Chapter v.
In which the history of Mrs Fitzpatrick is continued.
"We remained at Bath no longer than a fortnight after our wedding; foras to any reconciliation with my aunt, there were no hopes; and of myfortune not one farthing could be touched till I was of age, of whichI now wanted more than two years. My husband therefore was resolved toset out for Ireland; against which I remonstrated very earnestly, andinsisted on a promise which he had made me before our marriage that Ishould never take this journey against my consent; and indeed I neverintended to consent to it; nor will anybody, I believe, blame me forthat resolution; but this, however, I never mentioned to my husband,and petitioned only for the reprieve of a month; but he had fixed theday, and to that day he obstinately adhered.
"The evening before our departure, as we were disputing this pointwith great eagerness on both sides, he started suddenly from hischair, and left me abruptly, saying he was going to the rooms. He washardly out of the house when I saw a paper lying on the floor, which,I suppose, he had carelessly pulled from his pocket, together with hishandkerchief. This paper I took up, and, finding it to be a letter, Imade no scruple to open and read it; and indeed I read it so oftenthat I can repeat it to you almost word for word. This then was theletter:
_'To Mr Brian Fitzpatrick._
'SIR,
'YOURS received, and am surprized you should use me in this manner, as have never seen any of your cash, unless for one linsey-woolsey coat, and your bill now is upwards of L150. Consider, sir, how often you have fobbed me off with your being shortly to be married to this lady and t'other lady; but I can neither live on hopes or promises, nor will my woollen-draper take any such in payment. You tell me you are secure of having either the aunt or the niece, and that you might have married the aunt before this, whose jointure you say is immense, but that you prefer the niece on account of her ready money. Pray, sir, take a fool's advice for once, and marry the first you can get. You will pardon my offering my advice, as you know I sincerely wish you well. Shall draw on you per next post, in favour of Messieurs John Drugget and company, at fourteen days, which doubt not your honouring, and am,
Sir, your humble servant, 'SAM. COSGRAVE.'
"This was the letter, word for word. Guess, my dear girl--guess howthis letter affected me. You prefer the niece on account of her readymoney! If every one of these words had been a dagger, I could withpleasure have stabbed them into his heart; but I will not recount myfrantic behaviour on the occasion. I had pretty well spent my tearsbefore his return home; but sufficient remains of them appeared in myswollen eyes. He threw himself sullenly into his chair, and for a longtime we were both silent. At length, in a haughty tone, he said, `Ihope, madam, your servants have packed up all your things; for thecoach will be ready by six in the morning.' My patience was totallysubdued by this provocation, and I answered, `No, sir, there is aletter still remains unpacked;' and then throwing it on the table Ifell to upbraiding him with the most bitter language I could invent.
"Whether guilt, or shame, or prudence, restrained him I cannot say;but, though he is the most passionate of men, he exerted no rage onthis occasion. He endeavoured, on the contrary, to pacify me by themost gentle means. He swore the phrase in the letter to which Iprincipally objected was not his, nor had he ever written any such. Heowned, indeed, the having mentioned his marriage, and that preferencewhich he had given to myself, but denied with many oaths the havingmentioned any such matter at all on account of the straits he was infor money, arising, he said, from his having too long neglected hisestate in Ireland. And this, he said, which he could not bear todiscover to me, was the only reason of his having so strenuouslyinsisted on our journey. He then used several very endearingexpressions, and concluded by a very fond caress, and many violentprotestations of love.
"There was one circumstance which, though he did not appeal to it, hadmuch weight with me in his favour, and that was the word jointure inthe taylor's letter, whereas my aunt never had been married, and thisMr Fitzpatrick well knew.----As I imagined, therefore, that the fellowmust have inserted this of his own head, or from hearsay, I persuadedmyself he might have ventured likewise on that odious line on nobetter authority. What reasoning was this, my dear? was I not anadvocate rather than a judge?--But why do I mention such acircumstance as this, or appeal to it for the justification of myforgiveness?--In short, had he been guilty of twenty times as much,half the tenderness and fondness which he used would have prevailed onme to have forgiven him. I now made no farther objections to oursetting out, which we did the next morning, and in a little more thana week arrived at the seat of Mr Fitzpatrick.
"Your curiosity will excuse me from relating any occurrences whichpast during our journey; for it would indeed be highly disagreeable totravel it over again, and no less so to you to travel it over with me.
"This seat, then, is an ancient mansion-house: if I was in one ofthose merry humours in which you have so often seen me, I coulddescribe it to you ridiculously enough. It looked as if it had beenformerly inhabited by a gentleman. Here was room enough, and not theless room on account of the furniture; for indeed there was verylittle in it. An old woman, who seemed coeval with the building, andgreatly resembled her whom Chamont mentions in the Orphan, received usat the gate, and in a howl scarce human, and to me unintelligible,welcomed her master home. In short, the whole scene was so gloomy andmelancholy, that it threw my spirits into the lowest dejection; whichmy husband discerning, instead of relieving, encreased by two or threemalicious observations. `There are good houses, madam,' says he, `asyou find, in other places besides England; but perhaps you had ratherbe in a dirty lodgings at Bath.'
"Happy, my dear, is the woman who, in any state of life, hath acheerful good-natured companion to support and comfort her! But why doI reflect on happy situations only to aggravate my own misery? mycompanion, far from clearing up the gloom of solitude, soon convincedme that I must have been wretched with him in any place, and in anycondition. In a word, he was a surly fellow, a character perhaps youhave never seen; for, indeed, no woman ever sees it exemplified but ina father, a brother, or a husband; and, though you have a father, heis not of that character. This surly fellow had formerly appeared tome the very reverse, and so he did still to every other person. Goodheaven! how is it possible for a man to maintain a constant lie in hisappearance abroad and in company, and to content himself with shewingdisagreeable truth only at home? Here, my dear, they make themselvesamends for the uneasy restraint which they put on their tempers in theworld; for I have observed, the more merry and gay and good-humouredmy husband hath at any time been in company, the more sullen andmorose he was sure to become at our next private meeting. How shall Idescribe his barbarity? To my fondness he was cold and insensible. Mylittle comical ways, which you, my Sophy, and which others, havecalled so agreeable, he treated with contempt. In my most seriousmoments he sung and whistled; and whenever I was thoroughly dejectedand miserable he was angry, and abused me: for, though he was neverpleased with my good-humour, nor ascribed it to my satisfaction inhim, yet my low spirits always offended him, and those he imputed tomy repentance of having (as he said) married an Irishman.
"You will easily conceive, my dear Graveairs (I ask your pardon, Ireally forgot myself), that, when a woman makes an imprudent match inthe sense of the world, that is, when she is not an arrant prostituteto pecuniary interest, she must necessarily have some inclination andaffection for her man. You will as easily believe that this affectionmay possibly be lessened; nay, I do assure you, contempt will whollyeradicate it. This contempt I now began to entertain for my husband,whom I now discovered to be--I must use the expression--an arrantblockhead. Perhaps you will wonder I did not make this discovery longbefore; but women will suggest a thousand excuses to themselves forthe folly of those they like: besides, give me leave to tell you, itrequires a most penetrating eye to discern a fool through thedisguises of gaiety and good breeding.
"It will be easily imagined tha
t, when I once despised my husband, asI confess to you I soon did, I must consequently dislike his company;and indeed I had the happiness of being very little troubled with it;for our house was now most elegantly furnished, our cellars wellstocked, and dogs and horses provided in great abundance. As mygentleman therefore entertained his neighbours with great hospitality,so his neighbours resorted to him with great alacrity; and sports anddrinking consumed so much of his time, that a small part of hisconversation, that is to say, of his ill-humours, fell to my share.
"Happy would it have been for me if I could as easily have avoided allother disagreeable company; but, alas! I was confined to some whichconstantly tormented me; and the more, as I saw no prospect of beingrelieved from them. These companions were my own racking thoughts,which plagued and in a manner haunted me night and day. In thissituation I past through a scene, the horrors of which can neither bepainted nor imagined. Think, my dear, figure, if you can, to yourself,what I must have undergone. I became a mother by the man I scorned,hated, and detested. I went through all the agonies and miseries of alying-in (ten times more painful in such a circumstance than the worstlabour can be when one endures it for a man one loves) in a desert, orrather, indeed, a scene of riot and revel, without a friend, without acompanion, or without any of those agreeable circumstances which oftenalleviate, and perhaps sometimes more than compensate, the sufferingsof our sex at that season."