Swift was actually carried off! Phrenologists had a low opinion +of his intellect, from the observations they took. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Dr. Wilde traces the symptoms of ill-health in Swift, as detailed +in his writings from time to time. He observes, likewise, that the +skull gave evidence of <span class="tei tei-q">“diseased action”</span> of the brain during life—such +as would be produced by an increasing tendency to <span class="tei tei-q">“cerebral +congestion”</span>.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_27" name="note_27" href="#noteref_27">27.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“He +[Dr. Johnson] seemed to me to have an unaccountable +prejudice against Swift; for I once took the liberty to ask him if +Swift had personally offended him, and he told me he had +not.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Boswell's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tour to the Hebrides</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_28" name="note_28" href="#noteref_28">28.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Few men, +to be sure, dared this experiment, but yet their +success was encouraging. One gentleman made a point of asking +the Dean, whether his uncle Godwin had not given him his education. +Swift, who hated <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">that</span></em> subject cordially, and, indeed, cared +little for his kindred, said, sternly, <span class="tei tei-q">“Yes; he gave me the education +of a dog.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Then, sir,”</span> cried the other, striking his fist on the +table, <span class="tei tei-q">“you have not the gratitude of a dog!”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Other occasions there were when a bold face gave the Dean +pause, even after his Irish almost-royal position was established. +But he brought himself into greater danger on a certain occasion, +and the amusing circumstances may be once more repeated here. +He had unsparingly lashed the notable Dublin lawyer, Mr. Serjeant +Bettesworth— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +So, at the bar, the booby Bettesworth,<br /> +Though half a crown out-pays his sweat's worth,<br /> +Who knows in law nor text nor margent,<br /> +Calls Singleton his brother-serjeant! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The Serjeant, it is said, swore to have his life. He presented himself +at the deanery. The Dean asked his name. <span class="tei tei-q">“Sir, I am Serjeant +Bett-es-worth.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">In what regiment, pray?</span></span>”</span> asked Swift. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A guard of volunteers formed themselves to defend the Dean +at this time.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_29" name="note_29" href="#noteref_29">29.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“But, +my Hamilton, I will never hide the freedom of my sentiments +from you. I am much inclined to believe that the temper +of my friend Swift might occasion his English friends to wish him +happily and properly promoted at a distance. His spirit, for +I would give it the proper name, was ever untractable. The motions +of his genius were often irregular. He assumed more the air of +a patron than of a friend. He affected rather to dictate than +advise.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Orrery.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_30" name="note_30" href="#noteref_30">30.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“An +anecdote which, though only told by Mrs. Pilkington, +is well attested, bears, that the last time he was in London +he went to dine with the Earl of Burlington, who was but newly +married. The earl, it is supposed, being willing to have a little +diversion, did not introduce him to his lady nor mention his name. +After dinner said the Dean, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Lady Burlington, I hear you can +sing; sing me a song.’</span> The lady looked on this unceremonious +manner of asking a favour with distaste, and positively refused. +He said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘She should sing, or he would make her. Why, madam, +I suppose you take me for one of your poor English hedge-parsons; +sing when I bid you.’</span> As the earl did nothing but laugh at this +freedom, the lady was so vexed that she burst into tears and retired. +His first compliment to her when he saw her again was, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Pray, +madam, are you as proud and ill-natured now as when I saw you +last?’</span> To which she answered with great good humour, <span class="tei tei-q">‘No, +Mr. Dean; I'll sing for you if you please.’</span> From which time he +conceived a great esteem for her.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life</span></span>. <span class="tei tei-q">“He had +not the least tincture of vanity in his conversation. He was, +perhaps, as he said himself, too proud to be vain. When he was +polite, it was in a manner entirely his own. In his friendships he +was constant and undisguised. He was the same in his +enmities.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Orrery</span></span>. +</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_31" name="note_31" href="#noteref_31">31.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“I +make no figure but at Court, where I affect to turn +from a lord to the meanest of my acquaintances.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal to +Stella.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am plagued with bad authors, verse and prose, who send me +their books and poems, the vilest I ever saw; but I have given +their names to my man, never to let them see me.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal to +Stella.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The following curious paragraph illustrates the life of a courtier:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Did I ever tell you that the lord treasurer hears ill with the +left ear just as I do?... I dare not tell him that I am so, sir; +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">for fear he should think that I counterfeited to make my +court!</span></em>”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal +to Stella.</span></span></p> +</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_32" name="note_32" href="#noteref_32">32.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The +war of pamphlets was carried on fiercely on one side and +the other; and the Whig attacks made the ministry Swift served +very sore. Bolingbroke laid hold of several of the Opposition +pamphleteers, and bewails their <span class="tei tei-q">“factitiousness”</span> in the following +letter:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“BOLINGBROKE TO THE EARL OF STRAFFORD.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Whitehall, July 23rd, 1712.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It is a melancholy consideration that the laws of our country +are too weak to punish effectually those factitious scribblers, who +presume to blacken the brightest characters, and to give even +scurrilous language to those who are in the first degrees of honour. +This, my lord, among others, is a symptom of the decayed condition +of our Government, and serves to show how fatally we mistake +licentiousness for liberty. All I could do was to take up Hart, +the printer, to send him to Newgate, and to bind him over upon +bail to be prosecuted; this I have done; and if I can arrive at +legal proof against the author Ridpath, he shall have the same +treatment.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Swift was not behind his illustrious friend in this virtuous indignation. +In the history of the four last years of the queen, the Dean +speaks in the most edifying manner of the licentiousness of the +press and the abusive language of the other party: +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It must be acknowledged that the bad practices of printers +have been such as to deserve the severest animadversion from the +public.... The adverse party, full of rage and leisure since their +fall, and unanimous in their cause, employ a set of writers by +subscription, who are well versed in all the topics of defamation, +and have a style and genius levelled to the generality of their +readers.... However, the mischiefs of the press were too exorbitant +to be cured by such a remedy as a tax upon small papers, +and a bill for a much more effectual regulation of it was brought +into the House of Commons, but so late in the session that there +was no time to pass it, for there always appeared an unwillingness +to cramp overmuch the liberty of the press.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But to a clause in the proposed bill, that the names of authors +should be set to every printed book, pamphlet, or paper, his reverence +objects altogether, for, says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“beside the objection to this clause +from the practice of pious men, who, in publishing excellent writings +for the service of religion, have chosen, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">out of an humble Christian +spirit, to conceal their names</span></em>, it is certain that all persons of true +genius or knowledge have an invincible modesty and suspicion of +themselves upon first sending their thoughts into the world.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This <span class="tei tei-q">“invincible modesty”</span> was no doubt the sole reason which +induced the Dean to keep the secret of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Drapier's Letters</span></span> and +a hundred humble Christian works of which he was the author. +As for the Opposition, the Doctor was for dealing severely with +them: he writes to Stella:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Journal. Letter XIX +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“London, March 25th, 1710-11.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“... We have let Guiscard be buried at last, after showing +him pickled in a trough this fortnight for twopence a piece; and +the fellow that showed would point to his body and say, <span class="tei tei-q">‘See, +gentlemen, this is the wound that was given him by his grace the +Duke of Ormond;’</span> and, <span class="tei tei-q">‘This is the wound,’</span> &c.; and then the +show was over, and another set of rabble came in. 'Tis hard that +our laws would not suffer us to hang his body in chains, because +he was not tried; and in the eye of the law every man is innocent +till then.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Journal. Letter XXVII +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“London, July 25th, 1711.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I was this afternoon with Mr. Secretary at his office, and helped +to hinder a man of his pardon, who is condemned for a rape. The +under-secretary was willing to save him; but I told the secretary +he could not pardon him without a favourable report from the +judge; besides he was a fiddler, and consequently a rogue, and +deserved hanging for something else, and so he shall swing.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_33" name="note_33" href="#noteref_33">33.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">It was his constant practice to keep his birthday as a day of +mourning.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_34" name="note_34" href="#noteref_34">34.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“These +devils of Grub Street rogues, that write the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Flying +Post</span></span> and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Medley</span></span> in one paper, will not be quiet. They are +always mauling Lord Treasurer, Lord Bolingbroke, and me. We have the +dog under prosecution, but Bolingbroke is not active enough; but +I hope to swinge him. He is a Scotch rogue, one Ridpath. They +get out upon bail, and write on. We take them again, and get +fresh bail; so it goes round.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal to Stella.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_35" name="note_35" href="#noteref_35">35.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Swift +was by no means inclined to forget such considerations; +and his English birth makes its mark, strikingly enough, every +now and then in his writings. Thus in a letter to Pope (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Swift</span></span>, vol. xix, p. 97), he says:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We have had your volume of letters.... Some of those who +highly value you, and a few who knew you personally, are grieved +to find you make no distinction between the English gentry of this +kingdom, and the savage old Irish (who are only the vulgar, and +some gentlemen who live in the Irish parts of the kingdom); but +the English colonies, who are three parts in four, are much more +civilized than many counties in England, and speak better English, +and are much better bred.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And again, in the fourth Drapier's Letter, we have the following:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A short paper, printed at Bristol, and reprinted here, reports +Mr. Wood to say <span class="tei tei-q">‘that he wonders at the impudence and insolence +of the Irish, in refusing his coin.’</span> When, by the way, it is the +true English people of Ireland who refuse it, although we take it +for granted that the Irish will do so too whenever they are +asked.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Swift</span></span>, vol. iv, p. 143. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He goes further, in a good-humoured satirical paper, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">On Barbarous +Denominations in Ireland</span></span>, where (after abusing, as he was +wont, the Scotch cadence, as well as expression), he advances to +the <span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Irish brogue</span></span>”</span>, and speaking of the +<span class="tei tei-q">“censure”</span> which it brings down, says:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And what is yet worse, it is too well known that the bad consequence +of this opinion affects those among us who are not the +least liable to such reproaches farther than the misfortune of being +born in Ireland, although of English parents, and whose education +has been chiefly in that kingdom.”</span>—Ibid. vol. vii, p. 149. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But, indeed, if we are to make <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">anything</span></em> of Race at all, we must +call that man an Englishman whose father comes from an old +Yorkshire family, and his mother from an old Leicestershire one!</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_36" name="note_36" href="#noteref_36">36.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“The +style of his conversation was very much of a piece with +that of his writings, concise and clear and strong. Being one day +at a sheriff's feast, who amongst other toasts called out to him, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Mr. Dean. The trade of Ireland!’</span> he answered quick: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Sir, +I drink no memories!’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Happening to be in company with a petulant young man who +prided himself on saying pert things ... and who cried out, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘You must know, Mr. Dean, that I set up for a wit?’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘Do you +so?’</span> says the Dean. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Take my advice, and sit down again!’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At another time, being in company, where a lady whisking her +long train [long trains were then in fashion] swept down a fine +fiddle and broke it; Swift cried out—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">Mantua vae miserae nimium vicina Cremonae!”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Delany</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Observations upon Lord Orrery's </span><span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-style: italic">“</span><span style="font-style: italic">Remarks, &c. +of Swift</span><span style="font-style: italic">”</span></span></span>. London, 1754.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_37" name="note_37" href="#noteref_37">37.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Don't you remember how I used to be in pain when Sir William +Temple would look cold and out of humour for three or four days, +and I used to suspect a hundred reasons? I have plucked up my +spirits since then, faith; he spoiled a fine +gentleman.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal +to Stella.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_38" name="note_38" href="#noteref_38">38.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“The Epicureans were more intelligible in their +notion, and fortunate in their expression, when they placed a man's happiness +in the tranquillity of his mind and indolence of body; for +while we are composed of both, I doubt both must have a share +in the good or ill we feel. As men of several languages say the +same things in very different words, so in several ages, countries, +constitutions of laws and religion, the same thing seems to be +meant by very different expressions; what is called by the Stoics +apathy, or dispassion; by the sceptics, indisturbance; by the +Molinists, quietism; by common men, peace of conscience,—seems +all to mean but great tranquillity of mind.... For this reason +Epicurus passed his life wholly in his garden: there he studied, +there he exercised, there he taught his philosophy; and, indeed, +no other sort of abode seems to contribute so much to both the +tranquillity of mind and indolence of body, which he made his +chief ends. The sweetness of the air, the pleasantness of smell, +the verdure of plants, the cleanness and lightness of food, the +exercise of working or walking, but, above all, the exemption from +cares and solicitude, seem equally to favour and improve both contemplation +and health, the enjoyment of sense and imagination, +and thereby the quiet and ease both of the body and mind.... +Where Paradise was has been much debated, and little agreed; +but what sort of place is meant by it may perhaps easier be conjectured. +It seems to have been a Persian word, since Xenophon +and other Greek authors mention it as what was much in use and +delight among the kings of those eastern countries. Strabo describing +Jericho: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Ibi est palmetum, cui immixtae sunt etiam ahae +stirpes hortenses, locus ferax palmis abundans, spatio stadiorum +centum, totus irriguus: ibi est Regis Balsami +paradisus.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Essay +on Gardens.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the same famous essay Temple speaks of a friend, whose +conduct and prudence he characteristically admires. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I thought it very prudent in a gentleman of my friends +in Staffordshire, who is a great lover of his garden, to pretend no +higher, though his soil be good enough, than to the perfection of +plums; and in these (by bestowing south walls upon them) he has +very well succeeded, which he could never have done in attempts +upon peaches and grapes; and <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">a good plum is certainly better than +an ill peach</span></em>.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_39" name="note_39" href="#noteref_39">39.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Swift's Thoughts on Hanging.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Directions to Servants.</span></span>) +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“To grow old in the office of a footman is the highest of all +indignities; therefore, when you find years coming on without +hopes of place at Court, a command in the army, a succession +to the stewardship, an employment in the revenue (which two last +you cannot obtain without reading and writing), or running away +with your master's niece or daughter, I directly advise you to go +upon the road, which is the only post of honour left you: there +you will meet many of your old comrades, and live a short life +and a merry one, and making a figure at your exit, wherein I will +give you some instructions.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The last advice I give you relates to your behaviour when you +are going to be hanged; which, either for robbing your master, +for housebreaking, or going upon the highway, or in a drunken +quarrel by killing the first man you meet, may very probably be +your lot, and is owing to one of these three qualities: either a love +of good fellowship, a generosity of mind, or too much vivacity of +spirits. Your good behaviour on this article will concern your +whole community; deny the fact with all solemnity of imprecations: +a hundred of your brethren, if they can be admitted, will +attend about the bar, and be ready upon demand to give you +a character before the Court; let nothing prevail on you to confess, +but the promise of a pardon for discovering your comrades: but +I suppose all this to be in vain; for if you escape now, your fate +will be the same another day. Get a speech to be written by the +best author of Newgate: some of your kind wenches will provide +you with a holland shirt and white cap, crowned with a crimson +or black ribbon: take leave cheerfully of all your friends in Newgate: +mount the cart with courage; fall on your knees; lift up +your eyes; hold a book in your hands, although you cannot read +a word; deny the fact at the gallows; kiss and forgive the hangman; +and so farewell; you shall be buried in pomp at the charge +of the fraternity: the surgeon shall not touch a limb of you; and +your fame shall continue until a successor of equal renown succeeds +in your place....”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_40" name="note_40" href="#noteref_40">40.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“He +continued in Sir William Temple's house till the death of +that great man.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Anecdotes of +the Family of Swift</span></span>, by the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dean</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It has since pleased God to take this great and good person to +himself.”</span>—Preface to <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Temple's Works</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On all <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">public</span></em> occasions, Swift speaks of Sir William in the same +tone. But the reader will better understand how acutely he remembered +the indignities he suffered in his household, from the +subjoined extracts from the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal to Stella</span></span>:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I called at Mr. Secretary the other day, to see what the d—— +ailed him on Sunday: I made him a very proper speech; told +him I observed he was much out of temper, that I did not expect +he would tell me the cause, but would be glad to see he was in +better; and one thing I warned him of—never to appear cold to +me, for I would not be treated like a schoolboy; that I had felt +too much of that in my life already”</span> +[<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">meaning Sir William Temple</span></span>] +&c. &c.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal to Stella.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am thinking what a veneration we used to have for Sir William +Temple because he might have been Secretary of State at fifty; +and here is a young fellow hardly thirty in that +employment.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Ibid.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The Secretary is as easy with me as Mr. Addison was. I have +often thought what a splutter Sir William Temple makes about +being Secretary of State.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Ibid.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Lord Treasurer has had an ugly fit of the rheumatism, but is +now quite well. I was playing at <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">one-and-thirty</span></span> with him and his +family the other night. He gave us all twelvepence a piece to begin +with; it put me in mind of Sir William Temple.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Ibid.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I thought I saw Jack Temple [<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">nephew to Sir William</span></span>] and his +wife pass by me to-day in their coach; but I took no notice of +them. I am glad I have wholly shaken off that family.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">S. to S. +Sept., 1710.</span></span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_41" name="note_41" href="#noteref_41">41.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Swift must +be allowed,”</span> says Dr. Johnson, <span class="tei tei-q">“for a time, to +have dictated the political opinions of the English nation.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A conversation on the Dean's pamphlets excited one of the +Doctor's liveliest sallies. <span class="tei tei-q">“One, in particular, praised his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Conduct +of the Allies</span></span>.—Johnson: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Sir, his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Conduct of the +Allies</span></span> is a performance of very little ability.... Why, sir, Tom Davies might +have written the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Conduct of the +Allies</span></span>!’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Boswell's</span></span> <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life of +Johnson</span></span>.</p> +</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_42" name="note_42" href="#noteref_42">42.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Whenever +he fell into the company of any person for the +first time, it was his custom to try their tempers and disposition +by some abrupt question that bore the appearance of rudeness. +If this were well taken, and answered with good humour, he afterwards +made amends by his civilities. But if he saw any marks of +resentment, from alarmed pride, vanity, or conceit, he dropped all +further intercourse with the party. This will be illustrated by an +anecdote of that sort related by Mrs. Pilkington. After supper, +the Dean having decanted a bottle of wine, poured what remained +into a glass, and seeing it was muddy, presented it to Mr. Pilkington +to drink it. <span class="tei tei-q">‘For,’</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I always keep some poor parson to +drink the foul wine for me.’</span> Mr. Pilkington, entering into his +humour, thanked him, and told him <span class="tei tei-q">‘he did not know the difference, +but was glad to get a glass at any rate.’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘Why then,’</span> said +the Dean, <span class="tei tei-q">‘you shan't, for I'll drink it myself. Why, —— take +you, you are wiser than a paltry curate whom I asked to dine with +me a few days ago; for upon my making the same speech to him, +he said, he did not understand such usage, and so walked off without +his dinner. By the same token, I told the gentleman who +recommended him to me, that the fellow was a blockhead, and +I had done with him.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sheridan's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life of Swift</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_43" name="note_43" href="#noteref_43">43.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +FROM THE ARCHBISHOP OF CASHELL. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Cashell, May 31st, 1735</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Sir</span></span>,—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have been so unfortunate in all my contests of late, that +I am resolved to have no more, especially where I am likely to be +overmatched; and as I have some reason to hope what is past +will be forgotten, I confess I did endeavour in my last to put the +best colour I could think of upon a very bad cause. My friends +judge right of my idleness; but, in reality, it has hitherto proceeded +from a hurry and confusion, arising from a thousand unlucky +unforeseen accidents rather than mere sloth. I have but one +troublesome affair now upon my hands, which, by the help of the +prime serjeant, I hope soon to get rid of; and then you shall see +me a true Irish bishop. Sir James Ware has made a very useful +collection of the memorable actions of my predecessors. He tells +me, they were born in such a town of England or Ireland; were +consecrated such a year; and, if not translated, were buried in +the Cathedral church, either on the north or south side. Whence +I conclude, that a good bishop has nothing more to do than to +eat, drink, grow fat, rich, and die; which laudable example I propose +for the remainder of my life to follow; for to tell you the truth, +I have for these four or five years past met with so much treachery, +baseness, and ingratitude among mankind, that I can hardly think +it incumbent on any man to endeavour to do good to so perverse +a generation.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am truly concerned at the account you give me of your health. +Without doubt a southern ramble will prove the best remedy you +can take to recover your flesh; and I do not know, except in one +stage, where you can choose a road so suited to your circumstances, +as from Dublin hither. You have to Kilkenny a turnpike and +good inns, at every ten or twelve miles' end. From Kilkenny +hither is twenty long miles, bad road, and no inns at all: but +I have an expedient for you. At the foot of a very high hill, just +midway, there lives in a neat thatched cabin, a parson, who is not +poor; his wife is allowed to be the best little woman in the world. +Her chickens are the fattest, and her ale the best in all the country. +Besides, the parson has a little cellar of his own, of which he keeps +the key, where he always has a hogshead of the best wine that can +be got, in bottles well corked, upon their side; and he cleans, and +pulls out the cork better, I think, than Robin. Here I design to +meet you with a coach; if you be tired, you shall stay all night; +if not, after dinner we will set out about four, and be at Cashell +by nine; and by going through fields and by-ways, which the +parson will show us, we shall escape all the rocky and stony roads +that lie between this place and that, which are certainly very bad. +I hope you will be so kind as to let me know a post or two before +you set out, the very day you will be at Kilkenny, that I may +have all things prepared for you. It may be, if you ask him, +Cope will come: he will do nothing for me. Therefore, depending +upon your positive promise, I shall add no more arguments to +persuade you, and am, with the greatest truth, your most faithful +and obedient servant,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Theo. Cashell.</span></span>”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_44" name="note_44" href="#noteref_44">44.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. +Swift lived with him [Sir William Temple] some time, +but resolving to settle himself in some way of living, was inclined +to take orders. However, although his fortune was very small, +he had a scruple of entering into the Church merely for +support.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Anecdotes +of the Family of Swift</span></span>, by the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dean</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_45" name="note_45" href="#noteref_45">45.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Dr. Swift +had a natural severity of face, which even his smiles +could never soften, or his utmost gaiety render placid and serene; +but when that sternness of visage was increased by rage, it is scarce +possible to imagine looks or features that carried in them more +terror and austerity.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Orrery.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_46" name="note_46" href="#noteref_46">46.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“London, April 10th, 1713.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Lady Masham's eldest boy is very ill: I doubt he will not +live; and she stays at Kensington to nurse him, which vexes us +all. She is so excessively fond, it makes me mad. She should +never leave the queen, but leave everything, to stick to what is +so much the interest of the public, as well as her +own....”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal.</span></span></p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_47" name="note_47" href="#noteref_47">47.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“My +health is somewhat mended, but at best I have an ill +head and an aching heart.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">In May, 1719.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_48" name="note_48" href="#noteref_48">48.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Perhaps the most melancholy satire in the whole of the +dreadful book, is the description of the very old people in the Voyage to +Laputa. At Lugnag, Gulliver hears of some persons who never +die, called the Struldbrugs, and expressing a wish to become +acquainted with men who must have so much learning and experience, +his colloquist describes the Struldbrugs to him. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He said, They commonly acted like mortals, till about thirty +years old, after which, by degrees, they grew melancholy and +dejected, increasing in both till they came to fourscore. This he +learned from their own confession: for otherwise there not being +above two or three of that species born in an age, they were too +few to form a general observation by. When they came to fourscore +years, which is reckoned the extremity of living in this +country, they had not only all the follies and infirmities of other +old men, but many more, which arose from the prospect of never +dying. They were not only opinionative, peevish, covetous, morose, +vain, talkative, but incapable of friendship, and dead to all natural +affection, which never descended below their grandchildren. Envy +and impotent desires are their prevailing passions. But those +objects against which their envy seems principally directed, are +the vices of the younger sort and the deaths of the old. By reflecting +on the former, they find themselves cut off from all possibility of +pleasure; and whenever they see a funeral, they lament, and +repent that others are gone to a harbour of rest, to which they +themselves never can hope to arrive. They have no remembrance +of anything but what they learned and observed in their youth +and middle age, and even that is very imperfect. And for the +truth or particulars of any fact, it is safer to depend on common +tradition than upon their best recollections. The least miserable +among them appear to be those who turn to dotage, and entirely +lose their memories; these meet with more pity and assistance, +because they want many bad qualities which abound in others.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If a Struldbrug happened to marry one of his own kind, the +marriage is dissolved of course, by the courtesy of the kingdom, +as soon as the younger of the two comes to be fourscore. For the +law thinks it to be a reasonable indulgence that those who are +condemned, without any fault of their own, to a perpetual continuance +in the world, should not have their misery doubled by +the load of a wife.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As soon as they have completed the term of eighty years, they +are looked on as dead in law; their heirs immediately succeed to +their estates, only a small pittance is reserved for their support; +and the poor ones are maintained at the public charge. After +that period, they are held incapable of any employment of trust +or profit, they cannot purchase lands or take leases, neither are +they allowed to be witnesses in any cause, either civil or criminal, +not even for the decision of meers and bounds.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At ninety they lose their teeth and hair; they have at that +age no distinction of taste, but eat and drink whatever they can +get without relish or appetite. The diseases they were subject to +still continue, without increasing or diminishing. In talking, they +forget the common appellation of things, and the names of persons, +even of those who are their nearest friends and relatives. For +the same reason, they can never amuse themselves with reading, +because their memory will not serve to carry them from the beginning +of a sentence to the end; and by this defect they are deprived +of the only entertainment whereof they might otherwise be capable.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The language of this country being always on the flux, the +Struldbrugs of one age do not understand those of another; neither +are they able, after two hundred years, to hold any conversation +(further than by a few general words) with their neighbours, the +mortals; and thus they lie under the disadvantage of living like +foreigners in their own country.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“This was the account given me of the Struldbrugs, as near as +I can remember. I afterwards saw five or six of different ages, +the youngest not above two hundred years old, who were brought +to me several times by some of my friends; but although they +were told <span class="tei tei-q">‘that I was a great traveller, and had seen all the world’</span>, +they had not the least curiosity to ask me a single question; only +desired I would give them slumskudask, or a token of remembrance; +which is a modest way of begging, to avoid the law that strictly +forbids it, because they are provided for by the public, although +indeed with a very scanty allowance.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“They are despised and hated by all sorts of people; when one +of them is born, it is reckoned ominous, and their birth is recorded +very particularly; so that you may know their age by consulting +the register, which, however, has not been kept above a thousand +years past, or at least has been destroyed by time or public disturbances. +But the usual way of computing how old they are, is, +by asking them what kings or great persons they can remember, +and then consulting history; for infallibly the last prince in their +mind did not begin his reign after they were fourscore years old.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“They were the most mortifying sight I ever beheld, and the +women more horrible than the men; besides the usual deformities +in extreme old age, they acquired an additional ghastliness, in +proportion to their number of years, which is not to be described; +and among half a dozen, I soon distinguished which was the eldest, +although there was not above a century or two between +them.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gulliver's +Travels.</span></span></p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_49" name="note_49" href="#noteref_49">49.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The name +of Varina has been thrown into the shade by those +of the famous Stella and Vanessa; but she had a story of her +own to tell about the blue eyes of young Jonathan. One may +say that the book of Swift's life opens at places kept by these +blighted flowers! Varina must have a paragraph. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She was a Miss Jane Waryng, sister to a college chum of his. +In 1696, when Swift was nineteen years old, we find him writing +a love-letter to her, beginning, <span class="tei tei-q">“Impatience is the most inseparable +quality of a lover.”</span> But absence made a great difference in his +feelings; so, four years afterwards, the tone is changed. He writes +again, a very curious letter, offering to marry her, and putting the +offer in such a way that nobody could possibly accept it. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +After dwelling on his poverty, &c., he says, conditionally, <span class="tei tei-q">“I shall +be blessed to have you in my arms, without regarding whether +your person be beautiful, or your fortune large. Cleanliness in the +first, and competency in the second, is all I ask for!”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The editors do not tell us what became of Varina in life. One +would be glad to know that she met with some worthy partner, +and lived long enough to see her little boys laughing over Lilliput, +without any <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">arrière pensée</span></span> +of a sad character about the great Dean!</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_50" name="note_50" href="#noteref_50">50.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">A sentimental Champollion might find a good deal of matter +for his art, in expounding the symbols of the <span class="tei tei-q">“Little Language”</span>. +Usually, Stella is <span class="tei tei-q">“M.D.,”</span> but sometimes her companion, Mrs. Dingley, +is included in it. Swift is <span class="tei tei-q">“Presto”</span>; also P.D.F.R. We have +<span class="tei tei-q">“Goodnight, M.D.; Night, M.D.; Little M.D.; Stellakins; Pretty +Stella; Dear, roguish, impudent, pretty M.D.!”</span> Every now and +then he breaks into rhyme, as— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I wish you both a merry new year,<br /> +Roast beef, minced-pies, and good strong beer, +And me a share of your good cheer.<br /> +That I was there, as you were here,<br /> +And you are a little saucy dear. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_51" name="note_51" href="#noteref_51">51.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The following +passages are from a paper begun by Swift on +the evening of the day of her death, Jan. 28, 1727-8: +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She was sickly from her childhood, until about the age of fifteen; +but then she grew into perfect health, and was looked upon as one +of the most beautiful, graceful, and agreeable young women in +London—only a little too fat. Her hair was blacker than a raven, +and every feature of her face in perfection.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“... Properly speaking”</span>—he goes on with a calmness which, +under the circumstances, is terrible—<span class="tei tei-q">“she has been dying six +months!...”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Never was any of her sex born with better gifts of the mind, +or who more improved them by reading and conversation.... +All of us who had the happiness of her friendship agreed unanimously, +that in an afternoon's or evening's conversation she never +failed before we parted of delivering the best thing that was said +in the company. Some of us have written down several of her +sayings, or what the French call <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">bons mots</span></span>, +wherein she excelled beyond belief.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The specimens on record, however, in the Dean's paper called +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Bons Mots de Stella</span></span>, scarcely bear out this last part of the +panegyric. But the following prove her wit: +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A gentleman, who had been very silly and pert in her company, +at last began to grieve at remembering the loss of a child lately +dead. A bishop sitting by comforted him—that he should be easy, +because <span class="tei tei-q">‘the child was gone to heaven’</span>. <span class="tei tei-q">‘No, my lord,’</span> said +she; <span class="tei tei-q">‘that is it which most grieves him, because he is sure never +to see his child there.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When she was extremely ill, her physician said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Madam, you +are near the bottom of the hill, but we will endeavour to get you +up again.’</span> She answered, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Doctor, I fear I shall be out of breath +before I get up to the top.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A very dirty clergyman of her acquaintance, who affected +smartness and repartees, was asked by some of the company how +his nails came to be so dirty. He was at a loss; but she solved +the difficulty, by saying, <span class="tei tei-q">‘the doctor's nails grew dirty by scratching +himself.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A quaker apothecary sent her a vial, corked; it had a broad +brim, and a label of paper about its neck. <span class="tei tei-q">‘What is that?’</span>—said +she—<span class="tei tei-q">‘my apothecary's son!’</span> The ridiculous resemblance, +and the suddenness of the question, set us all +a-laughing.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Swift's +Works</span></span>, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> ed., vol. ix, +295-6.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_52" name="note_52" href="#noteref_52">52.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“I am +so hot and lazy after my morning's walk, that I loitered +at Mrs. Vanhomrigh's, where my best gown and periwig was, and +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">out of mere listlessness dine there, very often</span></em>; so +I did to-day.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal +to Stella.</span></span> Mrs. Vanhomrigh, Vanessa's mother, was the widow of a Dutch +merchant who held lucrative appointments in King William's time. +The family settled in London in 1709, and had a house in Bury +Street, St. James's—a street made notable by such residents us +Swift and Steele; and, in our own time, Moore and Crabbe.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_53" name="note_53" href="#noteref_53">53.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Vanessa +was excessively vain. The character given of her +by Cadenus is fine painting, but in general fictitious. She was +fond of dress; impatient to be admired; very romantic in her +turn of mind; superior, in her own opinion, to all her sex; full of +pertness, gaiety, and pride; not without some agreeable accomplishments, +but far from being either beautiful or genteel;... +happy in the thoughts of being reported Swift's concubine, but +still aiming and intending to be his +wife.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Lord Orrery.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_54" name="note_54" href="#noteref_54">54.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“You bid +me be easy, and you would see me as often as you +could. You had better have said, as often as you can get the +better of your inclinations so much; or as often as you remember +there was such a one in the world. If you continue to treat me +as you do, you will not be made uneasy by me long. It is impossible +to describe what I have suffered since I saw you last: I am +sure I could have borne the rack much better than those killing, +killing words of yours. Sometimes I have resolved to die without +seeing you more;, but those resolves, to your misfortune, did not +last long; for there is something in human nature that prompts +one so to find relief in this world I must give way to it, and beg +you would see me, and speak kindly to me; for I am sure you'd +not condemn any one to suffer what I have done, could you but +know it. The reason I write to you is, because I cannot tell it to +you, should I see you; for when I begin to complain, then you +are angry, and there is something in your looks so awful that it +strikes me dumb. Oh! that you may have but so much regard +for me left that this complaint may touch your soul with pity. +I say as little as ever I can; did you but know what I thought, +I am sure it would move you to forgive me; and believe I cannot +help telling you this and live.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Vanessa.</span></span> +(M. 1714.)</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_55" name="note_55" href="#noteref_55">55.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“If we +consider Swift's behaviour, so far only as it relates to +women, we shall find that he looked upon them rather as busts +than as whole figures.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Orrery.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You must have smiled to have found his house a constant +seraglio of very virtuous women, who attended him from morning +to night.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Orrery.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A correspondent of Sir Walter Scott's furnished him with the +materials on which to found the following interesting passage about +Vanessa—after she had retired to cherish her passion in retreat:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Marley Abbey, near Celbridge, where Miss Vanhomrigh resided, +is built much in the form of a real cloister, especially in its external +appearance. An aged man (upwards of ninety, by his own account), +showed the grounds to my correspondent. He was the son of +Mrs. Vanhomrigh's gardener, and used to work with his father in +the garden while a boy. He remembered the unfortunate Vanessa +well; and his account of her corresponded with the usual description +of her person, especially as to her <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">embonpoint</span></em>. He said she +went seldom abroad, and saw little company; her constant amusement +was reading, or walking in the garden.... She avoided +company, and was always melancholy, save when Dean Swift was +there, and then she seemed happy. The garden was to an uncommon +degree crowded with laurels. The old man said that when +Miss Vanhomrigh expected the Dean she always planted with her +own hand a laurel or two against his arrival. He showed her +favourite seat, still called <span class="tei tei-q">‘Vanessa's bower’</span>. Three or four trees +and some laurels indicate the spot.... There were two seats and +a rude table within the bower, the opening of which commanded +a view of the Liffey.... In this sequestered spot, according to +the old gardener's account, the Dean and Vanessa used often to +sit, with books and writing materials on the table before +them.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Swift</span></span>, vol. i, pp. 246-7. +<span class="tei tei-q">“... But Miss Vanhomrigh, irritated at the situation in which +she found herself, determined on bringing to a crisis those expectations +of a union with the object of her affections—to the hope of +which she had clung amid every vicissitude of his conduct towards +her. The most probable bar was his undefined connexion with +Mrs. Johnson, which, as it must have been perfectly known to her, +had, doubtless, long elicited her secret jealousy, although only +a single hint to that purpose is to be found in their correspondence, +and that so early as 1713, when she writes to him—then in Ireland—<span class="tei tei-q">‘If +you are very happy, it is ill-natured of you not to tell me so, +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">except 'tis what is inconsistent with mine</span></em>.’</span> Her silence and patience +under this state of uncertainty for no less than eight years, must +have been partly owing to her awe for Swift, and partly, perhaps, +to the weak state of her rival's health, which, from year to year, +seemed to announce speedy dissolution. At length, however, +Vanessa's impatience prevailed, and she ventured on the decisive +step of writing to Mrs. Johnson herself, requesting to know the +nature of that connexion. Stella, in reply, informed her of her +marriage with the Dean; and full of the highest resentment against +Swift for having given another female such a right in him as Miss +Vanhomrigh's inquiries implied, she sent to him her rival's letter +of interrogatories, and, without seeing him, or awaiting his reply, +retired to the house of Mr. Ford, near Dublin. Every reader knows +the consequence. Swift, in one of those paroxysms of fury to +which he was liable, both from temper and disease, rode instantly +to Marley Abbey. As he entered the apartment, the sternness of +his countenance, which was peculiarly formed to express the fiercer +passions, struck the unfortunate Vanessa with such terror that she +could scarce ask whether he would not sit down. He answered +by flinging a letter on the table, and, instantly leaving the house, +remounted his horse, and returned to Dublin. When Vanessa +opened the packet, she only found her own letter to Stella. It +was her death warrant. She sunk at once under the disappointment +of the delayed, yet cherished, hopes which had so long sickened +her heart, and beneath the unrestrained wrath of him for whose +sake she had indulged them. How long she survived the last +interview is uncertain, but the time does not seem to have exceeded +a few weeks.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott.</span></span></p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_56" name="note_56" href="#noteref_56">56.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“M. Swift est +Rabelais dans son bon sens, et vivant en bonne +compagnie. Il n'a pas, à la verité, la gaîté du premier, mais il +a toute la finesse, la raison, le choix, le bon goût qui manquent +à notre curé de Meudon. Ses vers sont d'un goût singulier, et +presque inimitable; la bonne plaisanterie est son partage en vers et +en prose; mais pour le bien entendre il faut faire un petit voyage +dans son pays.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Voltaire</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lettres sur les Anglais</span></span>, Let. 22.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_57" name="note_57" href="#noteref_57">57.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The following +is a <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">conspectus</span></span> of them:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Addison.</span></span>—Commissioner of Appeals; Under Secretary of +State; Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland; Keeper +of the Records in Ireland; Lord of Trade; and one +of the Principal Secretaries of State, successively. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Steele.</span></span>—Commissioner of the Stamp Office; Surveyor of the +Royal Stables at Hampton Court; and Governor of +the Royal Company of Comedians; Commissioner of +<span class="tei tei-q">“Forfeited Estates in Scotland”</span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Prior.</span></span>—Secretary to the Embassy at the Hague; Gentleman of +the Bedchamber to King William; Secretary to the +Embassy in France; Under Secretary of State; +Ambassador to France. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Tickell.</span></span>—Under Secretary of State; Secretary to the Lords +Justices of Ireland. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Congreve.</span></span>—Commissioner for licensing Hackney Coaches; +Commissioner for Wine Licences; place in the Pipe-office; +post in the Custom-house; Secretary of Jamaica. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Gay.</span></span>—Secretary to the Earl of Clarendon (when Ambassador +to Hanover.) +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">John Dennis.</span></span>—A place in the Custom-house. +<span class="tei tei-q">“En Angleterre ... les lettres sont plus en honneur qu'ici.”</span>— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Voltaire</span></span>, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lettres sur les Anglais</span></span>, Let. +20.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_58" name="note_58" href="#noteref_58">58.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">He was +the son of Colonel William Congreve, and grandson +of Richard Congreve, Esq., of Congreve and Stretton in Staffordshire—a +very ancient family.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_59" name="note_59" href="#noteref_59">59.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pipe.</span></span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pipe</span></span>, in law, is a roll in the Exchequer, called also +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">great roll</span></span>.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pipe</span></span>-<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Office</span></span> +is an office in which a person called the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Clerk of +the Pipe</span></span> makes out leases of crown lands, by warrant, from the +Lord-Treasurer, or Commissioners of the Treasury, or Chancellor +of the Exchequer.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Clerk of the Pipe makes up all accounts of +sheriffs, &c.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Rees</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cyclopaed.</span></span> Art. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pipe.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pipe</span></span>-<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Office</span></span>.—Spelman +thinks so called because the papers were +kept in a large <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">pipe</span></span> or cask.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“These be at last brought into that office of Her Majesty's +Exchequer, which we, by a metaphor, do call the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">pipe</span></span> ... because +the whole receipt is finally conveyed into it by means of divers +small <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">pipes</span></span> or quills.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Bacon</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Office of Alienations</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +[We are indebted to Richardson's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dictionary</span></span> for this fragment of +erudition. But a modern man of letters can know little on these +points—by experience.]</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_60" name="note_60" href="#noteref_60">60.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“It +has been observed that no change of Ministers affected +him in the least, nor was he ever removed from any post that was +given to him, except to a better. His place in the Custom-house, +and his office of Secretary in Jamaica, are said to have brought +him in upwards of twelve hundred a year.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Biog. +Brit.</span></span>, Art. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Congreve</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_61" name="note_61" href="#noteref_61">61.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Dryden addressed his <span class="tei tei-q">“twelfth epistle”</span> +to <span class="tei tei-q">“My dear friend Mr. Congreve,”</span> on his comedy called +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Double Dealer</span></span>, in which he says— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Great Jonson did by strength of judgement please;<br /> +Yet, doubling Fletcher's force, he wants his case.<br /> +In differing talents both adorn'd their age:<br /> +One for the study, t'other for the stage.<br /> +But both to Congreve justly shall submit,<br /> +One match'd in judgement, both o'ermatched in wit.<br /> +In him all beauties of this age we see, &c. &c. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Double Dealer</span></span>, however, +was not so palpable a hit as the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Old +Bachelor</span></span>, but, at first, met with opposition. The critics having +fallen foul of it, our <span class="tei tei-q">“swell”</span> applied the scourge to that presumptuous +body, in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Epistle Dedicatory</span></span> to the <span class="tei tei-q">“Right Honourable Charles +Montague.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I was conscious,”</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">“where a true critic might have put +me upon my defence. I was prepared for the attack, ... but +I have not heard anything said sufficient to provoke an answer.”</span> +He goes on— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“But there is one thing at which I am more concerned than all +the false criticisms that are made upon me; and that is, some of +the ladies are offended. I am heartily sorry for it; for I declare, +I would rather disoblige all the critics in the world than one of +the fair sex. They are concerned that I have represented some +women vicious and affected. How can I help it? It is the business +of a comic poet to paint the vices and follies of human kind.... +I should be very glad of an opportunity to make my compliments +to those ladies who are offended. But they can no more +expect it in a comedy, than <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">to be tickled by a surgeon when he is +letting their blood</span></em>.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_62" name="note_62" href="#noteref_62">62.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Instead of endeavouring to raise a vain monument to myself, +let me leave behind me a memorial of my friendship, with one of +the most valuable men as well as finest writers of my age and +country—one who has tried, and knows by his own experience, +how hard an undertaking it is to do justice to Homer—and one +who, I am sure, seriously rejoices with me at the period of my +labours. To him, therefore, having brought this long work to a +conclusion, I desire to dedicate it, and to have the honour and +satisfaction of placing together in this manner the names of Mr. Congreve +and of—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">A. Pope</span></span>.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Postscript +to Translation of the Iliad of +Homer.</span></span> Mar. 25, 1720.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_63" name="note_63" href="#noteref_63">63.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“When asked +why he listened to the praises of Dennis, he said, +he had much rather be flattered than abused. Swift had a particular +friendship for our author, and generally took him under his protection +in his high authoritative manner.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Thos. Davies</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dramatic Miscellanies</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_64" name="note_64" href="#noteref_64">64.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Congreve +was very intimate for years with Mrs. Bracegirdle, +and lived in the same street, his house very near hers, until his +acquaintance with the young Duchess of Marlborough. He then +quitted that house. The Duchess showed us a diamond necklace +(which Lady Di. used afterwards to wear) that cost seven thousand +pounds, and was purchased with the money Congreve left her. +How much better would it have been to have given it to poor +Mrs. Bracegirdle.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Young</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_65" name="note_65" href="#noteref_65">65.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“A glass +was put in the hand of the statue, which was supposed +to bow to her Grace and to nod in approbation of what she +spoke to it.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Thos. Davies</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dramatic Miscellanies</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_66" name="note_66" href="#noteref_66">66.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The +sum Congreve left her was 200<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, as is said in the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dramatic Miscellanies</span></span> of Tom Davies; where are some particulars +about this charming actress and beautiful woman. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She had a <span class="tei tei-q">“lively aspect”</span>, says Tom, on the authority of Cibber, +and <span class="tei tei-q">“such a glow of health and cheerfulness in her countenance, +as inspired everybody with desire”</span>. <span class="tei tei-q">“Scarce an audience saw her +that were not half of them her lovers.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Congreve and Rowe courted her in the persons of their lovers. +<span class="tei tei-q">“In <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tamerlane</span></span>, Rowe courted her Selima, in the person of +Axalla....; Congreve insinuated his addresses in his Valentine to her +Angelica, in his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Love for Love</span></span>; in his Osmyn to her Almena, +in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mourning Bride</span></span>; and, lastly, in his Mirabel to her +Millamant, in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Way of the World</span></span>. Mirabel, the fine gentleman of +the play, is, I believe, not very distant from the real character of +Congreve.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dramatic Miscellanies</span></span>, vol. iii, 1784. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +She retired from the stage when Mrs. Oldfield began to be the +public favourite. She died in 1748, in the eighty-fifth year of +her age.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_67" name="note_67" href="#noteref_67">67.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Johnson calls +his legacy the <span class="tei tei-q">“accumulation of attentive parsimony, +which,”</span> he continues, <span class="tei tei-q">“though to her (the Duchess) superfluous +and useless, might have given great assistance to the ancient +family from which he descended, at that time, by the imprudence +of his relation, reduced to difficulties and distress.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lives +of the Poets.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_68" name="note_68" href="#noteref_68">68.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">He replied +to Collier, in the pamphlet called <span class="tei tei-q">“Amendments +of Mr. Collier's False and Imperfect Citations,”</span> &c. A specimen +or two are subjoined:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The greater part of these examples which he has produced, +are only demonstrations of his own impurity: they only savour +of his utterance, and were sweet enough till tainted by his breath.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Where the expression is unblameable in its own pure and genuine +signification, he enters into it, himself, like the evil spirit; he +possesses the innocent phrase, and makes it bellow forth his own +blasphemies.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If I do not return him civilities in calling him names, it is because +I am not very well versed in his nomenclatures.... I will only +call him Mr. Collier, and that I will call him as often as I think +he shall deserve it.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The corruption of a rotten divine is the generation of a sour +critic.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Congreve,”</span> says Dr. Johnson, <span class="tei tei-q">“a very young man, elated with +success, and impatient of censure, assumed an air of confidence +and security.... The dispute was protracted through two years; +but at last Comedy grew more modest, and Collier lived to see +the reward of his labours in the reformation of the +theatre.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life +of Congreve.</span></span></p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_69" name="note_69" href="#noteref_69">69.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The scene of +Valentine's pretended madness in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Love for Love</span></span> +is a splendid specimen of Congreve's daring manner:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Scandal.</span></span>—And have you given your master a hint of their plot +upon him? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Jeremy.</span></span>—Yes, Sir; he says he'll favour it, and mistake her +for <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Angelica</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Scandal.</span></span>—It may make us sport. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Foresight.</span></span>—Mercy on us! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Husht—interrupt me not—I'll whisper +predictions to thee, and thou shalt prophesie;—I am truth, and can teach thy +tongue a new trick,—I have told thee what's passed—now I'll tell +what's to come:—Dost thou know what will happen to-morrow? +Answer me not—for I will tell thee. To-morrow knaves will thrive +thro' craft, and fools thro' fortune; and honesty will go as it did, +frost-nipt in a summer suit. Ask me questions concerning tomorrow. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Scandal.</span></span>—Ask him, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mr. Foresight</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Foresight.</span></span>—Pray what will be done at Court? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Scandal</span></span> will tell +you;—I am truth, I never come there. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Foresight.</span></span>—In the city? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Oh, prayers will be said in empty churches at the +usual hours. Yet you will see such zealous faces behind counters, +as if religion were to be sold in every shop. Oh, things will go +methodically in the city, the clocks will strike twelve at noon, and +the horn'd herd buzz in the Exchange at two. Husbands and wives +will drive distinct trades, and care and pleasure separately occupy +the family. Coffee-houses will be full of smoke and stratagem. +And the cropt prentice that sweeps his master's shop in the morning, +may, ten to one, dirty his sheets before night. But there are two +things, that you will see very strange; which are, wanton wives +with their legs at liberty, and tame cuckolds with chains about their +necks. But hold, I must examine you before I go further; you +look suspiciously. Are you a husband? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Foresight.</span></span>—I am married. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Poor creature! Is your wife of +Covent Garden <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Parish</span></span>? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Foresight.</span></span>—No; St. Martin's-in-the-Fields. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Alas, poor man! his eyes are sunk, and his hands +shrivelled; his legs dwindled, and his back bow'd. Pray, pray, +for a metamorphosis—change thy shape, and shake off age; get +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Medea's</span></span> kettle and be boiled anew; come forth with lab'ring +callous hands, and chine of steel, and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Atlas'</span></span> shoulders. Let +Taliacotius trim the calves of twenty chairmen, and make the pedestals +to stand erect upon, and look matrimony in the face. Ha, ha, ha! +That a man should have a stomach to a wedding supper, when +the pidgeons ought rather to be laid to his feet! ha, ha, ha! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Foresight.</span></span>—His frenzy is very high now, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mr. Scandal</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Scandal.</span></span>—I believe it is a spring-tide. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Foresight.</span></span>—Very likely—truly; you understand these +matters. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mr. Scandal</span></span>, I shall be very glad to confer with you +about these things he has uttered. His sayings are very mysterious and hieroglyphical. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Oh! why would <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Angelica</span></span> be +absent from my eyes so long? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Jeremy.</span></span>—She's here, Sir. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mrs. Foresight.</span></span>—Now, Sister! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mrs. Frail.</span></span>—O Lord! what must I say? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Scandal.</span></span>—Humour him, Madam, by all means. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Where is she? Oh! I see her; she comes, like +Riches, Health, and Liberty at once, to a despairing, starving, and +abandoned wretch. Oh—welcome, welcome! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mrs. Frail.</span></span>—How d'ye, Sir? Can I serve you? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Hark'ee—I have a secret to tell you. +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Endymion</span></span> and +the moon shall meet us on <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mount Latmos</span></span>, and we'll be married in +the dead of night. But say not a word. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Hymen</span></span> shall put his +torch into a dark lanthorn, that it may be secret; and Juno shall +give her peacock poppy-water, that he may fold his ogling tail; +and Argus's hundred eyes be shut—ha! Nobody shall know, but +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Jeremy.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mrs. Frail.</span></span>—No, no; we'll keep it secret; it shall be done +presently. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—The sooner the better. +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Jeremy</span></span>, come hither—closer—that +none may overhear us. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Jeremy</span></span>, I can tell you news; +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Angelica</span></span> is turned nun, and I am turning friar, and yet we'll marry +one another in spite of the Pope. Get me a cowl and beads, that +I may play my part; for she'll meet me two hours hence in black +and white, and a long veil to cover the project, and we won't see +one another's faces 'till we have done something to be ashamed +of, and then we'll blush once for all.... +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Enter</span></span> <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Tattle</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tattle.</span></span>—Do you know me, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine</span></span>? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—You!—who are you? No, I hope not. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tattle.</span></span>—I am <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Jack Tattle</span></span>, your friend. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—My friend! What to do? I am no married man, +and thou canst not lye with my wife; I am very poor, and thou +canst not borrow money of me. Then, what employment have +I for a friend? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tattle.</span></span>—Hah! A good open speaker, and not to be trusted with +a secret. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Angelica.</span></span>—Do you know me, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine</span></span>? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Oh, very well. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Angelica.</span></span>—Who am I? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—You're a woman, one to whom Heaven gave beauty +when it grafted roses on a brier. You are the reflection of Heaven +in a pond; and he that leaps at you is sunk. You are all white—a +sheet of spotless paper—when you first are born; but you are +to be scrawled and blotted by every goose's quill. I know you; +for I loved a woman, and loved her so long that I found out a +strange thing: I found out what a woman was good for. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tattle.</span></span>—Ay! pr'ythee, what's that? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Why, to keep a secret. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tattle.</span></span>—O Lord! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—Oh, exceeding good to keep a secret; for, though +she should tell, yet she is not to be believed. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tattle.</span></span>—Hah! Good again, faith. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Valentine.</span></span>—I would have musick. Sing +me the song that I like.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Congreve</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Love for Love</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +There is a <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mrs. Nickleby</span></span>, of the year 1700, in Congreve's comedy +of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Double Dealer</span></span>, in whose character the author introduces +some wonderful traits of roguish satire. She is practised on by +the gallants of the play, and no more knows how to resist them +than any of the ladies above quoted could resist Congreve. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lady Plyant.</span></span>—Oh, reflect upon the honour of your conduct! +Offering to pervert me [the joke is that the gentleman is pressing +the lady for her daughter's hand, not for her own]—perverting +me from the road of virtue, in which I have trod thus long, and +never made one trip—not one <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">faux pas</span></span>. Oh, consider it; what +would you have to answer for, if you should provoke me to frailty! +Alas! humanity is feeble, Heaven knows! Very feeble, and unable +to support itself. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mellefont.</span></span>—Where am I? Is it day? and am I awake? +Madam— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lady Plyant.</span></span>—O Lord, ask me the question! I'll swear I'll +deny it—therefore don't ask me; nay, you shan't ask me, I swear I'll +deny it. O Gemini, you have brought all the blood into my face; +I warrant I am as red as a turkey-cock; O fie, cousin Mellefont! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mellefont.</span></span>—Nay, madam, hear me; I mean—— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lady Plyant.</span></span>—Hear you? No, no; I'll deny you first, and hear +you afterwards. For one does not know how one's mind may +change upon hearing—hearing is one of the senses, and all the +senses are fallible. I won't trust my honour, I assure you; my +honour is infallible and uncomatable. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mellefont.</span></span>—For heaven's sake, madam—— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lady Plyant.</span></span>—Oh, name it no more. Bless me, how can you +talk of Heaven, and have so much wickedness in your heart? May +be, you don't think it a sin. They say some of you gentlemen +don't think it a sin; but still, my honour, if it were no sin ——. +But, then, to marry my daughter for the convenience of frequent +opportunities—I'll never consent to that: as sure as can be, I'll +break the match. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mellefont.</span></span>—Death and amazement! Madam, upon my +knees—— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lady Plyant.</span></span>—Nay, nay, rise up; come, you shall see my good +nature. I know love is powerful, and nobody can help his passion. +'Tis not your fault; nor I swear, it is not mine. How can I help +it, if I have charms? And how can you help it, if you are made +a captive? I swear it is pity it should be a fault; but, my honour. +Well, but your honour, too—but the sin! Well, but the necessity. +O Lord, here's somebody coming. I dare not stay. Well, you +must consider of your crime; and strive as much as can be against +it—strive, be sure; but don't be melancholick—don't despair; but +never think that I'll grant you anything. O Lord, no: but be +sure you lay all thoughts aside of the marriage, for though I know +you don't love Cynthia, only as a blind for your passion to me; +yet it will make me jealous. O Lord, what did I say? Jealous! +No, I can't be jealous; for I must not love you; therefore don't +hope; but don't despair neither. They're coming; I <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">must</span></em> +fly.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +Double Dealer</span></span>, act II, scene v, page 156. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_70" name="note_70" href="#noteref_70">70.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“There +seems to be a strange affectation in authors of appearing +to have done everything by chance. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Old Bachelor</span></span> was written +for amusement in the languor of convalescence. Yet it is apparently +composed with great elaborateness of dialogue, and incessant ambition +of wit.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Johnson</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lives of the Poets</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_71" name="note_71" href="#noteref_71">71.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Among those by +whom it (<span class="tei tei-q">‘Will's’</span>) was frequented, +Southerne and Congreve were principally distinguished by Dryden's +friendship.... But Congreve seems to have gained yet farther +than Southerne upon Dryden's friendship. He was introduced to +him by his first play, the celebrated <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Old Bachelor</span></span> being put into +the poet's hands to be revised. Dryden, after making a few alterations +to fit it for the stage, returned it to the author with the high +and just commendation, that it was the best first play he had ever +seen.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dryden</span></span>, +vol. i, p. 370.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_72" name="note_72" href="#noteref_72">72.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">It +was in Surrey Street, Strand (where he afterwards died), +that Voltaire visited him, in the decline of his life. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The anecdote in the text, relating to his saying that he wished +<span class="tei tei-q">“to be visited on no other footing than as a gentleman who led +a life of plainness and simplicity”</span>, is common to all writers on the +subject of Congreve, and appears in the English version of Voltaire's +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters concerning the English Nation</span></span>, published in London, 1733, +as also in Goldsmith's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Memoir of Voltaire</span></span>. But it is worthy of +remark, that it does not appear in the text of the same Letters in +the edition of Voltaire's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Œuvres Complètes</span></span> +in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Panthéon Littéraire</span></span>, +Vol. v. of his works. (Paris, 1837.) +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Celui de tous les Anglais qui a porté le plus loin la gloire du +théâtre comique est feu M. Congreve. Il n'a fait que peu de pièces, +mais toutes sont excellentes dans leur genre.... Vous y voyez +partout le langage des honnêtes gens avec des actions de fripon; +ce qui prouve qu'il connaissait bien son monde, et qu'il vivait +dans ce qu'on appelle la bonne compagnie.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Voltaire</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lettres +sur les Anglais</span></span>, Let. 19.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_73" name="note_73" href="#noteref_73">73.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">On the death +of Queen Mary, he published a Pastoral—<span class="tei tei-q">“The +Mourning Muse of Alexis.”</span> Alexis and Menalcas sing alternately +in the orthodox way. The Queen is called <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pastora</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I mourn <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pastora</span></span> dead, let Albion mourn,<br /> +And sable clouds her chalky cliffs adorn,”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +says Alexis. Among other phenomena, we learn that— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +With their sharp nails themselves the Satyrs wound,<br /> +And tug their shaggy beards, and bite with grief the ground,— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +(a degree of sensibility not always found in the Satyrs of that +period.... It continues—) +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Lord of these woods and wide extended plains,<br /> +Stretch'd on the ground and close to earth his face,<br /> +Scalding with tears the already faded grass. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +To dust must all that Heavenly beauty come?<br /> +And must Pastora moulder in the tomb?<br /> +Ah Death! more fierce and unrelenting far,<br /> +Than wildest wolves and savage tigers are;<br /> +With lambs and sheep their hunger is appeased,<br /> +But ravenous Death the shepherdess has seized. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This statement that a wolf eats but a sheep, whilst Death eats +a shepherdess; that figure of the <span class="tei tei-q">“Great Shepherd”</span>, lying speechless +on his stomach, in a state of despair which neither winds nor floods +nor air can exhibit, are to be remembered in poetry surely, and +this style was admired in its time by the admirers of the great +Congreve! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In the <span class="tei tei-q">“Tears of Amaryllis for Amyntas”</span> (the young Lord Blandford, +the great Duke of Marlborough's only son), Amaryllis represents +Sarah Duchess! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The tigers and wolves, nature and motion, rivers and echoes, +come into work here again. At the sight of her grief— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Tigers and wolves their wonted rage forgo,<br /> +And dumb distress and new compassion show,<br /> +Nature herself attentive silence kept,<br /> +<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">And motion seemed suspended while she wept</span></em>! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And Pope dedicated the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Iliad</span></span> to the author of these lines—and +Dryden wrote to him in his great hand: +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Time, place, and action may with pains be wrought,<br /> +But Genius must be born and never can be taught.<br /> +This is your portion, this your native store;<br /> +Heaven, that but once was prodigal before,<br /> +To <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Shakespeare</span></span> gave as much, she could not give him more.<br /> +Maintain your Post: that's all the fame you need,<br /> +For 'tis impossible you should proceed;<br /> +Already I am worn with cares and age,<br /> +And just abandoning th' ungrateful stage:<br /> +Unprofitably kept at Heaven's expence,<br /> +I live a Rent-charge upon Providence:<br /> +But you whom every Muse and Grace adorn,<br /> +Whom I foresee to better fortune born,<br /> +Be kind to my remains, and oh defend<br /> +Against your Judgement your departed Friend!<br /> +Let not the insulting Foe my Fame pursue;<br /> +But shade those Lawrels which descend to You:<br /> +And take for Tribute what these Lines express;<br /> +You merit more, nor could my Love do less. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This is a very different manner of welcome to that of our own +day. In Shadwell, Higgons, Congreve, and the comic authors of +their time, when gentlemen meet they fall into each other's arms, +with <span class="tei tei-q">“Jack, Jack, I must buss thee”</span>; or, <span class="tei tei-q">“'Fore George, Harry, +I must kiss thee, lad”</span>. And in a similar manner the poets saluted +their brethren. Literary gentlemen do not kiss now; I wonder if +they love each other better. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Steele calls Congreve <span class="tei tei-q">“Great Sir”</span> and <span class="tei tei-q">“Great Author”</span>; says +<span class="tei tei-q">“Well-dressed barbarians knew his awful name”</span>, and addresses him +as if he were a prince; and speaks of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pastora</span></span> as one of the most +famous tragic compositions.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_74" name="note_74" href="#noteref_74">74.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“To +Addison himself we are bound by a sentiment as much +like affection as any sentiment can be which is inspired by one +who has been sleeping a hundred and twenty years in Westminster +Abbey.... After full inquiry and impartial reflection we have +long been convinced that he deserved as much love and esteem as +can justly be claimed by any of our infirm and erring +race.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Macaulay</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Many who praise virtue do no more than praise it. Yet it is +reasonable to believe that Addison's profession and practice were +at no great variance; since, amidst that storm of faction in which +most of his life was passed, though his station made him conspicuous, +and his activity made him formidable, the character +given him by his friends was never contradicted by his enemies. +Of those with whom interest or opinion united him, he had not +only the esteem but the kindness; and of others, whom the violence +of opposition drove against him, though he might lose the love, +he retained the reverence.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Johnson.</span></span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_75" name="note_75" href="#noteref_75">75.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Addison was perfect good company with intimates, and had +something more charming in his conversation than I ever knew in +any other man; but with any mixture of strangers, and sometimes +only with one, he seemed to preserve his dignity much, with +a stiff sort of silence.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_76" name="note_76" href="#noteref_76">76.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Milton's +chief talent, and indeed his distinguishing excellence +lies in the sublimity of his thoughts. There are others of the +modern, who rival him in every other part of poetry; but in the +greatness of his sentiments he triumphs over all the poets, both +modern and ancient, Homer alone excepted. It is impossible for +the imagination of man to disturb itself with greater ideas than +those which he has laid together in his first, second, and sixth +books.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, No. 279. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If I were to name a poet that is a perfect master in all these +arts of working on the imagination, I think Milton may pass for +one.”</span>—Ibid., No. 417. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +These famous papers appeared in each Saturday's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, from +January 19 to May 3, 1712. Besides his services to Milton, we +may place those he did to Sacred Music. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_77" name="note_77" href="#noteref_77">77.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Addison +was very kind to me at first, but my bitter enemy +afterwards.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Leave him as soon as you can,’</span> said Addison to me, speaking +of Pope; <span class="tei tei-q">‘he will certainly play you some devilish trick else: he +has an appetite to satire.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Lady +Wortley Montagu</span></span> (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's +Anecdotes</span></span>).</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_78" name="note_78" href="#noteref_78">78.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Lancelot +Addison, his father, was the son of another Lancelot +Addison, a clergyman in Westmoreland. He became Dean of +Lichfield and Archdeacon of Coventry.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_79" name="note_79" href="#noteref_79">79.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“The +remark of Mandeville, who, when he had passed an +evening in his company, declared that he was <span class="tei tei-q">‘a parson in a tye-wig’</span>, +can detract little from his character. He was always reserved +to strangers, and was not incited to uncommon freedom by a +character like that of Mandeville.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Johnson</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lives of the Poets</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Old Jacob Tonson did not like Mr. Addison: he had a quarrel +with him, and, after his quitting the secretaryship, used frequently +to say of him—<span class="tei tei-q">‘One day or other you'll see that man a bishop—I'm +sure he looks that way; and indeed I ever thought him a +priest in his heart.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Addison stayed above a year at Blois. He would rise as +early as between two and three in the height of summer, and lie +abed till between eleven and twelve in the depth of winter. He +was untalkative whilst here, and often thoughtful: sometimes so +lost in thought, that I have come into his room and stayed five +minutes there before he has known anything of it. He had his +masters generally at supper with him; kept very little company +beside; and had no amour that I know of; and I think I should +have known it, if he had had any.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Abbé +Philippeaux</span></span> of Blois +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>). +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_80" name="note_80" href="#noteref_80">80.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“His +knowledge of the Latin poets, from Lucretius and Catullus +down to Claudian and Prudentius, was singularly exact and +profound.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Macaulay.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_81" name="note_81" href="#noteref_81">81.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Our country +owes it to him, that the famous Monsieur Boileau +first conceived an opinion of the English genius for poetry, by +perusing the present he made him of the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Musae Anglicanae</span></span>.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Tickell</span></span> +(Preface to <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Addison's Works</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_82" name="note_82" href="#noteref_82">82.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“It was my fate to be much with the wits; my father was +acquainted with all of them. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Addison was the best company in the +world.</span></em> I never knew anybody that had so much wit as +Congreve.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Lady +Wortley Montagu</span></span> (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_83" name="note_83" href="#noteref_83">83.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Mr. Addison To Mr. Wyche. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Sir</span></span>,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My hand at present begins to grow steady enough for a +letter, so the properest use I can put it to is to thank +y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> honest +gentleman that set it a shaking. I have had this morning a desperate +design in my head to attack you in verse, which I should +certainly have done could I have found out a rhyme to rummer. +But though you have escaped for y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> +present, you are not yet out of danger, if I can a little recover my talent at Crambo. I +am sure, in whatever way I write to you, it will be impossible for me +to express y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> deep sense I have of +y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> many favours you have lately +shown me. I shall only tell you that Hambourg has been the +pleasantest stage I have met with in my travails. If any of my +friends wonder at me for living so long in that place, I dare say +it will be thought a very good excuse when I tell him Mr. Wyche +was there. As your company made our stay at Hambourg agreeable, +your wine has given us all y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> +satisfaction that we have found in our journey through Westphalia. If drinking your +health will do you any good, you may expect to be as long lived as Methusaleh, +or, to use a more familiar instance, as y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> +oldest hoc in y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> cellar. +I hope y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> two pair of legs that was left +a swelling behind us are by this time come to their shapes again. I can't forbear +troubling you with my hearty respects to y<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="vertical-align: super">e</span></span> +owners of them, and desiring you to believe me always,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dear Sir,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“To Mr. Wyche, His Majesty's Resident at Hambourg,</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“May, 1703.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +—From the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life of Addison</span></span>, by Miss Aikin, vol. i, p. +146. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_84" name="note_84" href="#noteref_84">84.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">It is pleasing to remember that the relation between Swift +and Addison was, on the whole, satisfactory, from first to last. +The value of Swift's testimony, when nothing personal inflamed his +vision or warped his judgement, can be doubted by nobody. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sept. 10, 1710.—I sat till ten in the evening with Addison and +Steele.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“11.—Mr. Addison and I dined together at his lodgings, and +I sat with him part of this evening.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“18.—To-day I dined with Mr. Stratford at Mr. Addison's retirement +near Chelsea.... I will get what good offices I can from +Mr. Addison.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“27.—To-day all our company dined at Will Frankland's, with +Steele and Addison, too.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“29.—I dined with Mr. Addison,”</span> +&c.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal to Stella.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Addison inscribed a presentation copy of his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Travels</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-q">“To Dr. Jonathan Swift, the most agreeable companion, the truest friend, and +the greatest genius of his age.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott</span></span>. +From the information of Mr. Theophilus Swift. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Addison, who goes over first secretary, is a most excellent +person; and being my most intimate friend, I shall use all my +credit to set him right in his notions of persons and +things.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I examine my heart, and can find no other reason why I write +to you now, besides that great love and esteem I have always had +for you. I have nothing to ask you either for my friend or for +myself.”</span>—Swift to Addison (1717), +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Swift</span></span>, vol. xix, +p. 274. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Political differences only dulled for a while their friendly communications. +Time renewed them; and Tickell enjoyed Swift's +friendship as a legacy from the man with whose memory his is so +honourably connected. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_85" name="note_85" href="#noteref_85">85.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Addison +usually studied all the morning; then met his party +at Button's; dined there, and stayed five or six hours, and sometimes +far into the night. I was of the company for about a year, +but found it too much for me: it hurt my health, and so I quitted +it.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's +Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_86" name="note_86" href="#noteref_86">86.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“When +he returned to England (in 1702), with a meanness of +appearance which gave testimony of the difficulties to which he +had been reduced, he found his old patrons out of power, and was, +therefore, for a time, at full leisure for the cultivation of +his mind.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Johnson</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lives of the Poets</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_87" name="note_87" href="#noteref_87">87.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Addison +wrote very fluently; but he was sometimes very +slow and scrupulous in correcting. He would show his verses to +several friends; and would alter almost everything that any of +them hinted at as wrong. He seemed to be too diffident of himself; +and too much concerned about his character as a poet; or (as he +worded it) too solicitous for that kind of praise, which, God knows, +is but a very little matter after all!”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_88" name="note_88" href="#noteref_88">88.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“As to +poetical affairs,”</span> says Pope, in 1713, <span class="tei tei-q">“I am content at +present to be a bare looker-on.... Cato was not so much the +wonder of Rome in his days, as he is of Britain in ours; and +though all the foolish industry possible has been used to make it +thought a party play, yet what the author once said of another +may the most properly in the world be applied to him on this +occasion:—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Envy itself is dumb—in wonder lost;</span><br /> +And factions strive who shall applaud him most. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The numerous and violent claps of the Whig party on the one +side of the theatre were echoed back by the Tories on the other; +while the author sweated behind the scenes with concern to find +their applause proceeding more from the hands than the head.... +I believe you have heard that, after all the applauses of the opposite +faction, my Lord Bolingbroke sent for Booth, who played Cato, +into the box, and presented him with fifty guineas in acknowledgement +(as he expressed it) for defending the cause of liberty so well +against a perpetual dictator”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Letter to <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sir W. Trumbull</span></span>”</span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cato</span></span> ran for thirty-five nights without interruption. Pope wrote +the Prologue, and Garth the Epilogue. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is worth noticing how many things in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cato</span></span> keep their ground +as habitual quotations, e.g.:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ ... big with the fate<br /> +Of Cato and of Rome.”</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“'Tis not in mortals to command success,<br /> +But we'll do more, Sempronius, we'll deserve it.”</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Blesses his stars, and thinks it luxury.”</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I think the Romans call it Stoicism.”</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My voice is still for war.”</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway,<br /> +The post of honour is a private station.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Not to mention:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The woman who deliberates is lost,”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +And the eternal:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Plato, thou reasonest well,”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +which avenges, perhaps, on the public their neglect of the play! +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_89" name="note_89" href="#noteref_89">89.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“The +lady was persuaded to marry him on terms much like +those on which a Turkish princess is espoused—to whom the Sultan +is reported to pronounce, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Daughter, I give thee this man for thy +slave.’</span> The marriage, if uncontradicted report can be credited, +made no addition to his happiness; it neither found them, nor +made them, equal.... Rowe's ballad of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Despairing Shepherd</span></span> +is said to have been written, either before or after marriage, upon +this memorable pair.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Johnson.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I received the news of Mr. Addison's being declared Secretary +of State with the less surprise, in that I knew that post was almost +offered to him before. At that time he declined it, and I really +believe that he would have done well to have declined it now. +Such a post as that, and such a wife as the Countess, do not seem +to be, in prudence, eligible for a man that is asthmatic, and we +may see the day when he will be heartily glad to resign them +both.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Lady Wortley Montagu</span></span> to +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span>. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Works</span></span>, Lord Wharncliffe's +ed., vol. ii, p. 111. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The issue of this marriage was a daughter, Charlotte Addison, +who inherited, on her mother's death, the estate of Bilton, near +Rugby, which her father had purchased, and died, unmarried, at +an advanced age. She was of weak intellect. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Rowe appears to have been faithful to Addison during his courtship, +for his Collection contains <span class="tei tei-q">“Stanzas to Lady Warwick, on +Mr. Addison's going to Ireland”</span>, in which her ladyship is called +<span class="tei tei-q">“Chloe”</span>, and Joseph Addison, <span class="tei tei-q">“Lycidas”</span>; besides the ballad mentioned +by the doctor, and which is entitled <span class="tei tei-q">“Colin's Complaint”</span>. +But not even the interest attached to the name of Addison could +induce the reader to peruse this composition, though one stanza +may serve as a specimen:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +What though I have skill to complain—<br /> +Though the Muses my temples have crowned;<br /> +What though, when they hear my sweet strain,<br /> +The Muses sit weeping around. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Ah, Colin! thy hopes are in vain;<br /> +Thy pipe and thy laurel resign;<br /> +Thy false one inclines to a swain<br /> +Whose music is sweeter than thine. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_90" name="note_90" href="#noteref_90">90.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">One +of the most humourous of these is the paper on Hoops, +which, the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> tells us, particularly +pleased his friend <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sir Roger</span></span>: +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Mr. Spectator</span></span>—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You have diverted the town almost a whole month at the +expense of the country; it is now high time that you should give +the country their revenge. Since your withdrawing from this place, +the fair sex are run into great extravagances. Their petticoats, +which began to heave and swell before you left us, are now blown +up into a most enormous concave, and rise every day more and +more; in short, sir, since our women knew themselves to be out +of the eye of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Spectator</span></span>, they will be kept within no +compass. You praised them a little too soon, for the modesty of their headdresses; +for as the humour of a sick person is often driven out +of one limb into another, their superfluity of ornaments, instead +of being entirely banished, seems only fallen from their heads upon +their lower parts. What they have lost in height they make up +in breadth, and, contrary to all rules of architecture, widen the +foundations at the same time that they shorten the superstructure.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The women give out, in defence of these wide bottoms, that +they are very airy and very proper for the season; but this I look +upon to be only a pretence and a piece of art, for it is well known +we have not had a more moderate summer these many years, so +that it is certain the heat they complain of cannot be in the weather; +besides, I would fain ask these tender-constitutioned ladies, why +they should require more cooling than their mothers before them?</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I find several speculative persons are of opinion that our sex +has of late years been very saucy, and that the hoop-petticoat is +made use of to keep us at a distance. It is most certain that +a woman's honour cannot be better entrenched than after this +manner, in circle within circle, amidst such a variety of outworks +and lines of circumvallation. A female who is thus invested in +whalebone is sufficiently secured against the approaches of an ill-bred +fellow, who might as well think of Sir George Etheridge's +way of making love in a tub as in the midst of so many hoops.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Among these various conjectures, there are men of superstitious +tempers who look upon the hoop-petticoat as a kind of prodigy. +Some will have it that it portends the downfall of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">French</span></span> king, +and observe, that the farthingale appeared in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">England</span></span> a little +before the ruin of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spanish</span></span> monarchy. Others are of opinion +that it foretells battle and bloodshed, and believe it of the same +prognostication as the toil of a blazing star. For my part, I am +apt to think that it is a sign that multitudes are coming into the +world rather than going out of it,”</span> &c. +&c.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, No. 127. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_91" name="note_91" href="#noteref_91">91.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. +Addison has not had one epithalamium that I can hear +of, and must even be reduced, like a poorer and a better poet, +Spenser, to make his own.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_92" name="note_92" href="#noteref_92">92.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“I +have observed that a reader seldom peruses a book with +pleasure till he knows whether the writer of it be a black or a fair +man, of a mild or a choleric disposition, married or a bachelor; +with other particulars of a like nature, that conduce very much +to the right understanding of an author. To gratify this curiosity, +which is so natural to a reader, I design this paper and my next +as prefatory discourses to my following writings; and shall give +some account in them of the persons that are engaged in this work. +As the chief trouble of compiling, digesting, and correcting will fall +to my share, I must do myself the justice to open the work with +my own history.... There runs a story in the family, that when +my mother was gone with child of me about three months, she +dreamt that she was brought to bed of a judge. Whether this +might proceed from a lawsuit which was then depending in the +family, or my father's being a justice of the peace, I cannot determine; +for I am not so vain as to think it presaged any dignity +that I should arrive at in my future life, though that was the interpretation +which the neighbourhood put upon it. The gravity of +my behaviour at my very first appearance in the world, and all +the time that I sucked, seemed to favour my mother's dream; +for, as she has often told me, I threw away my rattle before I was +two months old, and would not make use of my coral till they +had taken away the bells from it.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As for the rest of my infancy, there being nothing in it remarkable, +I shall pass it over in silence. I find that during my nonage +I had the reputation of a very sullen youth, but was always the +favourite of my schoolmaster, who used to say that <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">my parts were +solid and would wear well</span></em>. I had not been long at the university +before I distinguished myself by a most profound silence; for +during the space of eight years, excepting in the public exercises +of the college, I scarce uttered the quantity of an hundred words; +and, indeed, I do not remember that I ever spoke three sentences +together in my whole life....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have passed my latter years in this city, where I am frequently +seen in most public places, though there are not more than half +a dozen of my select friends that know me.... There is no place +of general resort wherein I do not often make my appearance; +sometimes I am seen thrusting my head into a round of politicians +at Will's, and listening with great attention to the narratives that +are made in these little circular audiences. Sometimes I smoke +a pipe at Child's, and whilst I seem attentive to nothing but the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Postman</span></span>, overhear the conversation of every table in the room. +I appear on Tuesday night at St. James's Coffee-house; and sometimes +join the little committee of politics in the inner room, as one +who comes to hear and improve. My face is likewise very well +known at the Grecian, the <span class="tei tei-q">‘Cocoa-Tree’</span>, and in the theatres both +of Drury Lane and the Haymarket. I have been taken for a +merchant upon the Exchange for above these two years; and +sometimes pass for a Jew in the assembly of stock-jobbers at Jonathan's. +In short, wherever I see a cluster of people, I mix with +them, though I never open my lips but in my own club.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thus I live in the world rather as a <span class="tei tei-q">‘<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>’</span> of mankind +than as one of the species; by which means I have made myself +a speculative statesman, soldier, merchant, and artizan, without +ever meddling in any practical part in life. I am very well versed +in the theory of a husband or a father, and can discern the errors +in the economy, business, and diversions of others, better than +those who are engaged in them—as standers-by discover blots +which are apt to escape those who are in the game.... In short, +I have acted, in all the parts of my life, as a looker-on, which is +the character I intend to preserve in this +paper.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, No. 1. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_93" name="note_93" href="#noteref_93">93.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“So effectually, +indeed, did he retort on vice the mockery +which had recently been directed against virtue, that, since his +time, the open violation of decency has always been considered, amongst us, the +sure mark of a fool.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Macaulay</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_94" name="note_94" href="#noteref_94">94.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“The +Court was sat before Sir Roger came; but, notwithstanding +all the justices had taken their places upon the bench, +they made room for the old knight at the head of them; who for +his reputation in the country took occasion to whisper in the judge's +ear that <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">he was glad his lordship had met with so much good weather +in his circuit</span></em>. I was listening to the proceedings of the Court with +much attention, and infinitely pleased with that great appearance +and solemnity which so properly accompanies such a public administration +of our laws; when, after about an hour's sitting, I observed +to my great surprise, in the midst of a trial, that my friend Sir +Roger was getting up to speak. I was in some pain for him, till +I found he had acquitted himself of two or three sentences, with +a look of much business and great intrepidity.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Upon his first rising; the Court was hushed, and a general +whisper ran among the country people that Sir Roger <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">was up</span></em>. +The speech he made was so little to the purpose, that I shall not +trouble my readers with an account of it, and I believe was not +so much designed by the knight himself to inform the Court, as +to give him a figure in my eyes, and to keep up his credit in the +country.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, No. 122.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_95" name="note_95" href="#noteref_95">95.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Garth +sent to Addison (of whom he had a very high opinion) +on his death-bed, to ask him whether the Christian religion was +true.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Young</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have always preferred cheerfulness to mirth. The latter I +consider as an act, the former as an habit of the mind. Mirth is +short and transient, cheerfulness fixed and permanent. Those are +often raised into the greatest transports of mirth who are subject +to the greatest depression of melancholy: on the contrary, cheerfulness, +though it does not give the mind such an exquisite gladness, +prevents it from falling into any depths of sorrow. Mirth is like +a flash of lightning that breaks through a gloom of clouds, and +glitters for a moment; cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight +in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual +serenity.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Addison</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span>, p. 381.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_96" name="note_96" href="#noteref_96">96.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">The husband +of the Lady Warwick who married Addison, and +the father of the young earl, who was brought to his stepfather's +bed to see <span class="tei tei-q">“how a Christian could die”</span>. He was amongst the +wildest of the nobility of that day; and in the curious collection +of Chap-Books at the British Museum, I have seen more than one +anecdote of the freaks of the gay lord. He was popular in London, +as such daring spirits have been in our time. The anecdotists +speak very kindly of his practical jokes. Mohun was scarcely out +of prison for his second homicide, when he went on Lord Macclesfield's +embassy to the Elector of Hanover, when Queen Anne sent +the garter to H. E. Highness. The chronicler of the expedition +speaks of his lordship as an amiable young man, who had been +in bad company, but was quite repentant and reformed. He and +Macartney afterwards murdered the Duke of Hamilton between +them, in which act Lord Mohun died. This amiable baron's name +was Charles, and not Henry, as a recent novelist has christened +him.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_97" name="note_97" href="#noteref_97">97.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Steele +had the greatest veneration for Addison, and used to +show it, in all companies, in a particular manner. Addison, now +and then, used to play a little upon them; but he always took it +well.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's +Anecdotes</span></span>). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sir Richard Steele was the best-natured creature in the world: +even in his worst state of health, he seemed to desire nothing but +to please and be pleased.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Young</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>). +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_98" name="note_98" href="#noteref_98">98.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The gaiety +of his dramatic tone may be seen in this little scene +between two brilliant sisters, from his comedy, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Funeral, or +Grief à la Mode</span></span>. Dick wrote this, he said, from <span class="tei tei-q">“a necessity of +enlivening his character”</span>, which, it seemed, the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Christian Hero</span></span> +had a tendency to make too decorous, grave, and respectable in +the eyes of readers of that pious piece. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +[<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Scene draws, and discovers</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Lady Charlotte</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">reading at a table,</span></span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Lady +Harriet</span></span>, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">playing at a glass, to and fro, and viewing +herself.</span></span>] +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ha.</span></span>—Nay, good sister, you may +as well talk to me [<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">looking +at herself as she speaks</span></span>] as you sit staring at a book which I know you +can't attend.—Good Dr. Lucas may have writ there what he pleases, +but there's no putting Francis, Lord Hardy, now Earl of Brumpton, +out of your head, or making him absent from your eyes. Do but +look on me, now, and deny it if you can. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ch.</span></span>—You are the maddest girl +[<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">smiling</span></span>]. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ha.</span></span>—Look ye, I knew you could not say it and forbear +laughing [<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">looking over Charlotte</span></span>].—Oh! I see +his name as plain as you do—F—r—a—n +Fran,—c—i—s, cis, Francis, 'tis in every +line of the book. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ch.</span></span> [<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">rising</span></span>]—It's in +vain, I see, to mind anything in such +impertinent company—but granting 'twere as you say, as to my +Lord Hardy—'tis more excusable to admire another than oneself. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ha.</span></span>—No, I think not,—yes, +I grant you, than really to be +vain of one's person, but I don't admire myself—Pish! I don't +believe my eyes to have that softness. [<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Looking in the glass.</span></span>] +They an't so piercing: no, 'tis only stuff, the men will be talking.—Some +people are such admirers of teeth—Lord, what signifies teeth! +[<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Showing her teeth.</span></span>] A very black-a-moor has as white a set of +teeth as I.—No, sister, I don't admire myself, but I've a spirit of +contradiction in me: I don't know I'm in love with myself, only +to rival the men. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ch.</span></span>—Aye, but Mr. Campley will gain ground ev'n of that +rival of his, your dear self. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ha.</span></span>—Oh, what have I done to you, that you should name +that insolent intruder? A confident, opinionative fop. No, indeed, +if I am, as a poetical lover of mine sighed and sung of both sexes, +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The public envy and the public care, +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I shan't be so easily catched—I thank him—I want but to be +sure, I should heartily torment him by banishing him, and then +consider whether he should depart this life or not. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ch.</span></span>—Indeed, sister, to be serious with you, this vanity in +your humour does not at all become you. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ha</span></span>.—Vanity! All the matter is, we gay people are more +sincere than you wise folks; all your life's an art.—Speak you +real.—Look you there.—[<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Hauling her to +the glass.</span></span>] Are you not +struck with a secret pleasure when you view that bloom in your +look, that harmony in your shape, that promptitude in your mien? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ch.</span></span>—Well, simpleton, if I am at first so simple as to be +a little taken with myself, I know it a fault, and take pains to +correct it. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ha.</span></span>—Pshaw! Pshaw! Talk this musty tale to old Mrs. +Fardingale, 'tis tiresome for me to think at that rate. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ch.</span></span>—They that think it too soon to understand themselves +will very soon find it too late.—But tell me honestly, don't you +like Campley? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">L. Ha.</span></span>—The fellow is not to be abhorred, if the forward thing +did not think of getting me so easily.—Oh, I hate a heart I can't +break when I please.—What makes the value of dear china, but +that 'tis so brittle?—were it not for that, you might as well have +stone mugs in your closet.'—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Funeral</span></span>, Oct. 2nd. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We knew the obligations the stage had to his writings [Steele's]; +there being scarcely a comedian of merit in our whole company +whom his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatlers</span></span> had not made better by his recommendation of +them.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Cibber.</span></span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_99" name="note_99" href="#noteref_99">99.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“There is not now in his sight that excellent man, whom +Heaven made his friend and superior, to be at a certain place in pain for +what he should say or do. I will go on in his further encouragement. +The best woman that ever man had cannot now lament +and pine at his neglect of himself.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Steele</span></span> +[of himself]. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +Theatre</span></span>, No. 12, Feb., 1719-20.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_100" name="note_100" href="#noteref_100">100.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +Funeral</span></span> supplies an admirable stroke of humour,—one +which Sydney Smith has used as an illustration of the faculty in +his Lectures. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The undertaker is talking to his employés about their duty. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sable.</span></span>—Ha, you!—A +little more upon the dismal [<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">forming their +countenances</span></span>]; this fellow has a good mortal look,—place him near +the corpse: that wainscot-face must be o' top of the stairs; that +fellow's almost in a fright (that looks as if he were full of some +strange misery) at the end of the hall. So—But I'll fix you all +myself. Let's have no laughing now on any provocation. Look +yonder,—that hale, well-looking puppy! You ungrateful scoundrel, +did not I pity you, take you out of a great man's service, and show +you the pleasure of receiving wages? <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Did not I give you ten, then +fifteen, and twenty shillings a week to be sorrowful?—and the more +I give you I think the gladder you are!</span></span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_101" name="note_101" href="#noteref_101">101.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“From my own Apartment, Nov. 16.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“There are several persons who have many pleasures and entertainments +in their possession, which they do not enjoy; it is, +therefore, a kind and good office to acquaint them with their own +happiness, and turn their attention to such instances of their good +fortune as they are apt to overlook. Persons in the married state +often want such a monitor; and pine away their days by looking +upon the same condition in anguish and murmuring, which carries +with it, in the opinion of others, a complication of all the pleasures +of life, and a retreat from its inquietudes.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am led into this thought by a visit I made to an old friend +who was formerly my schoolfellow. He came to town last week, +with his family, for the winter; and yesterday morning sent me +word his wife expected me to dinner. I am, as it were, at home +at that house, and every member of it knows me for their well-wisher. +I cannot, indeed, express the pleasure it is to be met by +the children with so much joy as I am when I go thither. The +boys and girls strive who shall come first, when they think it is +I that am knocking at the door; and that child which loses the +race to me runs back again to tell the father it is Mr. Bickerstaff. +This day I was led in by a pretty girl that we all thought must +have forgot me; for the family has been out of town these two +years. Her knowing me again was a mighty subject with us, and +took up our discourse at the first entrance; after which, they +began to rally me upon a thousand little stories they heard in the +country, about my marriage to one of my neighbours' daughters; +upon which, the gentleman, my friend, said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Nay; if Mr. Bickerstaff +marries a child of any of his old companions, I hope mine +shall have the preference: there is Mrs. Mary is now sixteen, and +would make him as fine a widow as the best of them. But I know +him too well; he is so enamoured with the very memory of those +who flourished in our youth, that he will not so much as look upon +the modern beauties. I remember, old gentleman, how often you +went home in a day to refresh your countenance and dress when +Teraminta reigned in your heart. As we came up in the coach, +I repeated to my wife some of your verses on her.’</span> With such +reflections on little passages which happened long ago, we passed +our time during a cheerful and elegant meal. After dinner his +lady left the room, as did also the children. As soon as we were +alone, he took me by the hand: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Well, my good friend,’</span> says +he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I am heartily glad to see thee; I was afraid you would never +have seen all the company that dined with you to-day again. Do +not you think the good woman of the house a little altered since +you followed her from the playhouse to find out who she was for +me?’</span> I perceived a tear fall down his cheek as he spoke, which +moved me not a little. But, to turn the discourse, I said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘She +is not, indeed, that creature she was when she returned me the +letter I carried from you, and told me, <span class="tei tei-q">“She hoped, as I was a +gentleman, I would be employed no more to trouble her, who had +never offended me; but would be so much the gentleman's friend +as to dissuade him from a pursuit which he could never succeed +in.”</span> You may remember I thought her in earnest, and you were +forced to employ your cousin Will, who made his sister get acquainted +with her for you. You cannot expect her to be for ever fifteen.’</span> +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Fifteen!’</span> replied my good friend. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Ah! you little understand—you, +that have lived a bachelor—how great, how exquisite a pleasure +there is in being really beloved! It is impossible that the most +beauteous face in nature should raise in me such pleasing ideas as +when I look upon that excellent woman. That fading in her +countenance is chiefly caused by her watching with me in my +fever. This was followed by a fit of sickness, which had like to +have carried me off last winter. I tell you, sincerely, I have so +many obligations to her that I cannot, with any sort of moderation, +think of her present state of health. But, as to what you say of +fifteen, she gives me every day pleasure beyond what I ever knew +in the possession of her beauty when I was in the vigour of youth. +Every moment of her life brings me fresh instances of her complacency +to my inclinations, and her prudence in regard to my +fortune. Her face is to me much more beautiful than when I first +saw it; there is no decay in any feature which I cannot trace +from the very instant it was occasioned by some anxious concern +for my welfare and interests. Thus, at the same time, methinks, +the love I conceived towards her for what she was, is heightened +by my gratitude for what she is. The love of a wife is as much +above the idle passion commonly called by that name, as the loud +laughter of buffoons is inferior to the elegant mirth of gentlemen. +Oh, she is an inestimable jewel! In her examination of her household +affairs, she shows a certain fearfulness to find a fault, which +makes her servants obey her like children; and the meanest we +have has an ingenuous shame for an offence not always to be seen +in children in other families. I speak freely to you, my old friend; +ever since her sickness, things that gave me the quickest joy before +turn now to a certain anxiety. As the children play in the next +room, I know the poor things by their steps, and am considering +what they must do should they lose their mother in their tender +years. The pleasure I used to take in telling my boy stories of +battles, and asking my girl questions about the disposal of her +baby, and the gossipping of it, is turned into inward reflection +and melancholy.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He would have gone on in this tender way, when the good +lady entered, and, with an inexpressible sweetness in her countenance, +told us <span class="tei tei-q">‘she had been searching her closet for something +very good, to treat such an old friend as I was’</span>. Her husband's +eyes sparkled with pleasure at the cheerfulness of her countenance; +and I saw all his fears vanish in an instant. The lady observing +something in our looks which showed we had been more serious +than ordinary, and seeing her husband receive her with great concern +under a forced cheerfulness, immediately guessed at what we +had been talking of; and applying herself to me, said, with a smile, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Mr. Bickerstaff, do not believe a word of what he tells you: +I shall still live to have you for my second, as I have often promised +you, unless he takes more care of himself than he has done since +his coming to town. You must know he tells me, that he finds +London is a much more healthy place than the country; for he +sees several of his old acquaintances and schoolfellows are here—<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">young +fellows with fair, full-bottomed periwigs</span></em>. I could scarce keep +him this morning from going out <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">open-breasted</span></em>.’</span> My friend, who +is always extremely delighted with her agreeable humour, made +her sit down with us. She did it with that easiness which is peculiar +to women of sense; and to keep up the good humour she had +brought in with her, turned her raillery upon me. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Mr. Bickerstaff, +you remember you followed me one night from the playhouse; +suppose you should carry me thither to-morrow night, and lead +me in the front box.’</span> This put us into a long field of discourse +about the beauties who were the mothers to the present, and shined +in the boxes twenty years ago. I told her, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I was glad she had +transferred so many of her charms, and I did not question but +her eldest daughter was within half a year of being a toast.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We were pleasing ourselves with this fantastical preferment of +the young lady, when, on a sudden, we were alarmed with the +noise of a drum, and immediately entered my little godson to give +me a point of war. His mother, between laughing and chiding, +would have put him out of the room; but I would not part with +him so. I found, upon conversation with him, though he was +a little noisy in his mirth, that the child had excellent parts, and +was a great master of all the learning on the other side of eight years +old. I perceived him a very great historian in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Aesop's Fables</span></span>; +but he frankly declared to me his mind, <span class="tei tei-q">‘that he did not delight +in that learning, because he did not believe they were true;’</span> for +which reason I found he had very much turned his studies, for +about a twelvemonth past, into the lives of Don Bellianis of +Greece, Guy of Warwick, the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Seven Champions</span></span>, and other historians +of that age. I could not but observe the satisfaction the father +took in the forwardness of his son, and that these diversions might +turn to some profit. I found the boy had made remarks which +might be of service to him during the course of his whole life. He +would tell you the mismanagement of John Hickerthrift, find fault +with the passionate temper in Bevis of Southampton, and loved +St. George for being the champion of England; and by this means +had his thoughts insensibly moulded into the notions of discretion, +virtue, and honour. I was extolling his accomplishments, when +his mother told me, <span class="tei tei-q">‘that the little girl who led me in this morning +was, in her way, a better scholar than he. Betty,’</span> said she, <span class="tei tei-q">‘deals +chiefly in fairies and sprites; and sometimes in a winter night +will terrify the maids with her accounts, until they are afraid to +go up to bed.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I sat with them until it was very late, sometimes in merry, +sometimes in serious discourse, with this particular pleasure, which +gives the only true relish to all conversation, a sense that every +one of us liked each other. I went home, considering the different +conditions of a married life and that of a bachelor; and I must +confess it struck me with a secret concern, to reflect, that whenever +I go off I shall leave no traces behind me. In this pensive mood +I return to my family; that is to say, to my maid, my dog, my +cat, who only can be the better or worse for what happens to +me.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Tatler.</span></span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_102" name="note_102" href="#noteref_102">102.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“As +to the pursuits after affection and esteem, the fair sex +are happy in this particular, that with them the one is much more +nearly related to the other than in men. The love of a woman +is inseparable from some esteem of her; and as she is naturally +the object of affection, the woman who has your esteem has also +some degree of your love. A man that dotes on a woman for her +beauty, will whisper his friend, <span class="tei tei-q">‘that creature has a great deal of +wit when you are well acquainted with her.’</span> And if you examine +the bottom of your esteem for a woman, you will find you have +a greater opinion of her beauty than anybody else. As to us men, +I design to pass most of my time with the facetious Harry Bickerstaff; +but William Bickerstaff, the most prudent man of our family, +shall be my executor.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span>, No. +206.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_103" name="note_103" href="#noteref_103">103.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The Correspondence +of Steele passed after his death into the +possession of his daughter Elizabeth, by his second wife, Miss +Scurlock, of Carmarthenshire. She married the Hon. John, afterwards +third Lord Trevor. At her death, part of the letters passed +to Mr. Thomas, a grandson of a natural daughter of Steele's; and +part to Lady Trevor's next of kin, Mr. Scurlock. They were published +by the learned Nichols—from whose later edition of them, +in 1809, our specimens are quoted. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here we have him, in his courtship—which was not a very long +one. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO MRS. SCURLOCK +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Aug. 30, 1707.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Madam</span></span>,—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I beg pardon that my paper is not finer, but I am forced +to write from a coffee-house, where I am attending about business. +There is a dirty crowd of busy faces all around me, talking of +money; while all my ambition, all my wealth, is love! Love +which animates my heart, sweetens my humour, enlarges my soul; +and affects every action of my life. It is to my lovely charmer +I owe, that many noble ideas are continually affixed to my words +and actions; it is the natural effect of that generous passion to +create in the admirer some similitude of the object admired. Thus, +my dear, am I every day to improve from so sweet a companion. +Look up, my fair one, to that Heaven which made thee such; +and join with me to implore its influence on our tender innocent +hours, and beseech the Author of love to bless the rites He has +ordained—and mingle with our happiness a just sense of our transient +condition, and a resignation to His will, which only can +regulate our minds to a steady endeavour to please Him and each +other.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am for ever your faithful servant,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Rich. Steele.</span></span>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Some few hours afterwards, apparently, Mistress Scurlock received +the next one—obviously written later in the day! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Saturday night (Aug. 30, 1707).</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear, Lovely Mrs. Scurlock</span></span>,—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have been in very good company, where your health, under +the character of <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">the woman I loved best</span></em>, has been often drunk; so +that I may say that I am dead drunk for your sake, which is more +than <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">I die for you</span></em>.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Rich. Steele.</span></span>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO MRS. SCURLOCK. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sept. 1, 1707.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Madam</span></span>,—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It is the hardest thing in the world to be in love, and yet +attend business. As for me, all who speak to me find me out, and +I must lock myself up, or other people will do it for me.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A gentleman asked me this morning, <span class="tei tei-q">‘What news from Lisbon?’</span> +and I answered, <span class="tei tei-q">‘She is exquisitely handsome.’</span> Another desired +to know <span class="tei tei-q">‘when I had last been at Hampton Court?’</span> I replied, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘It will be on Tuesday come se'nnight.’</span> Pr'ythee allow me at +least to kiss your hand before that day, that my mind may be in +some composure. O Love!</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A thousand torments dwell about thee,</span><br /> +Yet who could live, to live without thee? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Methinks I could write a volume to you; but all the language +on earth would fail in saying how much, and with what disinterested +passion,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am ever yours,</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Rich. Steele.</span></span>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Two days after this, he is found expounding his circumstances +and prospects to the young lady's mamma. He dates from <span class="tei tei-q">“Lord +Sunderland's office, Whitehall”</span>; and states his clear income at +1,025<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></em> per annum. <span class="tei tei-q">“I promise myself,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“the pleasure of +an industrious and virtuous life, in studying to do things agreeable +to you.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +They were married according to the most probable conjectures +about the 7th inst. There are traces of a tiff about the middle +of the next month; she being prudish and fidgety, as he was +impassioned and reckless. General progress, however, may be seen +from the following notes. The <span class="tei tei-q">“house in Bury Street, St. James's”</span>, +was now taken. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO MRS. STEELE. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oct. 16, 1707.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dearest Being on Earth</span></span>,—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Pardon me if you do not see me till eleven o'clock, having +met a schoolfellow from India, by whom I am to be informed on +things this night which expressly concern your obedient husband,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Rich. Steele.</span></span>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO MRS. STEELE. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Eight o'clock, Fountain Tavern,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Oct. 22, 1707.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">My Dear</span></span>,—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I beg of you not to be uneasy; for I have done a great deal +of business to-day very successfully, and wait an hour or two about +my <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gazette</span></span>.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dec. 22, 1707.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">My dear, dear Wife</span></span>,—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I write to let you know I do not come home to dinner, being +obliged to attend some business abroad, of which I shall give you +an account (when I see you in the evening), as becomes your dutiful +and obedient husband.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Devil Tavern, Temple Bar.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Jan. 3, 1707-8.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Prue,</span></span>—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have partly succeeded in my business to-day, and inclose +two guineas as earnest of more. Dear Prue, I cannot come home +to dinner. I languish for your welfare, and will never be a moment +careless more.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your faithful husband,”</span> &c. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Jan. 14, 1707-8.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Wife,</span></span>—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Edgecombe, Ned Ask, and Mr. Lumley, have desired me +to sit an hour with them at the George, in Pall Mall, for which +I desire your patience till twelve o'clock, and that you will go to +bed,”</span> &c. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Gray's Inn, Feb. 3, 1708.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Prue,</span></span>—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If the man who has my shoemaker's bill calls, let him be +answered that I shall call on him as I come home. I stay here in +order to get Jonson to discount a bill for me, and shall dine with +him for that end. He is expected at home every minute.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your most humble, obedient servant,”</span> &c. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Tennis Court Coffee-house,</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“May 5, 1708.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Wife,</span></span>—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I hope I have done this day what will be pleasing to you; +in the meantime shall lie this night at a baker's, one Leg, over +against the <span class="tei tei-q">‘Devil’</span> Tavern, at Charing Cross. I shall be able to +confront the fools who wish me uneasy, and shall have the satisfaction +to see thee cheerful and at ease.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If the printer's boy be at home, send him hither; and let +Mrs. Todd send by the boy my night-gown, slippers, and clean +linen. You shall hear from me early in the morning,”</span> &c. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Dozens of similar letters follow, with occasional guineas, little +parcels of tea, or walnuts, &c. In 1709 the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tatler</span></span> made its appearance. +The following curious note dates April 7, 1710:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I inclose to you [<span class="tei tei-q">‘Dear Prue’</span>] a receipt for the saucepan and +spoon, and a note of 23<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l</span></span>. of Lewis's, +which will make up the 50<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> +I promised for your ensuing occasion.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I know no happiness in this life in any degree comparable to +the pleasure I have in your person and society. I only beg of +you to add to your other charms a fearfulness to see a man that +loves you in pain and uneasiness, to make me as happy as it is +possible to be in this life. Rising a little in a morning, and being +disposed to a cheerfulness ... would not be amiss.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In another, he is found excusing his coming home, being <span class="tei tei-q">“invited +to supper to Mr. Boyle's”</span>. <span class="tei tei-q">“Dear Prue,”</span> he says on this occasion, +<span class="tei tei-q">“do not send after me, for I shall be ridiculous.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_104" name="note_104" href="#noteref_104">104.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Of this famous Bishop, Steele wrote,— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Virtue with so much ease on Bangor sits,<br /> +All faults he pardons, though he none commits. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_105" name="note_105" href="#noteref_105">105.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Here +we have some of his later letters:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO LADY STEELE.<br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hampton Court, March 16, 1716-17.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Prue,</span></span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If you have written anything to me which I should have +received last night, I beg your pardon that I cannot answer till +the next post.... Your son at the present writing is mighty +well employed in tumbling on the floor of the room and sweeping +the sand with a feather. He grows a most delightful child, and +very full of play and spirit. He is also a very great scholar: he +can read his primer; and I have brought down my Virgil. He +makes most shrewd remarks about the pictures. We are very +intimate friends and playfellows. He begins to be very ragged; +and I hope I shall be pardoned if I equip him with new clothes +and frocks, or what Mrs. Evans and I shall think for his service.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO LADY STEELE.<br /> +[Undated.] +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You tell me you want a little flattery from me. I assure you +I know no one who deserves so much commendation as yourself, +and to whom saying the best things would be so little like flattery. +The thing speaks for itself, considering you as a very handsome +woman that loves retirement—one who does not want wit, and +yet is extremely sincere; and so I could go through all the vices +which attend the good qualities of other people, of which you are +exempt. But, indeed, though you have every perfection, you have +an extravagant fault, which almost frustrates the good in you to +me; and that is, that you do not love to dress, to appear, to shine +out, even at my request, and to make me proud of you, or rather +to indulge the pride I have that you are mine....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your most affectionate, obsequious husband,</span><br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Rich. Steele.</span></span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A quarter of Molly's schooling is paid. The children are perfectly +well.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO LADY STEELE.<br /> +<span class="tei tei-q">“March 26, 1717.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">My Dearest Prue,</span></span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I have received yours, wherein you give me the sensible +affliction of telling me enow of the continual pain in your head.... +When I lay in your place, and on your pillow, I assure you I fell +into tears last night, to think that my charming little insolent +might be then awake and in pain; and took it to be a sin to go +to sleep.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“For this tender passion towards you, I must be contented that +your <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Prueship</span></span> will condescend to call yourself my well-wisher.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +At the time when the above later letters were written, Lady +Steele was in Wales, looking after her estate there. Steele, about +this time, was much occupied with a project for conveying fish +alive, by which, as he constantly assures his wife, he firmly believed +he should make his fortune. It did not succeed, however. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Lady Steele died in December of the succeeding year. She lies +buried in Westminster Abbey. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_106" name="note_106" href="#noteref_106">106.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Lord +Chesterfield sends these verses to Voltaire in a characteristic +letter.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_107" name="note_107" href="#noteref_107">107.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Steele +replied to Dennis in an <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Answer to a Whimsical Pamphlet, +called </span><span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-style: italic">“</span><span style="font-style: italic">The Character of Sir John Edgar</span><span style="font-style: italic">”</span></span></span>. What Steele had to say +against the cross-grained old Critic discovers a great deal of humour: +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thou never didst let the sun into thy garret, for fear he should +bring a bailiff along with him....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your years are about sixty-five, an ugly, vinegar face, that if +you had any command you would be obeyed out of fear, from +your ill-nature pictured there; not from any other motive. Your +height is about some five feet five inches. You see I can give +your exact measure as well as if I had taken your dimension with +a good cudgel, which I promise you to do as soon as ever I have +the good fortune to meet you....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your doughty paunch stands before you like a firkin of butter, +and your duck-legs seem to be cast for carrying burdens.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Thy works are libels upon others, and satires upon thyself; +and while they bark at men of sense, call him knave and fool that +wrote them. Thou hast a great antipathy to thy own species; +and hatest the sight of a fool but in thy glass.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Steele had been kind to Dennis, and once got arrested on account +of a pecuniary service which he did him. When John heard of the +fact—<span class="tei tei-q">“'Sdeath!”</span> cries John; <span class="tei tei-q">“why did not he keep out of the +way as I did?”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Answer</span></span> concludes by mentioning that Cibber had offered +Ten Pounds for the discovery of the authorship of Dennis's pamphlet; +on which, says Steele,— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am only sorry he has offered so much, because the <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">twentieth +part</span></em> would have over-valued his whole carcass. But I know the +fellow that he keeps to give answers to his creditors will betray +him; for he gave me his word to bring officers on the top of the +house that should make a hole through the ceiling of his garret, +and so bring him to the punishment he deserves. Some people +think this expedient out of the way, and that he would make his +escape upon hearing the least noise. I say so too; but it takes +him up half an hour every night to fortify himself with his old +hair trunk, two or three joint-stools, and some other lumber, which +he ties together with cords so fast that it takes him up the same +time in the morning to release himself.”</span></p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_108" name="note_108" href="#noteref_108">108.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Gay +calls him—<span class="tei tei-q">“Dear Prior ... beloved by every muse”</span>.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Mr. +Pope's Welcome from Greece.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Swift and Prior were very intimate, and he is frequently mentioned +in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal to Stella</span></span>. <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Prior,”</span> says Swift, <span class="tei tei-q">“walks +to make himself fat, and I to keep myself down.... We often +walk round the park together.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In Swift's works there is a curious tract called <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Remarks on the +Characters of the Court of Queen Anne</span></span> [Scott's edition, vol. xii]. +The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Remarks</span></span> are not by the Dean: but at the end of each is +an addition in italics from his hand, and these are always characteristic. +Thus, to the Duke of Marlborough, he adds, <span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Detestably +Covetous</span></span>,”</span> &c. Prior is thus noticed— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Matthew Prior, Esq.</span></span>, Commissioner of Trade.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“On the Queen's accession to the throne, he was continued in +his office; is very well at Court with the ministry, and is an entire +creature of my Lord Jersey's, whom he supports by his advice; +is one of the best poets in England, but very facetious in conversation. +A thin, hollow-looked man, turned of 40 years old. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">This +is near the truth.</span></em>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Yet counting as far as to fifty his years,<br /> +His virtues and vices were as other men's are,<br /> +High hopes he conceived and he smothered great fears,<br /> +In a life party-coloured—half pleasure, half care. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Not to business a drudge, nor to faction a slave,<br /> +He strove to make interest and freedom agree,<br /> +In public employments industrious and grave,<br /> +And alone with his friends, Lord, how merry was he! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Now in equipage stately, now humbly on foot,<br /> +Both fortunes he tried, but to neither would trust;<br /> +And whirled in the round as the wheel turned about,<br /> +He found riches had wings, and knew man was but dust. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Prior's</span></span> <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Poems</span></span>. [<span class="tei tei-q">“For my own +monument.”</span>] +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_109" name="note_109" href="#noteref_109">109.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“They +joined to produce a parody, entitled <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Town and +Country Mouse</span></span>, part of which Mr. Bayes is supposed to gratify +his old friends Smart and Johnson, by repeating to them. The +piece is therefore founded upon the twice-told jest of +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Rehearsal</span></span>.... +There is nothing new or original in the idea.... +In this piece, Prior, though the younger man, seems to have had +by far the largest share.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dryden</span></span>, vol. i, p. 330.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_110" name="note_110" href="#noteref_110">110.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“He +was to have been in the same commission with the Duke +of Shrewsbury, but that that nobleman,”</span> says Johnson, <span class="tei tei-q">“refused +to be associated with one so meanly born. Prior therefore continued +to act without a title till the duke's return next year to +England, and then he assumed the style and dignity of ambassador.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He had been thinking of slights of this sort when he wrote his +Epitaph:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Nobles and heralds by your leave,<br /> +Here lies what once was Matthew Prior,<br /> +The son of Adam and of Eve;<br /> +Can Bourbon or Nassau claim higher? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But, in this case, the old prejudice got the better of the old joke. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_111" name="note_111" href="#noteref_111">111.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">His +epigrams have the genuine sparkle: +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">The Remedy worse than the Disease.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +I sent for Radcliff; was so ill,<br /> +That other doctors gave me over:<br /> +He felt my pulse, prescribed a pill,<br /> +And I was likely to recover. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But when the wit began to wheeze,<br /> +And wine had warmed the politician,<br /> +Cured yesterday of my disease,<br /> +I died last night of my physician. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +—— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Yes, every poet is a fool;<br /> +By demonstration Ned can show it;<br /> +Happy could Ned's inverted rule<br /> +Prove every fool to be a poet. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +—— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +On his death-bed poor Lubin lies,<br /> +His spouse is in despair;<br /> +With frequent sobs and mutual sighs,<br /> +They both express their care. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A different cause, says Parson Sly,<br /> +The same effect may give;<br /> +Poor Lubin fears that he shall die,<br /> +His wife that he may live. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_112" name="note_112" href="#noteref_112">112.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">PRIOR TO SIR THOMAS HANMER. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Aug. 4, 1709.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Sir,</span></span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Friendship may live, I grant you, without being fed and +cherished by correspondence; but with that additional benefit +I am of opinion it will look more cheerful and thrive better: for +in this case, as in love, though a man is sure of his own constancy, +yet his happiness depends a good deal upon the sentiments of +another, and while you and Chloe are alive, 'tis not enough that +I love you both, except I am sure you both love me again; and +as one of her scrawls fortifies my mind more against affliction than +all Epictetus, with Simplicius's comments into the bargain, so +your single letter gave me more real pleasure than all the works +of Plato.... I must return my answer to your very kind question +concerning my health. The Bath waters have done a good deal +towards the recovery of it, and the great specific, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Cape Caballum</span></span>, +will, I think, confirm it. Upon this head I must tell you that my +mare Betty grows blind, and may one day, by breaking my neck, +perfect my cure: if at Rixham fair any pretty nagg that is between +thirteen and fourteen hands presented himself, and you would be +pleased to purchase him for me, one of your servants might ride +him to Euston, and I might receive him there. This, sir, is just +as such a thing happens. If you hear, too, of a Welch widow, +with a good jointure, that has her <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">goings</span></span> and is not very skittish, +pray, be pleased to cast your eye on her for me, too. You see, +sir, the great trust I repose in your skill and honour, when I dare +put two such commissions in your hand....”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The +Hanmer Correspondence</span></span>, p. 120. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +FROM MR. PRIOR. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Paris, 1st-12th May, 1714.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">My dear Lord and Friend,</span></span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Matthew never had so great occasion to write a word to +Henry as now: it is noised here that I am soon to return. The +question that I wish I could answer to the many that ask, and to +our friend Colbert de Torcy (to whom I made your compliments +in the manner you commanded) is, What is done for me: and to +what I am recalled? It may look like a bagatelle, what is to +become of a philosopher like me? but it is not such: what is to +become of a person who had the honour to be chosen, and sent +hither as intrusted, in the midst of a war, with what the Queen +designed should make the peace; returning with the Lord Bolingbroke, +one of the greatest men in England, and one of the finest +heads in Europe (as they say here, if true or not, +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">n'importe</span></span>); having +been left by him in the greatest character (that of Her Majesty's +Plenipotentiary), exercising that power conjointly with the Duke +of Shrewsbury, and solely after his departure; having here received +more distinguished honour than any minister, except an Ambassador, +ever did, and some which were never given to any, but +who had that character; having had all the success that could +be expected, having (God be thanked!) spared no pains, at a time +when at home the peace is voted safe and honourable—at a time +when the Earl of Oxford is Lord Treasurer and Lord Bolingbroke +First Secretary of State? This unfortunate person, I say, neglected, +forgot, unnamed to anything that may speak the Queen satisfied +with his services, or his friends concerned as to his fortune.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. de Torcy put me quite out of countenance, the other day, +by a pity that wounded me deeper than ever did the cruelty of +the late Lord Godolphin. He said he would write to Robin and +Harry about me. God forbid, my lord, that I should need any +foreign intercession, or owe the least to any Frenchman living, +besides the decency of behaviour and the returns of common +civility: some say I am to go to Baden, others that I am to be +added to the Commissioners for settling the commerce. In all +cases I am ready, but in the meantime, +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">dic aliquid de tribus capellis</span></span>. +Neither of these two are, I presume, honours or rewards, neither +of them (let me say to my dear Lord Bolingbroke, and let him +not be angry with me), are what Drift may aspire to, and what +Mr. Whitworth, who was his fellow clerk, has or may possess. +I am far from desiring to lessen the great merit of the gentleman +I named, for I heartily esteem and love him; but in this trade +of ours, my lord, in which you are the general, as in that of the +soldiery, there is a certain right acquired by time and long service. +You would do anything for your Queen's service, but you would +not be contented to descend, and be degraded to a charge, no way +proportioned to that of Secretary of State, any more than Mr. Ross, +though he would charge a party with a halbard in his hand, would +be content all his life after to be Serjeant. Was my Lord Dartmouth, +from Secretary, returned again to be Commissioner of Trade, +or from Secretary of War, would Frank Gwyn think himself kindly +used to be returned again to be Commissioner? In short, my +lord, you have put me above myself, and if I am to return to myself, +I shall return to something very discontented and uneasy. I am +sure, my lord, you will make the best use you can of this hint for +my good. If I am to have anything, it will certainly be for her +Majesty's service, and the credit of my friends in the Ministry, +that it be done before I am recalled from home, lest the world +may think either that I have merited to be disgraced, or that ye +dare not stand by me. If nothing is to be done, +<span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">fiat voluntas Dei</span></span>. +I have writ to Lord Treasurer upon this subject, and having implored +your kind intercession, I promise you it is the last remonstrance +of this kind that I will ever make. Adieu, my lord; all +honour, health, and pleasure to you.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yours ever,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Matt.</span></span>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“PS.—Lady Jersey is just gone from me. We drank your +healths together in usquebaugh after our tea: we are the greatest +friends alive. Once more adieu. There is no such thing as the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Book of Travels</span></span> you mentioned; if there be, let friend Tilson +send us more particular account of them, for neither I nor Jacob +Tonson can find them. Pray send Barton back to me, I hope with +some comfortable tidings.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Bolingbroke's Letters.</span></span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_113" name="note_113" href="#noteref_113">113.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“I +asked whether Prior's poems were to be printed entire; +Johnson said they were. I mentioned Lord Hales's censure of +Prior in his preface to a collection of sacred poems, by various +hands, published by him at Edinburgh a great many years ago, +where he mentions <span class="tei tei-q">‘these impure tales, which will be the eternal +opprobium of their ingenious author’</span>. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Johnson</span></span>: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Sir, Lord +Hales has forgot. There is nothing in Prior that will excite to +lewdness. If Lord Hales thinks there is, he must be more combustible +than other people.’</span> I instanced the tale of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Paulo +Purganti and his Wife</span></span>. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Johnson</span></span>: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Sir, there is nothing +there but that his wife wanted to be kissed, when poor Paulo was out +of pocket. No, sir, Prior is a lady's book. No lady is ashamed +to have it standing in her library.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Boswell's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life of Johnson</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_114" name="note_114" href="#noteref_114">114.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Gay +was of an old Devonshire family, but his pecuniary prospects +not being great, was placed in his youth in the house of +a silk-mercer in London. He was born in 1688—Pope's year, and +in 1712 the Duchess of Monmouth made him her secretary. Next +year he published his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Rural Sports</span></span>, which he dedicated to Pope, +and so made an acquaintance, which became a memorable friendship. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Gay,”</span> says Pope, <span class="tei tei-q">“was quite a natural man,—wholly without +art or design, and spoke just what he thought and as he thought +it. He dangled for twenty years about a Court, and at last was +offered to be made usher to the young princess. Secretary Craggs +made Gay a present of stock in the South-Sea year; and he was +once worth 20,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, but lost it all +again. He got about 500<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> by +the first <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Beggar's Opera</span></span>, and +1,100<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> or 1,200<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> by the second. He +was negligent and a bad manager. Latterly, the Duke of Queensberry +took his money into his keeping, and let him only have what +was necessary out of it, and, as he lived with them, he could not +have occasion for much. He died worth upwards of +3,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>). +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_115" name="note_115" href="#noteref_115">115.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. +Gay is, in all regards, as honest and sincere a man as +ever I knew.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Swift</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">to Lady Betty Germaine</span></span>, Jan. 1733.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_116" name="note_116" href="#noteref_116">116.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Of manners gentle, of affections mild;<br /> +In wit a man; simplicity, a child;<br /> +With native humour temp'ring virtuous rage,<br /> +Form'd to delight at once and lash the age;<br /> +Above temptation in a low estate,<br /> +And uncorrupted e'en among the great:<br /> +A safe companion, and an easy friend,<br /> +Unblamed through life, lamented in the end.<br /> +These are thy honours; not that here thy bust<br /> +Is mix'd with heroes, or with kings thy dust;<br /> +But that the worthy and the good shall say,<br /> +Striking their pensive bosoms, <span class="tei tei-q">“<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">Here</span></em> lies Gay.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope's</span></span> <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Epitaph on Gay</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +A hare who, in a civil way,<br /> +Complied with everything, like Gay. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Fables</span></span>, <span class="tei tei-q">“The Hare and Many Friends.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_117" name="note_117" href="#noteref_117">117.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“I +can give you no account of Gay,”</span> says Pope, curiously, +<span class="tei tei-q">“since he was raffled for, and won back by his +Duchess.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Works</span></span>, +Roscoe's ed., vol. ix, p. 392. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Here is the letter Pope wrote to him when the death of Queen +Anne brought back Lord Clarendon from Hanover, and lost him +the secretaryship of that nobleman, of which he had had but a +short tenure. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Gay's Court prospects were never happy from this time.—His +dedication of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Shepherd's Week</span></span> to Bolingbroke, Swift used +to call the <span class="tei tei-q">“original sin”</span>, which had hurt him with the house of +Hanover. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sept. 23, 1714.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span class="tei tei-q"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">“</span><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Mr. Gay,</span></span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Welcome to your native soil! welcome to your friends! +thrice welcome to me! whether returned in glory, blest with +Court interest, the love and familiarity of the great, and filled +with agreeable hopes; or melancholy with dejection, contemplative +of the changes of fortune, and doubtful for the future; whether +returned a triumphant Whig or a depending Tory, equally all hail! +equally beloved and welcome to me! If happy, I am to partake +of your elevation; if unhappy, you have still a warm corner in +my heart, and a retreat at Benfield in the worst of times at your +service. If you are a Tory, or thought so by any man, I know +it can proceed from nothing but your gratitude to a few people +who endeavoured to serve you, and whose politics were never your +concern. If you are a Whig, as I rather hope, and as I think your +principles and mine (as brother poets) had ever a bias to the side +of liberty, I know you will be an honest man and an inoffensive +one. Upon the whole, I know you are incapable of being so much +of either party as to be good for nothing. Therefore, once more, +whatever you are or in whatever state you are, all hail!</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“One or two of your own friends complained they had nothing +from you since the Queen's death; I told them no man living +loved Mr. Gay better than I, yet I had not once written to him +in all his voyage. This I thought a convincing proof, but truly +one may be a friend to another without telling him so every month. +But they had reasons, too, themselves to allege in your excuse, +as men who really value one another will never want such as make +their friends and themselves easy. The late universal concern in +public affairs threw us all into a hurry of spirits: even I, who +am more a philosopher than to expect anything from any reign, +was borne away with the current, and full of the expectation of +the successor. During your journeys, I knew not whither to aim +a letter after you; that was a sort of shooting flying: add to this +the demand Homer had upon me, to write fifty verses a day, besides +learned notes, all of which are at a conclusion for this year. Rejoice +with me, O my friend! that my labour is over; come and make +merry with me in much feasting. We will feed among the lilies +(by the lilies I mean the ladies). Are not the Rosalindas of Britain +as charming as the Blousalindas of the Hague? or have the two +great Pastoral poets of our own nation renounced love at the same +time? for Philips, unnatural Philips, hath deserted it, yea, and +in a rustic manner kicked his Rosalind. Dr. Parnell and I have +been inseparable ever since you went. We are now at the Bath, +where (if you are not, as I heartily hope, better engaged) your +company would be the greatest pleasure to us in the world. Talk +not of expenses: Homer shall support his children. I beg a line +from you, directed to the Post-house in Bath. Poor Parnell is in +an ill state of health.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Pardon me if I add a word of advice in the poetical way. Write +something on the King, or Prince, or Princess. On whatsoever +foot you may be with the court, this can do no harm. I shall +never know where to end, and am confounded in the many things +I have to say to you, though they all amount but to this, that +I am, entirely, as ever,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your,”</span> &c. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Gay took the advice <span class="tei tei-q">“in the poetical way”</span>, and published <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">An +Epistle to a Lady, occasioned by the arrival of her Royal Highness +the Princess of Wales</span></span>. But, though this brought him access to +Court, and the attendance of the Prince and Princess at his farce +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">What d'ye, call it?</span></span> it did not bring him a place. On the +accession of George II, he was offered the situation of Gentleman +Usher to the Princess Louisa (her Highness being then two years old); +but <span class="tei tei-q">“by this offer”</span>, says Johnson, <span class="tei tei-q">“he thought himself insulted.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_118" name="note_118" href="#noteref_118">118.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Gay was a great eater.—As the French philosopher used to +prove his existence by <span lang="la" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="la"><span style="font-style: italic">cogito, ergo sum</span></span>, +the greatest proof of Gay's existence is, +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">edit, ergo est</span></span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Congreve</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">in a Letter to Pope</span></span> (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's +Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_119" name="note_119" href="#noteref_119">119.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Swift +indorsed the letter—<span class="tei tei-q">“On my dear friend Mr. Gay's death; +received Dec. 15, but not read till the 20th, by an impulse foreboding +some misfortune.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It was by Swift's interest that Gay was made known to Lord +Bolingbroke, and obtained his patronage.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Scott's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Swift</span></span>, vol. i, +p. 156. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Pope wrote on the occasion of Gay's death, to Swift, thus:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“[Dec. 5, 1732.]</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“One of the dearest and longest ties I have ever had is +broken all on a sudden by the unfortunate death of poor Mr. Gay. +An inflammatory fever carried him out of this life in three days.... He +asked of you a few hours before when in acute torment +by the inflammation in his bowels and breast.... His sisters, we +suppose, will be his heirs, who are two widows.... Good God! +how often are we to die before we go quite off this stage? In +every friend we lose a part of ourselves, and the best part. God +keep those we have left! few are worth praying for, and one's +self the least of all.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_120" name="note_120" href="#noteref_120">120.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Gay, +like Goldsmith, had a musical talent. <span class="tei tei-q">‘He could play +on the flute,’</span> says Malone, <span class="tei tei-q">‘and was, therefore, enabled to adapt +so happily some of the airs in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Beggar's +Opera</span></span>.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Notes to</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Spence</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_121" name="note_121" href="#noteref_121">121.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +'Twas when the seas were roaring<br /> +With hollow blasts of wind,<br /> +A damsel lay deploring<br /> +All on a rock reclined.<br /> +Wide o'er the foaming billows<br /> +She cast a wistful look;<br /> +Her head was crown'd with willows<br /> +That trembled o'er the brook. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Twelve months are gone and over,<br /> +And nine long tedious days;<br /> +Why didst thou, venturous lover—<br /> +Why didst thou trust the seas?<br /> +Cease, cease, thou cruel Ocean,<br /> +And let my lover rest;<br /> +Ah! what's thy troubled motion<br /> +To that within my breast? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The merchant robb'd of pleasure,<br /> +Sees tempests in despair;<br /> +But what's the loss of treasure<br /> +To losing of my dear?<br /> +Should you some coast be laid on,<br /> +Where gold and diamonds grow,<br /> +You'd find a richer maiden,<br /> +But none that loves you so. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +How can they say that Nature<br /> +Has nothing made in vain;<br /> +Why, then, beneath the water<br /> +Should hideous rocks remain?<br /> +No eyes the rocks discover<br /> +That lurk beneath the deep,<br /> +To wreck the wandering lover,<br /> +And leave the maid to weep? +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +All melancholy lying,<br /> +Thus wail'd she for her dear;<br /> +Repay'd each blast with sighing,<br /> +Each billow with a tear;<br /> +When o'er the white wave stooping,<br /> +His floating corpse she spy'd;<br /> +Then, like a lily drooping,<br /> +She bow'd her head, and died. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">A Ballad</span></span>, from the +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">What d'ye call it?</span></span>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“What can be prettier than Gay's ballad, or, rather, Swift's, +Arbuthnot's, Pope's, and Gay's, in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">What d'ye call it?</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-q">‘'Twas when the seas were roaring’</span>? I have been well informed, that +they all contributed.”</span>—Cowper to Unwin, 1783.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_122" name="note_122" href="#noteref_122">122.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Dr. Swift had been observing once to Mr. Gay, what an odd +pretty sort of thing a Newgate Pastoral might make. Gay was +inclined to try at such a thing for some time, but afterwards thought +it would be better to write a comedy on the same plan. This was +what gave rise to the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Beggar's Opera</span></span>. He began on it, and when +he first mentioned it to Swift, the Doctor did not much like the +project. As he carried it on, he showed what he wrote to both +of us; and we now and then gave a correction, or a word or two +of advice; but it was wholly of his own writing. When it was +done, neither of us thought it would succeed. We showed it to +Congreve, who, after reading it over, said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘It would either take +greatly, or be damned confoundedly.’</span> We were all at the first +night of it, in great uncertainty of the event, till we were very +much encouraged by overhearing the Duke of Argyle, who sat in +the next box to us, say, <span class="tei tei-q">‘It will do—it must do!—I see it in the +eyes of them!’</span> This was a good while before the first Act was +over, and so gave us ease soon; for the Duke [besides his own +good taste] has a more particular research than any one now living +in discovering the taste of the public. He was quite right in this +as usual; the good nature of the audience appeared stronger and +stronger every act, and ended in a clamour of +applause.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_123" name="note_123" href="#noteref_123">123.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Waller, +Spenser, and Dryden were Mr. Pope's great favourites, +in the order they are named, in his first reading, till he was about +twelve years old.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Pope's father (who was an honest merchant, and dealt in +Hollands, wholesale) was no poet, but he used to set him to make +English verses when very young. He was pretty difficult in being +pleased; and used often to send him back to new turn them. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘These are not good rhimes;’</span> for that was my husband's word +for verses.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope's Mother</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence</span></span>). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I wrote things, I'm ashamed to say how soon. Part of an Epic +Poem when about twelve. The scene of it lay at Rhodes, and +some of the neighbouring islands; and the poem opened under +water with a description of the Court of +Neptune.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> (ibid.). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“His perpetual application (after he set to study of himself) +reduced him in four years' time to so bad a state of health, that, +after trying physicians for a good while in vain, he resolved to +give way to his distemper; and sat down calmly in a full expectation +of death in a short time. Under this thought, he wrote letters +to take a last farewell of some of his more particular friends, and, +among the rest, one to the Abbé Southcote. The Abbé was extremely +concerned, both for his very ill state of health and the +resolution he said he had taken. He thought there might yet be +hope, and went immediately to Dr. Radcliffe, with whom he was +well acquainted, told him Mr. Pope's case, got full directions from +him, and carried them down to Pope in Windsor Forest. The +chief thing the Doctor ordered him was to apply less, and to ride +every day. The following his advice soon restored him to his +health.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> (ibid.). +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_124" name="note_124" href="#noteref_124">124.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">MR. +POPE TO THE REV. MR. BROOME, PULHAM, +NORFOLK.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Aug. 29, 1730.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Sir,—</span></span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I intended to write to you on this melancholy subject, the +death of Mr. Fenton, before yours came, but stayed to have informed +myself and you of the circumstances of it. All I hear is, +that he felt a gradual decay, though so early in life, and was declining +for five or six months. It was not, as I apprehended, the gout +in his stomach, but, I believe, rather a complication first of gross +humours, as he was naturally corpulent, not discharging themselves, +as he used no sort of exercise. No man better bore the approaches +of his dissolution (as I am told), or with less ostentation yielded +up his being. The great modesty which you know was natural to +him, and the great contempt he had for all sorts of vanity and +parade, never appeared more than in his last moments: he had +a conscious satisfaction (no doubt) in acting right, in feeling himself +honest, true, and unpretending to more than his own. So he +died as he lived, with that secret, yet sufficient contentment.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As to any papers left behind him, I dare say they can be but +few; for this reason, he never wrote out of vanity, or thought +much of the applause of men. I know an instance when he did +his utmost to conceal his own merit that way; and if we join to +this his natural love of ease, I fancy we must expect little of this +sort: at least, I have heard of none, except some few further +remarks on Waller (which his cautious integrity made him leave +an order to be given to Mr. Tonson), and perhaps, though it is +many years since I saw it, a translation of the first book of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Oppian</span></span>. +He had begun a tragedy of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dion</span></span>, but made small progress in it.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As to his other affairs, he died poor but honest, leaving no +debts or legacies, except of a few pounds to Mr. Trumbull and my +lady, in token of respect, gratefulness, and mutual esteem.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I shall, with pleasure, take upon me to draw this amiable, +quiet, deserving, unpretending, Christian, unphilosophical character +in his epitaph. There truth may be spoken in a few words; as +for flourish, and oratory, and poetry, I leave them to younger +and more lively writers, such as love writing for writing sake, and +would rather show their own fine parts than report the valuable +ones of any other man. So the elegy I renounce.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I condole with you from my heart on the loss of so worthy +a man, and a friend to us both....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Adieu; let us love his memory, and profit by his example. +Am very sincerely, dear sir,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Your affectionate and real servant.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">TO THE EARL OF BURLINGTON</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“August, 1714.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">My Lord</span></span>,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“If your mare could speak she would give you an account +of what extraordinary company she had on the road, which, since +she cannot do, I will.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It was the enterprising Mr. Lintot, the redoubtable rival of +Mr. Tonson, who, mounted on a stonehorse, overtook me in Windsor +Forest. He said he heard I designed for Oxford, the seat of the +Muses, and would, as my bookseller, by all means accompany me +thither.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I asked him where he got his horse? He answered he got it of +his publisher; <span class="tei tei-q">‘for that rogue, my printer,’</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘disappointed +me. I hoped to put him in good humour by a treat at the tavern +of a brown fricassée of rabbits, which cost ten shillings, with two +quarts of wine, besides my conversation. I thought myself cocksure +of his horse, which he readily promised me, but said that +Mr. Tonson had just such another design of going to Cambridge, +expecting there the copy of a new kind of Horace from Dr. ——; +and if Mr. Tonson went, he was pre-engaged to attend him, being +to have the printing of the said copy. So, in short, I borrowed +this stonehorse of my publisher, which he had of Mr. Oldmixon +for a debt. He lent me, too, the pretty boy you see after me. +He was a smutty dog yesterday, and cost me more than two hours +to wash the ink off his face; but the devil is a fair-conditioned +devil, and very forward in his catechism. If you have any more +bags he shall carry them.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I thought Mr. Lintot's civility not to be neglected, so gave the +boy a small bag containing three shirts and an Elzevir Virgil, and, +mounting in an instant, proceeded on the road, with my man before, +my courteous stationer beside, and the aforesaid devil behind.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Lintot began in this manner: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Now, damn them! What +if they should put it into the newspaper how you and I went +together to Oxford? What would I care? If I should go down +into Sussex they would say I was gone to the Speaker; but what +of that? If my son were but big enough to go on with the business, +by G-d, I would keep as good company as old Jacob.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hereupon, I inquired of his son. <span class="tei tei-q">‘The lad,’</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘has fine +parts, but is somewhat sickly, much as you are. I spare for nothing +in his education at Westminster. Pray, don't you think Westminster +to be the best school in England? Most of the late Ministry +came out of it; so did many of this Ministry. I hope the boy +will make his fortune.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Don't you design to let him pass a year at Oxford?’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘To +what purpose?’</span> said he. <span class="tei tei-q">‘The Universities do but make pedants, +and I intend to breed him a man of business.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As Mr. Lintot was talking I observed he sat uneasy on his +saddle, for which I expressed some solicitude. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Nothing,’</span> says he. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘I can bear it well enough; but, since we have the day before us, +methinks it would be very pleasant for you to rest awhile under +the woods.’</span> When we were alighted, <span class="tei tei-q">‘See, here, what a mighty +pretty Horace I have in my pocket! What, if you amused yourself +in turning an ode till we mount again? Lord! if you pleased. +What a clever miscellany might you make at leisure hours!’</span> +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Perhaps I may,’</span> said I, <span class="tei tei-q">‘if we ride on; the motion is an aid to +my fancy; a round trot very much awakens my spirits; then jog +on apace, and I'll think as hard as I can.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Silence ensued for a full hour; after which Mr. Lintot lugged +the reins, stopped short, and broke out, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Well, sir, how far have +you gone?’</span> I answered, seven miles. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Z—ds, sir,’</span> said Lintot, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘I thought you had done seven stanzas. Oldisworth, in a ramble +round Wimbledon Hill, would translate a whole ode in half this +time. I'll say that for Oldisworth [though I lost by his Timothy's] +he translates an ode of Horace the quickest of any man in England. +I remember Dr. King would write verses in a tavern, three hours +after he could not speak: and there is Sir Richard, in that rumbling +old chariot of his, between Fleet Ditch and St. Giles's pound shall +make you half a Job.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Pray, Mr. Lintot,’</span> said I, <span class="tei tei-q">‘now you talk of translators, what +is your method of managing them?’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘Sir,’</span> replied he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘these +are the saddest pack of rogues in the world: in a hungry fit, they'll +swear they understand all the languages in the universe. I have +known one of them take down a Greek book upon my counter, +and cry, <span class="tei tei-q">“Ah, this is Hebrew,”</span> and must read it from the latter +end. By G-d, I can never be sure in these fellows, for I neither +understand Greek, Latin, French, nor Italian myself. But this is +my way; I agree with them for ten shillings per sheet, with a +proviso that I will have their doings corrected with whom I please; +so by one or the other they are led at last to the true sense of an +author; my judgement giving the negative to all my translators.’</span> +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Then how are you sure these correctors may not impose upon +you?’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘Why, I get any civil gentleman (especially any Scotchman) +that comes into my shop, to read the original to me in English; +by this I know whether my first translator be deficient, and whether +my corrector merits his money or not.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘I'll tell you what happened to me last month. I bargained +with S—— for a new version of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lucretius</span></span>, to publish against Tonson's, +agreeing to pay the author so many shillings at his producing +so many lines. He made a great progress in a very short time, +and I gave it to the corrector to compare with the Latin; but +he went directly to Creech's translation, and found it the same, +word for word, all but the first page. Now, what d'ye think I did? +I arrested the translator for a cheat; nay, and I stopped the +corrector's pay, too, upon the proof that he had made use of Creech +instead of the original.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Pray tell me next how you deal with the critics?’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘Sir,’</span> +said he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘nothing more easy. I can silence the most formidable +of them; the rich ones for a sheet a-piece of the blotted manuscript, +which cost me nothing; they'll go about with it to their +acquaintance, and pretend they had it from the author, who submitted +it to their correction: this has given some of them such an +air, that in time they come to be consulted with and dedicated to +as the tip-top critics of the town.—As for the poor critics, I'll +give you one instance of my management, by which you may guess +the rest: a lean man, that looked like a very good scholar, came +to me, t'other day; he turned over your Homer, shook his head, +shrugged up his shoulders, and pish'd at every line of it. <span class="tei tei-q">“One +would wonder,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“at the strange presumption of some men; +Homer is no such easy task as every stripling, every versifier—”</span> +He was going on, when my wife called to dinner; <span class="tei tei-q">“Sir,”</span> said I, +<span class="tei tei-q">“will you please to eat a piece of beef with me?”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Lintot,”</span> +said he, <span class="tei tei-q">“I am very sorry you should be at the expense of this +great book, I am really concerned on your account.”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Sir, I am +much obliged to you: if you can dine upon a piece of beef together +with a slice of pudding—?”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Lintot, I do not say but Mr. Pope, +if he would condescend to advise with men of learning—”</span> <span class="tei tei-q">“Sir, +the pudding is upon the table, if you please to go in.”</span> My critic +complies; he comes to a taste of your poetry, and tells me in the +same breath, that the book is commendable, and the pudding +excellent.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“ <span class="tei tei-q">‘Now, sir,’</span> continued Mr. Lintot, <span class="tei tei-q">‘in return for the frankness +I have shown, pray tell me, is it the opinion of your friends at +Court that my Lord Lansdowne will be brought to the bar or not?’</span> +I told him I heard he would not, and I hoped it, my lord being +one I had particular obligations to.—<span class="tei tei-q">‘That may be,’</span> replied +Mr. Lintot; <span class="tei tei-q">‘but by G— if he is not, I shall lose the printing +of a very good trial.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“These, my lord, are a few traits with which you discern the +genius of Mr. Lintot, which I have chosen for the subject of a +letter. I dropped him as soon as I got to Oxford, and paid a visit +to my Lord Carleton, at Middleton....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am,”</span> &c. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +DR. SWIFT TO MR. POPE. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Sept. 29, 1725.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am now returning to the noble scene of Dublin—into the +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">grand monde</span></span>—for +fear of burying my parts; to signalize myself +among curates and vicars, and correct all corruptions crept in +relating to the weight of bread-and-butter through those dominions +where I govern. I have employed my time (besides ditching) in +finishing, correcting, amending, and transcribing my <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Travels</span></span> +[<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gulliver's</span></span>], +in four parts complete, newly augmented, and intended +for the press when the world shall deserve them, or rather, when +a printer shall be found brave enough to venture his ears. I like +the scheme of our meeting after distresses and dissensions; but +the chief end I propose to myself in all my labours is to vex the +world rather than divert it; and if I could compass that design +without hurting my own person and fortune, I would be the most +indefatigable writer you have ever seen, without reading. I am +exceedingly pleased that you have done with translations; Lord +Treasurer Oxford often lamented that a rascally world should lay +you under a necessity of misemploying your genius for so long +a time; but since you will now be so much better employed, when +you think of the world, give it one lash the more at my request. +I have ever hated all societies, professions, and communities; and +all my love is towards individuals—for instance, I hate the tribe +of lawyers, but I love Councillor Such-a-one and Judge Such-a-one: +it is so with physicians (I will not speak of my own trade), soldiers, +English, Scotch, French, and the rest. But principally I hate and +detest that animal called man—although I heartily love John, +Peter, Thomas, and so on.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“... I have got materials towards a treatise proving the falsity +of that definition <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">animal rationale</span></em>, and to show it should be only +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">rationis capax</span></span>.... +The matter is so clear that it will admit of +no dispute—nay, I will hold a hundred pounds that you and I agree +in the point....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dr. Lewis sent me an account of Dr. Arbuthnot's illness, which +is a very sensible affliction to me, who, by living so long out of +the world, have lost that hardness of heart contracted by years +and general conversation. I am daily losing friends, and neither +seeking nor getting others. Oh, if the world had but a dozen of +Arbuthnots in it, I would burn my <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Travels</span></span>!”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +MR. POPE TO DR. SWIFT. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“October 15, 1725.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am wonderfully pleased with the suddenness of your kind +answer. It makes me hope you are coming towards us, and that +you incline more and more to your old friends.... Here is one +[Lord Bolingbroke] who was once a powerful planet, but has now +(after long experience of all that comes of shining) learned to be +content with returning to his first point without the thought or +ambition of shining at all. Here is another [Edward, Earl of +Oxford], who thinks one of the greatest glories of his father was +to have distinguished and loved you, and who loves you hereditarily. +Here is Arbuthnot, recovered from the jaws of death, +and more pleased with the hope of seeing you again than of reviewing +a world, every part of which he has long despised but what +is made up of a few men like yourself....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Our friend Gay is used as the friends of Tories are by Whigs—and +generally by Tories too. Because he had humour, he was +supposed to have dealt with Dr. Swift, in like manner as when +any one had learning formerly, he was thought to have dealt with +the devil....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Lord Bolingbroke had not the least harm by his fall; I wish +he had received no more by his other fall. But Lord Bolingbroke +is the most improved mind since you saw him, that ever was improved +without shifting into a new body, or being <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">paullo minus +ab angelis</span></span>. I have often imagined to myself, that if ever all of us +meet again, after so many varieties and changes, after so much of +the old world and of the old man in each of us has been altered, +that scarce a single thought of the one, any more than a single +action of the other, remains just the same; I have fancied, I say, +that we should meet like the righteous in the millennium, quite +at peace, divested of all our former passions, smiling at our past +follies, and content to enjoy the kingdom of the just in tranquillity.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +—— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I designed to have left the following page for Dr. Arbuthnot to +fill, but he is so touched with the period in yours to me, concerning +him, that he intends to answer it by a whole letter.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_125" name="note_125" href="#noteref_125">125.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Of +the Earl of Peterborough, Walpole says:—<span class="tei tei-q">“He was one of +those men of careless wit, and negligent grace, who scatter a +thousand <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">bons mots</span></span> +and idle verses, which we painful compilers +gather and hoard, till the authors stare to find themselves authors. +Such was this lord, of an advantageous figure, and enterprising +spirit; as gallant as Amadis and as brave; but a little more expeditious +in his journeys; for he is said to have seen more kings and +more postilions than any man in Europe.... He was a man, +as his friend said, who would neither live nor die like any other +mortal.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +FROM THE EARL OF PETERBOROUGH TO POPE. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You must receive my letter with a just impartiality, and give +grains of allowance for a gloomy or rainy day; I sink grievously +with the weather-glass, and am quite spiritless when oppressed +with the thoughts of a birthday or a return.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Dutiful affection was bringing me to town, but undutiful laziness, +and being much out of order keep me in the country: however, +if alive, I must make my appearance at the birthday....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You seem to think it vexatious that I shall allow you but one +woman at a time either to praise or love. If I dispute with you +on this point, I doubt, every jury will give a verdict against me. +So, sir, with a Mahometan indulgence, I allow you pluralities, the +favourite privileges of our Church.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I find you don't mend upon correction; again I tell you you +must not think of women in a reasonable way; you know we +always make goddesses of those we adore upon earth; and do not +all the good men tell us we must lay aside reason in what relates +to the Deity?</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“... I should have been glad of anything of Swift's. Pray +when you write to him next, tell him I expect him with impatience, +in a place as odd and as out of the way as himself.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yours.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Peterborough married Mrs. Anastasia Robinson, the celebrated +singer.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_126" name="note_126" href="#noteref_126">126.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Button +had been a servant in the Countess of Warwick's +family, who, under the patronage of Addison, kept a coffee-house +on the south side of Russell Street, about two doors from Covent +Garden. Here it was that the wits of that time used to assemble. +It is said that when Addison had suffered any vexation from the +Countess, he withdrew the company from Button's house.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“From the coffee-house he went again to a tavern, where he +often sat late and drank too much wine.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Johnson</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Will's coffee-house was on the west side of Bow Street, and +<span class="tei tei-q">“corner of Russell Street”</span>. See <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Handbook of London</span></span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_127" name="note_127" href="#noteref_127">127.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“My +acquaintance with Mr. Addison commenced in 1712: I +liked him then as well as I liked any man, and was very fond of +his conversation. It was very soon after that Mr. Addison advised +me <span class="tei tei-q">‘not to be content with the applause of half the nation’</span>. He +used to talk much and often to me, of moderation in parties: and +used to blame his dear friend Steele for being too much of a party +man. He encouraged me in my design of translating the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Iliad</span></span>, +which was begun that year, and finished in +1718.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's +Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_128" name="note_128" href="#noteref_128">128.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Addison, +who was no stranger to the world, probably saw +the selfishness of Pope's friendship; and, resolving that he should +have the consequences of his officiousness to himself, informed +Dennis by Steele that he was sorry for the +insult.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Johnson</span></span> (<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life +of Addison</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_129" name="note_129" href="#noteref_129">129.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“While +I was heated with what I had heard, I wrote a letter +to Mr. Addison, to let him know <span class="tei tei-q">‘that I was not unacquainted with +this behaviour of his; that if I was to speak of him severely in +return for it, it should not be in such a dirty way; that I should +rather tell him himself fairly of his faults, and allow his good +qualities; and that it should be something in the following manner.’</span> +I then subjoined the first sketch of what has since been called my +satire on Addison. He used me very civilly ever after; and never +did me any injustice, that I know of, from that time to his death, +which was about three years after.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Pope</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_130" name="note_130" href="#noteref_130">130.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“That +Tickell should have been guilty of a villany seems to +us highly improbable; that Addison should have been guilty of +a villany seems to us highly improbable; but that these two men +should have conspired together to commit a villany, seems, to +us, improbable in a tenfold degree.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Macaulay</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_131" name="note_131" href="#noteref_131">131.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">LORD +BOLINGBROKE TO THE THREE YAHOOS OF TWICKENHAM. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“July 23, 1726.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Jonathan, Alexander, John, most excellent Triumvirs Of +Parnassus</span></span>,—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Though you are probably very indifferent where I am, or +what I am doing, yet I resolve to believe the contrary. I persuade +myself that you have sent at least fifteen times within this fortnight +to Dawley farm, and that you are extremely mortified at +my long silence. To relieve you, therefore, from this great anxiety +of mind, I can do no less than write a few lines to you; and I please +myself beforehand with the vast pleasure which this epistle must +needs give you. That I may add to this pleasure, and give further +proofs of my beneficent temper, I will likewise inform you, that +I shall be in your neighbourhood again, by the end of next week: +by which time I hope that Jonathan's imagination of business will +be succeeded by some imagination more becoming a professor of +that divine science, <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">la bagatelle</span></span>. +Adieu. Jonathan, Alexander, John, mirth be with you!”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_132" name="note_132" href="#noteref_132">132.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Prior must be +excepted from this observation. <span class="tei tei-q">“He was lank +and lean.”</span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_133" name="note_133" href="#noteref_133">133.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Swift exerted +himself very much in promoting the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Iliad</span></span> subscription; +and also introduced Pope to Harley and Bolingbroke.—Pope +realized by the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Iliad</span></span> upwards of +5,000<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, which he laid out +partly in annuities, and partly in the purchase of his famous villa. +Johnson remarks that <span class="tei tei-q">“it would be hard to find a man so well +entitled to notice by his wit, that ever delighted so much in talking +of his money”</span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_134" name="note_134" href="#noteref_134">134.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Garth, +whom Dryden calls <span class="tei tei-q">“generous as his Muse”</span>, was a +Yorkshireman. He graduated at Cambridge, and was made M.D. +in 1691. He soon distinguished himself in his profession, by his +poem of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dispensary</span></span>, and in society, and pronounced Dryden's +funeral oration. He was a strict Whig, a notable member of the +Kit-Kat and a friendly, convivial, able man. He was knighted by +George I, with the Duke of Marlborough's sword. He died in +1718.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_135" name="note_135" href="#noteref_135">135.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Arbuthnot +was the son of an episcopal clergyman in Scotland, +and belonged to an ancient and distinguished Scotch family. He +was educated at Aberdeen; and, coming up to London—according +to a Scotch practice often enough alluded to—to make his fortune—first +made himself known by <span class="tei tei-q">‘an examination of Dr. Woodward's +account of the Deluge’</span>. He became physician, successively to +Prince George of Denmark and to Queen Anne. He is usually +allowed to have been the most learned, as well as one of the most +witty and humorous members of the Scriblerus Club. The opinion +entertained of him by the humourists of the day is abundantly +evidenced in their correspondence. When he found himself in his +last illness, he wrote thus, from his retreat at Hampstead, to Swift:</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Hampstead, Oct. 4, 1734.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">My Dear and Worthy Friend,</span></span>—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“You have no reason to put me among the rest of your forgetful +friends, for I wrote two long letters to you, to which I never +received one word of answer. The first was about your health; +the last I sent a great while ago, by one De la Mar. I can assure +you with great truth that none of your friends or acquaintance +has a more warm heart towards you than myself. I am going out +of this troublesome world, and you, among the rest of my friends, +shall have my last prayers and good wishes.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“... I came out to this place so reduced by a dropsy and an +asthma, that I could neither sleep, breathe, eat, nor move. I most +earnestly desired and begged of God that he would take me. Contrary +to my expectation, upon venturing to ride (which I had +forborne for some years), I recovered my strength to a pretty +considerable degree, slept, and had my stomach again.... What +I did, I can assure you was not for life, but ease; for I am at +present in the case of a man that was almost in harbour, and then +blown back to sea—who has a reasonable hope of going to a good +place, and an absolute certainty of leaving a very bad one. Not +that I have any particular disgust at the world; for I have as +great comfort in my own family and from the kindness of my +friends as any man; but the world, in the main, displeases me, +and I have too true a presentiment of calamities that are to befall +my country. However, if I should have the happiness to see you +before I die, you will find that I enjoy the comforts of life with +my usual cheerfulness. I cannot imagine why you are frightened +from a journey to England: the reasons you assign are not sufficient—the +journey I am sure would do you good. In general, +I recommend riding, of which I have always had a good opinion, +and can now confirm it from my own experience.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My family give you their love and service. The great loss +I sustained in one of them gave me my first shock, and the trouble +I have with the rest to bring them to a right temper to bear the +loss of a father who loves them, and whom they love, is really +a most sensible affliction to me. I am afraid, my dear friend, we +shall never see one another more in this world. I shall, to the last +moment, preserve my love and esteem for you, being well assured +you will never leave the paths of virtue and honour; for all that +is in this world is not worth the least deviation from the way. It +will be great pleasure to me to hear from you sometimes; for none +are with more sincerity than I am, my dear friend, your most +faithful friend and humble servant.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Arbuthnot,”</span> Johnson says, <span class="tei tei-q">“was a man of great comprehension, +skilful in his profession, versed in the sciences, acquainted with +ancient literature, and able to animate his mass of knowledge by +a bright and active imagination; a scholar with great brilliance +of wit; a wit who in the crowd of life, retained and discovered +a noble ardour of religious zeal.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Dugald Stewart has testified to Arbuthnot's ability in a department +of which he was particularly qualified to judge: <span class="tei tei-q">“Let me +add, that, in the list of philosophical reformers, the authors of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Martinus Scriblerus</span></span> ought not to be overlooked. Their happy +ridicule of the scholastic logic and metaphysics is universally known; +but few are aware of the acuteness and sagacity displayed in their +allusions to some of the most vulnerable passages in Locke's Essay. +In this part of the work it is commonly understood that Arbuthnot +had the principal share.”</span>—See Preliminary Dissertation to +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Encyclopaedia +Britannica</span></span>, note to p. 242, and also note B. B. B., p. 285. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_136" name="note_136" href="#noteref_136">136.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO MR. RICHARDSON. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Twickenham, June 10, 1733.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As I know you and I mutually desire to see one another, I hope +that this day our wishes would have met, and brought you hither. +And this for the very reason, which possibly might hinder you +coming, that my poor mother is dead. I thank God, her death +was as easy as her life was innocent; and as it cost her not a groan, +or even a sigh, there is yet upon her countenance such an expression +of tranquillity, nay, almost of pleasure, that it is even amiable to +behold it. It would afford the finest image of a saint expired +that ever painter drew; and it would be the greatest obligation +which even that obliging art could ever bestow on a friend, if you +could come and sketch it for me. I am sure, if there be no very +precedent obstacle, you will leave any common business to do this; +and I hope to see you this evening, or to-morrow morning as early, +before this winter flower is faded. I will defer her interment till +to-morrow night. I know you love me, or I could not have written +this—I could not (at this time) have written at all. Adieu! May +you die as happy!</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Yours,”</span> &c. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_137" name="note_137" href="#noteref_137">137.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. +Pope was with Sir Godfrey Kneller one day, when his +nephew, a Guinea trader, came in. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Nephew,’</span> said Sir Godfrey, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘you have the honour of seeing the two greatest men in the +world.’</span>—<span class="tei tei-q">‘I don't know how great you may be,’</span> said the Guinea +man, <span class="tei tei-q">‘but I don't like your looks: I have often bought a man, +much better than both of you together, all muscles and bones, for +ten guineas.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Warburton</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spence's Anecdotes</span></span>).</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_138" name="note_138" href="#noteref_138">138.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Swift's mention of him as one +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +—— whose filial piety excels,<br /> +Whatever Grecian story tells, +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +is well known. And a sneer of Walpole's may be put to a better +use than he ever intended it for, à propos of this subject.—He +charitably sneers, in one of his letters, at Spence's <span class="tei tei-q">“fondling an +old mother—in imitation of Pope!”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_139" name="note_139" href="#noteref_139">139.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Joseph Spence +was the son of a clergyman, near Winchester. +He was a short time at Eton, and afterwards became a Fellow of +New College, Oxford, a clergyman, and professor of poetry. He +was a friend of Thomson's, whose reputation he aided. He published +an <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Essay on the Odyssey</span></span> in 1726, which introduced him to +Pope. Everybody liked him. His <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Anecdotes</span></span> were placed, while +still in MS., at the service of Johnson and also of Malone. They +were published by Mr. Singer in 1820.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_140" name="note_140" href="#noteref_140">140.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">He speaks of Arbuthnot's having helped him through <span class="tei tei-q">“that +long disease, my life”</span>. But not only was he so feeble as is implied +in his use of the <span class="tei tei-q">“buckram”</span>, but <span class="tei tei-q">“it now appears”</span>, says Mr. Peter +Cunningham, <span class="tei tei-q">“from his unpublished letters, that, like Lord Hervey, +he had recourse to ass's-milk for the preservation of his health.”</span> +It is to his lordship's use of that simple beverage that he alludes +when he says— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Let Sporus tremble!—A. What, that thing of silk,<br /> +Sporus, that mere white-curd of ass's-milk? +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_141" name="note_141" href="#noteref_141">141.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“He +(Johnson) repeated to us, in his forcible melodious manner, +the concluding lines of the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Dunciad</span></span>.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Boswell</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_142" name="note_142" href="#noteref_142">142.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Langton +informed me that he once related to Johnson +(on the authority of Spence), that Pope himself admired these +lines so much that when he repeated them his voice faltered. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘And well it might, sir,’</span> said Johnson, <span class="tei tei-q">‘for they are noble lines.’</span> ”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">J. Boswell</span></span>, junior. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_143" name="note_143" href="#noteref_143">143.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Coleridge speaks +of the <span class="tei tei-q">“beautiful female faces”</span> in Hogarth's +pictures, <span class="tei tei-q">“in whom,”</span> he says, <span class="tei tei-q">“the satirist never extinguished that +love of beauty which belonged to him as a +poet.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Friend.</span></span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_144" name="note_144" href="#noteref_144">144.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“I was +pleased with the reply of a gentleman, who, being +asked which book he esteemed most in his library, answered, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Shakespeare’</span>: being asked which he esteemed next best, replied +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Hogarth’</span>. His graphic representations are indeed books: they +have the teeming, fruitful, suggestive meaning of <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">words</span></em>. Other +pictures we look at—his prints we read....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The quantity of thought which Hogarth crowds into every +picture would almost unvulgarize every subject which he might +choose....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I say not that all the ridiculous subjects of Hogarth have +necessarily something in them to make us like them; some are +indifferent to us, some in their nature repulsive, and only made +interesting by the wonderful skill and truth to nature in the painter; +but I contend that there is in most of them that sprinkling of the +better nature, which, like holy water, chases away and disperses +the contagion of the bad. They have this in them, besides, that +they bring us acquainted with the every-day human face,—they +give us skill to detect those gradations of sense and virtue (which +escape the careless or fastidious observer) in the circumstances of +the world about us; and prevent that disgust at common life, +that <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">taedium quotidianarum formarum</span></span>, +which an unrestricted passion +for ideal forms and beauties is in danger of producing. In this, +as in many other things, they are analogous to the best novels of +Smollett and Fielding.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Charles Lamb</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It has been observed that Hogarth's pictures are exceedingly +unlike any other representations of the same kind of subjects—that +they form a class, and have a character, peculiar to themselves. +It may be worth while to consider in what this general +distinction consists.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“In the first place, they are, in the strictest sense, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">historical</span></em> +pictures; and if what Fielding says be true, that his novel of +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tom Jones</span></span> ought to be regarded as an epic prose-poem, because +it contained a regular development of fable, manners, character, +and passion, the compositions of Hogarth, will, in like manner, +be found to have a higher claim to the title of epic pictures than +many which have of late arrogated that denomination to themselves. +When we say that Hogarth treated his subjects historically, +we mean that his works represent the manners and humours of +mankind in action, and their characters by varied expression. +Everything in his pictures has life and motion in it. Not only +does the business of the scene never stand still, but every feature +and muscle is put into full play; the exact feeling of the moment +is brought out, and carried to its utmost height, and then instantly +seized and stamped on the canvas for ever. The expression is +always taken <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">en passant</span></span>, +in a state of progress or change, and, as +it were, at the salient point.... His figures are not like the background +on which they are painted: even the pictures on the wall +have a peculiar look of their own. Again, with the rapidity, variety, +and scope of history, Hogarth's heads have all the reality and +correctness of portraits. He gives the extremes of character and +expression, but he gives them with perfect truth and accuracy. +This is, in fact, what distinguishes his compositions from all others +of the same kind, that they are equally remote from caricature, +and from mere still life.... His faces go to the very verge of +caricature, and yet never (we believe in any single instance) go +beyond it.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Hazlitt</span></span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_145" name="note_145" href="#noteref_145">145.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">He +made this excursion in 1732, his companions being John +Thornhill (son of Sir James), Scott the landscape-painter, Tothall, +and Forrest.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_146" name="note_146" href="#noteref_146">146.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Dr. Johnson +made four lines once, on the death of poor +Hogarth, which were equally true and pleasing: I know not why +Garrick's were preferred to them:—</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The hand of him here torpid lies,<br /> +That drew th' essential forms of grace;<br /> +Here, closed in death, th' attentive eyes,<br /> +That saw the manners in the face. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Hogarth, among the variety of kindnesses shown to me +when I was too young to have a proper sense of them, was used to +be very earnest that I should obtain the acquaintance, and if possible +the friendship, of Dr. Johnson; whose conversation was, to +the talk of other men, like Titian's painting compared to Hudson's, +he said: <span class="tei tei-q">‘but don't you tell people now that I say so’</span> (continued +he) <span class="tei tei-q">‘for the connoisseurs and I are at war, you know; and because +I hate <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">them</span></em>, they think I hate <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Titian</span></span>—and +let them!’</span> ... Of Dr. Johnson, when my father and he were talking about him one +day, <span class="tei tei-q">‘That man’</span> (says Hogarth) <span class="tei tei-q">‘is not contented with believing +the Bible; but he fairly resolves, I think, to believe nothing <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">but</span></em> +the Bible. Johnson’</span> (added he), <span class="tei tei-q">‘though so wise a fellow, is more +like King David than King Solomon, for he says in his haste, <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">All +men are liars</span></em>.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Mrs. Piozzi</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Hogarth died on the 26th of October, 1764. The day before his +death, he was removed from his villa at Chiswick to Leicester +Fields, <span class="tei tei-q">“in a very weak condition, yet remarkably cheerful.”</span> He +had just received an agreeable letter from Franklin. He lies buried +at Chiswick. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_147" name="note_147" href="#noteref_147">147.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">TO +SIR WATKIN PHILLIPS, BART., OF JESUS COLLEGE, OXON. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dear Phillips</span></span>,—In +my last, I mentioned my having spent an +evening with a society of authors, who seemed to be jealous and +afraid of one another. My uncle was not at all surprised to hear +me say I was disappointed in their conversation. <span class="tei tei-q">‘A man may +be very entertaining and instructive upon paper,’</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘and +exceedingly dull in common discourse. I have observed, that those +who shine most in private company are but secondary stars in the +constellation of genius. A small stock of ideas is more easily +managed, and sooner displayed, than a great quantity crowded +together. There is very seldom anything extraordinary in the +appearance and address of a good writer; whereas a dull author +generally distinguishes himself by some oddity or extravagance. +For this reason I fancy that an assembly of grubs must be very +diverting.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“My curiosity being excited by this hint, I consulted my friend +Dick Ivy, who undertook to gratify it the very next day, which +was Sunday last. He carried me to dine with S——, whom you +and I have long known by his writings. He lives in the skirts of +the town; and every Sunday his house is open to all unfortunate +brothers of the quill, whom he treats with beef, pudding, and +potatoes, port, punch, and Calvert's entire butt beer. He has fixed +upon the first day of the week for the exercise of his hospitality, +because some of his guests could not enjoy it on any other, for +reasons that I need not explain. I was civilly received in a plain, +yet decent habitation, which opened backwards into a very pleasant +garden, kept in excellent order; and, indeed, I saw none of the +outward signs of authorship either in the house or the landlord, +who is one of those few writers of the age that stand upon their +own foundation, without patronage, and above dependence. If +there was nothing characteristic in the entertainer, the company +made ample amends for his want of singularity.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At two in the afternoon, I found myself one of ten messmates +seated at table; and I question if the whole kingdom could produce +such another assemblage of originals. Among their peculiarities, +I do not mention those of dress, which may be purely accidental. +What struck me were oddities originally produced by affectation, +and afterwards confirmed by habit. One of them wore spectacles +at dinner, and another his hat flapped; though (as Ivy told me) +the first was noted for having a seaman's eye, when a bailiff was +in the wind; and the other was never known to labour under any +weakness or defect of vision, except about five years ago, when +he was complimented with a couple of black eyes by a player, +with whom he had quarrelled in his drink. A third wore a laced +stocking, and made use of crutches, because, once in his life, he +had been laid up with a broken leg, though no man could leap +over a stick with more agility. A fourth had contracted such an +antipathy to the country, that he insisted upon sitting with his +back towards the window that looked into the garden; and when +a dish of cauliflower was set upon the table, he snuffed up volatile +salts to keep him from fainting; yet this delicate person was the +son of a cottager, born under a hedge, and had many years run +wild among asses on a common. A fifth affected distraction: when +spoke to, he always answered from the purpose. Sometimes he +suddenly started up, and rapped out a dreadful oath; sometimes +he burst out a-laughing; then he folded his arms, and sighed; +and then he hissed like fifty serpents.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“At first, I really thought he was mad; and, as he sat near me, +began to be under some apprehensions for my own safety; when +our landlord, perceiving me alarmed, assured me aloud that I had +nothing to fear. <span class="tei tei-q">‘The gentleman,’</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘is trying to act +a part for which he is by no means qualified: if he had all the +inclination in the world, it is not in his power to be mad; his +spirits are too flat to be kindled into phrenzy.’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘'Tis no bad +p-p-puff, how-owever,’</span> observed a person in a tarnished laced coat: +<span class="tei tei-q">‘aff-ffected m-madness w-will p-pass for w-wit w-with nine-nineteen +out of t-twenty.’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘And affected stuttering for humour,’</span> +replied our landlord; <span class="tei tei-q">‘though, God knows! there is no affinity +betwixt them.’</span> It seems this wag, after having made some abortive +attempts in plain speaking, had recourse to this defect, by means +of which he frequently extorted the laugh of the company, without +the least expense of genius; and that imperfection, which he had +at first counterfeited, was now become so habitual, that he could +not lay it aside.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A certain winking genius, who wore yellow gloves at dinner, +had, on his first introduction, taken such offence at S——, because +he looked and talked, and ate and drank, like any other man, +that he spoke contemptuously of his understanding ever after, and +never would repeat his visit, until he had exhibited the following +proof of his caprice. Wat Wyvil, the poet, having made some +unsuccessful advances towards an intimacy with S——, at last gave +him to understand, by a third person, that he had written a poem +in his praise, and a satire against his person: that if he would +admit him to his house, the first should be immediately sent to +press; but that if he persisted in declining his friendship, he would +publish the satire without delay. S—— replied, that he looked +upon Wyvil's panegyric as, in effect, a species of infamy, and would +resent it accordingly with a good cudgel; but if he published the +satire, he might deserve his compassion, and had nothing to fear +from his revenge. Wyvil having considered the alternative, resolved +to mortify S—— by printing the panegyric, for which he received +a sound drubbing. Then he swore the peace against the aggressor, +who, in order to avoid a prosecution at law, admitted him to his +good graces. It was the singularity in S——'s conduct on this +occasion, that reconciled him to the yellow-gloved philosopher, who +owned he had some genius; and from that period cultivated his +acquaintance.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Curious to know upon what subjects the several talents of my +fellow guests were employed, I applied to my communicative friend +Dick Ivy, who gave me to understand that most of them were, or +had been, understrappers, or journeymen, to more creditable authors, +for whom they translated, collated, and compiled, in the business +of bookmaking; and that all of them had, at different times, +laboured in the service of our landlord, though they had now set +up for themselves in various departments of literature. Not only +their talents, but also their nations and dialects, were so various, +that our conversation resembled the confusion of tongues at Babel. +We had the Irish brogue, the Scotch accent, and foreign idiom, +twanged off by the most discordant vociferation; for as they all +spoke together, no man had any chance to be heard, unless he +could bawl louder than his fellows. It must be owned, however, +there was nothing pedantic in their discourse; they carefully +avoided all learned disquisitions, and endeavoured to be facetious; +nor did their endeavours always miscarry; some droll repartee +passed, and much laughter was excited; and if any individual +lost his temper so far as to transgress the bounds of decorum, he +was effectually checked by the master of the feast, who exerted +a sort of paternal authority over this irritable tribe.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The most learned philosopher of the whole collection, who had +been expelled the university for atheism, has made great progress +in a refutation of Lord Bolingbroke's metaphysical works, which +is said to be equally ingenious and orthodox: but in the meantime, +he has been presented to the grand jury as a public nuisance for +having blasphemed in an alehouse on the Lord's Day. The Scotchman +gives lectures on the pronunciation of the English language, +which he is now publishing by subscription.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The Irishman is a political writer, and goes by the name of +My Lord Potatoe. He wrote a pamphlet in vindication of a minister, +hoping his zeal would be rewarded with some place or pension; +but finding himself neglected in that quarter, he whispered about +that the pamphlet was written by the minister himself, and he +published an answer to his own production. In this he addressed +the author under the title of <span class="tei tei-q">‘your lordship’</span>, with such solemnity, +that the public swallowed the deceit, and bought up the whole +impression. The wise politicians of the metropolis declared they +were both masterly performances, and chuckled over the flimsy +reveries of an ignorant garreteer, as the profound speculations of +a veteran statesman, acquainted with all the secrets of the cabinet. +The imposture was detected in the sequel, and our Hibernian +pamphleteer retains no part of his assumed importance but the +bare title of <span class="tei tei-q">‘my lord’</span>, and the upper part of the table at the +potatoe-ordinary in Shoe Lane.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Opposite to me sat a Piedmontese, who had obliged the public +with a humorous satire, entitled <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Balance of the English Poets</span></span>; +a performance which evinced the great modesty and taste of the +author, and, in particular, his intimacy with the elegances of the +English language. The sage, who laboured under the ἀγροφοβία, +or <span class="tei tei-q">‘horror of green fields’</span>, had just finished a treatise on practical +agriculture, though, in fact, he had never seen corn growing in his +life, and was so ignorant of grain, that our entertainer, in the face +of the whole company, made him own that a plate of hominy was +the best rice-pudding he had ever eat.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The stutterer had almost finished his travels through Europe +and part of Asia, without ever budging beyond the liberties of +the King's Bench, except in term-time, with a tipstaff for his companion: +and as for little Tim Cropdale, the most facetious member +of the whole society, he had happily wound up the catastrophe of +a virgin tragedy, from the exhibition of which no promised himself +a large fund of profit and reputation. Tim had made shift to live +many years by writing novels, at the rate of five pounds a volume; +but that branch of business is now engrossed by female authors, +who publish merely for the propagation of virtue, with so much +ease, and spirit, and delicacy, and knowledge of the human heart, +and all in the serene tranquillity of high life, that the reader is +not only enchanted by their genius, but reformed by their morality.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“After dinner, we adjourned into the garden, where I observed +Mr. S—— give a short separate audience to every individual in +a small remote filbert-walk, from whence most of them dropped +off one after another, without further ceremony.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Smollett's house was in Lawrence Lane, Chelsea, and is now +destroyed. See <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Handbook of London</span></span>, p. 115. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The person of Smollett was eminently handsome, his features +prepossessing, and, by the joint testimony of all his surviving +friends, his conversation, in the highest degree, instructive and +amusing. Of his disposition, those who have read his works (and +who has not?) may form a very accurate estimate; for in each +of them he has presented, and sometimes, under various points of +view, the leading features of his own character without disguising +the most unfavourable of them.... When unseduced by his +satirical propensities, he was kind, generous, and humane to others; +bold, upright, and independent in his own character; stooped to +no patron, sued for no favour, but honestly and honourably maintained +himself on his literary labours.... He was a doating father, +and an affectionate husband; and the warm zeal with which his +memory was cherished by his surviving friends, showed clearly the +reliance which they placed upon his +regard.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sir Walter Scott</span></span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_148" name="note_148" href="#noteref_148">148.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Smollett +of Bonhill, in Dumbartonshire. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Arms</span></span>, az. <span class="tei tei-q">“a bend, or, +between a lion rampant, ppr., holding in his paw a banner, arg. +and a bugle-horn, also ppr. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Crest</span></span>, +an oak-tree, ppr. <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Motto, Viresco.</span></span>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Smollett's father, Archibald, was the fourth son of Sir James +Smollett of Bonhill, a Scotch judge and Member of Parliament, +and one of the commissioners for framing the Union with England. +Archibald married, without the old gentleman's consent, and died +early, leaving his children dependent on their grandfather. Tobias, +the second son, was born in 1721, in the old house of Dalquharn +in the valley of Leven; and all his life loved and admired that +valley and Loch Lomond beyond all the valleys and lakes in Europe. +He learned the <span class="tei tei-q">“rudiments”</span> at Dumbarton Grammar-school, and +studied at Glasgow. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But when he was only eighteen, his grandfather died, and left +him without provision (figuring as the old judge in <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Roderick Random</span></span> +in consequence, according to Sir Walter). Tobias, armed with +the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Regicide</span></span>, a tragedy—a provision precisely similar to +that with which Dr. Johnson had started, just before—came up to London. +The <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Regicide</span></span> came to no good, though at first patronized by Lord +Lyttelton (<span class="tei tei-q">“one of those little fellows who are sometimes called great +men,”</span> Smollett says); and Smollett embarked as <span class="tei tei-q">“surgeon's mate”</span> +on board a line-of-battle ship, and served in the Carthagena +expedition, in 1741. He left the service in the West Indies, and, +after residing some time in Jamaica, returned to England in 1746. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +He was now unsuccessful as a physician, to begin with; published the satires, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Advice</span></span> and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Reproof</span></span>—without any luck; +and (1747) married the <span class="tei tei-q">“beautiful and accomplished Miss Lascelles”</span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In 1748 he brought out his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Roderick Random</span></span>, which at once +made a <span class="tei tei-q">“hit”</span>. The subsequent events of his life may be presented, +chronologically, in a bird's-eye view:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1750. Made a tour to Paris, where he chiefly wrote <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Peregrine +Pickle</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1751. Published <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Peregrine Pickle</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1753. Published <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1755. Published version of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Don Quixote</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1756. Began the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Critical Review</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1758. Published his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">History of England</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1763-1766. Travelling in France and Italy; published his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Travels</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1769. Published <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Adventures of an Atom</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +1770. Set out for Italy; died at Leghorn 21st of Oct., 1771, in +the fifty-first year of his age. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_149" name="note_149" href="#noteref_149">149.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">A +good specimen of the old <span class="tei tei-q">“slashing”</span> style of writing is presented +by the paragraph on Admiral Knowles, which subjected +Smollett to prosecution and imprisonment. The admiral's defence +on the occasion of the failure of the Rochfort expedition came to +be examined before the tribunal of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Critical Review</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He is,”</span> said our author, <span class="tei tei-q">“an admiral without conduct, an engineer +without knowledge, an officer without resolution, and a man without +veracity!”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Three months imprisonment in the King's Bench avenged this +stinging paragraph. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +But the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Critical</span></span> was to Smollett a perpetual fountain of <span class="tei tei-q">“hot +water”</span>. Among less important controversies may be mentioned +that with Grainger, the translator of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tibullus</span></span>. Grainger replied +in a pamphlet; and in the next number of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Review</span></span> we find him +threatened with <span class="tei tei-q">“castigation”</span>, as an <span class="tei tei-q">“owl that has broken from his +mew”</span>! +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In Dr. Moore's biography of him is a pleasant anecdote. After +publishing the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Don Quixote</span></span>, he returned to Scotland to pay a visit +to his mother:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“On Smollett's arrival, he was introduced to his mother with +the connivance of Mrs. Telfer (her daughter), as a gentleman from +the West Indies, who was intimately acquainted with her son. +The better to support his assumed character, he endeavoured to +preserve a serious countenance, approaching to a frown; but while +his mother's eyes were riveted on his countenance, he could not +refrain from smiling: she immediately sprung from her chair, and +throwing her arms round his neck, exclaimed, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Ah, my son! my +son! I have found you at last!’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“She afterwards told him, that if he had kept his austere looks +and continued to <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">gloom</span></em>, he might have escaped detection some time +longer, but <span class="tei tei-q">‘your old roguish smile’</span>, added she, <span class="tei tei-q">‘betrayed you at +once.’</span> ”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Shortly after the publication of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Adventures of an Atom</span></span>, +disease again attacked Smollett with redoubled violence. Attempts +being vainly made to obtain for him the office of Consul in some +part of the Mediterranean, he was compelled to seek a warmer +climate, without better means of provision than his own precarious +finances could afford. The kindness of his distinguished friend and +countryman, Dr. Armstrong (then abroad), procured for Dr. and +Mrs. Smollett a house at Monte Nero, a village situated on the +side of a mountain overlooking the sea, in the neighbourhood of +Leghorn, a romantic and salutary abode, where he prepared for +the press, the last, and like music <span class="tei tei-q">‘sweetest in the close’</span>, the +most pleasing of his compositions, <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Expedition of Humphry +Clinker</span></span>. This delightful work was published in +1771.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sir Walter +Scott</span></span>.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_150" name="note_150" href="#noteref_150">150.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">The dispute with the captain arose from the wish of that +functionary to intrude on his right to his cabin, for which he had +paid thirty pounds. After recounting the circumstances of the +apology, he characteristically adds:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“And here, that I may not be thought the sly trumpeter of my +own praises, I do utterly disclaim all praise on the occasion. Neither +did the greatness of my mind dictate, nor the force of my Christianity +exact this forgiveness. To speak truth, I forgave him from a +motive which would make men much more forgiving, if they were +much wiser than they are; because it was convenient for me so +to do.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_151" name="note_151" href="#noteref_151">151.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Lady +Mary was his second cousin—their respective grandfathers +being sons of George Fielding, Earl of Desmond, son of +William, Earl of Denbigh. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +In a letter dated just a week before his death, she says:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“H. Fielding has given a true picture of himself and his first +wife in the characters of Mr. and Mrs. Booth, some compliments +to his own figure excepted; and I am persuaded, several of the +incidents he mentions are real matters of fact. I wonder he does +not perceive Tom Jones and Mr. Booth are sorry scoundrels.... +Fielding has really a fund of true humour, and was to be pitied +at his first entrance into the world, having no choice, as he said +himself, but to be a hackney writer or a hackney coachman. His +genius deserved a better fate; but I cannot help blaming that +continued indiscretion, to give it the softest name, that has run +through his life, and I am afraid still remains.... Since I was +born no original has appeared excepting Congreve, and Fielding, +who would, I believe, have approached nearer to his excellences, +if not forced by his necessities to publish without correction, and +throw many productions into the world he would have thrown +into the fire, if meat could have been got without money, or money +without scribbling.... I am sorry not to see any more of Peregrine +Pickle's performances; I wish you would tell me his +name,”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters +and Works</span></span> (Lord Wharncliffe's ed.), vol. iii, pp. 93, 94.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_152" name="note_152" href="#noteref_152">152.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">He +sailed for Lisbon, from Gravesend, on Sunday morning, +June 30th, 1754; and began the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Journal of a Voyage</span></span> during the +passage. He died at Lisbon, in the beginning of October of the +same year. He lies buried there, in the English Protestant church-yard, +near the Estrella Church, with this inscription over him:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“HENRICUS FIELDING,<br /> +LUGET BRITANNIA GREMIO NON DATUM<br /> +FOVERE NATUM.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_153" name="note_153" href="#noteref_153">153.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Fielding +himself is said by Dr. Warton to have preferred <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Joseph +Andrews</span></span> to his other writings.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_154" name="note_154" href="#noteref_154">154.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Richardson,”</span> +says worthy Mrs. Barbauld, in her Memoir of +him, prefixed to his Correspondence, <span class="tei tei-q">“was exceedingly hurt at this +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Joseph Andrews</span></span>), the more so as they had been on good terms, +and he was very intimate with Fielding's two sisters. He never +appears cordially to have forgiven it (perhaps it was not in human +nature he should), and he always speaks in his letters with a great +deal of asperity of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tom Jones</span></span>, more indeed than was quite +graceful in a rival author. No doubt he himself thought his indignation +was solely excited by the loose morality of the work and of +its author, but he could tolerate Cibber.”</span></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_155" name="note_155" href="#noteref_155">155.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">It +must always be borne in mind, that besides that the Doctor +couldn't be expected to like Fielding's wild life (to say nothing of +the fact, that they were of opposite sides in politics), Richardson +was one of his earliest and kindest friends. Yet Johnson too (as +Boswell tells us) read <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Amelia</span></span> through without +<span class="tei tei-q">“stopping”</span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_156" name="note_156" href="#noteref_156">156.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Manners +change from generation to generation, and with +manners morals appear to change—actually change with some, but +appear to change with all but the abandoned. A young man of the +present day who should act as Tom Jones is supposed to act at +Upton, with Lady Bellaston, &c., would not be a Tom Jones; +and a Tom Jones of the present day, without perhaps being in +the ground a better man, would have perished rather than submit +to be kept by a harridan of fortune. Therefore, this novel is, and +indeed, pretends to be, no example of conduct. But, notwithstanding +all this, I do loathe the cant which can recommend <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Pamela</span></span> +and <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Clarissa Harlowe</span></span> as strictly moral, although they poison the +imagination of the young with continued doses of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">tinct. lyttae</span></span>, +while <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tom Jones</span></span> is prohibited as loose. I do not speak of young +women; but a young man whose heart or feelings can be injured, or even +his passions excited by this novel, is already thoroughly corrupt. +There is a cheerful, sunshiny, breezy spirit, that prevails everywhere, +strongly contrasted with the close, hot, day dreamy continuity +of Richardson.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Coleridge</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Literary Remains</span></span>, vol. ii, p. 374.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_157" name="note_157" href="#noteref_157">157.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Nor was she (Lady Mary Wortley Montagu) a +stranger to that beloved first wife, whose picture he drew in his +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Amelia</span></span>, when, +as she said, even the glowing language he knew how to employ, +did not do more than justice to the amiable qualities of the original, +or to her beauty, although this had suffered a little from the accident +related in the novel—a frightful overturn, which destroyed the +gristle of her nose. He loved her passionately, and she returned +his affection....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“His biographers seem to have been shy of disclosing that after +the death of this charming woman, he married her maid. And +yet the act was not so discreditable to his character as it may +sound. The maid had few personal charms, but was an excellent +creature, devotedly attached to her mistress, and almost brokenhearted +for her loss. In the first agonies of his own grief, which +approached to frenzy, he found no relief but from weeping along +with her; nor solace when a degree calmer, but in talking to her +of the angel they mutually regretted. This made her his habitual +confidential associate, and in process of time he began to think he +could not give his children a tenderer mother, or secure for himself +a more faithful housekeeper and nurse. At least, this was what +he told his friends; and it is certain that her conduct as his wife +confirmed it, and fully justified his good +opinion.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters and Works +of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.</span></span> Edited by Lord Wharncliffe. +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Introductory Anecdotes</span></span>, vol. i, pp. 80, 81. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Fielding's first wife was Miss Craddock, a young lady from Salisbury, +with a fortune of 1,500<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, whom he married in 1736. About +the same time he succeeded, himself, to an estate of 200<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> per +annum, and on the joint amount he lived for some time as a splendid +country gentleman in Dorsetshire. Three years brought him to the +end of his fortune; when he returned to London, and became +a student of law. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_158" name="note_158" href="#noteref_158">158.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">In the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Gentleman's Magazine</span></span>, for 1786, an anecdote is related +of Harry Fielding, <span class="tei tei-q">“in whom,”</span> says the correspondent, <span class="tei tei-q">“good nature +and philanthropy in their extreme degree were known to be the +prominent features.”</span> It seems that <span class="tei tei-q">“some parochial taxes”</span> for his +house in Beaufort Buildings had long been demanded by the collector. +<span class="tei tei-q">“At last, Harry went off to Johnson, and obtained by a +process of literary mortgage the needful sum. He was returning +with it, when he met an old college chum whom he had not seen +for many years. He asked the chum to dinner with him at a neighbouring +tavern; and learning that he was in difficulties, emptied +the contents of his pocket into his. On returning home he was +informed that the collector had been twice for the money. <span class="tei tei-q">‘Friendship +has called for the money and had it,’</span> said Fielding; <span class="tei tei-q">‘let the +collector call again.’</span> ”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +It is elsewhere told of him, that being in company with the Earl +of Denbigh, his kinsman, and the conversation turning upon their +relationship, the Earl asked him how it was that he spelled his +name <span class="tei tei-q">“Fielding”</span>, and not <span class="tei tei-q">“Feilding”</span>, like the head of the house? +<span class="tei tei-q">“I cannot tell, my lord,”</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">“except it be that my branch +of the family were the first that knew how to spell.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_159" name="note_159" href="#noteref_159">159.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">In +1749, he was made Justice of the Peace for Westminster +and Middlesex, an office then paid by fees, and very laborious, +without being particularly reputable. It may be seen from his +own words, in the Introduction to the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Voyage</span></span>, what kind of work +devolved upon him, and in what a state he was, during these last +years; and still more clearly, how he comported himself through all. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Whilst I was preparing for my journey, and when I was almost +fatigued to death with several long examinations, relating to five +different murders, all committed within the space of a week, by +different gangs of street-robbers, I received a message from his +grace the Duke of Newcastle, by Mr. Carrington, the King's messenger, +to attend his grace the next morning in Lincoln's Inn +Fields, upon some business of importance: but I excused myself +from complying with the message, as, besides being lame, I was +very ill with the great fatigues I had lately undergone, added to +my distemper.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“His grace, however, sent Mr. Carrington the very next morning, +with another summons; with which, though in the utmost distress, +I immediately complied; but the duke happening, unfortunately +for me, to be then particularly engaged, after I had waited some +time, sent a gentleman to discourse with me on the best plan which +could be invented for these murders and robberies, which were +every day committed in the streets; upon which I promised to +transmit my opinion in writing to his grace, who, as the gentleman +informed me, intended to lay it before the Privy Council.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Though this visit cost me a severe cold, I, notwithstanding, +set myself down to work, and in about four days sent the duke as +regular a plan as I could form, with all the reasons and arguments +I could bring to support it, drawn out on several sheets of paper; +and soon received a message from the Duke, by Mr. Carrington, +acquainting me that my plan was highly approved of, and that all +the terms of it would be complied with.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The principal and most material of these terms was the immediately +depositing 600<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> in my hands; at which small charge I +undertook to demolish the then reigning gangs, and to put the +civil policy into such order, that no such gangs should ever be +able for the future, to form themselves into bodies, or at least to +remain any time formidable to the public.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I had delayed my Bath journey for some time, contrary to the +repeated advice of my physical acquaintances, and the ardent +desire of my warmest friends, though my distemper was now turned +to a deep jaundice; in which case the Bath waters are generally +reputed to be almost infallible. But I had the most eager desire +to demolish this gang of villains and cut-throats....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“After some weeks the money was paid at the Treasury, and +within a few days, after 200<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span> of it had come into my hands, the +whole gang of cut-throats was entirely dispersed....”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Further on, he says— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I will confess that my private affairs at the beginning of the +winter had but a gloomy aspect; for I had not plundered the +public or the poor of those sums which men, who are always ready +to plunder both as much as they can, have been pleased to suspect +me of taking; on the contrary, by composing, instead of inflaming, +the quarrels of porters and beggars (which I blush when I say +hath not been universally practised), and by refusing to take a +shilling from a man who most undoubtedly would not have had +another left, I had reduced an income of about 500<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, a year of +the dirtiest money upon earth, to little more than +300<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l.</span></span>, a considerable +portion of which remained with my clerk.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_160" name="note_160" href="#noteref_160">160.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">He came +of a Suffolk family—one of whom settled in Nottinghamshire. +The famous <span class="tei tei-q">“starling”</span> was actually the family crest.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_161" name="note_161" href="#noteref_161">161.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“It was +in this parish”</span> (of Animo, in Wicklow), <span class="tei tei-q">“during our +stay, that I had that wonderful escape in falling through a mill-race, +whilst the mill was going, and of being taken up unhurt; the +story is incredible, but known for truth in all that part of Ireland, +where hundreds of the common people flocked to see +me.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sterne</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_162" name="note_162" href="#noteref_162">162.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“My wife returns to Toulouse, +and proposes to pass the summer at Bagnères—I, on the contrary, go and visit my +wife, the church, in Yorkshire. We all live the longer, at least the happier, for +having things our own way; this is my conjugal maxim. I own +'tis not the best of maxims, but I maintain 'tis not the +worst.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sterne's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters</span></span>, 20th January, 1764.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_163" name="note_163" href="#noteref_163">163.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">In +a collection of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Seven Letters by Sterne and His Friends</span></span>, +(printed for private circulation), in 1844, is a letter of M. Tollot, +who was in France with Sterne and his family in 1764. Here is +a paragraph:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Nous arrivâmes le lendemain à Montpellier, où nous trouvâmes +notre ami Mr. Sterne, sa femme, sa fille, Mr. Huet, et quelques +autres Anglaises; j'eus, je vous l'avoue, beaucoup de plaisir en +revoyant le bon et agréable Tristram.... Il avait été assez longtemps +à Toulouse, où il se serait amusé sans sa femme, qui le poursuivit +partout, et qui voulait être de tout. Ces dispositions dans +cette bonne dame, lui ont fait passer d'assez mauvais momens; il +supporte tous ces désagrémens avec une patience d'ánge.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +About four months after this very characteristic letter, Sterne +wrote to the same gentleman to whom Tollot had written; and +from his letter we may extract a companion paragraph:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“... All which being premised, I have been for eight weeks +smitten with the tenderest passion that ever tender wight underwent. +I wish, dear cousin, thou couldst conceive (perhaps thou +canst without my wishing it) how deliciously I canter'd away with +it the first month, two up, two down, always upon my <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">hanches</span></span>, +along the streets from my hotel to hers, at first once—then twice, +then three times a day, till at length I was within an ace of setting +up my hobby-horse in her stable for good and all. I might as +well, considering how the enemies of the Lord have blasphemed +thereupon. The last three weeks we were every hour upon the +doleful ditty of parting—and thou mayest conceive, dear cousin, +how it altered my gait and air—for I went and came like any +louden'd carl, and did nothing but <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">jouer des +sentimens</span></span> with her from sun-rising even to the setting of the same; and now +she is gone to the south of France; and to finish the +<span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">comédie</span></span>, I fell ill and broke a vessel in my lungs, +and half bled to death. <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">Voilà mon +histoire!</span></span>”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Whether husband or wife had most of the <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">patience d'ánge</span></span> +may be uncertain; but there can be no doubt which needed it most! +</p> +</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_164" name="note_164" href="#noteref_164">164.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tristram Shandy</span></span> is still a +greater object of admiration, the man as well as the book; one is invited to dinner, when he +dines, a fortnight before. As to the volumes yet published, there +is much good fun in them, and humour sometimes hit and sometimes +missed. Have you read his <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sermons</span></span>, with his own comick figure, +from a painting by Reynolds, at the head of them? They are in +the style I think most proper for the pulpit, and show a strong +imagination and a sensible heart; but you see him often tottering +on the verge of laughter, and ready to throw his periwig in the +face of the audience.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Gray's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters</span></span>, June 22nd, 1760. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It having been observed that there was little hospitality in +London—Johnson: <span class="tei tei-q">‘Nay, sir, any man who has a name, or who +has the power of pleasing, will be very generally invited in London. +The man, Sterne, I have been told, has had engagements for three +months.’</span> Goldsmith: <span class="tei tei-q">‘And a very dull fellow.’</span> Johnson: +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Why, no, sir.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Boswell's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life of Johnson</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Her [Miss Monckton's] vivacity enchanted the sage, and they +used to talk together with all imaginable ease. A singular instance +happened one evening, when she insisted that some of Sterne's +writings were very pathetic. Johnson bluntly denied it. <span class="tei tei-q">‘I am +sure,’</span> said she, <span class="tei tei-q">‘they have affected me.’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘Why,’</span> said Johnson, +smiling, and rolling himself about—<span class="tei tei-q">‘that is, because, dearest, +you're a dunce.’</span> When she some time afterwards mentioned this +to him, he said with equal truth and politeness, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Madam, if I had +thought so, I certainly should not have said +it.’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Boswell'</span></span>s <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life +of Johnson</span></span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_165" name="note_165" href="#noteref_165">165.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">A passage +or two from Sterne's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sermons</span></span> may not be without +interest here. Is not the following, levelled against the cruelties +of the Church of Rome, stamped with the autograph of the author +of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sentimental Journey</span></span>?— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“To be convinced of this, go with me for a moment into the +prisons of the Inquisition—behold <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">religion</span></em> with mercy and justice +chained down under her feet,—there, sitting ghastly upon a black +tribunal, propped up with racks, and instruments of torment.—Hark!—what +a piteous groan!—See the melancholy wretch who +uttered it, just brought forth to undergo the anguish of a mock-trial, +and endure the utmost pain that a studied system of <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">religious +cruelty</span></em> has been able to invent. Behold this helpless victim +delivered up to his tormentors. <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">His body so wasted with sorrow +and long confinement, you'll see every nerve and muscle as it suffers.</span></em> +Observe the last movement of that horrid engine.—What convulsions +it has thrown him into! Consider the nature of the +posture in which he now lies stretched.—What exquisite torture he endures +by it.—'Tis all nature can bear.—Good <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">God</span></span>! see how +it keeps his weary soul hanging upon his trembling lips, willing to +take its leave, but not suffered to depart. Behold the unhappy +wretch led back to his cell,—dragg'd out of it again to meet the +flames—and the insults in his last agonies, which this principle—this +principle, that there can be religion without morality—has +prepared for him.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sermon 27th</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The next extract is preached on a text to be found in Judges +xix, ver. 1, 2, 3, concerning a <span class="tei tei-q">“certain Levite”</span>:— +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Such a one the Levite wanted to share his solitude and fill up +that uncomfortable blank in the heart in such a situation; for, +notwithstanding all we meet with in books, in many of which, no +doubt, there are a good many handsome things said upon the secrets of retirement, +&c.... yet still, <span class="tei tei-q">‘<em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">it is not good for man to be alone</span></em>’</span>: +nor can all which the cold-hearted pedant stuns our ears with upon +the subject, ever give one answer of satisfaction to the mind; in +the midst of the loudest vauntings of philosophy, nature will have +her yearnings for society and friendship;—a good heart wants +some object to be kind to—and the best parts of our blood, and +the purest of our spirits, suffer most under the destitution.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Let the torpid monk seek Heaven comfortless and alone. God +speed him! For my own part, I fear I should never so find the +way; <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">let me be wise and religious, but let me be</span></em> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Man</span></span>; wherever Thy +Providence places me, or whatever be the road I take to Thee, +give me some companion in my journey, be it only to remark to, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘How our shadows lengthen as our sun goes down’</span>;—to whom +I may say, <span class="tei tei-q">‘How fresh is the face of Nature! how sweet the flowers +of the field! how delicious are these fruits!’</span> ”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sermon +18th.</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +The first of these passages gives us another drawing of the famous +<span class="tei tei-q">“Captive”</span>. The second shows that the same reflection was suggested +to the Rev. Laurence, by a text in Judges, as by the +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">fille-de-chambre</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Sterne's <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sermons</span></span> were published as those of <span class="tei tei-q">“Mr. Yorick”</span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_166" name="note_166" href="#noteref_166">166.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“I am +glad that you are in love—'twill cure you at least of the +spleen, which has a bad effect on both man and woman—I myself +must even have some Dulcinea in my head; it harmonizes the +soul; and in these cases I first endeavour to make the lady believe +so, or rather, I begin first to make myself believe that I am in love—but +I carry on my affairs quite in the French way, +sentimentally—<span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">l'amour</span></span> +(say they) <span lang="fr" class="tei tei-foreign" xml:lang="fr"><span style="font-style: italic">n'est rien sans sentiment</span></span>. Now, +notwithstanding they make such a pother about the <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">word</span></em>, they have no precise +idea annexed to it. And so much for that same subject called +love.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sterne's</span></span> <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters</span></span>, +May 23rd, 1765. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“PS.—My <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sentimental Journey</span></span> will please Mrs. +J—— and my Lydia [his daughter, afterwards Mrs. Medalle]—I can answer +for those two. It is a subject which works well, and suits the +frame of mind I have been in for some time past. I told you my +design in it was to teach us to love the world and our fellow creatures +better than we do—so it runs most upon those gentler passions +and affections which aid so much to it.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Letters</span></span> [1767]. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_167" name="note_167" href="#noteref_167">167.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">TO +MRS. H——. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Coxwould, Nov. 15th, 1767.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Now be a good, dear woman, my H——, and execute those +commissions well, and when I see you I will give you a kiss—there's +for you! But I have something else for you which I am fabricating +at a great rate, and that is my <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sentimental Journey</span></span>, which shall +make you cry as much as it has affected me, or I will give up the +business of sentimental writing ...</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I am yours, &c. &c.,</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">T. Shandy</span></span>.”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +TO THE EARL OF ——. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Coxwould, Nov. 28th, 1767.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“MY LORD—'Tis with the greatest pleasure I take my pen to +thank your lordship for your letter of inquiry about Yorick—he +was worn out, both his spirits and body, with the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Sentimental +Journey</span></span>; 'tis true, then, an author must feel himself, or his +reader will not—but I have torn my whole frame into pieces by my +feelings—I believe the brain stands as much in need of recruiting +as the body; therefore I shall set out for town the twentieth of +next month, after having recruited myself a week at York. I might +indeed solace myself with my wife (who is come from France), but, +in fact, I have long been a sentimental being, whatever your lordship +may think to the contrary.”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_168" name="note_168" href="#noteref_168">168.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“It +is known that Sterne died in hired lodgings, and I have +been told that his attendants robbed him even of his gold sleeve-buttons +while he was expiring.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Ferriar</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He died at No. 41 (now a cheesemonger's) on the west side of +Old Bond Street.—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Handbook of London.</span></span>”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_169" name="note_169" href="#noteref_169">169.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“In +February, 1768, Laurence Sterne, his frame exhausted by +long debilitating illness, expired at his lodgings in Bond Street, +London. There was something in the manner of his death singularly +resembling the particulars detailed by Mrs. Quickly, as +attending that of Falstaff, the compeer of Yorick for infinite jest, +however unlike in other particulars. As he lay on his bed totally +exhausted, he complained that his feet were cold, and requested +the female attendant to chafe them. She did so, and it seemed +to relieve him. He complained that the cold came up higher; +and whilst the assistant was in the act of chafing his ankles and +legs, he expired without a groan. It was also remarkable that +his death took place much in the manner which he himself had +wished; and that the last offices were rendered him, not in his +own house, or by the hand of kindred affection, but in an inn, and +by strangers.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“We are well acquainted with Sterne's features and personal +appearance, to which he himself frequently alludes. He was tall +and thin, with a hectic and consumptive +appearance.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sir Walter +Scott</span></span>.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_170" name="note_170" href="#noteref_170">170.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“With +regard to Sterne, and the charge of licentiousness which +presses so seriously upon his character as a writer, I would remark +that there is a sort of knowingness, the wit of which depends, firstly, +on the modesty it gives pain to; or, secondly, on the innocence +and innocent ignorance over which it triumphs; or thirdly, on +a certain oscillation in the individual's own mind between the +remaining good and the encroaching evil of his nature—a sort of +dallying with the devil—a fluxionary art of combining courage +and cowardice, as when a man snuffs a candle with his fingers for +the first time, or better still, perhaps, like that trembling daring +with which a child touches a hot tea-urn, because it has been +forbidden; so that the mind has its own white and black angel; +the same or similar amusement as may be supposed to take place +between an old debauchee and a prude—the feeling resentment, +on the one hand, from a prudential anxiety to preserve appearances +and have a character; and, on the other, an inward sympathy +with the enemy. We have only to suppose society innocent, and +then nine-tenths of this sort of wit would be like a stone that falls +in snow, making no sound, because exciting no resistance; the +remainder rests on its being an offence against the good manners +of human nature itself.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“This source, unworthy as it is, may doubtless be combined with +wit, drollery, fancy, and even humour; and we have only to regret +the misalliance; but that the latter are quite distinct from the +former, may be made evident by abstracting in our imagination +the morality of the characters of Mr. Shandy, my Uncle Toby, +and Trim, which are all antagonists to this spurious sort of wit, +from the rest of <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tristram Shandy</span></span>, and by supposing, instead of +them, the presence of two or three callous debauchees. The result +will be pure disgust. Sterne cannot be too severely censured +for thus using the best dispositions of our nature as the panders +and condiments for the basest.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Coleridge</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Literary Remains</span></span>, +vol. i, pp. 141, 142. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_171" name="note_171" href="#noteref_171">171.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“He was +a friend to virtue, and in his most playful pages never +forgets what is due to it. A gentleness, delicacy, and purity of +feeling distinguishes whatever he wrote, and bears a correspondence +to the generosity of a disposition which knew no bounds but his +last guinea....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The admirable ease and grace of the narrative, as well as the +pleasing truth with which the principal characters are designed, +make the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Vicar of Wakefield</span></span> one of the most delicious morsels +of fictitious composition on which the human mind was ever +employed.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“... We read the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Vicar of Wakefield</span></span> in youth and in age—we +return to it again and again, and bless the memory of an author +who contrives so well to reconcile us to human +nature.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Sir Walter +Scott</span></span>.</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_172" name="note_172" href="#noteref_172">172.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Now +Herder came,”</span> says Goethe in his Autobiography, relating +his first acquaintance with Goldsmith's masterpiece, <span class="tei tei-q">“and together +with his great knowledge brought many other aids, and the later +publications besides. Among these he announced to us the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Vicar +of Wakefield</span></span> as an excellent work, with the German translation +of which he would make us acquainted by reading it aloud to us +himself....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A Protestant country clergyman is perhaps the most beautiful +subject for a modern idyl; he appears like Melchizedeck, as priest +and king in one person. To the most innocent situation which +can be imagined on earth, to that of a husbandman, he is, for the +most part, united by similarity of occupation as well as by equality +in family relationships; he is a father, a master of a family, an +agriculturist, and thus perfectly a member of the community. +On this pure, beautiful, earthly foundation rests his higher calling; +to him is it given to guide men through life, to take care of their +spiritual education, to bless them at all the leading epochs of their +existence, to instruct, to strengthen, to console them, and if consolation +is not sufficient for the present, to call up and guarantee +the hope of a happier future. Imagine such a man with pure +human sentiments, strong enough not to deviate from them under +any circumstances, and by this already elevated above the multitude +of whom one cannot expect purity and firmness; give him the +learning necessary for his office, as well as a cheerful, equable activity, +which is even passionate, as it neglects no moment to do good—and +you will have him well endowed. But at the same time add the +necessary limitation, so that he must not only pause in a small +circle, but may also, perchance, pass over to a smaller; grant him +good nature, placability, resolution, and everything else praiseworthy +that springs from a decided character, and over all this +a cheerful spirit of compliance, and a smiling toleration of his own +failings and those of others,—then you will have put together pretty +well the image of our excellent Wakefield.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The delineation of this character on his course of life through +joys and sorrows, the ever-increasing interest of the story, by the +combination of the entirely natural with the strange and the singular, +make this novel one of the best which has ever been written; +besides this, it has the great advantage that it is quite moral, nay, +in a pure sense, Christian—represents the reward of a goodwill +and perseverance in the right, strengthens an unconditional confidence +in God, and attests the final triumph of good over evil; +and all this without a trace of cant or pedantry. The author was +preserved from both of these by an elocution of mind that shows +itself throughout in the form of irony, by which this little work +must appear to us as wise as it is amiable. The author, Dr. Goldsmith, +has, without question, a great insight into the moral world, +into its strength and its infirmities; but at the same time he can +thankfully acknowledge that he is an Englishman, and reckon +highly the advantages which his country and his nation afford him. +The family, with the delineation of which he occupies himself, +stands upon one of the last steps of citizen comfort, and yet comes +in contact with the highest; its narrow circle, which becomes +still more contracted, touches upon the great world through the +natural and civil course of things; this little skiff floats on the +agitated waves of English life, and in weal or woe it has to expect +injury or help from the vast fleet which sails around it.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“I may suppose that my readers know this work, and have it +in memory; whoever hears it named for the first time here, as +well as he who is induced to read it again, will thank +me.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Goethe</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Truth and Poetry; from my own Life</span></span> (English translation, vol. i, +pp. 378-9). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He seems from infancy to have been compounded of two natures, +one bright, the other blundering; or to have had fairy gifts laid +in his cradle by the <span class="tei tei-q">‘good people’</span> who haunted his birthplace, +the old goblin mansion, on the banks of the Inny.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He carries with him the wayward elfin spirit, if we may so +term it, throughout his career. His fairy gifts are of no avail at +school, academy, or college: they unfit him for close study and +practical science, and render him heedless of everything that does +not address itself to his poetical imagination, and genial and festive +feelings; they dispose him to break away from restraint, to stroll +about hedges, green lanes, and haunted streams, to revel with jovial +companions, or to rove the country like a gipsy in quest of odd +adventures....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Though his circumstances often compelled him to associate +with the poor, they never could betray him into companionship +with the depraved. His relish for humour, and for the study of +character, as we have before observed, brought him often into +convivial company of a vulgar kind; but he discriminated between +their vulgarity and their amusing qualities, or rather wrought +from the whole store familiar features of life which form the staple +of his most popular writings.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Washington Irving</span></span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_173" name="note_173" href="#noteref_173">173.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“The +family of Goldsmith, Goldsmyth, or, as it was occasionally +written, Gouldsmith, is of considerable standing in Ireland, and +seems always to have held a respectable station in society. Its +origin is English, supposed to be derived from that which was +long settled at Crayford in Kent.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Prior's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life of Goldsmith</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Oliver's father, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather +were clergymen; and two of them married clergymen's daughters. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_174" name="note_174" href="#noteref_174">174.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">At church with meek and unaffected grace,<br /> +His looks adorn'd the venerable place;<br /> +Truth from his lips prevail'd with double sway,<br /> +And fools who came to scoff remain'd to pray.<br /> +The service past, around the pious man,<br /> +With steady zeal each honest rustic ran;<br /> +E'en children follow'd with endearing wile,<br /> +And pluck'd his gown to share the good man's smile.<br /> +His ready smile a parent's warmth exprest,<br /> +Their welfare pleased him, and their cares distrest;<br /> +To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given,<br /> +But all his serious thoughts had rest in Heaven.<br /> +As some tall cliff that lifts his awful form,<br /> +Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm,<br /> +Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread,<br /> +Eternal sunshine settles on its head. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Deserted Village.</span></span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_175" name="note_175" href="#noteref_175">175.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“In +May this year (1768), he lost his brother, the Rev. Henry +Goldsmith, for whom he had been unable to obtain preferment in +the Church....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“....To the curacy of Kilkenny West, the moderate stipend +of which, forty pounds a year, is sufficiently celebrated by his +brother's lines. It has been stated that Mr. Goldsmith added a +school, which, after having been held at more than one place +in the vicinity, was finally fixed at Lissoy. Here his talents and +industry gave it celebrity, and under his care the sons of many +of the neighbouring gentry received their education. A fever +breaking out among the boys about 1765, they dispersed for a time, +but reassembling at Athlone, he continued his scholastic labours +there until the time of his death, which happened, like that of his +brother, about the forty-fifth year of his age. He was a man of +an excellent heart and an amiable +disposition.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Prior's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Goldsmith</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see,<br /> +My heart, untravell'd, fondly turns to thee:<br /> +Still to my brother turns with ceaseless pain,<br /> +And drags at each remove a lengthening chain. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Traveller</span></span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_176" name="note_176" href="#noteref_176">176.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“When +Goldsmith died, half the unpaid bill he owed to Mr. +William Filby (amounting in all to 79<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">l</span></span>.) was for clothes supplied +to this nephew Hodson.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Forster's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Goldsmith</span></span>, p. 520. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +As this nephew Hodson ended his days (see the same page) <span class="tei tei-q">“a +prosperous Irish gentleman”</span>, it is not unreasonable to wish that +he had cleared off Mr. Filby's bill. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_177" name="note_177" href="#noteref_177">177.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Poor +fellow! He hardly knew an ass from a mule, nor a turkey +from a goose, but when he saw it on the +table.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Cumberland's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Memoirs</span></span>.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_178" name="note_178" href="#noteref_178">178.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“These +youthful follies, like the fermentation of liquors, often +disturb the mind only in order to its future refinement: a life spent +in phlegmatic apathy resembles those liquors which never ferment +and are consequently always muddy.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Goldsmith</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Memoir of Voltaire</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He (Johnson) said Goldsmith was a plant that flowered late. +There appeared nothing remarkable about him when he was +young.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Boswell</span></span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_179" name="note_179" href="#noteref_179">179.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“An +<span class="tei tei-q">‘inspired idiot’</span>, Goldsmith, hangs strangely about him +[Johnson] ... Yet, on the whole, there is no evil in the <span class="tei tei-q">‘gooseberry-fool’</span>, +but rather much good; of a finer, if of a weaker sort than +Johnson's; and all the more genuine that he himself could never +become <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">conscious</span></em> of it, though unhappily never cease attempting to +become so: the author of the genuine <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Vicar of Wakefield</span></span>, nill +he will he, must needs fly towards such a mass of genuine +manhood.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Carlyle's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Essays</span></span> (2nd ed.), vol. iv, p. 91.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_180" name="note_180" href="#noteref_180">180.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“At +present, the few poets of England no longer depend on the +great for subsistence; they have now no other patrons but the +public, and the public, collectively considered, is a good and a +generous master. It is indeed too frequently mistaken as to the +merits of every candidate for favour; but to make amends, it is +never mistaken long. A performance indeed may be forced for +a time into reputation, but, destitute of real merit, it soon sinks; +time, the touchstone of what is truly valuable, will soon discover +the fraud, and an author should never arrogate to himself any share +of success till his works have been read at least ten years with +satisfaction.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“A man of letters at present, whose works are valuable, is perfectly +sensible of their value. Every polite member of the community, +by buying what he writes, contributes to reward him. The +ridicule, therefore, of living in a garret might have been wit in the +last age, but continues such no longer, because no longer true. +A writer of real merit now may easily be rich, if his heart be set +only on fortune: and for those who have no merit, it is but fit +that such should remain in merited +obscurity.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Goldsmith</span></span>, +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Citizen of the World</span></span>, Let. 84. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_181" name="note_181" href="#noteref_181">181.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Goldsmith attacked Sterne, obviously enough, censuring his +indecency, and slighting his wit, and ridiculing his manner, in the +53rd letter in the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Citizen of the World</span></span>. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“As in common conversation,”</span> says he, <span class="tei tei-q">“the best way to make +the audience laugh is by first laughing yourself; so in writing, +the properest manner is to show an attempt at humour, which will +pass upon most for humour in reality. To effect this, readers +must be treated with the most perfect familiarity; in one page +the author is to make them a low bow, and in the next to pull them +by the nose; he must talk in riddles, and then send them to bed +in order to dream for the solution,”</span> &c. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Sterne's humorous <span class="tei tei-foreign"><span style="font-style: italic">mot</span></span> +on the subject of the gravest part of the +charges, then, as now, made against him, may perhaps be quoted +here, from the excellent, the respectable Sir Walter Scott. +<span class="tei tei-q">“Soon after <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Tristram</span></span> had appeared, Sterne asked a Yorkshire +lady of fortune and condition, whether she had read his book, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I +have not, Mr. Sterne,’</span> was the answer; <span class="tei tei-q">‘and to be plain with you, +I am informed it is not proper for female perusal.’</span> <span class="tei tei-q">‘My dear good +lady,’</span> replied the author, <span class="tei tei-q">‘do not be gulled by such stories; the +book is like your young heir there’</span> (pointing to a child of three +years old, who was rolling on the carpet in his white tunics): <span class="tei tei-q">‘he +shows at times a good deal that is usually concealed, but it is all +in perfect innocence.’</span> ”</span> +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_182" name="note_182" href="#noteref_182">182.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><span class="tei tei-q">“Goldsmith +told us that he was now busy in writing a Natural +History; and that he might have full leisure for it, he had taken +lodgings at a farmer's house, near to the six-mile stone in the +Edgeware Road, and had carried down his books in two returned +post-chaises. He said he believed the farmer's family thought +him an odd character, similar to that in which the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Spectator</span></span> +appeared to his landlady and her children; he was <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">The Gentleman</span></span>. +Mr. Mickle, the translator of the <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Lusiad</span></span>, and I, went to visit +him at this place a few days afterwards. He was not at home; but having +a curiosity to see his apartment, we went in, and found curious +scraps of descriptions of animals scrawled upon the wall with +a blacklead pencil.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Boswell</span></span>. +</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_183" name="note_183" href="#noteref_183">183.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“When +Goldsmith was dying, Dr. Turton said to him, <span class="tei tei-q">‘Your +pulse is in greater disorder than it should be, from the degree of +fever which you have; is your mind at ease?’</span> Goldsmith answered +it was not.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. Johnson</span></span> +(<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">in Boswell</span></span>). +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“Chambers, you find, is gone far, and poor Goldsmith is gone +much farther. He died of a fever, exasperated, as I believe, +by the fear of distress. He had raised money and squandered +it, by every artifice of acquisition and folly of expense. But let +not his failings be remembered; he was a very great +man.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Dr. +Johnson</span></span> to Boswell, July 5th, 1774. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_184" name="note_184" href="#noteref_184">184.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“When +Burke was told [of Goldsmith's death] he burst into tears. +Reynolds was in his painting-room when the messenger went to +him; but at once he laid his pencil aside, which in times of great +family distress he had not been known to do, left his painting-room, +and did not re-enter it that day....</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“The staircase of Brick Court is said to have been filled with +mourners, the reverse of domestic; women without a home, without +domesticity of any kind, with no friend but him they had come to +weep for; outcasts of that great, solitary, wicked city, to whom +he had never forgotten to be kind and charitable. And he had +domestic mourners, too. His coffin was reopened at the request +of Miss Horneck and her sister (such was the regard he was known +to have for them!) that a lock might be cut from his hair. It was +in Mrs. Gwyn's possession when she died, after nearly seventy +years.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-variant: small-caps">Forster's</span></span> +<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Goldsmith</span></span>. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_185" name="note_185" href="#noteref_185">185.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext"><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"><span class="tei tei-q">“Goldsmith's +incessant desire of being conspicuous in company +was the occasion of his sometimes appearing to such disadvantage, +as one should hardly have supposed possible in a man of his genius. +When his literary reputation had risen deservedly high, and his +society was much courted, he became very jealous of the extraordinary +attention which was everywhere paid to Johnson. One +evening, in a circle of wits, he found fault with me for talking of +Johnson as entitled to the honour of unquestionable superiority. +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Sir,’</span> said he, <span class="tei tei-q">‘you are for making a monarchy of what should +be a republic.’</span></span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“He was still more mortified, when, talking in a company with +fluent vivacity, and, as he flattered himself, to the admiration of +all present, a German who sat next him, and perceived Johnson +rolling himself as if about to speak, suddenly stopped him, saying, +<span class="tei tei-q">‘Stay, stay—Toctor Shonson is going to zay zomething.’</span> This +was no doubt very provoking, especially to one so irritable as Goldsmith, +who frequently mentioned it with strong expressions of +indignation.</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +<span class="tei tei-q">“It may also be observed that Goldsmith was sometimes content +to be treated with an easy familiarity, but upon occasions would +be consequential and important. An instance of this occurred +in a small particular. Johnson had a way of contracting the names +of his friends, as Beauclerk, Beau; Boswell, Bozzy.... I remember +one day, when Tom Davies was telling that Dr. Johnson said—<span class="tei tei-q">‘We +are all in labour for a name to <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Goldy's</span></span> play,’</span> Goldsmith seemed +displeased that such a liberty should be taken with his name, and +said, <span class="tei tei-q">‘I have often desired him not to call me <span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Goldy</span></span>.’</span> ”</span> +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +This is one of several of Boswell's depreciatory mentions of +Goldsmith—which may well irritate biographers and admirers—and +also those who take that more kindly and more profound view +of Boswell's own character, which was opened up by Mr. Carlyle's +famous article on his book. No wonder that Mr. Irving calls +Boswell an <span class="tei tei-q">“incarnation of toadyism”</span>. And the worst of it is, that +Johnson himself has suffered from this habit of the Laird of Auchenleck's. +People are apt to forget under what Boswellian stimulus +the great Doctor uttered many hasty things:—things no more +indicative of the nature of the depths of his character than the +phosphoric gleaming of the sea, when struck at night, is indicative +of radical corruption of nature! In truth, it is clear enough on +the whole that both Johnson and Goldsmith <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">appreciated</span></em> each other, +and that they mutually knew it. They were, as it were, tripped +up and flung against each other, occasionally, by the blundering +and silly gambolling of people in company. +</p> +<p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em"> +Something must be allowed for Boswell's <span class="tei tei-q">“rivalry for Johnson's +good graces”</span> with Oliver (as Sir Walter Scott has remarked), for +Oliver was intimate with the Doctor before his biographer was,—and +as we all remember, marched off with him to <span class="tei tei-q">“take tea with +Mrs. Williams”</span> before Boswell had advanced to that honourable +degree of intimacy. But, in truth, Boswell—though he perhaps +showed more talent in his delineation of the Doctor than is generally +ascribed to him—had not faculty to take a fair view of <em class="tei tei-emph"><span style="font-style: italic">two</span></em> great +men at a time. Besides, as Mr. Forster justly remarks, <span class="tei tei-q">“he was +impatient of Goldsmith from the first hour of their +acquaintance.”</span>—<span class="tei tei-hi"><span style="font-style: italic">Life +and Adventures</span></span>, p. 292. +</p></dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_186" name="note_186" href="#noteref_186">186.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">The above portraits are from +contemporary prints of this princess, +before her marriage, and in her old age.</dd><dt class="tei tei-notelabel"><a id="note_187" name="note_187" href="#noteref_187">187.</a></dt><dd class="tei tei-notetext">Here [below in the text] +are the figures, as drawn by young Gilray, of Lord North, +Mr. Fox, Mr. Pitt, and Mr. Burke.</dd></dl> + </div> + <hr class="doublepage" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 5.00em; margin-top: 5.00em"> + <div id="pgfooter" class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 4.00em; margin-top: 4.00em"><pre class="pre tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em">***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HENRY ESMOND; THE ENGLISH HUMOURISTS; THE FOUR GEORGES*** +</pre><hr class="doublepage" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"><a name="rightpageheader131" id="rightpageheader131"></a><a name="pgtoc132" id="pgtoc132"></a><a name="pdf133" id="pdf133"></a><h1 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 3.46em; margin-top: 3.46em"><span style="font-size: 173%">Credits</span></h1><table summary="This is a list." class="tei tei-list" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em"><tbody><tr><th class="tei tei-label tei-label-gloss">July 10, 2008 </th></tr><tr><td class="tei tei-item"><table summary="This is a list." class="tei tei-list" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em; margin-top: 1.00em"><tbody><tr class="tei tei-labelitem"><th class="tei tei-label"></th><td class="tei tei-item">Project Gutenberg TEI edition 1</td></tr><tr class="tei tei-labelitem"><th class="tei tei-label"></th><td class="tei tei-item"><span class="tei tei-respStmt"> + <span class="tei tei-name"> + Produced by Chris Curnow, David King, and the Online + Distributed Proofreading Team at <http://www.pgdp.net/>. + </span> + </span></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table></div><hr class="doublepage" /><div class="tei tei-div" style="margin-bottom: 3.00em; margin-top: 3.00em"><a name="rightpageheader134" id="rightpageheader134"></a><a name="pgtoc135" id="pgtoc135"></a><a name="pdf136" id="pdf136"></a><h1 class="tei tei-head" style="text-align: left; margin-bottom: 3.46em; margin-top: 3.46em"><span style="font-size: 173%">A Word from Project Gutenberg</span></h1><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">This file should be named + 29363-h.html or + 29363-h.zip.</p><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">This and all associated files of various formats will be found + in: + + <a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/9/3/6/29363/" class="block tei tei-xref" style="margin-bottom: 1.80em; margin-left: 3.60em; margin-top: 1.80em; margin-right: 3.60em"><span style="font-size: 90%">http://www.gutenberg.org</span><span style="font-size: 90%">/dirs/2/9/3/6/29363/</span></a></p><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Updated editions will replace the previous one — the old + editions will be renamed.</p><p class="tei tei-p" style="margin-bottom: 1.00em">Creating the works from public domain print editions means that + no one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the + Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United + States without permission and without paying copyright royalties. + Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this + license, apply to copying and distributing Project Gutenberg™ electronic works + to protect the Project Gutenberg™ concept and trademark. 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