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"The Ladies": A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty

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Title: "The Ladies": A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty

Author: L. Adams Beck


        
Release date: July 1, 2005 [eBook #8434]
                Most recently updated: March 27, 2014

Language: English

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[Illustration: _Elizabeth Duchess of Hamilton and Argyle née
Gunning_]

"The Ladies"

A Shining Constellation of Wit and Beauty

by

E. Barrington

Illustrated with Portraits



Preface



The aim of these stories is not historical exactitude nor unbending
accuracy in dates or juxtaposition. They are rather an attempt to
re-create the personalities of a succession of charming women, ranging
from Elizabeth Pepys, wife of the Diarist, to Fanny Burney and her
experiences at the Court of Queen Charlotte. As I have imagined them, so I
have set them forth, and if what is written can at all revive their
perished grace and the unfading delight of days that now belong to the
ages, and to men no more, I shall not have failed. Much is imagination,
more is truth, but which is which I scarcely can tell myself. I have
wished to set them in other circumstances than those we know.

What would Elizabeth Pepys have felt if she had read the secrets of the
Diary? If Stella and Vanessa had met--Ah, that is a tenderness and terror
almost beyond all thinking! How would my Lady Mary's smarting pride have
blistered herself and others if the Fleet marriage of her eccentric
son--whose wife she never saw--had actually come between the wind and her
nobility? Was there no finer, more ethereal touch in Elizabeth Gunning's
stolen marriage with her Duke than is recorded in Horace Walpole's
malicious gossip? Could such beauty have been utterly sordid? What were
the fears and hopes of the lovely Maria Walpole as, after long concealment
of her marriage, she trembled on the steps of a throne? How did those
about her judge of Fanny Burney in the Digby affair? Did she wholly
conceal her heart? From her Diary we know what she wished to feel--very
certainly not entirely what she felt.

Perhaps of all these women we know best that Elizabeth who never
lived--Elizabeth Bennet. She is the most real because her inner being is
laid open to us by her great creator. I have not dared to touch her save
as a shadow picture in the background of the quiet English country-life
which now is gone for ever. But her fragrance--stimulating rather than
sweet, like lavender and rosemary--could not be forgotten in any picture
of the late eighteenth or early nineteenth centuries and among the women
whom all the world remembers. They, one and all, can only move in
dreamland now. Their lives are but stories in a printed book, and a
heroine of Jane Austen's is as real as Stella or the fair Walpole. So I
apologise for nothing. I have dreamed. I may hope that others will dream
with me.

E. BARRINGTON




Table of Contents



I. The Diurnal of Mrs Elizabeth Pepys
   _Had she Read her Husband's Diary_

II. The Mystery of Stella
   _Why might not she and Vanessa have met?_

III. My Lady Mary
   _To Dispel the Mystery of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's quitting
England in 1739_

IV. The Golden Vanity
   _A Story of the First Irish Beauties--the Gunnings_

V. The Walpole Beauty
   _A Tale in Letters about Maria Walpole, Countess of Waldegrave,
Duchess of Gloucester, Niece of Horace Walpole_

VI. A Blue Stocking at Court
   _Why Fanny Burney, Madame D'Arblay, retired from Court in 1791_

VII. The Darcys of Rosing
   _A Reintroduction to some of the characters of Miss Austen's
Novels_




Illustrations



Elizabeth Cunning
Portrait by Catherine Reed

Mrs Pepys as St. Katharine
Portrait by Hayts

Esther Johnson, "Stella"
Portrait by Kneller

Hester Vanhomrigh, "Vanessa"

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
Portrait by Kneller

Maria Gunning
Portrait by Cotes

Maria Walpole and Her Daughter, Elizabeth Laura
Portrait by Reynolds

Fanny Burney, Madame D'Arblay
After Portrait by E. F. Burney




Elizabeth Pepys
1640-1669



"So home to dinner with my wife, very pleasant and pleased with one
another's company, and in our general enjoyment one of another, better we
think than most other couples do."

Elizabeth St. Michel, daughter of a French Huguenot, was fifteen when
Pepys married her. She was only twenty-nine when she died. Pepys himself
at their marriage was twenty-two. It is the skirmishing of young folk that
he describes when he reports such animated scenes as the occasion when his
wife threatened him with the red-hot tongs. They had their brisk
encounters and their affectionate interludes as well, when "very merry we
were with our pasty, well-baked, and a good dish of roasted chickens;
pease, lobsters, strawberries."

In odd moments, Pepys applied himself to his wife's education. Dismissing
her dancing-master by reason of jealousy, he began instead a course in
Arithmetic. He himself taught her Addition, Subtraction, and the
Multiplication Tables; but, says he, "I purpose not to trouble her yet
with Division, but to begin with the Globes to her now."

At her early death he mourned sincerely, and erected a memorial
celebrating the accomplished charms of Elizabeth, his wife,--

  "Forma, Artibus, Linguis Cultissima."

[Illustration: Mrs Pepys as St. Katharine]



I

The Diurnal of Mrs. Elizabeth Pepys


2d _May_.--Sam'l now in great honour at the Navy Office, whereat my
heart do rejoice, and the less for the havings, which do daily increase,
than that I would willingly see him worshipfully received, the which
indeede his hard work do plentifully deserve, he sparing himselfe in
nothing for the advancing of his busyness.

And I do reason with myselfe that though he have faults many and great
(which God knowes is true) yet he do come up in the world and our gettings
are very good and do daily increase. How they go I know not, for that
little and grudging is spent on my clothes, and though Sam'l goes very
noble still it is not possible but much is saved, though he do lament
himself in very high wordes of our spendthrift way of life and small
saving.

But of this more anon.

Up and dressed a pease pudding with boyled rabbets and bacon to dinner for
want of a cook-mayde, Sarah leaving us at dawn, and he loving it mightily.
The which he should not have this day but that I have a month's mind to a
slashte wastcote which hitherto he hath soured upon. This done, a brave
dish of cream in the which he takes great delight; and so seeing him in
Tune I to lament the ill wear of my velvet wastcote as desiring a Better,
whereon he soured. We jangling mightily on this I did object his new
Jackanapes coat with silver buttons, but to no purpose. He reading in the
Passionate Pillgrim which he do of all things love. But angry to prayers
and to Bed.

But it is observable that this day I discover Sam'l in the keeping of a
Journal and very secret in this, and come at it I will, he being much
abroad on his occasions the while I sit at home.

3d.--This day awakes Sam'l in a musty humour as much over-served with meat
and Drink, and in great discontent calling me, do bid me rise and fetch
his Pills that olde Mother Wigsworth did give him at Brampton. I merry and
named him the Passionate Pillgrim from his love to these, whereupon he
flings the Pills in my face and all scattered, Deb grudging to gather them
it being Lord's Day. So I to churche, leaving him singing and playing
"Beauty, Retire" to his Viall, a song not worthy to be sung on a holy Day
however he do conceit his skill therein. His brown beauty Mrs Lethulier in
the pew against us and I do perceive her turn her Eye to see if Sam'l do
come after. She very brave in hanging sleeves, yet an ill-lookt jade if
one do but consider, but with the seeking Eye that men look to, and Sam'l
in especial. Fried Loyne of mutton to dinner, and Sam'l his head akeing I
did sit beside him discoursing of the new hangings for the small closet,
wherein great pleasure for it will be most neat and fine. And great
content have we in such discourse and in our house and the good we are
come to.

4th.--This day do Sam'l speak handsomely enough of his humour yesterday,
charging it upon the Rabbets, and so I left it. And strange it is how when
he do so repent my heart do take part with him though I would better
renounce him awhile to learn him manners. So he to the Exchange and buys
me a piece of Paragon to a pettycote, and though it be not what I would
have of my own choosing yet I do receive it with many goode words as
hoping all will yet be as I desire. So to sup on a good dish of beef _à
la mode_, and he well content, it appearing he have this day bestowed
upon himself at the Exchange a good Theorbo, four Bookes, and a payre of
Globes, talking very high how these be for my instruction rather than his
own liking. The which I receive smyling, but do think--Lord! what fools
men be that will have a woman so lightly deceived, fine wordes buttering
no parsnips. Sure they be but Children when all said and done, and their
Innocency in this a pleasant thing to see.

Comes Mr Collins with his new Wife, a pretty well-shaped Woman with black
hayre and Eyes, and she, much cried up for her skill on the Theorbo, do
after play a Lesson upon it, but very ill, and pretty to see Sam'l that
was hoping great things (loving musique) in pain and grief to hear her
mean false playing and yet making fine wordes of it to please her, and
they gone, do call her slut and baggage and I know not what all. So to
prayers and bed.

5th.--Sam'l this day reading over his vows not to drink strong waters or
wines nor yet go to the play for two weekes. But I do ask myself (though
not Sam'l) whether these vows be convenient. For I do surely think he do
it only because it is the greater pleasure to drink and see the play, it
being thus forbid. And in Saml' it is to be noted and methinks in other
Men also that they do suck more pleasure from a thing forbidden and hard
to come at than from the same thing when comely and convenient to be done
in the sight of all. This day, he being with his Lordship, I to gain a
sight of his Journal, he carelessly leaving it about, but took nothing by
my pains, it being writ in secret writing, which do plainly show it to be
what he would be shamed if known. Whereas mine owne is voide of all
offence, and I do lay it under the smocks in the great armoire only
because it is not seemly that Sam'l should know my thoughts, I having to
deal with him as best I may.

_Mem_. To ask of Mrs Jemimah Crosby if her father, being a scrivener,
knoweth and can instruct in secret writings.

Sam'l home late this day, and the supper, a calve's head, very good, with
a noble Barell of oysters, he bringing with him Mr S. Lucy, and so supt
very merry, and after in the garden, Sam'l to play on his flageolette, it
being full moon. So to bed, omitting prayers. A pleasant day and content
together.

6th.--This day, seeing Mrs Jemimah Crosby, I to ask her earnestly if her
father the scrivener do teach the secret writing, and she replying that so
it was, I after the mayde's cleaning the house, do forth and to his
lodging behind Paternoster Row, he being a worthy olde Gentleman with a
long white bearde, very reverend. I enjoining him to be secret, which he
the more willingly promised that I have obliged him and Mrs Jem with
codiniac and quince marmalett of my own making, do tell him how my father
(which is unknown to him) have documents and papers which he would
willingly decipher but for his bad Eyes. Wherein God forgive me, for his
eyes are the best Part of him. Olde Mr Crosby thereon urgent that my
father entrust him with the worke, but I sticking at the expense, no more
said. So I to show him a line of Dots and hooks which I did copy from
Sam'l his Journal, and he reading it with ease, what should it prove to be
but this:--

    "Took occasion to fall out with my wife very highly about her ribbands
     being ill matcht and of two colours, and to very high words, so that
     I did call her Beaste."

So finding all as I thought and it being very needful that I should know
Sam'l his thoughts (and indeed he is very simple to write them unless he
think he have a fool to his wife) I do covenant with the olde Gentleman
for Lessons which are dear enough, but to be paid from the housekeeping,
and indeed the better that Sam'l should live plaine awhile in
consideration of his ailing. So home in good time, and do find Sam'l and
our she-cousin Scott very merry with capping of Epitaphs and sayings,
wherein I also delighte. A very merry witty woman and harmlesse. Suppt on
a Westfalia Ham and so with prayers content to bed.

7th.--This day Sam'l returning from the Office takes me to a fine
collacion at Hamling's house, wherein the fine silver set forth upon the
table do give us great pleasure, but I a little shamed because the ladies
so brave, Mrs Hamling very Rich in an embroidered suit, and Mrs Pegg Penn
in flowered sattin, which God knows she do not become, and heads set out
with the new French frizzle. I very plain in my olde black silk new-laced
all over with black silk gimp, Sam'l declaring I am very pretty in this,
but I trust him not herein, he willing to save his Purse. One passage of
Sam'l kissing the little black beauty, Mrs Deakin, that he do call his
Morena, displeased me, she being known for a frolicsome jade. He later
singing, "Gaze not on Swans," and "Goe and be Hanged--that's Good-bye,"
all did applaud, and great mirth. It was observable that Captain Wade,
kissing me on parting, did a little detain my Hand, and for this Sam'l did
so betwit and becall me, returning in the Coach, that I pretended sleep,
which did put him in a great discontent and so angry and without Prayers
to bed. Yet sure this shows his good liking to me, and I think his heart
sound, though he do Friske as I would he did not.

8th.--This day hear that my Lady Sandwich is Delivered of a young Lady and
all well. Sam'l thinking (on some jest of my Lord's) to stand Godfather
and give the name--though how to call the Babe for him I see not--do at
once provide silver Spoons and a Porringer. Which, seeing he is not yet
bidden, doth I confesse, appear exceeding foolish and like a man that hath
more silly pride than sense, the rather that I lack a French mantle that
he hath promist but not performed. But I say nothing, according to the
olde wise saw of Goody Gorum,--

    Nothing say,
    But take your way.

He this day in his new Cote of the fashion and half cloth stockings going
to give my Lord joy, do indeed seem very brave and noble, and hath a neat
legg, and it pleases me to see him go as he should, for he is a personable
man when well set out. And if he did but consider how it is to his honour
that his Wife should go as fine as he I could the more rejoice therein,
but it is not so, and great dishonour it is to him to consider how this
quarter he hath spent fifty pounds on his clothes and but twelve on me, a
thing not fit to be said of him. But I wait my time.

10th.--This day Sam'l refuses me the French mantle as beyond his Purse,
but offers a payre of gloves--I refusing this. Slipt out for Lesson, olde
Mr Crosby being a worthy and patient teacher, but it is a science very
hard to be come at, and I weary enough in the learning of it, though
indeed it be so needful. Still, some progress, and he saying merrily I
would be at some mischief in this, with love Letters or such Toys, do make
me to blush, so as I never did but when Sam'l was courting me. Yet no
guilty deed, but what is very fitting for a woman. Was instant with the
olde Gentleman that he should speake of my Lessons to none, the more so (I
did say) that my father would not have these papers known to any, great
matters hanging on it. Which indeed is true though not as he takes it.

So I home and with Sam'l to the Play, where my Lady Castlemaine, which
indeed is a great Beauty, nor can I deny it, but sure it is not hard to be
a beauty in Clothes and jewels that do dazzle the Eyes of all that Gaze
upon her. But, Lord! to see how bold and unmannerly in staring upon
strangers and the men on the stage, and in fine do not please me with her
Freedoms. This Sam'l disputing very hotly after we had supt upon a Jowl of
Salmon, I to speake my mind, asking if he would have his Wife casting
oranges to the actors and blowing Kisses all about the house, and he not
knowing what to answer, I do say, "Then prayse it not in others, for, if
you will have me a bold Slut, no doubt but I will do my endeavours to
please you," and so whiskte off, he sitting astonied. And strange how men
will like in otheres what in their own Wives they love not but fear.

14th.--This day I by my Lady's desire to see the young Lady which is a
fine Babe and like to do well. But no word of Sam'l to stand Godfather,
and Sir J. Minnes and Lrd Brouncker spoke of, which is no more than I
thought, but will make Sam'l madd with his spoones. But no loss herein if
it do make him more biddable in women's matters. Her La'ship observing
that my Lutestring suit is well worn and do me no credit, I did adventure
to beseech her that she would break a word with Sam'l on his next waiting
upon her that he would give me a Gown of Moyre which is now all the
fashion, and this, with many good words she promist very lovingly,
desiring that I would come in a weeks time to learn how she hath sped. So
I home in good Tune as knowing he oweth his duty to my Lord and Lady and
will be said by her. In comes fayre Mrs Margaret Wight to sup on a dish of
Eggs and butter of Sparagus that Sam'l hath ate with my Lord Carlingford
and do highly commend. And indeed it is rare meat. After, we dancing and
very merry with Mrs Margaret, and she gone, I take occasion to tell Sam'l
of the Godfathers like to stand for the young Lady. Whereat he in a great
Tosse, but I willing to smoothe all betwixt him and my Lady do tell him
the honourable words she have spoke of him to myself and others, the more
especially of his Velvet suit with scarlet ribands. The which pleasing
him, we fall to discourse of what to do with the Spoons and Porringer,
resolving the spoons do go to Betty Michell where certayne it is I do
stand Godmother, and the Porringer to Mrs Lane, whose name I know not but
will come at shortly, and he do cry her up for a sober and God-fearing
woman. So pleasantly to bed and good frends.

16th.--This day comes my new cook-Mayd, Jane Gentleman, and heaven send
she prove worthy of her name, for I am drove almost madd with mayds that
are not mayds but Sluts and know not diligence nor cleanliness, to their
own undoing and mine. And strange it is to consider how in the olden days
before my mother and Grandmother (who suffered great horroures from the
like) the mayds were a peaceable and diligent folk, going about their
busyness to the great content of all housewives. But now it is not so. And
it is only two days sennight that I coming suddenly in did find Sarah
with my new silk Hood upon her Frowsy head and Will discoursing with her
and thrumming upon Sam'l his viallin. Whereat I did catch her a sound
souse of the Ear, but she never a whit the better of it and answering me
so sawcily that we parted on it, Sam'l upholding me in this, though it be
hard enough to fill her place the wench being a good Cooke-mayde, though
sluttish.

20th.--Sam'l to visit my Lady, who receives him with great content and
satisfaction, though she railed bitterly at my Lord that is so taken up
with his pleasures and amusements that he goeth not to Court as he should,
and she fears will be passed over and forgot for others that keep more
stir. Requiring Sam'l that he would deal plainly with my Lord on this,
making known to him that his Reputacion do hereby decay. But this methinks
is a difficult matter, and I do counsel Sam'l that he put not his finger
between the Bark and the Tree, lest it come by a shrewd squeeze, but let
rather my Lady deal with her Lord as a Wife should do. But he would not
harken, whereby I foresee trouble.

He then, pulling out of his pocket a little Packett, do say pleasantly,
"What, my Deare, shall you and I never go a-fairing again? What think you
I have here? And how many Kisses will you bid me for a sight?"

Much merriment and pleasure from this, he holding it high, and I leaping
for it like a Dogg. At the last he opens it, and lo a fine Lace of the new
fashion for my bosom, and I do well perceive that my Lady hath been at
him, and am well content I did break the matter to her, though an honest
gown had been more to my Purpose. Yet well begun is half done. Though but
half, as Sam'l shall find.

Our she-cousin Scott did visit me this day with sore complaints of her
husband's humours and constant drizzling, which is more than a woman can
or ought to bear. Therefore I should remember that with Sam'l it is not
so, but a spurt or flame of anger when he will be very high with me, yet
quickly snuft out and friends again. And generally, it is noticeable, with
some little gift for peacemaking, so that I have more than once of set
purpose Baited him to this end. Yet not often. Considering therefore the
husbands I do know, I think Sam'l no worse a bargain than any and better
than some, but shall be better assured in this when I shall come at his
Journal. My seventh lesson today in the secret writing, and progress made,
but it do make my head ake extremely and were it not needful would not
continue on therein.

Comes this day my old Mayd Gosnell that Sam'l and I do call our Marmotte,
she telling me that Jane my mayde is naught and she hath herself seen her
abroade in light company. Yet cooking as she cooks Sam'l sticks on this
and bids me wink my eyes and observe nothing, and such like are men!

21st.--This day Sam'l his feast for the recovery of his ailment which he
do always solemnly keep with great store of meat and Drink and company.
And this is a great day with him and a troublous one with me, and to the
Mayds also such as would madd a Saint. Yet all said and done a noble
Dinner, enough and to spare, being a dish of Marrowbones, a legg of
Mutton, a loin of Veal, a dish of fowl, being three Pullets and 24 Larks
all in a great dish, a Tart, a neat's tongue, a dish of anchovies, a dish
of Prawns and cheese. His company seven men (Captain Fenner and both Sir
Williams among them) and seven women and all reasonable merry. But I
beseeching Sam'l privately to eat and Drink sparingly for the pain in his
Toe, he do so becall me that it was ten to an Ace that I did hurle the
Spit and the birds withal into the fire. Yet knowing he would pay dear
next day, I said the less and so continued on, bidding him take his own
way and pay for his liking. But indeed great company and the Dinner well
cooked and served and they did drink my health on it. Also the house very
handsome with Plate displayed and fires where the Company did sit. And the
greatness of living we are come to did make Mrs Pierce's Mouth to water
though she in her flowered Lutestring and liking well of it. So she green
and yellow with spite as I did well perceive. Great Musique after, with
"Great, good and just," and Sam'l at the top of his Tune, and so to cards
and wine. Weary to bed, Sam'l starting up in the night with Nightmare not
knowing what he did, and did so shreeke and cry that the Mayds in affright
did run in, and the Watchmen passing called to know was any poor Soul
murthered within. But this no more than my Expectation, and so quietly to
sleep.

22d.--This day a noble gift of Plate being two Candelsticks and a dish
from Capt Salmon, he looking for favour from Sam'l concerning the
Henrietta shippe that he would have on next going to Sea. Which do plainly
prove to what honour and advancement we are come to be so courted, and do
gladde his heart and mine. Sat long discoursing of this, and, turning the
case, what should fall out but a ring set with an Orient perle for me,
which as not expecting I received with great good will. Sam'l to the
office and I to my lesson wherein very diligent and commended of olde Mr
Crosby, and indeed I am come already to the reading of many wordes, yet
not glibbly. So home, but Sam'l coming home and I combing his hayre he did
say, "Who do I meet this day in Broade Street but olde Crosby, Mrs Jem's
father, that I did think long dead and buried, not having seen him this
year and more, and so to talk with him."

And, Lord! to see how I did redden, my heart so beating in my bosom as I
could have thought it would choak me, and do even sweat in the writing of
it. For sure it might well be the olde Gentleman would think Sam'l did
know all my father's business and speak thereon. But I could not speak and
my hand shaked so in the Combing that I did drop the comb. And he
continuing, "So I asked him how he did and he answered, 'Bravely'; and
more I would have said for it is a worthy man, but little Mrs Deakin
passing, that I do call my Morena, I would not be seen talking to one so
scurvily clad, and so incontinently left him standing and hasted away."

So it passed, nor did I ask him if he hasted after his Morena, for heaven
be thankt that she did pass by, though I thought not to live to say it.
But I will take order with olde Mr Crosby, for olde men be tattlers more
than any woman or is convenient. And so a great escape.

So Sam'l carries me to the Paynter where he sits for his face and very
like it is, yet do not please, he thinking it do make his Eyes too small
and ill-favoured, but I not so, and Lord! to see him sit Smirking upon Mr
Savile since Mrs Knipp hath commended his Smyle! But Mr Savile the Paynter
seeing me did speak in very handsome language, telling Sam'l he hath a
Beauty to his wife worthy that her picture should be with the Court
Ladies' pictures, and much more fine things, harping on the same string,
whereto Sam'l made answer that he would consider of it. But to see the
Vanity of men, when all the world knows that the sight of a pretty Woman's
face is worth all the men that ever were or will be! So I sat devising how
to set myself off if this should be, and did like well of my Cardinal
sattin suit with a chapeau de poil tied beneath my chin. Or it may be,
perles in my hayre, and to borrow my Lady's if so she will. Fritters for
supper, the best I ever did eat, Sam'l confirming me in this, and he
discoursing very high of the corruption of the times, and no regard to
clean living in court or city, and glad I am that thus he thinks, and do
hope he acts answerably, as he should.

27th.--This day, by long promise, Sam'l do carry me to White Hall to see
the Queen in her presence Chamber playing at Cards with her ladies, and
the people looking and crowding upon them. He commending Mrs Stewart
for a great Beauty and so indeede she is, and one I do not weary in
looking on, and do far outshine my Lady Castlemaine as I well perceive His
Maj'tie do also thinke. Her Maj'tie appearing very comely in a Gown of
silver lace, but Lord! how no one takes heed of her when my Lady
Castlemaine is by, which is a great dishonour to a sweete Lady in her owne
Court, and I am much mistook if Her Maj'tie be not the best Lady of them
all, and that not saying much! But strange to see how beauty sways all and
how Sam'l do uphold my Lady Castlemaine in all things.

Captain Holmes accosted us and very fine in his gold laced suit, and it is
noticeable that Sam'l troubled in mind because he well knows that Captain
H---- hath called me for a Toast and the greatest Beauty in Town. And this
Sam'l likes well of for his own Pride, yet not for me to know. So saying
we must return in Haste, he would bid adieu to the Captain, but he
followed and escorted me very gallant to the Coche, hat under his arm, and
so kissed my hand at parting not once but twice. Now I know well to make
Captain Holmes or any other Captain keepe his Distance, but Sam'l,
thinking all one as himself, in a sadd musty humour, and yet would not
come forth with what ailed him. So I do Debate with myself if it be not
well he should see that Men of court and Fashion do judge me worth a
thought. And I think it be, and so I do learn my Part.

In comes Mrs. Knipp to play and sing. Very witty and pleasant doubtlesse,
and they very merry. I with Jane, contriving my olde pettycote with a
broade blacke lace at the foot to hide the wear. But indeede I begin to be
full of thoughts considering if I do well in going to Brampton, when Sam'l
alone in Towne do friske and please himself as he will, Jane confirming me
in this. He home with Knipp, returning in a great Tosse because I did not
bid her to sup with us, and do pull his supper all about the floor, a good
hasht hen as ever a man did eat, when he should the rather soberly thank
heaven for meat and appettite. But sorry later, there being nought else
but sops and wine. And so, good friends and to bed, the Storms coming and
going, but I think he do love me at heart, and indeede I do love him well.

28th.--Lord's Day. To church at St. Olave's where a poor dull sermon from
a bawling Scotman, and Sam'l to sleep, a thing unseemly in the Church, but
I awake and did fix in my mind the pattern of my Lady Batten's Hood, the
which I would not ask of her for that we do of late a little make
ourselves strange to her and her family, but the less matter because I now
have it in my Eye. Mrs Lethulier masqued, which methought a strange thing
to be seen at Worshipp, though the great Ladies do now carry their masques
to the Play that none may see them Blush, or rather, as Sam'l do say, that
none may see they cannot blush if they would. And indeed all the Men do
now complain that the Beauties hide their faces.

_Mem_. To Buy a masque in Paternoster Row when I do go to Mr Crosby.
This night to bed in the little green chamber--the Chymney swepers in our
own.

1st _June_.--To my Lady this day and do give her my thankfull
gratitude for that she hath spoke with Sam'l concerning my poore clothes,
telling her of the Lace he did give, she pishing and pshawing it for a
meane gift, remembering the money that do pass through his hands whereof
my Lord hath informed her. Comes Sam'l later to carry me home, and my Lady
speaking with him of my Lady Jem's marriage with young Mr Carteret do say
he is so abasht and so little coming forward with his courtship that it do
much discomfort poor Lady Jem as not knowing what he would be at. So my
Lady beseecht Sam'l that he would instruct him how to court a lady, he
otherwise doing very well, and a worthy Gentleman, and one my Lady Jem
could like of if not so shamefaced. Sam'l simpring upon this, as who
should say, "None better," do make us merry, seeing him already conning
over what manner of Speeches and approaches will grace the Gentleman, but
I do know him well able in such matters. And indeed in all.

2d _July_.--Lesson, and do now begin well to read. Bought masque of
the Toy woman, in the Row, she saying, "Lord! is this the fayre Mrs Pepys,
wife to Mr Sam'l Pepys, that is known for a great man to be? Sure Madam
was well pleased with the French mantle that he did buy for her a sennight
come Saturday?"

So seeing she was a little ugly talking woman, I did sound her on this,
for it vexed me cruelly since he hath sent it to another. And for all, I
do and will believe it is but sporting and jesting, which if I did not,
God help us all! So sadly and soberly home, but yet said nothing. Pray God
all be well.

24th _July_.--For many days have I not writ, for at the last I did
come to read what I would, and though not all, for some is in Greeke or I
know not what, yet what I did read hath broke my heart. His Mrs Lane that
he did prayse for a God-fearing woman, his Deb--but what do I say?--sure
he hath not a heart but a stone. So I telling him certayne things of my
knowledge (and yet not how I did know them), he in great fear and terrour
and as I thought unlike a man of Courage. Which did shame me for him that
I could scarce bring myself to look in his face and see him thus,
remembering his high carriage that I did use to see in him. And times
there were when I would the rather he did Brazen it out, it seeming so
poor a thing to see him so low, and times again when in Madness I would
have taken a knife to him, but he did pull it away with weeping Teares and
promise of amendment. But how to trust him or any I cannot tell. And I
have bid Will Hewer (Sam'l humbly agreeing thereto) that he continue with
his master and oversee him in all his walks abroad, doing me to wit where
he goeth. Yet, how to trust Will--for sure all men are alike and will give
the other countenance in Deceit. So what way to surety, for if a man
regard not his wife where shall she look for good? And truly I do believe
that in such Trafficking men do chip and whittle away their heart till
none be left and they cannot love if they would, and no anchorage in so
rotten a Holding ground. And thus have I learned that a woman may be young
and yet aweary of her life, which I did not think to be true.

Sometimes I would I had not read, and again I would know more and run the
knife yet deeper in my heart, and in that curst book never will I read
again, and even in the writing of this well do I know I cannot forbear to
read, and so Teares my drink and all my content gone. But let me remember
there was here and there a word where he hath writ tenderly of his poor
Wife, and when I did see him weep my heart did pity him. But what hope or
help, for a Jar mended may hold water, but yet the Cracks remain, and the
worth gone for ever and a Day.

Well, God mend all, and yet I think He cannot. But in this Booke of mine
will I never write more, for the mirth and the little Frets that I did
think so great alike do pierce my heart to read. So farewell, my Booke,
that was a good friend in sunshine but an ill friend in storm, for I am
done with thee and with many things more this day.

And so to the work that must be done and the day that must be lived though
Brows ake and heart break.

(_Elizabeth Pepys died at the age of twenty-nine_.)




Esther Johnson
"Stella"
1681-1728



Jonathan Swift's cousin and biographer sums up his views of the mystery of
Stella in definite fashion: "For that she was married to Dr Swift about
the year 1716, I am thoroughly persuaded, although it is certain they
continued to live in separate Houses in the same manner they had usually
done before." Other contemporaries of Swift are equally persuaded that no
marriage took place at all. Under the circumstances, it is no great marvel
if, as one gossip suggests, "her spirits might have become dejected, by
her frequent revolving in her mind the Odness of her Situation."

When Esther Johnson's mother was companion to Lady Giffard, sister of Sir
William Temple, the "Platonick" friendship between the young girl and
Temple's secretary began. There are reports of Stella's charm, not only in
the Journal, but in a general tradition that she was "surrounded by every
Grace and blessed with every Virtue that could allure the Affections and
captivate the Soul of the most stubborn Philosopher." Says John
Hawkesworth: "There was a natural musick in her Voice, and a pleasing
complacency in her aspect when she spoke. As to her wit, it was confessed
by all her acquaintance and particularly by the Dean, that she never
failed to say the best thing that was said whenever she was in company."

She died at forty-seven, and was buried in St. Patrick's Cathedral, where
Swift, seventeen years later, by his own instructions, was buried at her
side.

[Illustration: Esther Johnson--"Stella"]



II

The Mystery of Stella


_This paper have I wrote for certain grave considerations which make me
suppose it well it were one day placed in the hands of the Dean. 'Tis,
however, possible I may destroy it, but this time shall determine ere my
death. Writ an: 1727 by me_, ESTHER JOHNSON.

When the Dean paid his last visit to London, an: 1726, he writ thus in a
letter directed to Mrs Dingley, but for her and me:--

"Farewell, my dearest lives and delights I love you better than ever, as
hope saved, and ever will. I can count on nothing but MD's love and
kindness, and so, farewell, dearest MD. PRESTO."

So he signs himself, and so it seems the old screen will still be kept up
and the letters to me wrote to her also, and in the child's talk that
pleaseth him, lest any in the world suspect the famous divine hath a man's
heart. But hath he? This I have not known, nor shall. Let me tell my own
heart yet again how deep my debt to him, remembering the sickly child of
Moor Park, to whom he brought not alone learning but companionship, and
all the joy known to her childhood. For it pleased Dr Swift, then a young
man, to condescend to a child's humours, to solace her solitary hours,
forsook as she was of her mother's company, and not alone to teach her to
write, but all store of knowledge. And Dr Swift hath since been pleased to
acknowledge that, having instilled in this poor child the principles of
honour and virtue, she hath not swerved from them in any passage of her
life.

Yet have I not? Again I question my heart. 'T is the most I can hope that
the woman hath repaid the child's debt. On this I will be judged.

A keen remembrance begins not much before the age of eight, nor can I
recall a time when I did not love him. My mother's time was took up in
making her court to my Lady Giffard, sister to our benefactor, Sir William
Temple; and Rebecca Dingley's (a kinswoman of the Temples) in making her
court to all; and the child Esther might run as she pleased, chid only
when she was remembered.

And this young man took pity on her. I remember very well Dr Swift's face
in youth. 'Twas extraordinary handsome and commanding, the eyes blue and
piercing, the features strong, and a something that very early
distinguisht him from others, so that great persons coming of errands to
Sir William Temple were not seldom drawn into intercourse with his
secretary.

Mr Swift was not then so prudent as he became later. What need with a
child? He permitted his fancy to range in all he said; and seated by the
lake at Moor Park, with this child at his knee looking up into his face,
he would discourse of things in heaven and earth, forgetting his hearer.
For he who could charm all charmed himself no less, and often hath said to
me laughing:--

"There's no company so good as Jonathan Swift's--and he himself would
choose it before all others!"

Of this I am not certain, for the Dean hath been and is very partial to
the company of the great and famous of either sex.

'Twas thus, sitting by the lake and gazing down the great perspective cut
in the trees, he saw the peasants going homeward up the hill, no greater
than ants, and looking into my eyes (from which and my name he called me
Star, and later, Stella), he said:--

"What say you, Mrs Star, if these folk were really no bigger than now they
seem? What if this country were peopled by a race of little creeping
Hop-o'-my-Thumbs?"

"O rare, rare!" I cried, and clapt my hands. "Tell me the history of them,
Mr Swift, and their little homely ways and houses like bees' cells for
size."

And as I looked up and the words came from him, truly all was visible
before me. 'Tis a gift Mr Swift hath had from the beginning, that men
should see what he would. And women,--O Father Almighty,--women!

So that was the beginning of Gulliver his travels, that being told for a
child's pleasure hath since become a world's wonder. It had not then the
meanings he gave it later, nor were there any Yahoos.

If I ask myself when this harmless love did change to a woman's, I cannot
tell, because with my growth it grew. But the first pain it brought (and
sure pain is love's shadow) was an: 1697, when I was sixteen years of age.
For I sat by the housekeeper's window, and Sir William and Mr Swift were
pacing the path, their voices coming and going. Mr Swift was now dressed
as the young Levite he sometimes called himself since he returned from
Ireland a clergyman; and he walked with his eyes fixed moodily on the
ground, listening to Sir William.

"Why, as to that, Jonathan," said he familiarly, "I ever thought it
behoves a parson to marry when he hath got preferment. There is room for
Mrs Parson's help with the women and children of the parish and 't is meet
she should set an example with her neat parsonage, and be a notable woman
with her possets and cordials for the sick. Now what like is this pretty
Varina that Dr Holmes hath brought news of from Belfast?"

"Miss Waring," says Mr Swift, very grave, "is a commendable young lady,
but I design not for marriage as yet, Sir, nor for a long time to come."

They past out of hearing and, returning, I heard but the last part of Sir
William's words:--

"'T is a cruel thing for a man to raise hopes he means not to be
answerable for, and I am told the young lady grows very melancholy upon
it. True it is, a man must sow his wild oats even though he honour his
cloth; but 't is not well to sow them in a harmless girl's acre, Jonathan.
Sow them by the wayside, and then they come not up to her confusion and
your own."

"A sound precept, Sir; but better still to sow none. This shall be my
care. As to the connection you speak of, 't is long broke off, and was at
all times impossible, the lady having no portion, and myself--as you
know!"

His brow was like a thunder-cloud ere it bursts; but, looking up, he
catcht sight of me, and continued with no pause:--

"As for that matter of the publishers, Sir--they have writ to say that
they wait your commands anent the Letters of Phalaris. Asking your pardon,
time goes, and we should be speaking of this and not of child's toys."

I knew by the black blink of his eyes that I had heard what he would not;
and as they turned, my heart beat so that I laid my hand on it, as if that
poor fence might hide its throbbing. And for the first time in my life I
knew I had in this world an enemy, and that was this Varina; and from that
hour mine eyes waited on him.

More often mine eyes than my company, for, especially since this
conversation with Sir William, Mr Swift was now grown very cautious. In
public he addressed me as "Mrs Johnson," or, when Sir William rallied him,
as "Mrs Esther," affecting an awful distance, which was not in his heart,
for therein was still the tenderness for his child and pupil, as he had
used to call me. And he was good enough to signify to Mrs Dingley, who
carried it to me, that he found me grown to his liking; "beautiful,
graceful, and agreeable," says he, and condescended to praise even my
black hair and pale face, after which I would not have exchanged it
against the golden hair of Helen. But still held aloof except when I was
in company with others. And I took note that, of all the ladies that came
and went at Moor Park, there was not one but hung upon his talk, and held
up her head when he came near, spreading out all her graces. Mr Swift had
always that power with our sex and, if he used it, 't is but what all men
do. Providence made us fair game, to our undoing and theirs. 'T is not all
men who have this gift, and never have I seen one who, having it, spared
to use it, whether from liking or policy.

Yet he used it strangely. I remember, when the fair Lady Mary Fane came to
Moor Park,--a widowed beauty and toast,--the look of scorn she cast from
her fine eyes on the young secretary.

"I marvel, Sir William," says she, "that you will have your servant ever
at your elbow, so that a body hath never a word with you alone. I would
not presume to censure, but certainly my father's chaplain does not so
intrude himself into company; and 'tis difficult for persons of quality to
speak their mind in such underbred society."

"Why, your Ladyship," says he, laughing, "be gracious to my young Levite.
He is not of the common sort of creeping parson, but I dare venture will
yet be heard of. Simple as your Ladyship thinks him, he is at home in all
company, be it great or little; and I had not known him three year when I
sent him to London on a secret errand--and I was not mistook."

"Such persons," says the lady, very haughty, "are paid to exert themselves
in our service. We may expect no less."

So it passed; but a busybody carried this, with other tattle, to Mr Swift,
who questioned me also. I looked to see him mighty angry; and first his
brows frowned, and then he laughed, as if a thought pleased him.

"Said she so, the painted jade! What, Madam Stella, shall not a stinking
pride be taught its place by the Church? I'll give the hussy her lesson."

That very day, my Lady Mary sitting to embroidery on the great terrace in
the shade, and I holding her threads, she threw Mr Swift a word as he
past, to ask the name of the nymph that was turned to a bush to escape the
pursuit of Apollo; for that was the subject of her needle.

"Daphne, Madam," says he. "Have I your permission to look upon your work?
Oh, fie!--this bush--'t is a rosebush, and Daphne became a laurel. Sure, a
lady with your Ladyship's reputation for wit will not be in error."

She stopped with the needle in her hand and lookt at him angrily.

"Sir, if you know better than Mrs Weyland who drew my pattern, instruct
me. I am not too proud to learn from my--betters."

She made the word an insult, and went on:--

"Have I done amiss to give Apollo wings to his feet?"

"Why, indeed, Madam,'tis Mercury carries the wings. In another lady's
presence I had said 'tis Cupid, but from some ladies love cannot fly."

So it began. In a moment more she had bid him be seated, and tell her
stories that a lady might paint with her needle. And presently her hands
dropt in her lap, and her eyes fixed on his face, and 't was not long ere
I was dismist.

That evening he came into Dingley's room, where I sat with her to repair
the household linen, and rattled on, full of wit and good humour; and when
Dingley went out to fetch a cordial for him, he says:--

"Well, Mistress Stella, did we give the lying slut her lesson today--did
we? Sure,'twas a pure bite!"

And says I:--

"I have seldom heard your Reverence more entertaining."

And he, laughing hugely:--

"A cat may be choked with cream as well as fishbones, Mrs Stella. Keep
your pretty little eyes open, child, and thou shalt see."

In a week she was his humble servant. 'T is scarce credible, but I saw her
once lay her hand, sparkling with jewels, upon his, and he shake it off as
if 't were dirt. I saw the water brim her eyes as she lookt at him and he
laught and turned away. Indeed, her Ladyship had her lesson ere she left
Moor Park, and I knew not then enough to pity her. Pity--'t is a flower
that grows in the furrows of a heart ploughed over by sorrow, and my day
was not yet come. He laught with me over the disconsolate beauty, when she
importuned him to be her son's tutor, and he replied he had far other
views.

Yet for all his caution we met sometimes, when I be gathering flowers and
lavender, or fruit for Mrs Groson the cook. And I knew he loved to talk
with me. He loves it still. Many was the jest we had--jests with their
root in childhood and folly to all but him and me.

So came the day that changed all.

'Twas a fair sunset, with one star shining, and I stood in the copse far
from the house, to hear the nightingale; and, though I thought of him, did
not see that he leaned against the King's Beech, until he stirred and made
my heart to flutter.

"I watch your namesake, Stella," says he, "and wonder if in that sweet
star are plots and envyings--a Marlborough intriguing against his King, a
Burnet plotting for an archbishopric, an ugly Dutch monsterkin on the
throne--and a naughty rogue called Stella, that hath forgot her old tutor
and loves him no more. Yet if that love should miscarry, I know not--"

"If it miscarry," says I, trembling, "there will be many to succeed it.
But I think, Mr Swift, it cannot."

"Many?" he answered, and up went his brows. "Such as my Lady Mary and
such-like? But that is no love, Stellakin. 'T is only thy innocence could
mistake it. The true name is none so pretty, and not for thy lips. Get
thee to a nunnery, child--the world is not for such as thee."

So I faltered out: "What is love?"

"A thing that hath no existence between man and woman in this world, so
mixed is it with lust and hatred and jealousy. True, there is love, but it
is not that one. 'T is the loves filial and paternal, and friendship,
better than all the loves the rhymesters hang with their namby-pamby. The
love between the sexes--'t is a game wherein the weaker loses, and
then--_voe victis!_ Hast forgot thy Latin, child?"

And then I broke out into a great sobbing, as if my bursting heart would
break; for, I know not why, but this cut me like a knife. And he took my
hand with anxious kindness to soothe me; and at the bird's rustle in the
tree, dropt it and stood apart. He lived in the eye of the world even in
such affections as he owned. But I sobbed on.

"Pray, pray, don't sob, Stella," he says. "This is mighty, mighty ill and
like a child. Dry those pretty eyes,--prettier, gadso! than any Lady
Mary's of them all!--and tell me wherein I have offended 'T was not
willingly."

So, drowned in tears, I lookt up, and having lookt, turned away weeping,
and could say no more. For what skill had I to argufy with a man of such
infinite parts? And yet well I knew that in this matter of love I was the
wiser, though but a simpleton. But he caught my hands.

"Have I hurt thee, Stella? I were a devil if I did. What ails my girl at
love? What is it to thee? Keep away from that raging fire. Souse it with
every stream of reason and honour. Heap the ice of the Pole on it, for it
is not only hell itself but feeds the flame of hell eternal."

He so wrung my hand that it pained; and I saw his face work like a man
most desperately sick and ill. It dried the tears in my eyes, and I stood
trembling and staring upon him, and the twilight was sweet about us with a
smell of grass and growing things and flowers; a night for lovers--and I
most miserable.

"I doubt--" he began and stopt; and then, with a cry that choked in his
throat, he put his arms about me and I laid my head on his breast.

Should I blame myself for that half-hour? Should I blame my Dear, the
Desire of mine eyes? 'T was but a step to take across the line that parts
innocence from--No, no, never will I say guilt! 'T was not guilt, if all
the tongues of men and angels should so preach. 'T is in the later denial
of love that guilt lay hid. But these things I did not then know, and I
thought in my simplicity the world changed and the foolish girl become a
woman and beloved, and our lives together in a fair prospect before us.

And suddenly--"Go--go!" he cried, rejecting me and thrusting me from him.
"Go, and never again let me see your face. I sicken--I sicken at what is
done. No--no! Speak not, utter not, lest I strike you and myself dead.
Leave me, for God's pity's sake! Go!"

So did the Angel with the flaming sword drive our first parents out of
Paradise. I drew apart shuddering, and he cried after me in a loud
whisper:--

"Let none see your face. Go in by the covered door, and so to your room,
and plead headache if Dingley see you. Go."

I left him in the dark. I drew my palatine about my face and none saw; and
so to my room, and outed the light, and sat by the window till the dawn
came.

Now, if I am condemned herein, I take the blame, but cannot change my
thought. What woman in giving all met ever so sorry a return--and why? I
broke my brain with thinking, and at that time found no answer. Later, I
knew. But to escape the hue and cry of question, I washed the tears from
my eyes in the morning, and so to the housekeeper's room. And he was
there, reading in a great book, and my heart leapt like the last leap of a
hare with the dogs on it.

"Why, Stellakin--saucy-nose!" says he, laughing, but his face was pale. He
could cheat with his words, but I saw his face bleacht like a linen clout
behind his laugh, and I swear at that time he loved me, though he loved
advancement better. "You are bright and early, young woman! Are you for
the garden, to get you a stomach for breakfast? Well, so-so! and pray for
poor Presto as you go; for in honour and conscience, his Ppt is the child
of his heart."

How could I endure this? I closed the door, and left him laughing with
white lips.

So went the day, and now I saw his drift. He would hold the little
language of childhood for a shield betwixt us. I should be nothing more
for ever than Ppt,--poor pretty thing,--Stellakin, the pretty rogue. He
would not fail in this, but only in all my hopes. He would give me all but
that I longed for. He would glut me with sugar-comfits but never a taste
of the living bread.

And next day a new thing. Dingley and I sitting together, he came upon us,
and in all he said included ker. She was his second MD. He was her poor
Presto, also. I saw his will and knew he built a fence about himself.

Sometimes I thought I had but a mean spirit so to live, and thought to ask
his meaning; but dared not, for he struck an awe into my very soul. So
gradually the days covered that sunset, and't was impossible I should
speak; and life went by, and still I studied with him, but Dingley always
present.

Hath he a heart? I know not. That sunset was a grave between us; and had
the corpse risen and stared him in the face, I think he had run mad. In my
solitary hours, I would imagine I spoke. Sometimes I would kneel before
him entreating, and he would raise me up, as a certain king did another
Esther. Sometimes he would fall at my knees, and I would bow my head upon
him, weeping for joy.

But yet always I knew that, if we glanced near that secret, he would rise
and stare upon me with a ghastly face, and I would see him no more. Yet at
that time he loved me. To himself he will not lie in reading this.

'Twas in 1699 Sir William Temple died, and the household at Moor Park was
broke up. Mr Swift took the kindest part in my settlement and the laying
out of my little fortune. "And be easy about money, you nauti-nauti, dear
girls," says he to old Dingley and me; "for what is mine is yours; and
were it my blood, 't is all one."

And so laid his plans that we should come to Ireland, where he had
preferment at Laracor near Dublin, and the prebend of Dunlavin in St.
Patrick's Cathedral. And, God forgive me, I asked myself if the thought to
keep me under his guidance mingled not itself with all his kindness.

So I, being twenty years old, and Dingley a kind bustling woman, we went;
and Ireland was a kindly home, for 't was near him, and I might see him.
Not as I would--oh, never that! but as a friend, provided 't was with
caution. For as he now mounted in the Church, and his ambition
strengthened on him (and sure Wolsey himself did not more suffer from that
failing of noble minds), caution grew to be his main thought; for he said
the adventure of our coming looked so like a frolic that censure might
hold as if there were a secret history in such a removal; but this would
soon blow over by circumspect conduct, and this too was used to put a
distance between us. But 't was the condition of our intercourse, and thus
I accepted it. For aught I could discern, all else was clean forgot, and
we lodged near him and met as friends--no more.

Nor could I think otherwise when Mr Tisdall, his friend, made suit to me.
I was cold,--what else,--for I thought myself a wife, if a forsaken one,
and Mr Tisdall imagined that Dr Swift opposed his suit, objecting that his
means did not come up to the expectation he formed for me, who was, he
said, in a manner, his ward.

Poor Mr Tisdall writ in haste on this, and brought me Dr Swift's reply
(who had not broke the matter to me) and thus it ran:--

My conjecture is that you think I obstruct your inclinations to please my
own. In answer to all which I will, upon my conscience and honour, tell
you the naked truth, [The naked truth! O God, if it were told!] If my
fortunes and humour served me to think of that state, I should certainly
make your choice, because I never saw that person whose conversation I
entirely valued but hers. This was the utmost I ever gave way to. [But
once--but once!] And this regard of mine never once entered my head as an
impediment to you, since it is held so necessary and convenient a thing
for ladies to marry, and that time takes off the lustre of virgins in all
other eyes but mine.

This Mr Tisdall offered on his knees, declaring it must remove my last
objections, since the worthy friend of my childhood supported his suit. I
received it sedately, and dismist him with the compunction so worthy a
gentleman merited. Was this letter honest to his friend? I say not.

Henceforth he disliked Mr Tisdall. Could I impute this to jealousy? Why
not? A man will be jealous if his dog but lick the hand of another; and,
though he reserve himself perfect freedom, no man must so much as sigh for
the woman he hath once honoured with his regard. Truly there is a
something Oriental in the passions of men; and if a woman break through
this, 'tis at her peril.

So stood matters when the Doctor went to London, an: 1710, on his errand
of obtaining the First Fruits for the Irish Church from the Crown--and he
chosen all others to this, for his commanding talent and presence, though
then but forty-two years of age, and many dignitaries older, yet not
wiser. It created much envy.

I missed him, and yet took a sad ease in his going. 'Twas the easier to
talk with Dingley, to play at ombre with the Dean and Mrs Walls; for when
he was in presence, my heart waited upon his speech, and he wounded with
many a word and look he thought not on. And he writ often in the form of a
Journal to Dingley and me, saying:--

"I will write something every day to MD, and when it is full, will send
it; and that will be pretty, and I will always be in conversation with MD,
and MD with Presto."

'T was near a year since his going when Mrs Coleburn came to Dublin, full
of London talk, and her friendship with the great Dr Swift, the hope of
the Tories. Indeed, it made her a great woman with the clergy in Dublin,
that she knew so much of his sayings and doings, and in what high company
he was got, and the clutter he made in London. Much was true, as I knew
under his own hand. Much was idle twattle and the giddiness of a woman
that will be talking. Now, one day, she visited me, dressed out in the
last London mode, and talked as I knotted, and presently says she:--

"And, Mrs Johnson, what will be said, the Doctor being made a Bishop as he
now looks for, if he bring home a fine young bride from London? Sure he
lives at Mrs Vanhomrigh's, so often is he there; and Hessy is as pretty a
girl as eye can see, in her young twenties and a bit of a fortune to boot.
I have ever said the Doctor was not on the market for nothing. He is not
the man for a portionless beauty. Hath he wrote of this? for all the
tongues are wagging, and the lady in such a blaze with the tender passion
that she can't by any means smother it."

"Doctor Swift hath often writ of Mrs Vanhomrigh and her hospitalities,"
says I, smiling. "Also of the charming Miss V. Her name is no stranger
here."

So I baffled the woman, and could see her petty malice dumbed. I held the
smile on my face like a mask.

"Well, 'tis a charming creature, and the Doctor commends her wit in all
quarters; and 't is certain lie should be a judge, for he tutors her in
Latin. There's many a man would gladly tutor the seductive Miss Hessy."

When she took leave, I writ to the kind Patty Holt in London. When her
reply returned, 't was but to confirm Mrs Coleburn. Then I turned over all
his letters--yet did not need--for mention of this woman, and found but
three, though of the mother and her house he writ in almost every letter,
but making somewhat too light of it. 'Twas a raging pain that he should be
her tutor--I had thought that was mine only and not to recur--a memory
stored where neither rust nor moth might touch it. Well--what could I but
hate the girl? And to hate is a bitter thing: it saps the life and breaks
the strength, and so no escape night or day. I must then fancy his letters
cooling, and later says Dingley unprompted:--

"The Doctor is took up with his fine friends and his business. La!--for
sure he writes not as he did, but is plaguey busy. Two simple women can't
expect so much of his time that duchesses go begging for."

He stayed long away, and Patty Holt writ often, discreet and willing to
serve me; and one day comes a packet from her, and when I cut the seals,
out falls a letter--his. I read it first.

Miss Hessy, I am so weary of this place ['t was Windsor] that I am
resolved to leave it in two days. I will come as early on Monday as I can
find opportunity, and will take a little Grub Street lodgings pretty near
where I did before, and will dine with you three times a week and tell you
a thousand secrets, provided you will have no quarrels with me. I long to
drink a dish of coffee in the sluttery, and hear you dun me for secrets,
and "Drink your coffee--why don't you drink your coffee?"

So he writ, and more--much more could I read unsaid. For him, this was
much--I knew it. Then, another letter--a woman's hand.

It is inexpressible the concern I am in ever since I heard from Mrs Lewis
that your head is so much out of order. Who is your physician? Satisfy me
so much as to tell me what medicines you have took and do take. O what
would I give to know how you do this instant. My fortune is too hard. Your
absence was enough without this cruel addition. I have done all that was
possible to hinder myself from writing for fear of breaking my promise;
but it is all in vain; for had I vowed neither to touch pen, ink, or
paper, I certainly should have had some other invention, and I am
impatient to the last degree to hear how you are. I hope I shall soon have
you here.

The two were wrapt in a sheet from Patty who had writ thereon:--"Dropt by
the Doctor when in a giddy attack, visiting me."

I think she was shamed. So was not I. As well ask the hound if he is
shamed when tracking the deer. Had it been to save my life, instead of
lose it, I had less eagerly read. 'T was clear they understood one
another. With me, in his caution, Dingley must be joined when he writ.
With her, not so. Her happiness was a knife turned in a bleeding wound.

So I writ him, in a letter of many matters, somewhat scornfully of the
family as marvelling a little that he whom all solicited could be
satisfied with such inconsiderable people. In time he replied thus:--

Sir A. Fountaine and I dined by invitation with Mrs V. You say they are of
no consequence--why, they keep as good female company as I do male. I see
all the drabs of quality at this end of the town with them. I saw two Lady
Bettys there this afternoon. Rare walking in the Park now. Why don't you
walk in the Green of St. Stephen's? What beasts the Irish women are, never
to walk.  Men hide not matters so well as women. They say too much or not
enough.

Much later he writ: "I found Mrs V. all in combustion with her landlord.
Her eldest daughter is of age, and going to Ireland to look after her
fortune and get it in her own hands."

So I was to think it concerned them not to be apart. Immediately I set my
wits to discover where was her estate, and 't was not long ere I knew 't
was Marlay Abbey, near Celbridge; but the lady would reside in Dublin
while making her dispositions, being Mrs Emerson's guest, and was like to
be at a rout at her house. 'Twas long since I attended a rout, but I
intrigued to be bidden as courtiers intrigue for an inch of blue ribbon;
and in such a fever and anguish as I think I had died of it if not
successful.

So, when the day was come, I went with Mrs Stoyte; and the first person I
saw was a young lady on the stair-head as we went up, and Mrs Emerson
presenting her to many. A fine young London madam, who curtseyed to me,
taking no more heed than of any other.

Shall I admit her beauty? I did not think her charming, despite fine
sparkling eyes and a luxuriance of brown hair. Her lips were full and her
chin round, but she looked full her age, and between the brows was a line
that I would call the Doctor's sign-manual. I have it myself--I have seen
it in others--'t is the claw-foot of care, care never-ending and cruel
unrest, and hope that sickens the spirit and fades the bloom; and in her,
though but just of age, the first bloom was gone that is like morning dew
in a young girl's eyes. He loves to tyrannise over women and show his
familiarity by a certain brutality of address, and the line comes not
slowly.

I caught sight of her person with mine in a long glass--she in her
sea-green sacque flowered with pink, and myself in gray,--"an angel's face
a little cracked,"--that was the best he could say for Stella! She gave
not a thought to the faded Dublin lady that would have given all but her
eternal hope to read in that girl's soul. Oh, the mask of the human face
behind which none may look!

[Illustration: Hester Vanhomrigh--Vanessa]

So she went, and after a year he returned, now Dean of St. Patrick. He was
kind, but 't was a kindness that stood apart and viewed itself carefully,
lest it diminish my due. 'Twas easy seen he was engaged in thought.
Well--shall a woman expect more from a man in the world's eye? Let her be
humbly grateful for the crumbs he lets fall.

Also for the crumbs from her rival's table; for Miss Hessy following, and
now an orphan, was established soon after at Marlay; and whether I would
or not, I knew when the Dean's rides took him that way, my Mrs Prue being
courted by his man Samuel, and all he did trickling through that channel.
'T was at this time also that copies were handed about of his poem,
"Cadenus and Vanessa," and 't was the very top of talk and admiration.
Many might guess who was the lady, and the Dean was mighty angry, and said
'twas but a jest, and no friend to him who took it otherwise.

He asked me with a feigned carelessness if I had read it; and I replying
carelessly that I thought it extreme fine and could wish he would write
oftener in that vein, he smiled and looked pleased, and so it passed. But
again and yet again I conned the lines:--

    'T is to the world a secret yet
      Whether the nymph, to please her swain,
      Talks in a high romantic strain,
    Or whether he at last descends
    To act with less seraphic ends.
      Or, to compound the business, whether
      They temper love and books together,
    Must never to mankind be told,
    Nor shall the conscious Muse unfold.

I knew the meaning of that passage where others guesst. I read it by the
light of a sunset many years gone, and lived in hell.

'T was when Mr Dean was next in London, came a letter to me

Madam, I have great and urgent reason to wish the honour of meeting you
and a half hour's conversation. Any place you may condescend to appoint
will be perfectly agreeable and the favour prized by

Your obedient humble servant,

ESTHER VANHOMRIGH

(who would not ask it unless it concerned Mrs Johnson as nearly as
herself).

I broke my brains thinking, should I or should I not? Nor can I now
unravel all the motives at work. But in two days' time I writ:--

Madam, I have a difficulty to come at the reason for your request, but am
compelled by courtesy to appoint three o' the clock at the rooms of Mrs
Dew, my old servant, at Kidder Street, No. 12. Your obt humble servant,

ESTHER JOHNSON.

Strange our names should be alike!

She was the first at the meeting. I ensured this, delaying my chair at the
corner of Kidder Street till I saw her enter.

The room was small and poorly decent, and her hoop and mine filled it. She
curtseyed low, as did I, and though she aimed at composure, I could see
her lips work. The line between her brows was eight years deeper, her face
pale, the bloom faded, and her mouth droopt. Had she been any other, I had
pitied her. His friendship is fatal to my sex, though I have wore it like
an honour. For me, I was composed. It's not for nothing I have spent my
life in that school--she was a newer pupil.

Being seated, I asked her to favour me with her commands, and she came
straight at the business with a kind of directness pitiable enough.

"Madam, all the world talks of the goodness of Mrs Johnson. I am not long
a resident of these parts, but am no stranger to your merits. 'Tis my
confidence in them causes this explanation. May I ask pardon for plain
speaking?"

"Madam, if the subject is one I can admit of, speech cannot be too plain."

"So I have been told. Accept me therefore as a plain-dealer, Madam, and
have the goodness to read what I cannot speak. But first,"--she put her
hand to her throat as if she might swoon, and so closing her eyes for a
moment, opened them clearly on me,--"Madam, between a certain gentleman
and myself have been love-passages tending, as I believed--hoped--to
marriage. A passion that, with due regard to honour, hath been the ruler
of my life hath brought me to Celbridge, as I did think for the happiness
of both. Being arrived, I have the happiness to see this gentleman often,
and he hath had the goodness to say that no person hath ever been so
loved, honoured, esteemed, ADORED by him as your humble servant. Yet I am
told that a former attachment doth so constrain his honour that little can
be hoped."--(Her voice broke.) "Madam, will you read this paper, and say
Yes or No?"

I opened it, and thus read:---;

Madam, of your angelic goodness be pleased to answer, are you indeed the
wife of one I name not? If it be true, I will utterly withdraw my
intrusive presence. In pity, answer me.

It seemed many minutes I sat with this in my hand, and she dropt on her
knee at my feet, looking up in agony. Time passed and I heard my voice as
if it were another's, and strange to me.

"Madam, am I expected to disclose my secrets to one of whom I know not if
she tells truth? What are you to the Dean, and what proof do you give of
what you are, that I should answer?"

She said very low:--

"I had not thought of that. But 'tis very true. And, trembling and looking
fearfully about her, she put her hand inside the whalebone of her bodice
and drew out letters.

"I thought not these would be seen by any, but buried with me when I die;
but't is impossible you should know me for honest, and because honour
speaks in your face--read these."

I took them, trembling inwardly. She, poor wretch, was newer to her trade,
and was like to faint. I knew the writing.

I will see you tomorrow, if possible. You know it is not above five days
since I saw you, and that I would ten times more, if it were at all
convenient.--Cad bids me tell you that, if you complain of difficult
writing, he will give you enough to complain of.

"Cad"? Then I remembered--"Cadenus and Vanessa."  So--_she_ might
call him by a little familiar name, but I, never. I stopt there.

"Madam, have you thus writ to him?"

"Always of late, Madam. With a dash before it, as here you will see the
cause."

She pushed a letter into my hand, eager, as I thought, to convince not
only me but herself of his regard. And thus it read:--

I wish your letters were as difficult (cautious) as mine, for then they
would be of no consequence if dropped by careless messengers. A stroke
thus--signifies all that may be said to Cad at beginning or conclusion.

"So," says I, "a stroke means endearments. Otherwise 't is difficult to
conclude these sentimental letters."

"Madam," she broke out, "it means more than tongue can tell. And since you
still doubt, have the condescension to read this letter of my own which he
returned to me in rebuke. 'Twill show you our terms."

--Cad, you are good beyond expression. I thought that last letter I writ
was obscure and restrained enough. I took pains to write it after your
manner. I am sorry my jealousy should hinder you from writing more love
letters. Pray tell me, did you not wish to come where that road to the
left would have led you? I am now as happy as I can be without seeing--Cad.
I beg you will continue happiness to your own Heskinage.

I read, and was silent--reading this letter by the light of a dead sunset.
I never dared so write. There was that between them that he had never
shared with me, and yet all his old caution, as with me. I thought not,
however, so much of his feelings as of hers, for I think his care for
women is but skin-deep at-best. He was ever willing to take the tribute of
their hearts--nay, of their lives; but should they incommode him, or
trespass across the line he hath marked--this careless liking is changed
to hatred, and he will avenge himself brutally on the weak creatures that
love him.

Who should know this but I--I who have lived beside him and retained his
friendship only because I have in all things submitted to his will--silent
to death? Had I anything to lose to this unfortunate woman? No, I had lost
all many a long year ago. She still had hopes; I, none. Why torture a
wretch so miserable?

She kneeled before me, pale as a corpse. 'Twas the strangest meeting. I
could scarce hear her voice.

"Madam," says she, "I have put my life in your hand; for if Mr Dean knew
that I had come here--that I had dared--O Madam, he can be cruel to
women!"

I strove to collect my thoughts; then heard my own voice as a stranger's:--

"Madam, to your question, the answer is No. There is no marriage between
Mr Dean and me. I have no claim on him that obstructs your own."

She looked up like one in a stupor of amazement--so dazed and white that I
repeated my words. Then, suddenly, she gathered herself into composure
like my own, but her poor lips trembled. I saw in her my girlhood long
dead.

"If I say I thank you, Madam, with all my heart and soul for thus opening
your mind to a most miserable woman, I say little. What is left of my life
shall be a study to deserve your compassion. What would you have me do?"

I replied: "I think you will not fail in what honour and conscience
dictate. 'Tis not for me to say. 'Tis between you and Mr Dean. And now,
Madam, will you give me leave to withdraw, for this hath been a painful
meeting for us both."

"Not before I bless you with all my broken heart," she cried, and took my
hand. "For I will now tell you that, for all these letters, I know he
loves not me, nor any. I may please him better than another in moments,
but there's no security. He hath a contempt for women that scorches, and
to hurt them--but 'tis not this I would say. I feared to find an exulting
rival when I came to you, Madam, and instead I find an angel of
compassion. Sure I read it in your eyes. In this life we shall meet no
more; but in my prayers you will be present, and I beseech you, as the
last favour, to give me an interest in yours, that I may know myself not
utterly forsook. My one sister is not long dead--I am utterly alone in the
world."

She could not continue, but kissed my hand, and her tears fell on it. I
told her that this meeting should remain secret, but she needed not
assurance. We embraced, and so, curtseying, separated, she departing
first. A good woman, if I have known one. 'Tis of good women men make
their victims. The ill women cannot and do not suffer; they but repay our
score. When I reached home I found her paper still in my hand.

I must now be brief. Mr Dean returned, and all was as before; but I
wearied yet more of the child's play and prattle he still continued for my
amusement. He was much engaged with writing. I thought him ill at ease.

I was seated by the window on a day he will recall, when he entered pale
and furious.

"What hath gone amiss?" I cried, starting up.

"This," says he, in a voice I scarce knew, so awful was it; and laid
before me the poor Vanessa's paper that I believed I had destroyed weeks
agone. O, what had I done? 'Twas another paper I had burned, and this had
lain in my pocket. 'Twas most certainly Mrs Prue--But what matter? He had
what for her sake and mine I had died to hide.

"Hath that vixen dared to come anigh you?" he cried. "Hath she ventured to
disquiet my friends, the wanton jade, the scheming--" and so on, pouring
horrid words upon her that chilled my blood. 'T was terrible in him, that
he could so swiftly change to these furies with one he had favoured, and
to a rage frightful to see.

I tried to moderate him, to speak for her; but nothing availed. Finally I
rose to withdraw, for he would hear nothing.

"But I'll break her spirit," he said, with clenched hands. "I'll ride to
Celbridge and face her with her crime--"

I held him back. "For God's sake, no. Have patience. She hath done no
harm, and no eye but mine saw the paper. I pitied her--we parted friends."

"Then you saw her? She came?"

But I can write no more. He tore his coat from me, and so down the stair
like a madman; and I heard his horse clatter down the street, while I
prayed for a soul in agony, and that she might not think I betrayed her.

Hours went by. He returned, still riding furiously, and told me how he had
dashed the paper on the table before her, and how she had sunk down
speechless when he so spoke as satisfied even his vengeance. And so
continued:--

"But I am resolved. Such sluts, such tongue-snakes shall not cross my
path. You have been obedient, Stella, through good and ill report, and
merit reward. I will speak with the Bishop of Clogher and he shall marry
us forthwith, though privately. And we will live apart, for I cannot bend
my will and habits to live with any woman; but Stella shall know she is my
wife, and the knowledge pierce that ----'s heart."

So, at last, the words I had once died to hear came and found me cold.
Indeed, I despised them, though still I honour my friend. I mused, while
he leaned against the window, breathing heavily and waiting my reply.

"It comes too late," I said. "There was a time when it had been welcome,
but not now. Also, my sympathies are engaged in a quarter where I think a
little mercy had become you. With your permission, Mr Dean, this is a
subject that shall detain us no more."

I pickt up my knotting as Dingley entered. He stared upon me and went out,
nor was it ever again mentioned.

After, she writ me a word: "Madam and my friend, I know 'twas not your
doing. That needs no words. I am very ill, and were it possible we should
meet, 'twould be my solace, but 'tis impossible. May the happiness the
good should enjoy attend you, as do my prayers. Your grateful humble
servant, E.V."

I answered thus: "Madam and my friend, God be with you in life and death.
The question you put to me I shall for ever answer as then. Comfort
yourself, for sure there is a world that sets this right, else were we of
all men most miserable."

She was dead in three weeks, of a broken heart, For me, my own hour draws
on. I have writ this paper, yet think to destroy it, and know not what is
best. No happiness lies before him in old age, for 'tis a plant he pulled
up by the roots for himself and others--alas! how many. Should I then
cause him to suffer more? He hath had the mercy of my silence for a
lifetime. 'Tis not so hard to be silent in the grave.

(_Stella died in the year 1727. The letters in this story to or from
Dean Swift are authentic._)




Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
1689-1762



"I thank God witches are out of fashion," observes Lady Mary, in a letter
to her daughter, when spicy gossip about her doings abroad had been
circulated in London, "or I should expect to have it deponed, by several
credible witnesses, that I had been seen flying through the air on a
broomstick."

Conspicuous always, she was nominated a "toast" in the Kit-Kat Club when
she was eight, occupied herself with Latin at ten, was married when she
was twenty-three, began her campaign for smallpox inoculation when she was
twenty-nine, held salons in London, Constantinople, Brescia, Rome, and
Venice, and died when she was seventy-three, bequeathing a fortune and
twenty large manuscript volumes of prose and verse to her daughter, one
guinea to her son, and two volumes of correspondence to a gentleman in
Holland, with the request that the letters be published at once.

"Her family," writes Horace Walpole, "are in terror lest they should be,
and have tried to get them. Though I do not doubt but they are an olio of
lies and scandal, I should like to see them. She had parts, and had seen
much."

Admirers and foes alike will be pleased to note that Edward Wortley
Montagu, in the days of courtship, used to direct his love letters to her,
simply,--

   _The Lady Mary Pierrpont
    With Care and Speed._

[Illustration: Lady Mary Wotley Montague]



III

My Lady Mary


[_Letters from my Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, celebrated for her Beauty
and Talents no less than for the introduction of the Practice of
Inoculation for the Smallpox into England, to her Friend the Lady D----n
in Paris. These Letters will dispel the Mystery to the Publick of the Lady
M.W.M.'s quitting England in the year 1739._]

_Writ in the year 1737, Their Majesties George II & Queen Caroline
reigning._

I resume my pen, my dear Madam, to acquaint you with the news of the day,
though 'tis what you scarce deserve from your silence, unless indeed a
letter have miscarried, and 'twill not surprise me if my last hath not
come to your hands, which if so, is provoking, it being writ in my best
manner. I willingly would hear from you, was it but to say you still
exist, for I begin to find myself in the mind of the worshipper of
Minerva, who, receiving no answer to prayers and vows, discharged a
pitcher of foul water in her Goddess-ship's face, declaring he would not
longer be at the trouble to address a lady who would not be at the trouble
to listen, and she might go to the devil for him. 'Tis not however quite
come to this with me, so I continue.

The world riots on at its common pace, and is now come to the pass that
vice is scarce worth the pain of concealing. Yet when it becomes the
general rule, sure there is nothing so stale! Its facility damns it, and
it then must simulate some of the airs of virtue to be alluring. Indeed, I
conclude it not wholly imaginary that, if it was made easier to be
virtuous than vicious, the whole moral balance of the universe would shift
and our present monarch and Madame Walmoden be the saints of a new
calendar. 'Tis here we need the clergy, and, for the life of me, I see not
how else. They lend a _haut goût_ to vice by condemning it; and if
they should disappear, vice must cease to interest and go with them. I
gave this for my opinion to the Queen and Lady Sundon, when they were fond
to discuss metaphysics, adding that the Seven Deadly Sins required the
flames of the infernal regions for their heating and the Ten Commandments
for their encouragement if they could be hoped to flourish in the future
as at present--and they had the condescension to agree.

All this being so, it will give you neither surprise nor concern to hear
my Lord H----d hath run off with his ward, Miss Nanny Graves, leaving his
lady with four children. We shall have them back in a few months with
reputations so little worse crackt than those of the decentest among us as
will not be worth the trouble of censuring, and give neither themselves
nor others the smallest uneasiness.

His Majesty is happy at present in the loss of "that old deaf woman," as
he lately called my Lady Suffolk, who was once his greatest blessing.
There is much I could tell you, but think best not to commit to paper,
save that I hear from my Lord Hervey (who is as much as ever in the
Queen's confidence) of the farewell of Lady Suffolk to Her Majesty. She
lamented to the Queen that she no longer met with the same attention from
His Majesty. "I told her," said the Queen, "that she and I were no longer
of an age to think of these sort of things in such a romantic way, and as
wishing not to encourage it, bade her take a week to consider of the
business and give me her word to read no romances meanwhile, and I was
sure she would think better of her present concern."

She cares little who rules the King, so she and Sir Robert Walpole rule
the kingdom; and indeed does both with the skill of a juggler tossing
balls at Bartholomew Fair. Suffice it to say that she is as complaisant as
ever, and treats the favourites, be they who they will, with a
condescending and smiling geniality that enables her to give many an
unexpected stab--the dagger hid in flowers. 'Tis thus, in my opinion,
every sensible woman in the like case should carry herself. 'Tis not tears
and agonies that move that sex, but good humour and composure, and thus
are they left to their follies while common sense pursues its own objects.
Yet, will a future age credit (what my Lord Hervey tells me) that our
sovereign Lord, wishing to meet the daughter of the French Regent,--a
Princess whose reputation is known to all the world,--writ thus to his
Queen, "C'est un plaisir que je suis sûr, ma chere Caroline, vous serez
bien aise de me procurer, quand je vous dis combien je le souhaite"?

Never was woman mistress of so much tact, nor with more need of it. He
struts like a little despot while the beggars sing in the street:--

    You may strut, dapper George, but 't will all be in vain,
    We know 't is Queen Caroline, not you, that reign.

He thinks her his slave, and all his sultanas tremble at her nod! Lord,
what a world do we live in! I wonder in how many private homes 'tis the
same.

She is, indeed, an extraordinary woman; and for my part, despising men and
women alike for their motives, I could at this instant form a ministry of
women, with the Queen at their head, no more silly and impudent than they
who now suppose themselves to guide the fortunes of the country. If the
Gods have any relish of humour,--and 'tis to be thought they have, else
had they not created such a miserable little crawling species,--they must
often be witty at our expense. _Quelle vie!_

I comprehend her well. When I give my friendship and confidence and meet
with a scurvy return, 'tis not anger nor aversion it produces in me, but a
complete indifference. Was I to hear tomorrow that Mr Wortley had a train
of charmers as long as Captain Macheath's in the "Beggars' Opera," 'twould
not inflict a pang, so long as he kept within the bounds of prudence and
family decency; and indeed, 'tis as my poor sister Gower said to me more
than once: "'Tis you, sister, for a merciless good sense that makes you
accommodate yourself without complaint to what had drove another woman
distracted." We not married two years before I had to complain of his
indifference and negligence (though no worse), and writ him plainly to
that effect, concluding in the words that, as this was my first complaint,
so it should be my last. I kept my word, and he his course, and we now
correspond with good temper on family interests, and no more.

But since I have spoke of the "Beggars' Opera," know that I have myself
become possessed of a Polly lovelier than any Lavinia Fenton that ever
played the part. 'Tis a romance--heaven send it go no further! Here is the
first chapter.

Being some weeks since at Twicknam, I did not see company awhile, owing to
my cousin's death; for though, as I writ at the time of my father's, I
don't know why filial piety should exceed fatherly fondness, and still
less cousinly, still there is a decency to be exprest in black bombazine
and retirement. Besides, a thousand nothings kept me engaged. I passed a
part of the time writing satires upon the little crooked viper of
Twicknam, Pope--that may appear one day with a decoration from my Lord
Hervey's pen; for Pope's last lampoon on me is a disgrace to any nature
above that of a baboon. So all was pastoral and tranquil.

But, as the Fates would have it, walking one day by the river and (I
suppose) pulling off my glove, I lost the diamond ring that was my
mother's,--the plainest thing and such as may be found anywhere,--a ring
about the finger, of small brilliant sparks. 'Twas not the value, which is
nothing, but I returned home in a scold with my woman Pratt, that was
walking behind me and thinking of nothing but her face, which some
commending have turned her head or she must have seen it fall. She is a
fool, even for her nauseous class. Seeing nothing better to be done, I
caused notices to be writ and stuck about the village that a Lady of
Quality having dropt her ring etc., would give a reward. And having wrote
of my loss to Mr Wortley, my son, and a few friends, fixed my mind with my
usual good sense that I would see it no more.

For upwards of a week nothing took place. I was seated in the garden with
my tent-stitch, when out comes Pratt to say a young woman requested an
audience of me. I was vexed to be disturbed, having on my mind a letter
that morning received to say that young rake, my son, was run off from
Hinchinbrook and none knew where--but you are no stranger to his
behaviour. I therefore sent word by Pratt that I could not see her, well
knowing she would add any force to the information that my words lackt.
But I was vexed to the blood by my young rogue, knowing not where to find
him, and suspecting sonic low haunt in the Fleet.

To my astonishment returns Pratt presently, flouncing and bridling, and
with her a young woman--Heavens! No, but one of the nymphs of the Thames,
or rather, for they are somewhat oozy hereabouts, a dryad of the Richmond
woods, indeed as beautiful a person as ever I saw in my life. There is not
one of our reigning girls to be compared with her for a moment and even my
Lord Hervey's Molly Lepel would vanish beside her, nor could Paris have
any doubt where to bestow the apple. I am an amateur of beauty and can't
forget your Ladyship's praise of my commendation of the fair Fatima,
saying you never before knew one fine woman do such justice to another. So
here I repeat myself.

This fair creature was drest in a plain suit of minunet that had seen
better days, and a straw hat tied with ribbons over a cap of thread lace.
But her eyes! large, black, and languishing, they would have recalled to
me those verses addrest to the daughter of Sultan Achmet,--

    Your eyes are black and lovely,
    But wild and disdainful as those of a stag,

but for the fall of lashes that hid their soft fire; her hair raven-black,
a bloom I never saw equalled in this country, and her lips a veritable
scarlet and shaped for every sweetness.

Thinks I--'t is well the Duke of Wharton and his club for gallantry can't
see this paragon, else--but I leave the rest to your discretion, for your
Ladyship knows "Sophia" as I call him, as well as I. However, the
agreeablest girl in the world came forward and dropt a curtsey, with her
eyes on the ground, and offered my ring, excusing herself on the scruple
that she must needs give it into my own hand--and all this in a voice like
music.

I leave you to guess if I was pleased, for the ring was on my mother's
hand when she died, and 'twas so prettily tendered, too.

"Well, child, I thank you for your pains," says I "and will, of course, be
answerable for the reward, but give me leave to add that, if I can serve
you in any other manner, 'tis not my custom to leave service forgot; if I
am not mistook, your mind is not as free from care as a well-wisher could
like to see it."

Indeed, there was an air of melancholy about her which moved me
prodigiously, and seeing Pratt flouncing and bustling in such a manner as
denoted her curiosity and jealousy, I dismist her to the house. She can't
endure a face that eclipses her own curds-and-whey skin, and lookt upon my
little thread-satin beauty with a true court malice. I was, however,
really desirous myself to know what had brought so much beauty to
misfortune.

"Madam," says she, "my story is so common that it needs not detain your
ear. My father was a rich Turkey merchant, and I wanted for nothing that
money could buy. But he was bit by some scheme for making more, three
years since; a scheme he compared--alas, too late!--to the South Sea
Bubble itself. And in this he lost all, and I had the pious duty to
support him by my needleworks. However, he sunk under his miseries into a
melancholy that deprived him of life two years since. I nursed him to his
last sigh and then, desiring to lead a life of virtue, I entered the
family of Mrs Lamb, the Levant merchant's lady and a cousin of my father,
to care her children. She carried them down here for an airing, and
walking with the little misses yesterday, I found this ring and have the
happiness to restore it."

She spoke with a propriety I can't describe, and curtseyed to retire.
Indeed, my dear Lady D----n, you had yourself been seduced into the step I
next took, though how far 'twas prudent, I leave you to judge, allowing
the uneasiness beauty causes, go where it will.

"Child," says I, "I thank you, and as for the reward--"

She stopt me with a simplicity and integrity that could not but confirm my
first opinion.

"'Tis not possible, Madam, I should accept it for an act of honesty common
to all decent persons. Refuse me not that privilege, and permit me to
retire, with thanks to your Ladyship for so encouraging a reception."

Again she curtseyed, but I detained her. 'Twas truly a pleasure to see so
charming a creature.

"Child, if not possible I should serve you in one way, it may in another.
If the question be not disagreeable, are you happily placed with this city
lady?"

Her fine eyes moistened.

"No, Madam. Not but what Madam means well, but she possesses not an easy
humour, and Miss Nanny, Susan, Betty, and the rest are hard to be
controlled. I receive but my clothes and food and 'tis very true--"

She stopt what she would have said, with all the easiness of a girl of
quality, but a modesty they have exchanged for the paint-pot and whitewash
in which they now blaze out. What she did not say left much to be guessed.
'T is certainly these rich city folk for an illiberality of mind and petty
spitefullness that inflicts countless stings on their dependants. 'Twas a
weakness, I own, but it then came into my mind on a high point of
generosity (with which I am sometimes took like a colic) to do what I
could for the poor creature. 'Twas to be seen she was educated, and she
presently confirmed my belief that she could read, write, and cast
accompts to perfection, and was skilled in needleworks and household
management. Her expectations of payment did not run high, and 'tis but
reasonable I should consider of this. So was I tempted into what you may
censure as an indiscretion, and said I was in need of one to overlook my
family of servants, and be about myself and my girl, who hath picked up
some little grossnesses from Pratt that I like not. Not that I would
dismiss Pratt, but put this one somewhat above her as her training
deserves. 'Twas charity and carefulness combined.

Sure never was gratitude more lively exprest than when she fell on her
knee and kist my hand, protesting and vowing her life should be the
monument to my goodness. And indeed, think what you will, Madam, 'tis a
girl more suited to the company of persons of quality than to city dames
that drive behind a pair of Suffolk Dumplings with coachman to match,
their own hair and portliness dressed out in the last mode but three. For
this girl fashion mattered not. I dare to swear the more she put off, the
fairer she mist appear, even as our general mother Eve gained no lustre
from her fig leaves nor furs.

'Twas not till the matter was settled and she retired, that my good sense
asserted itself, and thus it said:--

"Come, Madam, what do you know of this nymph that you should be in such
haste to make yourself her guardian? Did you ever know gratitude, or even
decency, in return for a favour? And here have you took a girl into your
family that will certainly draw every rake within thirty miles to hunt
down the prey?"--"No matter," says my conscience (did you credit its
existence, my dear Lady D----n? for so did not I), "if you take not pity
on the wench, she will in three years' time be chargeable to the parish,
with a brat in either hand, cast off for a newer face." 'Tis the way of
the men, and those that trust them embark their little capital into worse
than the South Sea Bubble. I resolved to keep her very secluded and say
nothing of my Polly Peachum (whose name, by the way, is Anne Wentworth)
outside the house, but indeed might as well endeavour to stifle a
promising scandal as such beauty! However, she arrived a week later with
her meagre outfit. 'Twas an odd whim, I own.

Don't I see you now, saying as you read, "Well do I know the sequel. Mr
Wortley comes up from Hinchinbrook and loses the acorn he is pleased to
call his heart to Mrs Anne." You are much mistook, Madam, and was it to be
she, I had as soon that as another, for I might thus acquire the merit
with my husband which the Queen gains with hers by choosing his
inamoratas. It fell out far otherwise to your expectations; and, but for
Pratt's gruntings and grumblings about cuckoos picked up in the street,
which Mrs Anne bore with smiling patience, I had vaunted every day my good
fortune in lighting on such beauty and merit.

My first alarm took place when Molly Skerret comes down one day and sees
her engaged over the lace ruffles of my _negligée_. Says she:--

"Are you mad, Lady Mary, that you will needs have a beauty about you like
yonder? All the men will be running after her. She is a close resemblance
to Sally Salisbury, that hath been the rage--she that some time back
stabbed young Finch and fled to France."

I set it down to spite, for dear Molly is no beauty herself. But the very
next day my troubles begun, for the viper of Twicknam, happening to spy
her in the garden in attendance on my girl, went home swelling with poison
and writ the following, which was handed about all over the place and in
the town.

    Narcissa widely from the world retired
    So soon's sne saw her slighted charms expired.
    But since she still must hope another spring,
    (As snakes collect their poison ere they sting,)
    She chose a lovely nymph to keep her sweet,
    And, willing to be cheated as to cheat,
    When in her glass the glowing charmer shone,
    She fondly dreamed the image was her own.

This made a great talk, which was against my wish to keep the girl
retired. But you will credit, my dear Lady D., that the malice of this
little crooked monster, who should from affinity be conversant with the
habits of snakes, would not set me against the poor innocent wench that
caused it, and I contented myself with the caution to her that she should
keep in the garden and speak with no men but what I judged proper. I fear
none the less that there may be a difficulty in keeping her, impossible to
be overcome, but will tell you further in replying to your obliging favour
just received.

Before concluding this epistle, which indeed is more truly to be called a
novel, I would have you know that Lady Polden was inoculated, together
with all her family, for the smallpox two months since, excepting only
Miss Jenny, that none could persuade from fear of the lancet. All
recovered after a day or two's disagreeables, but poor Miss Jenny catching
the distemper, supposedly at a masquerade, fell a victim at the age of
eighteen, and was buried a week last Monday in all the forms. 'Tis certain
there are those would sooner die with the approval of the doctors than
live to dance on their graves without it.

My daughter presents her duty to you. I have designs myself to cross to
France ere long, but will not be particular as to plans until I am more
resolved.

I am affectionately yours.

       *       *       *       *       *

_(Two months later)_

My Dear Madam,--

I know not whether I do well or ill in acquainting you with a matter so
delicate, as there is none other but my Lord Hervey to whom I dare confide
it, and 'tis but to you and to him I would be obliged for assistance. But
friendship, if an illusion, is the last left me, and I won't dismiss it
until I am compelled. 'Tis certainly absurd that one human being should
depend upon any other for anything, for alone we are born and die, and it
may be thought the Great Author of our being intended us to walk the way
alone that conducts from the one to the other, else had he made our minds
more accessible. For my part, if truth be a merit, I can say I never had
an affection, but what I regretted it sooner or later, or made a
confidence, but what I wished it recalled. Excepting in one case, which I
leave to your discernment. And such is my vexation at this minute that,
was I to be born in another incarnation as Pythagoras pretends, I would be
a foundling, indebted to none who could exact repayment of the gift of
life forced upon an unwilling victim to please the humour of others.

If I write a little bitter I know your kind cpncern will excuse me in view
of what I relate. I am extreme annoyed and fluttered, yet would not be a
vain lamenter neither. Life is still endurable when met with an easy
common sense, and this I call to my aid on this occasion.

I had a mind to return to London about a month since, when word came that
my young rake of a son would come hither for a few days, with his friend
Carew. I knew not the young man, but remember his father in the Thoresby
days, and the old man now being dead, the youth is well to pass in the
world in a small way and hath inherited the old Devon grange.

However, I took this as a sign of grace in my prodigal, and desired Anne
to see the rooms prepared and that she should not attend me with my
tent-stitch after dinner, as wishing to keep flint and steel apart, which
your Ladyship will admit was a prudence to be desired. And so went down to
receive the young men.

You are not now to learn that Edward, with all his follies, hath a very
pleasant humour when he chooses, and a tongue not unworthy of his family;
and young Carew being very conversable and well-featured and full of odd
stories of the authorities at Oxford and the liberties they allow
themselves under the mask of gravity, the evening past extreme agreeably,
and it was late when I left them to their bottle.

Pratt and Anne Wentworth attended me to bed, and I desired the last to put
my pearl necklace into my dressing-box with the dressing-plate, with which
she complied in her obliging manner and took the key as customary. This
done, I dismist them and writ a few lines to my Lord Hervey, and so to
sleep.

The next day we past on the river in a water party and sillabubs at
Richmond and what not; and evening come I asked for my necklace and--Lord
bless me!--'twas not to be found. Anne, pale as her smock, was looking in
all corners,--and Pratt, also, but with purst lips as who should say,
"Your Ladyship now sees what copies of whimsies and foundlings,"--till I
was vexed to the blood with them both, and knew not what to say next; the
more so, since I had seen Mrs Anne gathering flowers for the bowpots after
sunrise, and young Carew staring after her like a zany. I don't doubt but
what there had been a thousand sweet nothings before I opened my window.
The house was hunted in vain, and all the comfort Edward could give me was
the assurance of his father's anger at my folly in taking a stranger into
the house; which is most abominably true, Mr Wortley loving to find fault
and invent it where not found.

By this time Pratt was weeping like a crocodile, and the Bow Street
runners sent for to come and take particulars lest the pearls be sold in
Drury Lane. Indeed, my dear Madam, I could not close an eye for vexation,
and to complete it could not but remark that young Carew kept casting
sheep's eyes at Mrs Anne that looked as lovely as a weeping angel, could
such be supposed. How different are tears in one woman and another! Pratt,
her nose inflamed, her eyes scarce visible in swelled lids, might have
been exposed to the Duke of Wharton and his "Schemers" without an ounce of
virtue lost on either side; whereas Anne, with the liquid pearls hung on
her lashes as if to replace the lost ones, was a dish for the Gods. 'Tis
no manner of use to scold the Fates for what they give or withhold; but I
swear 'tis easy known they are women, such favourites do they make without
reason.

We returned to London without loss of time, and the young men remained on
in my family for awhile--a course I took because the investigators are
such filthy drunken beasts as I would not bring myself to endure their
presence, and thought it more fitting that Edward should direct them.
'Twas more than a week ere they returned, with the news that pearls
answerable to the description were sold at a receiving "ken" about Drury
Lane. My blessed offspring, who (by the way) is grown extreme handsome,
endeavoured to learn more certainly, but was told with surprising
impudence that they were likely out of the kingdom by this time. The
wretch that kept the place was took in custody and closely questioned; but
naught could be got from him but that a young madam whom he supposed a
nymph of Drury Lane had sold it, saying she had it from her young cully of
a lover, and she would not have the sale known for worlds, but had
occasion for the money. Asked to describe her, he said so many were his
dealings as he took no particular heed beyond that she was handsome, and a
way with her, says he, that would whistle a bird off a bough.

God forgive me--'twas not wonderful I looked at Mrs Anne, and the thought
came in my mind how little I knew but her own story, and my own folly that
took up with a stranger on what I might call a mere spasm of liking. She
saw it, for she hath a gift of reading faces, and says she:--

"Your Ladyship, I am sensible that suspicion is like to rest on me, for
Mrs Pratt is some time in your family and I but new come. This is a
hanging matter, Madam, and I beseech you have so much pity for a poor girl
as permit me a few days more before I am handed over to these cruel men.
'Tis the bare truth that, so far from stealing, I would give my life to
repay the debt I owe your goodness. And sure I that restored a jewel
unasked am scarce to be now held guilty. Have pity upon your poor girl,
Madam! and delay but till Mrs Lamb and her family return from the Wells to
speak for me."

'Twas so well exprest and carried so much truth that, though I called
myself a thousand weak fools, I could not refuse her, and so set a week
and lamented my own weakness in regard of beauty, that might be a man for
the sensibility I have for it but that I detect their little cunning
tricks. I know not how I am so oddly made up, unless it be the merciless
good sense of which my poor sister Gower complained; but I am no more like
to believe a woman ill-behaved because she is handsome (as women do), than
to think her innocent (as a man would do) for the same excellent reason.

Some more days past, and I had other cause to regret my course; for
passing a door ajar, I looked through the crack, hearing voices, and found
Mrs Pratt conversing very much at her ease with my prodigal--a thing
which, though well enough in Congreve's comedies, is what I will not have
in my family. I am so ill-bred as to be quite insensible to the romantic
nights that are now the vogue and, walking into the room, spoke my mind,
desiring Mrs Pratt to be so good as pack her boxes and depart within the
hour, which was accordingly done, I having her boxes looked through ere
she went, so much assurance awaking my suspicion that perhaps she could
tell more of the pearls than anyone, if so disposed. However, nothing
found, and so off she went in a sulky silence, my son and heir talking
very high and railing upon me for injustice. He took himself off next
morning with young Carew (who however behaved very genteelly throughout),
saying as he flung away, that God only knew but they might next be
suspected, and they had better depart while their characters were safe.
You know the silly cant he is apt to talk as well as any.

I was fluttered and wearied when they departed, and had, what is rare with
me, a touch of the vapours; but there was Anne, hearing me come up, and
did all to support me that a feeling heart and good sense could dictate.
Will your Ladyship credit me when I tell you the poor girl had had good
reason all along to suspect Mrs Pratt might have a hand in the thievery,
but would not speak as knowing nothing for certain, and sparing to trouble
me with the understanding she surprised between Pratt and my young
gentleman. Her good sense and heart were a cordial, and I drew a little
consolation in considering that I would now retain her about my person and
enjoy a little peace in a worthy attendant. For, though I have known no
instances of honour and integrity but among those of high birth, still
there are exceptions, no doubt, to be found to any rule. So resolving, I
sat down to write to my rake that I had sufficient reason to think his
Dulcinea might know more of the pearls, and to request he would oblige me
by using his best endeavours to trace them.

What a bubble is hope! Two days later comes a letter from young Carew,
expressing himself with decency and respect, to tell me that with my
permission he had made up his mind to marry Mrs Anne Wentworth, who was
not unwilling to hear his suit, since he knew not where else he could find
so much beauty coupled with good sense and modesty. He doubted not but I
would approve his resolution.

'Twas somewhat of a blow. I had come to like the girl about me as a lap
dog or any other little fondling. Her every look was a caress, and her
voice as soft as violets. Also she hath mended my girl's manners of a
hundred little indelicacies gathered from Pratt's pertness. I had
willingly kept her, but 'twas not to be. What! shall a young beauty refuse
a comfortable home and other matrimonial delights for a lonely woman! Not
she!

I gave them what, by courtesy, may be called my blessing, and my suit of
blue lutestring to Mrs Bride, and she threw herself at my feet, and I
actually came near shedding a tear to see her overflowing gratitude. 'Twas
worthy such a set of verses as Pope writ when the rural lovers were killed
in each other's arms by a stroke of lightning.

No doubt Carew is a fool--yet I think a wise one. She will play him no
tricks and stratagems, and will be a fair Lady Bountiful in his moated
grange, and will care her children and the poor, and con possets and
caudles with the parson's wife--Pshaw! what sickly stuff do I write that
should know better. 'Tis liker she will play him false in a year, with
some booby squire that rides to hounds and swaggers in with his boots a
mass of mud to drink himself silly after a dinner of roast pig. And for
me, I have replaced her next day with a Mrs Susan--the Duchess of
Montagu's late woman, that hath all the pertnesses and the tricks of her
trade.

Well--'tis the way of the world. Set not your heart on anything. A hard
heart that values nothing is the only wear, and 'tis evident Scripture so
enjoins it. My glass tells me I am still a personable woman, and 'tis open
to me to find amusement in making a lover--and myself--happy if so I
choose--and if 'twere not so dull a pastime. And there is crimp and
quadrille for the asking, and the new game that is just come up.

Horace Walpole is crossing the Channel and will give this to your
Ladyship's hand. And the favour I would have of you (in all secrecy) is
this--that you would cause enquiry to be made with caution at Breguet's in
the Rue des Moineaux, whether he hath had lately any sale of pearls from
England. 'Twas a thing spoke of as not impossible, that they should find
their way there, for I hear from H. W. and others that the man is a
well-practised receiver of such goods from England. But with caution, I
entreat, and with no mention to H. W., for I begin to have an anxiety that
I have not as yet mentioned to any.

Pray be so good as send your reply by special hand. I await it uneasily.
It may be that I have the spleen, but though I have done with
knight-errantry for distrest beauty, I wonder sometimes whether my little
Anne Carew have not a happier fate than any woman of fashion. 'Tis but a
modest grange in Devon; but those two simple souls will taste of happiness
there and in each other, and the world will not trouble them. The seasons
will come and go, and when they lie in the churchyard 'twill not be with
tons of marble and scutcheons of lies above 'em, but with nature's
covering of snow in winter and leaves and flowers in summer. They'll sleep
the sweeter. I would willingly have her with me still. Present my
compliments to our Embassador. I may yet have to ask his good offices, but
am still in hopes to avoid this.

Your Ladyship's most affectionate, as ever.

       *       *       *       *       *

_(A month later)_

My Dear Madam,--

Herewith the end of the romance I have inflicted on your obliging
attention, and I am now to tell you your comments were fully justified and
I have writ myself down an ass and invoked as fine a lampoon as Pope could
write in gall and vinegar. "Sappho" will be as nothing to it, and indeed
that I, that know the world or should know it, should behave so like a
country bumpkin new come to town is gall and wormwood to myself. I cannot
hide from a friend what all the world will soon ridicule, and had sooner
you heard it from me than another. Was you to reproach my folly as I
deserve, you will write volumes and I promise to read with seasonable
humility. Sure I must be falling into premature dotage.

I was at Twicknam again, somewhat ailing with My common swelled face, when
I was told Mr Carew would see me. I refused, but he would take no denial
and indeed forced his way in--so pale that I could expect nothing but the
worst news of my son and implored him to speak. 'Twas some time and took a
dram to restore him before he could answer, what with his haste and
fluttered spirits. But when he did--'twas to tell me Madam had flown the
day they married. The ceremony was scarce over and they returned to the
house, when, making some excuse, she slipt from the room. He waited as
long as a bridegroom's patience would hold out and followed her; but found
she was nowhere to be seen. Your kindness, Madam, will conceive the horror
with which he searched everywhere, but could get no news. The least he
could suppose was that she was murdered for the diamond ring he gave her
on the occasion.

At the last he had recourse to the law, and what a discovery was there.
Who think you was my paragon--the compendium in little of all the female
virtues? Why, Sally Salisbury's niece! and the equal of Sally herself for
worthless good looks and behaviour. She is not yet well known to the town
or I could not have been so took in. But you will recall that Molly
Skerret observed the likeness to that drab Sally on seeing her. Good
Heaven, that I had heeded, and not harboured the slut!

Yet there is worse to follow, and I know not how to tell such folly, but
must do so. She is the wife of my son, whom indeed I knew capable of any
wickedness short of robbing his mother. He picked the hussy up in the
Fleet and wed her, and then, being in debt, the thought struck the
promising pair that my jewels might meet their needs. He took advantage of
the loss of my ring to have it copied, and the rest followed easy with a
fool like me.

"But I beseech you, Madam," says poor Carew, shaking in every limb, "that
you would have the goodness to review your jewels, since the only way I
can reason upon her continuing with you and pretending to accept my
addresses was to take time while Mrs Pratt was under suspicion to make off
with more and keep you easy about them. The pretended love-affair with Mrs
Pratt was plainly to be a false scent."

I sent for my cases, and find my chain of diamonds, my gold etui set with
diamonds, my Turkish clasp with emeralds, and other things disappeared
with my Venus. I enclose the list and description, for I learn Miss Sally
Salisbury is now in Paris, and it is probable that her niece and nephew
(my son) have joined her or committed the jewels to her good offices. I am
ashamed to give your Ladyship such trouble about this trifle, yet beg your
obliging enquiries in the Rue des Moineaux or where else your Lord may
suggest. But by all means keep it from Horace Walpole. I want not his
bitter tongue to lick my sores. 'Tis of course certain we cannot use the
law, considering who is involved--a point Madam no doubt laid her account
with when she carried through the plot.

Lord, when I think of my sentiment wasted on the arrant hussy! My green
churchyards and Lady Bountifuls and all the praise of simplicity and
parade of folly that took me because of a pretty face and arts from the
gutter. Well, 'tis the miserable truth that this young fool (who sure must
get it from his mother) did wed this slut at the Fleet two years since,
and hath damned himself for life. He is now as weary of her as is to be
expected, and besought me to deliver him from the consequence of his
folly. Beside that fact the affair of the diamonds seems shrunk, for
nothing can be done, nor does he deserve it. He whines like a whipt dog in
his letters.

I would my father had lived to see the soundness of Mr Wortley's
reasoning, when he refused to entail his estates upon a future child of
whose vices and disposition he could know nothing. 'Twould certainly be
the young gentleman's utter ruin had he money to handle in reversion. I
will not trouble you with the number of falsehoods he has stuft into his
letters.

I have trained myself to fortitude, and go about with as many knives stuck
in my heart as our Lady of the Seven Dolours that I saw in Vienna, but
make much less display of them. The best news I could have at this moment
would be the young villain's death, for the misery he will yet bring upon
himself and others is too certain. For Madam, she will doubtless be heard
of yet in a manner that the decency of my sex obliges me to soften. I
doubt they will both end on the gallows, though indeed her face will
probably save her that or any penalty.

Well, I have done with such fragments of a heart as I had, and wish it may
never trouble me more. I am sick of the cant of sentiment and duties and
suchlike, which is the mask men use to cover what will not bear
considering. Let me write of it no more. The open wickedness of the world
we live in is preferable to hypocrisy and cringing. I will rather laugh
with others than be a laughing-stock. I sicken at this complication of
folly and falsity. I go to the Bath shortly, and look for change and
pleasure there, though Mr Wortley speaks of passing through on his way to
Bristol, I know not for what. Lord Hervey is resolved to come there,
though I fear it will not please his lady, who seems resolved to keep so
general a blessing to herself, which is more than she or any can hope. She
takes it, however, with easy good sense, and wisely, for there's nothing
on earth, I protest, worth a tear.

The rage for cards runs higher than ever, and let me conclude my romance
and this long paper with a pretty parable of them that is making the round
of the town. Will your Ladyship guess the author? 'T is called "The
Goddesses of Chance."

"There was long since in the Moon four Goddesses. One was the Queen of
Riches, the second the Queen of Love, the third the Queen of Power, and of
the fourth you'll hear anon. 'Tis to be supposed the fourth received the
most homage; for a thing known loses its value, as when a man despises his
own wife and thinks Lord M.'s a descended Venus, when, was the case
reversed, his own would be his object.

"On a certain day these ladies, being, after all, women, disputed between
themselves on a point of precedence.

"Says the Goddess of Riches, jingling her diamonds:--

"'I come first with all. I am worshipt in every polite country, and even
the blacks fight over the shells that are their coinage. I give not only
gold but all it can buy, inclusive of such bagatelles as love and honour,
and all the other little nothings men cry up when they have a mind to be
droll. I need give no examples though I might cite the late marriage of my
Lady M. E. at the age of fifteen to a wealthy lord of seventy-five that
shall be nameless. Undoubtedly I am Queen of all.'

"'Not by any means,' says the Goddess of Hearts, adjusting her crown with
a simper. ''Tis I am supreme. 'Tis known a young rake will sell his last
estate to win a smile from Miss Sally Salisbury and other worthy ladies.
And hath not the Countess of H----t lately run off with her footman? I
lead statesmen and kings by the nose. Many such moral examples could I
give if needful.'

"The Goddess of Power, brandishing her club with a brawny arm, then
replied:--

"'I beg your Ladyships would cease twattling when 'tis in my power with a
crack of my club to silence you all. I leave you to judge whether anything
in life is so powerful as what can end it. What's love when a crack on the
sconce can kill it, or riches when a blow can turn it over to the
grimacing heir-at-law? No, no, ladies. Strength comes first, and this
was seen when the Strong Man was at Bartholomew Fair and half the beauties
ran after him and poured their gold in a perfect Pactolus at his feet.
Show your good sense, therefore, by a discreet silence.'

"But still they disputed, and at last the fourth said:--

"'Sisters, let us descend to earth, that we may settle the question which
I see not how else to conclude.'

"'But how shall we go?' says the three at once.

"'We will go as the Queens of Chance, and men may sport with us, play with
us, revile us, men and women alike. And they shall sell us their honour,
love, and whatever else they have marketable, and on the day of Judgment
we four will see whose bag is fullest of their commodities. 'Tis the only
way to settle the dispute. And in the end all shall come to me.'

"And the three said: 'And who are you, Madam?'

"And says she: 'With my black spade I dig the earth where all shall lie.
'Tis I will be the Black Hag of the Pack, and you shall strip them and I
will dig their graves. Be it known to you that I am Destiny herself.'

"So they came to earth, and are the Queens of Diamonds, Hearts, and Clubs.
But if the Queen of Spades be in your hand, say the gambler's prayer
backward, for she is the chance you can't reckon in the game, or in life
or death."

I think it neatly turned, whoever did it, and I declare this little
writing hath so affrighted the fine ladies, that Mrs Murray swooned away
at the Duchess of Manchester's, finding the Queen of Spades in her hand at
commerce, and was forced to be revived with strong waters. His Grace of
Wharton, known to you and me as "Sophia," hath given up cards altogether,
though whether it be the parable, I know not. And the viper of Twicknam is
so jealous that he did not himself write this piece, that he spews his
venom in all directions, in hope some will settle on the author. His
pleasure to scourge alike the follies and virtues of mankind is, for aught
I know, the liveliest this world affords. The follies are, at least,
inexhaustible, and none need be at a loss for amusement that can taste
them, whether in themselves or others.

The Queen, who I can't undertake to commiserate for bad health, so hard a
life as she leads, hath had the unspeakable blessing to see her lord
return from Hanover, after a storm which induced his faithful subjects to
believe they had lost him. Will your Ladyship credit that the wits affixed
a paper to the walls of St. James's Palace with, writ on it, this
following:--

"Lost or strayed out of this house, a man who has left a wife and six
children on the parish. Whoever will give tidings of him to the
churchwardens of St. James's Palace, so as he may be got again, shall
receive four shillings and sixpence reward.--N.B. This reward will not be
increased, nobody judging him to be worth a crown."

Impudence indeed! But I hear from Lord Hervey that she is counselled by
Sir Robert Walpole to invite Madame Walmoden hither from Hanover, to amuse
his leisure. 'Tis done as you might throw a bone to a dog, while Her
Majesty and the Walpole pursue the business of governing. I have no sort
of liking for either, but own, had that woman been a man, she had been a
great one, so entirely does she subdue her heart and all the femininities
in her to what her reason demands. When she dies, and it can't be long
first, from what I hear, the fool she leaves will drift like a stick in a
stream.

Well, I sicken of England and of the town and the wits and all else. My
mind is made up to quit this country ere long, and seek peace abroad,
where I found it when I was younger than I am now. Folly! I tell myself
so, and yet I will do it, when one or two businesses I must attend on are
finished. 'Tis not that I am a lamenter over that I have told you. I care
not what happens to my prodigal, and had sooner be out of hearing of his
doings. When a cup is broke, throw it from you and think of it no more.
But whether 'tis the spleen or the vapours, I have a mind to cross the
water and seek a new earth, if not a new heaven. Here I am in neither, but
in purgatory. Quelle vie!--'Tis what I say daily.

Adieu, my dearest Madam--may it not be long before we meet.

Inviolably yours,

M. W. M.

_(The son of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu was the misery of her life, and
it is the historic truth that he made much such a marriage as I have
described. It is said he turned Mohammedan after the death of his parents.
A portrait of him in a most aggressive turban is in existence. The reason
for Lady Mary's leaving England in 1739, and returning only to die in
1762, has never been known.)_




Maria Gunning
_Countess of Coventry_
1733-1760

Elizabeth Gunning
_Duchess of Hamilton and of Argyll_
1734-1790



"'Tis a warm day," remarks George Selwyn in a letter to Lord Carlisle,
"and someone proposes a stroll to Betty's front shop; suddenly the cry is
raised, 'The Gunnings are coming,' and we all tumble out to gaze and to
criticize."

The two lovely sisters from Roscommon in Ireland, introduced by their
beauty, were the sensation of fashionable England in 1751. Maria, a year
the elder, was the more dashing and at first the more conspicuous of the
two. She became Countess of Coventry, and died at twenty-seven. Elizabeth
married the Duke of Hamilton, after his death, refused the Duke of
Bridgewater, but later married the Duke of Argyll. Four of her children
were Dukes, two of Hamilton and two of Argyll.

So much Irish luck and beauty kept the Gunnings constantly in the centre
of court affairs. A poem celebrating their conquests was entitled, "The
Grand Contest between the Fair Hibernians and the English Toasts."

The Queen of the Bluestockings said of them, when she saw them together,
"Indeed very handsome; nonpareille, for the sisters are just alike take
them together, and there is nothing like them."

[Illustration: Maria Gunning.]



IV

The Golden Vanity

A Story of the First Irish Beauties
The Gunnings


It was the year of grace 1750, and old Mother Corrigan sat outside her
door in Slattern Alley, smoking her short black pipe with a relish; and't
was a good day with her, for she had told his fortune that morning for
Squire Tyrconnel, on his way to fight a duel in the Phcenix Park with
Lawyer Daly; and when it was finished, says she to him:--

"Let you count the buttons on his body-coat, your Honour, and fix the
third from the top in your eye. And when you stand up to him, say a prayer
and pink him with your swordeen in that very spot, and the Lord grant him
a bed in heaven, the old villain, for he'll never be asking one on earth
again."

And as she said, so it was, and old Daly turned up his toes and never
spoke more, when the Squire got him in the third button. And an hour
after, Squire Tyrconnel sent his purse with five golden guineas in it, and
a pound of the best rappee to be found in the Four Courts, and all for
Mother Corrigan, and she was a proud woman that day. Her house was stuffed
as full of money as an egg of meat; but no one would think it to look at
her; for she had it all hid away like an old fairy, so that no one would
give a thought to it.

She was sitting at her door at the top of Slattern Alley where it turns
into Britain Street, and she in the best of good tempers, when a lady came
by with two young daughters beside her--a tall woman, with a fine
blossoming colour in her face and an air like a peacock spreading his tail
and her eyes as clear as spring water. It would be hard to see a finer
woman of her age in a day's walk, and all the gentlemen going to and from
the Castle must turn to have another look at the three of them. Her dress
might be handsome at first sight; but, closer, you could see she had it
held up with pins and stitches, and a bit of good lace fell over it to
hide the wear in the front. Also, she drew her feet under her hoop, that
they might not be noticed, though they were as small as a young child's.
And so she minced along with steps like mice, for fear of showing the
burst in her shoe.

But for all that she held up her head like the deer in the Lord
Lieutenant's park, and her pride was enough for a queen, and too much for
a poor lady walking the Dublin streets and holding her skirt up out of the
mud.

But it was the two she had with her that any lady might be proud of. There
were never two such out of heaven; and sure it may be believed, for the
world has said it often enough since that day, and will say it to the end
of time. For the elder was a sweet rogue, with hair like red gold clean
out of the fire, and eyes like a blue June morning, and cheeks like May
flowers that a rose has kissed, and lips that better than a rose would
kneel to kiss one day; and her smile lit up the street, and she tripped
along as light as a spring breeze.

But the younger--sure the Lord was well pleased the day he made her face,
for't was perfection's self, Her hair was a dark brown veined with gold,
and her eyes like purple violets with the rain on them; and when she
closed her long lashes 'twas like a cloud over the stars; and her mouth,
and the soft smile, and the dimple that dipped when she laughed--a man
would stand all day to watch her and not think long. 'Tis a strange thing
that one girl will be like that, all beauty and shining sweetness, and
another, perhaps as good,--for better she could not be in her heart,--will
be a poor sorrowful little victim that a cat would not look at in the
dark!

And old Mother Corrigan saw them coming, and she took her pipe out from
between her teeth, and says she:--

"Halt here, my ladies, the three of you, and hear the fortune that's
waiting you--the way you'll be ready when it comes."

"Fortune!" says the lady, stopping, a girl in each hand; "'Tis the black
fortune and the sad fortune that befell me since the day the gold ring was
on my finger. And I don't want to hear any more, so I don't; for if I had
more to bear than I have this minute I wouldn't face the morn's morrow."

But Mother Corrigan rose up as nimbly as a woman to a dance, and she
looked the lady in the eyes as if she was as tall as herself, and, "Come
in," says she, "for though 'tis a poor place, the beauty of the three of
you will light it like candles, and 'tis here your luck begins."

So they went in, and the lady said she had not so much as a silver bit to
cross her hand with, and indeed would have pulled her daughters back; but
the old woman would not have it.

"Leave it so," says Mother Corrigan, "what matters an empty hand today
when you'll fill the two hands of me with gold when the luck comes that's
coming? Give me your word, my lady, and I'll take it for as good as five
guineas."

So she gave her word to fill Mother Corrigan's hand with golden guineas;
and the two young girls were standing by, their cheeks like burning roses
for fear and hope, as the old witch caught the lady's hand, and gabbled
something that was not a prayer, and the words came from her like a person
talking in their sleep.

"High blood and poverty. Sure, your father had a crown on his head and no
gold to gild it with."

But the lady pulled her hand away angrily.

"Then you know who I am. What's the good of play-acting? I guessed this
would be the way of it!"

"I don't know and I don't care," says the old woman with a grin. "I'm
telling you what I see, and till this minute I never laid eye on you or
yours. Don't you be speaking again, for there's no sense in that; but
harken!"

So she told her her father was poor and proud, an Irish lord with a castle
in a bog and an old coach with the cloth hanging off it in flitters and
the plough-horses to draw it; and that he never gave her a penny since
she married, for he had it not to give. And she told her her husband was
no better, but running after the cards and dice all day, so that all the
world cried folly on her for taking up with him.

"But no matter!" says Mother Corrigan, "for you did a good deed for
yourself that day you stood up with him in the church."

"A good deed!" says the lady, very angry. "Don't you be a foolish old
woman, and you so near your end. For I got nothing out of it but care and
crying and pinching poverty and five children that I don't know how to put
the bread in their mouths; and this minute I'm as lonesome as a widow, for
my husband is off and away in the country, and here am I in Dublin; and if
I know how to get bit or sup for them it's as much as I do know."

But the old woman shook her head till her teeth rattled.

"Let you be easy and take what's coming. I see you sitting in a king's
house, and the walls all gilded gold, and the carpets like moss that your
foot would sink into, and riches and grandeur, and everyone bowing down to
the mother of the beauties."

"Well, if the half of it's true," says the lady, "the first news should
come to me is that I'm a widow; for 'tis impossible it should happen as
you say with a husband that hasn't one penny-piece to rattle on a
tombstone."

"You'll not be a widow for many a day, and 'tis your husband's name brings
the luck."

"You don't know what his name is. You couldn't If you'll tell me his name,
I'll engage to believe any mortal thing you tell me."

So the three looked at the old woman; but she took another look at the
hand as she might be reading a book, and:--

"Good-day to you, Mrs Gunning, and good-day to his Lordship's
daughter,--my Lord Mayo,--and good-day to the mother of the two beauties
that'll sweep the world."

And she clucked and chuckled to herself, highly diverted with their
astonishment. How did she know it? What that old woman did not know would
make but a short story. 'T was said she had informants over the whole
countryside, like a Minister of the Crown.

They stared, for they were new come to Dublin, running from their debts in
Roscommon and taking the chance to pick up husbands in the city, and there
was not one there who knew them.

So she took the youngest girl's hand in hers and says she:--

"You'll marry the highest man, bar one or two, in England. And you'll not
be content with that; for when you bury him, you'll marry the highest man
in Scotland; and if I sat here till tomorrow, I couldn't tell you the half
of the riches and glory that's waiting for you. You'll have to crawl
through the black mud to get the first; but after that 'tis a clear
course, and the mud won't stick to a duchess's gown, young Miss Elizabeth
Gunning!"

A duchess! Elizabeth's eyes were like winter stars, they so sparkled--they
would put out the light of diamonds. She held herself like a young poplar
and says she:--

"And if you're right, old woman, or anything like it, I'll come and see
you when I get promotion, and my Lord Duke shall fill your pockets with
gold."

But Mother Corrigan grinned like a dog.

"I haven't a pocket, my Lady's Honour. My hand's good enough; but I'll not
be here when you come riding back to poor old Dublin in yer coach and
six--and now for the fairy of the world!"--And she took the hand of the
eldest, who was shaking like a leaf and expecting to hear of a prince and
his blue ribbon at the least, and her eyes fixed on the old witch like two
blue lakes with the stars dipping in them.

But she shook her head.

"A great man, but not so big a man as your sister's." (The girl looked
jealous daggers at Elizabeth.) "A fine man, and the gold lace on him, and
velvet and silk stockings, and gold buckles shining in the shoes of him,
and a big house to live in, and fine clothes for your back, and--"

She stopped dead, like a horse pulled up on his haunches; but the young
Maria twitched her by the raggedy sleeve.

"Go on. What is it? I want to hear."

"Don't ask me, and you so beautiful!"

"I do ask, and I'll have it out of you. I suppose you mean I'll get old
and ugly like yourself."

"You'll never be old and ugly. Them that remembers you will remember the
loveliest thing God ever made when he took clay in his two hands."

"I don't know what she means," says Maria fretfully. "But sure some women
are handsome till they die. Tell us when will the luck come, and how?"

"With the Golden Vanity and a woman with a man's name. And now leave me,
my three queens, and I'll have a drop to warm me old bones and a whiff of
the pipe to put the life in me. But don't forget the old woman when the
great lords is kneeling before you and pouring the diamonds out of baskets
before ye--and send the golden guineas, and--"

So she went on mumbling and muttering, and that was the first and last
time the old hag told a fortune for love and not for money. She had not
long to tell any, for she died next May, and not a soul to cry for her.

       *       *       *       *       *

They stepped out into the sunshine, their heads high, and scarce a word to
say to each other; for all three were thinking of the promises as light
and glittering as soap bubbles. And Maria would not spare a word to
Elizabeth, for not a woman but must walk after the heels of a duchess, and
she was all for leading.

"The Golden Vanity!" says Elizabeth. "Mama, what should that be? When I'm
a duchess--"

"I don't know, and most likely 'tis not worth knowing." Mrs. Gunning was
angry. Her fine brows were drawn together. "Leave talking of duchesses,
you silly fools, and go get the herrings for tea. I have left the
children too long as it is."

So she marched down Britain Street like a queen, for all her burst
shoe,--a shabby street it was for such ladies,--and the two walked off
to Fishmonger's Alley, and not a head but turned to look at them.

"Faith, they're goddesses and no mistake!" says gay Mr Councillor Egan, on
the way from the Law Courts, with his mulberry face and his mulberry
velvet coat. 'Twas to Lawyer Curran he said it, and in a small city like
Dublin the name held, and the two were called the Goddesses from that
time.

Old Corrigan's words gave them courage for a while; but what can hold up
against a diet of herrings day in and day out? And that was all the poor
lady could give her family. What was she to do? Mr Gunning had took
himself off to Castle Coote, his beggarly place in the country, where he
could dice and drink in peace with the neighboring squireens, and live off
claret and the skinny fowls that pecked about the avenue; and she had the
weight of the children on her spare shoulders.

'Twas about this time that young Harry Lepel, the first man they met, in a
way of speaking, fell in love with Elizabeth, the younger. The way it
happened was this. She was walking down Mount Street with Maria, and she
let fall her purse, and nothing in it but a pocket-piece to save her
gentility. Harry was strolling off to my Lord Cappoquin's, from mounting
guard at the Castle (for at that time his Lordship lived in Merrion
Square); and indeed Mr Lepel was as fine a figure of a young man as a girl
could wish to see, in his regimentals all laced with gold and his handsome
head above them--a brown man with dark eyes. And seeing a young madam drop
her purse, he stooped for it and, coming up behind them, saluted very
stiff and offered it, and the two turned and looked him in the face.

'Tis certain a man might come up a thousand times behind a woman's back
and not be startled as Harry Lepel was when he saw them; for there never
was, nor will be, two such sisters. 'Twas like a battery suddenly
unmasked; and what chance had the poor devil that was marching up to it
like an innocent? The only thing he could do was to surrender at
discretion--but to which lady? That was the trouble. Elizabeth Gunning
settled it for him.

"I thank you, Sir," says she, with a smile that had ruined St. Anthony,
for she was one that smiled with her eyes as well as her mouth--a golden
sunshine that the heart opened to naturally.

He was stuttering and stammering. "Madam, I thank you for the happiness of
touching anything your hand hath blessed."

'Twas sudden, I allow; but then, so too was her beauty. At all events, he
dared no more, not having the courage, though all the will, to linger, and
was turning off when a queer thing happened. But 'twas to be.

A drunken poltroon of a bargeman was coming up from Liffey-side, lurching
and yawing like a Dutch hooker in a gale; and seeing them in a little
bunch on the cobblestones, he took an anger at them in his wooden head,
and, whether purposely or not I know not, but he elbowed up against Miss
Maria and drove her into the dirty kennel; and she gave a faint scream,
for her shoes were destroyed with the mud, and it was the only pair she
had to her name. So what does Mr Lepel do but let drive straight from the
shoulder at the offender, and in a minute the shoes and the lady were out
of the kennel and the bargeman lying there as snug as snug, and the oaths
he let out of him blackening the air like a flight of crows. So Mr Lepel,
smiling with set lips like a picture, says to the girls:--

"Ladies, permit me to escort you to your home. 'Tis much to be regretted
the streets are not safe for beauty unattended, though to be sure I have
the happiness to profit by the circumstance. I trust it hath been no shock
to your sensibility?"

And, indeed, tears had gathered in Elizabeth's eyes; but Maria was
laughing like a Hebe, and looking up in his face--the blue-eyed lovely
rogue!

"We thank you, Sir. 'Tis what our own brother had done had he been more
than five. But while he is in the nursery, we must be obliged to kind
strangers for protection."

"Madam, I would not willingly remain a stranger," says Mr Harry, very
eager, and touching his cocked hat. "Permit me to present myself for want
of a better introducer. My name is Harry Lepel."

"I thank you, Sir. 'Twill be remembered with gratitude. May we now bid you
farewell?"

Miss Maria sank down, in a curtsey so well devised that it showed the
littlest foot in the world, save only Elizabeth's. A fortunate bootmaker
later was to make five guineas an afternoon by showing their shoes at a
penny a head to the mob that gathered to stare at them; but that time was
not yet come. Mr Lepel spoke earnestly:--

"Madam, you can't suppose--'tis not possible I can permit you to return
alone after such an adventure. The sun sinks and the streets are mighty
ill lit. If my company is disagreeable, I can walk ten paces behind; but
otherwise--"

Here Elizabeth interposed, with a fine colour in her cheek:--

"The company of our protector can't be disagreeable--'tis a favour. But,
Sir, I will be frank with you: we are in Dublin _incognita_; our
lodging is not equal to our pretensions to birth; and in short--"

She hesitated, with her eyes dropped and the lashes like night upon her
cheek. The crimson bow of her upper lip trembled--a seductive picture of
troubled beauty. Anyhow it did Mr Harry's business for him. He could no
more have tore himself away at that moment than he could have embraced the
barge-man swearing blue murder at his feet.

"Madam, these are misfortunes that may happen to the greatest, and 'tis
easy seen that in your case breeding and birth combine with--beauty. Is it
indiscreet to ask the name of the ladies I have the honour to address?"

"'Tis very indiscreet," says Miss Maria, with one of her bright
side-glances; "but yet--should we withhold it, sister?"

"Surely not from so kind a friend." Elizabeth spoke eagerly. "Our name,
Sir, is Gunning, and we are granddaughters to the late Viscount Mayo and
nieces to his present Lordship. And when I add that our parents have
fallen into poverty, you will comprehend--"

Her voice paused on a silver note, which had the beginning of a sob; and
when Elizabeth saddened, the world must sadden with her, so lovely were
her long eyes and the drooping head. Pity poor Mr Harry! Talk of Scylla
and Charybdis--he stood between the Sirens, and could he have halved his
heart (and many men have that power), one half had gone to either charmer.

"Madam," says he tenderly, "I feel for your sorrows more than I can
express. Might I but have the happiness to be presented to your mama; for
'tis the most prodigious circumstance--I am the son of Sir Francis Lepel
of Tarrington in Yorkshire, and I have heard him speak of my Lord Mayo
many a time. His Lordship stood second to my grandfather in his famous
duel with Lord Ayrshire thirty year since. My name will not be unknown.
Permit me--"

And again he saluted, very gallant, and the three proceeded down the
street, the girls on thorns for thinking of the dingy rooms, and their
mother down-at-heel, and the everlasting herrings sizzling on the grate,
and Lucy and Kitty screaming for their supper. 'Twas thinking thus that
Maria touched Elizabeth's arm, as much as to say: "Shall we let him go?"
For indeed these girls had a perfect language of signs between them,
elaborated in the shifts and devices of their life; and Miss Maria, at
least, was an accomplished little schemer. But Elizabeth responded not to
the pinch.

"Why, Sir," says she sweetly, "the name is indeed familiar. Sitting on his
Lordship's knee, often have I heard him discourse of Sir Francis. You are
no stranger. Yet truth is best. We are poor, Mr Lepel. My sister and I are
debarred from all the pleasures of our rank, and our only concern is how
to lighten our mama's burden if we could. 'Tis this makes us hesitate, for
we can't offer you the hospitality we would."

"Name it not, Madam, I entreat," says Mr Harry, trying to look into those
too seductive eyes. "God forbid I should add to your anxieties. But had I
the happiness to know your mama, whose beauty half Ireland knows by
repute, sure I might be permitted to open the way to some pleasures. There
is, for instance, a Birthnight ball to be celebrated at the Castle--"

"Sir, you are all goodness, but gentlemen understand little of the
difficulties of poor young ladies of quality. How should they? We have no
dresses fit for the eyes of his Excellency. Even shoes--"

She permitted a foot to appear beneath the edge of her petticoat and
ambushed it again. But it had done its work.

"You tear my heart, Madam. But since that little marvel of a foot recalls
Cinderella's, permit me to say that a fairy godmother smoothed the way for
that young lady to a certain ball, and there she met the prince whose
throne she afterwards shared."

"There are no fairies in Dublin, Sir." Her voice was like flowing honey,
while the little foot so commended was bestowing a sharp kick upon the
fair Maria, and thus it said:--

"Run ahead. Turn the corner and run like a lamp-lighter, and let mama know
what is toward. Hide the herrings. Bundle the children to bed. Fling
mama's Irish lace over her head. I can hold him fifteen minutes. Speed!"

'Tis much to be said in one kick, and it takes a woman to say and a woman
to hear; but Miss Maria was a woman, though but eighteen. She smiled like
Truth's self.

"Sister, if 'tis not disagreeable to you to spare me, I have the message
to leave at Mrs Flaherty's, and will go forward and meet with you at our
door. Excuse me, Mr Lepel. My sister is a slow walker and I a swift. I
knew not 'twas so late."

Off went Miss Maria. Turning the corner, she picked up her petticoats and
legged it along like a hare at dawn.

It may be thought that the acquaintance ripened in those fifteen minutes,
which doubled into thirty. Elizabeth's step was slower, her voice more
musical, even as a nightingale sings her sweetest to the moon. The shade
of my Lord Mayo might hover about them to safeguard propriety, but Mr
Harry drew as near as the rampart of the lady's hoop would permit, bending
his head to catch her murmurs, and his nostrils inhaling the faint perfume
of silken hair rolled back from the whitest brow in the world. They made a
pair that many would have remarked, but for the ill-lit streets.

Maria awaited them at the shabby door in Britain Street.

"I would not go in, sister, lest mama should scold me for leaving you; and
indeed I am but just arrived," says she demurely. And since she had not
entered, 'twas singular how neat was the appearance of that dingy room;
for 'twas dingy, do what you would.

The fire burned brightly, and if there was a delicate odour of herrings
and onions, 'twas the worst could be said, for none were to be seen.
Indeed, a rich perfume fought with it, as if a hasty hand had dashed the
odours of Araby here and there to discourage the herrings. A large velvet
cloak, the worse for wear, disguised the rents of the sofa, whereon sat
Mrs Gunning, majestic in another of faded purple satin, beneath which her
dress remained conjectural. A noble square of Limerick point was flung
over her head and hung veil-like by each ear; and, indeed, with the little
cherub Lucy at her feet, she might have sat for an aging Madonna.

Kitty was bundled off to the camp-bed in the back room; and sure the
picture was homelike, if you studied the handsome lady rather than the
ragged chairs. 'Twas the best they could do, poor souls, in fifteen
minutes, and wonderful in the time. 'Tis women for quick thinking and
quick acting where men are concerned; and, indeed, the look of
astonishment Mrs Gunning gave as the three entered was inimitable, though
already she had every particular set down in her mind. She swept the
stateliest curtsey, and cast a rebuking maternal eye on her daughters, ere
she addressed Mr Lepel.

But, when explanations were made, how did her brow clear and a
fair-weather smile efface the frost! She welcomed him with cordial
kindness, with such reminiscences of his family as warmed his heart; and
though no hospitality was offered save one,--a bottle of generous claret
in a silver cup enriched with the Mayo arms,--'twas given with such
good-will, and served by so lovely a cup-bearer, the fair Maria, that
the man does not breathe but must feel it worthy of the three ladies who
tendered it. He toasted them one and all in turn, and if his bow to
Elizabeth was a little lower, that circumstance did not displease Mrs
Gunning.

"I leave you to judge, Mr Lepel," says she, "what it costs a mother to see
her dear ones exiled from all the little gay scenes where it would become
them to appear. But what can I do? My father's grandchildren, Mr Gunning's
daughters, can't appear except with propriety; and why should I hesitate
to tell so kind a friend that 'tis beyond my power?"

'Twas discussed between them all for an hour as to the Birthnight ball;
but Mrs Gunning was resolute, nor could Mr Harry dare to make the offers
that trembled on his lips. He could have groaned aloud to think on the
sums he wasted nightly on gaming--one half of which would have adorned
these beauties and set them free to flutter their wings in the sunshine of
fashion. Later Maria, half-smiling, half-sad, told how they were promised
luck by the old witch of Dublin, though she gave not all the particulars.
She built not on it, she declared, nor yet did Elizabeth; and she, a soft
sigh parting her lips, confirmed her sister: "the more so," says she,
"that none of us can imagine what is the Golden Vanity. Is there such a
ship, to be the ship of our fortunes? 'Tis that it sounds most like."

He shook his head. Mrs Gunning softly remonstrated:--

"My dears, be not giddy, nor let your heads run on such follies. There is
no such name and no such thing and 'tis impossible--"

More she would have said, but a man came crying somewhat down the street,
and beside him went another with a flambeau, that he might read a paper in
his hand, and what the man cried was this:--

"Let the fashion of Dublin, both ladies and gentlemen, take notice that
there comes presently to the theatre in Aungier Street the dramatic
company which Mr Sheridan presents to his patrons in a new and luscious
play, by name--"

But here was the speaker's voice drowned by a wagon passing on the
cobblestones.

"What is it?" cries Mrs Gunning, running to the window; for indeed she
loved the play as well as did her girls. And, as if the question had
reached him, the man turned towards her and bellowed like the bull of
Bashan: "The Golden Vanity!"

The little company within stared transfixed upon one another.

       *       *       *       *       *

For the next fortnight did the three live in a kind of rapture; and 't is
not to be wondered at, the name coming so pat on the prophecy. And sure,
Mr Lepel was no less moved; for he took a deeper than brotherly interest
in all that touched them, his heart being caught that day in Dublin
streets; and if he then thought Elizabeth a beauty, it took not a week to
rank her an angel. Before the week was out, he laid his heart and the
reversion of the baronetcy at her foot, not regarding the worn little shoe
that cased it. For, indeed, the sisters wore the same size, and Elizabeth
being the better mistress of her wardrobe, 'tis to be feared she sought
often for her own, to find them gadding abroad on Miss Maria's feet and
herself left to luck. 'Twas mortifying, and her heavenly blush was as much
owing to this circumstance as to the gentleman's ardour.

However, taken by Mr Harry's fine person and clothes (and which was the
most potent is not known), she accepted the heart, and he set about to
inform his father of his good fortune, for mother he had none. 'Twas with
inward quakings, for beauty, were it Helen's own, is but a blunted arrow
against a seasoned heart of seventy: and Sir Francis Lepel had reached
that discreet age. 'T was vain to tell him of celestial eyes and roseate
bloom. God help us! 'tis little he cared for the like. The baronetcy was
poor and Mr Harry expensive, and what Sir Francis looked to was a fat
balance at Child's the banker's. Was the lady a fortune? And when Mr
Harry, trembling, avowed that a single doit could not be hoped in that
quarter, the old gentleman, his temper as well as his foot highly inflamed
with gout, swore to disinherit him if the matter went further.

Poor Harry was in a sad quandary. He slept and ate ill, and 'twas
provoking that Elizabeth bloomed like a rose and troubled not her fair
head about Sir Francis. Her mind seemed possessed with but the one
thought--to attend the Birthnight ball and, like the planet Venus, shine
in her rightful heaven. And indeed Mr Harry could not fancy her heart so
deeply engaged as he might wish; for he could scarce get a word in while
the two peered into the mercers' shops, gloating on satin and muslin. Mrs
Gunning, as improvident, was almost drawn in by them, when word came of a
card debt that their papa owed to Sir Horatius Blake, and the unfortunate
lady received not even the pittance that provided herrings for six hungry
mouths; so that they were like to come down to dry bread, which event
fairly ended all talk of the ball.

'Tis not to be supposed that Mr Harry did not offer to set all the
mantua-makers in Dublin to work, though in his heart he knew his own
credit did not stand immaculate. He stormed up and down the room,
protesting, vowing, exclaiming; but Mrs Gunning would have none of it.
Says she:--

"I do all justice to your kind heart, Mr. Lepel, but 'tis not, because we
are unfortunate, that we have no pride, and 'tis impossible Miss Gunning
should accept garments from the gentleman she honours with her hand."

And Elizabeth, lovelier than ever in grief, confirmed her mother, Maria
stamping her foot like an angry goddess. 'Twill be admitted 'twas a hard
case. And since misfortunes don't come alone, arrived a furious letter
from Sir Francis, demanding instantly to see Mr. Harry, and acquainting
him that his appointment in the Guards was cancelled, and he must join his
new regiment in London at a day's notice. Sir Francis had good interest
with the lady whose interest with His Majesty was unquestioned, and 'tis
to be thought this event did not come by chance.

Oh, then were wailings and passionate embraces on the part of Mr. Lepel,
Miss Elizabeth receiving them with wondering eyes. "For London, is not so
far but we shall meet again, Harry," says she, with her angelical smile.

He had preferred tears, no doubt; but a man must take what comes his way,
and be thankful. He, who had never before been guilty of the like, now
composed a set of verses of atrocious demerit. Indeed, the first two lines
will suffice:--

    If from my Chloe's snowy breast I part,
    Grant me to know I bear with me her tears.

"'Tis very pretty!" says Chloe. "O Harry, I would you did not love me so!
A girl's affections are cool and temperate, I think--at least 'tis so with
me. Forget me a little,--though not too much child,--and be happy."

It might have been her mother who spoke. 'Tis certain no person ever had
the appearance of sweet simplicity more than Elizabeth Gunning; but
whether 'twas wholly devoid of art--Ah, well, shall we dissect the rose?
Best to enjoy and ask no questions.

The day of parting he came to Britain Street, and solemnly renewed his
vows in the presence of Mrs Gunning and Maria.

"And, O my Elizabeth," cries he, "pledge me once more that hand which is
all my joy. Swear that neither raging seas" ('twas a day calm as milk and
the Irish sea like a mirror) "nor the brutish tyranny of man shall divide
us, and that our constant hearts shall never change!"

Miss Elizabeth raises heavenly eyes, a glittering moisture enhancing their
brilliance.

"Have I not pledged my word, Harry; and if you believe not that, what will
serve? Sure 'tis you that rove and will see fairer faces" (frantic
protestations from Mr Lepel) "yet I don't doubt _you_. Farewell, dear
Harry, and remember us when you are in the glitter of London."

She covered her face with a handkerchief, and he took the last embrace,
kissed Mrs Gunning's hand and Maria's, and hurried madly from the room.
Elizabeth unveiled her face and folded the handkerchief for future use.

"He's gone," says poor Mrs Gunning, seeking her own; "and if I know where
tomorrow's dinner is to come from, for you all, I'm--a Dutchman!"

They mingled their tears, and Elizabeth's were real enough now. 'Tis
possible, could the matter be sifted, that many more tears have been shed
for absent dinners than absent lovers; and certainly, though beauty may
survive without the last, it cannot without the first. There was so much
of gloomy and terrible in their mama's aspect, that Maria wept also; and
Kitty and Lucy, with the little John, who had all been secreted in the
bedroom during the adieux, dashed in screaming at the tops of their
voices, as if the heavens were falling; and so sat the poor unfortunate
family drowned in tears. 'Twas not balls they thought of then, nor
departing lovers, but simply bread and herrings.

A lady came down the street, picking her way through the garbage that
adorned it. Her dress was hooped in the mode, and of a showy brocade, with
much tinsel interwoven and very glittering, so that the ragged children in
the gutter stood, finger in mouth, to see. She had a muslin cross-over
upon an expansive bosom, and 'twas finely laced with Mechlin, not too
clean, and set off with a black velvet ribbon about the throat, graced
with a clasp of paste. A large tilted hat tied beneath her chin shaded an
arch and sparkling pair of eyes, which, though not in their first youth,
lighted up a face with striking features an air of easy good-humour. If
her critics had accused this lady of being somewhat too goodhumored with
the other sex, why 'twas perhaps natural to her circumstances and needs no
further excuse. Her worst detractors never denied her a good heart, and an
ear open to the lament of misery. In her hand she carried a cane of fine
ebony, and altogether appeared a radiant vision of a fine woman in the
purlieus of Britain Street. She paused and looked about her, bewildered.

"I declare I know not where I am got to!" says she, half aloud. "And these
barbarians--'tis hard to be understood or to understand their gibberish.
If now--"

And even as the words left her lips, arose a piercing wail from across the
street, in which three lusty young throats united--Lucy, Kitty, and John,
each outscreaming the other.

"Crimini!" says Madam, "what's this? Is Herod abroad in Dublin?" The
screams redoubled. She added: "'Tis almost to be wished he was!" And stood
half-laughing, half-unwilling to pass on.

"I will!" says she; and more doubtfully, "I won't! 'Tis not my business.
Sure I have enough stage tears and sobs to make me distrust all I hear."

She turned resolutely away, and halted again.

"Poor lady! 'Tis a lady soothing them, and weeping herself. I will! She
can but bid me exit."

And so marched to the open door, and into the narrow passage, and rapped
smartly with her cane on the door of the parlour, bringing all her natural
assurance to bear.

Dead silence. The screams halted, as if a tap was turned off: whoever was
inside was all ears. She rapped again. And now a scuffling; and Maria
opened the door, and six pairs of astonished eyes gloated on the stranger.
And no less did hers on the party within; for there sat Mrs Gunning,
beautiful and maternal, with the little John's curly pate on her bosom;
Elizabeth, lovely as the day, leaning on one shoulder of her mother; Kitty
and Lucy, golden-curled cherubs, clinging to her gown; and Maria, like a
sorrowful wood-nymph, holding the door. Sure, never was such a family, and
these children seemed made of some more exquisite clay than ordinary.

"Lord, am I got into heaven, for I see the angels about me!" says Madam,
advancing with a reverence lower than the paltry room demanded. "Forgive
an intruder, Madam, and confer a benefit. For being newly come to Dublin,
I've lost my way returning from Smock Alley, and while I called up courage
to enter and ask it from any other than these savages, I heard a cry that
hastened my steps. Be pleased to pardon me, and say if I can be of service
to yourself and your sweet family; for 'tis the plain truth--I'm dazzled
as I stand, by the beauty of your olive branches."

'Tis not possible to mistake the voice of sympathy, and Mrs Gunning rising
from her chair, curtseyed in her turn, and begged the visitor to be
seated. "Lord, Madam," says she, "you catch us very unfit for company; but
so kind a heart needs no excuse, and I will be candid with you. We are of
birth and breeding like yourself." ('Twas a skilful compliment and the
lady simpered.) "And therefore, as a gentlewoman of quality, you shall
understand my grief when I present myself as my Lord Viscount Mayo's
daughter, and add that I have not the wherewithal to clothe or feed these
innocents! You are yourself too young to be a mother, Madam" (again the
lady simpered), "yet will comprehend a mother's anguish. I am Mrs. Gunning
of Castle Coote, and such is my condition!"

She wept again. The lady applied a laced kerchief to either eye. A
touching scene.

"Madam, a heart of marble must feel for you, and mine is not marble--far
from it. But sure such beauty must open all doors. Marriage--" She broke
off.  "Alas, Madam, in these days of money-grubbing avarice, what is
beauty? My second"--she indicated Elizabeth--"is cruelly rejected by the
father of a gentleman of birth not near so high as our own, because she
has no estates pinned to her petticoat."  "Monster!" cries the lady with
spirit.

Mrs Gunning proceeded:--

"And, O, Madam, were you in want, as a lady of quality sometimes is, of a
young lady to write letters, to keep accounts, and all those little useful
arts such as mending lace and the like, I can truly say that in my
Elizabeth you would find solid worth. She is graver than my Maria.

"Sure we cannot have had the happiness to meet you for nothing. 'Twas
ordained you should walk in upon us. Permit me to ask the name of our
benefactress." The lady hummed and hawed a little; but not being easily
daunted, she tossed up her head bravely enough ere she replied:--

"Gemini, Madam! We can't all be ladies of quality; and if we could, I see
not who could provide the wants and amusements of the fashionable. To be
plain with you, I am an actress--and--"

"An actress!" screams Maria, all rapture. "Sister, do you hear? Was it not
this very day I said, would I could go on the stage like the famous Mrs
Woffington, and other beauties such as this lady. And then should I be
happy and pour all the gold I made into my mama's lap."

The lady shook her head, a little melancholy.

"Gold? Not much of that on the stage, young miss. 'Tis found there--true;
but--but--indirectly. However, this concerns you not. Madam, I am in no
need of such an attendant as you describe, having my dresser and--"

"I might have guessed it! When did luck ever come our way? Farewell,
Madam. Return to your own happiness and abandon us to our misery."

Heart-rending! The lady drew nearer.

"Gemini, Madam! You misjudge me. A woman can but offer what's in her
power. A good word from me to our manager, Mr Sheridan, and with such
faces I doubt not small parts can be found for your daughters in one of
the plays to be produced here, even now rehearse it, and the parts of
Susan and Careless go begging, for the girls that took them are called
away by their mama's illness. But dare I mention such a proposal?"

"Madam, you are all goodness and beauty!" cries Elizabeth. And Maria fell
on her knees like one distraught and kissed the pretty hand in its black
mitten. 'Twas known to them that Mr Sheridan's company was from London and
would return there; and indeed this came like a sunburst through the
cloud, for 'twas food, clothes, admiration, money, hope--and many other
charming things that set them dreaming on worlds to conquer.

They swept their mama away on the wave of their delight; and indeed that
poor lady was always prone to take gilding for gold so long as it
glittered sufficiently.

"And what, Madam, is this play in which Susan and Peggy appear?"

"Child, 'tis 'The Golden Vanity'--a play of a poor girl that weds a rich
lord and--"

Heavens and earth! She could not continue, for how describe the joy and
wonder of the family! Reserve fled away. Prudence borrowed the wings of
Hope, and dressed her face with rainbows. Crowding around the stranger,
they entreated her name, that it might grace their prayers; and she,
radiant with the sunshine she dispensed, calls out:--

"Why, girls, sure you have heard it. 'Tis I am the leading lady in all Mr
Sheridan produces at present. I am George Anne Bellamy."

"George!" screams Mrs G. "'A woman with a man's name,' said old Mother
Corrigan. Girls, your luck's come!" And with that falls into strong
hysterics and frights them all to death.

But joy is a strong cordial, and 'twas not long ere she sat up, panting
and dishevelled, with George Anne's hand in hers, telling her the story of
Mother Corrigan. 'Tis to be supposed Mrs G. had heard that Mrs Bellamy's
heart was not marble in any sense; but what was the lady to do? For my
Lord Mayo spent his rents five years ahead, and though his good nature
would give the coat off his back, that would neither clothe nor feed her
family; while, as for Mr Gunning, that gentleman regarded his wife and
children no more than the cuckoo that leaves her offspring to chance.

Mrs Bellamy was all ears. 'Twas prodigious, 'twas vastly astonishing, she
vowed. Maria was sent out with half a guinea, and they had a comfortable
dish of tea, with currant bread and what not; and she told them tales of
the stage and the fine matches made by Mrs This and Signorina That,
displaying little of its threadbare and much of its tinsel; and by the
time the candles were lit, they were all sworn friends. They parted with
embraces; for Mrs G. was as easy as George Anne, and the girls must needs
follow the example set.

She had her way with Mr Sheridan, who knew 'twas as much as his play was
worth to offend Mrs Bellamy; and she returned next day to announce her
success, triumphing and rattling on like a girl herself, so pleased was
she with their pleasure. All was joy and gladness, and she named the hour
of the first rehearsal and their introduction to Mr Sheridan, who knew as
well as another how pretty faces fill the playhouse; and was proceeding,
when Maria, turning archly upon her, says:--

"Look you here, dearest Mrs Bellamy! Think what it will cost us to refuse
this." And so holds up a splendid card, thick as boards and embellished
with a gilt edge and the Royal Arms and the Irish Harp, and Heaven knows
what braveries, inviting the Honourable Mrs Gunning, Miss Gunning, and
Miss Elizabeth Gunning to the Birthnight ball at the Castle, on the part
of his Excellency, the Earl of Harrington. Diamonds were never so bright
as the eyes that sparkled above it; for the charming new prospect of the
Stage had quite effaced the ball, and poor Mr Harry's trouble in securing
the invitation was like to go for nothing.

"I care nothing now for it!" cries Maria, and Elizabeth echoed her; while
George Anne looked thoughtfully at the Lion and Unicorn guarding a
Paradise she could not hope to enter. Maria made to tear the card across;
but Mrs Bellamy caught it from her hand and did not smile.

"Children," says she at last, "you know not what you talk of. I would have
a word alone with your mama. Take the little ones in your hand, and go out
a while in the sunshine." She thrust some cream-cakes upon them, and they
did so, looking doubtfully at her cloudy eyes; and when the door shut, she
turned to Mrs Gunning.

"Madam, you know well't is my wish to serve you and yours. But seeing this
invitation, there's thoughts comes into my head that I must needs speak
out. This" (she flicked the card) "is the life for the Miss Gunnings, and
not the stage. 'T would scarce become me to tell a lady like yourself what
must be faced there, but--but--'t is much! Ask Peg Woffington--ask Kitty
Clive--ask George Anne Bellamy!" She hung her head.

There was silence. Mrs G. stared at her, all aghast.

"Why, yesterday, all your talk was of pleasure and success. Sure, dear Mrs
Bellamy, 't was not like your kindness to draw on the poor things till
they can think of naught else, and now so far otherwise."

"Why, Madam, I thought there was no other way; and if so, needs must. But
seeing this, my mind misgives me and I falter. I'm a plain-dealer, Madam,
with all my faults, and 't is easy to be seen your daughters are a world's
wonder. I never saw the like, and that being so, 't is certain the dangers
are tenfold for them. They'll see the glories and grandeurs, sure enough,
but not through a wedding ring."

"If you mean, Madam, that my daughters--" Mrs Gunning flamed out, furious;
but George Anne was not to be turned from her purpose. She raised her hand
in a fine stage attitude.

"Madam, I wish vastly to serve you. Hear my proposal. Accept this
invitation."

"Impossible. We have no dresses, no shoes, no equipage, and no means to
get them. 'T is absurd!"

"'Tis not absurd. Hear me. In the theatre properties is a fine dress for
Lady Modish and two more for Peggy and Susan Careless. Not perhaps what
such ladies might expect, but passable. And--I know men. There's not a man
will look at their gowns for looking at their faces, though the suits are
well enough when all's said. I vow, Madam, you have so long lived beside
the two that you forget what beauties they are. I wager my next benefit to
a China orange that you'll have no more care once they are seen, but all
the women mad with jealousy and the men with love. Indeed, your young
madams are what one reads of in romances, but don't see. Give them this
chance, and if it fails, I'm good for my offer; but I'm much mistook if
you hold me to it. Gemini, Madam; use your wits! Would you have them what
I won't name, when they may be what your old witch foretold?"

She smiled her charming smile, and pressed Mrs G.'s hand. The lady
pondered. 'Twas disagreeable to owe such a thing to a mere actress, and
one, too, whose reputation was a trifle flyblown. The stage she might have
swallowed--being the lady's province and she a queen on the boards. But an
entry to the world where she and her daughters had a birthright--Fie!
'twas a very different pair of shoes. But George Anne had that in her eye
that would be obeyed; and seeing it, Mrs G. dropped her high tone and
returned the pressure with an air of sensibility.

"'Twas said by old Corrigan that 'twas you to bring us luck, dearest
Madam, and  'tis certain you are prudence itself. Sure a mother can risk
nothing for her darlings. If you will ensure us the dresses, I accept;
and, indeed, my Lord Harrington's father was a friend of my own revered
father in happier days. 'T is possible--"

"'T is certain," cries George Anne gaily. "Not a word will I drop to Mr
Sheridan, who is a perfect Israelite where theatre matters are in hand.
Count on me."

She was gone ere the girls returned, and  'tis needless to tell their
wonder. They preferred the stage, yet condescended to say they would
favour the ball, since Mrs Bellamy counselled it. "But, never, never will
it turn my heart from the charming footlights!" says Maria. "What say you,
sister?"

"I know not. My taste is quieter than yours. I will tell you my mind the
day after the ball. Poor Harry--'tis he has given us this."

She would say no more, but sat thoughtful.

'Twas the evening of the Birthnight ball when George Anne arrived, in a
hackney coach, attended by her dresser, and scarce visible for mantua
boxes. The three children were put away--their usual fate--in the beds
within, and though not able to sleep for excitement, were mute as mice,
lest they be punished by the closing of the door upon the ravishing
glimpses they had of the parlour.

'Tis not for a mere scribbler to intrude upon the chaste mysteries of the
toilet. Suffice it therefore to say that, when all was completed, George
Anne and Mrs. March the dresser stood back, breathless, to contemplate the
work of their hands.

Mrs. Gunning, her fine brown hair piled on her head into an edifice
twisted with gauze and feathers that granted her five inches more of
height, looked a Roman empress--her fine bust displayed to advantage and
sustaining a necklace of stage emeralds set in pinchbeck, which could not
be told from the veritable jewels, so closely were they copied for George
Anne from her Grace the Duchess of Bridgewater's. Her hoop was very wide,
and over it a green satin brocade flowered with gold, wherein George Anne
had played Lady Modish but twenty times, and so rich that 'twould serve
her great-granddaughter. 'Twas ruffled at neck and elbow with Mechlin, and
the girls gazed in awe at their splendid mama. 'Twas a changed woman. She
expanded, she glided, she moved, as a swan floating through her native
element differs from the same lurching along the bank.

But Elizabeth--O beautiful! Sure 'twas joy to see her! Her hair, agleam
with gold, was rolled back and carried in massive braids that crowned and
bound her head in the Grecian taste, confined by a bandeau of pearls that
crossed her brow. Her Grecian robe (indeed the fair Miss Lebeau had played
Calista in it) was a white satin with a fall of lace, and round her
slender throat a chain of seed pearl. Mrs Bellamy knew her business. 'Twas
simple, but simplicity becomes a goddess, and frills and flounces can but
distract the eye from loveliness that seems native to heaven. Her mother
surveyed her in a kind of amaze and then turned to Maria.

'Twas peculiar to these two fair sisters that they adorned each other and
each appeared more beautiful when both were in company. Indeed't was said
later that this contributed much to their triumphs. Maria now appeared in
a fine India muslin embroidered in gold wheat-ears--a robe which't is to
be feared Mr Sidney of the East India Company, the rich nabob of
Jubblepore, had laid at the feet of George Anne in pursuance of a suit not
wholly disdained. No matter! On Maria it shone like the raiment of the
youngest of the angels, draping yet expressing her fair limbs with a
seductive reserve that was art embellishing nature. She had a row of seed
pearl like her sister, and one rose of faintest pink nestled in her virgin
bosom. Her hair of burning gold was dressed in curls _à la mouton_,
as Mrs March expressed it, and a string of pearls wove through the rich
tresses.

But 'tis useless to describe beauty. As well dry a rose in a book and look
for bloom and dew. It depends on bright eye and smiling lip and wordless
sweetness and the fall of exquisite lashes and the tone of music and--and
this poor scribbler lays down his pen and attempts no more to paint where
the great artists later owned themselves vanquished.

"And all is prepared," cries George Anne, exulting. "For my mother's job
coach is at hand to take my three beauties; and distress not yourself, my
dearest Madam, for I engage to remain with your little family will return
in the coach when it deposits you here. And now, children, peep and
whisper no longer, but come see your lovely mama and sisters before they
go to conquer the world."

'Twas the kindest heart! She clapped her hands, and in rushed the three
children like Bedlam let loose, careering round and about the three,
shouting, laughing, and begging to be took also. Raisins and oranges from
George Anne's reticule alone restored them to their beds in peace.

"'The Golden Vanity' has sent forth two incomparable beauties," says she
at the door as they stepped into the coach. "May it bring them the luck of
its heroine and more."

       *       *       *       *       *

St. Patrick's Hall was all of a blaze with wax candles and flambeaux, and
shining mirrors set in with gilt Cupids, and twinkling of fairy lights in
the great glass lustres and their glittering chains of drops and pendants.
Garlands of green, with roses interspersed, were in swags and loops about
the splendid walls, where hung the pictures of bygone viceroys in ribbon
and star, in frames to match the mirrors that multiplied the scene a
hundredfold.

And, more than all, the handsomest women in Ireland were decked out in
silks and satins and all the family jewels, and they sparkling like the
lustres above their heads. And all the gentlemen in uniforms and silk
stockings showing off their fine calves, and they strutting with their
swords and squiring the ladies and bowing. And above it all the Throne,
with the velvet canopy and the Royal Arms, and my Lord Harrington, his
Excellency, sitting like a picture of himself, with his stars and orders
and his coat of sky-blue velvet laced and embroidered with gold; and as
each pretty lady came up to him and swept her curtsey he lifted her by the
hand and kissed her cheek; for the Viceroy has that privilege, and many a
man envied him a few of the kisses, if they did not envy them all.

And now at the great doors appeared three ladies, quietly, like persons
used to assemblies, though to be honest their knees were trembling under
them and their little hearts quaking. So they were passed on from one
golden image to another, until they arrived before his Excellency, the
company politely making way, and a whisper that rose to a buzz running
with them. "Lord! who are they?"--"Who can they be?"--"Look at the
girls!"--"Exquisite!"--"Beautiful!"--"For my part I see nothing in them.
Vilely dressed. Very far from modish."--"Too tall."--"Too short"--in fact,
every expression of approval and disfavour. But every lady stood on the
tips of her satin shoes to see, and every gentleman took the fullest
advantage of his height; and had poor Harry been there, he had died of
jealousy. Alas! even his fond letters were not in Elizabeth's gentle
bosom, but tossed forgot on the bed in Britain Street, with George Anne
casting the eye of sensibility on them.

And now the officer who performed the introduction took Mrs Gunning's
gloved hand, very stately, and led her before the Throne.

"The Honourable Mrs. Gunning, your Excellency."

Down she flowed in a magnificent curtsey, her hands supporting her brocade
on either side, her head bent majestic--Beauty adoring Power. Suddenly my
Lord steps nimbly forward on the dais.

"What?" he cries. "Do my eyes deceive me? Impossible! But sure I have the
happiness to see the daughter of my old friend, and I am honoured beyond
expression to welcome her beneath my roof. Where have you been retired?
And what are these two lovely nymphs? Your daughters? No, sure it can't be
and you all youth and beauty yourself. Present them."

And while mama blushed and bridled, the magic words were spoke, and the
two dropped the gentlest curtseys, and rising, received a salute more than
usual warm from his Excellency on either fair blushing cheek. 'Twas
observed he lingered an instant on Maria's. Viceroys, too, are human.

'Twas an instantaneous conquest--how could it be otherwise? A moment later
they were the centre of a competing crowd of gentlemen, and glances of
coldness and aversion raining on them from ladies only a little less fair
and now deserted. That his Excellency was the first victim, none could
doubt, for when he was not in company with the beauties, he was
discoursing of them to others. True it is that he conducted the Dowager
Rathconnel to the supper-table, but equally true that he left the lady
seated before such dainties as ensure an old age of gout, disengaging
himself with a nimble wit that should have appeased her, and sought out
the mother of the Graces, devoting himself to memories of old times with a
gusto, while Maria and Elizabeth danced and smiled on their adorers,
blooming and beautiful.

"My dear Madam," says his Lordship, "how is it possible that you have
lived so retired for fifteen years? 'T was not justice to your
admirers--of whom I was ever one. How came it about?"

"Why, your Excellency," says the lady very serious, "'twas not with my
good-will. You know well that my late father's good heart was his chief
possession; and my husband--alas!"

Sure a pause and downcast eyes are more expressive than any words. His
Excellency shook his majestic peruke, and echoed the lady.

"Alas! Cards, horses, the bottle--how many a wife and mother hath had
cause to curse that fatal trinity! And 'tis even so, Madam?"

She applied George Anne's laced handkerchief to her eye, then smiled
faintly and seeing opportunity, seized it.

"I would not cloud this festive scene, your Excellency, yet why should I
reserve from a tried friend that I and my poor daughters--"

"Yes, yes!" cries his Lordship, very impatient.

"--Are here this night in borrowed dress," continues Mrs G. solemnly, "and
are indebted even for the shoes upon their feet to the kindness of an
actress, Mrs Bellamy."

"Good Ged!" says Lord Harrington, genuinely shocked, and the more so that
he had himself known Mrs. Bellamy some years since. "Sure it can't be! I
won't believe it. Indeed, we must discourse further of this. Come hither!"

Profoundly interested, he led her to a withdrawing-room and there they
fell into so deep discussion that never had he been such a negligent host.
And when Mrs. Gunning left the withdrawing-room, it was with an imperial
head held high, and a flush in her cheek which became her so well that the
most prying female eye would not give her a day over thirty.

His Excellency led out Maria to a minuet. Twice he took Elizabeth down the
country dances. The generous wines had warmed his heart, the glow of
beauty kindled it to flame, and it was plain to be seen that his eyes were
only for the fair Gunnings. The world followed his example,--when does it
otherwise?--and a petal from Maria's rose, a look from the violet
dark-lashed eyes of Elizabeth, were the prizes of the night.

A party of noblemen escorted them to the doors on leaving, and 'twas with
the utmost difficulty Mrs. Gunning persuaded them it was unnecessary to
ride in cavalcade about the coach to Britain Street. When the ladies were
gone, they returned to the Banqueting Hall to toast "The Irish Beauties,"
and break their glasses in their honour until the floor was strewn with
broken crystal, and the celebrants were most of them borne speechless to
their beds. Indeed, a challenge passed between my Lords Cappoquin and Tuam
upon a dispute as to which lady was the greater Venus.

Never was such a triumph! And Mrs Gunning, falling into George Anne's arms
in Britain Street, declared with tears of joy:--

"You were right, entirely right, my dearest Madam. I am promised a
handsome pension on the Irish Establishment, and his Excellency counsels
me to transport my girls to London, where, he considers, they may pretend
to the highest matches, and promises introductions worthy of them. And, O
Madam, playing at faro in the cardroom, I won a milleleva--no less!--
Fifty guineas!--Lord! was ever anyone so happy!"

Tears of sensibility stood in George Anne's eyes. She was one who shared
to the full the griefs or triumphs of her friends. She wrung Mrs G.'s hand
and embraced the fair conquerors, scorning to mention the rent in Maria's
muslin gown, and the stain of wine on Elizabeth's satin. It was a generous
heart, and had earned more gratitude than she afterwards received from
two, at least, of the ladies.

'Twas amazing to Mrs Gunning and Maria now that ever they had contemplated
the stage--so very far below their pretensions; and it took but a week to
open the former lady's eyes to the little cracks in George Anne's
reputation. She saw plainly that such a friendship could be no aid to
their soaring aspirations; and indeed her ambition had now spread its
wings to some purpose. The Earl of Harrington having advanced the first
installment of her pension, she immediately moved their lodging to the
genteeler Mount Street, and Britain Street was forgot, along with George
Anne. Sure a mother must be prudent! Elizabeth only forsook not her
friend, going to wait upon her and carrying with her many of the posies
left in daily homage to her sister and herself. She had little in her
power, for money was still none too plenty; but kindness and gratitude
smell sweeter even than roses, and these she carried in handfuls straight
from a grateful heart to George Anne.

It smoothed not her own path in Mount Street, for Mrs Gunning's pride grew
with what fed it, and though admiration was plenty, offers were few. It
might be that the enmity of the Dublin ladies stood in their way, for
certain it is that Mrs G. was never a favourite. Where she judged well to
flatter, she flattered too openly; where she disliked and saw no gain, she
insulted; and many gentlemen would have retired from her acquaintance, but
for Maria's frolicsome gaiety and the sweetness of Elizabeth. It gained
ground about the city that there was much scheming in Mount Street with a
view to rich husbands, and it smirched the girls as well as their mama,
and put thorns in their way. It made the men bolder than they should be,
and the women cold.

Maria was the hardier and took it as a necessity of their situation; but
the milder Elizabeth wept often on George Anne's kind bosom over the
insults (as she took it) which Mrs Gunning received with rapture, as
hopeful signs of love. And, whatever the actress's own case might be, 'tis
certain she showed more delicacy in dealing with the girl than did her
lady mother.

Nor had she much comfort from Mr Harry's letters. His father remained
adamant; and though he writ, 'twas more carelessly, and a rumour reached
Dublin that coupled his name with the great fortune Miss Hooker, and was
generally took for truth. Mrs Gunning greeted it with pleasure, regarding
Mr Harry as a gone-by and much below her hopes; but though Elizabeth's
heart was not wounded, her pride was pierced to the quick. It seemed that
all the world conspired to humiliate her, and she asked herself what was
the use of beauty, if it meant this and no more. She sighed and left his
last letter unanswered.

Miss Maria too had her troubles. My Lord Errington pursued her with
ardour, and his handsome rakish face and gallant impudence drew the pretty
moth towards the heat and flame of a dangerous candle. Folly, no more, but
his lady took her vengeance in scandals that spread about the town, and a
duel was fought that did Maria no good and kept off worthier pretenders to
her hand; and indeed it was not a day too soon when the family packed up
their belongings and changed the air to London. The girls outshone all
others--true! but 'twas thought more in beauty than discretion, for
Elizabeth must needs sink with her family. The world draws not nice
distinctions.

But to say they were courted in London is to say little. They broke
triumphant upon the town, supported by letters from his Excellency, and
the town received them with frenzy, as it might the great Italian singer
or the new lions at the Tower, or what not. Amongst the greatest, the Duke
of Hamilton put himself at their disposal, urged thereto by a particular
letter from my Lord Harrington and his own love of beauty. He dangled
about them daily, and it must be owned that from the first moment of
meeting Mrs Gunning fixed the eye of cupidity on his Grace. For of all the
matches of the Kingdom James Hamilton was the greatest available. Duke of
Brandon  in England, of Chatelherault in France, of Hamilton in Scotland,
of vast possessions, of suitable age and gallant presence, a princess need
not have disdained his hand. A great prince, indeed, and knowing it
possibly too well,'t was he to dazzle a girl's eye and carry her heart by
storm! For hearts--it was never supposed his Grace possessed one; at
least, he wore it not on his sleeve, but was ever cold and haughty, though
it was well known he liked a pretty woman as well as any--short of the
wedding ring. He hung about the new beauties as a gentleman will, until
wagers began to be laid at White's as to which had caught his favour, and
where would fall the handkerchief of the Grand Bashaw.

Meanwhile, his attentions made them more than ever the mode, and the town
gallants swarmed about them like bees, at the Assemblies where they
figured, attended by my Lord Duke in ribbon and star. As the days went by,
however, the anxious mother observed that his preference was for
Elizabeth, and that he had no thought to interfere with my Lord Coventry,
who could not keep his eyes off Maria, though he committed himself no
further than the Duke. Indeed, stories were now freely circulated
concerning Britain Street and the poverty and shifts of the family, and
wagers were laid that neither the one nobleman nor the other looked for
more than a few months' amusement with the two loveliest girls in England.
Mrs. Gunning was openly called the Adventuress, and it was a favourite
sport with some ladies to imitate her Irish accent and carnying ways with
those she would please; and doubtless Maria angled a little too openly for
her lord. They were, in short, easy game for the mockers, and Elizabeth
shrunk daily more into the shade. It appeared as if it would be the Dublin
story over again.

Mr. Harry came at once to their lodging on his return from Yorkshire, and
to be sure, had not a word to say of Miss Hooker. He would have saluted
Elizabeth, but she drew back with a curtsey, her manner sweet and cold as
an autumn dawn with a touch of winter in the air. He found her changed,
and no wonder, and said as much with some anger.

"It should not surprise you, Harry," says she serenely. "I am now
eighteen, and have seen the world, as you have also. Our betrothal was a
child's game. I like you too well to be your ruin. Marry Miss Hooker, of
whom I hear. 'Tis your best way, and obedience to parents a plain duty."

"You were not so wise in Dublin," replies Mr. Lepel, casting a jealous eye
on the fair monitress. If her looks had changed it was to a more radiant
sweetness, and there was that in the way her long silken lashes lay on her
fair cheek that dwarfed Miss Hooker's fortune. He had better have kept his
distance from the siren, he thought with bitterness. But sure a little
pleasant dallying could hurt neither Miss Hooker nor his father--a summer
pastime and no more; and if the tales flying about town were but the half
of them true, he might hope for this, especially with the past pleading
for him in Elizabeth's tender heart. Sure there was a softening in her
glance. He pushed his chair somewhat nearer and took her hand. She
withdrew it, and removed her seat farther away.

"Is my Elizabeth angry with her Harry," cries he with a fine dramatic air.
"Does she forget those happy days when we were all to one another? What is
Miss Hooker or Miss Any-person to come between us? What--"

"Your future wife, as I understand," says Elizabeth, perfectly calm. "No,
Mr Lepel--I know the world now, better than I could wish" (she sighed),
"and I desire not your attentions. I--"

But Mr Lepel broke in, pale and furious.

"And is it thus you speak, you heartless jade? Clothes, jewels, balls,
'tis these you value. Is there a woman alive that will not sell her soul
for the like? O God, why are fair faces made to madden us? Now I have seen
you once more, how can I return to that flat-faced--"

She rose, with a wave of her hand that dismissed him; but he ranted on in
a towering passion of wrath and grief. It had all burst up anew in his
heart, in and for a moment. He believed himself hardly used indeed.

"Could I bury my father and inherit his land, you would not use me thus.
It is all a cursed thirst for gold, and you are for sale like an Eastern
slave. Who is the highest bidder? But I know well. What am I to compare
with--"

"His Grace the Duke of Hamilton!" announces Mrs Abigail, very demure in
her pinners at the door; and in walks his Grace, magnificent in manners
and dress, and Mr Lepel's fury stopped on a breath, though he could not
regain countenance as readily as Elizabeth. She rose to meet the
visitor--a rose in June; and he might take the blush of anger which was
due to Mr Lepel for a welcome to himself.

What could Mr Harry do but draw back, stammering and looking foolish under
the cold glance Duke Hamilton bestowed on him. Prudence counselled,
"Withdraw. What do you here?" Angry Love retorted, "Here I stay. What!
Shall I leave the field to a rival?" And so, flung himself in a chair
glaring defiance, Elizabeth palpitating between the two. 'Twas not
surprising that she drew nearer to the Duke, as if for protection; that
there was an imploring softness in her face as she looked up to him; that
she saw him greater, handsomer, stronger than ever, beside this idle and
futile young man who had reviled her. The carelessness of his glance at Mr
Lepel seemed to fling his pretensions in the mud--his haughty coolness to
degrade the young man; and to such thoughts women are responsive. If her
heart was touched before, the dart went deeper now She held her head
higher, deerlike, and wasted no words on the unwelcome guest.

The two gentlemen, seeing neither could outstay the other, departed
presently together, Mr Lepel saying with assumed lightness as he bowed,
hat in hand, at the door: "We had not the pleasure to see Madame la mere,
your Grace, and no doubt but she is slipped away on some hunting errand. I
wonder what new fox is broke cover. Half the world bets on my Lord
Coventry still!"

The Duke returned not his salute, and Lepel could not tell whether or no
his arrow had gone home through the armour of chilly pride and silence. He
himself strode angry and ashamed down the street.

That same evening a Council of Three was held in the lodging, Mrs. Gunning
with her mask of smiles laid by, Maria fretful, Elizabeth grave and
retired in her own thoughts. The ladies had but the one bedroom, with a
little closet for the youngest adjoining.

"Girls," says Mrs Gunning, "'Tis time I spoke plain. This six weeks in
town hath reduced my purse till I am frighted to look in it; and what have
we to show? Young women with not half your looks are married and settled
since we came hither. We have had a vast deal of froth and flutter, but
nothing solid. Were it possible to live on sweetmeats and dress in posies,
we have a fine prospect, but not else. I see nought before us but Britain
Street--or worse.", Maria shrugged her white shoulders.

"What more can we do, mama? Sir James Ramsden has offered marriage, and
Captain Golightly; and Mr. Lennox has asked Elizabeth, and Mr. Lepel--"
"What signifies all that?" cries Mrs. Gunning. "Don't let them slip.
They'll serve for the future perhaps, if all fails. Elizabeth, I command
you on your duty that you please Mr. Lepel, though not more than
sufficient to content him. If we can't better him--But, Maria, what said
my Lord Coventry to you at Lady Lowther's ball? I saw him very earnest."

"Nothing that mightn't be in the news-prints, mama. His breed of black
shorthorns filled his thought and tongue. I protest I loathed the man's
folly. 'Tis an insipid creature when all's said."

"No man with a coronet is insipid. He is grave and reserved, and I would
he had been Elizabeth's admirer rather than yours, for they could have sat
silent in a corner together. But what of the Duke, child? My hopes are
sadly sunk."

Elizabeth flamed in a blush, less beautiful than painful. A sore heart was
behind it. She replied not. Mrs. Gunning frowned.

"Well, girls, you're easy enough, but so am not I. Now therefore listen
while I speak my mind."

'Tis needless to be particular in recording the lady's speech, which was
much to the point in dealing with their needs and stratagems. She spoke
for many minutes and at the end tears of shame and anger were in Maria's
lovely eyes. If Elizabeth wept,'twas behind a sheltering hand.

"What signifies grumbling?" finishes Mrs Gunning. "'Tis as plain as the
nose on your face. Elizabeth's is the best chance, and if she makes her
match my Lord Coventry will kiss your slipper, Maria. The Duchess's sister
can marry where she will."

'Twas vain to interrupt. Mrs Gunning sailed on, maternal, imperative, and
took no heed. It would be impertinence to intrude on the talk that
followed, and the plan laid for the entrapping of his Grace, of whom it
may be said that he could protect himself against even the assaults of
beauty better than Mrs Gunning supposed. But Elizabeth, borne down by two
to her one, fought a losing game.

"I hate the man," she cried with spirit, and knew 'twas false as she said
it. "I'd sooner sweep a crossing--"

Mrs Gunning smiled contemptuous.

"Not you! You came pretty near it in Britain Street, and 'ti

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