IMLAY'S DESERTION.
1794-1795.
Unfortunately, as a rule, the traveller on life's journey has but as
short a time to stay in the pleasant green resting-places, as the
wanderer through the desert. In September Mary followed Imlay to Paris.
But the gates of her Eden were forever barred. Before the end of the
month he had bidden her farewell and had gone to London. Against the
fascination of money-making, her charms had little chance. His
estrangement dates from this separation. When Mary met him again, he had
forgotten love and honor, and had virtually deserted her. While her
affection became stronger, his weakened until finally it perished
altogether.
Her confidence in him, however, was confirmed by the months spent at
Havre, and she little dreamed his departure was the prelude to their
final parting. For a time she was lighter-hearted than she had ever
before been while he was away. The memory of her late happiness reassured
her. Her little girl was an unceasing source of joy, and she never tired
of writing to Imlay about her. Her maternal tenderness overflows in her
letters:--
"... You will want to be told over and over again," she said in
one of them, not doubting his interest to be as great as her, "that
our little Hercules is quite recovered.
"Besides looking at me, there are three other things which delight
her: to ride in a coach, to look at a scarlet waistcoat, and hear
loud music. Yesterday at the fete she enjoyed the two latter; but,
to honor J. J. Rousseau, I intend to give her a sash, the first she
has ever had round her...."
In a second, she writes:--
"I have been playing and laughing with the little girl so long,
that I cannot take up my pen to address you without emotion.
Pressing her to my bosom, she looked so like you (_entre nous_,
your best looks, for I do not admire your commercial face), every
nerve seemed to vibrate to her touch, and I began to think that
there was something in the assertion of man and wife being one, for
you seemed to pervade my whole frame, quickening the beat of my
heart, and lending me the sympathetic tears you excited."
And in still another, she exclaims:--
"My little darling is indeed a sweet child; and I am sorry that you
are not here to see her little mind unfold itself. You talk of
'dalliance,' but certainly no lover was ever more attached to his
mistress than she is to me. Her eyes follow me everywhere, and by
affection I have the most despotic power over her. She is all
vivacity or softness. Yes; I love her more than I thought I should.
When I have been hurt at your stay, I have embraced her as my only
comfort; when pleased with her, for looking and laughing like you;
nay, I cannot, I find, long be angry with you, whilst I am kissing
her for resembling you. But there would be no end to these details.
Fold us both to your heart."
As the devout go on pilgrimage to places once sanctified by the presence
of a departed saint, so she visited alone the haunts of the early days
of their love, living over again the incidents which had made them
sacred. "My imagination," she told him, "... chooses to ramble back to
the barrier with you, or to see you coming to meet me and my basket of
grapes. With what pleasure do I recollect your looks and words, when I
have been sitting on the window, regarding the waving corn." She begged
him to bring back his "barrier face," as she thus fondly recalled their
interviews at the barrier. She told him of a night passed at Saint
Germains in the very room which had once been theirs, and, glowing with
these recollections, she warned him, that if he should return changed in
aught, she would fly from him to cherish remembrances which must be ever
dear to her. Occasionally a little humorous pleasantry interrupted the
more tender outpourings in her letters. Just as, according to Jean Paul,
a man can only afford to ridicule his religion when his faith is firm, so
it was only when her confidence in Imlay was most secure that she could
speak lightly of her love. To the reader of her life, who can see the
snake lurking in the grass, her mirth is more tragical than her grief. On
the 26th of October, Imlay having now been absent for over a month, she
writes:--
"I have almost _charmed_ a judge of the tribunal, R., who, though I
should not have thought it possible, has humanity, if not _beaucoup
d'esprit_. But, let me tell you, if you do not make haste back, I
shall be half in love with the author of the _Marseillaise_, who is
a handsome man, a little too broad-faced or so, and plays sweetly
on the violin.
"What do you say to this threat?--why, _entre nous_, I like to
give way to a sprightly vein when writing to you. 'The devil,' you
know, is proverbially said to 'be in a good humor when he is
pleased.'"
Many of her old friends in the capital had been numbered among the
children devoured by the insatiable monster. A few, however, were still
left, and she seems to have made new ones and to have again gone into
Parisian society. The condition of affairs was more conducive to social
pleasures than it had been the year before. Robespierre was dead. There
were others besides Mary who feared "the last flap of the tail of the
beast;" but, as a rule, the people, now the reaction had come, were
over-confident, and the season was one of merry-making. There were fetes
and balls. Even mourning for the dead became the signal for rejoicing;
and gay Parisians, their arms tied with crape, danced to the memory of
the victims of the late national delirium. The Reign of Terror was over,
but so was Mary's happiness. Public order was partly restored, but her
own short-lived peace was rudely interrupted. Imlay in London became more
absorbed in his immediate affairs, a fact which he could not conceal in
his letters; and Mary realized that compared to business she was of
little or no importance to him. She expostulated earnestly with him on
the folly of allowing money cares and ambitions to preoccupy him. She
sincerely sympathized with him in his disappointments, but she could not
understand his willingness to sacrifice sentiment and affection to sordid
cares. "It appears to me absurd," she told him, "to waste life in
preparing to live." Not one of the least of her trials was that she was
at this time often forced to see a man who was Imlay's friend or partner
in Paris, and who seems to have aided and abetted him in his
speculations. He tormented her with accounts of new enterprises, and she
complained very bitterly of him. "----, I know, urges you to stay," she
wrote in one of her first letters of expostulation, "and is continually
branching out into new projects because he has the idle desire to amass a
large fortune, rather, an immense one, merely to have the credit of
having made it. But we who are governed by other motives ought not to be
led on by him; when we meet we will discuss this subject." For a little
while she tried to believe that her doubts had no substantial basis, but
were the result of her solitude. In the same letter she said:--
"... I will only tell you that I long to see you, and, being at
peace with you, I shall be hurt, rather than made angry, by delays.
Having suffered so much in life, do not be surprised if I
sometimes, when left to myself, grow gloomy and suppose that it was
all a dream, and that my happiness is not to last. I say happiness,
because remembrance retrenches all the dark shades of the picture."
But by degrees the dark shades increased until they had completely
blotted out the light made by the past. Imlay's letters were fewer and
shorter, more taken up with business, and less concerned with her. Ought
she to endure his indifference, or ought she to separate from him
forever? was the question which now tortured her. She had tasted the
higher pleasures, and the present pain was intense in proportion. Her
letters became mournful as dirges.
On the 30th of December she wrote:--
"Should you receive three or four of the letters at once which I
have written lately, do not think of Sir John Brute, for I do not
mean to wife you, I only take advantage of every occasion, that one
out of three of my epistles may reach your hands, and inform you
that I am not of ----'s opinion, who talks till he makes me angry
of the necessity of your staying two or three months longer. I do
not like this life of continual inquietude, and, _entre nous_, I am
determined to try to earn some money here myself, in order to
convince you that, if you choose to run about the world to get a
fortune, it is for yourself; for the little girl and I will live
without your assistance unless you are with us. I may be termed
proud; be it so, but I will never abandon certain principles of
action.
"The common run of men have such an ignoble way of thinking that if
they debauch their hearts and prostitute their persons, following
perhaps a gust of inebriation, the wife, slave rather, whom they
maintain has no right to complain, and ought to receive the sultan
whenever he deigns to return with open arms, though his have been
polluted by half an hundred promiscuous amours during his absence.
"I consider fidelity and constancy as two distinct things, yet the
former is necessary to give life to the other; and such a degree of
respect do I think due to myself, that if only probity, which is a
good thing in its place, brings you back, never return! for if a
wandering of the heart or even a caprice of the imagination detains
you, there is an end of all my hopes of happiness. I could not
forgive it if I would.
"I have gotten into a melancholy mood, you perceive. You know my
opinion of men in general; you know that I think them systematic
tyrants, and that it is the rarest thing in the world to meet with
a man with sufficient delicacy of feeling to govern desire. When I
am thus sad, I lament that my little darling, fondly as I dote on
her, is a girl. I am sorry to have a tie to a world that for me is
ever sown with thorns.
"You will call this an ill-humored letter, when, in fact, it is
the strongest proof of affection I can give to dread to lose you.
---- has taken such pains to convince me that you must and ought to
stay, that it has inconceivably depressed my spirits. You have
always known my opinion. I have ever declared that two people who
mean to live together ought not to be long separated. If certain
things are more necessary to you than me,--search for them. Say but
one word, and you shall never hear of me more. If not, for God's
sake let us struggle with poverty--with any evil but these
continual inquietudes of business, which I have been told were to
last but a few months, though every day the end appears more
distant! This is the first letter in this strain that I have
determined to forward to you; the rest lie by because I was
unwilling to give you pain, and I should not now write if I did not
think that there would be no conclusion to the schemes which
demand, as I am told, your presence."
Once, but only once, the light shone again. On the 15th of January she
received a kind letter from Imlay, and her anger died away. "It is
pleasant to forgive those we love," she said to him simply. But it was
followed by his usual hasty business notes or by complete silence, and
henceforward she knew hope only by name. Her old habit of seeing
everything from the dark side returned. She could not find one redeeming
point in his conduct. Despair seized her soul. Her own misery was set
against a dark background, for she looked beneath the surface of current
events. She heard not the music of the ball-room, but that of the
battle-field. She saw not the dances of the heedless, but the tears of
the motherless and the orphaned. The luxury of the upper classes might
deceive some men, but it could not deafen her to the complaints of the
poor, who were only waiting their chance to proclaim to the new
Constitution that they wanted not fine speeches, but bread. Other
discomforts contributed their share to her burden. A severe cold had
settled upon her lungs, and she imagined she was in a galloping
consumption. Her lodgings were not very convenient, but she had put up
with them, waiting day by day for Imlay's return. Weary of her life as
Job was of his, she, like him, spoke out in the bitterness of her soul.
Her letters from this time on are written from the very valley of the
shadow of death. On February 9 she wrote:--
"The melancholy presentiment has for some time hung on my spirits,
that we were parted forever; and the letters I received this day,
by Mr. ----, convince me that it was not without foundation. You
allude to some other letters, which I suppose have miscarried; for
most of those I have got were only a few, hasty lines calculated to
wound the tenderness that the sight of the superscriptions excited.
"I mean not, however, to complain; yet so many feelings are
struggling for utterance, and agitating a heart almost bursting
with anguish, that I find it very difficult to write with any
degree of coherence.
"You left me indisposed, though you have taken no notice of it; and
the most fatiguing journey I ever had contributed to continue it.
However, I recovered my health; but a neglected cold, and continual
inquietude during the last two months, have reduced me to a state
of weakness I never before experienced. Those who did not know that
the canker-worm was at work at the core cautioned me about suckling
my child too long. God preserve this poor child, and render her
happier than her mother!
"But I am wandering from my subject; indeed, my head turns giddy,
when I think that all the confidence I have had in the affection of
others is come to this. I did not expect this blow from you. I
have done my duty to you and my child; and if I am not to have any
return of affection to reward me, I have the sad consolation of
knowing that I deserved a better fate. My soul is weary; I am sick
at heart; and but for this little darling I would cease to care
about a life which is now stripped of every charm.
"You see how stupid I am, uttering declamation when I meant simply
to tell you that I consider your requesting me to come to you as
merely dictated by honor. Indeed, I scarcely understand you. You
request me to come, and then tell me that you have not given up all
thoughts of returning to this place.
"When I determined to live with you, I was only governed by
affection. I would share poverty with you, but I turn with affright
from the sea of trouble on which you are entering. I have certain
principles of action; I know what I look for to found my happiness
on. It is not money. With you, I wished for sufficient to procure
the comforts of life; as it is, less will do. I can still exert
myself to obtain the necessaries of life for my child, and she does
not want more at present. I have two or three plans in my head to
earn our subsistence; for do not suppose that, neglected by you, I
will lie under obligations of a pecuniary kind to you! No; I would
sooner submit to menial service. I wanted the support of your
affection; that gone, all is over! I did not think, when I
complained of ----'s contemptible avidity to accumulate money, that
he would have dragged you into his schemes.
"I cannot write. I enclose a fragment of a letter, written soon
after your departure, and another which tenderness made me keep
back when it was written. You will see then the sentiments of a
calmer, though not a more determined moment. Do not insult me by
saying that 'our being together is paramount to every other
consideration!' Were it, you would not be running after a bubble,
at the expense of my peace of mind.
"Perhaps this is the last letter you will ever receive from me."
Grief sometimes makes men strong. Mary's stimulated her into a
determination to break her connection with Imlay, and to live for her
child alone. She would remain in Paris and superintend Fanny's education.
She had already been able to look out for herself; there was no reason
why she should not do it again. Until she settled upon the means of
support to be adopted, she would borrow money from her friends. Anything
was better than to live at Imlay's expense. As for him, such a course
would probably be a relief, and certainly it would do him no harm. "As I
never concealed the nature of my connection with you," she wrote him,
"your reputation will not suffer." But her plans, for some reason, did
not meet with his approval. He was tired of her, and yet he seems to have
been ashamed to confess his inconstancy. At one moment he wrote that he
was coming to Paris; at the next he bade her meet him in London. But no
mention was made of the farm in America. The excitement of commerce
proved more alluring than the peace of country life. His shilly-shallying
unnerved Mary; positive desertion would have been easier to bear. On
February 19 she wrote him:--
"When I first received your letter putting off your return to an
indefinite time, I felt so hurt that I knew not what I wrote. I am
now calmer, though it was not the kind of wound over which time has
the quickest effect; on the contrary, the more I think, the sadder
I grow. Society fatigues me inexpressibly; so much so that, finding
fault with every one, I have only reason enough to discover that
the fault is in myself. My child alone interests me, and but for
her I should not take any pains to recover my health."
The child was now the strongest bond of union between them. For her sake
she felt the necessity of continuing to live with Imlay as long as
possible, though his love was dead. Therefore, when he wrote definitely
that he would like her to come to him, since he could not leave his
business to go to her, she relinquished her intentions of remaining alone
in France with Fanny, and set out at once for London. She could hardly
have passed through Havre without feeling the bitter contrast between her
happiness of the year before, and her present hopelessness. "I sit, lost
in thought," she wrote to Imlay, "looking at the sea, and tears rush into
my eyes when I find that I am cherishing any fond expectations. I have
indeed been so unhappy this winter, I find it as difficult to acquire
fresh hopes as to regain tranquillity. Enough of this; be still, foolish
heart! But for the little girl, I could almost wish that it should cease
to beat, to be no more alive to the anguish of disappointment." The boat
upon which she sailed was run aground, and she was thus unexpectedly
detained at Havre. During this interval she touched still more closely
upon sorrow's crown of sorrow in remembering happier things, by writing
to Mr. Archibald Hamilton Rowan, who had escaped from his prison in
Ireland to France, and giving him certain necessary information about the
house she had left, and which he was about to occupy.
She reached London in April, 1795. Her gloomiest forebodings were
confirmed. Imlay had provided a furnished house for her, and had
considered her comforts. But his manner was changed. He was cold and
constrained, and she felt the difference immediately. He was little with
her, and business was, as of old, the excuse. According to Godwin, he had
formed another connection with a young strolling actress. Life was thus
even less bright in London than it had been in Paris. If hell is but the
shadow of a soul on fire, she was now plunged into its deepest depths.
Its tortures were more than she could endure. For her there were, indeed,
worse things waiting at the gate of life than death, and she resolved by
suicide to escape from them. This part of her story is very obscure. But
it is certain that her suicidal intentions were so nearly carried into
effect, that she had written several letters containing her, as she
thought, last wishes, and which were to be opened after all was over.
There is no exact account of the manner in which she proposed to kill
herself, nor of the means by which she was prevented. "I only know,"
Godwin says, "that Mr. Imlay became acquainted with her purpose at a
moment when he was uncertain whether or no it was already executed, and
that his feelings were roused by the intelligence. It was perhaps owing
to his activity and representations that her life was at this time saved.
She determined to continue to exist."
This event sobered both Imlay and Mary. They saw the danger they were in,
and the consequent necessity of forming a definite conclusion as to the
nature of their future relations. They must either live together in
perfect confidence, or else they must separate. "My friend, my dear
friend," she wrote him, "examine yourself well,--I am out of the
question; for, alas! I am nothing,--and discover what you wish to do,
what will render you most comfortable; or, to be more explicit, whether
you desire to live with me, or part forever! When you can ascertain it,
tell me frankly, I conjure you! for, believe me, I have very
involuntarily interrupted your peace." The determination could not be
made in a hurry. In the meantime Mary knew it would be unwise to remain
idle, meditating upon her wrongs. Forgetfulness of self in active work
appeared the only possible means of living through the period of
uncertainty. Imlay had business in Norway and Sweden which demanded the
personal superintendence either of himself or of a trustworthy agent. He
gave it in charge to Mary, and at the end of May she started upon this
mission. That Imlay still looked upon her as his wife, and that his
confidence in her was unlimited, is shown by the following document in
which he authorizes her to act for him:--
May 19, 1795.
Know all men by these presents that I, Gilbert Imlay, citizen of
the United States of America, at present residing in London, do
nominate, constitute, and appoint Mary Imlay, my best friend and
wife, to take the sole management and direction of all my affairs,
and business which I had placed in the hands of Mr. Elias Bachman,
negotiant, Gottenburg, or in those of Messrs. Myburg & Co.,
Copenhagen, desiring that she will manage and direct such concerns
in such manner as she may deem most wise and prudent. For which
this letter shall be a sufficient power, enabling her to receive
all the money or sums of money that may be recovered from Peter
Ellison or his connections, whatever may be the issue of the trial
now carrying on, instigated by Mr. Elias Bachman, as my agent, for
the violation of the trust which I had reposed in his integrity.
Considering the aggravated distresses, the accumulated losses and
damages sustained in consequence of the said Ellison's disobedience
of my injunctions, I desire the said Mary Imlay will clearly
ascertain the amount of such damages, taking first the advice of
persons qualified to judge of the probability of obtaining
satisfaction, or the means the said Ellison or his connections, who
may be proved to be implicated in his guilt, may have, or power of
being able to make restitution, and then commence a new prosecution
for the same accordingly....
Respecting the cargo of goods in the hands of Messrs. Myburg and
Co., Mrs. Imlay has only to consult the most experienced persons
engaged in the disposition of such articles, and then, placing them
at their disposal, act as she may deem right and proper....
Thus confiding in the talent, zeal, and earnestness of my dearly
beloved friend and companion, I submit the management of these
affairs entirely and implicitly to her discretion.
Remaining most sincerely and affectionately hers truly,
G. IMLAY.
_Witness_, J. SAMUEL.
Unfortunately for Mary, she was detained at Hull, from which town she was
to set sail, for about a month. She was thus unable immediately to still
the memory of her sorrows. It is touching to see how, now that she could
no longer doubt that Imlay was made of common clay, she began to find
excuses for him. She represented to herself that it was her misfortune to
have met him too late. Had she known him before dissipation had enslaved
him, there would have been none of this trouble. She was, furthermore,
convinced that his natural refinement was not entirely destroyed, and
that if he would but make the effort he could overcome his grosser
appetites. To this effect she wrote him from Hull:--
"I shall always consider it as one of the most serious misfortunes
of my life, that I did not meet you before satiety had rendered
your senses so fastidious as almost to close up every tender avenue
of sentiment and affection that leads to your sympathetic heart.
You have a heart, my friend; yet, hurried away by the impetuosity
of inferior feelings, you have sought in vulgar excesses for that
gratification which only the heart can bestow.
"The common run of men, I know, with strong health and gross
appetites, must have variety to banish ennui, because the
imagination never lends its magic wand to convert appetite into
love, cemented by according reason. Ah! my friend, you know not the
ineffable delight, the exquisite pleasure, which arises from an
unison of affection and desire, when the whole soul and senses are
abandoned to a lively imagination, that renders every emotion
delicate and rapturous. Yes; these are emotions over which satiety
has no power, and the recollection of which even disappointment
cannot disenchant; but they do not exist without self-denial. These
emotions, more or less strong, appear to me to be the distinctive
characteristics of genius, the foundation of taste, and of that
exquisite relish for the beauties of nature, of which the common
herd of eaters and drinkers and _child-begetters_ certainly have no
idea. You will smile at an observation that has just occurred to
me: I consider those minds as the most strong and original whose
imagination acts as the stimulus to their senses.
"Well! you will ask what is the result of all this reasoning. Why,
I cannot help thinking that it is possible for you, having great
strength of mind, to return to nature and regain a sanity of
constitution and purity of feeling which would open your heart to
me. I would fain rest there!
"Yet, convinced more than ever of the sincerity and tenderness of
my attachment to you, the involuntary hopes which a determination
to live has revived are not sufficiently strong to dissipate the
cloud that despair has spread over futurity. I have looked at the
sea and at my child, hardly daring to own to myself the secret wish
that it might become our tomb, and that the heart, still so alive
to anguish, might there be quieted by death. At this moment ten
thousand complicated sentiments press for utterance, weigh on my
heart, and obscure my sight."
After almost a month of inactivity, the one bright spot in it being a
visit to Beverly, the home of her childhood, she sailed for Sweden, with
Fanny and a maid as her only companions. Her "Letters from Sweden,
Norway, and Denmark," with the more personal passages omitted, were
published in a volume by themselves shortly after her return to England.
Notice of them will find a more appropriate place in another chapter. All
that is necessary here is the very portion which was then suppressed, but
which Godwin later included with the "Letters to Imlay." The northern
trip had at least this good result. It strengthened her physically. She
was so weak when she first arrived in Sweden that the day she landed she
fell fainting to the ground as she walked to her carriage. For a while
everything fatigued her. The bustle of the people around her seemed
"flat, dull, and unprofitable." The civilities by which she was
overwhelmed, and the endeavors of the people she met to amuse her, were
fatiguing. Nothing, for a while, could lighten her deadly weight of
sorrow. But by degrees, as her letters show, she improved. Pure air, long
walks, and rides on horseback, rowing and bathing, and days in the
country had their beneficial effect, and she wrote to Imlay on July 4,
"The rosy fingers of health already streak my cheeks; and I have seen a
physical life in my eyes, after I have been climbing the rocks, that
resembled the fond, credulous hopes of youth."
But even a sound body cannot heal a broken heart. Mary could not throw
off her troubles in a day. She after a time tried to distract her mind by
entering into the amusements she had at first scorned, but it was often
in vain. "I have endeavored to fly from myself," she said in one letter,
"and launched into all the dissipation possible here, only to feel keener
anguish when alone with my child." There was a change for the better,
however, in her mental state, for though her grief was not completely
cured, she at least voluntarily sought to recover her emotional
equilibrium. Self-examination showed her where her weakness lay, and she
resolved to conquer it. With but too much truth, she told Imlay:--
"Love is a want of my heart. I have examined myself lately with
more care than formerly, and find that to deaden is not to calm the
mind. Aiming at tranquillity I have almost destroyed all the energy
of my soul, almost rooted out what renders it estimable. Yes, I
have damped that enthusiasm of character, which converts the
grossest materials into a fuel that imperceptibly feeds hopes which
aspire above common enjoyment. Despair, since the birth of my
child, has rendered me stupid; soul and body seemed to be fading
away before the withering touch of disappointment."
Despite her endeavors, her spiritual recovery was slow. A cry of agony
still rang through her letters. But she had at least one pleasure that
helped to soften her cares. This was her love for her child, which,
always great, was increased by Imlay's cruelty. The tenderness which he
by his indifference repulsed, she now lavished upon Fanny. She seemed to
feel that she ought to make amends for the fact that her child was, to
all intents and purposes, fatherless. In the same letter from which the
above passage is taken, there is this little outburst of maternal
affection:--
"I grow more and more attached to my little girl, and I cherish
this affection with fear, because it must be a long time before it
can become bitterness of soul. She is an interesting creature. On
ship-board how often, as I gazed at the sea, have I longed to bury
my troubled bosom in the less troubled deep; asserting, with
Brutus, 'that the virtue I had followed too far was merely a name!'
and nothing but the sight of her--her playful smiles, which seemed
to cling and twine round my heart--could have stopped me."
It so happened that at one time she was obliged to leave her child with
her nurse for about a month. Business called her to Toensberg in Norway,
and the journey would have been bad for Fanny, who was cutting her teeth.
"I felt more at leaving my child than I thought I should," she wrote to
Imlay, "and whilst at night I imagined every instant that I heard the
half-formed sounds of her voice, I asked myself how I could think of
parting with her forever, of leaving her thus helpless." Here indeed was
a stronger argument against suicide than Christianity or its
"aftershine." This absence stimulated her motherly solicitude and
heightened her sense of responsibility. In her appeals to Imlay to settle
upon his future course in her regard, she now began to dwell upon their
child as the most important reason to keep them together. On the 30th of
July she wrote from Toensberg:--
"I will try to write with a degree of composure. I wish for us to
live together, because I want you to acquire an habitual
tenderness for my poor girl. I cannot bear to think of leaving her
alone in the world, or that she should only be protected by your
sense of duty. Next to preserving her, my most earnest wish is not
to disturb your peace. I have nothing to expect, and little to
fear, in life. There are wounds that can never be healed; but they
may be allowed to fester in silence without wincing."
On the 7th of August she wrote again in the same strain:--
"This state of suspense, my friend, is intolerable; we must
determine on something, and soon; we must meet shortly, or part
forever. I am sensible that I acted foolishly, but I was wretched
when we were together. Expecting too much, I let the pleasure I
might have caught, slip from me. I cannot live with you, I ought
not, if you form another attachment. But I promise you, mine shall
not be intruded on you. Little reason have I to expect a shadow of
happiness, after the cruel disappointments that have rent my heart;
but that of my child seems to depend on our being together. Still,
I do not wish you to sacrifice a chance of enjoyment for an
uncertain good. I feel a conviction that I can provide for her, and
it shall be my object, if we are indeed to part to meet no more.
Her affection must not be divided. She must be a comfort to me, if
I am to have no other, and only know me as her support. I feel that
I cannot endure the anguish of corresponding with you, if we are
only to correspond. No; if you seek for happiness elsewhere, my
letters shall not interrupt your repose. I will be dead to you. I
cannot express to you what pain it gives me to write about an
eternal separation. You must determine. Examine yourself. But, for
God's sake! spare me the anxiety of uncertainty! I may sink under
the trial; but I will not complain."
He seems to have written to her regularly. At times she reproached him
for not letting her hear from him, but at others she acknowledged the
receipt of three and five letters in one morning. If these had been
preserved, hers would not seem as importunate as they do now, for he gave
her reason to suppose that he was anxious for a reunion, and wrote in a
style which she told him she may have deserved, but which she had not
expected from him. She also referred to his admission that her words
tortured him; and there was talk of a trip together to Switzerland. But
at the same time his proofs of indifference forced her to declare that
she and pleasure had shaken hands. "How often," she breaks out in her
agony, "passing through the rocks, I have thought, 'But for this child, I
would lay my head on one of them, and never open my eyes again!'" The
only particular in which he remained firm was his unwillingness to give a
final decision in what, to her, was the one all-important matter. His
vacillating behavior was heartless in the extreme. Her suspense became
unbearable, and all her letters contained entreaties for him to relieve
it. She was ready, once he said the word, to undertake to support her
child and herself. But the fiat must come from him. Had it remained
entirely with her she would have returned to him. But this she could not
do unless he would receive her as his wife and promise loyalty to her. "I
do not understand you," she wrote on the 6th of September, in answer to
one of his letters. "It is necessary for you to write more explicitly,
and determine on some mode of conduct. I cannot endure this suspense.
Decide. Do you fear to strike another blow? We live together, or
eternally apart! I shall not write to you again till I receive an answer
to this."
Finally, after allowing her to suffer three months of acute agony, he
summoned up resolution enough to write and tell her he would abide by her
decision. Her business in the North had been satisfactorily settled, for
which she was, alas! to receive but poor thanks; and the welfare of the
child having now become the pivot of her actions, she returned to
England. From Dover she sent him a letter informing him that she was
prepared once more to make his home hers:--
You say I must decide for myself. I have decided that it was most
for the interest of my little girl, and for my own comfort, little
as I expect, for us to live together; and I even thought that you
would be glad some years hence, when the tumult of business was
over, to repose in the society of an affectionate friend, and mark
the progress of our interesting child, whilst endeavoring to be of
use in the circle you at last resolved to rest in, for you cannot
run about forever.
From the tenor of your last letter, however, I am led to imagine
that you have formed some new attachment. If it be so, let me
earnestly request you to see me once more, and immediately. This is
the only proof I require of the friendship you profess for me. I
will then decide, since you boggle about a mere form.
I am laboring to write with calmness; but the extreme anguish I
feel at landing without having any friend to receive me, and even
to be conscious that the friend whom I most wish to see will feel a
disagreeable sensation at being informed of my arrival, does not
come under the description of common misery. Every emotion yields
to an overwhelming flood of sorrow, and the playfulness of my child
distresses me. On her account I wished to remain a few days here,
comfortless as is my situation. Besides, I did not wish to surprise
you. You have told me that you would make any sacrifice to promote
my happiness--and, even in your last unkind letter, you talk of the
ties which bind you to me and my child. Tell me that you wish it,
and I will cut this Gordian knot.
I now most earnestly entreat you to write to me, without fail, by
the return of the post. Direct your letter to be left at the
post-office, and tell me whether you will come to me here, or where
you will meet me. I can receive your letter on Wednesday morning.
Do not keep me in suspense. I expect nothing from you, or any human
being; my die is cast! I have fortitude enough to determine to do
my duty; yet I cannot raise my depressed spirits, or calm my
trembling heart. That being who moulded it thus knows that I am
unable to tear up by the roots the propensity to affection which
has been the torment of my life,--but life will have an end!
Should you come here (a few months ago I could not have doubted it)
you will find me at ----. If you prefer meeting me on the road,
tell me where.
Yours affectionately,
MARY.
The result of this letter was that Imlay and Mary tried to retie the
broken thread of their domestic relations. The latter went up to London,
and they settled together in lodgings. It would have been better for her
had she never seen him again. The fire of his love had burnt out. No
power could rekindle it. His indifference was hard to bear; but so long
as he assured her that he had formed no other attachment, she made no
complaint. For Fanny's sake she endured the new bitterness, and found
such poor comfort as she could in being with him. It was but too true
that the constancy of her affection was the torment of her life. In spite
of everything, she still loved him. Before long, however, she discovered
through her servants that he was basely deceiving her. He was keeping up
a separate establishment for a new mistress. Mary, following the impulse
of the moment, went at once to this house, where she found him. The
particulars of their interview are not known; but her wretchedness during
the night which followed maddened her. His perfidy hurt her more deeply
than his indifference. Her cup of sorrow was filled to overflowing, and
for the second time she made up her mind to fly from a world which held
nothing but misery for her. It may be concluded that for the time being
she was really mad. It will be remembered that troubles of a kindred
nature had driven Mrs. Bishop to insanity. All the Wollstonecrafts
inherited a peculiarly excitable temperament. Mary, had she not lost all
self-control, would have been deterred from suicide, as she had been from
thoughts of it in Sweden, by her love for Fanny. But her grief was so
great it drowned all memory and reason. The morning after this night of
agony she wrote to Imlay:--
"I write you now on my knees, imploring you to send my child and
the maid with ---- to Paris, to be consigned to the care of Madame
----, Rue ----, Section de ----. Should they be removed, ---- can
give their direction.
"Let the maid have all my clothes, without distinction.
"Pray pay the cook her wages, and do not mention the confession
which I forced from her; a little sooner or later is of no
consequence. Nothing but my extreme stupidity could have rendered
me blind so long. Yet, whilst you assured me that you had no
attachment, I thought we might still have lived together.
"I shall make no comments on your conduct or any appeal to the
world. Let my wrongs sleep with me! Soon, very soon, I shall be at
peace. When you receive this, my burning head will be cold.
"I would encounter a thousand deaths, rather than a night like the
last. Your treatment has thrown my mind into a state of chaos; yet
I am serene. I go to find comfort; and my only fear is that my poor
body will be insulted by an endeavor to recall my hated existence.
But I shall plunge into the Thames where there is the least chance
of my being snatched from the death I seek.
"God bless you! May you never know by experience what you have made
me endure. Should your sensibility ever awake, remorse will find
its way to your heart; and, in the midst of business and sensual
pleasures, I shall appear before you, the victim of your deviation
from rectitude."
Then she left her house to seek refuge in the waters of the river. She
went first to Battersea Bridge, but it was too public for her purpose.
She could not risk a second frustration of her designs. There was no
place in London where she could be unobserved. With the calmness of
despair, she hired a boat and rowed to Putney. It was a cold, foggy
November day, and by the time she arrived at her destination the night
had come, and the rain fell in torrents. An idea occurred to her: if she
wet her clothes thoroughly before jumping into the river, their weight
would make her sink rapidly. She walked up and down, up and down, the
bridge in the driving rain. The fog enveloped the night in a gloom as
impenetrable as that of her heart. No one passed to interrupt her
preparations. At the end of half an hour, satisfied that her end was
accomplished, she leaped from the bridge into the water below. Despite
her soaked clothing, she did not sink at once. In her desperation she
pressed her skirts around her; then she became unconscious. She was
found, however, before it was too late. Vigorous efforts were made to
restore life, and she was brought back to consciousness. She had met with
the insult she most dreaded, and her disappointment was keen. Her failure
only increased her determination to destroy herself. This she told Imlay
in a letter written shortly after, dated November, 1795:--
"I have only to lament that, when the bitterness of death was past,
I was inhumanly brought back to life and misery. But a fixed
determination is not to be baffled by disappointment: nor will I
allow that to be a frantic attempt which was one of the calmest
acts of reason. In this respect I am only accountable to myself.
Did I care for what is termed reputation, it is by other
circumstances that I should be dishonored.
"You say 'that you know not how to extricate ourselves out of the
wretchedness into which we have been plunged.' You are extricated
long since. But I forbear to comment. If I am condemned to live
longer it is a living death.
"It appears to me that you lay much more stress on delicacy than on
principle; for I am unable to discover what sentiment of delicacy
would have been violated by your visiting a wretched friend, if
indeed you have any friendship for me. But since your new
attachment is the only sacred thing in your eyes, I am silent. Be
happy! My complaints shall never more damp your enjoyment; perhaps
I am mistaken in supposing that even my death could, for more than
a moment. This is what you call magnanimity. It is happy for
yourself that you possess this quality in the highest degree.
"Your continually asserting that you will do all in your power to
contribute to my comfort, when you only allude to pecuniary
assistance, appears to me a flagrant breach of delicacy. I want
not such vulgar comfort, nor will I accept it. I never wanted but
your heart. That gone, you have nothing more to give. Had I only
poverty to fear, I should not shrink from life. Forgive me, then,
if I say that I shall consider any direct or indirect attempt to
supply my necessities as an insult which I have not merited, and as
rather done out of tenderness for your own reputation than for me.
Do not mistake me. I do not think that you value money; therefore I
will not accept what you do not care for, though I do much less,
because certain privations are not painful to me. When I am dead,
respect for yourself will make you take care of the child.
"I write with difficulty; probably I shall never write to you
again. Adieu!
"God bless you!"
Imlay, whose departure to his other house Mary construed into abandonment
of her, made, in spite of this letter, many inquiries as to her health
and tranquillity, repeated his offers of pecuniary assistance, and, at
the request of mutual acquaintances, even went to see her. But a _show_
of interest was not what she wanted, and her thanks for it was the
assurance that before long she would be where he would be saved the
trouble of either talking or thinking of her. Fortunately Mr. Johnson and
her other friends interfered actively in her behalf, and by their
arguments and representations prevailed upon her to relinquish the idea
of suicide. Through their kindness, the fever which consumed her was
somewhat abated. Her temporary madness over, she again remembered her
responsibility as a mother, and realized that true courage consists in
facing a foe, and not in flying from it. Of the change in her intentions
for the future she informed Imlay:--
LONDON, November, 1795.
Mr. Johnson having forgot to desire you to send the things of mine
which were left at the house, I have to request you to let
Marguerite bring them to me.
I shall go this evening to the lodging; so you need not be
restrained from coming here to transact your business. And whatever
I may think and feel, you need not fear that I shall publicly
complain. No! If I have any criterion to judge of right and wrong,
I have been most ungenerously treated; but wishing now only to hide
myself, I shall be silent as the grave in which I long to forget
myself. I shall protect and provide for my child. I only mean by
this to say that you have nothing to fear from my desperation.
Farewell.
Godwin makes the incredible statement that Imlay refusing to break off
his new connection, though he declared it to be of a temporary nature,
Mary proposed that she should live in the same house with his mistress.
In this way he would not be separated from his child, and she would
quietly wait the end of his intrigue. Imlay, according to Godwin,
consented to her suggestion, but afterwards thought better of it and
refused. There is not a word in her letters to confirm this extraordinary
story. It is simply impossible that at one moment she should have been
driven to suicide by the knowledge that he had a mistress, and that at
the next she should take a step which was equivalent to countenancing his
conduct. It is more rational to conclude that Godwin was misinformed,
than to believe this.
Towards the end of November Imlay went to Paris with the woman for whom
he had sacrificed wife and child. Mary felt that the end had now really
come, as is seen in the few letters which still remain. Once the first
bitterness of her disappointment had been mastered, the old tenderness
revived, and she renewed her excuses for him. "My affection for you is
rooted in my heart," she wrote fondly and sadly. "I know you are not what
you now seem, nor will you always act and feel as you now do, though I
may never be comforted by the change." And in another letter she said,
"Resentment and even anger are momentary emotions with me, and I wish to
tell you so, that if you ever think of me, it may not be in the light of
an enemy." Writing to him, however, was more than she could bear. Each
letter reopened the wound he had inflicted, and inspired her with a wild
desire to see him. She therefore wisely concluded that all correspondence
between them must cease. In December, 1795, while he was still in Paris,
she bade him her last farewell, though in so doing she was, as she says,
piercing her own heart. She refused to hold further communication with
him or to receive his money, but she told him she would not interfere in
anything he might wish to do for Fanny. Here it may be said that, though
Imlay declared that a certain sum should be settled upon the latter, not
a cent of it was ever paid. This is Mary's last letter to him:--
LONDON, December, 1795.
You must do as you please with respect to the child. I could wish
that it might be done soon, that my name may be no more mentioned
to you. It is now finished. Convinced that you have neither regard
nor friendship, I disdain to utter a reproach, though I have had
reason to think that the "forbearance" talked of has not been very
delicate. It is, however, of no consequence. I am glad you are
satisfied with your own conduct.
I now solemnly assure you that this is an eternal farewell. Yet I
flinch not from the duties which tie me to life.
That there is "sophistry," on one side or other, is certain; but
now it matters not on which. On my part it has not been a question
of words. Yet your understanding or mine must be strangely warped,
for what you term "delicacy" appears to me to be exactly the
contrary. I have no criterion for morality, and have thought in
vain, if the sensations which lead you to follow an ankle or step
be the sacred foundation of principle and affection. Mine has been
of a very different nature, or it would not have stood the brunt of
your sarcasms.
The sentiment in me is still sacred. If there be any part of me
that will survive the sense of my misfortunes, it is the purity of
my affections. The impetuosity of your senses may have led you to
term mere animal desire the source of principle; and it may give
zest to some years to come. Whether you will always think so, I
shall never know.
It is strange that, in spite of all you do, something like
conviction forces me to believe that you are not what you appear to
be.
I part with you in peace.
She saw him once or twice afterwards. When he came to London again,
Godwin says that "she could not restrain herself from making another
effort, and desiring to see him once more. During his absence, affection
had led her to make numberless excuses for his conduct, and she probably
wished to believe that his present connection was, as he represented it,
purely of a casual nature. To this application she observes that he
returned no other answer, except declaring, with unjustifiable passion,
that he would not see her."
They did meet, however, but their meeting was accidental. Imlay was one
day paying a visit to Mr. Christie, who had returned to London, and with
whom he had business relations. He was sitting in the parlor, when Mary
called. Mrs. Christie, hearing her voice, and probably fearing an
embarrassing scene, hurried out to warn her of his presence, and to
advise her not to come in the room. But Mary, not heeding her, entered
fearlessly, and, with Fanny by the hand, went up and spoke to Imlay. They
retired, it seems, to another room, and he then promised to see her
again, and indeed to dine with her at her lodgings on the following day.
He kept his promise, and there was a second interview, but it did not
lead to a reconciliation. The very next day she went into Berkshire,
where she spent the month of March with her friend, Mrs. Cotton. She
never again made the slightest attempt to see him or to hear from him.
There was a limit even to her affection and forbearance. One day, after
her return to town, she was walking along the New Road when Imlay passed
her on horseback. He jumped off his horse and walked with her for some
little distance. This was the last time they met. From that moment he
passed completely out of her life.
And so ends the saddest of all sad love stories.