_From my own Apartment, Sept. 30._
I am called off from public dissertations by a domestic affair of great
importance, which is no less than the disposal of my sister Jenny for
life. The girl is a girl of great merit, and pleasing conversation;
but I being born of my father's first wife, and she of his third, she
converses with me rather like a daughter than a sister. I have indeed
told her, that if she kept her honour, and behaved herself in such
manner as became the Bickerstaffs, I would get her an agreeable man for
her husband; which was a promise I made her after reading a passage in
Pliny's Epistles.[197] That polite author had been employed to find out
a consort for his friend's daughter, and gives the following character
of the man he had pitched upon:
"Aciliano plurimum vigoris et industriæ quanqum in maxima verecundia:
est illi facies liberalis, multo sanguine, multo rubore, suffusa: est
ingenua totius corporis pulchritudo, et quidum senatorius decor, quæ
ego nequaquam arbitror negligenda: debet enim hoc castitati puellarum
quasi præmium dari."
"Acilianus (for that was the gentleman's name) is a man of
extraordinary vigour and industry, accompanied with the greatest
modesty. He has very much of the gentleman, with a lively colour, and
flush of health in his aspect. His whole person is finely turned,
and speaks him a man of quality: which are qualifications that, I
think, ought by no means to be overlooked, and should be bestowed on a
daughter as the reward of her chastity."
A woman that will give herself liberties, need not put her parents
to so much trouble; for if she does not possess these ornaments in a
husband, she can supply herself elsewhere. But this is not the case
of my sister Jenny, who, I may say without vanity, is as unspotted
a spinster as any in Great Britain. I shall take this occasion to
recommend the conduct of our own family in this particular.
We have in the genealogy of our house, the descriptions and pictures
of our ancestors from the time of King Arthur; in whose days there was
one of my own name, a Knight of his Round Table, and known by the name
of Sir Isaac Bickerstaff. He was low of stature, and of a very swarthy
complexion, not unlike a Portuguese Jew. But he was more prudent than
men of that height usually are, and would often communicate to his
friends his design of lengthening and whitening his posterity. His
eldest son Ralph, for that was his name, was for this reason married to
a lady who had little else to recommend her, but that she was very tall
and very fair. The issue of this match, with the help of high shoes,
made a tolerable figure in the next age; though the complexion of the
family was obscure until the fourth generation from that marriage. From
which time, till the reign of William the Conqueror, the females of
our house were famous for their needlework and fine skins. In the male
line, there happened an unlucky accident in the reign of Richard the
Third; the eldest son of Philip, then chief of the family, being born
with an hump-back and very high nose. This was the more astonishing,
because none of his forefathers ever had such a blemish; nor indeed was
there any in the neighbourhood of that make, except the butler, who was
noted for round shoulders, and a Roman nose: what made the nose the
less excusable, was the remarkable smallness of his eyes.
These several defects were mended by succeeding matches; the eyes were
opened in the next generation, and the hump fell in a century and a
half; but the greatest difficulty was, how to reduce the nose; which
I do not find was accomplished till about the middle of Henry the
Seventh's reign, or rather the beginning of that of Henry the Eighth.
But while our ancestors were thus taken up in cultivating the eyes and
nose, the face of the Bickerstaffs fell down insensibly into chin;
which was not taken notice of (their thoughts being so much employed
upon the more noble features) till it became almost too long to be
remedied.
But length of time, and successive care in our alliances, have cured
this also, and reduced our faces into that tolerable oval which we
enjoy at present. I would not be tedious in this discourse, but cannot
but observe, that our race suffered very much about three hundred years
ago, by the marriage of one of our heiresses with an eminent courtier,
who gave us spindle-shanks, and cramps in our bones, insomuch that we
did not recover our health and legs till Sir Walter Bickerstaff married
Maud the milkmaid, of whom the then Garter King-at-arms (a facetious
person) said pleasantly enough, that she had spoiled our blood, but
mended our constitutions. After this account of the effect our prudent
choice of matches has had upon our persons and features, I cannot
but observe, that there are daily instances of as great changes made
by marriage upon men's minds and humours. One might wear any passion
out of a family by culture, as skilful gardeners blot a colour out of
a tulip that hurts its beauty. One might produce an affable temper
out of a shrew, by grafting the mild upon the choleric; or raise a
Jack-pudding from a prude, by inoculating mirth and melancholy. It
is for want of care in the disposing of our children, with regard to
our bodies and minds, that we go into a house and see such different
complexions and humours in the same race and family. But to me it is
as plain as a pikestaff, from what mixture it is, that this daughter
silently lowers, the other steals a kind look at you, a third is
exactly well behaved, a fourth a splenetic, and a fifth a coquette. In
this disposal of my sister, I have chosen, with an eye to her being
a wit, and provided, that the bridegroom be a man of a sound and
excellent judgment, who will seldom mind what she says when she begins
to harangue: for Jenny's only imperfection is an admiration of her
parts, which inclines her to be a little, but a very little, sluttish;
and you are ever to remark, that we are apt to cultivate most, and
bring into observation, what we think most excellent in ourselves, or
most capable of improvement. Thus my sister, instead of consulting her
glass and her toilet for an hour and a half after her private devotion,
sits with her nose full of snuff,[198] and a man's nightcap on her
head, reading plays and romances. Her wit she thinks her distinction;
therefore knows nothing of the skill of dress, or making her person
agreeable. It would make you laugh to see me often with my spectacles
on lacing her stays; for she is so very a wit, that she understands no
ordinary thing in the world. For this reason I have disposed of her to
a man of business, who will soon let her see, that to be well dressed,
in good humour, and cheerful in the command of her family, are the arts
and sciences of female life. I could have bestowed her upon a fine
gentleman, who extremely admired her wit, and would have given her a
coach and six: but I found it absolutely necessary to cross the strain;
for had they met, they had eternally been rivals in discourse, and in
continual contention for the superiority of understanding, and brought
forth critics, pedants, or pretty good poets. As it is, I expect an
offspring fit for the habitation of city, town, or country; creatures
that are docile and tractable in whatever we put them to. To convince
men of the necessity of taking this method, let but one, even below the
skill of an astrologer, behold the turn of faces he meets as soon as he
passes Cheapside Conduit, and you see a deep attention and a certain
unthinking sharpness in every countenance. They look attentive, but
their thoughts are engaged on mean purposes. To me it is very apparent
when I see a citizen pass by, whether his head is upon woollen, silks,
iron, sugar, indigo, or stocks. Now this trace of thought appears or
lies hid in the race for two or three generations. I know at this time
a person of a vast estate, who is the immediate descendant of a fine
gentleman, but the great-grandson of a broker, in whom his ancestor is
now revived. He is a very honest gentleman in his principles, but can't
for his blood talk fairly: he is heartily sorry for it; but he cheats
by constitution, and overreaches by instinct.
The happiness of the man who marries my sister will be, that he has
no faults to correct in her but her own, a little bias of fancy, or
particularity of manners, which grew in herself, and can be amended by
her. From such an untainted couple, we can hope to have our family rise
to its ancient splendour of face, air, countenance, manner, and shape,
without discovering the product of ten nations in one house. There is
Obadiah Greenhat says, he never comes into any company in England, but
he distinguishes the different nations of which we are composed: there
is scarce such a living creature as a true Briton. We sit down indeed
all friends, acquaintance, and neighbours; but after two bottles, you
see a Dane start up and swear, the kingdom is his own. A Saxon drinks
up the whole quart, and swears, he'll dispute that with him. A Norman
tells them both, he'll assert his liberty: and a Welshman cries, they
are all foreigners and intruders of yesterday, and beats them out of
the room. Such accidents happen frequently among neighbours' children,
and cousins-german. For which reason I say, study your race, or the
soil of your family will dwindle into cits or squires, or run up into
wits or madmen[199].