CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Delville
IF I was not a slave to my promise I should not write to you at present as I find myself utterly incapable of expressing the mixed sensation of my mind—I have often complained of the inadequateness of language but never felt it more strongly than now the most copious that I am acquainted with could by no means afford you even an idea of
the different reflections that have progressively given place to each other in the space of eight and forty hours
I am provoked at this natural incapacity of conveying my sentiments to you words are but a cloak or rather a clog to our ideas there should be no curtain before the hearts of friends and the longing I have ever felt for an intuitive converse is to me a strong argument for a future state—What says my sceptical friend to this opinion—Dont be alarmed I am not going to sermonize—but what is almost as dull to narrate
By the carelesness or ignorance of my postilion who drove me at least a dozen miles out of my road over Salisbury Plain it was near midnight before I reached this place—You who are thoroughly acquainted with the natural warmth of my temper and know
how impatient I have been to embrace a favourite sister after an absence of twelve years may judge of my anxiety—but there was no remedy and I strove to amuse the irksome tediousness of my journey by endeavouring to trace in my imagination the growing beauties of my Emmas features from ten years old when I last saw the little darling of our house to their meridian charms at twentytwo
At length we reached the gates of this noble edifice and had the pleasure to find the family not retired to rest by perceiving lights in the hall—I enquired for Sir James Desmond as I was determined not to announce myself and I thought it rather too late for an unknown visitor to demand an interview with his lady—I was shewn into a saloon from whence the company had retired after supper and from an adjacent
apartment I heard a confused sound of voices intermixed with the detestable noise of a dicebox
In a few minutes all was hushed and a man whom I believed to be an upper servant was sent to reconnoitre my person and enquire my name and business I told him I should not reveal either but to his master He smiled as it now seems at my ignorance and withdrew In about ten minutes which seemed as many hours to me Sir James entered with an air compounded of fierte and timidity I presented myself with the best grace I possibly could and on mentioning my name was accosted with the utmost politeness by my brotherinlaw
On my expressing my impatience to see my sister he said he was pretty certain
that she was not gone to bed and offered to conduct me to her apartment I declined his offer till a stranger was announced to her for I wished to surprise not alarm her A servant was then sent to let her ladyship know that there was a gentleman from London who desired to pay his respects to her—We followed the servant to her dressingroom door she was sitting leaning on her elbow and seemed lost in thought the delivering of the message roused her from her reverie she started up and said who can it be at this late hour I flew and caught her in my arms crying out tis I tis Charles she pressed me to her bosom softly exclaimed my brother and almost fainted in my arms
I will not pretend to describe my sensation for the reasons given in the beginning of this letter but I am certain
I never felt such unimpassioned tenderness before—Sir James who was not much affected with our interview left us to go and order some refreshment for me tho in truth I needed none my mind being so perfectly delighted with beholding my beloved sister whom I had ever thought on with all a fathers fondness that I had no leisure to attend to the calls of appetite
I asked her a thousand questions without waiting for her answer except to one the number of her children—she replied I have but one—it is the image of our mother and named after her—Come Charles and let me shew you my lovely Fanny—She led me to the nursery where I beheld a little sleeping angel of about two years old—As we crossed the staircase I again heard the dicebox rattle—Sir James is fond of play I fancy Emma said I—She affected
not to hear my question and did not answer it
A thousand disagreeable images rushed on my imagination in that instant I crushed their growth and talked of India of my other sisters Lucy and Mrs Selwyn and of you also till we were summoned to the saloon where supper was prepared for me
I there met three gentlemen with Sir James amongst whom was the person I had mistaken for a servant When he was presented to me I made my apology which he received with great good humour and congratulated Lady Desmond on my arrival with such apparent sincerity that I have taken a liking to this new acquaintance whose name is Sewell—
We spent a couple of hours most agreeably my sister became quite chearful
Sir James and she sung two or three sweet duettos and we all retired to rest about three oclock in the most perfect harmony and at this happy crisis I will leave you having run my letter into too great a length though I have a thousand things more to say to you but I have quite as many to say to Emma and so Sir you must as in duty bound give place to your betters as you have gallantry enough I hope to agree with me that all amiable women are so
Adieu
C EVELYN
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Delville
YOU know what an investigator of human nature I am and yet here have I been four whole days and as many nights under the same roof with Sir James Desmond and cannot form any fixed idea of his character one hour tender and polite to his wife fond of his lovely child and easy in his manners to all around him—The next cold distrait nay peevish to my sister
insensible to the carresses of his little girl inattentive and indifferent to his guests—help me Stanley to account for such an opposition of qualities and inconsistency of demeanour in the same individual
Too plainly I perceive that Emma is not happy yet she adores her husband and when she speaks of him her tongue grows wanton in his praise at his approach her eyes sparkle with delight but lose their lustre when his countenance changes as it sometimes does from gay to grave The variety of expression that Emmas Cameleonlike features receive from her Proteus serve but to heighten her beauty—I should think that nothing could be more interesting than her sprightly glance if I had not seen her downcast eye
Why Stanley do all women affect to charm us by levity when our affections are much more liable to be attracted by an appearance of sensibility However it is not the semblance but the reality that can please as I have very lately experienced—Where it is only assumed it is easily detected and when the paint is washed off the complexion looks the worse for having worn it—affectation in women and hypocrisy in men are equally detestable
I have very uneasy apprehensions tho I hope they are not well founded that Sir James Desmonds ruling passion is the love of play Men addicted to this vice of all others shoud never marry it absorbs every generous affection of the human heart The drunkard has intervals of sobriety and in those
may be capable of friendship and of fondness—The choleric man is not always in a passion and is even proverbially good natured and humane sorry for and ready to atone the evil his short lived frenzy may have caused—Even the libertine tho he may cease to love most generally esteems a virtuous wife and if not a despicable wretch indeed endeavours to compensate for his want of fondness by generosity and politeness towards her
But let a man be once possessed with a passion for gaming he becomes incapable of honour or affection he woud wish to win money from his dearest friend tho he knew that friend must be distressed by losing it and woud sacrifice the interest of his tenderest connection to gratify this sordid vice which
like a whirlpool swallows every virtue—His mind can never be at peace his losses are attended with a permanent regret his winnings with but a transient exultation The constant contention of his passion destroys his constitution and anticipates old age he passes his days and nights with harpies like himself he lives unloved and dies unlamented
I know not how I have been drawn into this long exclamation against a vice which you hold in as much abhorrence as I do but my mind was full of rancour against it merely on a supposition that it may interfere with the happiness of a beloved sister—I have now let out my venom and shall perhaps be able to throw off that reserve to Sir James and his associates
which this mental bile has hitherto been the cause of
I find from Emma that my brother was rather averse to her marrying Sir James Desmond but that he had suffered too much from a disappointed love to inflict such torments upon her as she then confessed to him and does now to me that she coud not have been happy with any other man—May her husbands gratitude reward her predilection—And indeed if my suspicion with regard to his love of play be groundless I doubt not but he will As I have already said he seems to love and esteem her the caprice of his temper may produce sudden changes in his manner but I think her beauty and tenderness must secure his affections—I will think no more upon
this subject at present My mind is involuntarily occupied by more selfish reflections but in my next I shall afford you an opportunity of judging for yourself by reasoning from facts
Adieu
C EVELYN
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
I PROMISED in my last to give you the minute transactions of this family but how impossible not only them but every trace of my past life except thy friendship are vanished from my memory
My sentiments my passions are engrossed by one object—my whole soul is hers—never was love so violent nor beauty so inspiring Since the
first fair that Edens garden graced—woud she were my Eve and I her Adam For in this peopled world there is no doubt but that she must have had as many lovers as beholders—Perhaps some favoured youth has already touched her gentle heart and your unhappy friend must sigh in vain—jealousy is twinborn with love but so is hope and I will hope while I exist—despair and death to me can be but one—
I will strive to methodize my thoughts a little and attempt a description of this charming woman though I know it impossible to give you a just idea of her perfections We were at breakfast in Lady Desmonds dressingroom when a servant announced the arrival of Lady Juliana Harley—my sisters eyes sparkled with joy at her approach—
She was dressed in a light grey cassimere cloth habit embroidered with black her hair was turned up under a white riding hat in which was a black band and feather some of her lovely auburn locks had broke from their confinement and wandered carelessly oer her snowy neck—she is a little taller than the middle size her complexion dazzlingly fair the colour in her cheeks so faint so transient that you can hardly pronounce there is any except when she speaks or is addressed and then we may say with Donne
Her pure and eloquent blood
Spoke in her cheeks and so distinctly wrought
That one would almost say her body thought
This circumstance however tho it may perhaps lessen her beauties increases
her charms for by appearing not to have been any original defect in her complexion but the casual effect of misfortune or illhealth captivate us thro sympathy which is always stronger than the senses Her eyes dark blue adorned with long black eyelashes her brows of the same colour her nose the perfect Grecian her lips and teeth—but I shall attempt no more—A statue may be described but not a living Venus—she seems to be about four and twenty and has been near two years a widow
Emma tells me that my elder brother had been proposed for her before her marriage with Mr Harley but her father the Earl of K— had already entered into a treaty with her late husband and poor Harry was of course
refused—I grieve now for what he must have suffered at that time but console myself with thinking that he would have had a much severer struggle on his leaving life had he been possessed of such an object At least I strive to persuade myself that it was happy for him he was not married to Lady Juliana as I may hope at the same time that it was very fortunate for me
This charming woman has promised to stay a fortnight with my sister and then we are all to go to London together—I will use all my interest with Emma to delay her journey and detain her lovely guest for a longer term If I do not obtain some little share in her heart whilst she remains under the same roof with me where I have a thousand opportunities of marking my attentions
without appearing to obtrude them I must despair of making any impression when she will be surrounded by crouds of admirers and hurried into all the dissipation of the gay world
The country as the poets tell us is the scene for love the pleasing objects that surround us the pureness of the air but above all its stillness harmonize the soul and render it susceptible of every soft and tender feeling—Noise is an enemy to all the gentle passions I agree with Sterne that a lover who was unfortunate enough to throw down the fire shovel and tongs when he was going to prostrate himself at his mistresss feet coud have very little hopes of success from his flurried fair one
Silence is rendered vocal at this moment by the soft sounds of Lady Julianas and my sisters voices under my window—They are going to walk perhaps—I fly I follow them
Adieu
CHARLES EVELYN
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
SOME French writer says
That there are men who are such egotists that rather than not talk of themselves they woud even reveal their failings
Those men were never in love or they woud have experienced a much higher delight in talking of the object of their affections than of themselves
For my part I can neither think talk or write upon any other subject than the
charming Juliana—If you were not a lover I shoud fear you woud soon grow tired of my correspondence but as I know you are capable of all the pleasing weaknesses necessarily attendant upon that character I trust you will indulge me on my favourite topic
In my last I gave you a faint sketch of lady Julianas personal charms but believe me Stanley no pen or pencil can describe the winning softness and attractive grace that accompanies her every look and motion—I have seen many elegant women but she is elegance personified—ipsa forma
There is a plaintive sweetness in her voice that woud render the most trifling expressions interesting even a blind man who did not understand her language woud be enamoured of the sound—She
talks but little and when she ceases I feel like our progenitor when Raphael left off speaking—
The Angel ended and in Adams ear
So charming left his voice that he awhile
Thought him still speaking still stood fixed to hear
Her words upon every subject on which she converses are perfectly well chosen from whence I conclude she has read the best authors in our language she is a perfect mistress of the French and Emma says plays finely on the harpsichord but has not been prevailed on since she came here to afford us this delight I have never seen her laugh and she sighs oftener than she smiles—she seems to labour under an habitual melancholy which gives an additional softness both to her looks and manner—
Do you know that notwithstanding our friendship I should not be quite easy at your seeing Lady Juliana if I was not convinced that Lucy has an unbounded power over your affections and will of course be kind enough to herself and me to prevent your becoming my rival As to the men who are in this house they are so entirely occupied by their sordid passion for gaming that I almost doubt whether the united charms of the whole sex could be able to make any impression on them Their hearts are tied up in their purses But though I despise their stupidity I am indebted to it as it occasions their retiring to a distant apartment every day after dinner to pursue their sports and pastimes and leaves me happier than an emperor in the society of two most charming women
I am sometimes permitted to read to them Milton is a favourite of Lady Julianas and you may see by my quotation that our tastes are the same I have sometimes perceived while I have been reading that she has looked earnestly upon me but the moment I have raised my eyes in hopes of meeting hers their modest lids have veiled them from my sight and I have frequently observed a silent tear steal down her lovely cheek
What can these marks of sorrow mean I woud give worlds to know provided it was in my power to remove the cause—Emma too whom you know to be the gentlest of the gentle kind appears absent and lost in thought frequently—From this account you will not suppose that our evenings are passed in the most lively manner Yet believe me Stanley I woud not exchange the pleasure
I receive from this devotement of my time for
The broadest mirth unfeeling folly wears
The minutes seem to fly while our society is confined to a triumvirate but as soon as Sir James and his companions join us Lady Juliana retires and then all is what they call jollity and I call noise
I dont know whether you may not be inclined to laugh at my Sombre ideas of happiness I know Lucy will if you shew her my letter be that as it may I am certain I never was half so happy before though perhaps neither you or she woud be so in the same situation—I therefore wish ye both all the pleasures the gay world can give and am most affectionately yours
C EVELYN
WILLIAM STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
Holy St Francis what a change is here
Is Rosaline whom thou didst love so dear
So soon forsaken
AND now I suppose like your gallant prototype Monsieur Romeo you have totally forgotten your former mistress and are ready to hang drown or put an end to your miserable existence in any other doleful way all for the love of your fair Juliet Alas poor Charles—however I am glad you have
been laid hold of by this charming relict—Lovemaking and haymaking are the two most delightful rural pastimes that I know of but it is not requisite that both should be done while the sun shines—for the first is just as agreeable by a fireside under a roof with or without the singing of cagebirds as in a summers evening under the shade of a beech to the soft notes of the nightingale—For notwithstanding all that you or the poets have said in praise of the country I will venture to promise that your fond vows will be just as well received by Lady Juliana at her house in Berkeleysquare as in the mossgrown woods or floweringshrubbery at Delville—It is the man and not the place that must render his passion acceptable for every spot is an Eden with those we love
I will allow there is much pleasure and perhaps some little advantage too in being in the same house with the object of our affections whilst we are endeavouring to inspire a reciprocal one but that once having taken effect believe me it is much more for the interest of the lover to be placed at a little distance than too near The plesaure of expecting his approach fixes the fairones attention to his most agreeable qualities and the flattering likeness which her fondness and selflove join to draw off the absent idol generally exceeds the merits of the original
If therefore you can flatter yourself with having made any impression on Lady Julianas heart and are seriously
in love yourself which I know not how to believe after your seeming attachment to Miss Morton dont be afraid of her Ladyships coming to London—remember
That to a woman that loves there is but one man in the world
Some ladywriter has refined upon this sentiment of Rousseaus and says That to a woman who truly loves there is no man in the world the object is more and every other less
I admire your ingenuity in endeavouring to persuade yourself that your brothers being unsuccessful in his addresses was a fortunate circumstance for him because it is a lucky one for you—just so do all men reason who speak from their passions Selflove is an artful sophister and I have no doubt but you coud easily prevail upon yourself to believe that it was a great advantage to
poor Harry to be taken off by a fever in his eightandtwentieth year as his death has put you into possession of a noble estate and recalled you from Indias burning soil to the mild climate of your native land
Your serious complaint of the inadequateness of language in your first letter made me smile—believe me you were more at a loss for ideas than words when you sat down to write or at least the former wanted pr••ision for nothing can be clearer to me than that you were then undetermined with regard to Sir James Desmonds character—the new lights thrown upon it since in my mind do but puzzle the cause—I am not personally acquainted with him but he is generally well spoken of tho said to be remarkably fond of play and
I have heard it hinted that he has suffered by it considerably
I cant tell why I should dislike your new acquaintance Mr Sewell and yet I do—your mistaking him for a servant is against him—a meanness either in manners or appearance is no favourable prognostic—or—dont be angry Charles but possibly my antipathy may have arisen from your too sudden sympathy Not from any spirit of contradiction but that I know you are often too liable to impromptu attachments both in love and friendship—And yet tho you have smarted pretty severely for a firstsight connection before now I woud not if I coud restrain the openness and benevolence of your nature—Every man that is not himself a knave is liable to be duped by one till a thorough knowledge of the world has taught him caution at the cost
of one of the highest pleasures in life—that of thinking well of human nature
I dont know whether your sisters Mrs Selwyn and my Lucy for I still hope to call her mine have not reason to be jealous in the friendly way of your partiality to Lady Desmond—she cannot in my mind have more excellent or amiable qualities than your eldest sister nor is it possible that she can have more charms either in mind or person than your youngest But I will not hint this unjust preference to either of them particularly as I have reason from your last letter to believe that they and all the rest of the world are quite upon a par in your present estimation your whole quota of fond affections being absolutely devoted to the transcendent beauties of your divine
Juliana—I hope that last line is sublime enough to satisfy your lovership
Adieu my dear Charles I have said nothing of my own affairs because they are still in an unpleasant train
Yours W STANLEY
P S I shewed your last letter to Lucy she smiled and said some men have strange fancies
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
UPON my honour you do me wrong Stanley—I never loved or feigned to love Miss Morton—I thought her lively elegant and sensible and still think her so but were every charm she possesses augmented beyond the power of numbers to encrease my heart could hold no sympathy with hers—For if she has a heart it is an unfeeling one—Do not mistake me now by supposing that
I complain of her coldness from having experienced it—Believe me I never proceeded so far as to meet with a repulse
When I first came to England I saw her often liked nay admired and might perhaps have loved her had not the worthlessness of her disposition broke thro the cobweb veil of an affected sensibility and turned my admiration to disgust—You may remember that at the time of my arrival in London Miss Morton was on a visit at my sister Selwyns this circumstance occasioned our being particularly intimate we spent almost our whole time together and whether from any little design of rendering herself agreeable to me by indulging what you call my foible or from an affectation of singular sensibility I know not she used to launch forth into such effusion of sentimental tenderness and generosity as exceeded
even our eastern ideas of humanity—I have seen her ready to weep for a drowning fly and my sister Lucy used to say Miss Morton coud only be a fit wife for The Man of Feeling
It happened one summers evening that we three walked in the park till near dusk as we came down ConstitutionHill a young woman in a wretched garb with a pale and emaciated countenance passed closely by us Chance and chance alone directed my eyes to glance full upon hers in a moment her face was suffused with crimson she turned her head aside quickened her pace and was almost instantly out of sight
Nothing is so swift as thought a ray of recollection beamed upon my mind and
brought back to my remembrance the once smiling countenance of Nancy Weston whose father had been one of the under masters at Winchester at whose house I boarded when I was placed at college there—Her appearance spoke distress—saas adieu I quitted the ladies and set out with hasty strides to overtake and acknowledge my former playfellow or rather plaything for she was some years younger than myself and I had borne her in my arms a thousand times What convinced me that I was not mistaken in my conjecture with regard to the identity of the person was a pretty large mole at the bottom of her left cheek which used to give a thousand nameless graces to her mouth
I reached the top of the hill without perceiving the object of my pursuit but upon looking backwards I saw her lying
on the ground at some distance from the footpath with her face covered by her hands—The little effort which conscious shame had impelled her feebleness to make in order to pass unnoticed by me had totally exhausted her last remains of strength and perhaps she had said with Jane Shore—
Why shoud I wander stray farther on for I can die even here
I flew directly towards her and raised her almost lifeless body from the earth—she could not articulate a single word but the dumb eloquence of flowing tears too plainly spoke unutterable woe—I saw a gentleman passing at some distance and called to him for help as he came near I entreated him to use the utmost expedition to fetch a chair to receive a young woman that I feared was dying—he said he was sorry my humanity was not
bestowed upon a worthier object as he supposed her to be one of those unhappy wretches who nightlyinfest the park but she shoud not however perish for want of his assistance and at that moment set forward to call a chair in which at his return I placed her and desired the men to carry her gently to the first apothecarys shop in Picadilly whither I attended her
Every medicinal aid that is usually given to fainting persons was administered to her and she revived a little—the humane apothecary said she wanted food more than physic and made her eat a little bread and drink some wine and water I then desired her to direct the chairmen to her home and said I woud follow her thither—she raised her languid eyes and said in a low and scarcely articulate voice I have no home I then requested the apothecary to provide a
lodging for her near him and to attend her both as a physician and a friend promising to be answerable for any expence and trouble that might be incurred upon her account and as a counter security to which engagement left a bill for fifty pounds in his hands to be settled for at some future day
The poor unhappy girl then fell on her knees before me pouring out the strongest expressions of gratitude for my kindness I intreated her to compose her shattered spirits for the present and to rely upon my friendship not to desert her let her faults or misfortunes be of what nature soever they might So leaving my address with her that she might know where to apply I returned to Mrs Selwyns in order to account for my abrupt manner of quitting Miss Morton and Lucy
When I had told my tale I expected to see the bewitching tear of pity stand in Miss Mortons eye—when to my amazement a settled gloom loured on her brow and indignation sparkled from her eyes—she continued silent till I addressed myself to her and Lucy requesting them to spare me some part of their wardrobe to supply the immediate necessities of the unhappy Nancy Weston till there coud be some procured more suited to her humble station—
No words can describe the rage with which she told me that she was astonished both at my insolence and meanness in expecting that she woud suffer any thing she had ever worn to be contaminated by the person of a prostitute for such she was sure I had known her to be and if I intended to restore her to
her former situation she thought it woud be but decent to cloath her at my own rather than at any other persons expence
It is impossible to express the sudden and forcible effect which both the manner and matter of Miss Mortons harangue produced on me Suffice it to say that they unsexed her even from top to toe—and from that hour I have ever looked upon her mind with detestation and her person with disgust
I have entered into this long detail to acquit myself of a charge which by the generality of the world is scarcely deemed a vice but which I consider as an act of baseness that of engaging the affections of an innocent heart and then repaying its unmerited tenderness with
black ingratitude—Banished be the vile idea from every honest breast and may his couch be ever strewed with thorns that can for his sport create a pang in the bosom of unsuspecting innocence
Away with the unpleasing subject and let it prove to my Stanley of how much consequence his esteem is to my happiness when I tell him that it is now three oclock in the morning that I have danced from eight in the evening but not with Lady Juliana she having retired with visible dejection to her chamber on the arrival of some company yet could not lay me down in peace till I had removed the unjust suspicion he has hinted tho seemingly in jest of my being a faithless lover or, in other words a scoundrel—But tho at this moment I am very far
from being happy either on my own or Emmas account I have the consolation of thinking that I have not deserved to be wretched and of knowing that I may boldly subscribe myself your sincere Friend
CHARLES EVELYN
P S Lady Juliana has appeared for some days past much graver than usual—she declines any little service from me tho of ever so trifling a nature and seems cautiously to avoid entering into any conversation with me tho in a mixed company Ah Stanley I have no hopes of making any impression on her heart either at Delville or in Berkeleysquare
Mr Sewell has lately dropped some hints to me that Sir James Desmonds
finances are a good deal embarrassed by his ill success at play I think this person will justify my predeliction in his favour as he talks so very sensibly against both the vice and folly of gaming But that in so unaffected a manner that he acknowledges the necessity of it to those who would live in the world as at present constituted This is too sad a truth—The manners of life however corrupt must be our rule of action if we would preserve our rank in it—He who would be virtuous alone must live alone While he has been speaking upon this subject I have seen my sister steal a tender look at her husband more persuasive than all the rhetoric of Demosthenes—But if she cannot cure his disease I can prevent its effects from becoming fatal for the present at least I should be happy to
do so—if I coud be happy—Send me bills for the enclosed draft by return of the post—I may perhaps have occasion for more than mere travelling expences before I leave this
WILLIAM STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
IT is now very near eleven oclock and I am but this moment returned from an excursion I made into Kent for three or four days of course I did not receive your letter till this instant—I should think myself unworthy of the very delicate attention you have shewn to my good opinion were I to delay the thanks that are due for it to another post—accept them my dear Evelyn and be assured that I consider
your generous impatience of blame upon an article too lightly treated by the generality of men as the strongest proof of your friendship—The highest compliment we can pay to those we regard is the endeavouring to appear worthy of their esteem for tho love may friendship never did or will subsist without a mutual exertion of good qualities as well as of kind offices—and he who can acquiesce in anothers thinking meanly of him betrays an equal want of regard to him and of respect to himself—so much in honour of your nice feelings and I heartily wish that all men and women too were possessed of the same—particularly the latter who like Caesars wife ought not to be even suspected—
I am extremely pleased at the little novel → which my raillery for indeed I
meant no more extorted from you—Pray at your leisure let me have the remainder of Nancy Westons story I feel myself much interested for her which is more than I ever was for Miss Morton she always appearing to me a sort of madeup Miss than which I know not a less amiable character
O Charles if women woud but trust to nature for their power to charm and scorn the mean the treacherous auxiliary of art how unbounded woud be their dominion over us—But I have not time now to expatiate on a topic that has ever been my favourite one—For my mind is nice tho my moral is not severe
I am glad to hear that Lady Juliana is grown cold and reserved to you—It is at least a tacit confession that she is apprized
of your passion—No woman ventures to be disagreeably distant to a man to whom she has once been civil till she is quite certain that her caprice will render him unhappy—Ladies are too tenacious of their sway to attempt an exertion of it where it is not likely to be felt but your true lover is the properest object in the world for tyranny and seems really designed for no other purpose but to be trampled on
Courage then Charles—The ice at least is broken and in such a changeable latitude who knows how soon the wind may veer about to the south and breathe its soft Etesian gales upon you You will I doubt not perceive that I am not at present much inclined to write a panegyric upon the fair sex and will of course conclude that Lucy and I have had a brouillerie—I always
squabble with those I love—because they wont let me have my own way—for with those I care not about I have no way at all Yes Evelyn your sister is—a dear delightful charming woman—good night
W STANLEY
Your bills shall be sent by next post
LADY JULIANA HARLEY TO MISS LUCY EVELYN
I KNOW it will give my Lucy pleasure to hear that I have passed some time with her amiable friends at Delville I acknowledge a secret and irresistible charm that attaches me to every part of the Evelyn family and in the society of Lady Desmond tho far less intimately connected with her than you I hoped I should recover my spirits so far as to enable me to indulge your request of
passing some months of the approaching winter in London—
The unexpected meeting with Mr Evelyn at first a good deal disconcerted me for I am little used to seeing strangers His appearance perhaps too strongly recalled the idea of his brother but by degrees the painful suggestions of memory became less poignant and I fancied I might with safety indulge the melancholy pleasure of tracing Henrys features in his brothers face
But even this transient—what shall I call it alas it will not bear the name of happiness—coud not arrive to me without alloy
Not to deal longer in mystery your brother to his great misfortune as well as mine I fear has conceived an affection
for me Nay I know he has—Dissembling is beneath me—gracious heaven why was I born to be a curse to all the Evelyn race Why am I doomed to be the source of misery to those whom I love best on earth This is beyond the common course of ills
But let me recollect myself—Your brothers passions seem to be violent and therefore may be the less permanent—I will stop the growing mischief then by flying from his fight I had resolved to go to London with Lady Desmond and have sent my servants thither—no matter—I will return to Yorkshire which I never more intended to visit and pass the winter there or any where rather than hazard your brothers Lady Desmonds and my Lucys peace
You may perhaps think that I am too easily alarmed upon this subject but O my friend those who have felt the pangs of real love should dread inflicting where they cannot heal them and pity poor cold pity is all that now is left me to bestow
Your brother has not yet made any explicit declaration of his attachment towards me his pride will therefore be saved from the mortification of thinking that I fly from him—Trifling as this consolation may appear I am glad he is in possession of it as any other reason that he may assign for my shunning his addresses must be less painful than the real one
If I were writing to any other person I should have some apprehension lest they might suppose my vanity had mistaken
Mr Evelyns natural politeness for the effects of a commencing passion but his every look and action bear so striking a resemblance to those of his lamented brother who loved me but too well that it is impossible to doubt their motive—besides my Lucy is a perfect Columbus in the terra incognita of lovers hearts and discovered her faithful Stanleys fond attachment in his speaking eyes for many months before his tongue revealed it—happy happy Lucy whose hand and heart are free to bless the man who best deserves them whilst I—Here let me stop nor pain your gentle breast with my complainings—
I shall quit this house tomorrow five minutes before I set out I will acquaint Lady Desmond with my intention of returning into the North—How shall I be able to conceal the cause of this sudden
alteration in my purpose from her yet I will conceal it from her from all the world but you
Write to me I intreat you tho I know I need not—The friend of my heart will continue as she has ever been attentive to its happiness—
Adieu—
J HARLEY
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
O STANLEY she is gone fled and much I fear it is from me she flies—
Last night curse on all sports and sportsmen Sir James Desmond proposed our going out a shooting this morning early the day was gloomy and it was near nine oclock before we determined upon setting out—The ladies as I thought were not yet risen—while our horses were getting ready I took a turn
in the garden and at some distance heard the sound of female voices—I stopped to listen from whence they came and at that instant perceived Lady Juliana and my sister coming towards me in close conference—they seemed to be engaged upon some very important subject and I fancied I heard my name mentioned—the moment they beheld me they turned about and with a quickened pace shot down another walk—I saw they wished to avoid me and therefore returned directly into the house I joined Sir James and his friends and we set out together but I was too much occupied with the scene that had just passed before me to be at all interested in their sport—they rallied me upon my inattention and wished me to return home as I interrupted their amusement without seeming to be myself amused—I readily accepted my congé and clapping spurs
to my horse galloped back again with an unspeakable anxiety
I found my sister alone in the drawing room and instantly enquired for Lady Juliana—she replied with a melancholy accent she has left us Charles—Whither is she gone and what coud be the cause of such a sudden flight—On both these subjects I am as ignorant as you can be It is impossible I cried but if you ever loved me Emma tell me and tell me truly have I offended Lady Juliana and is it from my hated sight she flies—I am sure she does not hate you she replied for her nature is incapable of repaying hatred for love—What then she knows I love her—From her discourse I believe she fears you do—but be composed sit down I beg of you—Wherefore shoud she fear it Does she think meanly of me My
brother was not thought unworthy her alliance she woud have given her hand to him but that her fathers promise was engaged to one she never loved—but I will know the cause of her disdain from her own lips will know it I rang the bell and ordered my chaise to be got ready instantly Emma burst into tears and said do not render me more unhappy than I am already—my brother do not leave me in distress
Alarmed as all my passions were her gentle accents vibrated upon my heart and calmed each throbbing pulse—I sat down by her took her trembling hand and said what does my Emma mean—Can I relieve her sorrows—Her tears flowed more abundantly and for some minutes stopped her utterance—at length turning her head away from me she said yes Charles thank heaven
you can but do not let the present circumstance lessen my husband in your esteem no man is perfect and Sir James has but one fault—he is too fond of play—There is an execution in our house this moment for seven hundred pounds—I woud have joined with my husband to raise the money by relinquishing my jointure—but he woud not listen to the proposal declaring he woud perish in a gaol rather than injure me or our dear little Fanny—He is indeed my brother the tenderest of husbands and of fathers
Of those particulars Emma said I you certainly are the best judge but have I not reason to resent Sir Jamess want of confidence in me Why did he not prevent this disgrace to himself and family by acquainting me with his
necessities—Coud he suppose me mean enough to suffer you to be distressed for any sum within my power to raise—Ah Charles she replied catching my hand the mind that feels its own reproach dreads to expose itself to that of others—They who have lost the fear of being contemned most generally deserve to be so
I will believe you reason justly Emma and woud not if I coud refute your argument but time now presses—It is impossible that I can rest till my doom is pronounced by Lady Juliana—this night I must leave Delville and am at present no otherways prepared to extricate you from your irksome situation than by taking the debt upon myself if your creditor will accept my security I am ready to give it but as
I am not known to him he may perhaps object—If I coud stay but three days longer it might be more easily accomplished for from some hints that have been dropped in relation to Sir Jamess circumstances I drew upon my banker for a thousand pounds but I cannot expect the bills shoud be returned to me till Friday at the soonest
It is no matter she replied Mr Sewell will I doubt not gladly accept of your security Is Sewell then your creditor I exclaimed Coud he lodge an execution in the house under whose roof he dwells I know not how it is my brother but I believe the money was originally lost at play to Mr Sewell—Sir James gave him a bond on which he raised the money from his brother who now exacts the payment in this severe manner
I fear then Emma Sewell is a knave and joined in mean collusion with his brother to distress your husband who looks upon him as his friend—You are deceived Charles I am sure he is Sir Jamess friend and mine by his perpetually dissuading him from play—It may be so but tell me Emma all you know and all you think of Lady Julianas sudden departure what can it mean
She replied I again repeat to you that I am as ignorant of Lady Julianas motives for her conduct as yourself—though to all appearance she has been perfectly blameless through the whole course of her life her actions have always been involved in a sort of mystery and seemingly inconsistent to my apprehension—My sister Lucy may possibly be better acquainted with her
sentiments than I am as she was very intimate with her even before her marriage She did not continue in that state above four months and tho I had reason to believe she was an unhappy wife she lamented her husbands untimely death with such an extravagance of sorrow as placed her very nearly on a footing with the Malabarian widows for her health was so much impaired by her grief that it was thought impossible she coud recover nor have I ever seen her chearful since her husband died—But from the moment she perceived your particular attachment her melancholy was encreased and she has seemed twenty times upon the point of expressing her uneasiness at your constant assiduities For these last three days she appeared to be quite retired within herself and I have had so many disagreeable things to engross my
thoughts that I was rather pleased at her reserve and did not attempt to draw her out of it
This morning she sent her woman to let me know that she wished to speak with me and that I shoud find her in the garden to which I instantly repaired She was seated in the temple by the rivers side leaning on her arm and seemed lost in thought when I approached her she started from her reverie and said—The ill fate that has ever attended me prevents my staying longer at Delville or accompanying you to London I was born to create misery where I wish to confer happiness but I will not voluntarily increase the baneful influence of that malignant fatality which dwells around me—For this reason only do I now take a precipitate leave of you my dear Lady Desmond intreating you not to
mention my departure till I have been gone some hours
I at first proceeded Emma endeavoured to rally her out of her resolution and told her that she seemed by her phrase to have been studying judicial astrology but that I was a greater conjuror than she took me for and assured her that I saw no baneful influence nor malignant fatality in her horoscope but on the contrary love joy and harmony proceeding from the little twinkling star that had directed her steps to Delville from which place I earnestly entreated she woud not depart till we all set out together
I had forced a smile into my countenance while I talked to her and did not till I had done speaking perceive that her eyes were filled with tears—She turned her face from me and stepping
out of the temple said Lady Desmond has too much humanity to jest with the sorrows of her friend did she believe them real—and I have too much tenderness for her to convince her that they are so—again I take my leave wishing every good on earth to her and all that have the happiness to belong to her once more repeating my request of concealing my departure—The reason of this request must be sufficiently obvious to a person endowed with less perspicuity than are any of Mr Evelyns sisters
I need not proceed to relate Emmas entreaties or Lady Julianas refusals—it is from me she flies—why then do I pursue her What a question Do we not all pursue whateer eludes our wish and shun the bliss that meets it and sure if ever man was yet impelled by an irresistible impulse I am
You will perhaps smile at the seeming inconsistency of contenting myself with expressing my ardor thro a long letter instead of indulging it by pursuing the fair fugitive but at present my impetuous passion is controuled by fraternal affection—I cannot leave my sister in distress and to relieve her from it I must wait the return of Sir James Desmond and his companions of the field
They are arrived I hear their boisterous and unmeaning mirth Sir Jamess voice sounds louder than the rest—thoughtless man
Adieu my Stanley
C EVELYN
I find it impossible to set out this night—Sewells brother is to be sent for—How cruel this delay I have this moment
received your short billet accept my thanks in return they are all I have to offer my mind is too much disturbed to think on any subject but one and I have already tired you with that—I detest hazard and yet am going to play at it—They say it interests and agitates—I deny its power except on those whose minds are tainted with the meanest of all vices avarice—But I have a purpose in it which is not quite so selfish
MISS EVELYN TO LADY JULIANA HARLEY
I DO really and truly begin to think that you my dear Lady Juliana and all the rest of the world are agreed in believing that I am literally hewn out of a marble block and can bear disappointments and vexations as unfeelingly as the •foresaid sturdy substance can endure the ••rokes of the hammer and the chissel But ye are all mistaken for I am and •ver will be exceedingly grieved and provoked
at the absurdities of my friends when they are either weak or malicious enough to interfere with my happiness or their own
Why thou inhuman fair one what a roundeau of delights has thy caprice destroyed I could cry with vexation when I think of the dear little parties I had formed in your box at the opera your Charles and my William with the Lords A, B, C, and so on to the end of the alphabet Making their bends adorings—Our suppers at Almacks our private balls our masquerades but above all our quarres with our Corydons in Berkeleysquare—and can I bear the disappointment and all for what why truly because the thing in the world which was most likely to happen and which I most wished has actually come to pass—that Charles Evelyn shoud fall
in love with Lady Juliana—O cruel cruel friend thou hast almost broke my heart
But to be serious for whatever you may think I am by no means inclined to jest upon this subject what are these dreadful portents that have alarmed you and driven you at this season of the year to the very antipodes of our delights the chilling North If you really did not like my brother tho I must say I see no reason why you should not you need not have given him any encouragement but merely suffered him to dangle after you till the beginning of next summer and by that time either he woud have been tired of serving without wages or you woud have been ashamed of acting a shabby part and so have paid the man for his pain and passion with your lovely self
For the sake of common sense my dear Juliana think better of this business away with those glooms that should have been put off with your sables and order your chaise to London
You cannot imagine how much I am distressed for a chaperon—my sister Selwyn is within a month or six weeks of lyingin and goes no where—my sister Desmond is not come to town and when she does will be so taken up with her domestic concerns her child and her husband to be sure that I am not to expect much comfort from her—Now you are to know as a very great secret that this is the last year of my reign—I feel that I must abdicate in spring if possible it shall not be till the Ranelagh season is near over—but I must not trifle longer with Stanley—You cannot conceive how I love him and yet I have now cookedup
a most delicious quarrel about Maria Morton whom I know he detests and indeed so do all the men of her acquaintance merely to prevent his teizing me into matrimony at this time of the year when one has something else to do
I have now laid all my distresses before you and if your heart is not as much steeled to friendship as to love you will have pity on the sister tho ever so obdurate to the brother and fly to the relief of your
LUCY EVELYN
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Delville
FATE seems to oppose my every purpose Stanley here am I still detained by drifting snows and piercing winds not that their force shoud stop my progress on my own account
nor storms nor night should keep me here
—but that fellow Sewells brother who derives his greatness from that of his debtors and says like Cacofogo
The King of
Spain owes me money
will not set out from his cottage tho tis but eighteen miles off till the weather mends forsooth—and here must I wait like St Laurence on the gridiron till his usurership arrives—
I sat down to hazard as I told you last night determined like our former kings on a twelfth night if possible to lose a thousand pounds to Sir James and make that sum a debt which must otherwise be deemed a courtesy—but here chance unluckily opposed my pupose—Fortune as she is called favoured or rather disappointed me I won every thing the baronet and both his companions are my debtors
N B Sewell has again recovered some part of my esteem he lost his money like a gentleman—one must borrow similies
when they cant frame them—the other one Simpson who they say is rich seemd to suffer the most dreadful agonies and sometimes vented his feelings in horrid imprecations O Stanley how is it possible that a rational being shoud ever put himself a second time into such a situation as to render him at once both unhappy and contemptible—
Your letter has most agreeably interrupted my moralizing—Thanks to my friend for his punctuality I will this moment go and present the bills to Emma Sir James is not yet risen if I can quit Delville without seeing him it will save both him and me from an equal embarrassment yet their is something tells me that my going sans adieu may in his present situation perhaps offend the baronet and all impatient as I am I will stay breakfast—
Beyond the fixed and
settled rules
—This little business is finished and if I could describe the grateful tenderness with which Emma received the present you woud be charmed with the portrait Stanley—Sir James Desmond too seemed to accept it from her hands with more sensibility and dignity than I imagined him possessed of
Does not our selflove sometimes suppose merits where we bestow our favours in order to heighten our own pleasure in the act of benevolence—I am not at leisure now to investigate the philosophy of this idea but I am persuaded that we are generally more strongly attached to those we have obliged than even to those who have obliged us—Is it not usury then to expect gratitude Not that I woud encourage the modern philosophy which reduces all virtue to selfinterest for if I may
hazard an unborrowed simile the liberal mind may be compared to the Nile which enriches the soil from its own abundance without requiring any return
Adieu for a few hours—
C EVELYN
MISS EVELYN TO LADY JULIANA HARLEY
ClargesStreet
I HAVE often heard that love makes wise men fools and turns our wits the seamy side without—Poor Charles It was almost midnight when he arrived here last night pale as ashes his eyes wild and haggard and his hair undressd My sister Selwyn had not been well all day and was retired to rest—The moment he came into the parlour where I was sitting he cried out Where is she Lucy Gone to bed said I thinking
he enquired after Mrs Selwyn—Do not torture me he replied but tell me where is lady Juliana
A strange question truly answered I surely you have seen her long since I did—I spoke this in a miff for I thought he might have first enquired his sisters health after an absence of above a month—Quite frantic he threw himself at my feet and said he woud not stir from thence till I informed him where you were for that Stanley had told him he believed I knew—Mem I shall punish Mr Stanley pretty handsomely for pretending to guess at my secrets Mr Selwyn who was in his library in the next room composing a sermon for ought I know alarmed by the noise this inamorato made peeped into the parlour with his glasses on and seeing a man at my feet seemed doubtful whether
he should retire or advance till I intreated him to come in assuring him it was not a lover but a lunatic he beheld in that situation—You are mistaken Lucy Charles exclaimed I am the tenderest fondest most unhappy lover that ever yet existed and if you have not a mind to drive me to distraction you will acquaint me where my deity resides and let me kneel before the shrine which she inhabits with purest adoration
Psha very prophane that said Mr Selwyn—For Heavens sake Charles said I rise and compose yourself—you must be very certain that if lady Juliana had entrusted me with any thing she chose to keep a secret I would not violate the trust by revealing it to you you can therefore receive no benefit from Mr Stanleys information But whatever are her motives for retirement I hope they
will not operate long and that she will be restored to the society of her friends in a few days or weeks at farthest
Days or weeks exclaimed he—you talk of centuries I tell you Lucy I will not rest till I behold her—Nay then said Mr Selwyn I shall wish you a good night it will be vain for me to sit up any longer but if you chuse to pass the night without sleep I will order the servants to mend the fire bring you fresh candles and go to bed for they must rise in the morning I could not help smiling at Mr Selwyns literal conception of my brothers expression—Charles seemed much offended with both of us and rushed out of the room without even bidding us good night
Now madam what do you think of the mischief your cruelty or caprice rather
has occasioned May I not say with Ophelia
O what a noble mind is here oerthrown
And have I not a right in common justice to demand the restoration of my brothers senses from your ladyship or some other averdupois equivalent for the loss In short my dear Juliana if you have any friendship for me you will immediately come to London and make an end of this simple business—If you cannot like my brother tell him so and perhaps the wound which his selflove must receive from your denial may rouse him to attempt the conquest of an hopeless passion
I am rather surprized at not having seen my poor lunatic today my sister Selwyn is quite grieved about him and sent this morning to know how he did and to invite him to dinner—but the servant returned with a non inventus—
he had drove out of town—whither can he have taken his flight Mr Selwyn thinks he ought to be put under Doctor Monros care but I make bold to say that you and only you can effect his cure—Hasten then my sweet friend to the relief both of Charles and
LUCY EVELYN
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Bath
NO Stanley she is not here and this place though througed with numbers of the young and gay is to me a desart Yet I confess there was a probability of meeting or at least hearing of her in such a concourse of people of her own rank—yet no tidings of her have yet reached me
Pardon me Stanley if I say that I can hardly forgive your Lucy—I will not call her my sister—She certainly knows where Lady Juliana is and yet is so inhuman to conceal it from me—Surely you must have power sufficient over her to make her reveal the secret be assured if she refuses to let you know it she is not worthy of your affection for I am certain it is impossible for a woman to deny any thing to the solicitations of the man she loves This maxim is too frequently proved to admit of its being doubted but what a wretch is he who takes advantage of its certainty to betray unsuspecting innocence or to involve the being he pretends to love in misery and guilt
I have been led into this reflection by the unsought confidence of our schoolfellow Capt Williams whom I happened
to meet with here and who is a very libertine and at present engaged in an unworthy attempt on a young lady his equal in birth though not in fortune She has a brother in the army who is expected daily from Ireland and the apprehension of his arrival hurries Williams into the most imprudent conduct so that the young lady will probably lose her reputation if her brother should even come time enough to protect her innocence
I have expressed my sentiments upon this subject very fully to him but he only laughs at what I say except when I mention the certainty of the young ladys brother calling him to account for his ill behaviour This part of the ceremony he says he does not like but has asked me to be his second in case he should be involved in such an adventure
But I have declined the honour for the punctilio should be shewn in avoiding an offence not in defending it
Is it not amazing that a man should premeditately rush on to an action that his heart must condemn even at the hazard of his life Anxious and unhappy as my mind is at present if I had the least acquaintance with the young lady I woud do every thing in my power to save her from destruction but he has had honour or rather prudence enough to conceal her name and it is of course impossible for me to interfere further
Once more let me entreat you to exert your utmost influence with Lucy to make her discover Lady Julianas retreat and I here pawn my honour both to her and you that if after one interview her ladyship should persist in dooming me to
perpetual banishment I will obey the stern decree will instantly quit England and never more obtrude myself into her presence—
Surely if Lucy loves her friend she will be satisfied with this proposal
Adieu
C EVELYN
WILLIAM STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
I AM sincerely sorry for your disappointment my dear Charles though more surprized at the effect than cause as I could not possibly suppose that if Lady Juliana seriously meant to fly from you she coud think of retiring to so public a place as Bath—But I own I flattered myself that the peculiar gaiety of a scene so entirely new to you woud have dissipated the chagrin you seem to
feel from her flight or that some new object woud have attracted your attention and engaged you in a less tiresome pursuit—But I find you are a brisk huntsman and are determined to pursue the sport though you have missed the quarry
I woud by all means advise you to drink the Bath water it is famous for exhilerating the spirits but if that shoud fail drink wine I entreat you—I have known many an unsuccessful passion cured by the bumpers that were filled to the obdurate fairones health wine is the modern Lethe Charles and as Gay says
Can banish care and cure despair
If I had any better comfort to offer you I shoud not perhaps so strongly recommend the above recipe but indeed my
friend I must beg to be excused from obeying the request you have so strenuously made to me for I never shall exert my influence over the woman I love to tempt her to an act of dishonour and such I hold a breach of confidence to be—And were I married to your charming sister—delightful thought I shoud esteem her still the more for preserving the secrets of her friends inviolate even from me
Nothing but the romantic passion with which you are infected can excuse your condemning my Lucy gladly do I accept the term for not betraying Lady Julianas confidence and give me leave to say that this passion has rendered your conduct both unjust and absurd towards the object of it
Lady Juliana has acted nobly and shewn herself superior to the meanness and cruelty of coquetry she has even sacrificed her own happiness to yours by depriving herself of the society of her friends to enable you to conquer an hopeless passion—Believe me Charles women speak but too plain when they decline our company and I think it is high time that you shoud ask yourself what right you have to break in upon her retirement and compel her to receive your visits
Your only plea is that she did not reject the addresses of your brother perhaps it is for that very reason that she declines yours—Allow me to say that Harry was to the full as amiable as you are—now surely it is not impossible that Lady Juliana might have loved your brother and if so can you imagine that
her affections are to descend with the family estate to the next heir
For shame Charles rouse your reason and cease to persecute this charming woman—she has already by all accounts suffered too much the sudden and yet unaccounted for death of her husband brought her almost to the brink of the grave Though every one knew it was impossible she coud love him yet her conduct towards him has ever been unimpeached and what must the delicacy of her mind have suffered from living with a man whom she coud not avoid detesting
Women have infinitely more merit in such cases than men—we are rarely if ever compelled to marry against our inclinations but if interest too often more powerful than any other attraction
prevails on us to unite ourselves to a disagreeable object we are generally so inhuman as to make her suffer for the crime we have ourselves committed by punishing her with neglect or perhaps a worse species of ill treatment—whilst the poor girl who has been led an unwilling victim to Hymens altar can have no safe resource but sighs and tears no indulgence is allowed to any former or future passion she may feel her affections must be restrained by the magical ceremony of marriage within her own bosom because she cannot confer them on a wretch she detests and must not dare to bestow them elsewhere
I am sorry that Williams is a scoundrel such I think any man who lays a scheme to destroy innocence But since knight errantry is exploded and that the young ladies of our siecle are pretty
well enlightened in matters of gallantry we must een leave them to take care of themselves—But as you so justly condemn his conduct I am pleased with your having refused to be his second—the man who appears in that character is always supposed to approve the cause of his friends quarrel—besides if you shoud engage in any such business you well know what you must necessarily suffer from Parson Selwyns preachments against the damnable sin of duelling—Think on this and keep clear of the consequences
Yours sincerely W STANLEY
P S Your quondam friend Maria Morton has made a runaway match with a young foreigner a Monsieur du Pont whom she has deceived by passing for a
great fortune—In reality she is worse than a beggar as the little estate that is to come to her after her mothers death is involved for its full value by debts contracted for the indulgence of Marias extravagance I pity Lady Morton much but the young man more
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
DEAR Stanley I have received your friendly may I not rather say your chiding letter I acknowledge the unreasonableness of my pursuit but when had reason power to conquer love
Yet in behalf of my own weakness give me leave to say that acting as you think upon wrong principles by endeavouring to obtrude myself into Lady Julianas
presence I have however shewn much moderation by limiting my pursuit to a single interview—I am not a bas•lisk Stanley the sight of me will not destroy this lovely woman and tis necessary I shoud first know her will before I can obey it
Tis true my friend she has shewn herself superior to coquetry and has voluntarily exiled herself from those gay scenes in which she ought to shine perhaps to shun my hated sight—Then is it not incumbent upon me to restore her to an admiring world to the society of those she loves—O why alas am I not of that happy number—You will answer me that passion is involuntary—I know it but too well You seem to hint that she once loved my brother is that a reason for her hating me There is no rivalship between us now his passions
are at peace and if he died possessed of her affections he was much happier than your living friend
You are a lover Stanley but a calm because an happy one—Lucy repays your tenderness and nought but worldly prudence now impedes your union For this reason you treat my sufferings lightly for even the tenderest simpathy of friendship cannot feel for woes it never has experienced—There is no Lethe for unhappy love and let me add en philosophe that wine enflames but never cures our passions—I shall not therefore my kind physician venture upon your recipe but I will save you the trouble of a father prescription by following my own regimen and ceasing to complain
I have met with a tender sympathizing friend and confidante here—I shall be angry if you smile Stanley when I tell you it is Nancy Weston—I never saw joy so strongly painted in any countenance as hers when she met me our surprize was mutual but luckily this unexpected interview happened about eight oclock in the morning and we had no spectators to restrain or comment upon the strong expressions of a grateful heart
She told me before I went to Delville that she was very capable of the millinery business having formerly lived some time with a relation of hers who had kept a shop in TavistockStreet but who was now dead—I then told her that if she coud find out any method of establishing herself properly in business I woud assist her with the
means of carrying it on and left her a few guineas to clothe and support her till my return
During the few hours I spent in London before I came here my mind was so violently agitated that I never once thought of Nancy Weston and the poor girls modesty woud have prevented her from ever applying to me or being farther burthensome as she expresses it had not chance thrown her in my way at this time—She works with a very creditable chamber milliner who had known her formerly at her cousins and who will take her into partnership with a few hundreds which she shall have with an hearty welcome into the bargain for I think I need not tell you that her happiness will contribute to mine
That puppy Williams has been witty upon hearing that an handsome milliners doll as he calls her drank tea with me on Sunday last—He happened to call upon me that evening and my trusty Scipio refused to admit him tho he would not make the common excuse of saying I was not at home—He has teized me ever since with a deal of unmeaning ribaldry and presses me most vehemently to introduce him to my favourite but that I never shall she is much too good and amiable to be the sport of such a libertine
If he may be credited which I much doubt he has been successful in his amour—he no longer conceals the ladys name tis Harrison he shewed her to me in the rooms—I never saw a more elegant form nor a more lively countenance—when he saluted her she
smiled and blushed—Can it be possible that guilt should assume that first of female charms the joint result of senfibility and modesty
She danced a minuet with Lord March and then took out Captain Williams—she acquitted herself in both the minuets with infinite grace and ease—Surely it is impossible she coud be conscious of having forfeited her honour and yet still continue to wear the semblance of chearful innocence
As she did not dance country dances I joined her party and drank tea with her—I talked to her a considerable time and tho I think there is too much levity in her manner I cannot prevail upon myself to believe that she has fallen a sacrifice to such a contemptible trifler as Williams Mrs Peachurn says
How are those mothers to be pitied who have handsome daughters I say How are those handsome girls to be pitied who have not mothers Miss Harrison has been an orphan from her birth her father was one of those gallant but unfortunate officers who lost their lives with Braddock her mother was then pregnant of this girl—she lived but a few hours after she received the account of her husbands loss and expired in the moment of her daughters birth—There is something so affecting in the circumstances of both her parents deaths that has inspired me with a kind of additional tenderness towards her—I pity and will if not too late preserve her
I have received a letter from my loved Emma by which I can discover that she is unhappy—Sir James Desmond is again involved in difficulties
she has not particularized the circumstances nor given the least hint of expecting any assistance from me—Does she not know I am her brother—assure Mrs Selwyn and your Lucy of my affectionate regard and believe me sincerely yours
C EVELYN
WILLIAM STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
Bravo Bravo Charles I am delighted beyond expression to find you like Hudibras profiting of Ralphos gifts at the very time you seem to disdain them
Sly as you are I will bet an hundred guineas to five that before you sat down to indite your last epistle you had drank a couple of glasses of Bath water or double that number of Champagne—
But no matter for the cause I congratulate you on the effect and will from thence take upon me to pronounce that your lovership is in a fair way of recovery
Three whole pages without the name of Juliana or the word love I shoud have been amazed indeed at this happy change in your stile if you had not lessened my surprise by mentioning your little tender sympathizing confidante—O Charles there is nothing like true female softness tis the very balm of life for when pity flows from beautiful lips who woud not receive comfort Gratitude too must have animated her speech glowd on her cheek and sparkled in her eyes I woud have given fifty guineas to have been a witness of your accidental interview—You are a lucky man to have met with this
charming girl for such I suppose her to be so critically
I think you are too severe upon Williams it was natural enough for him to rally you a little considering the gravity of your character upon teteatete with a young woman especially as you make such a mystery of your connection and had refused to introduce him to her acquaintance in which however I think you perfectly right Men of his character look upon all women who are placed in a situation beneath them as lawful prey whereas I consider that part of the softer sex whom fortune has dealt unkindly by whose principles and manners are more elevated than their station as peculiarly entitled to our respect and protection and coud more easily forgive myself for a failure in a point of politeness towards
a duchess than to a woman who is unhappy enough to feel her present condition a degradation from her former rank
I dont much like to introduce the subject of your passion for Lady Juliana but believe me if you are as you say sufficiently reasonable to be contented with one interview a little more reason will enable you to be contented without one—I heartily wish that was the case for my Lucy is quite unhappy and dissatisfied at being deprived of Lady Julianas society and now openly declares that you are the sole cause of her exile—Be generous Charles and restore her to her friends without conditions—trust to chance for your meeting and to the nobleness of her sentiments when you do
The portrait you have drawn of Miss Harrison is by no means decisive with regard to her present situation—Gaiety or gravity are in a great measure constitutional—I consider too great an addiction to the first as a misfortune rather than a fault but am far from thinking that liveliness and innocence are incompatible—Too great freedom of speech or manner in a young woman certainly lessens the respect which is otherwise due to her it enfranchises the bounds that are placed between the sexes puts them too much on a level and tempts libertines to hazard improper freedoms which though rejected and resented necessarily sully the purity of female delicacy and leave a stain behind—for as Lady Mary Wortley Montague has justly said
He comes too near who comes to be denied
Williams is certainly a worthless wretch and I heartily wish that Capt Harrison
may treat him as he deserves but I dont see why you should take the work off his hands and thrust yourself into a scrape unless it be merely pour passer le temps—but if I might advise I shoud think you had better look out for some better amusement and can hardly seek amiss
Joy to you Charles Mrs Selwyn was yesterday brought to bed of a son I suppose you will be one of its sponsors and must of course appear in propria persona Mr Selwyn is you know a formal divine and will not admit of proxies—I was sitting with him when the glad tidings of his sons birth were announced to him he instantly rang his bell and summoned all the servants who were not immediately attending on his lady to prayers—I attempted to retire but he insisted upon my joining in thanksgiving
for the birth of a male child which he said was an happy event let the parents be who they woud
You have made me as errant a scribbler as yourself and I coud go on in this sort of chitchat way for a year together but I have at present a more important though not a more pleasing occupation to pursue My lawsuit draws near a crisis I must pore over musty records and revise briefs in which I shall use the utmost dispatch as my Lucy is then to be my fee—Adieu my friend till I can call you brother
W STANLEY
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
MY dear Stanley I have seized upon the first minutes leisure I have been master of to acquaint you with an unlucky affair that has just now happened and which like all other extraordinary events will I suppose be aggravated in the repetition by a thousand falshoods To you then I commit the care of my fame upon this occasion certain that you will exert the noblest quality of friendship
in my favour that of justifying an absent friend
In order to make you thoroughly acquainted with this unfortunate business I must entreat you to read over the inclosed story of Nancy Weston which I wrote out some time ago as I received it from her own recital intending it for your perusal
THE STORY OF MISS WESTON
Her father died when she was about fourteen and left to her and her mother in money and effects about seven hundred pounds Her mother did not survive his loss above a year and when dying recommended her daughter to the care of a relation who kept a milliners shop in Tavistockstreet—With her Nancy Weston lived perfectly happy for two years till she became
acquainted with a young gentleman whom she had often seen a schoolboy at Winchester though she had never spoken to him there—He endeavoured to persuade her that he had been in love with her from her childhood and used every art to gain her affections and seduce her virtue
In the first he succeeded but too well but she continued proof against every temptation to become his mistress—The only expedient then left to get her into his power was to propose a marriage which he accordingly offered and as they were both under age a journey to Scotland was agreed upon
They set off in the usual runaway mode but her lover had ordered the postilions to travel westward instead
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of northward and when they arrived at Birmingham he told her they were then at Berwick upon Tweed and procured a person in the habit of a clergyman to perform the marriage ceremony—The innocent girl had not the least suspicion of the deceit and returned to London perfectly happy in the firm belief of her being legally married to the man she loved
During their journey both going and coming back he had charged her whenever she was out of his sight to keep a handkerchief close to her mouth and not to utter a syllable to any of the maidservants who attended her This command she had punctually obeyed though the caution was unnecessary for as she had no doubts
she woud not have made any enquiries—
On their return to town he took lodgings for her in a little street near Marybone and told her that she must be contented to live in the utmost privacy and retirement and by no means to assume his name or reveal herself to her relation in Tavistockstreet as his father was living and woud certainly disinherit him if his marriage was discovered—To these prudent restrictions she readily agreed and spent a year almost in the closest consinement hardly ever stirring out but at a very early hour in the morning or in the dusk of the evening—During this period of time she lay in of a daughter which increased her happiness by affording her constant employment in suckling and attending
her and made the tedious hours of her husbands frequent absences pass with less regret away—
As soon as they were married he possessed himself of the little fortune that her parents had left her Mrs Weston not having appointed any trustee and the money being placed in the funds—As his fondness abated his supplied towards her declined and she has frequently had no other subsistence for many days than bread and tea
In this inhuman manner did the monster continue to treat the unhappy girl for near two years till at length upon her venturing gently to remonstrate against his barbarity to his child and her he informed her that she was not any longer to consider herself as his wife and
openly confessed the deceit he had practised against her
The wretched victim became senseless at the shock she received from this discovery in which state he left her and when she had recovered her reason the woman of the house informed her that the gentleman whom she had hitherto called her husband had discharged the lodgings and desired her not to give her any farther credit on his account as he had turned her off and was going abroad for three years
Think my dear Stanley what the wretched Nancy Weston must have suffered at that instant and then tell me if you think there is any punishment too severe to be inflicted upon the fiend who caused her sufferings—The agonies of her mind drove her almost to despair
and had not her maternal tenderness prevailed over her sorrows she woud have terminated them and life together But her child was innocent was helpless and was dear to her and she virtuously resolved to struggle through every misery of life to •arn the means of its support
She immediately stripped herself of every little valuable she possessed in order to discharge her maid and some other trifling debts which she owed in the neighbourhood That done she determined to remove as far from her present situation as possible that she might not be reproached with the slander that her cruel husband had thrown upon her
This left her little to carry with her except her infant which she took in her arms to a twopair of stairs back room that she hired in the Borough and then
making herself as decent as her scanty wardrobe would permit she set out for Tavistockstreet to acquaint her relation with her melancholy circumstances and intreat her to furnish her with work to enable her to subsist herself and her child To compleat her miseries when she arrived at the house she found it oucupied by persons she did not know and was informed that her cousin had been dead above a year before
The elegance of her figure and dejection of her countenance interested the woman of the shop so far that she told her if the people in whose house she lodged or any other person of credit would be bound for her she would take her into the house as an assistant or furnish her with as much work as she coud do—The unhappy girl knowing that she had no friend that would be responsible
for her burst into tears thanked her and withdrew—The good womans heart sympathizing with her distress she recalled her and said for once she would trust to her skill in physiognomy and require no security from her but her face which she believed an honest one then gave her a capuchin to make—And my poor Nancy returned home with the pleasing and virtuous prospect of independance thro the means of honest industry
But misfortune was not inclined to relinquish its victim—for as she returned over Westminster Bridge with hasty steps to succour her child she was encompassed by a mob who had secured a pickpocket and were going to administer the supplemental discipline or common law of ducking to the culprit But as soon as she could get clear
of this riotous assembly she found to her cost that the ministers of justice are not always free from the very vices they correct for one of this selferected tribunal had cut off her pockets in which was every farthing she possessed and what was still a far greater loss the capuchin which the compassionate prepossession of a generous mind had ventured to intrust her with
On discovering her loss the fiend was instantly at her elbow tempting her to wait till the mob should be dispersed and then throw herself into the Thames—At that moment the cries of an infant struck her ear and instantly awakened all the mother in her almost frantic with grief she turned her back upon the shocking scene and with an agonizing heart reached her wretched home
She recollected that she had a silk gown almost as good as new it originally cost about five guineas and she did not doubt but she should be able to sell it for three—But there again she was disappointed the harpies in Monmouthstreet woud not give her more than one guinea and a half for it which she well knew woud not pay for the materials of the capuchin she had lost
At length by stripping herself of almost the whole of her wearing apparel she was enabled to raise the sum of three pounds and went with it directly to her humane employer in Tavistockstreet who listened to her tale with seeming incredulity said she was sorry for her misfortune but if she was subject to such accidents she coud not venture to furnish her with any more work—She then received the full price for her silk
and dismissed her giving her half a crown and a vast deal of good advice against evil company and bad ways
I will not dwell longer on the various scenes of wretchedness this poor creature passed through till her child fell ill of the smallpox and then all her former woes were swallowed up in her tender apprehension for its little life—During its illness she parted with even the common necessaries of raiment she had left and denied herself food to administer to its sustenance Her fond maternal cares were all in vain Providence was pleased to take her little darling she submitted with resignation to its loss when she reflected on the evils that must necessarily await it
Life was now become a load that she determined to lay down but there
needed no act of violence to hasten her dissolution famine and grief had seized upon her heart and in a few hours she woud perhaps have resigned her gentle spirits into His hands who gave it had she been permitted to sigh it out in peace
But the woman in whose house she had lodged for a month was now perfectly convinced of her inability to pay and therefore demanded her rent in the most boisterous terms and threatened to send her immediately to a gaol upon her noncompliance The being a prisoner was the only species of calamity she had not yet experienced her mind was impressed with horror at the idea and whilst her worse than savage landlady went out to seek a constable she stole softly out of the house and fled she knew not whither—Providence
directed her steps to the Park in that auspicious moment that I met her which I shall always consider as one of the fortunate events of my life Here ends her little history—and now for mine—
In my last I told you that I meant to settle this poor friendless creature in partnership with a chamber milliner of good repute—In consequence of this design Nancy Weston came to me yesterday morning to talk over her little plan of business and adjust all matters relative to it—Be it observed that she never had once named the person to whom she had been married nor had I ever asked it—delicacy prevented my making any enquiry when she first told me her story lest my curiosity might be miscontrued into a suspicion of her veracity and my contempt for
a man whom I supposed coud never come across me made me decline the renewal of a subject which must give her pain—This upon my honour is truth
As I said before she was sitting with me when I heard a bustle upon the stairs between Capt Williams and Scipio the former insisting in a laughing tone that he would come up She started at the sound of the voice but when he threw open the door of the room where we sat she cried out O my husband—and sunk senseless on the ground
Williams gazed upon her with a countenance where rage and contempt seemed equally mingled—Then turning to me who was just then raising his unhappy
wise in my arms he said you need not Sir have made a secret to me of your connection with that infamous woman I have long cast her off and it is natural to suppose she has passed thro many hands before she came into yours—But beware Mr Evelyn of repeating any forged tale she may tell you of a sham marriage and such stuff for I will not have my character traduced and remember I have put you on your guard
My astonishment had almost deprived me of the power of speech but Williamss insolence quickly restored it—I replied Sir this roof which I wish you to quit instantly is your present protection but whenever I speak of you I shall talk of a scoundrel and wherever I meet you I will treat you like one
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His wife had by this time thrown herself at his feet from whence he spurned her and rushing into my bedchamber snatched up one of my pistols which lay upon a table—I was lucky enough to seize his arm before he could discharge it but in the struggle between us it went off and wounded himself in the left side—The report of the pistol alarmed the family and in less than five minutes my apartment was crowded with persons of all ranks and denominations whose curiosity seemed so much more prevalent than their humanity that they neither thought of sending for a surgeon for the wounded person nor of offering any assistance to his wife who lay fainting upon the ground by his side
Scipio upon seeing that I was safe leaped for joy and then ran for Mr Lester
Williams was put into my bed I committed Mrs Williams for so I shall henceforth call her to the care of my landlady and set out in company with Mr Herbert and my quondam friend Sewell who arrived at Bath three days ago to related this accident to the mayor The usual forms were complied with these gentlemen became bail for my appearance as I could not think of asking Mrs Williams to give her testimony upon this occasion to acquit me and her husband has not uttered a single word since he received the wound However Mr Lester says he hopes he shall be able to extract the ball and he will then be in a fair way of recovery If with his health he recovers the right use of his reason and reviews his past life with contrition I shall rejoice in his restoration if not
I shall by no means lament the extinction of such a wretch from society
I have had a message from Miss Harrison desiring to see me The moment I have sealed this I shall attend her—I fear it will be an unpleasant interview
I think you will give me credit for being heartily tired of writing—I fear you will believe it feelingly
I sincerely wish success to your lawsuit and am with love to all you love ever yours
C EVELYN
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
York
I HAVE seen her Stanley the arbitress of my fate and it is irrecoverably fixed that I am to be unhappy—Sewell informed me that Lady Juliana was certainly at her late husbands seat at Harleyhill—I set out on the instant but I have not now time to acquaint
you with the particulars of our interview as I have only snatched up the pen while the horses are putting to my chaise in order to retrace the horrid cross roads that I have travelled from Bath hither
An express is this moment arrived from Sewell to acquaint me that Williams is not likely to recover and expresses the most impatient desire to see me—I feel that I shall be sorry for his death
though it comes not near my conscience
I have not been in bed these three nights—What shoud I do there rest has forsaken my pillow I am more in love more distracted and more wretched than any mortal out of the purlieus of Bedlam
Adieu
C EVELYN
LADY JULIANA HARLEY TO MISS LUCY EVELYN
Harleyhill
THE so much dreaded interview is over I have seen your unhappy brother—Do not think me inhuman Lucy when I say that I hope never to see him more—It is my tenderness and not my cruelty that dictates this fervent aspiration
I was just returned from taking the air with Miss Harley who has been here this fortnight and was retired to dress when a chaise drove up to the door and I was informed a gentleman desired to see me As Watson was at that time combing my hair I requested Miss Harley to step into the drawingroom and make my apologies for a few minutes—She returned almost on the instant screaming out it is the ghost of Evelyn
The likeness between your brothers immediately occurred to me at once accounted for her mistake and acquainted me with the name of my visitor I quieted her fears of an apparition and begged her to return to the drawingroom—I was seized with an universal tremor and when Watson had hurried on my cloaths I found
myself unable to walk or stand and desired that Mr Evelyn might be shewn into the dressingroom
As he approached me I made a vain effort to rise and I thought we appeared like two criminals who waited a sentence which they dreaded to receive—Before I coud prevent him he threw himself at my feet and entreated my pardon for having broken in on my retirement and said he had great reason to fear that he was the unhappy cause of my secluding myself from the world Ah Lucy have you betrayed me I told him with great sincerity that retirement was by no means disagreeable to me and that it was so long since I had been engaged in the gaiety of London that I feared I should make but an indifferent figure there
He said many civil things in answer which I shall not repeat and proceeded to avow his passion for me in the tenderest terms I woud have interrupted him but he implored me to give him a patient hearing declaring that if I persisted in declining his addresses he woud immediately quit England his family and friends and never more disturb the happiness he so sincerely wished me I was affected even to tears his looks his manner nay his voice pierced to my heart and recalled the kindred image of one who will ever survive there—I woud erase this passage were I writing to any other person breathing—But let it go I scorn disguise with thee
I then told him that I was highly sensible of the honour he did me that I
had not the least doubt of the sincerity of his regard and therefore would not trifle with his passion but candidly inform him that there was a bar an everlasting bar between us which could not be removed—But that if my promising never to enter into those engagements with any other person which I declined with him could make him happy he might depend upon my word provided he woud in return give up the thoughts of abandoning his country family and friends on my account but endeavour to conquer his illplaced passion and never speak to me upon the unhappy subject more
He said he had already bound himself to abide by my decision though misery shoud be his doom but that he woud by no means consent
to my becoming a sacrifice to a wretch whom he was sure I detested though compassion for his sufferings might incline me to so generous a proposal and that all he coud do in return was with humility to reject the offer and to rid me of his hated presence for that he never coud subscribe to a falshood by saying he coud see me and cease to love
He turned his head aside to hide the manly drops that filled his eyes wiped them away gazed on me for an instant gave a deep sigh and bowing left me
I cannot describe the situation of my mind at that instant tears luckily came to my relief and when Miss Harley came into my dressingroom I appeared more like a forsaken than
a cruel mistress—She triumphed in my distress and sneering said what are you always to weep for an Evelyn—
I shall conclude this tedious letter with entreating that Mrs Selwyn Lady Desmond and you will exert your utmost influence over Mr Evelyn to prevail on him not to quit England Believe me my dear Lucy I am perfectly contented to remain where I am the gay scenes you describe have no charms for me or if they had much rather would I deprive myself of them and even your loved society than rob you of your brother—Adieu my dear my chearful happy friend long may you continue so fervently wishes your affectionate
J HARLEY
MISS EVELYN TO LADY JULIANA HARLEY
WHY surely since the days of Cassandra and Orondates and such other silly gentlemen and ladies of absurd memory there never was and I hope never will be such a pair of ridiculous noodles as Lady Juliana Harley and Charles Evelyn
Whilst I read your letter my face was like an April sky half cloud half sunshine—I could have laughed but that I was vexed and I could have cried but that I was angry
Fye Charles I hate your weeping men yet I dont know why their tears affect one more than those of our own sex But what business have I to reason about such nonsense I am sure it will never be in my power to make Stanley cry though I think I should like mightily to see him pout first and then blubber for he has not a good crying face and I am certain I should laugh at him
And so because your ladyship for what reason I cannot tell does not happen to like my poor unfortunate brother he forsooth must transport
himself into some foreign country and you must remain locked up with that spiteful old Sybil your sisterinlaw in your impenetrable fortress at Harleyhill—Ridiculous as if there was not room enough for you and Charles Evelyn to dwell in this great city without ever meeting for twenty years endways and Ill warrant you by that time that if you shoud chance to knock your heads together you will not tremble nor he weep unless the concussion should happen to be violent indeed
Thank you Lady Juliana you are vastly good indeed to confess your passion for my poor dead brother in order to excuse your cruelty to my poor living one—But I will not accept of such cold confidence
Tell me thou little sly one who is the present possessor of your heart or I shall certainly persuade myself that it has been captivated by some Yorkshire squire that you are ashamed of your choice and therefore make a merit of
Living in shades with him and love alone
I like that idea well enough and I fancy I could be romantic if I would give myself time but I have not leisure—
And shew me to the company
must serve my turn
We have had rare doings at our house—A son and heir born to the noble family of the Selwyns
and how do you think we have testi•ied our joy upon this occasion neither by dancing singing or any other act of festivity I assure you but by wearing out our knees and my poor sisters spirits in praying by her bedside twice aday at least
But to abate my spirits upon this joyful event Lady Desmond writes me word that Sir James does not chuse to come to London this winter and she like a gentle turtle as she is prefers the leasless woods of Delville with her Caro Sposo to all the delights of this gay city without him—By the way their house has been aired and ready to receive them this month past—I have a great mind to take possession of it and set up for myself—If I dont do that I must absolutely marry Stanley that I may be able to a go a
little into the world for I am quite weary of waiting for a chaperon
Well if I do marry I will shew you all the difference my whole time shall be spent in matronizing young ladies unmarried ones I mean—Poor things they are much to be pitied for even a damsel of threescore who has never had an husband must not venture into a public place unless she can persuade some goodnaturd married girl who might perhaps be her granddaughter to let her tag after her
Poor Charles I will beg of him when I see him not to transport himself but transportation is better than hanging and I think as a despairing lover he is bound in honour to do something of that sort
Once more I intreat you if you have either love or regard for me to leave your musty castle and come amongst us I have a very particular reason for desiring it Stanley has got a verdict in his favour he grows importunate I fear I must yield like all bullies I feel myself a coward and shall never be able to keep up my spirits on the tremendous occasion if you do not lend your assistance—The very idea has sunk me to the centre I can no more but adieu
LUCY EVELYN
WILLIAM STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
My dear Charles
I HAVE received both your letters and am sincerely concerned for the very disagreeable situation you are in
With regard to Williamss accident you are by no means accountable for it—But had your hand directed the bullets which were lodged in his side after reading Nancy Westons
story I should not only have acquitted but applauded you for ridding the world of such a monster—But as I think his blood woud stain any hands but those of an executioner I am glad he has done justice on himself particularly as our legislature have not assigned a punishment for crimes like his tho to the full as fatal in their consequences as any of those for which men suffer death
My indignation and pity were both extremely moved whilst I perused your little ← novel → such woud I fain think it for the honour of human nature—But facts are stubborn things and I must tho unwillingly submit to be ranked of the same species with a villain who coud first rob his wife and then leave her and his child to perish
Though I woud by no means have advised your pursuing Lady Juliana to her retreat I congratulate you on the conclusion of your romance for surely my friend will now exert himself to conquer a passion which he must own it woud be the height of folly to indulge any further
My Lucy for proudly do I now look up to a possession of that title dearer far than crowns has received a long letter from your cruel fairone as yet she keeps the contents of it secret but as I hope the day is not far off when we shall be but one I may possibly be acquainted with the particulars of your interview without putting you to the pain of relating them and believe me Charles the less you think talk or write upon this subject the better—We all help
to engrave our misfortunes on our hearts by bearing them constantly in mind and recurring back to them daily as if we were incapable of turning our thoughts to any other subject
The report of Williamss accident has not yet made its way into Clargesstreet and you may assure yourself I shall not be the first to promulgate the intelligence for many and good reasons—Heavens how would Selwyn preach and how terrified would your sisters be—The few persons I have heard mention the affair have been candid enough to suppose that the pistol went off by accident but they all believe that jealousy of a favourite mistress was the occasion of his snatching it up
Fear not my friendship Charles upon this or any other occasion tho I both hope and believe this is the only one I shall ever have to prove it—You know I allow but two tests of this generous affection the not hearing ones friend abused and the sharing ones purse with him—You must be a spendthrift indeed if you shoud ever have recourse to mine—Yet I have some apprehensions of your exhausting your own if you continue to supply Sir James Desmonds necessities which I hear and fear to be very great The•e are no limits to a gamesters wants or a misers wishes and prudence should restrain us from casting wealth into a bottomless pit
If you did not know my heart to be as generous as your own I would
not venture to speak thus freely but the large drafts you have lately made in favour of Sir James Desmond have alarmed my friendship so far as to make me wish to awaken your discretion
I suppose that Sewell is come to follow his laudable vocation at Bath as there was nothing left for him to prey upon at Delville—I cannot help it Charles but I detest that man
I give you joy my friend of my success I have obtained a verdict and shall immediately be put into possession of a fortune sussicient to gratify every honest wish of the human heart—May my Lucy add value to its worth by deigning to accept the full enjoyment of it
I impatiently wish to hear of your safe return to Bath
And am most truly yours W STANLEY
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Bath
MY spirits have been kept in so constant an agitation for some time past by the disagreeable scenes I have been engaged in that I know not whether I have recollection sufficient to describe them to you—However I will strive to methodize my thoughts and
begin by recurring back to my interview with Miss Harrison
I found her pale trembling and in tears—As I entered the room she cried out O Sir what is become of Captain Williams
In as few words as possible I related to her the cause of the unhappy accident that happened at my lodgings and when I mentioned his marriage with Nancy Weston she fell upon her knees and exclaimed—Great Author of all good accept my thanks and withdraw not thy protecting providence from the being thou hast saved from the complicated misery of adding guilt to the sinners soul and sorrow to the wretched and innocent sufferer—This day Sir I was to have been made his wife by such another
marriage I suppose as was his first—The chaise now waits within an hundred yards that was to have carried my maid and me to Bristol where he was to have met us with a clergyman a friend of his who as we were both of age would have dispensed with what he called the unnecessary formality of a licence and married us in private
I most sincerely congratulated this amiable girl upon the providential escape she had met with in not being united to Captain Williams even though his intentions towards her might have been strictly honourable if that were possible in his present circumstances and which without want of charity I think I may reasonably doubt
She appeared extremely affected at Mrs Williamss distress said she hoped her husband would recover to do justice to her merit and reward her sufferings but that she never would upon any account see him more for she could not help owning that she had loved him tenderly—She talked of quitting Bath immediately—As a friend I took the liberty of opposing her intention and advised her not only to remain where she was but to appear as little affected as possible at the misfortune that had befallen her worthless lover—She thanked me for my advice and promised to follow it as far as she might be able
The moment I left Miss Harrison I set off in pursuit of my destiny—you know it Stanley—Fear not that I shall ever attempt to describe the
scene that passed between Lady Juliana and me—No words will ever be able to express my feelings nor no time to erase them from my heart—Yet let me boast her tenderness and tell you that she wept for your unhappy friend—tears do not flow from hatred—angels tears are tears of pity—Whilst I have life I will cherish the fond remembrance of her gentle sorrow—Do not chide me Stanley—The only glimpse I have of happiness is the being certain that she does not hate me—
At my return hither I found Williams in a very dangerous state the surgeons had extracted but one of the balls and he woud not suffer them to proceed any farther till I was present as he seemed to be persuaded that he should die in the operation
I went immediately to his bedside he was in a high fever but perfectly in his senses and his countenance expressive of the extremest anguish—He took me by the hand and said Can you forgive the anxiety I have cost you and look with compassion on a wretch who is now expiating his crimes by the severest torments
I assured him that I sincerely lamented the accident that had reduced him to such a situation and most truly compassionated his sufferings but that I thought they might be relieved if he woud suffer the surgeons to perform the necessary operation of extracting the other ball—He answered No—they cannot ease my pains—that wretched woman—But I own myself accountable for all her crimes and they sit heavy at my
heart—She was innocent when I met with her—and is so still upon my honour—I replied her sufferings are all you have to answer for and they indeed have been great—But were I now even at the point of death I woud attest her innocence with my latest words—I have known all her miseries but by all that is sacred she is free from guilt of any kind—He wept aloud—and with difficulty articulated—then I am still a greater villain
I told him I rejoiced in his contrition as he yet had it in his power in some measure to atone the crimes he had committed by doing justice to his unhappy wife—He remained silent for some time then groaned most heavily—and said—let me see her—but can she bear the sight of
him who would have murdered her I caught the pistol up with an intent to kill her—But Providence directed the wound to my own guilty heart—But all my crimes will be atoned by death—for never shall this bullet leave my side—I do not wish to live life woud be hateful to me—Miss Harrison I have injured her too—believe me she is a virtuous woman Evelyn
I replied I do believe it most sincerely—But do not wander from your present purpose—Your mind will be much easier when you have seen your wife He gazed upon me with a piercing look and said you are a man of honour and coud not be so base as to deceive a dying man You say my wife is guiltless free from stain—Then let her come and
pardon her cruel husband—I repeated every solemn assurance that I could give him of her blameless conduct with which he seemed perfectly satisfied and I went to bring her to his bedside
I found her in the diningroom from whence she had scarcely stirred from the time I left her In her situation it was impossible her mind coud feel repose or her body rest She appeared to me even a more melancholy object than when I met her in the Park her eyes were swoln with tears and her face pale and emaciated When I told her that her husband desired to see her she said it was impossible she dared not coud not look upon the man she had murdered nor coud she ever more know peace or comfort
With much difficulty I reasoned down her groundless apprehensions of having caused his death and led or rather supported her trembling feeble frame to his bedside she dropped upon her knees and I retired quick from a scene that was by much too interesting for my present state of mind
In about an hours time he sent for me he appeared much more composed than when I left him but still in extreme agony—He begged I would consult his surgeon and let him know his real state for he had much to do and he believed but a very short space to get it done—He promised to submit to any operation that shoud be thought necessary to save his life and thanked me a thousand
times for the gleam of peace which I had given to his torn mind
I immediately summoned a consullation of all the physical people of eminence at Bath but they woud not venture to pronounce with any degree of certainty till a further experiment had been made to come at the ball
I acquainted him with their opinions and begged of him to let the trial be instantly made but he peremptorily refused to submit to it till twelve oclock tomorrow as he said he had still more important affairs to execute than that He desired a proper person might be sent for to draw his will and entreated me to obtain a licence and get a clergyman to marry
him in due form at nine oclock tomorrow morning to his present nominal wife He also most earnestly requested me to wait upon Miss Harrison and implore her forgiveness of an unhappy dying man who never coud forgive himself
Need I tell you that I have been strongly affected with Williamss contrition I most sincerely pray that he may live to enjoy the fruits of his repentance and by his future conduct obliterate his past—I have obeyed all his commands and am at present so compleatly harrassed both in mind and body that I must decline entering into the particulars of your letter till another opportunity
I shall be present at Williamss marriage and at the dressing of his
wounds tomorrow but I much fear that I shall see him in his wedding and his winding sheet at once
Adieu
C EVELYN
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
IT is all over with poor Williams A mortification had begun some hours before the time that his surgeons were appointed—He was sensible of his situation by the perfect ease he enjoyed and intreated their humanity not to torture him in vain He bore the certainty of his approaching dissolution with the utmost calmness and
spent the few hours that were allotted him in imploring the forgiveness of heaven and his injured wife—He has bequeathed four hundred pounds a year to Mrs Williams for now she is entitled to that name according to all the forms of law—He has left an hundred guineas to be laid out in a ring for Miss Harrison on which is to be enamelled the word Beware—and has appointed me his residuary legatee
I staid by him the whole day and night and about four oclock this morning he expired—I will not pain you or myself with a description of his melancholy exit—I do not think his widow will survive him long—Tho he has acquitted me in the fullest and handsomest manner of his death I am advised
to take my trial at the ensuing assizes as the lawyers here inform me that if I avoid doing so I shall always be liable to a prosecution which may at some time or other be commenced against me from malice—I must desire you will consult the ablest lawyers in London upon this occasion and let me have their opinions—My mind is oppressed with an uncommon gloom—death is a tremendous subject of contemplation when we view it near—seen in perspective only we cast a transient glance and turn our eyes away—Perhaps it would disrobe the spectre of his terrors were we to look more frequently and steadily upon it
But these reflections are out of season to a joyful heart long may it be before one pang of sorrow shall find
entrance there May Lucy soon increase your happiness by sharing it and may it remain as uninterrupted as the sincere friendship of
C EVELYN
LADY DESMOND TO CHARLES EVELYN
MY dearest Charles I have read in some good author that generosity and gratitude are twins who have never been separated but always subsist in the same heart—In yours then my brother you will find the sentiments of mine sentiments which can only be felt but never expressed or
if they could the sensation would still remain as unintelligible to the bulk of humankind as the idea of a sixth sense
You will perhaps be suprized when I tell you that I have shed more tears this last week than I have for many months before
But joy has its tears as well as grief
And mine were tears of joy
There would be no enduring the transport of conferring happiness on those we love without that kind relief—Surely my brother you must have wept yourself when you made Emma happy
I think myself much obliged to Mr Sewell for the dispatch he made
from Bath to Delville with your bills Every thing here now wears a chearful aspect and I fancy as I look upon the lawn that it has acquired a brighter verdure than it used to wear even in the spring—But though this idea may be imaginary I am certain that my beloved Sir James has cast away the gloom that hung upon his brow and the soft smiles of sweet content now reign triumphant there I think he was even more oppressed with gratitude than me when I delivered your generous gift into his hands—He is gone to London to fulfil the purpose for which it was designed
We shall now have no more creditors for sure I am that he will never more involve himself by play—Tho at this time I could not bring myself
to hint even the most distant desire he should relinquish it but well he knows how ardently I wish he should and as he loves me with the utmost tenderness I cannot doubt his giving me this proof of his affection
Mr Sewell is gone with Sir James to London and I am to follow in a fortnight—Sir James thinks our house cannot be sufficiently aired in less time and would not have me or our dear little Fanny run the hazard of catching cold—I have a thousand apprehensions about his health and earnestly wish that he could have been content to pass the winter here as we had intended
Mr Sewell has informed me that you had paid a visit to Lady Juliana Harley he could not tell me what
was the result though I guess it but too well from his saying that you appeared dejected at your return—Why will you court unhappiness by pursuing perhaps the only woman within your sphere of life that would fly from you Blest as you are with virtue health and fortune why must you add to the too numerous proofs that happiness is not attainable on earth
Forgive me Charles this little opposition to your only irrational pursuit—Few are the persons even amongst the best within whose reach felicity seems placed all must deserve before they can obtain it but even then we sometimes cast it from us and like Ixion grasp a cloud—May you reverse the fable and long enjoy what you so well deserve My little Fannys playful fondness will
not suffer me longer to indulge in expressing the ardent wishes of my heart for my loved friend and brother but from that source they shall for ever flow to the Great Fountain of all good to bless protect and guide you
Your grateful E DESMOND
CHARLES EVELYN TO LADY DESMOND
I SINCERELY wish that my dear Emmas nerves were a little stronger for though I confess myself extremely pleased with the tenderness of your letter I for your sake lament the sensibility which dictated it—This is not a world for delicate minds to be happy in
Nor peace nor ease that heart can know
That like the needle true
Turns at the touch of joy or woe
But turning trembles too
There never was a sentiment more elegantly expressed—I would rather have been the author of that single stanza than of a dozen volumes of poetry nay and of good poetry too But why my Emma will you distress me by talking of gratitude Of what value is wealth if it does not enable us to purchase happiness and to diffuse is to enjoy it the greatest miser upon earth cannot confine his possessions solely to himself nor can the most luxurious man that lives appropriate to his own use the tithe of what he dissipates—He who bestows preserves his property a gift once made cannot be lessened it is a fund established in
a grateful heart which even the great destroyer Time cannot impair
But holding riches lightly as I do I would not wish that mine should flit away on the gross pinions of Folly or of Vice I therefore intreat you to exert all the influence you have over your beloved Sir James to prevail on him to conquer a passion that must come under one or other of those denominations—You must know that I mean his love of play
Yet I approve of your delicacy in not mentioning the subject at a time when it might have appeared like making conditions for what he thought a favour and indeed I should be better pleased if he were voluntarily to renounce gaming than if he sacrificed
his inclination even to your request
One of those harpies whom I saw at Delville a Mr Simpson has I hear lost large sums of money here—I am glad Sir James is not near enough to assist in repairing his losses—I think Mr Sewell a worthy and I may add a sensible man as he has had prudence enough to relinquish gaming—He professes the sincerest regard for both you and your husband—However I think I have a little reason to chide that he shoud inform me of Sir Jamess difficulties—Was he more worthy of my Emmas confidence than I
I am very glad to hear you are going to London dissipation contrary to its usual effects will be of infinite
service to you The generality of public entertainments which are frequented by persons of rank are calculated entirely to amuse the senses the heart has nothing to do with them and of course insensibly retires within itself its feelings lie dormant its sensibility becomes obtuse and I am apt to think that persons who live in a constant circle of dissipation do not know that they have an heart—But as I am by no means apprehensive that you are likely to forget that part of your anatomy I shall be glad the little flutterer shoud repose for a time in the apathy of what is so falsely stiled pleasure
I hope you will be time enough in town to be present at our dear Lucys wedding—I wish you coud contrive to call upon me in your journey it
will not be much out of your road and if we do not meet here it may be very long before we do
I thank you for the tender concern you express for me on account of my unhappy passion it is the only subject on which I would not listen to my Emmas advice—But remember my sister—They never knew to love that knew to change and be assured that no other woman can ever make the slightest impression upon the heart of your sincerely affectionate brother
C EVELYN
GEORGE SEWELL TO JOHN SIMPSON
WHAT the devil could prevent you Jack from meeting us at Salisbury Do you know that the baronet has been very near slipping through our hands and that at the very time when he is best worth our holding Why man we have found a mine the treasures of the East lie before us
Evelyns whole fortune may be ours Lady Desmond has got a key to his purse out of which she will certainly fill her husbands and we the galant knights of industry will as surely empty it
But to explain this mystery We were all in a doleful way when you like a false friend left us at Delville Not a shilling to be raised not a stake left unmortgaged but my ladys jointure and the baronet swore he would perish rather than rob his wife The intended journey to London was entirely laid aside and they were to pass the winter solus cum sola—He grew grave and peevish she retained her usual gentle chearfulness upon my soul Jack she is a very amiable woman and I am really glad we did not meddle with the jointure particularly
as we can now do very well without it
It was impossible for me to think of remaining in such a dull scene where I knew there was nothing to be got so I made a few wry faces at table talked of a flying gout and set out to drink the Bath water which like the Irish usquebaugh has always a little gold floating in it which may be easily extracted by such ingenious chymists as you and I
To my great joy one of the first persons I met with there was the prudent and sensible Mr Charles Evelyn—I had you know ingratiated myself into his good opinion at Delville by advising Sir James Desmond against play and I resolved to strengthen his prepossession by declaring that I had
entirely left it off myself—That was a stroke beyond you Simpson—I was fortunate enough to be able to acquaint him with the place of his Dulcineas retreat which he considered as a real obligation—There has not been such a Quixote in England these fifty years—Before he set out on his wildgoose chase I took occasion to mention the distressed situation of the Desmond family but under the seal of secrecy as I told him I knew the baronets pride would never suffer him to reveal the consequences of that misconduct he now so sincerely repented of—I talked in raptures of Lady Desmonds virtues and swore that Sir James and she would be the happiest couple on earth if their circumstances were tolerably easy—The gudgeon bit and immediately asked me what sum I thought would relieve
Sir James from his present difficulties I hesitated to pronounce but upon being pressed said I imagined four or five thousand pounds would discharge all his impatient creditors though I well knew that thrice that sum would not extricate him
The idiot Evelyn whom I suppose to be as rich as the Great Mogul sat down directly and drew drafts for six thousand pounds in favour of Sir James Desmond and as soon as they returned accepted consigned them to my friendly care to be delivered into the hands of his fair sister—And am I not a friend indeed for I dont expect above half this sum to roll into your pocket or mine
Both Sir James and Lady Desmond were strongly affected at this proof of
Evelyns generosity and the former was very near making a vow never to play again—I trembled lest his wife should have strengthened his wavering resolution by making it her request but if she had I would have laid five to three against any promise that Sir James could make for a man may as easily be cured of the hydrophobia as of an itch for gaming—All I feared was that he might get into other hands and therefore wrote to you to meet and accompany us to London for to be sure if he was not an egregious gull he must be surprized at our constant good luck
I contrived as I wrote you word that we should lye at Salisbury—After supper the baronet seemed pensive I pushed about the bottle and expected he would call for cards but he yawned
and talked of going to bed—On which I stept out of the room and returned in a moment with a box and dice and proposed taking a cast or two merely to amuse the time for silver—He could not resist the dear temptation and that jilt fortune and my own negligence in not having a die in my pocket turned against me and I lost an hundred guineas—But tant mieux say I tis a good bait and will catch thousands—The baronet exulted violently as all those fellows do that are not used to win—I congratulated him on the change of his luck said Fortune was certainly weary of persecuting him and that it was highly probable he would now recover all his former losses—He smiled at the idea and went to bed in high spirits
We did not get to town till late last night and then parted this day he dines with his brotherinlaw Selwyn and has desired me to meet him in the evening at his own house—I have accepted the invitation and shall go properly prepared In my next I hope to give you a good account of him or his money which is a much better thing—I am sorry you are not here we must strike while the iron is hot and rescue his dear guineas from falling into the hands of odious vulgar tradesmen as Lady Townley says
I hope you are successful at Bath though there is danger there of meeting with your match and give me leave to say you are not qualified for such an encounter—you lose your
temper with your money and know not how to retire with the easy gentlemanlike sans froid of yours
G SEWELL
LADY JULIANA HARLEY TO MISS EVELYN
Yes my Lucy I will hasten to your relief or rather to my own—Miss Harleys ill temper has rendered this place so hateful to me that I can no longer abide int
Surely there is a fatality that attends the meeting of an Evelyn and an Harley—From the moment that your brother left this house she has
treated me with the utmost asperity—She says she is certain that the whole race of Evelyns are idiots or that I must have given them philtres—But it is they not me who have the art of fascination for this poor lady is become enamoured by a single glance of your brother—Perhaps the sudden fright she received from the strong resemblance between him and the lamented Henry has occasioned this extraordinary prepossession—though love is by no means the offspring of fear—But no matter for the cause the effects have been dreadful to me and I am resolved to withdraw myself from them as quickly as possible
Heaven knows that this poor sinking heart of mine needs not to have its sorrows aggravated—Tis true my Lucy that your brother and I are
not under an absolute necessity of meeting yet surely unless he or I relinquish the enjoyment of your society we cannot well avoid it—Justice and reason ordain that I should make the sacrifice and what a desart will London be to me deprived of your sweet converse
On the approaching I hope happy event of your changing your name—
O name for ever sad for ever dear
—I beg if Mr Evelyn should be in London that his presence may be considered as more essential on that occasion than mine—My Lucy does but jest when she talks of terrors at giving her hand where she has long since bestowed her heart—Though I will allow that even thus happily circumstanced there is something
extremely awful in the marriage contract to a sensible and delicate mind I have often wondered where those very young ladies who elope from their families and friends have found resolution sufficient to support themselves thro that solemn ceremony But think what she endures who is compelled to make a joyless loveless vow
I purpose being in London by this day fortnight but let me conjure you not to delay Mr Stanleys happiness upon my account your sister Selwyn whom I sincerely congratulate will support your spirits and to say truth my Lucy I woud rather be excused from being present at a ceremony where love hope and joy shoud fill each chearful heart—These charming sensations have alas been
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long banished from mine and the only pleasing one which now inhabits there is the affectionate regard with which
I am most truly yours J HARLEY
MISS EVELYN TO LADY JULIANA HARLEY
THANK you my good Miss Harley with all my heart for having been able to effect by the pure dint of a diabolical disposition what all the earnest entreaties of Lady Julianas favourite friend had solicited in vain Old adages have always been highly esteemed by me for I firmly believe our ancestors were wiser than
the present generation and the needs must I shall henceforth look upon as an oracular truth—I ask ten thousand pardons thou departed spirit of Chesterfield for having ventured to quote an old proverb against your injunction
I am delighted at the idea of Miss Harleys falling in love by a coup doeil and shall certainly congratulate Charles on his conquest Dry wood is more apt to take fire than when tis green we all know but why the deuce came Miss Touchwood to make such a smoke and pother—I never knew but one person besides Miss Harley whose temper was not softened by love she poor dear was a middleaged Lady also and the fonder she grew of her lover the more spiteful she became to
all the rest of the world—But various are the effects of the same disease upon the human body and as various are the effects of the self-same passion upon the human mind—I think that last a good pretty philosophical sort of a sentence—Tis poetical at least
And so my dear Lady you are pleased to say that I do but jest when I talk of terrors in regard to a certain event and in the very next line you kindly allow that there is something very awful in a marriage contract to a sensible and delicate mind
Thank you my sweet friend for this obliging inuendo—but I am not in a humour to quarrel and the only revenge I desire to take for this sly hint is to insist upon your being present at my nuptials I think that sounds better than wedding and conveys a
more dignified idea of the solemn ceremony To be serious—for I am not merry though
I do beguile the thing I am
With seeming otherwise
I feel that there is something very tremendous in uniting our fate with that of a person whose temper and sentiments it is impossible we should be thoroughly acquainted with and becoming as it were dependent upon another for our temporal and eternal happiness—For I agree with Dr Tillotson That an unhappy marriage is a lesser Hell in passage to the greater—
I tremble whilst I write this sentence—yet wherefore shoud I be so much alarmed Stanley is generous and humane and shoud he even
cease to love me—shocking thought I will not dwell upon the gloomy subject—Now for the other end of the perspective—We have got the prettiest house imaginable very near Berkeleysquare not far from my sister Selwyns and in the same street with Emma—Apropos Sir James Desmond is come to town and her ladyship is expected in a few days he seems in high spirits which I rejoice at because I know my sisters gentle nerves are always in strict unison with his—I should be glad to know if she is very happy—If she is not Lord have mercy upon me for I never shall make half so good a wife and yet I assure you I am resolved to be as good as I possibly can
I did not intend to write above six lines when I took up the pen and they were meant to tell you
That I vow and declare
And still more I swear
That while in the country you tarry
I may laugh jest or sing
Or do any odd thing
But depend on it I will not marry
Theres an extempore for you—We have a great deal of company to dine and I must dress
Your ladyships most humble LUCY EVELYN
WILLIAM STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
I BY no means wonder at the oppression of spirits you seemed to labour under when you last wrote to me—Such a succession of melanchcly scenes woud unstring the nerves of an Hercules—I know not how to say I am sorry for Williams and yet I feel something like concern for his death mixed with a fear that if he had
lived he woud have relapsed into his former errors To conquer habitual vice is a more than Herculean labour it requires strength of mind and preseverance qualities which are seldom to be met with in a vicious person—for all kinds of baseness enervates the soul and render it averse from pain or difficulty—But peace be with his ashes and may his widow live to enjoy content if not felicity
I have consulted some of our ablest lawyers and they agree in desiring you should take your trial at the ensuing assizes but I hope neither this or any other business will prevent your being a witness and partaker of my happiness in receiving the completion of my every wish from my dear Lucys hand
The long desired day is at length fixed for the eighteenth of next month—By that time Lady Desmond and Lady Juliana Harley will both be in London and my Lucy says will both be present at what she calls the awful ceremony
After this hint I think I need not press your coming but let me intreat you my dear Charles upon this occasion to cast off your glooms and sables—
For if looking well wont move her
Looking ill will neer prevail
It is a general remark that grave ladies like sprightly men—Contrasts oftener create affection than similarity—in manners only I mean—for there must be a sympathy of sentiment to form a perfect love—
Her taste
was his own
is one of the very best reasons for a real attachment that I know of
I write in haste for I resent the loss of every moment which I do not enjoy in my Lucys company—My carriage waits to convey me to Clargesstreet you will therefore I hope forgive this abrupt adieu
W STANLEY
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Bath
NO Stanley no my friend I will not damp your joys nor gloom nor sorrow shall obtrude on your festivity—I never shall put on a wedding garment and therefore will not be a guest at yours—Yet shall my heart most truly sympathize
in my friends happiness nor can his own form any wish more ardent that it may be lasting
Lucy has many good and amiable qualities and will I am convinced exert them all to insure the happiness of the man she loves—I dont know any young woman better qualified to make a good wife she has an excellent temper and constant spirits and I am persuaded that chearsulness is a very necessary ingredient in matrimony—The languid and dejected part of her sex seem to claim a constant exertion of their husbands tenderness they appear to be incapable of bearing their part in the difficulties or distresses of life and of course throw the whole load upon the men—But tho tis natural to love the being we protect tis as reasonable to expect that
the companion of our journey through life should at least endeavour to enliven the dreary part of the road and make it seem less tiresome—You know the adage
Jucunda comes in viâ pro vehiculo est
Such a one I hope you will find in my sister and may your journey be long but not tedious
Believe me my friend I am sincerely rejoiced at hearing that Lady Juliana means to return to the world and her friends again—May every happiness the world can give be hers—and never never shall I interrupt it—How could you think that I would break my promise and sink myself in her esteem I scarce can pardon the idea
My gentle Emma too will grace your wedding—too surely may I say my heart will be amongst ye—The rest of me the mere animal body will remain here till after the assizes and when they are over I shall accompany Miss Harrison and her brother to Ireland—He is a very sensible elegant man and thinks himself obliged to me for the attention I have shewn to his sister
Poor Mrs Williams continues in a very weak and languid state of health fortune cannot repair the wrongs it has already done her her physicians have hopes of her recovery from drinking the Bristol waters next summer but I can scarcely form a hope that she will remain amongst us long enough to try their efficacy
Present my sincerest congratulations to your fair bride though I shall write to her and my sister Selwyn by next post
Farewell my Stanley and be assured that even the name of brother cannot add to the unfeigned regard with which
I am unalterably yours C EVELYN
MISS LUCY EVELYN TO CHARLES EVELYN
ClargesStreet
My dear Charles
I WILL not say with Beatrice
Against my will I am sent to bid you come to dinner
—For with my whole heart that is with all that I have left of it do I intreat your company on the eighteenth inst—Surely
my good my generous brother will not deny to grant the only request that I have ever made to him
Should you refuse even your princely present would lose its lustre in my eyes or at least your unkindness will diminish its brilliancy for indeed I have set my heart upon your coming and one should not be crossed upon ones weddingday—Let the honeymoon at least shine unclouded to its wain—Suppose Lady Juliana should be there she is no gorgon—She has the beauty indeed of the Medusa head but without its terrors—For my life I cant find out why you and she are so horridly afraid of each other—I am certain that if you never meet you will never come together and I think that is an event that might probably
enough be brought about if you did not take so much pains to avoid it—Neither women nor men I fancy should be understood au piè du lettre upon the article of love—both sides generally say more than they literally mean—For my part I know have told Mr Stanley twenty times that I should never marry and heartily sorry should I now be if he had been such a dunce as to have taken me at my word
For shame then Charles take courage and dont give out on a first denial—
All women should be wood
And not unsought be won
But let this matter be settled between you and your fair relict as you please
it has nothing to do with my request with which I again intreat your compliance and am most affectionately
Yours L EVELYN
P S Castlefranc has executed your commission in a most elegant taste—Thank you my sweet brother for the handsomest pair of earrings I ever saw—I mean to surprize Mr Stanley with them and will never forgive you if you are not present to enjoy his astonishment and hear Mr Selwyns remarks on the folly and vanity of such fopperies
LADY DESMOND TO CHARLES EVELYN
Charlesstreet Berkeleysquare
NOT all the gay and pleasing scenes in which I have been engaged since my arrival here have been able to efface the tender melancholy I felt at bidding you adieu—Though we parted at the Devizes you accompanied me all the way to London not
even my little Fannys chearful prattle and innocent curiosity could rouse me sufficiently from my reverie to make me answer her questions rationally—My mind was totally occupied on the peculiar unhappiness of yours in not being able to conquer a passion which you acknowledge to be hopeless
My anxiety for you has rendered me unjust I could not receive Lady Juliana with the cordiality and affection I used to feel for her nor cast my eyes upon her elegant form without wishing to lessen her charms—No woman ever took more pains to depreciate a rivals beauties to a wavering lover than I have done to find some fault with hers—But it is in vain—I cannot discover a single imperfection except her being the cause
though an innocent one of your unhappiness—I think she is thinner than she was when you saw her at Delville and is almost as much spiritualized though without the appearance of ill health as your fair idea Mrs Williams for whose recovery I am much interested and intreat you to present my best wishes to her
Lady Juliana endeavoured to appear chearful at my sisters wedding but every one might see she strove to be so—What cause can be assigned for such a depression of spirits in one who is surrounded with all the outward signs of happiness—She cannot surely love in vain—I know not what to think of her—But this is the last time that even your intreaties shall prevail on me to mention her again
I have been involved in a continued circle or rather whirl of public and private amusements ever since I came to town yet I feel I have an heart and that it grieves for you—I look back with pleasure on the three days I spent with you at Bath though there is a good deal of regret mingled with the recollection at not having had it in my power to persuade you to come up to London
Mr and Mrs Stanley are as happy as it is possible to be and with true joy I say they have a prospect of continuing so if happiness were a perennial flower—But alas few are the soils in which it always blooms—In most that I have seen tis but an annual nay sometimes blasted eer it can take root—Tis a celestial plant
and was not meant to flourish here below
Do not from hence conclude I am unhappy if I were I should deserve to be so for I should be ungrateful to Providence and to you—No let my thankful heart acknowledge its felicity by saying that my beloved Sir James and Fanny both are well and that I am to the best of brothers an affectionate sister
E DESMOND
GEORGE SEWELL TO JOHN SIMPSON
DEVILISH bad indeed Jack what routed horse and foot Stephens undone as well as you—No hopes of repairing the damage but by my success—Let me tell you gentlemen this will never do—You are mistaken if you fancy I have touched all the Baronets cash—No more than a paltry
seven hundred has come to my share—I was obliged to take in a partner as Sir James objected to playing with me têteatête for large sums—Not from any suspicion but as I was his friend he did not chuse to win my money Scrupulous idiot he need not have feared hurting me—A gamester like an historian should have neither country religion or friends—There must be no boggling I called in Kelly and passed him for a rich West Indian—We divided fourteen hundred for as Kelly is not of our set he insisted on the ready—He is an errant Jew and it grieved me to go snacks with such a niggardly rascal
However it was lucky that I struck the iron while twas hot for since my ladys arrival in town the Baronet has not touched a die—There has been a wedding in the family and a
deal of dining and supping together—The new brotherinlaw Mr Stanley is I fancy a devilish keen one—I was in hopes to have touched him for a little of his wifes fortune but upon Sir James proposing play a few nights ago at his own house this same wiseacre talked of gaming and gamesters in such a stile as made me almost blush and wish myself fairly out of the company—I perceive there is nothing to be got by him
Though Lady Desmond appears the gentlest of beings I begin to fancy that her husband is a little in awe of her from his not venturing to play since she came to town—If this shoud be the case I will take care that her reign shall be short by throwing out hints of his apparent subjection at which I am sure the
Baronets pride will revolt and then let her ladyship look to her jointure—If I can cure his qualms about it I shall have none of my own hencesorward—
There is a good clever woman in their set that I think has spirit enough for any thing a Madam du Pont she loves play and seems to understand it but I fancy she is poor Suppose we were to admit her of our society women are the best decoyducks in the world—I dont fancy she would have many scruples for I have heard that she is an infamous daughter to an indulgent mother whose circumstances she has ruined—
I have some doubts about Monsieur her husband he seems to be a man of honour but if he is fond of her he will easily be converted into—
What I do not like to answer the question
It is devilish hard lads that we must be confined to this piddling work—If they had not black balled us at the great clubs we might have rolled in our chariots long since not but that there are many of our fraternity amongst them and some not half such honest fellows as ourselves—
I enclose you bills for five hundred to make a push with—I desire Jack that you will be cautious how you play with foreigners they generally know as much of the matter as we do The East and West Indians are our best marks—Full purses and honest hearts the true ferae naturâ for gentlemen gamesters
I have just received a message from Sir James Lady Desmond goes to a ball he has strained his ancle and desires to see me—It is not impossible that I may make him dance without a fiddle before the night is over Luck attend us all adieu—
GEORGE SEWELL
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Bath
MY trial is over and I stand acquitted by the laws of the land as well as my own conscience—The process was very short Williams had taken every possible precaution to secure both my life and honour—Poor fellow I wish he had taken as much pains to preserve his own
The formalities of a court of judicature even to a mind conscious of its innocence and certain of acquital have something very awful in them—I am amazed how any person who stands self convicted is able to support himself on such a tremendous occasion Shakespear says
—Ive heard
That guilty creatures sitting at a play
Have by the very cunning of the scene
Been struck so to the soul that presently
They have proclaimed their malefactions
I should think such an effect much more likely to be produced by putting a culprit on his trial at least I am sure I should plead guilty if I was conscious of being so—But we are not judges of situations that we have not experienced and perhaps if I was capable of committing murder
I might be mean enough to deny my guilt for the poor privilege of carrying upanddown a wretched restless being
But away with these Tyburn topicks and let me talk to you of love and joy—To you I trust they are terms synonimous to me they never can or will be so But tell me Stanley how does your lively bride become that character—has she assumed an air of dignity and put the matron on even with the wedding ring as I have seen young ladies do ere now—or is she still the same unaffected pleasant Lucy not changed in any thing but name—How go the Selwyns and the Desmonds on—And answer me this once has Lady Juliana ever mentioned me—
There is a fister in law of hers here at present a Miss Hartley she did me the honour to address me in the rooms from having seen me for a moment at Harley Hill I had not the least recollection of her—How should I—I saw her not nor shoud have seen the Grecian Venus had she stood before me—I had no eyes but for one single object But I will not indulge myself with dwelling on the dear painful subject
Miss Harley has been particularly civil to the Harrisons and me I almost fancy she likes the Captain and tis a very probable conjecture for he is extremely agreeable both in his person and manners yet I shall be sorry if it is so for I would not have any one who bears the name of Harley wretched and I am pretty sure
that his affections are already bestowed upon Mrs Williams but I fear he will not be successful there as he has a potent rival in the grim king of terrors who lurks in ambush even beneath her smiles
I purpose setting out for Ireland in about ten days if my sisters have any commissions to execute I beg they will employ me as I am to them and you a sincerely affectionate brother
C EVELYN
MRS STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
Charlesstreet Berkeleysquare
I HAVE snatched the pen from my husband—how oddly that word looks because I am resolved to answer for myself as I have heard it remarked that one shoud never rely upon what a man says of his wife—Theres another queer word—and because
I have a secret to tell you that I dont chuse to trust Mr Stanley with—You see that I am already au fait of the mysteries of matrimony and understand my place
Now to your queries—I have not assumed any matronly airs as yet merely because I dont think they would become me—Besides the man likes me as I am at present but the moment I perceive the least alteration in his manners towards me Ill turn the tables upon him study the Graces become at once a very dignified fine lady scorn to laugh at any thing however ridiculous and be as dull and as formal as any Donna Elvira at the Court of Madrid—If variety has charms such a contrast surely must delight him
Now for my secret—Hush let me whisper in your ear—It is not Captain Harrison but Charles Evelyn that has captivated the tender heart of the young and beautiful Miss Harley—Lady Juliana assures me that her sisterinlaw is very little turned of thirty but were I to judge I think we might add ten to the score and bring her almost on the road to fifty—But were she fifteen I shoud not like her but that is no reason for your dislike and now that I am married and settled as it were I woud fain have you in the same predicament—Yet I wish you to look somewhere else for a wife as I am persuaded there never will be a match between a Harley and an Evelyn
They say the Irish ladies are remarkably handsome who knows but
some fair bogtrotter may lay hold of your heart and transmogrify you into a brogueneer—You ask me for commissions bring me over a sisterinlaw and I wont trouble you for any else but if you return single I desire you to bring me a great quantity of Irish stuff and every other kind of countraband commodity you can contrive to smuggle that is the manufacture of that country
I know you wont think my letter worth the postage if I dont say something of Lady Juliana—Seriously Charles she gives me great uneasiness both her health and spirits decline visibly and I am certain there is a cruel something that preys upon her heart—She laments her being the cause of your absenting yourself from your family yet highly approves
your shunning her—She sometimes talks of going abroad but I dont believe she will ever have resolution enough to travel for even I cannot prevail on her to stir from her own fireside—In short she is a riddle too difficult for me to expound
The Selwyns and Desmonds all salute you as does my sposo and your affectionate sister
LUCY STANLEY
P S Madame Du Pont whom you will possibly know better by the name of Maria Morton desires her compliments to you—She is a great deal with us at present as my brother and sister Desmond seem to have taken a particular liking for her—I think she is more agreeable as Madam du Pont
than she was as Miss Morton—But I hear shocking stories of her behaviour to her mother—If they are true I shall renounce her—for to me not all the charms of wit and beauty can compensate for a bad heart—Pray write from Ireland and tell me all about it
GEORGE SEWELL TO JOHN SIMPSON
SO the wheel is gone round I find and you are now pretty near the top—Climb away Jack but remember to sit fast when you get on the pinnacle—Such another tumble as your last would go near to undo us
Dame Fortune has been pleased to give me a lift also yet I could not have gone on cleverly if you had not supplied me with the ready—The baronets cash is exhausted and I have been kind enough to furnish him with a brace of hundreds which added to the sum he has lost to me since I wrote last makes a cool thousand and all I have to shew for it is a piece of stamped paper bond and warrant my boy thats all
Give me credit Jack I am a Machiavel in politics—Madame Du Pont is the finest bait I ever had to angle with she is really a woman of sense and spirit and will very soon be as adroit as any of our fraternity—Her husband is a silly fellow but he is a Frenchman and suffers her to do just what she pleases—She coquets
with the baronet and he loses his money with the best grace imaginable—Filthy dice are banished Monsieur Du Pont thinks it too masculine for ladies to play at hazard and the noise of the box gives Lady Desmond the headach—I am much mistaken if the heartach is not added to her other complaints very soon—So now we only piddle at loo quinze pharo vingt et un
Lady Desmond never plays and I think she begins to look coldly on her female friend but while Sir Jamess warmth continues her ladyships frigidity is of small consequence—The only end it can answer will be to disgust her husband for she is too timid to oppose him and our fair ally is not of a humour to be easily discouraged
where either her pleasure or profit is concerned
I rejoice to hear that Evelyn is gone to Ireland I was devilishly afraid he would have come athwart us—I made him believe I had left off play and I must have looked silly if he had found me at it—I wish we were as fairly rid of Stanley—I cant bear that man—I dont know why but I shrink before him and yet I am no coward Jack—A man should have courage that plays all the game and yet not affect the bully either—I have seen you much too hot upon some occasions—But I hope that humour was pretty well corrected by your Irish expedition
I wish you joy of your lordly nabob—he is a prize indeed—Stick
to him like a leech Jack for there can be no sin in robbing those who have robbed others—Tis every honest mans duty to recover stolen goods from a thief though he had no original claim to the property—Go on and prosper then
Yours GEORGE SEWELL
CHARLES EVELYN TO MRS STANLEY
Bath
I HAVE not words to express the pain I have suffered from your last letter—Her health and spirits decline visibly—A cruel something preys upon her heart
O Lucy how could you write those words and not efface them with your tears—I thought I had already experienced every species of anguish that could be inflicted by disappointed love—From respect and tenderness to the dear cause of all my sufferings I had brought my humbled mind to such a state of acquiescence as to forbear complaining—Nay I am persuaded I could without repining have endured to see her married to the object of her choice—But to know she is unhappy must render me so beyond a hope of cure—I have been long labouring to consider this idol of my heart as misers do their hidden treasure though hopeless of enjoying it yet while I thought twas safe I could not look upon myself undone—Now I am robbed of my ideal wealth and am left poor indeed
O Lucy if you ever loved me strive I conjure you to assuage her gentle sorrows and pour the balm of friendship on her wounded heart Gracious heaven what can the affliction be that thus oppresses her mild spirits Would I could bear it for her and ease her troubled breast
Perhaps this place or Bristol might be of service to her health perhaps tis that alone which is impaired and the now coming spring may with its vernal breezes bring back health to her and happiness to me—Comparative happiness I mean for I have long been wretched but never was completely so till now
Let Lady Juliana know that I shall quit this place immediately—You
know that I intended it before but if I had not nothing on earth should now detain me here I would fly to the Antipodes to leave it free for her Surely my fate is singularly severe that thus impels me to a voluntary banishment from every place in which my happiness is centered
I cannot Lucy enter into your raillery in regard to Miss Harley I do not think her amiable but were she all that coud attract Envy in woman or desire in man her charms woud be intirely lost on me—My eyes are closed to beauty I only feel its power when I turn them inward and gaze upon the image in my heart
I am sorry to hear that Madam Du Pont is so intimate with Emma
tho I am certain it will never be in her power to pervert her principles or render her heart callous yet from the hint you give and my own observation I by no means think her an eligible companion for my sister—A female mind cannot have too much delicacy provided that it does not degenerate into affectation—A gross or boisterous woman is an unnatural character and were I married I had much rather my wife should converse with men than monsters
The freedom that subsists between female friends renders the conversation of such a person as I have mentioned infinitely more dangerous than that of a malelibertine—A woman easily sees thro his designs and may if she pleases be on her
guard against them—While the insiduous companion of her private hours without alarming saps the foundation of her every virtue
But grant they should be fixed and are impregnable will not the tainted gale by often passing oer the beauteous flower tarnish its lustre abate its fragrant scent take off its polish and fade its blooming tints As chaste as delicate believe me Lucy as the opening rose shoud be the female heart
Not even the present anxiety of my mind can render me indifferent to the happiness of one with whom I am so tenderly connected as Lady Desmond—Read the above passage
to her and I am certain she will want no further caution
I shall set out for Ireland tomorrow—Remember my sister tho sure I need not urge your friendship that the treasure of my heart is committed to your care and may your kind attention be rewarded with the restoration of Lady Julianas health and happiness
Present my affections to our sisters to yours and my Stanley and write soon I intreat you to your unhappy and affectionate brother
C EVELYN
P S Direct for me at Captain Harrisons Kildarestreet Dublin—I am all amazement—Harrison is just come in and tells me that Miss Harley has offered to accompany his sister to Ireland What can she mean She shall not go if I can prevent it
THE STORY OF LADY JULIANA HARLEY
A NOVEL
IN LETTERS
BY MRS GRIFFITH
VOL II
LONDON PRINTED FOR T CADELL IN THE STRAND
MDCCLXXVI
THE STORY OF LADY JULIANA HARLEY
MRS STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
WHY thou dear Don all Dons excelling from Don Bellianis of Greece to Don Dismallo Thickskullo Halfwitto of Spain how shall I be able to accommodate my style to thy romantic strains Upon my life Charles a few such lovers as you would be sufficient to
restore the golden age of chivalry once more and reinstate our mortal sex in their former rank of deities altars and oblations would soon become the ton and the grand tour be exchanged for pilgrimages to our shrines
But for my own part I should never be able to endure such formal modes of proceeding—I should hate to be stuck up in a niche to be prayed to I dare swear that as music is generally a concommitant of devotion I should be tempted on the sound of a fiddle to step down take my kneeling votary by the hand and frisk a cotillon with him
Your Julianas and your Emmas are the right sort of people for such Platonic courtship—Gentle creatures who are apt to sigh and look pale by the hour without being able to tell why
But now to relieve part of your fond anxiety I shall acquaint you that the fair Julianas health is better than when I wrote last to you though I cannot flatter you with the least hope that her disposition towards you is the least amended by her getting the better of her indisposition—And therefore my dear dear brother let me seriously entreat you to resolve upon conquering this same—I was very near calling it a nonsensical passion—hopeless you acknowledge it to be and there needs nothing more to render it synonymous
Why you outdo Petrarch himself in constancy—For dame Laura notwithstanding the sublimity of her virtue coquetted a little with him now and then and whenever she thought that her cruelty would kill—or cure him—she treated him with a kind glance or a few civil speeches to keep him and his hopes too
from expiring—Have you met with this charming book the Life of Petrarch I mean—Tis universally and I will say justly admired because Mr Stanley who you know brother ecce signum has a good taste ag•ees with me in thinking it one of the most entertaining works that has been published these many years—and yet I would not have you read it because I fear the delicate and tender sentiments it abounds with might serve to superrefine you too much
I am all impatience to know whether Miss Harley went with you to Ireland and how you like the people and the country c c c
I shewed your letter to Emma and she seemed to feel a little jealousy at your not addressing it to her instead of me but I told her what I believe to be true that the hint was equally meant
sor us both and may say with regard to Madame Dupont that it was needless to either for from a thorough knowledge of her character in which I confess I had been much deceived we have conceived a mutual dislike to her—This however she either does not or will not see for she continues to visit my sister Desmond very frequently who is much too gentle to express her disapprobation of Madame by any stronger means than cold civility which would be to me as forbidding as rudeness—but Madame laughs away with Sir James and takes not the least notice of Emmas pouting—upon my honour if I was in Emmas situation I should do something more than pout I am sure I should go so far as to shut my doors against her and indeed every one ought to discountenance her for it is certainly true that Lady Morton who was one of
the fondest mothers is at this moment boarded and lodged in a little hovel near London to prevent her being thrown into gaol for debts which she contracted to indulge the vanity of her worthless daughter who neither sees nor affords her any other kind of consolation—From my heart I pity the young man who is married to her—A bad daughter never did or will make a good wife—A defect in principle runs through the whole mass in morals as well as chemistry Gratitude is the most natural of all virtues because it is the first affection that children become susceptible of
Do you know that Emma and Mr Stanley are both jealous of our correspondence though I shew them your letters—but not my own—for I hate to
be corrected and my husband is a critic you know and so adieu
My dear Charles
LUCY STANLEY
P S Lady Juliana is gone to her brothers seat at Richmond for a few days
WILLIAM STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
THOUGH you have changed hands and seem more inclined to address yourself to Lucy than me I will not even to her my other better self relinquish the pleasure I have always received from your correspondence and though she and I are but one in the common interests of life I must insist upon preserving a separate and exclusive claim to the continuance of your former friendship
The fullness of my heart requires a confidant—Happiness admits of participation more than sorrow—
For grief is proud and makes its owner stout
While felicity looks humbly round for objects on which it may diffuse itself grief contracts but joy dilates the mind—Then let me pour into your breast the effusions of my own and tell my friend with transport tell him there never was a happier man than your brother
O Charles the treasures of my Lucys mind have been concealed till now beneath the mask of gaiety she hid the tenderest noblest feelings of the heart the justest sentiments and the most perfect female understanding—I glory in doing justice to her sex—Wherefore do blockheads affect to compliment a woman
of sense by saying she has a masculine understanding Learning cannot bestow either sense or genius if it could we should not have so many drones and boobies issue from our colleges—Sense is the common of two and not confined to either sex—suppose it then equally bestowed on both women must surely have the advantage over us the purity of their minds and morals must render it less sophisticate than ours which is even in our early youth debauched by vicious indulgences and clogged with scholastic systems
Did you imagine that I should ever become such a champion for the ladies
But what cant a charming woman do
The discovery of your sisters uncommon merits which were concealed by modesty alone have rendered me such an enthusiast with regard to women that I cannot address a chambermaid
without some degree of respect—You may laugh if you please but I speak truth upon my honour
Is Miss Harrison a woman of sense If she be I should wish you were united to her I think you formerly mentioned her being very lively—What a charm when added to propriety and gentleness of manners—I sincerely long to see you as happy as myself if that be possible for I cannot help doubting whether to take her for all in all there is such another woman upon earth as my Lucy
It would be the art of sinking to mention any other subject I shall therefore conclude with entreating to hear from you speedily and subscribe myself
Your happy friend W STANLEY
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Dublin
MOST willingly my friend do I return to my colours and renew a correspondence from which I have ever received the sincerest pleasure though no part of it ever afforded me more than your last letter—O Stanley how much are you to be envied But envy is a mean contemptible vice and utterly incompatible with friendship I therefore
do not envy but rejoice in your felicity though certain that I am for ever barred from tasting bliss like yours for well I know that heartfelt happiness is only to be found in a tender and virtuous connection with the object of our love and esteem and that alas can never be my lot—My youth must pass away in gloomy dreary pining discontent Would it were passed and that like Aetna though my bosom flamed my head was crowned with snow—Here let me drop the painful subject and never never reassume it more
After a very agreeable journey which would have been still more so had we not been encumbered with Miss Harley—Heavens that any thing which bears that name should be to me unpleasing—We arrived at Holyhead—But I shall not attempt to describe the delightfully romantic wildness of the country
through which we passed to it—From thence we embarked for Dublin and without storm tempest or any other sinister accident arrived there in about eight hours As Miss Harley has taken up her abode at Captain Harrisons I have declined his friendly entreaties to become his guest but am lodged very near his house in Kildarestreet
Yes Stanley Miss Harrison is very sensible she has what I call a true feminine understanding and is therefore more capable of inspiring love than those ladies who are complimented with a masculine one For I must dissent from your opinion that there is no characteristic distinction between the understandings of the sexes—Manly sense has something awful in it When Dr Johnson speaks we listen with respect and admiration and feel our minds impressed with such an attentive kind of veneration as
I imagine was paid to the oracles of old When Mrs Montagu in the purest and most elegant language delivers sentiments equally just and sublime as his we are surprised and delighted the gracefulness of her manner seems to add beauty to her thoughts her words sink into our hearts like the softest sounds of the most perfect harmony and produce the same placid effects
I have now illustrated my opinion by the two most striking characters in point of understanding that this or any other age has produced The difference between masculine and feminine understandings appears to me as perfectly distinct as the contrasted style of excellence which is observable in the Apollo Belvidere and the Venus of Medicis
I am extremely distressed by Miss Harleys conduct or rather misconduct
—She certainly obtruded herself upon the Harrisons contrary to their inclinations though their humanity and good breeding would not permit them to refuse her accompanying them to Ireland During our journey and ever since our arrival here she has seemed to affect a particular attachment to me yet talks perpetually in an ambiguous and rancorous style of Lady Juliana
Simple woman were I even indifferent to her charming sisterinlaw I should detest her for the malignant disposition she hourly betrays—She throws out frequent hints of her having something particular to communicate to me but I am resolved never to listen to the envenomed tale for such I am sure it would be
In a short time I shall be freed from the irksomeness of her company as Captain
Harrison and I have agreed to make a tour of this country and visit some of the natural beauties it contains—This scheme I trust will answer a double purpose
for I have such a perpetual source of disquiet in my own breast that rest is grown painful to me and a state of agitation only affords me relief by rescuing me as it were from myself
In a few days I shall answer Lucys lively letter and am to her and you a sincerely affectionate friend and brother
C EVELYN
MISS HARLEY TO MADAME DUPONT
Dublin
O MARIA how do I curse the day that I left my own country for this land of savages—Though to be just I must allow that the once highly favoured Evelyn is a more inhuman being than any I have yet seen here—What an escape had you my dear girl of this same isicle I really begin to think that his heart is soused in snow as Madame de lEnclos says of Sevigné which neither your bright eyes or mine can thaw I am sincerely
sorry that I have given myself so much trouble about such an insensible wretch—I could almost go mad with vexation if it were not for the comfortable remembrance of his having slipt through your fingers when you thought yourself almost sure of him—pardon me Maria for confessing that this circumstance abates my mortification a little
To you I will further own that I was prompted full as much by spite as love to endeavour at this conquest and I would still give a finger nay a whole limb to rob that affected insipid lady Juliana of his affections even if I did not care six pence for the man—Heavens how I hate her and lady Desmond I am sure they are both hypocrites—but the men are such ideots as to admire these flat pictures of stilllife and prefer them even to you or me
But I beg pardon for abusing your friend Lady Desmond for though I am certain you cannot really like her yet I hear you are vastly intimate—For my own part I detest the whole race of the Evelyns next to my sisterinlaw
You will I dare say expect some account of these Harrisons that I came over with—The girl is naturally lively and tolerably agreeable I fancied at first that she was in love with Evelyn and hated her accordingly but I begin now to think I was mistaken though she professes a tender friendship for him—Ridiculous
Captain Harrison is handsome and wellbred but has a strong turn to ridicule which I believe is a national qualification—He sometimes rallies Evelyn who is really the knight of the sorrowful countenance upon his melancholy
and reserve but his rallery has no effect—how should it nothing can penetrate that obdurate heart—I now wish that I had bestowed my affections on the Captain my fortune at least would have been a desirable object to him though it is none to the savage Evelyn—But it is too late to think of that at present for both the brother and sister have observed my attachment to this iron man
I dont know why but I dont believe either of the Harrisons like me though they are extremely civil to me but that is no proof of regard from the people of this country as their hospitality is unbounded to strangers who generally laugh at and despise them for their officious kindness—I shall avail myself of their generofity by staying here some time if it were only to persecute Evelyn for alas I am persuaded that
all my perseverance will answer no other end
Write to me my dear Maria and give me a full and true account of every thing that you think will raise my spirits and enable me to support the mortifications I daily suffer—You know the sort of intelligence from whence alone I can derive comfort
How does your Caro Sposo is he as civil and as silly as usual or has he assumed the lordly airs of an English husband You were very fortunate Maria in meeting with such a pis aller Dont be angry my dear girl for I am so much out of temper that I cant help being peevish even to you I really am nevertheless your sincere friend
ANNE HARLEY▪
LADY JULIANA HARLEY TO MRS STANLEY
Richmond
THE transient gleams of returning health and chearfulness which I boasted to my Lucy are again vanished like the morning dews before the rising sun
The joy I felt at seeing a much loved and long absent brother was of that species that I hoped might have been indulged without fearing to taste of those bitter dregs that have ever been largely mingled in my cup For above these
three weeks in this sweet retirement with him and his friend Lord Somers did I enjoy such a tranquil kind of happiness as made me almost forget that I had been wretched
The unhappy separation between our parents on account of their religion had occasioned the same misfortune between my brother and me—My mother who was a catholic when she parted from my father took me with her to Dijon where I remained till heaven was pleased to deprive me of this most indulgent parent and teach my youthful heart to feel too early sorrow
At twelve years old I returned into England to my father who though possessed of every virtue had an austerity of manners that rendered him more the object of my fear than love My
brother was all kindness to me heard all my little complaints and soothed my private griefs Judge then my Lucy how I loved him—When I was about seventeen we underwent a second separation—He was sent to travel—had he staid in England I think I should not have been what now alas I am—But that is past
After what I have said will you not doubt my veracity when I tell you that within these ten days that once kind and tender brother is become cold distant and reserved to me and treats me like an alien to his heart and all because I cannot bestow mine upon his friend Lord Somners—Hourly I am persecuted with the flippant addresses of this ungenerous peer—How highly is Mr Evelyns conduct towards me exalted by so marked a contrast
Lord Somners is about seven and thirty and has lived abroad these twenty years his dress manners and attendants are all exotic his person is far from being disagreeable but then he seems to think of it more highly than it deserves and has sometimes dropt hints of my being engaged in a prior attachment from my regarding his attractions with so much indifference He bows sighs and sings in a regular routine and is in short the most complete petitmaître I ever had the misfortune to converse with
You will naturally imagine that I might easily silence such a lover or at least bear his impertinence with silent contempt but with all the seeming volatility I have described he possesses a dark subtle and I fear a treacherous heart—He has gained the strongest ascendancy over my brothers mind and is perpetually poisoning it with the most
acrimonious resentment against me—How this affair will end with regard to the latter I mean I know not but this I am certain of that no power on earth shall ever compel me to enter into any engagement with such a man as Lord Somners Having once been led a trembling victim to the altar where all my peace and happiness were sacrificed I never will renew that scene of guilt and its attendant misery again
I would quit Richmond instantly and go—I know not whither—but that I fear to offend my brother my tenderness for him is so mingled with respect that there is but one subject on which I should feel it possible to dissent from his will or to know that I had one of my own I ask no dominion even over myself but of the negative kind and surely every independent being has a right to that at least Yet if my brothers
infatuation should tempt him to abandon me what would become of your unhappy friend
J HARLEY
MRS STANLEY TO LADY JULIANA HARLEY
I WISH I was a conjurer for your sake my dear Juliana but as I happen not to be invested with any of the occult qualities and do not know a word of the Cabala I find it impossible to comprehend your incomprehensible ladyship—I confess myself such an absolute ignoramus as not to understand why your health and spirits should decline because your brother has proposed your marrying a foolish Lord whom you dislike
—For my own part I think I love Charles Evelyn as well as any sister loves her brother but had he taken it into his head to propose my marrying any noble Lord whose name and title was registered in the Court Calendar I should have answered No brother I thank you I beg leave to chuse for myself and not be directed by an almanack—And had he thought proper to grow sulky upon such denial I might have been a little sorry for the disappointment of his vanity but I will venture to say I should neither have lost my rest appetite or spirits upon the occasion—And yet you know that till the other day I was but a simple spinster and you are a grave and I wish I could say wise relict and have therefore a better right to judge for yourself particularly as I believe your inclinations were not much consulted in your former connection
Indeed Lady Juliana you treat this matter much too seriously and from thence it has acquired a degree of importance which it is by no means intitled to—Surely you have not only a negative but an absolute power over yourself and if your brother is worthy of that respectful tenderness you feel for him he cannot resent your exerting your right where your happiness and yours only is concerned
Be assured of this my good friend that it is our submission which enables men to become tyrants—we have ourselves only to blame—and yet you gentle ones are not entitled to the merits you affect to have as you yield more from indolence than resignation and never comply without repining
Theres Emma for instance who I think has caught the sighing sickness
from your ladyship she spends all her mornings in lamenting the mortification she will suffer in the evening from receiving Madame Dupont and some others of Sir Jamess gang whom I think as bad as highwaymen merely because she has not resolution to order her doors to be shut against them
In vain do I remonstrate to her that an appearance of habitual melancholy is more likely to alienate her husbands affections than her venturing to express her dislike of his companions can possibly do—she answers—she never did nor ever will oppose his inclinations—so broods over this moral sentiment and sits pining all day in a corner
Like to the culver on the bared bough
Perhaps it is because I am plentifully gifted with both that I think spirits and spirit too absolutely necessary to render the marriage state happy—
Not minds of melancholy strain
Still silent or that still complain
Can the dear bondage bless
As well may heavenly concert spring
From two old lutes with neer a string
Or none besides the bass
I would not wish you to imagine from what I have said that I have a mind to play Termagant myself or that I would wish any woman I love to undertake the rôle far from it I assure you—but I would wish my whole sex to think act and speak like rational beings and not furnish the men with an excuse for treating us like babies while we are young and despising us as ideots when we are no longer so
But to return to your present situation—I would by all means advise you to throw off the selfimposed restraint you labour under and seriously acquaint your brother with your dislike to Lord Somners
at the same time gently requesting that he will prevent his right honourableness from persecuting you with his addresses If after this they should still persist in their obstinacy order your carriage directly and do not stay moping and fretting at Richmond
I rejoice that any thing has made you think favourably of my poor Charles for my own part I condemn his conduct as being infinitely too romantic but the object or heroine of his romance ought to see his folly in a kinder light and I am pleased you do so How much do I wish it was in my power to improve that kindness into love—be assured I would not desire to do so if I did not think that your union would contribute as much to your own happiness as to his Remember my dear Juliana that this is the first time I have ever gravely touched
upon this subject—and I will now drop it for ever if it offends you
I know I need not apologize for the length of my letter—Country ladies love to have a great deal for their money and I am sure you will esteem this a tolerable pennyworth
Adieu my dear languid friend rouse your spirits and come amongst us or I shall very shortly step to Richmond and use a little gentle force to draw you from beneath the mournful cypress or the weeping willow
L STANLEY
MADAME DUPONT TO MISS HARLEY
SURELY my dear Miss Harley this unfortunate passion of yours has disturbed your mind a little for in your sober senses you could not have imagined that I ever had any serious thoughts of such an animal as Charles Evelyn—Slipt through my fingers say you Give me leave to tell you that if I had chosen to have held him neither you nor your delicate sisterinlaw
would have been able to have wrested him from me—but I hate your watergruel whining sentimental men and therefore never could have been your rival
However I sincerely pity you because I am convinced that yours is an hopeless passion and to be sure it is rather mortifying to be rejected especially at a time of life when one cannot hope to make many new conquests—Excuse me my dear but after thirty you know the bloom does wear off a little and then the fruit is not quite so tempting
My Pisaller as you are pleased to call him is the very best husband in the universe—Foreigners in general are better tempered than Englishmen and not so much infected with jealousy—this is a lucky circumstance for me as I
confess that I have still a little remain of coquetry and cannot find in my heart to quarrel with a man for thinking me handsomer than his wife particularly when poor Lady Desmond is so horridly mortified at the preferences I receive—The secret is out and I know you will thank me for communicating it to you
Your sisterinlaw is at her brothers seat at Richmond—Lord Somners has proposed for her a great match I assure you and which she poor simpleton has refused because she dont like the man—As if dans ce siecle it signified who one married provided there be a good fortune to help one to support it A handsome woman will always have a number of admirers and she must be hard to please indeed if in a croud she dont meet with one she can like Marriage formerly my mother says used to put an
end to gallantry but in these happpier times it commences even with our bridal days and many a girl who passed unnoticed while she was only Miss is courted and followed from the moment she is styled Mrs—Therefore my dear Harley get rid of the forbidding appellation as soon as you possibly can—The Hibernian swains are generally supposed ready to assist a monied lass upon such emergencies and I am sure you cannot make a better use of your fortune than by sinking the opprobrious title of an old maid under the name of Mrs—Any thing—
Apropos of Hibernia—I wish you could find out some part of that country no matter how wild or remote where I could place my mother to diet and lodge at a cheap rate—For my dear Dupont is sometimes unhappy at hearing of her distressed situation and if she was removed
into another kingdom he might know nothing of her circumstances and I would endeavour to persuade him that she was perfectly happy—besides the old lady has still some friends living who speak hardly of my want of attention towards her and tho I dont value the censure of the world my husband is made uneasy by it for he wishes every one to think as well of me as he does himself but you know thats impossible in such an illnatured world and I therefore only laugh at all their malicious reflections on my conduct
I perfectly agree with you that the Ladies Juliana and Desmond are a couple of hypocrites but I think Mrs Stanley worse than either of them tho hypocrisy indeed is not one of her failings—She has written me a card in answer to an invitation of mine civilly forbidding me her house while Lady
Desmond who has I own some cause to hate me receives me with such an icy kind of politeness as would freeze or rather petrify me if the warmth of Sir Jamess reception did not make ample amends for the bleakness of her ladyships air and manner
I am grown extravagantly fond of play—Unluckily Dupont dislikes it—In truth he knows nothing of the matter but his politeness makes him easily prevailed upon to fill up a corner at a whisttable while I enjoy the delights of loo or pharo without controul
You dont know how much you are obliged to me for devoting so much of my time to you at present for as I am the only female of my party I am sure they wait for me and so does my carriage to whisk me to them
Adieu my dear Harley remember to enquire for some place to stuff my mother into and believe me
Yours M DUPONT
P S If Lady Juliana had not marred her own fortune by refusing Lord Somners I should have done it for her by dropping a few suspicious hints to his Lordship who is an intimate acquaintance of Duponts and frequently visits here—There is no pleasure like demolishing a prude—but half my satisfaction is destroyed by knowing that she dont like the man—yet it may mortify her pride a little to know that he thinks ill of her—It shall be done
MR STANLEY TO MR EVELYN
I TAKE up the pen to address you in the same manner that Queen Annes ministers used to Lord Peterborough and write rather at than to you
I hope you are by this time set out on your tour and think it highly probable that this may find you measuring some of those stupendous lusus naturae vulgarly called the Giants Causeway—as if dame Nature who is an admirable oeconomist ever used two means to produce one end and first made giants
merely to lift these massy piles of quarry which most assuredly grew in the very spot where you will find them We have some such superstition I think with regard to Stonehenge also but like all other traditions it is only believed by the ignorant though by the way the learned have not yet been able to tell us how those huge pillars were conveyed to Salisbury plain and I can hardly suppose them to have started up there of their own accord though there are a sort of philosophers who liberally endow stupid and sluggish matter with both thought and action
Now for matters less conjectural—The case is pretty plain I think with regard to Miss Harley yet on the face of the evidence I am apprehensive she will be nonsuited for I well remember that hers was not a beautiful one some dozen years ago—I pity her sincerely however all
unsuccessful passions are intitled to compassion and the distresses of a female interest our humanity much more than those of our own sex There certainly cannot be a more aukward or mortifying situation for a woman than that of being in love with a man who dislikes her There is in this as well as many other cases an unjust distinction made between the sexes as there is a certain degree of disgrace attached to the idea of a rejected female while a man may be refused by half a dozen ladies and pay his addresses to a seventh with as good a grace as if she had been the primary object of his affections
I am ready to agree with you with regard to the effects produced by different modes of masculine and feminine elocution for that is the sole distinction you have made in your favourite instance
between the two great geniuses you have named
There is no sex in souls and though Milton has been pleased to tell us that on woman nature has
bestowed
Too much of ornament in outward show
Elaborate of inward less exact
For well I understand in the prime end
Of nature her the inferior in the mind
And inward faculties which most excel
I must beg leave to dissent from him nay more to say that he accuses Providence of a particular partiality in the disposal of his intellectual gifts between the human race which is by no means visible in any other part of the animal creation All instinctive qualities appearing to the full as strong and as acute in the female as the male through every species of the animal world—Why then
should we conceive that the highest order of beings that inhabit this terrestrial globe should be more unequally dealt with It is clear at least that Milton did not reason from analogy
Superior strength of body appears to be the portion of the male through all degrees of existence from hence and hence only they have arrogated to themselves an authoritative command over the weaker part of their species—but Providencc ever equal in the distribution of its bounty to his creatures amply atoned for this seeming partiality by endowing the female part of the creation with beauty to subdue the strong tame the ferocious and make their boasted strength of no other value but as it serves for the preservation and protection of the favourite female and her helpless offspring
I think I have now established the sexes upon an equal scale and fixed my proposition beyond the reach of controversy I mean with regard to their natural endowments without the least attention to the adventitious circumstances of education which I am thoroughly persuaded makes all the difference between what is styled a masculine and feminine understanding From you who are a lover I cannot expect any opposition to the opinion I have advanced but rather a folio of thanks for having raised the dignity of your fairones nature to an equality with that of the self-named lords of the creation
I have devoted so much of my paper to the honour of the ladies that I have scarcely room to tell you that I earnestly wish for your return to London There is something the matter between Sir James and Lady Desmond though she
is much too good a wife to reveal the cause of her discontent either to Mrs Selwyn or my Lucy but that there is a cause is perfectly apparent to them both and they fancy she would be more communicative to you than she is to them—Indeed I fear Sir James is posting to destruction the company he keeps must sink his mind as well as his fortune—Lady Desmond is much to be pitied she is now in the drawingroom with both her sisters they all join me in wishing your return and in sincere affection
W STANLEY
MR SEWELL TO MR SIMPSON
THE deed is done Jack The reversion of Lady Desmonds jointure is sold manor house and all Chancellor Henley used to say that a marriage settlement without trustees was one of the cobwebs of the law for there never was a woman who might not be kissed or kicked out of her consent to part with it Henley was a wise man and peace be to his manes
But though this point has been gained I am not much the richer for it as Sir
James has been admitted of the club at Boodles and has played pretty deep with his usual ill luck so that if it was not for his attachment to Madame Dupont which keeps him often at home I should not have shared any part of the spoil—He has entirely got out of my hands and therefore I must take care of myself I shall put his bond in force while he has any money left to pay it but as this will make an absolute breach between us and that I hate quarrelling with an old acquaintance I shall set out for Bath a few days before the money is demanded and if it is not paid on demand I shall leave orders to have him arrested immediately
I rejoice to hear you have such a noble harvest and reap so plentifully another labourer in the field may I think now be of use as even fools are apt to suspect a player who always wins—I think it
would be prudent in you to lose a little if you can do it with a tolerable grace but as you are apt to be peevish you had better stay till I come and let me win from you—you know we are to pass for strangers to each other—but all these matters we shall adjust at meeting—till when I am yours
G SEWELL
LADY JULIANA TO MRS STANLEY
IT is all in vain my Lucy your kindness your friendship and advice are all thrown away upon one who is fated to be unfortunate—If I can I will methodize the story of my present distress I begin from the receipt of your last letter
As I had not resolution to speak to my brother I wrote to him in the tenderest terms expressing the sincerest concern for having offended him yet
positively persevering in an absolute refusal of Lord Somners—Soon after he had received my letter he came into my dressingroom and spoke more calmly on the subject than I expected—He told me I should be released from his friends importunities but that in return for his giving up a point he had so much fixed his heart upon he insisted upon my answering truly any question he should ask me—I promised to comply with his request—He then fixed his eyes stedfastly on me and asked Did you never receive the addresses of a Mr Evelyn I was all confusion and hesitatingly answered Yes—before I was married—Aye and since too Juliana—or my information is false Alas my brother I replied that Mr Evelyn is no more He died within a fortnight of Mr Harley—He answered I am satisfied and left me
We dined têteàtête—and were tolerably chearful in the evening some company came I exerted my spirits to the utmost of my power and retired to rest rejoicing that the impending storm was blown over and flattering myself with a succeeding calm
Yesterday we dined at Lord H—s and did not return till pretty late in the evening my brother received a parcel of letters the moment we came home and retired to read them I amused myself with playing on the harpsichord till I was informed that supper was served—On my entering the saloon I saw no one but the servants and enquired where their master was I was told his Lordship was writing and did not chuse to sup—I sat down for formsake and in a few minutes desired them to take away—During the short time I sat at table I heard a little bustle in the hall and
the sound of a chaise driving off—I felt somewhat like curiosity upon this occasion but asked no questions
When the servants were withdrawn I took up a book and waited with an anxious kind of expectation for my brothers coming into the room till I heard the clock strike twelve—then rang the bell for Watson to attend me to my chamber—When she came into the room I fancied she had been crying but as I could not guess for what I made no enquiry but on my dressingtable I found a letter directed to me and knowing the address to be my brothers hand I opened it with infinite perturbation—the contents were as follow
I have received the strongest confirmation of your falshood Mr Evelyn lives—Lives to detest a woman who lost to all sense of her own and her familys
honour is become as much an object of contempt to him as to her injured brother
R—
P S I have quitted my house to avoid seeing you nor will I ever receive a line from your contaminated hand
Now Lucy judge what I must have felt what I still feel from this envenomed dart yet I know not the shaft from whence it came for heaven so help me at my greatest need as I with truth affirm I do not know a person living that I have ever injured
Yet I will own my punishment is just and would with patience bear all that the hand of malice can inflict were I the only sufferer—but my loved brother he
is wounded too even in the nicest point Wretch that I am I have undone his peace
Do not write to me Lucy the moment I have sealed this I shall quit this house for ever
Watson is a perfect Niobe I cannot prevail on her to go to bed though it is five in the morning—With the dawn I shall depart—I have left a few lines for my brother
I intreat you to conceal my distress from Mr Evelyn I know it would afflict him
The morning breaks—
While night even in the zenith of her dark domain is sunshine to the colour of my fate
Adieu my truly valued friend
J HARLEY
MISS HARLEY TO MADAME DUPONT
DEAR Maria the men say that the purport of a ladys letter is always contained in the postscript and were it not for that part of your last favour I could not have forgiven the matronly airs you assumed in the rest of it—but the kind assurance you give me of mortifying that hateful prude my sisterinlaw has bound me for ever to you—I am persuaded if we were acquainted with her real history we
need not be obliged to invention to blacken her character but she is a consummate hypocrite and has cunning enough to keep her own secrets so that a shrewd guess is all we have for it and I think we have a right to make free with that—Do not spare her Maria I entreat you—I am sure if she was to be married to Lord Somners it would break my heart
Tho I shall soon be entitled to be called your Ladyship as well as she you see I am resolved to take your advice and not like Jephthas daughter continue to bewail my virginity any longer
Tho the bloom is a little worn off as you say the fruit is still tempting enough to captivate a baronet of one of the first families in this land of genealogers—Sir John OShaughnasy has laid his laurels
at my feet and opened his honourable trenches in due form before me—He has been a soldier in the Empress of Germanys service and has reaped more honour than wealth from the field but that is of little consequence as my fortune is quite sufficient to maintain us in affluence in this country where every thing is much cheaper than in England My swain has all the manners of a foreigner speaks French and German fluently is above six foot high and comely with all—These little circumstances are not amiss in my mind for I cannot quite agree with you that it dont signify who one marries I only wish I could change his name for the sake of my English friends who I am sure will pronounce it horridly tho I am certain my spouseelect would as soon part with his life as alter a single letter of it—But every one has their foible and this I think is my baronets only one
Do you know that the brute Evelyn has left Dublin without even bidding me farewel—He carried off Captain Harrison with him and their intentions were kept as profound a secret from me as if they were going to invade an enemys country—I believe the sly Miss Harrison was in the plot against me but I am sufficiently revenged on her by robbing her of Sir James OShaughnasy who had dangled after her for some time—A pretty Miss indeed with her three thousand pounds to think of being a lady thank heaven I have ten times that sum to bestow upon my worthy knight
I will if possible be married before Evelyn returns for to say truth I would not wish to see him in company with my lover as I fear the comparifon might shake my resolution and if he were but to speak kindly to me I might perhaps
be fool enough to break with the baronet—but do you think there is much danger of such an event
I rejoice also at your mortifying Lady Desmond—she is the second object of my aversion—You are very lucky in being married to a Frenchman I fear if I was to amuse myself with a little coquetry my baronet would be jealous as he is so distractedly in love with me and it is not enough the mode here for married women to be galant to familiarise the idea to him
When I go to my husbands castle in the country I shall obey your commands by looking for a proper place to settle Lady Morton in but take my word it shall be far enough from me for I hate poor relations and I think her ladyship claims kindred with my mother
As you love me Maria proceed with caution against Lady Juliana too much zeal often hurries us into mistakes a hint well thrown out is frequently more successful than a story unsupported by evidence and as I have already said we have no other foundation to build upon but guesswork
I have returned your compliment by devoting time to you that is extremely precious to me as I am certain my fond lover is now waiting with impatience to behold me enter the Rotunda which you are to know is an humble imitation of Ranelagh
In haste yours ever— ANNE HARLEY
MR EVELYN TO MR STANLEY
Killarney
YOUR letter my dear Stanley found my imagination more agreeably occupied than you predicted as I was just then returned from viewing the beauties of the lake which takes its name from this town—Believe me they are past description and every attempt that has been made to express the various effusions
of nature in the different scenes that constitute the whole falls infinitely short of the originals—Neither the poets pen nor painters pencil have yet been able to give an adequate idea of this transporting spot—
Here nature wantons as in her prime
And plays at will her virgin fancies
The beautiful and sublime are here mingled in the superlative degree the great Creators works unspoiled by art rush on the mind and fill it with delight and awe—These mixed sensations overcame my spirits nor do I blush to say I found relief from tears I should look upon a man who could behold this scene unmoved to be deficient in some part of his organization and pity him for his natural incapacity
I shall not fear to be thought an enthusiast upon this subject by you who have sublimed your ideas as far as they can reach upon a more exalted object—
—Fairest of creation
Last and best of all Gods works
Believe me I am highly charmed with your arguments upon this charming subject and think with you that if we reason from analogy we must give up our boasted superiority and admit of an intellectual equality between the sons and daughters of Adam This position granted give me leave to say the scale must necessarily preponderate in favour of the softer sex since all we have left to put in equipoise against their
beauty winning softness and attractive grace
amounts to nothing more than bodily strength and the few advantages that may be derived
from a liberal education—The first can never be opposed to them and the latter by refining our ideas renders us but the more susceptible of their charms and endearments To sum up all women are and ever have been the sovereigns of the world But even monarchs are sometimes rendered unhappy by the vice or folly of their subjects and the hint you give me with regard to my beloved Emma has alarmed me vastly—not that I doubt her reigning sole and absolute in her husbands heart it is his weakness not her strength I fear—Perhaps he has again been drawn into play and in consequence of his folly his circumstances may be again distressed I know that Emmas tenderness will share his sorrows without upbraiding she will mourn in secret nor even to a sisters ear reveal her husbands faults—Gentle sufferer thou shalt be relieved—
Be assured that Emma would take as much nay perhaps more pains to conceal any difficulty she may labour under in pecuniary matters from me than any other person and that from a point of delicacy—It was honest Sewell not she that informed me of Sir James Desmonds circumstances while I was at Bath from him then I wish you to find out the situation of the baronets finances I think they cannot be much embarrassed as his debts were all cleared upon his going to London and if he is not quite a lunatic he cannot have involved himself greatly since—
But no matter what the sum is if it be within my power—For of what use but to make others happy can my fortune be Alas it cannot render me so
Your not mentioning Lady Juliana in any of your letters I take unkindly
it is treating me like an infant who forgets his plaything when it is removed from his sight—Can you suppose that I should cease to think because you do not speak of the sole object that occupies my mind
My agreeable friend and fellowtraveller grows impatient to return to England as we have the pleasure of hearing that Mrs Williamss health is nearly established—I shall be sorry to quit this kingdom with which I am extremely charmed as much with the people from whom I have received infinite civilities as with the place—But notwithstanding my reluctance I shall accompany Captain Harrison to Bristol and use my utmost endeavours to put him in possession of the greatest treasure this world can afford an amiable wife—I think it is almost needless to tell you that I mean to resign Captain Williamss
legacy in favour of his widow surely I have no title to his fortune and only held it in trust till she was able to enjoy it—The value of the gift will be enhanced by the pleasure she must necessarily receive from bestowing it on a man whose fortune though by no means contemptible is far from being adequate to his generosity
Captain Harrrisons estate lies in a different province from this he has business there I shall attend him and therefore soon bid adieu to this Eden—As I am selfbanished from London it is of little consequence in what part of his Majestys dominions I reside—Your letters will be forwarded to me with punctuality and I shall with impatience expect you to put it in my power to relieve my loved Emmas distress by acquainting me with the means that are wanting to her happiness
I beg to be indulged with an account of Lady Julianas health and of every thing that relates to yours and my sisters welfare—I live but in ye all
CHARLES EVEYLN
CHARLES EVELYN TO WILLIAM STANLEY
Roscommon
THE post is come in without bringing me a letter which is a real disappointment because I fear the delay may retard the happiness of others as well as mine
Harrisons business will oblige us to stay some days in this town which is a very dull one and the country round it
less cultivated than any part of Ireland that I have yet seen—The lands are entirely given up to pasture and we have rode over plains of five or six and thirty miles in circumference without seeing the face or even the vestige of any human creature excepting a few miserable huts made up of mud and straw which appear to be scarcely habitable Yet this country is not without its curiosities—We went yesterday to see a beautiful lake about twenty miles from hence which runs above twelve miles in length and eighteen broad in many parts of it Like that at Killarney it is bordered with flowering shrubs of various kinds which grow spontaneously and on its banks are situated a number of gentlemens seats—I acknowledge the scene beautiful yet it falls far short of the one just mentioned It wants variety and that luxuriant wildness that transcends the efforts of art
But here I was presented with a curiosity of another kind and of the first magnitude As Harrison and I were riding on the edge of the lake I observed a small brick house of two stories high that seemed to have no window or at least not one that looked upon the prospect I have described though it stood within a few yards of the richest and most beautiful part of it—I immediately enquired what could that edifice be designed for he replied it was the palace of a Prince to whose presence he would endeavour to introduce me—Of a lunatic you mean I answered who is selfinvested with royalty
You are mistaken said my friend he is a real Prince the Prince of Coolavin his ancestors were lords of this wide domain and his proud spirit cannot bear to look upon those lands which he considers as by right his own though
Cromwell tore the inheritance from his family and reduced his patrimony to the scanty pittance of two hundred pounds a year For this reason he has turned the back of his house to this fair prospect and looks with more delight upon his farmyard—But come continued he as I am acquainted with the young Princes Ill try if I can obtain admittance for us to the Monarch
When we came near the house it appeared in front a very decent building with sash windows close by it stood a smaller one only one story high at which we alighted and on our entrance were received by four young gentlemen with such politeness as would have done honour to an higher roof—The eldest of these was heir apparent and married to a very pretty young woman of the name of OConnor descended from the Kings of Munster
The second son had been educated in France and taken his degrees as a physician there—The third was an officer in the Spanish service now on a visit to his family and the fourth was I understood designed for the service of the catholic church
On Captain Harrisons expressing our desire of paying our respects to the Prince the eldest Mr ODermot said he would signify our request to his father and as Mr Harrisons mother was of a true Milesian family he did not doubt his compliance We were offered a variety of refreshments most hospitably invited to dinner and informed that we might immediately be introduced to the Dowager and Princess Consort
We were then conducted by the Spanish officer into a small drawingroom where my eyes were struck with the most
venerable female figure they had ever beheld—I declare Stanley I was almost tempted to bend the knee before her She was tall and of a majestic appearance yet had infinite sweetness in her countenance she was clothed in a blue damask dress made like a mans nightgown on her head she wore what they call a kercher of thin cambrick and from that head hung down even to her seet a profusion of the finest silver tresses that Time had ever blanched This reverend object brought to my mind that beautiful epithet in Shakespeare of Timehonoured Lancaster
To my surprize we were first presented to the young lady who received us with a kind of dignified sulkiness which was very disgusting while the elder ladys manners and appearance at once attracted our affection and respect—She entered instantly into conversation with us and
amongst other things informed us that she had been full forty years a wife and that during that time she had never passed the bounds of her sovereigns estate though she owned she had once made an attempt to see a little more of the world when she was young her lord she said was then from home but the moment she had
passed the line
her horse threw her and she broke her arm in the fall—She considered this incident as a judgment on her disobedience and had remained a contented prisoner of her husbands mockstate ever since
At length we were admitted to the Princes presence his person was large and seemed to have been well made his figure was erect his eye piercing and his countenance severe he was seated in an oak great chair from whence he did not deign to make the smallest inclination
of his body on our appearance but sternly asked the cause of Mr Harrisons desiring to see him—My friend was a little disconcerted by the question but soon recovered himself and with infinite politeness replied his visit was only meant as a mark of the sincere respect he had been early taught to feel for the Prince of Coolavin
The old mans features became then less austere and he talked in an enraptured strain of the beauty of Harrisons grandmother who had it seems the honour of being allied to him and bore the name of ODermot—He scarcely deigned to turn his eyes on me and mine did not solicit his attention for they were attracted by an immense large coffin covered with black cloth that stood on one side of the chamber there was an inscription on the plate in a language I did not understand and therefore
suppose to be Irish and over the plate was a something like a coronet but not appertaining to any rank of heraldry that I was acquainted with Over this gloomy apparatus was a shelf filled with some hundreds of wooden cups neatly turned which might each contain something less than half a pint their appearance puzzled me as they seemed to be rather a part of the furniture of a turners shop than of a Princes presencechamber On enquiry I was informed they were designed to be used at the Princes funeral when they were to be filled with whisky a species of malt spirit the common beverage in this country and given to each person who should attend his royal obsequies to the ruins of an old monastery which was about an hundred yards from his present mansion
When his Highness thought proper to dismiss us we were conducted back to Mr ODermots and had the honour of dining with the rest of this most extraordinary family—The old Lady informed us that not being royally descended she had never been permitted to eat with the Prince or to sit in his presence unless in case of sickness though he often indulged his daughterinlaw with these special honours—But she is a Princess added she and is therefore intitled to such distinctions
From the instant I heard this anecdote I took an aversion to the old savage and could easily conceive that he wanted nothing but power to be an admirable tyrant I thought of him in the same light as one of the Caribbee islanders who as Lord Kaims tells us do not suffer their wives to eat in their presence while the women of that
country are so remarkable for their sweetness of manners obedience and respect to their brutal husbands as never to give them occasion to remind them of their duty
O Stanley what a falling off is here from the pinnacle on which you and I have been labouring to place the female party of our species But let it be remembered that savages only treat women with haughtiness or contempt
During the time of dinner we had an old blind harper who played and sung ditties to us in the Irish language some of the tunes were uncommonly sweet and expressive of the deepest melancholy I was extremely charmed with the music great part of which the minstrel told us was extempore as well as the words—If I could have spoken his
language I should have been tempted to try if I could have prevailed on the old bard to have accompanied me to England though Mr ODermot assured me that OFarrel that is the harpers name would not quit the Barony of Costello for a thousand pounds a year but very politely added that he should if I pleased attend me while I staid at Roscommon—I accepted his offer with thanks and he returned in our fuite to this town
During my stay at Coolavin I was extremely amused with the singularity of the characters I there met with but my trusty Asiatic Scipio was a much greater object of surprize to the lower class of the family than the heads of it were to me—They had never seen a black man before and the Princesss waiting gentlewoman sent off an express
for her sister who lived at the distance of eight miles to come and see Kouli Khan the King of the blackmen who she said was come all the way from Turkey to visit her master—This was her geography about the matter
It was very late when we got back to our inn the night was fine and the roads good and we travelled as safe as at midday for there are no such beings as highwaymen throughout this country the robbing a henroost stealing a sheep or a little whiskey being the utmost of their misdemeanors
Adieu my dear Stanley I have written a long and I hope amusing history and left you at liberty to make your own comments for were I to transcribe the numberless reflections which occurred to me upon this ancient
mixture of pride and simplicity of manners I should swell my letter to the size of a volume
Yours as ever C EVELYN
MRS STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
SO all inconstant swains ought to be served my good Mr Evelyn Here lie two of your letters to my spouse unopened and of course unanswered—Had they been addressed to me the case would have been otherwise for I love to read letters exceedingly but you grew tired of my correspondence forsooth and have left me off so that if I was not the best natured sister in the world I should not now take up the pen to acquaint
you that my husband has eloped—It is true Charles—I have not seen him these ten days—And who do you think has spirited him away from me why truly his grandfather Sir John Stanley—He is turned of ninety and the express that came from Devonshire informed me that the good old gentleman could not hold out much longer so that I presume he is now gathered to his fathers and grandfathers and I may be a Lady at this present writing for ought I know
His knightship commanded me not to send his letters after him as he should not stay a moment longer than decency required for the old gentleman took care that affection or esteem should be entirely out of the question by behaving like a savage to his family all his life—But peace be with his soul and I am now glad that he has saved his grandsons feeling heart from being too
much affected at his death—I had like to have said loss from a figure of speech that you scholars term lapsus linguae
There is perhaps a latent kind of goodnature in behaving ill to ones near connections for the reason I have hinted but for my part I am selfish enough to wish to be lamented when I die and am therefore maliciously resolved to behave as well as I can while I live
I never was so tempted to do a wrong thing as I am at this moment to open your letters—But avaunt foul fiend tho I know my sweet William will say—Why did you not my love
The temptation does not arise from mere curiosity neither but I wish to know how far you are acquainted with certain subjects that I may not tire you with a twice told tale
But even with the fear of repetition before my eyes I will venture to say that our dear Emma is extremely happy—I have made many guesses at the cause but tho it is too plain that she is on the rack she will not confess—O Charles how grateful is my heart to Providence for having blessed me with such a husband as my Stanley Tis true we have not been long married and it may therefore appear presumption to expect a continuance of my present happiness—It might be so with any other man—but were his heart estranged which heaven avert I know he would from principle lament his own defection and hide his weakness from me—I must not trust myself upon this subject for it is a theme on which my grateful heart could dwell for ever
As I have an extreme good opinion of your understanding I flatter myself
you have by this time triumphed over your only weakness and that you can now read the name of Juliana without tremor or palpitation—I will therefore venture to inform you that she has refused a match her brother proposed to her and in consequence of her refusal a brouillé has happened between them—She acquainted me with these circumstances before she left Richmond—I fancy she is gone into Yorkshire as I have not heard from her lately tho I live in daily and anxious expectation of some further intelligence from her upon this subject
It is a sad thing that this poor lady is not allowed to live single if she chuses to do so but that right or wrong you men will marry her whether she will or no—Seriously I think it cruel to persecute her into matrimony because I really believe she is one of the few widows who wish
to continue so and as I am sincerely interested for her happiness I earnestly wish she was suffered to possess it on her own terms
A letter from Stanley—I give you joy of my Ladyship Charles but feel much more from knowing that the dear dispenser of all my happiness is well and will be in town in a very few days—I wish I knew when I was to rejoice in your coming for we all think that Emma like Hamlets Ghost tho dumb to us will speak to you—Haste then my prince to finish your travels and keep your court amongst us here
L STANLEY
MADAME DUPONT TO MISS HARLEY
JOY double joy to you my dear Harley You are now triumphant in every thing—Good and bad fortune flow in a stream and the current runs at present in your favour
Our enemy is fled and has left us mistress of the field—I plyed my battery so close that Lord Somners either was or affected to be convinced that Lady Juliana is every thing we wish to represent
her and yet were his lordship to repeat every word I have said it would not amount to a consistent story—There lies the true art of doing mischief with impunity
And who think you was the hero of my tale The very man she despised and rejected your obdurate swain Charles Evelyn
We are no longer rivals now Nancy but sincere friends I will therefore honestly confess to you that I have borne the strongest hatred to Lady Juliana from the moment that ideot Evelyn fell in love with her not that I loved him but I would have married him for he is immensely rich and yet I know not whether Lady Juliana was the sole cause of my disappointment—I was weak enough to quarrel with him about a wretched prostitute for such I am sure
she was that he picked up one evening in the Park even before his saucy sister Lucy and me—But away with the remembrance—I detest him and all that belong to him and some of his family shall yet feel my vergeance
But I am delighted transported my dear with your good fortune—You have waited to good purpose I almost wish I had not been in such a hurry myself a title is a delicious thing and even a baronets wife has as good a right you know to be called Ladyship as a countess—In truth one should have something to make one amends for being plagued with a husband for even the best of them are but an incumbrance—Dupont is not half so agreeable as he was he sulks sometimes as much as any Englishman but I suppose it is owing to his extreme fondness that he cannot bear to have any other person admire me but you know
it is not in my power to prevent a mans being in love with one if he chuses it tho I could almost wish that the party did not shew his attachment so openly
I thank you a thousand times for your promise of settling my mother I dont care where so it could be done speedily for to let you into a secret I am much afraid her creditors may get at her where she now is and it would be rather disgraceful to have it known that her ladyship was in gaol and whats worse I fear Dupont would release her tho at the expence of my diamonds—Hasten your enquiries then my dear Nancy as I have now let you into the whole truth of this matter and dont let your own happiness engross you so far as to be unmindful of yours ever
M DUPONT
P S You will again say my postscript is the most material part of my letter for I had forgot to tell you that Lady Juliana is turned out of her brothers house by my machination and as we suppose retired into Yorkshire
GEORGE SEWELL TO MR SIMPSON
DEAR Jack I shall not see you as soon as I intended the tide has turned in Sir James Desmonds favour and he is once more afloat with a full sail—A lucky night at Boodles has put him in possession of some thousands but it will soon be lowwater again with him I fancy as he has found out more ways than one of dissipating his cash—I shall stay till I find it near ebb One should not fly from a friend while he is happy
nor incumber him with company when he ceases to be so—I shall endeavour to nick the time of my retreat as exactly as possible
My fair ally has I think duped me—Can you believe that I was silly enough to grow fond of her But I have seen my folly and am certain that all women are as surely jilts as the changeable goddess we worship—I hope you still continue in her favour dame Fortune I mean no matter for the rest of the sex
Yours G SEWELL
LADY OSHAUGHNASY TO MADAME DUPONT
THANKS to you my dear Dupont for your congratulations they arrived most critically upon my weddingday—My dear baronet was so extremely pressing that I found it impossible to resist and gave him my hand last Thursday—His fondness is quite romantic he would not wait for settlements but has assured me that I shall have an unlimited power over my own fortune and that he will endow me with a noble
jointure—The Irish are all generous but I think my spouse rather too much so
Miss Harrison who is I believe bursting with envy said every thing in her power to prevail on me to defer my marriage till her brothers arrival in town I am certain she had some sinister view in wishing to delay my happiness and yet I cannot guess what it could be for it is impossible to suppose she could be vain enough to think of inveigling Sir John No matter what her schemes were I have put it out of her power to do me any injury
I have not yet seen any of my husbands relations they are all in the country and indeed there are few people of quality in Dublin at present—I am impatient till we go to our castle tho Sir John says it is a good deal out of repair and therefore he seems inclined to
purchase a small seat within a few miles of town but I love the grandeur of an ancient familymansion and have no doubt but he will indulge my wishes
I am at present so much engrossed by my own happiness that I have hardly leisure to rejoice in Lady Julianas misfortunes yet I am sincerely glad she is banished and to the spot she hates to Harleyhill—I give you infinite credit for having brought about a breach between her and her brother that brother whom she used to boast of as being all perfection But she was always insufferably vain of the merits of her family and used to talk of her mother as if she had been a phoenix tho I suppose she was neither better nor worse than yours or mine except her being a countess
Apropos of your mother I shall look for a proper place for her amongst our
tenants but you must excuse my repeating that I dont chuse to have her very near our castle—I suppose her Ladyship will be rather in the plaintive tone and one dont love to hear sorrowful tales that they cant remedy
That viper Evelyn is expected in town next week I will set out for our seat before he comes—for O my dear Dupont I feel I cannot bear his sight My baronet tho tall and handsome would be annihilated in his presence for tho both you and I detest him we must acknowledge he is charming in his figure at least His foolish companion Captain Harrison is returning to England to marry the widow of a man who was killed in a strange way at Evelyns lodgings at Bath but thank my stars I have done with the whole set for I dont intend to visit Miss Harrison when I come to town next winter
For heavens sake my dear Dupont take care of yourself and dont be caught tripping unless you are sure of a divorce and even then you know Sir James Desmond cant marry you unless you could contrive to detect his saintlike dame at a retaliation which I believe to be impossible for she has not spirit enough for a frolic unless she is mightily altered since I knew her she was then called the gentle Emma and I think can never rise higher than tagos praise—To suckle fools and chronicle small beer Sir John is all impatience at my staying so long out of his sight I hope you will excuse my quitting you for him and permit me to subscribe myself my dear Duponts sincere and happy friend
A OSHAUGHNASY
P S I dont think my name quite so terrible as I used to do
SIR WILLIAM STANLEY TO MR EVELYN
DEAR Evelyn the hurry of business I have been engaged in since my return to town will I hope be a sufficient excuse for not having sooner acknowledged the pleasure I received from both your letters—The first has inspired me with an earnest desire to see the beautiful lake which you modestlysay you cannot describe though you have contrived to give Lucy and me such an idea of it that we have both resolved
provided you will accompany us to visit Killarney next summer and when we are safe landed on the Irish shore we shall also expect you will do us the honour of presenting us to his Royal Highness of Coolavin and all the noble personages of his family
If the old savage as you justly call him should have retired into his coffin before our arrival I shall hope to be indulged with a sight of his spouse of whom I have formed so venerable an idea that I would travel some hundreds of miles to have the honour of kissing her fair hand and addressing her with that respect which is due not to her husbands mock royalty but to her sex and age
Had I met with the relation you have given of this extraordinary family in a book of travels or as it is now more politely
styled a Tour through Ireland I should have thought the author a bad chronologer and that he had stept back at least a couple of centuries in order to characterise the national weakness of the Irish that of uniting pride with poverty—Your veracity however is sufficient to prove that even in this enlightened age it still subsists in a superlative degree amongst the illustrious inhabitants of Coolavin
I was much pleased with your account of the blind bard I wish you understood his language who knows but he may be a second Homer and might sing the prowess of the progenitors of the ODermots in as lofty strains as the Grecian poet bestowed upon that of Achilles and Agamemnon—Be that as it may I am persuaded that those ditties which are framed in honour of their ancestors serve to inflame the
pride of the descendants and make them prefer indigence in a genteel profession to affluence in a meaner rank of life—This may appear from the destination of the younger sons who are devoted to poverty and can never be of use to their country—I heartily pity their misguided youth and think it amazing how such a family of gentlemen even in the cheapest country can be provided with food and raiment out of so small an income as two hundred pounds a year
I have purposely deferred mentioning the most material subject of your letter the unhappiness of Lady Desmond because I am by no means certain of the cause—A trifling circumstance has convinced me that it does not arise from any pecuniary difficulty nay I have reason to suppose Sir James Desmond must be rather in affluence though I hate gossiping
I think you have a right to be informed even of this trivial matter lest you should think me tardy in the execution of your generous intentions towards our dear Emma As I have received a very considerable addition to my fortune by the death of my grandfather I meant to surprise my Lucy by presenting her with a set of jewels which should correspond with the earrings you gave her and called upon Bellis in PallMall to bespeak them—He shewed me many beautiful ornaments and amongst the rest a diamond sprig for a ladys hair that was both rich and elegant I enquired the price which he told me was four hundred guineas I would have paid for it directly but he would not part with it as he said it was bespoke by Sir James Desmond whom he expected to call for it every moment as he had expressed the utmost impatience
to have it finished—I immediately directed another to be made exactly like it and felt myself extremely pleased with the information I had received upon a double account both with regard to the state of Sir Jamess finances and his affections
Luckily I did not mention this matter to Lucy as I meant to keep my transaction with Bellis a secret till my design was complete In the evening I proposed our going to Sir James Desmonds Lucy with her usual condescension complied yet I could perceive a something more like reluctance in her manner of assenting than I had ever before observed to any request of mine
When we came into Lady Desmonds drawingroom we found her embroidering a waistcoat for Sir James their little Fanny playing by her side—At a cardtable
were placed Sir Jame your friend Sewell two other men and Madame Dupont most elegantly dressed the finery of her whole appearance attracted my eyes which were soon fixed by surprize on the identical diamond sprig I had seen at Belliss in the morning conspicuous amongst the other ornaments of her hair I looked so long and steadily at her headdress that I fancied she became confused but as she is not easily put out of countenance my own disagreeable sensations upon this subject might probably occasion my thinking so
Sir James who is always polite pressed us to join their party at loo and the galant Mr Sewel offered to resign his place at the table either to Lucy or me—We declined their civilities and sat about an hour conversing with Emma who appeared more chearful than I have seen her for some time past yet still an
air of melancholy dwelt on her lovely face and like a summer cloud slightly obscured the lustre of the sun—While I turned my eyes alternately upon Lady Desmond and Madame Dupont I was ready to exclaim with Hamlet
Couldst thou on this fair mountain
Leave to feed and batten on that moor
But granting this affair as bad as I apprehend we must leave it to time to cure—Men will not be schooled out of their vices and corrosives but inflame wounds—All that can now be done is to guard the infamous secret from Emma the only means of doing which is to get her as much out of the scandalous set where she is only a cypher as possible—This thought immediately occurring to me I proposed her going to the opera with Lucy and me tomorrow evening she did not venture to reply to my proposal but turned her
dovelike eyes upon her husband as if to solicit his consent which to do him justice he very graciously gave adding that he was extremely sorry a prior engagement must prevent him from being of our party—He is neither a fool nor a brute we may therefore have hopes of his reformation
Remember my dear Charles that all I have said of Sir James and Madame Dupont is founded merely on conjecture she may have employed him to purchase this jewel for her and it would be cruel to rob her of the
immediate jewel of her soul
upon a slight surmise
The more I reflect upon this affair the more pleased I am at your absence—The warmth of your nature would not suffer you to wait till time shall unravel this mystery you would precipitately
call for an explanation of your doubts and by so doing injure the very person whom you wish to serve
The idea of mystery recals Lady Juliana Harley to my mind—It is above six weeks since she left her brothers house at Richmond neither Lucy nor any other person except old Watson her steward has heard from her since—He it seems has received her orders to dispose of her house and furniture in Berkeleysquare Upon being questioned he told me his Lady was not at Harleyhill but he either does not know or will not tell where she is
Lucy is inconsolable about her she fears some accident has befallen her and is hourly making fruitless enquiries after her friend—I confess there is something very extraordinary in her conduct time only can tell us more than we
know already which is that she is amiable and unhappy
Since we are upon the subject of private history I should be glad to know what Miss Harley is doing in Ireland and whether she has yet made any impression on your obdurate heart but if she has failed I should hope that either Miss Harrison or some other of her fair countrywomen have been more successful
I communicated some part of your letters to Mr Selwyn and he is determined to visit Ireland—He says if your accounts are genuine there are more strange sights to be seen there than in any other part of the world—He longs to converse with the Prince of Coolavin and shew him the sinfulness of pride and says if he will permit his youngest son
to take orders in the established church he will appoint him to a curacy
I have filled my paper with such a deal of tittletattle that I have barely left room to subscribe myself ever yours
W STANLEY
CHARLES EVELYN TO SIR WILLIAM STANLEY
Dublin
BELIEVE me Stanley I most sincerely rejoice in every acquisition of wealth and honour that can accrue to you and my loved Lucy to whom I must intreat you to make my apology for not answering her letter as the contents of yours have so entirely engrossed my thoughts that I cannot direct them to any other objects but the dear suffering ones of my tenderest affection
My sister Selwyn and Lucy will I hope forgive me when I own that even from my boyish days Emma has been the darling of my fondness but had I never known a partial regard for her till the present time I should have felt it now—She is unhappy—Thank heaven my other sisters are not so
Lady Juliana too—where can she be fled wherefore should she fly or why conceal the place of her retreat from her loved friend your wife
Sir James Desmond is—what I have ever thought him I will allow that our affections are not always in our power they may change from the most charming to the most odious object but a man of honour will not add insult to injury and triumph over the heart that he has wronged
I think with you that violent means will not recall a wandering affection and sure I am that Emmas gentle spirit will suffer all her husband can inflict in silent sadness she will not reproach him nor wound his ears with her complainings her tears will flow in secret their traces may perhaps be seen on her pale cheek and by her husbands conscious heart they may be deemed upbraidings
It is extremely fortunate that I am not in London I could not with patience have endured the scene you saw at Sir James Desmonds—How dare he bring his paramour into the presence of his wife Tis past conjecture Stanley I have no doubts of their infamous connection You say he is neither a fool nor brute and therefore we may hope for his reformation—that is when his vitiated taste grows sick and weary of his present folly he will behave less cruelly
to his wife from conscious shame of having used her ill But can the heart return when once estranged can she have that unbounded confidence in his affection which constitutes the charm of wedded love Will she not fear a second change of his affection and can she look with fond respect upon the man who has taught her to think slightly of him Impossible The human heart was formed to feel and when oppressed by unmerited sufferings it will resent Times lenient power will no doubt abate the keen anguish of disappointed love—Its cure at length is found in cold indifference and she who had a right to hope for happiness gladly compounds for ease Such is the state of many a female heart no wonder then if it should sometimes stray and when rejected by its lawful lord seek consolation in an aliens breast
I have no fears of this kind for our Emma she will as I have already said too tamely acquiesce in her hard fate But here I swear she shall not be insulted—Madame Dupont shall be banished from Sir James Desmonds house their scenes of galantry be played elsewhere
This is a point on which I intreat Lucy to interfere—It may not be so proper for you to appear in such a matter—Depend upon it Emma is perfectly acquainted with her husbands folly her sister therefore may speak freely to her and I intreat she will
There surely must be some cause for Lady Julianas conduct—Why is it made a mystery to me My tenderest wishes for her happiness accompany her flight and ever shall attend her—But yet I am not weak enough to form a thought of pursuing her nor would I obtrude
myself into her presence were it this moment in my power to do so—Then do not keep me longer in the dark but freely tell me all you know about her
That very silly woman that was Miss Harley has married a man who calls himself Sir John OShaughnasy but from all the accounts that I can learn he is a selfcreated baronet and equally deficient in manners morals rank and fortune She has not been acquainted with him above a month Miss Harrison used every argument in her power to delay the marriage till her brother returned to Dublin in order that he should make some inquiries into the mans character but the lovers were impatient and married they were They left this town on the morning of the day that Captain Harrison and I returned to it they set out with a very pompous
equipage to a waterdrinking place called Mallow and no person has heard from them since I hope the husband is not so bad as he is represented for tho I dislike I bear no malice to her mockladyship
No Stanley neither Miss Harrison nor any other woman I have seen in this kingdom has made any impression on my heart tho I acknowledge I have beheld much beauty here and that the lady I have named has charms sufficient both of mind and person to inspire the tenderest passion in a vacant heart but mine is filled with one adored idea and never shall another enter there—I wish not to renew the painful subject
Let your next letter be directed to Bath where I hope to hear that my loved Emma is at least set free from the mortifying triumph of her detested rival
and also what part of the world Lady Juliana has retired to Love to my sisters I think I would not have Emma know that I am acquainted with her present situation her delicacy will be wounded at knowing that I must despise her worthless husband Adieu
My dear Stanley
C EVELYN
LADY JULIANA HARLEY TO LADY STANLEY
The Continent
DO not imagine my dear Lucy that I have not fully shared the anxiety you must have suffered from my unaccountedfor absence Thank heaven this is the only time I have ever wittingly given you pain since the first happy days we spent together in youthful innocence—Ah why do I recall the fond remembrances
I have heard it said that at the approach of death we become insensibly weaned from our dearest connections the fibres of the heart grow relaxed and those dear ties which were so closely wound about it loosen and decay so as to make us willingly resign what we can no longer retain—How highly favourable must such a dispensation be to the sons and daughters of sensibility But why may not a living wretch partake of this indulgence why must the absent forms of those from whom she is banished haunt her retirement obtrude into her solitary cell and skim along before her la•guid eyes
Why do I still behold my Lucys face see the bright drop stand trembling in her eye or silent steal along her blooming cheek drawn forth by pity for her Juliana Why does my brothers form appear
before me why does contempt shoot from his angry eyes even through my sinking heart But I have other visions still more dreadful—spectres indeed that have long stampt indelible impressions on my heart and mind
Would I could tell you all—but soon I will—This bursting bosom shall have vent and pour forth all its sorrows into yours—A sad and cruel proof of friendship yet when you know how dearly it must cost me my Lucy will esteem it as she ought
Judge by your own feelings what I must have suffered at tearing myself from you without informing you of my intentions—Too well I knew that you would plead against my purpose and I also knew that even you must plead in vain
Deprived of the only stay in life that fate had left me my unkind brother on whom could I rely for comfort or protection A little twig bending beneath the blast without one fostering tree to shelter or support it—I have at length escaped the storm and never never will I brave it more
My rank and connections in life unhappily for me placed me in such a situation that it was impossible for me to indulge my sincere wish of living in retirement whilst I remained in England I was by many mistaken for an object of envy and malice pursued my steps tho their traces were marked by sorrow—What then have I to regret in the world I have left ought I not rather to rejoice in the idea of being forgotten by every acquaintance and by every friend except yourself who ever knew or loved me
The pains I have taken to conceal even from you the place of my retirement must convince you that my resolution is not to be shaken—But though determined on an entire seclusion from the world I still wish to preserve the tender attachment that has so long subsisted between us and which is now the sole remaining charm that can render life supportable to me you may therefore conclude that I desire to hear frequently from you for when we say we wish to be forgotten by the whole universe there is still one tender bosom where we would repose one dear and faithful friend in whose memory we desire even to survive ourselves
I did not bring a single servant with me from England—I have settled Watson who was so many years my maid with her father at Canterbury—The old
man was my fathers steward and still is mine his long and faithful services amply deserve the independence which he now enjoys If I were capable of tasting pleasure I should feel it from the recollection of having rendered a very worthy family happy
Watson is the only person to whom I have confided the place of my retreat you must inclose your letters to him and he will forward them to me—You see how strongly I rely upon your friendship—I cannot fear that I shall ever be neglected or forgotten by your tenderness and virtue
When I write next I hope I shall be more composed—Peace has began to dawn upon me since the determination of my purpose and may perhaps again revisit my sad heart—Soon shall its faults
and follies be laid open to your friendly eye—But Oh my Lucy judge me not severely and guard the fatal secret of
Your unhappy friend J HARLEY
LADY STANLEY TO LADY JULIANA
HOW have I trembled for the life or what is dearer still the reason of my beloved Juliana and though your letter has relieved my fears on the first subject you must pardon my saying that I am not yet at peace upon the last
Say my unkind mysterious friend what are those cruel ills your youth has suffered that have determined you to
quit a world you scarce have entered Blest as you are with every outward sign of happiness with beauty rank and fortune what are those secret pangs that prey upon your heart A life of innocence should be a life of peace and sure I am my Juliana knows no guilt
The only misfortune that has ever attended you was the death of Mr Harley or perhaps I might rather say your marriage with him But those events are passed long since and had you loved your husband with the tenderest fondness time would ere now have softened your distress—The youthful eye bends not its speculation always on the grave—Yours should look forward to long smiling scenes of happiness that wait you—Such should your visions be because you have a right to hope they would be realized
I cannot think so slightly of your understanding as to suppose your quarrel with your brother should disgust you with all the rest of the world—Indeed Juliana you want not his support but you want firmness to support yourself—The little tittletattle relative to my brother must have quickly blown over—You have sunk beneath a whisper not a storm
Return my friend return and face your foes they will vanish at your presence their malice shall recoil upon themselves and your fair fame appear more bright from their attempts to sully it Flight is always construed into a confession of guilt there is no retreating from slander we must confront the blatant beast or never hope to quell it
I flatter myself this hint will have due weight with you and make you reflect
that you ought not to let your enemies triumph over you for the sake of your friends your family and yourself
I am firmly persuaded that a great part of your unhappiness is constitutional and proceeds from the weakness of your nerves and hence arise those spectres that you say haunt your retirement they are fancybred Juliana and would quickly vanish in the dissipation of the gay world—Tis only in the gloom of solitude they ever dwell—Do not then mortify me by preferring such horrid company to mine
I believe it is near a dozen years since we were first acquainted and during that whole time have I been striving to enliven your spirits for you have been addicted to melancholy even from your childhood and of all persons breathing
are the most unfit for solitude—There may be truth in a paradox
I shall not comment upon the unkindness of concealing your design of quitting England from me nor on the childishness of your continuing to make a mystery of the place of your retirement I shall only say that whatever other proofs of your friendship you may think proper to honour me with I shall still think it deficient if I am to be kept in the dark with regard to your present situation for I think you know me well enough to be certain that I can keep a secret—My desire to be informed of this particular arises from an higher motive than curiosity for that alone might well be satisfied with the unbounded confidence you have promised to repose in me—But indeed my dear visionary I think you can have no secrets that I do not know—Perhaps I am mistaken
but at all events you may safely rely upon the sincere and faithful friendship of your ever affectionate
L STANLEY
P S My brother is not yet returned to London—I imagine he is now at Bath and has truly shared in my distress for your unaccountable flight—I shall remove his apprehensions for your safety by this post—Would to heaven I could as easily relieve the pangs he suffers from disappointed love
LADY STANLEY TO CHARLES EVELYN
DEAR Charles the business of administration and a hundred and fifty other plaguy businesses prevent my Stanley from answering your letter by this post and I though again rejected as a correspondent have resolved to share my joy with you at finding our lost sheep
I have had a letter from Lady Juliana she is somewhere on the continent but
as yet thinks proper to conceal the place of her retreat—Why I know not but I am certain you will rejoice to know that she is safe in any place—Though I am less unhappy on her account than I have been I shall not be easy till she returns to England—If the eloquence of my pen should fail to bring her back I think my Stanley will be so indulgent as to suffer me to try my persuasive powers in person provided we can discover her retreat—I would go to the antipodes for her service and I think the most material one I can do her and myself is to restore her to her friends—I fear self mingles much in my affection for her I cannot bear to think of losing the companion of my youth and the friend of my heart But away with the ungenerous suggestion
Will you believe me when I tell you that my lordly spouse has absolutely refused
to communicate the contents of your last letter to me though he has had the modesty to enjoin my writing to you and bids me tell you every thing I know—No truly Sir said I I beg to be excused for I shall take this opportunity of convincing my husband and my brother that I can at least keep my own secrets—So mum is the word with regard to myself
We have had more of Emmas company of late than usual and I have the pleasure to tell you that her spirits seem to be much better than they were—I wish I had a nostrum that could cure low spirits then should Lady Juliana Lady Desmond and Charles Evelyn be as well and happy as your affectionate
L STANLEY
P S Madame Dupont fell from her horse in Hyde Park and strained her ancle about a fortnight ago and has been ever since confined to her house where she has my consent to remain as long as she thinks proper for I like being sure of not meeting her either in public or private
MR SEWELL TO MR SIMPSON
DEAR Jack the scene is changed we have removed our coterie from Charlesstreet Berkeleysquare to Burystreet St Jamess and I highly approve of our new settlement for we have now no lookers on
Monsieur Dupont is not in town and Madame his Lady has met with a slight accident that confines her at home though it does not prevent her being in
perfect health and spirits—Her house is now our nightly rendezvous and we have made some very agreeable additions to our party particularly a Lord Somners who is rich and fond of play—As we are all pretty sharp set his Lordship stands but a bad chance of increasing his wealth amongst us but that is his lookout you know—I earnestly pray that Monsieur Dupont may remain in the country for I have a shrewd guess that he would disturb the nest if he were to see how prettily we build under his roof
Sir James Desmond is still a doating enamorato of Madames and she coquets it away at a great rate—There is a good pretty girl a distant relation by way of companion in the house she makes tea admirably and sings agreeably when we can spare time to listen to her—In short all is mirth and jollity
and the Peers guineas chink sweetly in our pockets yet I still keep my eye fixed on the proper time for decamping for I am quite certain this party is too pleasant to last and that it will end sorrowfully to some of us—I am resolved to take care of one and let the rest shift as they may—Sir James as I predicted is again out of cash and has borrowed five hundred more from yours
G SEWELL
P S I have taken care to get a fresh bond from the Baronet payable on demand for the fifteen hundred—As both you and I are in cash now suppose we looked out for a good mortgage Jack you may have many opportunities where you are young heirs are the people to deal with—We should strike the iron while tis hot
MR EVELYN TO LADY STANLEY
Bath
I AM truly grateful to my dear Lucy for her kind attention to my happiness which has received a considerable increase from the pleasing accounts in her letter
I am indeed sincerely rejoiced to hear of Lady Julianas safety though I own our apprehensions on her account could have no foundation but that of
uncommon and sinister accidents for surely there does not exist a savage in the wildest part of the universe that would injure her
I am still extremely perplexed by her conduct in concealing her retreat from you—It is not from me that she now flies my word has ever been inviolable nor for my own sake would I renew the pangs I have already suffered by hazarding another interview
I am highly pleased with your resolution of endeavouring to bring her back to England What cause can she possibly have to shun a world that must adore her I am lost in the conjecture
Our Emma too you tell me is more chearful—pleasing intelligence never may gloom again oppress her gentle spirits or sadness cloud the sweet serenity
of her complacent brow—I wish you to amuse her Lucy carry her from home—sad recipe to seek for happiness by flying from the only spot where it is most naturally to be found and yet in hers as in many other cases disappointment blasts it in its native soil while dissipation steals its fading colours and wears a faint resemblance of it to the world—For this I fear our Emma must compound
Captain and Miss Harrison returned hither with me—In a few days I hope I shall prevail on Mrs Williams to make a very deserving man happy by bestowing her hand and heart upon the Captain—Soon after their marriage they purpose going to the South of France for the entire recovery of Mrs Williamss health which is far from valid though she is better than I ever hoped to see her Miss Harrison and a young man
a very good family and fortune who is her sincere admirer will accompany them—She has not yet recovered the vivacity she possessed before her attachment to Captain Williams but time they say can conquer every thing and will I trust erase the memory of that disagreeable event from her mind
I know not why but my spirits are uncommonly low at present there is no nostrum for a mind diseased and therefore your kind wish for your suffering friends is vain
May you long enjoy those charming spirits that contribute so much to your own and your friends happiness—My sincere regards attend Sir William Stanley Lady Desmond and the Selwyns—Accept the same from your affectionate brother
C EVELYN
LADY OSHAUGHNASY TO MADAME DUPONT
Mallow
RUINED and undone Maria deceived stript and deserted Can you believe there was ever such a monster in nature as this beggarly baronet that has imposed on me I shall keep my title for a knight he surely is of some foreign order or other but the being stiled your Ladyship is all I have got for twenty thousand pounds luckily for me there is a reversionary heir to the
other ten and I could not bestow it on my vile husband
I will be calm if I can and acquaint you with the whole process of his villainy—He brought me to this place under pretence that his castle one in the air was in this county and that he could have frequent opportunities of seeing how the workmen went on with the repairs by making short excursions from hence
When I had been here about a week I expressed my surprize at not having received the usual compliments of visits c from his family he told me that most of them lived at a considerable distance but he would take care they should not be wanting in respect to me and he would set out next day to acquaint them with my arrival in the country—He took the carriage with him
and returned in two days accompanied by a couple of the strangest female frights I ever beheld the one old and ugly the other young and rather handsome These vulgar figures he introduced to me as an aunt and cousin I received them civilly but the sight of these quite cured me of my impatience to be acquainted with the rest of his kindred
These women got their persons and dress a little new modelled in a few days and one evening we went to the rooms together for this you must know is a waterdrinking place—I had sat down to cards with some ladies of fashion here when my cousin Catty came to the table and whispered me that Sir John had sent to desire I would let him have my keys for a few minutes as he wanted some paper out of my writingbox
she said she would carry them to him and return immediately
I complied without hesitation and more than an hour elapsed before I grew uneasy at not seeing Sir John or his young kinswoman—The old one who stuck close to my side said she believed Sir John and Catty were gone to visit a relation of theirs that lived about three miles off for she had seen them drive by in the chariot
Though I was by no means delighted with this intelligence I concealed my chagrin and waited in expectation of their sending the carriage for me as it happened to rain till every creature had left the rooms But had I staid till it came I might have remained there for ever
When I returned to my lodgings I found the doors of my apartment locked and upon enquiring for the servants I was told the men were all gone with Sir John and the young Lady and they believed my woman was in the bedchamber as they had heard an odd noise in that part of the house—I called to my maid several times but received no answer and upon having the doors forced open I found her locked up in a dark closet where she could scarcely breathe and from whence it was impossible she could be heard or convey me any intelligence
My trunks were all lying open my papers jewels money and the best part of my wardrobe vanished—I became almost distracted—The old Jezabel of an aunt either was or pretended to be ten times more outrageous than me—She tore her hair and uttered a
thousand imprecations against Sir John with whom in her fury she disclaimed all relationship—But I found the great source of her sorrow was the being left behind by her hopeful daughter
In this dreadful exigence I knew not how to act but as soon as I was a little calm I applied to a gentleman of the law for advice he assured me there was nothing to be done for my service as my husband had a legal claim to all my effects—I fancied that even this grave sage of the law and all the people about me seemed rather to laugh at my distress than pity it till I informed them that I was still possessed of ten thousand pounds which happily it was not in my husbands power to alienate They then changed their manners towards me and the counsellor would fain have persuaded me to institute a suit in the ecclesiastical court against Sir John—I shall not
take his advice but mean to return immediately to England and try what better information I can pick up there
O Maria what vile hypocrites are these men would to heaven I had remained single and yet it was impossible to doubt the apparent fondness of this cruel wretch who seemed perfectly to doat on me and I am such a fool I cannot help lamenting the loss of his tenderness It must have been that cursed Catty that seduced him from me How will my prudish sisterinlaw and all the other puritans of my acquaintance laugh at my being taken in at this time of my life I cannot bear the thought—I think I had better retire into some place where I am not known than expose myself to the ridicule of those who pretend to stile themselves my friends
No I will pursue my husband perhaps I may yet recover his affections or my effects and get him to discard his infamous accomplice—If you had seen how handsome he looked the very day he left me you could not have believed him a deceiver
I know not what to do my spirits are quite broken—I will hasten to you as I am certain you will pity your sincere friend
A OSHAUGHNASY
LADY JULIANA TO LADY STANLEY
WHY will my dearest friend add pain to my affliction by making a request I cannot must not grant Full well I know your generous motive Lucy nor have I once suspected that the inquiry owed its birth to curiosity merely—Your kindness would attempt to rescue me even from myself but in vain my friend for I am selfdevoted Soon will those vows have passed my lips which cannot indeed should never
be recalled and then your fond solicitude shall be indulged you then shall know the spot where I shall be irrevocably fixed This is no sudden start believe me Lucy—Long has the idea wandered through my mind—Long have I languished for that peaceful haven in which this tempestbeaten bark can only anchor
Too much a slave to all the fond affections of the heart love for my brother tempted me to hope that his society might sooth my griefs and lull my cares to rest—The thought was weak and vain—Blest be the disappointment I have met with—Had it not happened the arrow must have festered in the wound and rankled there for ever—It may now be drawn forth and the allhealing power of true contrition soften every pang
This language must appear obscure to you who judging from your own unspotted life must have pronounced mine innocent—Alas you know me not—Peace flies from hidden guilt nor can even penitence reclaim the wanderer back while close concealment bars the door against it confession must be added to contrition and for such an act of humiliation the season now approaches
Commune with yourself my friend and try your fortitude before you open the enclosed recital if you shrink back from pain commit it to the flames and let the remembrance of the sad reciter perish with it—O no that will not be the tear of pity glistens in your eye and purity like yours will weep for faults it could not have committed
When you have read my story you will be convinced that it is not the weakness
of my head that has conjured up spectres to haunt me—and yet I trust in the unbounded mercy of that gracious Power whose eye alone pervades the human heart that these sad objects shall be banished from me and peaceful visions bless my nightly slumbers—My hopes thus raised I cannot will not doubt of more than pardon of pity from my friend—Tis all I now can ask or you bestow on the unhappy
J HARLEY
P S To any one but my Lucy the enclosed narrative would afford little entertainment it is not a series of events but a continued conflict of the mind, and is a history of passions not of persons
STORY OF LADY JULIANA HARLEY
Though my loved Lucy is alalready acquainted with all the little events of those blessed days we passed in youthful innocence together and that I have already informed you of the cause of the separation that took place between my parents while I was a child you must allow me to recur back again to that fatal circumstance from which I have cause to date my every misery
My mother as you know died at Dijon a real martyr to the Catholic religion which she professed—To that she sacrificed all earthly ties the tender wife and the fond mother sunk before the idea of a higher duty the conflict was too great for her soft nature—
The saint sustained it but the woman died
When the period of all her sorrows drew near she called me to her and with her dying lips enjoined me to pay the strictest obedience to my father in every point except that of renouncing the religion in which I had been bred and which she added I trust my Julia will never forsake for something tells me that you may at some time or other of your life stand in need of such an asylum as can only be found in the bosom of our church
Too prophetic were her words but ever blest be the guardian spirit that inspired them The deep melancholy which succeeded to the violent sorrow I felt for the loss of such a parent marked my countenance with a timid and dejected air which my father at my return to England unkindly misconstrued into a sullenness of disposition or a personal dislike to him and this opinion inspired
an haughty coldness in his manners towards me—I trembled whenever I approached him his hand was not stretched forth to sustain my feeble steps nor did the encouraging smile of parental fondness ever smooth the severity of his naturally austere brow—My brother was his darling and my only consolation—Cruel as he is now become my heart avows its gratitude to him for all the little happiness that dawned upon my youth
When I had been about a year at my fathers he proposed sending back the governess that had come with me from France as he justly imagined that she kept up my attachment to the Catholic religion which he was determined I should renounce This was a severe stroke to me I loved Madame Duval as a second parent she had been a favourite of my mothers and many pleasing
melancholy hours we used to spend together in mingling our tears to her memory—On this occasion her dying commands occurred to me and I submitted without appearing to lament my loss
Her place was supplied by a very different sort of woman unpleasing in her person and vulgar in her manners—But you must remember Mrs Winterman—I conceived a very strong aversion to her from the first sight and therefore from the moment that my poor Duval left me I never had a female friend older than myself whom I could consult upon any difficult occasion or to whom I could pour forth the sorrows of my oerburthened heart
About this aera I had the happiness of becoming acquainted with you the vicinity of our houses in the country produced
an intimacy between our families and soon very soon my Lucy became the adopted sister of my love—About two years after our friendship had commenced my brother went to travel my father who could ill bear his absence determined to visit his estates in Scotland and leave me with Mrs Winterman and the servants at home—I know my Lucys kindness then prevailed on Mrs Evelyn to request my father that I might be permitted to pass the winter with her in London—His consent to this proposal was the only mark of his affection I ever had received—Woud to heaven he had been obdurate as he was wont to be and confined me at Fairfield yet let me not unjustly charge him with the sad effects that sprung from this indulgence—The faults are all my own the merit his
About the beginning of the following spring you may remember that your eldest brother returned to England on account of your mothers ill health though he had not finished his travels nor been abroad above three years
O Lucy do you recollect his form Alas to me it is for ever present He had such eyes as yours and Emmas gracious smile—Never till then had I beheld what manly beauty was yet had his charms been merely personal I think they could not have obtained my heart The tenderness he shewed his dying mother his fond attention to her slightest wish the ease the grace that marked his every action his kindness to my Lucy and her sisters joined to the passion he avowed for me soon wonmy youthful heart nor did a thought of blame obtrude itself upon my mind when I bestowed it on such worth as his
On Mrs Evelyns death my father sent for me imediately—Sad was the parting Lucy yet I own my tears had different sources and flowed perhaps even more from love than friendship—Though your amiable brother had offered every argument to sooth my grief and solemnly assured me he would solicit my fathers consent of which I could not entertain a doubt as soon as it was decent after the loss of so good a mother yet I could not command my sorrows they were impetuous I continued to weep and neither eat or slept during the journey On my arrival at Fairfield my father in the same breath inquired of Mrs Winterman what illness I had just recovered from and presented Mr Harley to me as a particular friend of his and my brothers
I was struck with horror at the sight of Mr Harley yet could by no means
account for my disgust both his person and address were pleasing yet I shuddered when he approached me as if he had been some noxious animal—My father in a few days perceived my dislike to his friend and spoke of my behaviour with resentment—I told him I would endeavour to alter my manners though I could not conquer my feelings which I confessed were unaccountable even to myself—He sternly replied I would advise you to get the better of your prejudice for it is beginning at the wrong end to set out with an aversion to your husband I was struck motionless at this expression and stood for several minutes as if I had been petrified—All the sorrows I had ever felt vanished from my remembrance swallowed up in the superior gulph of miseries that my foreboding mind then warned me to apprehend But tears came to my relief and soon a ray of hope beamed through the
gloomy prospect My father was severe I knew but I could not believe he could be so inhuman as to sacrifice the peace and happiness of an unoffending child—My brother would I hoped solicit for me and sure I thought my Evelyn could never plead in vain
I retired to my chamber and wrote you an account of every circumstance that had happened I was certain you would acquaint your brother with my situation and I had no doubt but that he would hasten his application to my father—That letter never reached you Lucy the cruel Mrs Winterman delivered it into my fathers hands and he became the more incensed against me
While I daily waited in anxious expectation of hearing from you I endeavoured to assume a more placid air and manner towards Mr Harley than I
had at first put on unfortunately he construed my behaviour into liking and addressed me with all the warmth of a declared lover My letter had betrayed me to my father he saw through the thin veil of affability and as he after told me rejoiced at my becoming a sacrifice to my own deceit
When a whole month had elapsed without my receiving a line from you or my loved Henry I grew almost distracted—I could no longer conceal the agonies of my mind—Despair inspired me with courage—I threw myself at my fathers feet revealed every sentiment of my heart implored his forgiveness and in the humblest but most earnest terms besought him not to devote his child to certain misery
He heard me with composure and calmly replied he did not think himself
indebted to my confidence for revealing the secrets of my heart as he was already apprized of the weakness of my conduct in attaching my affections without his consent to Mr Evelyn but though he had no power over my passions I should find he had some over my person—He then in the most solemn manner swore he would never bestow his daughter on a man who had made her guilty of a breach in her first duty and meanly strove to steal her foolish heart after so clandestine a manner I attempted to exculpate my Henry but he commanded my silence and sternly vowed I should accept of Mr Harley for my husband or from that hour be loaded with his curse then left me drowned in tears and sinking on the earth—O had it opened wide and taken me to its bosom I had been blest indeed
After this dreadful interview my spirits were so intirely depressed by sorrow that I was utterly unable to leave my chamber for above a week during which time I wrote to your brother and my own but both these letters met the same fate as my former one to you and served if possible to increase my fathers rage tho heaven is my witness I spoke not harshly of his cruel conduct He intercepted every letter that was addressed to me and except the indulgence of pen and ink to vent my sorrows I was treated in every respect like a criminal confined in the Bastile
In this deplorable situation you found me at your arrival in the country when I was permitted to receive the transport of seeing you but Mrs Winterman you remember never quitted the chamber but sat like the figure of curiosity with eyes ears and mouth wide open to
catch every syllable that passed between us—Though I of course was silent with regard to my situation your perspicuity easily discovered that some unhappiness of mind was the source of my illness and my poor Sally Watson who had been banished from my sight as she afterwards told me acquainted you with all the particulars of my distress
In consequence of your visit to me I know that Mr Evelyn immediately waited upon my father and made the most liberal proposals for his alliance—I also know to my everlasting sorrow that my unkind I will not call him cruel father refused them with disdain yet still my faithful Henry persevered bore all the haughtiness of causelessly offended pride and offered even his whole estate to be settled or disposed of at my fathers pleasure Alas it was in vain I was not sacrificed to interest but caprice
and resentment which carried him so far as to command that all intercourse of visits messages c between your family and ours might cease from that instant
During the time of my voluntary confinement to my chamber I received several polite and tender billets of inquiry after my health from Mr Harley from these I formed a romantic idea that the gentleness of his nature might be prevailed upon to relinquish his pretensions to my person if I could have resolution sufficient to acquaint him that my heart was engaged to another I anticipated in my mind the pleasure he would feel in rendering two persons happy and my eyes often overflowed with gratitude and esteem for Mr Harleys supposed generosity This simple scheme became the darling of my imagination and I resolved
to put it in practice as a last resource
From the time that this thought occurred to me my spirits grew better and I rather wished than feared a meeting with Mr Harley—It was not long delayed Soon after his total rejection of Mr Evelyn my father came into my chamber and acquainted me with every thing that had passed between them in order as he said to reconcile me to my duty by totally destroying every vain imagination I might have conceived of an union with a family whom he disliked for having attempted to seduce my affection without the sanction of his approbation
I replied not to this severe determination but with my tears but when he added with the most peremptory tone that he expected I should be ready to
bestow my hand on Mr Harley without reluctance that day sennight I again threw myself at his feet offered to renounce all connexion with my loved Evelyn with you my Lucy with all my world provided he would recal his harsh command and suffer me to live and die his daughter He looked upon me sternly and taking up a Bible that lay upon my table swore by it that nothing but my death should prevent my fulfilling the engagement he had made to Mr Harley at the time he had already mentioned then left me without waiting my reply
The little hope I had conceived of Mr Harleys generosity was now my sole support and I resolved to put it to the proof immediately—I saw him from my window walking in the garden I called for my hat and with my tearswoln eyes descended to him—He seemed surprised
and rejoiced at seeing me but took no notice of those strong marked traces of sorrow that appeared on my countenance—I tried to speak to him but tears stopped my utterance and the imperfect words died on my trembling lips—I returned to my chamber convinced of my own inability to express myself properly on a subject I was so much affected with and thought I should be able to do it better in writing—After many efforts which all appeared inadequate to my feelings I at length finished a letter in which I exhausted every argument that I thought could move his honour or pity and engage him to renounce the worthless hand that could not give a heart When I had sealed and sent it the agitation of my mind became almost insupportable but still I flattered myself that a certainty of any kind would afford me relief
I was not permitted to remain long in this error for in an hours time I received a very florid epistle from Mr Harley lamenting his misfortune in not having been able to engage my affections but that as he had every thing to hope for from my virtue and good sense he flattered himself that by a series of unremitted tenderness he should at length triumph over every prejudice I might have conceived against him and concluded with assuring me that the request contained in my letter was the only one I should ever make that he would ever refuse With the certainty I so much wished for all my hopes were blasted and I then thought it was impossible I could ever be more wretched—Vain presumption those sorrows were but the prelude to far greater woes
Warned by my folly let no woman ever confess a prior passion for another object to him whom fate allots her for a husband My fatal letter turned Mr Harleys heart to stone his pride was piqued and though I truly think he did not love me he would have died rather than have surrendered me to a triumphant rival
A thousand wild vagaries now rushed into my troubled brain I thought of getting off in some disguise of flying to my Henry—But then would not my father force me from his arms Might not some horrid scene of bloodshed follow Could I sustain the curse of disobedience O no my heart shrunk within me at the shocking thought—My mothers dying form seemed to appear before me and her last words to vibrate on my ear
I could resist no longer—And when my father came to reproach me with the letter which Mr Harley had so ungenerously shewn him I pacified his wrath by telling him with a composure that amazed myself that I was ready to obey his will and sacrifice my peace my happiness and all my soul held dear to his commands and go a silent victim to the altar with Mr Harley—At that instant my father gazed on me with an astonished look and said My Julia is incapable of deceit she therefore purposes what she now promises and means to make her father happy at last
O do not doubt it Sir I answered if giving up much more than life can answer that great end behold your daughter ready to make the sacrifice—My father turned away his head to hide
the starting tear then took me in his arms and blessed me
I was a perfect Niobe yet at that moment felt a transient transport that absorbed my griefs—Blest source of happiness the consciousness of having done my duty why wert thou not for ever present with me Why has this feeble frame been ever torn between thy dictates and contending passions
My father was so much pleased with me that he became all kindness on the sudden Sally Watson was allowed to attend me I was no longer watched by Mrs Winterman and he was indulgent enough to postpone my marriage for a fortnight without my requesting it in hopes that I should in that time recover my chearfulness—Alas it was for ever fled from me—and though I
wore the semblance of composure all the day my nights were passed in agonies
My poor Watson was amazed at my conduct and was afraid to mention the loved name of Evelyn—But as she found me frequently in tears she began to doubt the reality of my seeming calmness and ventured to acquaint me with the numberless stratagems my Henry had vainly tried to accomplish his hopes of seeing me—I was terrified at the account she gave me of the dangers to which he had exposed himself for me and told her that were it in my power to see him I would decline the interview as my fate was now irrevocably fixed and nothing upon earth could alter it
She then implored my forgiveness for having promised to deliver a letter from Mr Evelyn which she presented to me
—I had not virtue to withstand this trial I bathed the precious relic with my tears and placed it next my heart from thence my answer flowed in which I solemnly conjured him as he valued my happiness here and hereafter never to attempt to see me more—I told him that I now considered myself as Mr Harleys wife and that from that moment I never would receive a letter from or write to him again—I poured forth a thousand fervent wishes for his happiness and for yours my Lucy and bade him everlastingly farewel
In spite of my injunctions he wrote again and Watson brought his second letter but I returned it as it came unopened and fancied I had now gained a perfect victory over my fondness—How vain the selfsufficience of our boasted reason—The letter was no sooner gone than I a thousand times
repented my not reading it—Perhaps my Henry acquiesced in my request and readily resigned me to his rival—Had I been sure of that it would I thought have eased my tortured mind for I too fondly felt his sorrows added to my own
My days thus wasting in a state of misery brought forward that superlatively sad one that was to mark my future life with anguish As it approached I looked on it with horror yet I wished it past On the preceding evening my father took me by the hand and led me to the garden where as we walked he condescended to apologize for the seeming severity of his conduct towards me by saying that he apprehended my opposition to his will had proceeded from my mothers haying ea•ly inspired me with an aversion to his person and a contempt of his authority which latter article of undutifulness
at least he was resolved to conquer
In the zeal of my filial affection to her injured memory I exclaimed O Sir you do her wrong—I see my mother now and hear her dying words—At that instant I beheld my Henrys form concealed beneath a peasants garb standing near me I gave an heavy sigh and sunk upon the earth—My father stood amazed and thought the power of fancy had so far operated on my weak spirits as to conjure up a spectre to my view—He called for instant help and when my sight returned I still beheld my Henrys face pale and dejected with his hands fast closed leaning against a tree—I rose the moment I had strength sufficient and resting on my fathers arm returned into the house
My fathers late returning tenderness seemed much alarmed at this accident and he told Mr Harley before me that he thought it proper to deser our marriage for a few days longer—Judge of their mutual surprize when I requested that it might not be delayed The wretch condemned asks but an addition to his misery who begs a reprieve when hope of pardon is past You may be sure they readily assented and I desired leave to retire to my chamber for the remainder of the evening
There I indulged my sorrows and gave a loose to tears and to complainings—There I reproached the cruel Henry for having disobeyed my last command and exposed himself and me to certain ruin had he been detected—And there I tried to tearhis image from my tortured bosom—
But in the foldings of my
heart he lived with life and far the dearer he
After a night passed in the bitterest conflict with myself I arose more calm and hoped the force of duty to my father with a patient resignation to my irresistible doom might enable me to go through the awful and irrevocable ceremony with composure—Before I left my chamber I begged of heaven not to impute to me the sacrilegous loveless vow I was compelled to make—But when the solemn words of adjuration which begins the ceremony were pronounced I could no longer contain my sorrow it burst forth and had not my father supported me I had again sunk lifeless on the earth
On this occasion Mr Harley appeared rather more offended than alarmed and behaved with a gloomy kind of tenderness
towards me while my father seemed to impute what he called accident to the weak state of my nerves and as soon as I was able to stand again they proceeded to finish the ceremony and the indissoluble knot was tied
In about a week after I was to my great satisfaction conveyed to Harleyhill I flattered myself that change of place and objects might amuse my mind and that when I had quitted Fairfield I should lose the remembrance of the sorrows I had experienced there—There was another and a stronger reason that made me desirous of leaving it the vicinity of your house to ours—I had never ventured to walk in the garden or even to look out at a window since the evening before I was married lest my eyes should encounter their dearest yet most dreaded object—Alas I knew not that grief had preyed upon my
Henrys spirits and that he was at that time confined to his bed with a slow fever
I call heaven to witness that from the moment I became a wife I most solemnly purposed to fulfil my duty and never give Mr Harlcy the smallest cause of discontent—I concealed my grief and even endeavoured to assume a chearful air I received his friends and relations as graciously as I had power to do and if a sigh escaped me in his presence I blushed for having committed an involuntary fault yet had I not at that time given vent to my swoln bosom and poured forth all its sorrows to my faithful Watson I must have died overcharged with woe
As soon as the hurry and dissipation of our wedding visits were at an end my father left us and from that hour Mr
Harley became sullen and severe—When we have been alone and I have tried to sooth his temper and to force a smile from his contracted brow he would take out the fatal letter I had written to him before our marriage con it over several times then look upon me with contempt and say
Tis damned dissimulation all
—I could not at such times command my tears in spite of me they flowed—He then would sneer and say
Thank heaven you feel the pangs of disappointed love—So far we meet on equal terms
We passed four months in this deplorable state I had then the additional misfortune of losing my father who died in scotland and appointed Mr Harley guardian to my brother—On this account it was necessary for Mr Harley to go there and after my grief for my father had a little subsided I felt a secret
satisfaction in thinking that business and a new scene might contribute to raise his spirits and give a more chearful and contented turn to his mind
From the time he left me my days were spent in solitude nor did my feet eer pass the bounds of his demesne—Miss Harley then was with me our souls but ill accorded she was quickly disgusted with the retired life I led and quitted Harleyhill soon after her brother
It was then the autumnal season and thus freed from constraint my time was all my own a happiness I never had enjoyed before and when the moon shone bright I frequently indulged my meditations even till midnight in a grove and temple that were situated at a considerable distance from the house at the extremity of our improvements I used to have lights placed in the temple or
rather summerhouse that when I grew tired of walking I might sit there and read or weep unheard and unseen
In this sequestered spot I sat one evening gazing thro the dim medium of my tears at Henrys last dear letter—I needed not to read it the words were but too deeply engraved upon my heart—I thought I heard a little sound of gently treading feet I snatched up my loved treasure and placed it in my bosom then rose to see from whence the noise proceeded—My Henry stood before me but so much emaciated and altered that I scarcely knew him—I shrieked and would have fled he clasped me in his arms and held me there—I could not force my way nor when he loosed me from his hold had I the power to move
He knelt and wept before me—Offended as I was at his intrusion my breaking heart pleaded his cause too strongly and I reproached him not but with my tears Just then I heard the trampling of a horse close by the temple side which joined a private road that Mr Harley sometimes used—I bade my Henry fly—He pressed me to his heart and left me—It was our last embrace The door that he came in at to the garden then stood open and I hoped he might escape unseen
Fear lent me wings I ran or rather flew into the house and gained my chamber the family were all at rest but Watson—My looks were wild she trembled at my appearance and eagerly asked me what had happened—I could not answer her but sat fixed in a gloomy stupor
When I could speak I ordered her to bed—When left alone I became quite distracted I tore my hair and ran about the room I knew not why I threw up the sash to listen to some sound and was a thousand times tempted to throw myself out of it—I could hear nothing but the passing breeze and dogs that bayed the moon—I stole softly down stairs and resolved to return to the temple from whence I could look upon the road and see if any one was there but terror had unstrung my trembling limbs and they would not support me and in all the misery of anxious suspence I waited for the morning
When the day dawned I began to flatter myself that I might have been mistaken in supposing the horseman that passed the temple should be Mr Harley and yet he and he only had a key that opened all the gates that led into that road Conjecture was in vain—my poor
disturbed imagination could not form one that did not teem with horror
About six oclock I heard a confused noise at a distance and a cry of fire—I looked but saw none the servants who were up ran towards the sound and quickly brought me word that the summerhouse was in flames—But a still more horrid sound now pierced my sinking heart in looking for water to extinguish the fire they had found Mr Harleys body weltering in his blood with a discharged pistol clenched in his stiffened hand
The servants raised the body and as they brought it towards the house I heard their loud laments and rushed amongst them—Think how my eyes were blasted with the sight They could not bear it for a single moment—I sunk into a swoon—For above six days I remained
delirious without a single interval of reason—My faithful Watson never left my fide nor suffered any person but the doctor to approach me Though she has never hinted at it I am certain that in my ravings I betrayed myself and told the horrid secret of my having been the occasion though not the cause of my husbands death
When my senses and my misery returned together I incessantly prayed and wished for death—
But he comes not at call nor mends his slowest pace for plaints or cries
As a sacrifice of atonement to my husbands memory I bound myself by the most solemn vow never to see my Henry more—Yet still I own I wished to know his fate and be informed what provocation he had received from Mr Harley that could exculpate him from the foul crime of murder I knew he had not purposed this
vile act and I most earnestly hoped that selfdefence alone had forced him to commit it—I sometimes for a moment even wished that Henry had fallen instead of Harley I considered myself as an accomplice in his death and was a thousand times tempted to relieve my mind from the agony I suffered by revealing the unhappy circumstances that occasioned it—But then forgive me heaven my love returned and I rejoiced the man who killed my husband was in safety
Mr Harleys relations took every possible pains to discover his murderer—Shocking term my Lucy—Large rewards were offered but no trace appeared that led even to suspicion The circumstance of the summerhouse being set on fire was also unaccounted for as none but Watson knew I had
lights there which in my fright I had forgot to extinguish
From the time I recovered my reason though anxious for his fate beyond expression I never mentioned Mr Evelyns name I concealed all the misery I felt within my tortured boson nay had that kind of tenderness for Watson which Macbeth expresses for his wife when he says Be innocent of the knowledge—The unhappiness of my mind had humbled me so far as to make me look up with respect to my servant—She was deceived by my outward semblance and thought that grief for Mr Harleys shocking and untimely fate was all the woe that preyed upon my heart She delivered me a letter which had come by post enclosed to her—It was from Henry it lies before me now and if my tears will give me leave Ill copy it
TO LADY JULIANA HARLEY
Most loved and most unhappy of your sex how shall the cause of all your woes dare to approach you O Julia could I wash away my crimes with my hearts blood I would freely let it out
Yet do not think me worse than I unhappily am—tho stained with blood I am not a vile murderer—Heaven knows how earnestly I sought to avoid the fatal contest that has destroyed our every hope of mutual happiness He called me villain base adulterer Impatient as my nature is I yet forbore to answer him for conscious innocence disclaimed the opprobrious terms—He struck me Julia—I could bear no more but bad him use the weapons of a gentleman—We
both had pistols he discharged one but missed me I fired one of mine in the air He again presented at me swearing with the most dreadful imprecation that if I escaped his second fire you should be his victim the next instant
My calmness left me your danger roused my passions we both fired at the same instant—I saw the unhappy Harley fall—I threw myself upon my knees beside him but soon discovered that all help was vain—Heaven is my witness that at that moment I wished to have been in his situation rather than my own—But when I thought of what you must have suffered had he lived it in some measure reconciled me to his death tho never Julia will my mind know peace for having been the unhappy instrument of his untimely fate
I was a thousand times tempted to give myself up to justice and expiate my crime by yielding up my life—But there again you interfered I could not bear the thought of loading you with ignominy of blasting your fair fame and leaving you alone to stand the shock of infamy
Yet while I write I feel I shall not long support my share of misery—a burning fever preys upon my nerves—How wretched is my lot still doomed to add new sorrows to that heart for whose dear peace I would ten thousand times have sacrificed my own
I tremble for your sufferings Julia when you shall hear your Henry is no more—Yet O my love my life remember that if my days were lengthened they must be days of sorrow nor would our fate permit that I should
soften or alleviate yours—We must have parted Julia and what is death but parting Its only pang is there and that is past
Then grudge me not the sole retreat of misery the peaceful grave there only can your Henry know rest and there I trust that he shall find it if true contrition can atone his crime O my loved Julia add your prayers to mine for pardon and peace to the departing spirit of your faithful dying
HENRY
I will not vainly strive to paint the agonies I endured from the perusal of this letter and the fatal account that followed it—but O my Lucy
—Grief will not kill
For Julia lives to say that Henry died
Here let me close the sad detail of all my sorrows—They could know no addition
Can you my once dear friend without abhorrence think of her who robbed you of a brother and was the unhappy cause his pure and spotless soul was stained with blood
Are you not now amazed how conscious of the evils I had brought upon your family I dared to view your face or to behold the day Yet such was the fatality of my attachment to my dear departed Henry I could not bear my own existence but at those times my thoughts were fixed on him and my sad fancy busied in retracing the likeness of his features in an Evelyns face
The secret of my woes is now revealed and my heart lightened of an heavy
load—But after this confession I must decline our ever meeting more—I should sink down abashed before you and wound your gentle mind by my abasement
But at this distance we may still converse the healing balm of pity here may reach me and soften every pain
May saints and angels guard your steps and innocence conduct them to the paths of bliss
J HARLEY
LADY STANLEY TO LADY JULIANA
MY truly loved and most unhappy friend Why have you broke my heart I think my tears will never cease to flow You deign to ask my pity you have more much more my admiration and esteem—Most truly do I revere your fortitude and mourn your sorrows
In what sad ills has your inhuman fathers cruelty involved my hapless brother the illfated Harley and your
dear suffering self Yet I respect the mildness with which you treat the memory of him who was at once the author of your being and your woes
I at this moment blush from recollecting the petulance with which I have often jested with your grief unknowing of the cause Can you forgive me Julia Yes I know you will though I cannot pardon myself
It is impossible that any human being can think you guilty of Mr Harleys death and heaven that judges from intention only will most surely acquit you Nor did my unhappy brother I am well convinced ever purpose such a crime his guilt was accidental and he most surely forfeited his life in expiation of it—The rigour of the laws could ask no more and heaven I trust accepted of his penitence
A thousand things recur to my remembrance that strongly proved my brother wished to die he concealed his illness till it was past cure nor even then would be prevailed upon to keep his bed or take any kind of medicine
Fear not my friend that I shall ever more attempt to change your purpose or strive to draw you from your sanctuary—The world contains no joys for griefworn minds—The slender superstructure of all earthly pleasures must soon decay if not supported by an heart at ease—But those more permanent delights that arise from an holy and religious fervor which like the vital flame is never extinguished shall still be yours and time that lessens the value of all other enjoyments will but increase theirs till even this life may afford you sueh a state of happiness as only can beheightened in the next
Without your leave I never shall break in on your retirement yet sure the time may come when all your sorrows shall subside to rest and my then sainted friend may look on Lucys face without emotion In the mean time my prayers and tears are yours—Write to me I entreat you tell me that grief is banished from your bosom and that the roselipped cherub peace has filled its room
Adieu my most beloved and most lamented friend
L STANLEY
MR SEWELL TO MR SIMPSON
DEAR Jack the route is come and I think it high time to march Mensieur Dupont will be in town in a few days—I have reason to apprehend that there are others who mean to decamp as well as I but I may perhaps put a spoke in the wheel of the ammunitioncart I never was so near being nicked in my life but as luck would have it I discovered the trick before they counted game
In return for the intended deceit I have laid a train that shall blow them all up though I will not wait the springing of the mine
This is all heathen Greek to you but I shall see you in a few days and at meeting the riddle shall be explained by
Yours G SEWELL
P S Provide me handsome lodgings for I mean to make a figure
SIR WILLIAM STANLEY TO MR EVELYN
DEAR Charles matters are now come to such a crisis in the Desmond family that I think your presence and yours only can adjust them
I will however relate the particulars of their present situation and leave you to determine with regard to your coming as you think proper
The card parties at Sir James Desmonds have been for some time past to all appearance broken up our dear Emma regained her ease and chearfulness and her husband seemed to behave with more affection and attention towards her than he had done since her arrival in London
But what can escape the piercing eyes of love Emma soon found out that the scene was only changed and that the nightly origes were still held at Madame Duponts in Burystreet her husband who is much to be pitied having been for some time in the country
In consequence of this discovery some little altercation passed between Sir James and Lady Desmond he had however art enough to lull her anxiety to rest and all seemed peace and harmony between them
On Saturday last Emma dined at our house Sir James was expected but sent an apology after dinner she was affected with some little complaints incident to her situation for she is far gone with child and expressed an earnest desire to go home—Lucy would have attended her but we had other company nor did she think her sister very ill
Our carriage was immediately ordered for her and she left us—In a very short time after one of her servants came running almost breathless to our house and entreated I would come to his lady directly
Almost at the same minute a messenger brought me a note from Sir James Desmond dated from a bailiffs house in Careystreet requesting me to come to him instantly—I immediately supposed Emmas alarm to proceed from a
knowledge of her husbands situation and flew to her to relieve her apprehensions and assure her of my assistance
When I entered her apartment I found her lying breathless on a couch her maids in vain endeavouring to recover her from a swoon there was a letter lying by her which I knew to be her husbands writing and was shocked at his inhumanity in having acquainted her with his distress
I sent off directly for a surgeon to bleed her and also a note to Lucy desiring her to acquaint her company that Lady Desmond was taken ill and come to her as fast as possible—I waited in hopes that her senses would return that I might be able to set her mind at ease about her husband but with all the aid that could be given her she relapsed from one fainting fit into another and
the surgeon who attended seemed to be apprehensive for her life
My Lucy was almost distracted the poor little Fanny clung round her dying mother and I confess I never was so much distressed upon any occasion in my life
Lucy caught up the letter that lay by Lady Desmond and before she could have read more than half of it she burst into tears and sunk upon the sofa by her sister—I seised the contagious scroll and read the following lines
TO LADY DESMOMD
Before this paper will reach your hands we shall be many miles asunder—I hope your sense and virtue will enable you to conquer any remains of tenderness
you may yet feel for a man who acknowledges himself unworthy of it
Our affections are not in our power and though I own that mine have strayed to an object perhaps less amiable than yourself believe me Emma I would not thus publicly have deferted you had it been in my power to have supported appearances any longer But in truth I am a ruined man and had I staid must have involved you in misery without extricating myself for my pride would never suffer me to bear the being indebted to your family for the means of subsistence and I have long since parted with the last of mine
The sincerest satisfaction I can at present feel arises from the certainty that your brother will take care of you and my little Fanny and will properly educate
the child you carry if it should be a son
The generous girl who accompanies my flight has sacrificed all that was dear to her for my sake—Bear her no hatred Emma she is much less to blame than him who for the last time subscribes himself your husband
J DESMOND
I was almost struck speechless with indignation at the perusal of this vile paper and was no longer surprised at Lady Desmonds situation but could by no means reconcile its contents with the summons I had so lately received from Sir James—I instantly set about unravelling the mystery and thought if I could bring Sir James Desmond back to his house his presence would more effectually contribute to his wifes
recovery than any other medicine that could be tried
When I reached Careystreet I saw Sir James Desmonds postchaise and four horses standing at some distance from the bailiffs house—When I came into the room where he was Madame Dupont was seated by him in an elegant travelling dress—He immediately started up and said Sir William I fear your delay has undone me I shall not get out of this odious house tonight—I replied Sir James I cannot possibly think of speaking to you upon this subject before a third person I therefore must request that this Lady may be shewn into another apartment
Madame Dupont rose with the most disdainful air rung the bell and said she thought I might guess that there were no secrets now between Sir James and
her but that she should however comply with my illbred request
Upon the waiters entrance he told her there was not a vacant room in the house but that there was an elderly lady in the next who had been confined there about three weeks and she might if she pleased walk in there
She tripped out with the waiter and in a very few minutes we heard her utter a loud scream—I rushed out to see what was the occasion of it when I beheld Lady Mortons venerable figure bending over her unworthy daughter and heard her say My child you are come at last—Madame Dupont turned from her and with a look of indignation said to me I suppose this is your scheme Sir William
The good old Lady gazed in silence at us both the tears fast falling down her pallid cheek—I addressed her with the utmost respect and told her I was sincerely sorry to see her in a place so ill betfiting her rank and worth—She calmly answered I cant feel sorrow in Marias presence if love and duty bring her to this place—I thought those words must necessarily affect her daughter deeply and bowing retired from the chamber
When I returned to Sir James I acquainted him with the interview I had been witness to—He seemed much surprised and said It cannot be Lady Morton is at her nephews house in Shropshire Madame Dupont assured me she was there—I was charmed at his discovering this instance of her falshood and inhumanity but could not expatiate long on the subject as I was impatient
to acquaint him with Lady Desmonds situation—He was affected even to tears at my relation but said it was impossible he could ever see her more—I told him if he persisted in this resolution it was almost certain that his wife would never see another morning and that not only the whole world but his own heart must tell him he had murdered her
He started wildly at these words and struck his breast—Then said You know it is impossible Sir William I cannot if I would go see my injured Emma—That villain Sewell has undone us all tis at his suit I am here
I replied most willingly do I forgive his villainy since he has detained you for the happy purpose of saving Lady Desmonds life and your own character but do not waver any longer come
with me this moment or we may be too late I will be answerable to the bailiff for Sewells claim let it be what it may
Sir James again repeated It is impossible—I cant forsake Maria she has left all for me—She never can return to her husband and I will not abandon her to want and infamy—Emma has virtue and religion to support my loss and all who know love and esteem her I am the only man on earth that would forsake her but she has better friends than such a wretch as me
Long was our argument before I could prevail but he at length consented to throw himself at Lady Desmonds feet and if she received him as the returning prodigal to remain with her till she was able to go abroad with him if it should be her choice but
that on no account would he remain in England a bankrupt and a beggar—But the chief point he insisted upon was that if he gave up Madame Dupont she should be taken care of out of the wreck of his fortunes and not be suffered to know distress on his account but have some competent annuity settled upon her for her support
Nothing but Lady Desmonds life being at stake could have made me comply with these terms for her sake I acceded to them all and ratified the engagement with my honour provided he would quit the bailiffs house without seeing his Circe—He agreed and sat down to write a short farewel
There remained now I imagined nothing to be done but to pass a security to the bailiff for Sewells demand which was fifteen hundred pounds and carry Sir
directly to his own house—But to my great concern and surprize I found that there were already writs and executions upon sundry notes and bonds lodged in the bailiffs hand to the amount of twelve thousand pounds and that he would by no means consent to enlarge his prisoner till these debts were discharged—Had I been in possession of so large a sum and would have laid it down that would not have procured Sir Jamess release at that time as it was Saturday night the sheriffs office was shut and the governor of this enchanted castle would not suffer his guest to depart till every form of law was fulfilled
I had no resource left but an applicacation to the bailiffs humanity by acquainting him with Lady Desmonds situation and offering to be security for Sir Jamess forthcoming on Monday morning—The man paused for some
time then said So the madam that came here with his honour is not his wife—These are bad doings and she shall walk out of my house directly—and if so be that your honour will get another person to be security with you the gentleman shall go and see his sick lady for I never was hardhearted in my life
I immediately sent to my friend Mr Drummond who at my request became responsible with me for Sir Jamess appearance—I then ordered a chair to be in readiness to convey Madame Dupont where she thought proper as soon as we were gone out of the house—I got Sir James into my carriage and drove as hard as possible to Charlesstreet
In our way I inquired how his friend Sewell had been so far irritated against
him as to arrest him without giving him the least previous notice of his intention he told me that he had discovered his design of eloping with Madame Dupont by a note which she had dropped in which the time and place of their setting out was fixed for at the very spot which was in Parklane and on the instant of their meeting the bailiffs seized him—He called Sewell a thousand opprobrious names and swore his blood should expiate his villainy—Yet at the same time he said he rejoiced in his being detained if his presence could relieve one pang of Lady Desmonds but he was certain she must feel more sorrow from seeing him languish out his life in a prison as he must probably do upon his being surrendered back into custody again than she would have known from his leaving her
As we drew near Berkeleysquare he became extremely agitated and talked and looked as if he was distracted—I was sensible of a mixed sensation towards him compounded of compassion and contempt and felt very uneasy apprehensions for the consequences of the interview between him and our dear Emma—He entered his house like a culprit without even daring to enquire into the state of his wifes health When I went up stairs I found she was in bed and that her fainting fits had subsided about half an hour that she was perfectly sensible though speechless and that her tears flowed abundantly
When I approached the bedside she cast a look expressive of the most anxious inquiry towards me to which I immediately replied He waits but your permission to throw himself at his
loved Emmas feet—She raised herself with an amazing quickness and opened wide her arms but instantly sunk back and fainted quite away
While the persons about her were using means for her recovery I brought Sir James into the room he knelt by her bedside and wept the moment her senses returned she gazed upon him with a look of tenderness caught up his hand and pressed it to her lips and with a scarcely articulate voice said You will not leave me—He replied Never by heaven my love and clasped her in his arms—Her joy became too powerful and she again relapsed into a state of weakness
I forced Sir James out of the chamber and never yet saw any person so strongly affected as he appeared to be he called himself a murderer said he
had never known how tenderly he loved his wife till that sad hour vowed if she died he would destroy himself and doubted the possibility of her forgiving him—Yet in the midst of all his fond emotions he lamented the unhappy situation in which he had involved Madame Dupont but fortunately he has since received a letter from her which has entirely relieved his apprehensions for her and contributed more effectually to the restoration of his affections where they were justly due than any other circumstance could possibly have done
In this letter she loaded him with the most opprobrious terms and added the epithet of mean or poor spirited to them all thanked heaven for being released from a wretch who was contemptible enough to return home and ask forgiveness of his wife—Said her spirit could never brook such meanness
and that therefore she had sought and found protection in the arms of a man every way his superior who was neither a bankrupt in honour in fortune or in love—She assured him of her sincere detestation and desired if his wifes relations should be weak enough to trust him with his liberty that he should avoid hers and Lord Somners presence
Sir James was almost petrified at the perusal of this extraordinary epistle but upon recollection said he felt himself relieved from a weight which only such behaviour could ever have removed as she had art sufficient to persuade him that the violence of her passion for him alone could have prevailed on her to swerve from virtue but he was now convinced that it was her aversion to the sober duties of a married life that had occasioned her misconduct He however reproached himself severely as the prime
cause of her crimes and follies which he said he should repent of along with his own to the last hour of his life
A new cause of distress now occurred Lady Desmond was seized with labour pains I left Lucy with her and brought Sir James to my house yesterday morning she was delivered of a son who tho born two months before his time is likely to live and she thank heaven is in a fair way of recovery
This morning I accompanied the penitent baronet back to his prison in Careystreet where he said he should be content to pass his days provided Emma could be made happy I find upon enquiry that most of his debts are of the same nature of Sewells demand from whom he did not receive above five hundred for the bond of fifteen—These
matters must be litigated and the scoundrels who have cheated him exposed
About noon I procured his release upon bail and the moment I returned home though much fatigued sat down to give you this long and circumstantial detail of every thing relative to our dear Emma
I again repeat my wish for your return to London your presence will diffuse tranquility and joy amongst us all—But let we warn you my dear Charles against being too rigidly virtuous the baronet is truly penitent—
And in sooth so humbled
That he hath left part of his grief
With me to suffer with him
He seems to detest his former follies particularly his fondness for play which
he confesses has involved him and all that is dear to him in beggary and ruin
With sincere concern I tell you that my dear Lucy has for some time past entirely lost her chearfulness and vivacity she has received a long letter or rather history from Lady Juliana Harley which she says she cannot communicate even to me—She shuts herself up for hours to read this doleful tale and comes out of her dressing room with her eyes swoln with tears—Thank heaven the woes she weeps are not her own
Adiu my dear Evelyn I can no longer hold the pen than to subscribe myself
Yours W STANLEY
MR EVELYN TO SIR WILLIAM STANLEY
HOW could you my dear Stanley make me suffer through the long detail of your letter by not at first acquainting me that Emmas life was safe Every paragraph I read made me tremble for the next as I expected it to contain the period of her life and sufferings—Unhappy much loved sister I fear they will not separately end
Notwithstanding your caution I feel the strongest indignation against Sir
James Desmond and pay but little regard to his mere attrition for such I consider his present state of humiliation
There is no palliation for his misconduct but the weakness of his understanding—What a tottering foundation to build any permanent hope upon Experience may make fools cunning but nothing can make them wise and his reigning vice is of such a nature that men of the best sense once infected with it find it difficult to get the better of
How do I lament that Emmas happiness is bound in his and that he should ignorantly possess a treasure
richer than all his tribe
I have not your calmness Stanley and cannot think with patience of his casting such a pearl away—But Emma must be made happy and if
my whole fortune can effect that purpose it will be well bestowed
That wretched scoundrel Sewell who is now here and whom I sent for as soon as I had read your letter has offered to reduce his demand to the sum of five hundred pounds which he lent Sir James out of the money he had cheated him of provided he is not exposed but I refused any terms of accommodation with him threatened him with a prosecution and have publicly proclaimed him a cheat
I perfectly recollect your antipathy and my sympathy towards this man your presentiment tho since proved more just had less foundation than mine which arose from an open chearful countenance that has always appeared to me the index of an honest heart for I shall never read rascal in any
mans countenance till his actions have rendered the characters legible—Tho it seems that as Hamlet says
A man may smile and smile and be a villain
I must necessarily be detained here some days longer as I have promised to stay with Mr and Mrs Harrison till they are ready to set out for the Continent but had I no engagement I should not wish to meet Sir James Desmond till my resentment towards him is somewhat abated I also think that Emma must as yet be in too weak a state to bear even the slight emotion which might arise from seeing me after such an incident In the mean time I intreat you to use every possible means of settling Sir James Desmonds affairs and for that purpose enclose you an unlimited letter of credit on my banker The first use I desire you to make of it
is to release Lady Morton from her confinement I cannot express what I felt at your description of the interview between her and her unnatural daughter whose infamous conduct has brought her mothers silver hairs with sorrow to the grave—Though this expression be a common one it can never cease to be affecting
Do not be offended with me Stanley for saying that I am not sorry Lucys feelings should be augmented even at the expence of her vivacity—Tenderness stands second in the catalogue of female charms modesty is its only antecedent and always its companion they are both derived from the same source from sensibility and those soft drops which pity has engendered add infinitely more lustre to the speaking eye than all the jewels that ever issued from Golcondas mines or blazed around a diadem
But think what I myself must suffer when you say that Lucys tears flow for Lady Julianas sorrow Why am I ever doomed to be unhappy from the miseries of those that are most dear to me There is a fatal influence attends my love which equals the malignity arising from another persons hate
Write to me by every post I intreat you—I shall not know peace till I hear that Emmas is restored
Yours most truly C EVELYN
MADAME DUPONT TO LADY OSHAUGHNASY
London
MY dear Shanasy—I must abbreviate your horrid name—I am extremely glad you are returned to this delightful metropolis which I was near quitting upon a very foolish errand—That worthless wretch Sir James Desmond is a greater deceiver than even your baronet—But I hope his wife will turn termagant since he has bowed to the distaff and revenge my quarrel—Luckily I had more
spirit than my contemptible lover for having once broken ground I did not chuse to return to my husband and cry pray pray for forgiveness
I am now extremely happy in the friendly protection of Lord Somners—I hear poor Dupont is almost distracted at my loss and has commenced a suit in Doctors Commons in order to obtain a divorce—I shall not oppose his inclination for I have no doubt if it takes place that I shall obtain the title of Lady instead of Madame—But should I even be disappointed in this expectation one blessing I am sure of—that of being free
Duponts fortune was too confined for my inclinations and •he would by no means consent to my endeavouring to increase it by play or any other of the polite moyens de vivre Poor simpleton
he went into the country to find out a proper place for us to retire to where we might live soberly within our income but I had no idea of being buried alive at five and twenty and therefore did not chuse to wait his return
Though you have as you say been pillaged I assure you that you may make a very tolerable figure upon your ten thousand for I know many women in this town who have not the tenth part of the money who keep good company and play at gold loo every night—There lies the whole secret my dear and if I should be so lucky as to become Lady Somners I will take care to introduce you into proper setts for the purpose
Keep up your spirits I desire you and come to me this evening—I dont care to go much abroad in my present situation and shall be glad of an agreeable
female friend to join our little party On your account we shall not play high tonight so that if you put fifty pieces in your cardpurse for I dare say you have not a pambox they will probably be sufficient—Rely upon my friendship and believe me sincerely
Yours M DUPONT
LADY DESMOND TO MR EVELYN
I AM persuaded that a line from me will give you pleasure as it will be a more convincing proof of my recovery than any other that you can at this distance receive—Yes my most generous and best of brothers your Emma is again restored to health and happiness and at this hour more blessed than if she had never tasted sorrow
My husbands tenderness and virtue are now established on a solid base—He sees his errors and sure that is sufficient to prevent his ever falling into them again—But he does more he feelingly repents them—His sorrow is sincere it flows from love for me and for our children as well as from contrition—He regards not his own sufferings but cannot bear the thought of my partaking them he strives to conceal the anguish of his mind from me and would rather it should still prey upon his heart than be alleviated by the sympathy of mine
But I will watch over his dejected spirit will pour the balm of tenderness upon his reclaimed heart and speak of comfort to my afflicted mourner These are the offices of virtuous love the real proofs of conjugal affection and most
supremely happy do I think myself in being called to this delightful task
We never know our strength till it is tried our virtues and our passions all lie dormant unless occasion calls them forth Bred up in ease and affluence a life of poverty appeared to me a state of misery the idea was delusive and is vanished—Can I regret the pomp of dress and equipage when put in competition with my husbands love While I possessed them did they make me happy Too truly I can answer they did not—And are not millions so who never have enjoyed them
To this you may reply—There is a wide distinction between privation and deprivation those who have never known the elegancies of life can easily support the wants they scarcely feel but by habit they become necessary to those
who have long enjoyed them—But what is virtue Charles Is it not strength of mind to conquer habit or else an empty name I wish to express myself as strongly as possible upon this subject to relieve your apprehensions for my happiness which I am well convinced is totally independent of the goods of fortune
Sir James who is sensible of the most lively gratitude for your more than brotherly affection is resolved to be no farther burthensome to your generosity—His debts my brother Stanley says may be compounded for about five thousand pounds—The sale of our house jewels plate and other effects will probably amount to more than this sum and there is still a little estate left of about three hundred pounds a year—With this in many parts of the world we shall be rich but in any part of it we shall be more than rich we shall be happy
I have not yet mentioned your new relation my little Charles he was called after you by his fathers particular desire his mother not opposing—He thrives apace and my sweet Fanny grows almost an angel—Think you I would exchange these treasures for Potosis mines
I most earnestly wish to see you and as we shall not stay longer in London than is absolutely necessary to the settling of our affairs I hope you will not delay your coming
I am with the sincerest gratitude my dear Charless most affectionate sister
E DESMOND
MR EVELYN TO SIR WILLIAM STANLEY
DEAR Stanley I have by this post received a letter from Lady Desmond which has affected me almost as much as your account of her distress though the emotion I felt was of a different kind—I am charmed with the virtue and good sense she possesses in her present unhappy situation and my affection is encreased by my esteem for her worth
I begin also to be sensible of a kind of sympathy towards Sir James from the spirit he has shewn in rejecting my proffered assistance at a time when he standso much in need of it—I could not have avoided thinking meanly of him if he had condescended to accept of a support from an injured wife—The spirit of independence is natural to men from thence arises the only justifiable reason that can be assigned for the dominion they assume over the other sex and whenever they relinquish the power of assisting themselves
Housewives should make a skillet of their helms
This kind of argument might appear to any one who did not know me as meant for a salvo to myself on having altered my intentions towards Emma and her family—On the contrary my attachment
to her happiness and interest is stronger at this moment than it has ever been though I rejoice at finding that she will have less occasion for pecuniary assistance than either she or her husband apprehend at present
For this information I am indebted to Sewell who though undoubtedly a knave is willing to make a merit of disclosing the villainy of others provided his own may go unpunished—On these terms he has offered to make very material discoveries and I have promised to secure him from any legal inflictions leaving him to be punished only with the loss of character and the stings of his own conscience
Our Kings evidence then has laid open a most complicated scene of wickedness and is ready to prove that the Jew who bought the estate on which Emmas
jointure of five hundred pounds a year was settled the power over which unluckily devolved to her by my having neglected to administer to my brother who was her sole trustee did not pay in sterling cash above six thousand for it though the bargain was made for fifteen thousand which was much under the real value but in lieu of money made Sir James accept of old goods and chattels which when sold did not produce above eight hundred pounds As this rascally usurer who by the way is only a Jew in his dealings has amassed a noble fortune by his villainy I shall have infinite pleasure not only in making him refund his infamous purchase but in exposing him to the contempt he deserves
O heaven that such companions shoudst unfold
And put in every honest hand a whip
To lash the rascal naked thro the world
Even from East to West
I enclose you the heads of a bill which I request you will get immediately filed against that wretch of an usurer—I shall be in town in a very few days to prosecute the suit in the mean time I insist upon it that Sir James Desmond shall not part with his house or any thing else that he possesses for I have no doubt of being able to reestablish his fortune upon a better foundation than it has been for a considerable time past
And if he has as Emma says seen his errors in a true light I will endeavour to hope that their happiness may be as permanent as their lives at least I shall take care that nothing on my part shall be wanting to ensure it for it is only from the happiness of others that I can hence forward derive my own the prospect of bliss in a direct line being for ever barred from my hopes—All those fond schemes relative to myself which
youthful fancy once had formed are now blasted and in adopted children only shall I look for heirs
When I come amongst you I flatter myself you will be a little more communicative than you have hitherto been with regard to Lady Julianas situation be it what it may my warmest wishes for her happiness for ever shall attend her
My very worthy friends the Harrisons set out from hence for Dover on Tuesday next—Miss Harrison has consented to give her hand to Mr Stuart the gentleman I mentioned before as her lover as soon as they arrive at a proper place on the Continent—Her delicacy would not permit her to be married here as the scene would too strongly recall to her mind the imprudent step she was so near having taken with Captain Williams
I shall hope for the happiness of seeing you and all my sisters in perfect health on Wednesday evening—I most sincerely long to embrace ye all—Nor shall the repentant Sir James Desmond be excluded from his share of that brotherly affection with which I am most truly
Yours C EVELYN
P S I hope Lucy has recovered her chearfulness without losing her sensibility as I am very certain they are compatible—Tell Emma I thank her for her letter and will answer it in person
MADAME DUPONT TO LADY OSHAUGHNASY
MY dear Shanacy I am utterly undone and have no refuge but your friendship to fly to—You know that Monsieur Dupont has obtained a divorce and of course I am for ever barred from any claim to his assistance or support—Wretch that I am Why did I forsake the best and worthiest of men But repentance on this subject is now too late—and I shall not take up your time with unavailing lamentations
While the suir was depending I did not perceive the least abatement in Lord Somners fondness for me but as soon as the affair was determined I affected to grow extremely melancholy and more than hinted that nothing but a matrimonial connection with him could restore my happiness—He constantly waived the subject whenever it was mentioned and I began to think I had better appear to be satisfied with my situation than risk a quarrel that might possibly end in separation and trust to my charms and blandishments to effect my purpose at some future time
The artful monster took advantage of my apparent fondness and one evening that we unfortunately talked of that bane to my happiness your detested sisterinlaw he drew me in so far, as to confess that my hatred to her arose from my love to him and that I had
traduced her character merely to prevent his marrying her
This you know was a falshood for it was more to gratify you than myself that I at that time unjustly censured her However I flattered myself that as he seemed to have entirely forgotten her he would only think of the affair in the light I wished and receive the calumny as a proof of my love
But it turned out alas quite otherways—My cunning overshot the mark—His pride appeared to be hurt at being deceived and he wrote a letter directly to Lady Julianas brother Lord R— who was in Scotland acquainting him with the means by which he had been imposed on and intreating his and his sisters forgiveness
This huffgruff don of a nobleman arrived in town yesterday and came directly to our house Lord Somners was at home and I could hear enough of their conversation to discover that there was a very warm altercation between them—I trembled like an aspin leaf cursed my own folly for having betrayed myself and when Lord Somners came into my dressingroom I was as pale as death and looked like a culprit that expected sentence to be pronounced against him
The insensible barbarian Somners appeared perfectly composed and with the utmost sang froid said he was very sorry to be under a necessity of informing me that he could not have the honour of my company any longer under his roof for that Lord R—had insisted on his abandoning the woman who had
injured and villified the spotless character of his sister
Though I was shocked almost to death at his indifference I mustered up courage enough to tell him that I could not suppose him to be such a mean spirited wretch as to give up a woman who had sacrificed every thing to him to save himself from Lord R—s resentment—He replied that this was by no means the case on either side for he thought it but a flight compensation for the injuries he had done an amiable and virtuous woman to give up one who had made the sacrifice she boasted to Sir James Desmond at least if not to others
I grew outrageous at his insolence but my fury had no effect upon his impenetrable head or heart—He certainly never loved me He took out of his
pocketbook a bill for five hundred and left it on the table saying he hoped that sum would provide for me till I had formed a more lasting connection and bowing left me
I think I should have gone mad but for this last proof of his tenderness which has helped to console me for his loss
I now propose my dear Shanacy that you and I should set out together for Brighthelmstone Southampton Scarborough or any other public rendezvous of the gay and idle where I hope soon to repair the errors I have fallen into by drawing some young man of fortune into the matrimonial noose—Your title and appearance will be of infinite service to me on this occasion and the sooner this scheme is put in practice the better
I shall send my trunks to your lodgings directly and they shall be followed by your sincerely affectionate friend
I do not know what to sign myself—but it shall be
MARIA MORTON
LADY OSHAUGHNASY TO MISS MORTON
REALLY Miss Morton I am quite astonished at your assurance and were it not to prevent your coming or sending your trunks to me I should take no notice of your extraordinary letter How could you ever presume that I would appear in public with a woman that has been divorced from her husband and lived as a kept mistress with another man Let me tell you Madam
you are extremely mistaken in my character
Tis true that on my first coming to London being very low spirited and having no acquaintance in town I did condescend to sup with you two or three times in private and I think I paid pretty handsomely for my entertainment—Besides you were not then divorced and I might in charity suppose that your connection with Lord Somners was perfectly innocent—But the matter is much too clear at present for Lady OShaughnasy to be seen with Miss Morton—How could I with any face upbraid my husband for keeping an infamous woman if I should become the companion of such a one myself
And as to your making a merit to me of your traducing Lady Julianas character you know full well that it was to
gratify your own spleen and jealousy against her for having deprived you of your fancied conquest Mr Evelyn—But in truth Miss Morton though I do not wish to mortify you at present I am certain he never did or could like you—But nothing can conquer some peoples vanity
I have been informed that Sir John OShaughnasy is at Scarborough—It is my duty to follow him there and I have no doubt of recovering his affections—I mention this circumstance in order to prevent your bending your course that way as I should be sorry to be obliged to treat a person with contempt for whom I once had a small portion of regard and for this reason I hope you will henceforth avoid any further intercourse with
A OSHAUGHNASY
LADY JULIANA TO LADY STANLEY
Dijon
DRIED be my Lucys tears and may each trace of sorrow she has ever felt for her unhappy friend vanish at the receipt of this like morning dews before the rising sun No cause remains for Lucy now to weep her sister Magdalen is well and happy
Your letter was the harbinger of peace I could no longer doubt of heavens forgiveness when a frail mortal like myself looked with compassion on my sufferings and thought they had atoned for all my faults Hope once again illumined my sad mind and stilled the beating of my anxious heart—I dared to make my vows—From that blessed hour no pang has harrowed up my soul no bursts of grief have since deformed my face—Though the soft drops of penitence sincere will never cease to flow
Yes Lucy I believe that I could bear to see you now and meet your looks with firmness yet for your sake I would postpone the interview till use has made the idea of our separation more easy to your friendly heart—Yet let me not turn boaster perhaps your presence
might recal ideas that should be ever banished from my mind then do not risk my present tranquility but strive to wean yourself from the affection which you long have borne me and think of me as a departed friend
To complete my earthly happiness I have received a letter from my brother filled with the tenderest acknowledgments of what he calls the unlucky error that had led him to behave unkindly to me and the most earnest entreaties to return and pass my days with him without controul—Blest be the power of truth that has relieved his mind from the indignant yet humiliating sensation that must arise from the dishonour of a sister
For my own part I never felt resentment to my foes and only grieved for
what my brother suffered I am indebted to their malice Lucy—They meant to sting my heart but have procured its peace—May penitence for the intended mischief assuage their own remorse
I am infinitely indebted to the amiable superior of our convent for many indulgencies—She knew and loved my mother and has transferred that kindness to your friend—From this cause were there no other I should be pleased with her society but she is sensible as well as good
I mention this little circumstance to render you more easy at my seclusion from a world which has to me most surely been a world of woe—May every happiness it can afford await my tender friend and may we meet again in that
blessed place
where every tear is wiped from every eye
to part no more
ST MARY MAGDALEN