Lovel. Please to read on, my Lord. It cannot be her letter, if it does
not make you admire her more and more as you read. Cousin Charlotte,
Cousin Patty, pray attend----Read on, my Lord.
Miss Charlotte. Amazing fortitude!
Miss Patty only lifted up her dove's eyes.
Lord M. [Reading.] 'And the rather, as I was determined, had it come
to effect, to do every thing in my power to deserve your favourable
opinion.'
Then again they chorus'd upon me!
A blessed time of it, poor I!--I had nothing for it but impudence!
Lovel. Pray read on, my Lord--I told you how you would all admire her
----or, shall I read?
Lord M. D----d assurance! [Then reading.] 'I had another motive,
which I knew would of itself give me merit with your whole family: [they
were all ear:] a presumptuous one; a punishably-presumptuous one, as it
has proved: in the hope that I might be an humble mean, in the hand of
Providence, to reclaim a man who had, as I thought, good sense enough at
bottom to be reclaimed; or at least gratitude enough to acknowledge the
intended obligation, whether the generous hope were to succeed or not.'
--Excellent young creature!--
Excellent young creature! echoed the Ladies, with their handkerchiefs at
their eyes, attended with music.
Lovel. By my soul, Miss Patty, you weep in the wrong place: you shall
never go with me to a tragedy.
Lady Betty. Hardened wretch.
His Lordship had pulled off his spectacles to wipe them. His eyes were
misty; and he thought the fault in his spectacles.
I saw they were all cocked and primed--to be sure that is a very pretty
sentence, said I----that is the excellency of this lady, that in every
line, as she writes on, she improves upon herself. Pray, my Lord,
proceed--I know her style; the next sentence will still rise upon us.
Lord M. D----d fellow! [Again saddling, and reading.] 'But I have
been most egregiously mistaken in Mr. Lovelace!' [Then they all
clamoured again.]--'The only man, I persuade myself'----
Lovel. Ladies may persuade themselves to any thing: but how can she
answer for what other men would or would not have done in the same
circumstances?
I was forced to say any thing to stifle their outcries. Pox take ye
altogether, thought I; as if I had not vexation enough in losing her!
Lord M. [Reading.] 'The only man, I persuade myself, pretending to be
a gentleman, in whom I could have been so much mistaken.'
They were all beginning again--Pray, my Lord, proceed!--Hear, hear--pray,
Ladies, hear!--Now, my Lord, be pleased to proceed. The Ladies are
silent.
So they were; lost in admiration of me, hands and eyes uplifted.
Lord M. I will, to thy confusion; for he had looked over the next
sentence.
What wretches, Belford, what spiteful wretches, are poor mortals!--So
rejoiced to sting one another! to see each other stung!
Lord M. [Reading.] 'For while I was endeavouring to save a drowning
wretch, I have been, not accidentally, but premeditatedly, and of set
purpose, drawn in after him.'--What say you to that, Sir-r?
Lady S. | Ay, Sir, what say you to this?
Lady B. |
Lovel. Say! Why I say it is a very pretty metaphor, if it would but
hold.--But, if you please, my Lord, read on. Let me hear what is further
said, and I will speak to it all together.
Lord M. I will. 'And he has had the glory to add to the list of those
he has ruined, a name that, I will be bold to say, would not have
disparaged his own.'
They all looked at me, as expecting me to speak.
Lovel. Be pleased to proceed, my Lord: I will speak to this by-and-by--
How came she to know I kept a list?--I will speak to this by-and-by.
Lord M. [Reading on.] 'And this, Madam, by means that would shock
humanity to be made acquainted with.'
Then again, in a hurry, off went the spectacles.
This was a plaguy stroke upon me. I thought myself an oak in impudence;
but, by my troth, this almost felled me.
Lord M. What say you to this, SIR-R!
Remember, Jack, to read all their Sirs in this dialogue with a double rr,
Sir-r! denoting indignation rather than respect.
They all looked at me as if to see if I could blush.
Lovel. Eyes off, my Lord!----Eyes off, Ladies! [Looking bashfully, I
believe.]--What say I to this, my Lord!--Why, I say, that this lady has a
strong manner of expressing herself!--That's all.--There are many things
that pass among lovers, which a man cannot explain himself upon before
grave people.
Lady Betty. Among lovers, Sir-r! But, Mr. Lovelace, can you say that
this lady behaved either like a weak, or a credulous person?--Can you say--
Lovel. I am ready to do the lady all manner of justice.--But, pray now,
Ladies, if I am to be thus interrogated, let me know the contents of the
rest of the letter, that I may be prepared for my defence, as you are all
for my arraignment. For, to be required to answer piecemeal thus,
without knowing what is to follow, is a cursed ensnaring way of
proceeding.
They gave me the letter: I read it through to myself:--and by the
repetition of what I said, thou wilt guess at the remaining contents.
You shall find, Ladies, you shall find, my Lord, that I will not spare
myself. Then holding the letter in my hand, and looking upon it, as a
lawyer upon his brief,
Miss Harlowe says, 'That when your Ladyship,' [turning to Lady Betty,]
'shall know, that, in the progress to her ruin, wilful falsehoods,
repeated forgeries, and numberless perjuries, were not the least of my
crimes, you will judge that she can have no principles that will make her
worthy of an alliance with ladies of your's, and your noble sister's
character, if she could not, from her soul, declare, that such an
alliance can never now take place.'
Surely, Ladies, this is passion! This is not reason. If our family
would not think themselves dishonoured by my marrying a person whom I had
so treated; but, on the contrary, would rejoice that I did her this
justice: and if she has come out pure gold from the assay; and has
nothing to reproach herself with; why should it be an impeachment of her
principles, to consent that such an alliance take place?
She cannot think herself the worse, justly she cannot, for what was done
against her will.
Their countenances menaced a general uproar--but I proceeded.
Your Lordship read to us, that she had an hope, a presumptuous one: nay,
a punishably-presumptuous one, she calls it; 'that she might be a mean,
in the hand of Providence, to reclaim me; and that this, she knew, if
effected, would give her a merit with you all.' But from what would she
reclaim me?--She had heard, you'll say, (but she had only heard, at the
time she entertained that hope,) that, to express myself in the women's
dialect, I was a very wicked fellow!--Well, and what then?--Why, truly,
the very moment she was convinced, by her own experience, that the charge
against me was more than hearsay; and that, of consequence, I was a fit
subject for her generous endeavours to work upon; she would needs give me
up. Accordingly, she flies out, and declares, that the ceremony which
would repair all shall never take place!--Can this be from any other
motive than female resentment?
This brought them all upon me, as I intended it should: it was as a tub
to a whale; and after I had let them play with it a while, I claimed
their attention, and, knowing that they always loved to hear me prate,
went on.
The lady, it is plain, thought, that the reclaiming of a man from bad
habits was a much easier task than, in the nature of things, it can be.
She writes, as your Lordship has read, 'That, in endeavouring to save a
drowning wretch, she had been, not accidentally, but premeditatedly, and
of set purpose, drawn in after him.' But how is this, Ladies?--You see
by her own words, that I am still far from being out of danger myself.
Had she found me, in a quagmire suppose, and I had got out of it by her
means, and left her to perish in it; that would have been a crime indeed.
--But is not the fact quite otherwise? Has she not, if her allegory
prove what she would have it prove, got out herself, and left me
floundering still deeper and deeper in?--What she should have done, had
she been in earnest to save me, was, to join her hand with mine, that so
we might by our united strength help one another out.--I held out my hand
to her, and besought her to give me her's:--But, no truly! she was
determined to get out herself as fast as she could, let me sink or swim:
refusing her assistance (against her own principles) because she saw I
wanted it.--You see, Ladies, you see, my Lord, how pretty tinkling words
run away with ears inclined to be musical.
They were all ready to exclaim again: but I went on, proleptically, as a
rhetorician would say, before their voices would break out into words.
But my fair accuser says, that, 'I have added to the list of those I have
ruined, a name that would not have disparaged my own.' It is true, I
have been gay and enterprising. It is in my constitution to be so. I
know not how I came by such a constitution: but I was never accustomed to
check or controul; that you all know. When a man finds himself hurried
by passion into a slight offence, which, however slight, will not be
forgiven, he may be made desperate: as a thief, who only intends a
robbery, is often by resistance, and for self-preservation, drawn in to
commit murder.
I was a strange, a horrid wretch, with every one. But he must be a silly
fellow who has not something to say for himself, when every cause has its
black and its white side.--Westminster-hall, Jack, affords every day as
confident defences as mine.
But what right, proceeded I, has this lady to complain of me, when she as
good as says--Here, Lovelace, you have acted the part of a villain by me!
--You would repair your fault: but I won't let you, that I may have the
satisfaction of exposing you; and the pride of refusing you.
But, was that the case? Was that the case? Would I pretend to say, I
would now marry the lady, if she would have me?