THE town rang and buzzed to some purpose next day and the wits were busy
indeed. ’Twas an opportunity to be clever they could by no means miss
and some of the lampoons might have been writ by the Yahoos themselves
had they turned their talents that way. But the Duchess’s party was not
silent neither. Dr. Swift took pen in hand and writ a paper that
assailed the lampooners with a virulence not inferior to their own and a
wit so far superior as left them gasping. This heavy artillery was
followed by Mr. Pope’s light skirmishing tactics, which harassed and
annoyed the enemy beyond bearing and strewed the field of battle with
moribund and slaughtered reputations. Had the two gentlemen been so
minded they might have adorned their wigwams with more scalps than any
Indian brave, and indeed their war-whoops were terrific.
In a while they penetrated even the chaste precincts of Kensington
Palace where her Majesty followed the attack and defence with most
searching interest in hopes to find the Duchess of Queensbury among the
slain, and had instead the mortification to see her enthroned sublime on
the piled fragments of her enemies. ’Twas only the Queen’s high gust of
humour, that laughed at all wit no matter the source, which softened the
blow.
“That woman has the good fortune of her father the devil,” says she to
Mrs. Howard at the toilette—the chaplain at his prayers without her
door. “Had I undertook to protect a common little wanton like Polly,
Swift’s bludgeon had been on my head and Pope’s rapier through my heart
ere I could cry for mercy. ’Tis as much as I can do to make our
Kensington amours pass muster.”
She shot a side-glance at the unfortunate Mrs. Howard who between the
brow-beatings of her Sultan and the darts of the Queen was more to be
pitied than envied on her glittering eminence. The lady curtseyed
meekly. ’Twas not a subject she could handle with freedom. The Queen
continued:
“But is’t not a scandalous business that a person of her rank should
announce her protection for a libertine and a——?”
The chaplain’s loud Amen drowned the epithet in sanctity, and her
Majesty and the prayers pursued their respective ways.
“A bishopric would buy Swift,—he was always for sale in the late
Queen’s day, and were it not that the man, though well enough as a
lampooner, turns my stomach as a divine I would buy him tomorrow. But
though not too squeamish myself I protest I can’t swallow him. This
paper he has writ on Bolton is as fine as I have seen anywhere, if
’twere not disgraceful a man of his cloth should further such an
intrigue. ’Tis plain he hath abandoned all hope of a bishopric or he had
not done it. The raillery is excellent.”
She picked up the paper from her table and read aloud—
“‘’Tis to be sure an unpardonable proceeding and an affront to all
religion that this love matter was not conducted with the decent slyness
befitting the humour of a chaste people such as inhabit these Isles. Had
the Duke of Bolton concealed the lady in such a bower as the Fair
Rosamond’s and visited her by stealth (as indeed the example of a noble
reticence is set us in the highest quarters where the very names of such
ladies are unknown) there had been nothing but applause on a gallant
freedom. ’Tis his Grace’s lamentable sincerity that is the rock of
offence and may lead to disastrous consequences. For suppose it
incumbent on great sovereigns to go with flourish of drums and trumpets
to the ladies they delight to honour, to pension them from the public
purse and what not, where shall it end? We may yet have the chaste names
produced to the world that are whispered only by Princes in their hours
of relaxation from the burdens of state, and the delicacy which now
surrounds our court and others entirely disappear.’”
Her Majesty read this with malicious enjoyment to see the colour mount
in Mrs. Howard’s face.
“The whole is worth studying as an example of irony,” says her Majesty,
“and I commend it to you, my good Howard. Had Swift not chose the
profession he has, he had been at the top now. I know none more neat in
his sayings than— ‘A very little wit is valued in a woman as we are
pleased with a few words spoken plain by a parrot.’— That’s one I
recall daily.”
“It can’t appear reasonable to your Majesty,” says Mrs. Howard
endeavouring to make her court and hide her vexation. The Queen laughed
aloud.
“O, I can talk as foolish as another when I have a mind, and ’tis the
reason why I can endure the follies of others as I do daily. See—my
neck handkerchief, Howard. Here comes the King.”
Indeed his Majesty entered at this moment, and swore because the
chaplain’s mumble outside prevented his hearing the Queen’s remark.
“When will that intolerable snuffling cease!” cries he. “You should give
directions that he lower his voice.”
“Lord, Sir,—how can I?” says the Queen. “’Twould be all over the town
next day. I ventured once to have the door closed instead of ajar, and
’twas said the Queen had the door shut as knowing she was past praying
for.”
“The dirty buffoons!” says the monarch. “What is that handkerchief doing
about your neck?” He snatched it off and flung it on the floor, crying
roughly to Mrs. Howard, “Because you have an ugly neck yourself you hide
the Queen’s”—the poor mistress curtseying as she picked it up.
His Majesty next snatched at Dr. Swift’s paper and failing to read it
ironic was much gratified at the Doctor’s seeming censure of the Duke
until he came to the passage read by the Queen. His remarks at this
point must be reserved for the two ladies, who may be said to be
seasoned so far that their palates could bear more than the reader’s;
yet even the Queen put up her fan at this; and thus we leave the happy
party.
There was a grand masquerade that night at the Haymarket, when all the
high world was present. ’Twas a scene of extreme splendour, the walls
adorned with emblematical devices illuminated with thousands of lamps of
various colours, and elegant transparencies at either end. The ladies
blazed resplendent and the men not less so, the brocaded coat of the
Duke of Devonshire being valued at five hundred pounds independent of
the jewels and this only one amongst many. But of all, my Lord Baltimore
was the most magnificent, in white velvet and gold brocaded tissue. His
arm was healed now, but an interesting pallor set him off in the eyes of
nearly every lady present. He danced little, waiting, as it were, for
some one not present.
At last she came, brilliant and beautiful,—my Lady Fanny, dressed as a
Fair Persian in a sultana’s robe of pale lutestring and a short velvet
bodice so hung with jewels as almost to dazzle the eyes. She had a small
gold cap with a veil of gold gauze dependent and my Lord thought he had
never seen her so beautiful as he stood watching her charming face all
smiles and gaiety and never a look of care to tarnish it. He longed to
read her thoughts beneath that fair mask, to know if there were hope of
forgiveness—of friendship, for his own wound was so recent that he
scarce aspired to more.
Indeed his Lordship was sore and angry. Calmer reflection had made him
something of a fool in his own eyes, and ’twas a frame of mind much
assisted by the publicity of the Duke’s engagement with Diana. His
friend had obtained on easy terms what he had offered his name and title
to purchase in vain. ’Twas then a plain case of love and he slighted
almost openly, for though his offer was unknown, his pursuit was talked
of all over the town. His first failure, and a public one, it galled him
more than a little. ’Twas not perhaps surprising that his hurt pride
considered where it might turn for solace, and what success might
re-gild his faded laurels.
To this there was but one answer:—No beauty so brilliant, so modish as
my Lady Fanny, could he renew his interest in her heart.
’Tis to be easily understood how his thoughts went. With a doubt very
well hid, he asked her to favour him with a minuet, and she accepted
with a smiling coolness that said nothing either way. ’Twas exquisitely
performed and every eye on the charming pair and predictions flying from
lip to lip as the reconciliation was noted. My Lady Fanny knew this
well, and repelled all conjecture by her gay good humour, inscrutable as
the famous Sphinx of Egypt of which travellers tell us.
The dance over, he led her to an alcove covered with greenery and
flowers, a little retreat where they could be as private as they would,
and there fetched her a glass of lemonade and taking her fan all painted
with nymphs and loves, fanned a cool air to her glowing cheeks. He was
disposed to believe the past was past and no harm done, and adventured
as a man may on safe ice, his head in air.
“’Tis a marvellous gay scene, Madam, is it not? And of all the beauties
here I hold the most beautiful beside me in this little bower which
Love’s self might have contrived.”
“I think my dress is very well!” says Lady Fanny smiling. “’Twas
designed for me by Zincke who had seen a dress in the Persian taste in a
picture at Welbeck when painting her Grace of Portland’s portrait. The
cap I thought alluring with its demure veil which I can draw over my
face when I will. Pray hush, my Lord—I know exactly what you open your
mouth to say.”
“What, Madam?”
“O, it runs thus— “Don’t veil that lovely face which like the sun—”
Sad stuff! I’ll give you no more of it.”
It piqued him for ’twas true to his intention and not only so but she
mimicked his manner excellent well. Perhaps the ice was a little more
slippery than he had supposed. He fanned her diligently and changed the
subject.
“I see Bolton is absent. No doubt more happily engaged with his pretty
Polly. Is she still at Queensbury House?”
“By all means. There are alterations making at his house to please her
taste before he makes her mistress of it.”
“And of him. ’Tis sure the oddest flight in all this world so to
announce a thing that others keep decently private.”
“Its oddity is but its honesty so far as I can see,” says my Lady Fanny
yawning delicately. “’Tis surely more convenient to know how our friends
are situate and ’tis their advantage also that this sincerity permits us
to keep a friend we value.”
“I yield to none in respect for Mrs. Fenton,” says my Lord angrily—“but
at the same time would certainly forbid my wife her acquaintance now she
has chose to ally herself openly with a man she can’t marry.”
She looked at him with eyes provocative.
“’Tis known your Lordship respected the lady.”
How much, how little was meant? Impossible to say, but it left him
confused and angry, and he therefore struck wild, as the men in the ring
have it.
“’Tis only a man can judge these points. The delicacy and weakness of
the female mind are liable to gusts of sentiment, and your Ladyship’s
ardent and generous nature——”
“I have not found my nature ardent,” says the lady.— “Rather, I am
given to judging men coolly—and women also. I have seen Mrs. Fenton in
trial and prosperity and I judge her a woman of sense and spirit. I
shall always esteem her friendship, and fortunately have no dictator to
say me nay.”
“Fortunately?” He raised his eyebrows a thought. “If your Ladyship says
this in earnest it puts a period to all I would say.”
“And what is that?” says she, softly. “I never held an opinion so
savagely but what it could be changed by argument.”
If my Lord had but guessed it, the ice was thin indeed now, and the
Siren beckoning beyond, but vanity is blind whatever love may be, and he
went onward with a smile of confidence very thinly veiled by a lover’s
enforced humility.
“My Lady Fanny, ’tis not so long since I believed I might flatter myself
that you condescended to a little pleasure in my company. Was I wrong?”
Her eyes, large and sweet, looked at him above her fan.
“Indeed, no! ’Tis very true.”
’Twas so softly said that the colour kindled in his pale face. He drew
his breath somewhat quicker.
“A shadow—I scarce know what—fell between us, and by no will of mine I
have not had the happiness that was once so often mine. We have been
much apart the last weeks.”
“We have been much apart,” she echoed, in a voice scarce audible.
“It has been a trouble to me. I revolve night and day how to regain my
lost ground and once more be acceptable to the only woman whose liking
or distaste can make my heart to beat faster.”
Her soft and pensive silence was an invitation to continue. Gentleness
itself was the charming face now looking downward as though unable to
meet the fire of his eyes. Sure my Lord knew all the symptoms of
surrender!
“If I confess”—he said gallantly, “that I was turned from the course of
true love a moment—a moment only—by a wayside flower, my Lady Fanny,
who knows the world and the thoughts of men she rules, will not think
the crime unpardonable, since ’twas a fancy that never for a moment
touched the heart where she only is secure.”
He laid his hand on hers—it was not withdrawn,—and continued:
“’Twas not inconstancy indeed—I durst swear it. ’Twas trifling of the
lightest, yet had its use, for it taught me that I was but a captive
sporting at the end of my chain. Your fair hand holds it, and your heart
is my prison. Never will I seek for freedom. Can the loveliest of
charmers, the most desirable of women make me a return?”
She did not look up. In a voice sweet as honey, she whispered:
“Indeed I have waited for this moment, my Lord.”
He had her hand now in a firmer clasp. They were as solitary as in a
wood though the company passed their bower, as they came and went.
“Then may I believe that this dear hand is mine? That my beloved will
give me the day and make me the happiest of men?”
“You would have me marry you?” says she, raising her eyes to his. Even
then her tone might have warned him, but he rushed on his fate.
“I would have it beyond everything in the world. I desire it with all my
heart and soul, and now that your radiant eyes, your melting mouth give
consent, at last I kiss this soft hand and claim it for my own—my
beloved Lady Baltimore’s.”
My Lord was a finished wooer. His tone might have melted marble. It did
not however melt my Lady Fanny. Her moment was come. While he spoke she
had weighed her heart in the balance, had tasted every emotion he roused
in her, and (to pursue her own comparison of the man fallen from his
horse who knows not whether he is alive or dead) she knew now once for
all that this gentleman was of no mighty concern to her, and that she
lived and need fear his power no more. In short, that her heart was
whole and at her own disposal.
She disengaged her hand with such infinite delicacy that the action
appeared a caress, and entrenched it in her own lap.
“My Lord, you have spoken. Hear me in turn. I refuse your offer.
No—’tis no coyness that asks to be conquered. You shall know my reason.
Awhile ago you courted me. That cannot be denied. Yourself owns it. I,
in my turn, own that I think you might then have won me, had you cared.
’Tis so long ago now that I remember not how much my heart was yours,
but you certainly had an interest in it. Then—you left me. Do you think
in this town of tattle I didn’t know it! Do you think your sudden
silence and aversion passed unnoticed? You exposed me to the laughter
and comment of the world. You——”
He tried to check her eloquence.
“My beloved, don’t I now make rich amends? Won’t all the world see the
one sovereign of my heart? What more is in my power?”
She never heeded him.
“That the woman you attacked was worthy, was a mere chance. For all you
knew and hoped she was the worst of her sex. And for this I was thrown
aside. I will be frank with you, my Lord. It wounded my pride and I
thought ’twas my heart but could not tell. You have offered yourself to
another and was rejected— Why should I spare you now? And yet,
remembering the past,—indeed I scarce could tell. I was resolved
therefore that I would see you and hear your protestations that I might
judge whether ’twas the one or the other. I know at last. My pride was
hurt, but never my heart.”
He gazed at her transfixed. ’Twas the first time in his life he had seen
the lady in earnest. It could not but appear extraordinary to him that a
creature so airy, so sparkling—let us say so trifling, should now
assume a superiority he must needs acknowledge. His silence gave her the
final opportunity, and she spoke once more.
“So my Lord, we part. We shall meet often, but yet we part for ever. I
thank you that you showed me what you really was, for I have now nothing
to regret. I am saved from an unhappy marriage. You are no respecter of
women, and deserve my scorn.”
He summoned himself for the defensive. The lady must not carry off all
the honours of war from my Lord Baltimore.
“My dear creature—what is there to respect in them, I ask your
sincerity? Here’s yourself has trained me on to make a declaration that
you might quote to the town that I was at your feet and you spurned me.
Indeed I have not much cause to honour your sex.”
“Fear not. I shall not quote it to the town, my Lord, for I don’t feel
it a distinction,”—says the lady coolly. “I would not have it known
that the Grand Bashaw believed he might throw me the handkerchief when
another had refused to stoop for it. No,—the comedy we have played is
over—here is the epilogue. You may find a slave, but never a wife, and
your contempt of my sex shows an ignorance that deserves no better.
There are few women but might despise you if they knew your worth and
their own.”
She rose, performed a magnificent curtsey and left her Adam to an
Eve-less Paradise.
Rage and unbelief struggled in my Lord Baltimore’s mind. Rejected a
second time and where most he thought himself secure! It appeared an
evil dream from which he must presently waken though the lights shone
and music filled the air and the faces of men and women known to him
passed the retreat where he sat alone in a very fever of thoughts he
never supposed possible for his triumphant self. Sooner than be
remarked, he rose presently and went out into the near dancing room
where the first to catch his eye was my Lady Fanny with his master the
Prince of Wales.
The Prince laughed heartily in answer to somewhat she said, and my Lord
could hear his words:—
“Why, Madam, indeed I deserve your pity. I know not my fate as yet, but
that she is some little German lady in her pinafore in the nursery! What
is the use to be Prince of Wales if they don’t let me choose among the
beauties I see about me?”
“Because,”—says her Ladyship laughing, “your Royal Highness’s
admiration might make them Vane!”
’Twas known she was not enamoured of the reigning family, but this bold
allusion to the name of his discarded English favourite was so daring as
to terrify my Lord Baltimore and excite mingled laughter and fright in
all who heard, and they were many. No one but she had dared it.
The Prince, a fine fair young man, stared doubtful a moment, then burst
into a great laugh clapping his hands and applauding.
“Excellent, my Lady, excellent! If my heartfelt admiration would make
them vain, I wish to God I might begin with your lovely self. My
admiration is at your feet.”
She disengaged herself all laughing, her eyes sparkling, her cheeks like
living roses beneath her gold cap and veil,—the Prince catching at her
hand would have detained her, but she joined the Duchess of Queensbury.
Baltimore looked after her with a sickening anger and regret. They had
parted indeed.