Chapter III. A Paper Out Of The "Spectator"
Doth any young gentleman of my progeny, who may read his old grandfather'spapers, chance to be presently suffering under the passion of Love? Thereis a humiliating cure, but one that is easy and almost specific for themalady--which is, to try an alibi. Esmond went away from his mistress andwas cured a half-dozen times; he came back to her side, and instantly fellill again of the fever. He vowed that he could leave her and think no moreof her, and so he could pretty well, at least, succeed in quelling thatrage and longing he had whenever he was with her; but as soon as hereturned he was as bad as ever again. Truly a ludicrous and pitiableobject, at least exhausting everybody's pity but his dearest mistress's,Lady Castlewood's, in whose tender breast he reposed all his drearyconfessions, and who never tired of hearing him and pleading for him.
Sometimes Esmond would think there was hope. Then again he would beplagued with despair, at some impertinence or coquetry of his mistress.For days they would be like brother and sister, or the dearestfriends--she, simple, fond, and charming--he, happy beyond measure at hergood behaviour. But this would all vanish on a sudden. Either he would betoo pressing, and hint his love, when she would rebuff him instantly, andgive his vanity a box on the ear: or he would be jealous, and with perfectgood reason, of some new admirer that had sprung up, or some rich younggentleman newly arrived in the town, that this incorrigible flirt wouldset her nets and baits to draw in. If Esmond remonstrated, the littlerebel would say--"Who are you? I shall go my own way, sirrah, and that wayis towards a husband, and I don't want _you_ on the way. I am for yourbetters, colonel, for your betters: do you hear that? You might do if youhad 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 Ishould make you miserable, that would be the only comfort I should have inmarrying you. But you have not money enough to keep a cat decently afteryou have paid your man his wages, and your landlady her bill. Do you thinkI'm going to live in a lodging, and turn the mutton at a string whilstyour honour nurses the baby? Fiddlestick, and why did you not get thisnonsense knocked out of your head when you were in the wars? You are comeback more dismal and dreary than ever. You and mamma are fit for eachother. You might be Darby and Joan, and play cribbage to the end of yourlives."
"At least you own to your worldliness, my poor Trix," says her mother.
"Worldliness--O my pretty lady! Do you think that I am a child in thenursery, 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 fromyou, where shall I go? Shall I go and be head nurse to my Popishsister-in-law, take the children their physic, and whip 'em, and put 'emto bed when they are naughty? Shall I be Castlewood's upper servant, andperhaps marry Tom Tusher? _Merci!_ I have been long enough Frank's humbleservant. Why am I not a man? I have ten times his brains, and had I wornthe--well, don't let your ladyship be frightened--had I worn a sword andperiwig instead of this mantle and commode, to which nature has condemnedme--(though 'tis a pretty stuff, too--cousin Esmond! you will go to theExchange to-morrow, and get the exact counterpart of this ribbon, sir, doyou hear?)--I would have made our name talked about. So would Graveairshere have made something out of our name if he had represented it. My LordGraveairs would have done very well. Yes, you have a very pretty way, andwould have made a very decent, grave speaker;" and here she began toimitate Esmond's way of carrying himself, and speaking to his face, and soludicrously that his mistress burst out a-laughing, and even he himselfcould see there was some likeness in the fantastical malicious caricature.
"Yes," says she, "I solemnly vow, own, and confess, that I want a goodhusband. 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-threegames on the cards. I can dance the last dance, I can hunt the stag, and Ithink 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 thousandand one nights. I have a pretty taste for dress, diamonds, gambling, andold china. I love sugar-plums, Malines lace (that you brought me, cousin,is very pretty), the opera, and everything that is useless and costly. Ihave got a monkey and a little black boy--Pompey, sir, go and give a dishof chocolate to Colonel Graveairs,--and a parrot and a spaniel, and I musthave a husband. Cupid, you hear?"
"Iss, missis," says Pompey, a little grinning negro Lord Peterborow gaveher, with a bird of Paradise in his turbant, and a collar with hismistress's name on it.
"Iss, missis!" says Beatrix, imitating the child. "And if husband notcome, Pompey must go fetch one."
And Pompey went away grinning with his chocolate tray, as Miss Beatrix ranup to her mother and ended her sally of mischief in her common way, with akiss--no wonder that upon paying such a penalty her fond judge pardonedher.
-------------------------------------
When Mr. Esmond came home, his health was still shattered; and he took alodging near to his mistress's, at Kensington, glad enough to be served bythem, and to see them day after day. He was enabled to see a littlecompany--and of the sort he liked best. Mr. Steele and Mr. Addison both didhim the honour to visit him: and drank many a flask of good claret at hislodging, whilst their entertainer, through his wound, was kept to dietdrink and gruel. These gentlemen were Whigs, and great admirers of my LordDuke of Marlborough; and Esmond was entirely of the other party. But theirdifferent views of politics did not prevent the gentlemen from agreeing inprivate, nor from allowing, on one evening when Esmond's kind old patron,Lieutenant-General Webb, with a stick and a crutch, hobbled up to thecolonel's lodging (which was prettily situate at Knightsbridge, betweenLondon and Kensington, and looking over the Gardens), that thelieutenant-general was a noble and gallant soldier--and even that he hadbeen 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 poemabout Wynendael, he might have heard from the commander's own lips thestory a hundred times over.
Mr. Esmond, forced to be quiet, betook himself to literature for arelaxation, and composed his comedy, whereof the prompter's copy lieth inmy walnut escritoire, sealed up and docketed, _The Faithful Fool_, aComedy, as it was performed by her Majesty's servants. 'Twas a verysentimental piece; and Mr. Steele, who had more of that kind of sentimentthan Mr. Addison, admired it, whilst the other rather sneered at theperformance; though he owned that, here and there, it contained somepretty strokes. He was bringing out his own play of _Cato_ at the time,the blaze of which quite extinguished Esmond's farthing candle: and hisname was never put to the piece, which was printed as by a Person ofQuality. Only nine copies were sold, though Mr. Dennis, the great critic,praised it, and said 'twas a work of great merit; and Colonel Esmond hadthe whole impression burned one day in a rage, by Jack Lockwood, his man.
All this comedy was full of bitter satiric strokes against a certain younglady. The plot of the piece was quite a new one. A young woman wasrepresented with a great number of suitors, selecting a pert fribble of apeer, in place of the hero (but ill-acted, I think, by Mr. Wilks, theFaithful Fool), who persisted in admiring her. In the fifth act, Teramintawas made to discover the merits of Eugenio (the F. F.), and to feel apartiality for him too late; for he announced that he had bestowed hishand and estate upon Rosaria, a country lass, endowed with every virtue.But it must be owned that the audience yawned through the play; and thatit perished on the third night, with only half a dozen persons to beholdits agonies. Esmond and his two mistresses came to the first night, andMiss Beatrix fell asleep; whilst her mother, who had not been to a playsince King James the Second's time, thought the piece, though notbrilliant, had a very pretty moral.
Mr. Esmond dabbled in letters, and wrote a deal of prose and verse at thistime of leisure. When displeased with the conduct of Miss Beatrix, hewould compose a satire, in which he relieved his min
d. When smarting underthe faithlessness of women, he dashed off a copy of verses, in which heheld the whole sex up to scorn. One day, in one of these moods, he made alittle joke, in which (swearing him to secrecy) he got his friend DickSteele to help him; and, composing a paper, he had it printed exactly likeSteele's paper, and by his printer, and laid on his mistress'sbreakfast-table the following:--
"SPECTATOR.
No. 341. Tuesday, April 1, 1712.
Mutato nomine de te Fabula narratur.--HORACE.
Thyself the moral of the Fable see.--CREECH.
"Jocasta is known as a woman of learning and fashion, and as one of themost amiable persons of this Court and country. She is at home twomornings of the week, and all the wits and a few of the beauties of Londonflock to her assemblies. When she goes abroad to Tunbridge or the Bath, aretinue of adorers rides the journey with her; and, besides the Londonbeaux, she has a crowd of admirers at the Wells, the polite amongst thenatives of Sussex and Somerset pressing round her tea-tables, and beinganxious for a nod from her chair. Jocasta's acquaintance is thus verynumerous. Indeed, 'tis one smart writer's work to keep her visiting-book--astrong footman is engaged to carry it; and it would require a muchstronger head, even than Jocasta's own, to remember the names of all herdear friends.
"Either at Epsom Wells or at Tunbridge (for of this important matterJocasta cannot be certain) it was her ladyship's fortune to becomeacquainted with a young gentleman, whose conversation was so sprightly,and manners amiable, that she invited the agreeable young spark to visither if ever he came to London, where her house in Spring Garden should beopen to him. Charming as he was, and without any manner of doubt a prettyfellow, Jocasta hath such a regiment of the like continually marchinground her standard, that 'tis no wonder her attention is distractedamongst them. And so, though this gentleman made a considerable impressionupon her, and touched her heart for at least three-and-twenty minutes, itmust be owned that she has forgotten his name. He is a dark man, and maybe eight-and-twenty years old. His dress is sober, though of richmaterials. He has a mole on his forehead over his left eye; has a blueribbon to his cane and sword, and wears his own hair.
"Jocasta was much flattered by beholding her admirer (for that everybodyadmires who sees her is a point which she never can for a moment doubt) inthe next pew to her at St. James's Church last Sunday; and the manner inwhich he appeared to go to sleep during the sermon--though from under hisfringed eyelids it was evident he was casting glances of respectfulrapture towards Jocasta--deeply moved and interested her. On coming out ofchurch, he found his way to her chair, and made her an elegant bow as shestepped into it. She saw him at Court afterwards, where he carried himselfwith a most distinguished air, though none of her acquaintances knew hisname; and the next night he was at the play, where her ladyship waspleased to acknowledge him from the side-box.
"During the whole of the comedy she racked her brains so to remember hisname, that she did not hear a word of the piece: and having the happinessto meet him once more in the lobby of the playhouse, she went up to him ina flutter, and bade him remember that she kept two nights in the week, andthat she longed to see him at Spring Garden.
"He appeared on Tuesday, in a rich suit, showing a very fine taste both inthe tailor and wearer; and though a knot of us were gathered round thecharming Jocasta, fellows who pretended to know every face upon the town,not one could tell the gentleman's name in reply to Jocasta's eagerinquiries, flung to the right and left of her as he advanced up the roomwith a bow that would become a duke.
"Jocasta acknowledged this salute with one of those smiles and curtsies ofwhich that lady hath the secret. She curtsies with a languishing air, asif to say, 'You are come at last. I have been pining for you:' and thenshe finishes her victim with a killing look, which declares: 'O Philander!I have no eyes but for you.' Camilla hath as good a curtsy perhaps, andThalestris much such another look; but the glance and the curtsy togetherbelong to Jocasta of all the English beauties alone.
" 'Welcome to London, sir,' says she. 'One can see you are from thecountry by your looks.' She would have said 'Epsom', or 'Tunbridge', hadshe remembered rightly at which place she had met the stranger; but, alas!she had forgotten.
"The gentleman said, 'he had been in town but three days; and one of hisreasons for coming hither was to have the honour of paying his court toJocasta.'
"She said, 'the waters had agreed with her but indifferently.'
" 'The waters were for the sick,' the gentleman said: 'the young andbeautiful came but to make them sparkle. And, as the clergyman read theservice on Sunday,' he added, 'your ladyship reminded me of the angel thatvisited the pool.' 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 revokedwhen he heard it.
"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 moreinnocent and simple, the more artful her intentions were.
" 'We were discoursing,' says she, 'about spelling of names and words whenyou came. Why should we say goold and write gold, and call china chayny,and Cavendish Candish, and Cholmondeley Chumley? If we call PulteneyPoltney, why shouldn't we call poultry pultry--and----'
" 'Such an enchantress as your ladyship,' says he, 'is mistress of allsorts of spells.' But this was Dr. Swift's pun, and we all knew it.
" 'And--and how do you spell your name?' says she, coming to the point, atlength; for this sprightly conversation had lasted much longer than ishere set down, and been carried on through at least three dishes of tea.
" 'Oh, madam,' says he, '_I spell my name with the y_.' And laying downhis dish, my gentleman made another elegant bow, and was gone in a moment.
"Jocasta hath had no sleep since this mortification, and the stranger'sdisappearance. If balked in anything, she is sure to lose her health andtemper; and we, her servants, suffer, as usual, during the angry fits ofour queen. Can you help us, Mr. Spectator, who know everything, to readthis 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 theclerk of her visiting-book, a poor fellow with a great family of children.Read me this riddle, good Mr. Shortface, and oblige your admirer--OEDIPUS."
THE "TRUMPET" COFFEE-HOUSE, Whitehall.
"MR. SPECTATOR--I am a gentleman but little acquainted with the town,though I have had a university education, and passed some years serving mycountry abroad, where my name is better known than in the coffee-housesand St. James's.
"Two years since my uncle died, leaving me a pretty estate in the countyof Kent; and being at Tunbridge Wells last summer, after my mourning wasover, and on the look-out, if truth must be told, for some young lady whowould share with me the solitude of my great Kentish house, and be kind tomy tenantry (for whom a woman can do a great deal more good than thebest-intentioned man can), I was greatly fascinated by a young lady ofLondon, who was the toast of all the company at the Wells. Everyone knowsSaccharissa's beauty; and I think, Mr. Spectator, no one better thanherself.
"My table-book informs me that I danced no less than seven-and-twenty setswith her at the assembly. I treated her to the fiddles twice. I wasadmitted on several days to her lodging, and received by her with a greatdeal of distinction, and, for a time, was entirely her slave. It was onlywhen I found, from common talk of the company at the Wells, and fromnarrowly watching one, who I once thought of asking the most sacredquestion a man can put to a woman, that I became aware how unfit she wasto be a country gentleman's wife; and that this fair creature was but aheartless worldly jilt, playing with affections that she never meant toreturn, and, indeed, incapable of returning them. 'Tis admiration suchwomen want, not love that touches them; and I can conceive, in her oldage, no more wretched creature than this lady will be, when her beautyhath deserted her, when her admirers have left her, and she hath neitherfriendship nor religion to console her.
> "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 thewhole 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 shutmy eyes, so as actually not to see her, and whenever I opened them beheldhers (and very bright they are) still staring at me. I fell in with herafterwards at Court, and at the playhouse; and here nothing would satisfyher but she must elbow through the crowd and speak to me, and invite me tothe assembly, which she holds at her house, nor very far from Ch-r-ngCr-ss.
"Having made her a promise to attend, of course I kept my promise; andfound the young widow in the midst of a half-dozen of card-tables, and acrowd of wits and admirers. I made the best bow I could, and advancedtowards her; and saw by a peculiar puzzled look in her face, though shetried to hide her perplexity, that she had forgotten even my name.
"Her talk, artful as it was, convinced me that I had guessed aright. Sheturned the conversation most ridiculously upon the spelling of names andwords; and I replied with as ridiculous, fulsome compliments as I couldpay her: indeed, one in which I compared her to an angel visiting thesick-wells, went a little too far; nor should I have employed it, but thatthe allusion came from the Second Lesson last Sunday, which we both hadheard, and I was pressed to answer her.
"Then she came to the question, which I knew was awaiting me, and askedhow I _spelt_ my name? 'Madam,' says I, turning on my heel, 'I spell itwith the _y_.' And so I left her, wondering at the light-heartedness ofthe town-people, who forget and make friends so easily, and resolved tolook elsewhere for a partner for your constant reader.
"CYMON WYLDOATS.
"You know my real name, Mr. Spectator, in which there is no such a letteras _hupsilon_. But if the lady, whom I have called Saccharissa, wondersthat I appear no more at the tea-tables, she is hereby respectfullyinformed the reason _y_."
-------------------------------------
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. Shehad told Mr. Esmond this little story of having met a gentleman,somewhere, and forgetting his name, when the gentleman, with no suchmalicious intentions as those of "Cymon" in the above fable, made theanswer simply as above; and we all laughed to think how little MistressJocasta-Beatrix had profited by her artifice and precautions.
As for Cymon he was intended to represent yours and her very humbleservant, the writer of the apologue and of this story, which we hadprinted on a _Spectator_ paper at Mr. Steele's office, exactly as thosefamous journals were printed, and which was laid on the table at breakfastin place of the real newspaper. Mistress Jocasta, who had plenty of wit,could not live without her _Spectator_ to her tea; and this sham_Spectator_ was intended to convey to the young woman that she herself wasa flirt, and that Cymon was a gentleman of honour and resolution, seeingall her faults, and determined to break the chains once and for ever.
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 oldgrandfather was, who would like them to consider him a a very wise oldgentleman; 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 inhis time, would weary his kinsmen and women of a hundred years' timebeyond all endurance; and form such a diary of folly and drivelling,raptures and rage, as no man of ordinary vanity would like to leave behindhim.
The truth is, that, whether she laughed at him or encouraged him; whethershe smiled or was cold, and turned her smiles on another--worldly andambitious, as he knew her to be; hard and careless, as she seemed to growwith 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; thoughtof her constantly at home or away. If he read his name in a _Gazette_, orescaped the shot of a cannon-ball or a greater danger in the campaign, ashas happened to him more than once, the instant thought after the honourachieved or the danger avoided, was "What will _she_ say of it?" "Willthis distinction or the idea of this peril elate her or touch her, so asto be better inclined towards me?" He could no more help this passionatefidelity of temper than he could help the eyes he saw with--one or theother seemed a part of his nature; and knowing every one of her faults aswell as the keenest of her detractors, and the folly of an attachment tosuch a woman, of which the fruition could never bring him happiness forabove a week, there was yet a charm about this Circe from which the poordeluded gentleman could not free himself; and for a much longer periodthan Ulysses (another middle-aged officer, who had travelled much, andbeen in the foreign wars), Esmond felt himself enthralled and besotted bythe wiles of this enchantress. Quit her! He could no more quit her, as theCymon of this story was made to quit his false one, than he could lose hisconsciousness of yesterday. She had but to raise her finger, and he wouldcome back from ever so far; she had but to say, "I have discardedsuch-and-such an adorer," and the poor infatuated wretch would be sure tocome and _roder_ about her mother's house, willing to be put on the ranksof suitors, though he knew he might be cast off the next week. If he werelike Ulysses in his folly at least, she was in so far like Penelope, thatshe had a crowd of suitors, and undid day after day and night after nightthe handiwork of fascination and the web of coquetry with which she waswont to allure and entertain them.
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 thousandbeaux came and fluttered; where she was sure to have a ring of admirersround her, crowding to listen to her repartees as much as to admire herbeauty; and where she spoke and listened to much free talk, such as onenever would have thought the lips or ears of Rachel Castlewood's daughterwould have uttered or heard. When in waiting at Windsor or Hampton, theCourt ladies and gentlemen would be making riding parties together; Mrs.Beatrix in a horseman's coat and hat, the foremost after the staghoundsand over the park fences, a crowd of young fellows at her heels. If theEnglish country ladies at this time were the most pure and modest of anyladies in the world--the English town and Court ladies permitted themselveswords and behaviour that were neither modest nor pure; and claimed, someof them, a freedom which those who love that sex most would never wish togrant them. The gentlemen of my family that follow after me (for I don'tencourage the ladies to pursue any such studies), may read in the works ofMr. Congreve, and Dr. Swift, and others, what was the conversation andwhat the habits of our time.
The most beautiful woman in England in 1712, when Esmond returned to thiscountry, a lady of high birth, and though of no fortune to be sure, with athousand fascinations of wit and manners--Beatrix Esmond--was nowsix-and-twenty years old, and Beatrix Esmond still. Of her hundred adorersshe had not chosen one for a husband; and those who had asked had beenjilted by her; and more still had left her. A succession of near tenyears' crops of beauties had come up since her time, and had been reapedby proper _husband_men, if we may make an agricultural simile, and hadbeen housed comfortably long ago. Her own contemporaries were sobermothers by this time; girls with not a tithe of her charms, or her wit,having made good matches, and now claiming precedence over the spinsterwho but lately had derided and outshone them. The young beauties werebeginning to look down on Beatrix as an old maid, and sneer, and call herone of Charles the Second's ladies, and ask whether her portrait was notin the Hampton Court Gallery? But still she reigned, at least in one man'sopinion, superior over all the little misses that were the toasts of theyoung lads; and in Esmond's eyes was ever perfectly lovely and young.
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 thinkthat her mother was the purest and simplest woman in the whole world, andthat this girl should have been born from her. I am inclined to fancy, mymistress, who never said a harsh word to her children (and but twice
orthrice only to one person), must have been too fond and pressing with thematernal authority; for her son and her daughter both revolted early; norafter their first flight from the nest could they ever be brought backquite to the fond mother's bosom. Lady Castlewood, and perhaps it was aswell, knew little of her daughter's life and real thoughts. How was she toapprehend what passed in queens' antechambers and at Court tables? Mrs.Beatrix asserted her own authority so resolutely that her mother quicklygave in. The maid of honour had her own equipage; went from home and cameback at her own will: her mother was alike powerless to resist her or tolead her, or to command or to persuade her.
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 LordAshburnham, and now, on his return, behold his lordship was just marriedto 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 rathercoveted him, was out of her power. To her Esmond could say nothing inregard to the breaking of this match; and, asking his mistress about it,all Lady Castlewood answered was: "Do not speak to me about it, Harry. Icannot tell you how or why they parted, and I fear to inquire. I have toldyou before, that with all her kindness, and wit, and generosity, and thatsort of splendour of nature she has; I can say but little good of poorBeatrix, and look with dread at the marriage she will form. Her mind isfixed on ambition only, and making a great figure: and, this achieved, shewill 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 mylittle conversation would enable me to judge: and a kind temper--kind andenduring I'm sure he must have been, from all that he had to endure. Buthe quitted her at last, from some crowning piece of caprice or tyranny ofhers; and now he has married a young woman that will make him a thousandtimes happier than my poor girl ever could."
The rupture, whatever its cause was (I heard the scandal, but indeed shallnot take pains to repeat at length in this diary the trumpery coffee-housestory), caused a good deal of low talk; and Mr. Esmond was present at mylord's appearance at the birthday with his bride, over whom the revengethat Beatrix took was to look so imperial and lovely that the modestdowncast young lady could not appear beside her, and Lord Ashburnham, whohad his reasons for wishing to avoid her, slunk away quite shamefaced, andvery early. This time his grace the Duke of Hamilton, whom Esmond had seenabout her before, was constant at Miss Beatrix's side: he was one of themost splendid gentlemen of Europe, accomplished by books, by travel, bylong command of the best company, distinguished as a statesman, havingbeen ambassador in King William's time, and a noble speaker in the ScotsParliament, where he had led the party that was against the union, andthough now five- or six-and-forty years of age, a gentleman so high instature, accomplished in wit, and favoured in person, that he mightpretend to the hand of any princess in Europe.
"Should you like the duke for a cousin?" says Mr. Secretary St. John,whispering to Colonel Esmond in French; "it appears that the widowerconsoles himself."
But to return to our little _Spectator_ paper and the conversation whichgrew out of it. Miss Beatrix at first was quite _bit_ (as the phrase ofthat day was) and did not "smoke" the authorship of the story: indeedEsmond had tried to imitate as well as he could Mr. Steele's manner (asfor the other author of the _Spectator_, his prose style I think isaltogether inimitable); and Dick, who was the idlest and best-natured ofmen, would have let the piece pass into his journal and go to posterity asone of his own lucubrations, but that Esmond did not care to have a lady'sname 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 nolittle interest her countenance as she read it.
"How stupid your friend Mr. Steele becomes!" cries Miss Beatrix. "Epsomand Tunbridge! Will he never have done with Epsom and Tunbridge, and withbeaux at church, and Jocastas and Lindamiras? Why does he not call womenNelly and Betty, as their godfathers and godmothers did for them in theirbaptism?"
"Beatrix, Beatrix!" says her mother, "speak gravely of grave things."
"Mamma thinks the Church Catechism came from Heaven, I believe," saysBeatrix, with a laugh, "and was brought down by a bishop from a mountain.Oh, how I used to break my heart over it! Besides, I had a Popishgod-mother, mamma; why did you give me one?"
"I gave you the queen's name," says her mother, blushing. "And a verypretty name it is," said somebody else.
Beatrix went on reading--"Spell my name with a _y_--why, you wretch," saysshe, turning round to Colonel Esmond, "you have been telling my story toMr. Steele--or stop--you have written the paper yourself to turn me intoridicule. For shame, sir!"
Poor Mr. Esmond felt rather frightened, and told a truth, which wasnevertheless an entire falsehood. "Upon my honour," says he, "I have noteven read the _Spectator_ of this morning." Nor had he, for that was notthe _Spectator_, but a sham newspaper put in its place.
She went on reading: her face rather flushed as she read. "No," she says,"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 Isee an enormous compliment to a woman, and some outrageous panegyric aboutfemale virtue, I always feel sure that the captain and his better halfhave fallen out overnight, and that he has been brought home tipsy, or hasbeen found out in ----"
"Beatrix!" cries the Lady Castlewood.
"Well, mamma! Do not cry out before you are hurt. I am not going to sayanything wrong. I won't give you more annoyance than I can help, youpretty kind mamma. Yes, and your little Trix is a naughty little Trix, andshe leaves undone those things which she ought to have done, and doesthose things which she ought not to have done, and there's----well now--Iwon't go on. Yes, I will, unless you kiss me." And with this the younglady lays aside her paper, and runs up to her mother and performs avariety of embraces with her ladyship, saying as plain as eyes could speakto Mr. Esmond--"There, sir: would not _you_ like to play the very samepleasant game?"
"Indeed, madam, I would," says he.
"Would what?" asked Miss Beatrix.
"What you meant when you looked at me in that provoking way," answersEsmond.
"What a confessor!" cries Beatrix, with a laugh.
"What is it Henry would like, my dear?" asks her mother, the kind soul,who was always thinking what we would like, and how she could please us.
The girl runs up to her--"Oh, you silly kind mamma," she says, kissing heragain, "that's what Harry would like;" and she broke out into a greatjoyful laugh: and Lady Castlewood blushed as bashful as a maid of sixteen.
"Look at her, Harry," whispers Beatrix, running up, and speaking in hersweet low tones. "Doesn't the blush become her? Isn't she pretty? Shelooks younger than I am: and I am sure she is a hundred million thousandtimes better."
Esmond's kind mistress left the room, carrying her blushes away with her.
"If we girls at Court could grow such roses as that," continues Beatrix,with her laugh, "what wouldn't we do to preserve 'em? We'd clip theirstalks and put 'em in salt and water. But those flowers don't bloom atHampton Court and Windsor, Henry." She paused for a minute, and the smilefading away from her April face, gave place to a menacing shower of tears:"Oh, how good she is, Harry," Beatrix went on to say. "Oh, what a saintshe is! Her goodness frightens me. I'm not fit to live with her. I shouldbe better, I think, if she were not so perfect. She has had a great sorrowin her life, and a great secret; and repented of it. It could not havebeen my father's death. She talks freely about that; nor could she haveloved him very much--though who knows what we women do love, and why?"
"What, and why, indeed," says Mr. Esmond.
"No one knows," Beatrix went on, without noticing this interruption exceptby a look, "what my mother's life is. She hath been at early prayer thismorning: she passes hours in her closet; if you were to follow herthither, you would find her at prayers now. She t
ends the poor of theplace--the horrid dirty poor! She sits through the curate's sermons--oh,those dreary sermons! And you see, _on a beau dire_; but good as they are,people like her are not fit to commune with us of the world. There isalways, as it were, a third person present, even when I and my mother arealone. She can't be frank with me quite; who is always thinking of thenext world, and of her guardian angel, perhaps that's in company. Oh,Harry, I'm jealous of that guardian angel!" here broke out MistressBeatrix. "It's horrid, I know; but my mother's life is all for Heaven, andmine--all for earth. We can never be friends quite; and then, she caresmore for Frank's little finger than she does for me--I know she does: andshe loves you, sir, a great deal too much; and I hate you for it. I wouldhave had her all to myself; but she wouldn't. In my childhood, it was myfather she loved--(Oh, how could she? I remember him kind and handsome, butso stupid, and not being able to speak after drinking wine). And then, itwas Frank; and now, it is Heaven and the clergyman. How I would have lovedher! 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 ofthe blessed consolation of religion. Dear soul! she thinks she is happierfor believing, as she must, that we are all of us wicked and miserablesinners; and this world is only a _pied a terre_ for the good, where theystay for a night, as we do, coming from Walcote, at that great, dreary,uncomfortable Hounslow inn, in those horrid beds. Oh, do you rememberthose horrid beds?--and the chariot comes and fetches them to Heaven thenext morning."
"Hush, Beatrix," says Mr. Esmond.
"Hush, indeed. You are a hypocrite, too, Henry, with your grave airs andyour glum face. We are all hypocrites. Oh dear me! We are all alone,alone, alone," says poor Beatrix, her fair breast heaving with a sigh.
"It was I that writ every line of that paper, my dear," says Mr. Esmond."You are not so worldly as you think yourself, Beatrix, and better than webelieve you. The good we have in us we doubt of; and the happiness that'sto our hand we throw away. You bend your ambition on a great marriage andestablishment--and why? You'll tire of them when you win them; and be nohappier with a coronet on your coach----"
"Than riding pillion with Lubin to market," says Beatrix. "Thank you,Lubin!"
"I'm a dismal shepherd, to be sure," answers Esmond, with a blush; "andrequire 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 hisshoulders, and nursed me through my illness as love will scarce ever do.Only good wages, and a hope of my clothes, and the contents of myportmanteau. How long was it that Jacob served an apprenticeship forRachel?"
"For mamma?" says Beatrix. "Is it mamma your honour wants, and that Ishould have the happiness of calling you papa?"
Esmond blushed again. "I spoke of a Rachel that a shepherd courted fivethousand years ago; when shepherds were longer lived than now. And mymeaning was, that since I saw you first after our separation--a child youwere then----"
"And I put on my best stockings to captivate you, I remember, sir."
"You have had my heart ever since then, such as it was; and such as youwere, I cared for no other woman. What little reputation I have won, itwas that you might be pleased with it: and, indeed, it is not much; and Ithink a hundred fools in the army have got and deserved quite as much. Wasthere something in the air of that dismal old Castlewood that made us allgloomy, and dissatisfied, and lonely under its ruined old roof? We wereall so, even when together and united, as it seemed, following ourseparate schemes, each as we sat round the table."
"Dear, dreary old place!" cries Beatrix. "Mamma hath never had the heartto go back thither since we left it, when--never mind how many years ago,"and she flung back her curls, and looked over her fair shoulder at themirror superbly, as if she said, "Time, I defy you."
"Yes," says Esmond, who had the art, as she owned, of divining many of herthoughts. "You can afford to look in the glass still; and only be pleasedby the truth it tells you. As for me, do you know what my scheme is? Ithink of asking Frank to give me the Virginia estate King Charles gave ourgrandfather." (She gave a superb curtsy, as much as to say, "Ourgrandfather, indeed! Thank you, Mr. Bastard.") "Yes, I know you arethinking of my bar-sinister, and so am I. A man cannot get over it in thiscountry; unless, indeed, he wears it across a king's arms, when 'tis ahighly honourable coat: and I am thinking of retiring into theplantations, and building myself a wigwam in the woods, and perhaps, if Iwant company, suiting myself with a squaw. We will send your ladyship fursover for the winter; and, when you are old, we'll provide you withtobacco. I am not quite clever enough, or not rogue enough--I know notwhich--for the Old World. I may make a place for myself in the new, whichis 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 someday a little barbarian that is half Esmond half Mohock, and you will bekind to him for his father's sake, who was, after all, your kinsman; andwhom you loved a little."
"What folly you are talking, Harry!" says Miss Beatrix, looking with hergreat eyes.
"'Tis sober earnest," says Esmond. And, indeed, the scheme had beendwelling a good deal in his mind for some time past, and especially sincehis return home, when he found how hopeless, and even degrading tohimself, his passion was. "No," says he, then, "I have tried half a dozentimes now. I can bear being away from you well enough; but being with youis intolerable" (another low curtsy on Mrs. Beatrix's part), "and I willgo. I have enough to buy axes and guns for my men, and beads and blanketsfor the savages; and I'll go and live amongst them."
"_Mon ami_," she says, quite kindly, and taking Esmond's hand, with an airof great compassion. "You can't think that in our position anything morethan our present friendship is possible. You are our elder brother--as suchwe view you, pitying your misfortune, not rebuking you with it. Why, youare old enough and grave enough to be our father. I always thought you ahundred years old, Harry, with your solemn face and grave air. I feel as asister to you, and can no more. Isn't that enough, sir?" And she put herface quite close to his--who knows with what intention?
"It's too much," says Esmond, turning away. "I can't bear this life, andshall leave it. I shall stay, I think, to see you married, and thenfreight a ship, and call it the _Beatrix_, and bid you all----"
Here the servant, flinging the door open, announced his grace the Duke ofHamilton, and Esmond started back with something like an imprecation onhis lips, as the nobleman entered, looking splendid in his star and greenribbon. He gave Mr. Esmond just that gracious bow which he would havegiven to a lackey who fetched him a chair or took his hat, and seatedhimself by Miss Beatrix, as the poor colonel went out of the room with ahang-dog look.
Esmond's mistress was in the lower room as he passed downstairs. She oftenmet him as he was coming away from Beatrix; and she beckoned him into theapartment.
"Has she told you, Harry?" Lady Castlewood said.
"She has been very frank--very," says Esmond.
"But--but about what is going to happen?"
"What is going to happen?" says he, his heart beating.
"His grace the Duke of Hamilton has proposed to her," says my lady. "Hemade 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 theambassadress goes with him."