spirits, or courage to oppose the least struggle, even that of the
modesty of my sex, I suffered, tamely, whatever the gentleman pleased;
who proceeding insensibly from freedom to freedom, insinuating his hand
between my handkerchief and bosom, which he handled at discretion:
finding thus no repulse, and that every thing favoured, beyond
expectation, the completion of his desires, he took me in his arms, and
bore me, without life or motion, to the bed, on which laying me gently
downed, and having me at what advantage he pleased, I did not so much
as know what he was about, till recovering from a trance of lifeless
insensibility, I found him buried in me, whilst I lay passive and
innocent of the least sensations of pleasure: a death-cold corpse could
scarce have less life or sense in it. As soon as he had thus pacified a
passion which had too little respected the condition I was in, he got
off, and after recomposing the disorder of my clothes, employed himself
with the utmost tenderness to calm the transports of remorse and
madness at myself, with which I was seized, too late, I confess, for
having suffered on that bed, the embraces of an utter stranger I tore
my hair, wrung my hands, and beat my breast like a mad woman. But when
my new master, for in that light I then viewed him, applied himself to
appease me, as my whole rage was levelled at myself, no part of which I
thought myself permitted to aim at him, I begged of him with more
submission than anger, to leave me alone, that I might, at least, enjoy
my affliction in quiet. This he positively refused, for fear, as he
pretended, I should do myself a mischief. Violent passions seldom last
long, and those of women least of any. A dead still calm succeeded this
storm, which ended in a profuse shower of tears.
Had any one, but a few instants before, told me that I should have ever
known any man but Charles, I would have spit in his face or had I been
offered infinitely a greater sum of money than that I saw paid for me,
I had spurned the proposal in cold blood. But our virtues and our vices
depend too much on our circumstances; unexpectedly beset as I was,
betrayed by a mind weakened by a long severe affliction, and stunned
with the terrors of a goal, my defeat will appear the more excusable,
since I certainly was not present at, or a party in any sense to it.
However, as the first enjoyment is decisive, and he was now over the
bar, I thought I had no longer a right to refuse the caresses of one
that had got that advantage over me, no matter how obtained; conforming
myself then to this maxim, I considered myself as so much in his power,
that I endured his kisses and embraces without affecting struggles or
anger; not that he, as yet, gave me any pleasure, or prevailed over the
aversion of my soul, to give myself up to any sensation of that sort;
what I suffered, I suffered out of a kind of gratitude, and as a matter
of course what had passed.
He was, however, so regardful as not to attempt the renewal of those
extremities which had thrown me, just before, into such violent
agitations; but, now secure of possession, contented himself with
bringing me to temper by degrees, and waiting at the hand of time for
those fruits of generosity and courtship, which he since often
reproached himself with having gathered much too green, when, yielding
to the inability to resist him, and overborne by desires, he had
wreaked his passion on a mere lifeless, spiritless body, dead to all
purpose of joy, since taking none, it ought to be supposed incapable of
giving any. This is, however, certain; my heart never thoroughly
forgave him the manner in which I had fallen to him, although, in point
of interest, I had fallen to him, I had reason to be pleased that he
found, in my person, wherewithal to keep him from leaving me as easily
as he had had me.
The evening was, in the mean time, so far advanced, that the maid came
in to lay the cloth for supper, when I understood, with joy, that my
landlady, whose sight was present poison to me, was not to be with us.
Presently a neat and elegant supper was introduced, and a bottle of
Burgundy, with the other necessaries, were set on a dumb-waiter.
The maid quitting the room, the gentleman insisted, with a tender
warmth, that I should sit up in the elbow chair by the fire, and see
him eat, if I could not be prevailed on to eat myself. I obeyed with a
heart full or affliction, at the comparison it made between those
delicious _tête-à-têtes_ with my very dear youth, and this forced
situation, this new awkward scene, imposed and obtruded on me a cruel
necessity.
At supper, after a great many arguments used to comfort and reconcile
me to my fate, he told me that his name was H..., brother to the Earl
of L.... and that having, by the suggestions of my landlady, been led
to see me, he had found me perfectly to his taste, and given her a
commission to procure me at any rate, and that at length he had
succeeded, as much to his satisfaction as he passionately wished it
might be to mine adding, withal, some flattering assurances, that I
should have no cause to repent my knowledge of him.
I had now got down at least half a partridge, and three or four glasses
of wine, which he compelled me to drink by way of restoring nature, but
whether there was any thing extraordinary put into the wine, or whether
there wanted no more to revive the natural warmth of my constitution,
and give fire to the old train, I began no longer to look with that
constraint, not to say disguise, on Mr. H...., which I had hitherto
done but, withal, there was not the least grain of love mixed with this
softening of my sentiments: any other man would have been just the same
to me as Mr. H..., that stood in the same circumstances, and had done
for me, and with me, what he had done.
There are not, on earth at least, eternal griefs; mine were, if not at
an end, at least suspended: my heart, which had been so long overloaded
with anguish and vexation, began to dilate and open to the last gleam
of diversion or amusement. I wept a little, and my tears relieved me; I
sighed, and my sighs seemed to lighten me of a load that oppressed me;
my countenance grew, if not cheerful, at least more composed and free.
Mr. H..., who had watched, perhaps brought on this change, knew too
well not to seize it: he thrust the table imperceptibly from between
us, and bringing his chair to face me, he soon began, after preparing
me by all the endearments of assurance and protestations, to lay hold
of my hands, to kiss me, and once more to make free with my bosom,
which, being at full liberty from the disorder of a loose dishabile,
now panted and throbbed, less with indignation than with fear and
bashfulness, at being used so familiarly by still a stranger. But he
soon gave me greater occasion to exclaim, by stooping down and slipping
his hands above my garters; thence he strove to regain the pass, which
he had before found so open, and unguarded; but now he could not unlock
the twist of my thighs; I gently complained, and begged him to let me
alone; told him I was not well. However, he saw there was more form and
ceremony in my resistance, than good earnest; he made his conditions
for desisting from pursuing his point, that I should be put instantly
to bed, whilst he gave certain orders to the landlady, and that he
would return in an hour, when he hoped to find me more reconciled to
his passion for me, than I seemed at present. I neither assented nor
denied, but my air and manner of receiving his proposal, gave him to
see that I did not think myself enough my own mistress to refuse it.
Accordingly he went out and left me, when a minute or two after, before
I could recover myself into any composure for thinking, the maid came
in with her mistress’s service, and a small silver orringer of what she
called a bridal posset, and desired me to eat it as I went to bed,
which consequently I did, and felt immediately a heat, a fire run like
a hue-and-cry through every part of my body; I burnt, I glowed, and
wanted even little of wishing for any man.
The maid, as soon as I was lain down, took the candle away, and wishing
me a good night, went out of the room, and shut the door after her.
She had hardly time to get down stairs, before Mr. H.... opened my room
door softly, and came in, now undressed, in his night-gown and cap,
with two lighted wax candles, and bolting the door, gave me, though I
expected him, some sort of alarm. He came a tip-toe to the bed side,
and saying with a gentle whisper: “Pray, my dear, do not be startled...
I will be very tender and kind to you.” He then hurried off his
clothes, and leaped into bed, having given me openings enough, whilst
he was stripping, to observe his brawny structure, strong made limbs,
and rough shaggy breast.
The bed shook again when it received this new load. He lay on the
outside, where he kept the candles burning, no doubt for the
satisfaction of every sense, for as soon as he had kissed me, he rolled
down the bed clothes, and seemed transported with the view of all my
person at full length, which he covered with a profusion of kisses,
sparing no part of me. Then, being on his knees between my thighs, he
drew up his shirt, and bared all his hairy thighs, and stiff staring
truncheon, red top, and rooted into a thicket of curls, which covered
his belly to the novel, and gave it the air of a flesh brush; and soon
I feel it joining close to mine, when he had drove the nail up to the
head, and left no partition but the intermediate hair on both sides.
I had it now, I felt it now, and, beginning to drive, he soon gave
nature such a powerful summons down to her favourite quarters, that she
could no longer refuse repairing thither; all my animals spirits then
rushed mechanically to that center of attraction, and presently, inly
warmed, and stirred as I was beyond bearing, I lost all restraint, and
yielding to the force of the emotion, gave down, as mere woman, those
effusions of pleasure, which, in the strictness of still faithful love,
I could have wished to have kept in.
Yet oh! what an immense difference did I feel between this impression
of a pleasure merely animal, and struck out of the collision of the
sexes, by a passive bodily effect, from that sweet fury, that rage of
active delight which crowns the enjoyments of a mutual love passion,
where two hearts, tenderly and truly united, club to exalt the joy, and
give it a spirit and soul that bids defiance to that end which mere
momentary desires generally terminate in, when they die of a surfeit of
satisfaction!
Mr. H..., whom no distinctions of that sort seemed to distract, scarce
gave himself or me breathing time from the last encounter, but, as if
he had tasked himself to prove that the appearances of his vigour were
no signs hung out in vain, in a few minutes he was in a condition for
renewing the onset; to which, preluding with a storm of kisses, he
drove the same course as before, with unbated fervour; and thus, in
repeated engagements, kept me constantly in exercise, till dawn of
morning, in all which time he made me fully sensible of the virtues of
his firm texture of limbs, his square shoulders, broad chest, compact
hard muscles, in short a system of manliness, that might pass for no
bad image of our ancient sturdy barons, whose race is now so thoroughly
refined and frittered away into the more delicate and modern built
frame of our pap-nerved softlings, who are as pale, as pretty, and
almost as masculine as their sisters.
Mr. H..., content, however, with having the day break upon his triumph,
resigned me up to the refreshment of a rest we both wanted, and we soon
dropped into a profound sleep.
Though he was some time awake before me, yet he did not offer to
disturb a repose he had given me so much occasion for; but on my first
stirring, which was not till past ten o’clock, I was obliged to endure
one more trial of his manhood.
About eleven, in came Mrs. Jones, with two basins of the richest soup,
which her experience in these matters had moved her to prepare. I pass
over the fulsome compliments, the cant of the decent procuress, with
which she saluted us both; but though my blood rose at the sight of
her, I supprest my emotions, and gave all my concerne to reflections on
what would be the consequence of this new engagement.
But Mr. H..., who penetrated my uneasiness, did not suffer me to
languish under it, and acquainted me, that having taken a solid sincere
affection to me, he would begin by giving me one leading mark of it, in
removing me out of a house which must, for many reasons, be irksome and
disagreeable to me, into convenient lodgings, where he would take all
imaginable care of me; and desiring not to have any explanations with
my landlady, or be impatient till he returned, he dressed and went out,
having left me a purse with two and twenty guineas in it, being all he
had about him, as he express it, to keep my pocket still further
supplied.
As soon as he was gone, I felt the usual consequence of the first
launch into vice (for my love attachment to Charles never appeared to
me in that light). I was instantly borne away down the stream without
making back to the shore. My dreadful necessities, my gratitude, and
above all, to say the plain truth, the dissipation and diversion I
began to find in this new acquaintance, from the black corroding
thoughts my heart had been a prey to, ever since the absence of my dear
Charles, concurred to stun all my contrary reflections. If I now
thought of my first, my only charmer, it was still with the tenderness
and regret of the fondest love, embittered with the consciousness that
I was no longer worthy of him. I could have begged my bread with him
all over the world, but wretch that I was! I had neither the virtue or
courage requisite not to outlive my separation from him.
Yet, had not my heart been thus preengaged, Mr. H... might probably
have been the sole master of it; but the place was full, and the force
of conjectures alone had made him the possessor of my person; the
charms of which had, by the bye, been his sole object and passion, and
were, of course, no foundation for a love either very delicate or very
durable.
He did not return till six in the evening, to take me away to my new
lodgings; and my moveables being soon packed, and conveyed into a
hackney coach, it cost me but little regret to take my leave of a
landlady whom I thought I had so much reason not to be over pleased
with; and as for her part, she made no other difference to my staying
or going, but what that of the profit created.
We soon got to the house appointed for me, which was that of a plain
tradesman, who, on the score of interest, was entirely at Mr. H...’s
devotion, and who let him the first floor, very genteelly furnished,
for two guineas a week, of which I was instated mistress, with a maid
to attend me.
He stayed with me that evening, and we had a supper from a neighbouring
tavern, after which, and a gay glass or two, the maid put me to bed.
Mr. H.... soon followed, and notwithstanding the fatigues of the
preceding night, I found no quarter nor remission from him: he piquet
himself, as he told me, on doing the honours of my new apartment.
The morning being pretty well advanced, we got to breakfast; and the
ice now broke, my heart, no longer engrossed by love, began to take
ease, and to please itself with such trifles Mr. H....’s liberal liking
led him to make his court to the usual vanity of our sex. Silks, laces:
ear rings, pearl necklace, gold watch, in sort, all the trinkets and
articles of dress were lavishly heaped upon me; the sence of which, if
it did not create returns of love, forced a kind of grateful fondness,
something like love: a distinction which it would be spoiling the
pleasure of nine tenths of the keepers in the town to make, and is, I
suppose, the very good reason why so few of them ever do make it.
I was now established the kept mistress in form, well lodged, with a
very sufficient allowance, and lighted up with all the lustre of dress.
Mr. H.... continued kind and tender to me; yet, with all this, I was
far from happy: for, besides my regrets for my dear youth, which,
though often suspended or diverted, still returned upon me in certain
melancholic moments with redoubled violence, I wanted more society,
more dissipation.
As to Mr. H.... he was so much my superior in every sense, that I felt
it too much to the disadvantage of the gratitude I owed him. Thus he
gained my esteem, though he could not raise my taste; I was qualified
for no sort of conversation with him, except one sort, and that is a
satisfaction which leaves tiresome intervals, if not filled up by love,
or other amusements.
Mr. H...., so experienced, so learned in the ways of women, numbers of
whom had passed through his hands, doubtless, soon perceived this
uneasiness, and, without approving, or liking me the better for it, had
the complaisance to indulge me.
He made suppers at my lodging, where he brought several companions of
his pleasures, with their mistresses; and by this means I got into a
circle of acquaintance, that soon stripped me of all the remains of
bashfulness and modesty which might be yet left of my country
education, and were, to a just taste, perhaps, the greatest of my
charms.
We visited one another in form, and mimicked, as near as we could, all
the miseries, the follies, and impertinencies of the women in quality,
in the round of which they trifle away their time, without it ever
entering their little heads, that on earth there cannot subsist any
thing more silly, more flat, more insipid and worthless, than,
generally considered, their system of life is: they ought to treat the
men as their tyrants, indeed! were they to condemn them to it.
But though, amongst the kept mistresses (and I was now acquainted with
a good many, besides some useful matrons, who live by their connexions
with them), I hardly knew one that did not perfectly detest their
keepers, and, of course, made little or no scruple of any infidelity
they could safely accomplish, I had still no notion of wronging mine:
for, besides that no mark of jealousy on his side started me the hint,
or gave me the provocation to play him a trick of that sort, and that
his constant generosity, politeness, and tender attention to please me,
forced a regard to him, that, without affecting my heart, insured him
my fidelity, no object had yet presented that could overcome the
habitual liking I had contracted for him and I was on the eve of
obtaining, from the movements of his own voluntary generosity, a modest
provision for life, when an accident happened which broke all the
measures he had resolved upon in my favour.
I had now lived near seven months with Mr. H.... when one day returning
to my lodgings, from a visit in the neighbourhood, where I used to stay
longer, I found the street door open, and the maid of the house
standing at it, talking with some of her acquaintance, so that I came
in without knocking and, as I passed by, she told me Mr. H.... was
above. I slept up stairs into my own bed-chamber, with no other thought
than of pulling off my hat etc., and then to wait upon him in the
dining room, into which my bed-chamber had a door, as is common enough.
Whilst I was untying my hat strings, I fancied I heard my maid Hannah’s
voice and a sort of tustle, which raised my curiosity; I stole softly
to the door, where a knot in the wood had been slipped out, and
afforded a very commanding peep-hole to the scene then in agitation,
the actors of which had been to earnestly employed to hear my opening
my own door, from the landing place of the stairs, into my bedchamber.
The first sight that struck me was Mr. H.... pulling and hauling this
coarse country strammel towards a couch that stood in a corner of the
dining-room; to which the girl made only a sort of awkward holdening
resistance, crying out so loud, that I, who listened at the door, could
scarce hear her: “Pray Sir, don’t.., let me alone... I am not for your
turn... You cannot, sure, demean yourself with such a poor body as I...
Lord! Sir, my mistress may come home... I must not indeed... I will cry
out...” All of which did not hinder her from insensibly suffering
herself to be brought to the foot of the couch, upon which a push of no
mighty violence served to give her a very easy fall, and my gentleman
having got up his hands to the strong hold of her Virtue, she, no
doubt, thought it was time to give up the argument, and that all
further defense would be vain: and he, throwing her petticoats over her
face, which was now as red as scarlet, discovered a pair of stout,
plump, substantial thighs, and tolerably white; he mounted them round
his haps, and coming out with his drawn weapon, stuck it in the cloven
sport, where he seemed to find a less difficult entrance than perhaps
he had flattered himself with (for, by the way, this blouse had left
her place in the country, for a bastard), and, indeed, all his motions
shewed he was lodged pretty much at large. After he had done, his Deare
gets up, drops her petticoats down, and smooths her apron and
handkerchief. Mr. H.... looked a little silly, and taking out some
money, gave it her, with an air indifferent enough, bidding her be a
good girl, and say nothing.
Had I loved this man, it was not in nature for me to have had patience
to see the whole scene through: I should have broke in and played the
jealous princess with a vengeance. But that was not the case: my pride
alone was hurt, my heart not, and I could easier win upon myself to see
how far he would go, till I had no uncertainty upon my conscience.
The least delicate of all affairs of this sort being now over, I
retired softly into my closet, where I began to consider what I should
do. My first scheme naturally, was to rush in and upbraid them; this,
indeed, flattered my present emotions and vexations, as it would have
given immediate vent to them; but, on second thoughts, not being so
clear as to the consequence to be apprehended from such a step, I began
my discovery still a safer season, when dissembly my discovery till a
safer season, when Mr. H.... should have perfected the settlement he
had made overtures to me of, and which I was not to think such a
violent explanation, as I was indeed not equal to the management of,
could possibly forward, and might destroy. On the other hand, the
provocation seemed too gross, too flagrant not to give me some thoughts
of revenge; the very start of which idea restored me to perfect
composure; and delighted as I was with the confused plan of it in my
head, I was easily mistress enough of myself to support the part of
ignorance I had prescribed to myself; and as all this circle of
reflections was instantly over, I stole a tip-toe to the passage door,
and opening it with a noise, passed for having that moment come home;
and after a short pause, as if to pull off my things, I opened the door
into the dining room, where I fund the dowdy blowing the fire, and my
faithful shepherd walking about the room, and wistling, as cool and
unconcerned as if nothing had happened. I think, however, he had not
much to brag of having out-dissembled me: for I kept up, nobly, the
character of our sex for art, and went up to him with the same open air
of frankness as I had ever received him. He stayed but a little while,
made some excuse for not being able to stay the evening with me, and
went out.
As for the wench, she was now spoiled, at least for my servant; and
scarce eight and forty hours were gone round, before her insolence, on
what had passed betwen Mr. H.... and her, gave me so fair an occasion
to turn her away, at a minute’s warning, that, not to have done it
would have been the wonder; so that he could neither disapprove it nor
find in it the least reason to suspect my original motive. What became
of her afterwards, I know not; but generous as Mr. H.... was, he
undoubtedly made her amends: though, I dare answer, that he kept up no
further commerce with her of that sort; as his stooping to such a
coarse morsel, was only a sudden sally of lust, on seeing a wholesome
looking, buxom country wench, and no more strange than hunger, or even
a whimsical appetite’s making a fling meal of neck-beef, for change of
diet.
Had I considered this escapade of Mr. H.... in no more than that light
and contented myself with turning away the wench, I had thought and
acted right; but, flushed as I was with imaginary wrongs, I should have
held Mr. H... to have been cheaply off, if I had not pushed my revenge
farther, and repaid him, as exactly as could for the soul of me, in the
same coin.
Nor was this worthy act of justice long delayed: I had it too much at
heart. Mr. H... had, about a fortnight before, taken into his service a
tenant’s son, just come out the country, a very handsome young lad,
scarce turned of nineteen, fresh as a rose, well sharped and clear
limbed: in short, a very good excuse for any woman’s liking, even
though revenge had been out of the question; any woman, I say, who was
disprejudiced, and that wit and spirit enough to prefer a point of
pleasure to a point of pride.