MR. LOVELACE, TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ.
WEDN. EVENING.
I have been reading thy shocking letter--Poor Belton! what a multitude of
lively hours have we passed together! He was a fearless, cheerful
fellow: who'd have thought all that should end in such dejected
whimpering and terror?
But why didst thou not comfort the poor man about the rencounter between
him and that poltroon Metcalfe? He acted in that affair like a man of
true honour, and as I should have acted in the same circumstances. Tell
him I say so; and that what happened he could neither help nor foresee.
Some people are as sensible of a scratch from a pin's point, as others
from a push of a sword: and who can say any thing for the sensibility of
such fellows? Metcalfe would resent for his sister, when his sister
resented not for herself. Had she demanded her brother's protection and
resentment, that would have been another man's matte, to speak in Lord
M.'s phrase: but she herself thought her brother a coxcomb to busy
himself undesired in her affairs, and wished for nothing but to be
provided for decently and privately in her lying-in; and was willing to
take the chance of Maintenon-ing his conscience in her favour,* and
getting him to marry when the little stranger came; for she knew what
an easy, good-natured fellow he was. And indeed if she had prevailed
upon him, it might have been happy for both; as then he would not have
fallen in with his cursed Thomasine. But truly this officious brother of
her's must interpose. This made a trifling affair important: And what
was the issue? Metcalfe challenged; Belton met him; disarmed him; gave
him his life: but the fellow, more sensible in his skin than in his head,
having received a scratch, was frighted: it gave him first a puke, then
a fever, and then he died, that was all. And how could Belton help that?
--But sickness, a long tedious sickness, will make a bugbear of any thing
to a languishing heart, I see that. And so far was Mowbray à-propos in
the verses from Nat. Lee, which thou hast described.
* Madam Maintenon was reported to have prevailed upon Lewis XIV. of
France, in his old age, (sunk, as he was, by ill success in the field,)
to marry her, by way of compounding with his conscience for the freedoms
of his past life, to which she attributed his public losses.
Merely to die, no man of reason fears, is a mistake, say thou, or say
thy author, what ye will. And thy solemn parading about the natural
repugnance between life and death, is a proof that it is.
Let me tell thee, Jack, that so much am I pleased with this world, in
the main; though, in some points too, the world (to make a person of it,)
has been a rascal to me; so delighted am I with the joys of youth; with
my worldly prospects as to fortune; and now, newly, with the charming
hopes given me by my dear, thrice dear, and for ever dear CLARISSA; that
were I even sure that nothing bad would come hereafter, I should be very
loth (very much afraid, if thou wilt have it so,) to lay down my life
and them together; and yet, upon a call of honour, no man fears death
less than myself.
But I have not either inclination or leisure to weigh thy leaden
arguments, except in the pig, or, as thou wouldst say, in the lump.
If I return thy letters, let me have them again some time hence, that is
to say, when I am married, or when poor Belton is half forgotten; or when
time has enrolled the honest fellow among those whom we have so long
lost, that we may remember them with more pleasure than pain; and then I
may give them a serious perusal, and enter with thee as deeply as thou
wilt into the subject.
When I am married, said I?--What a sound has that!
I must wait with patience for a sight of this charming creature, till she
is at her father's. And yet, as the but blossoming beauty, as thou
tellest me, is reduced to a shadow, I should have been exceedingly
delighted to see her now, and every day till the happy one; that I might
have the pleasure of observing how sweetly, hour by hour, she will rise
to her pristine glories, by means of that state of ease and contentment,
which will take place of the stormy past, upon her reconciliation with
her friends, and our happy nuptials.