"There was a sound of revelry by night--
And Belgium's capital had gathered then
Her beauty and her chivalry; and bright
The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men;
A thousand hearts beat happily; and when
Music arose with its voluptuous swell,
Soft eyes looked love to eyes that spoke again,
And all went merry as a marriage bell."
_Childe Harold._
The ball at Sir William Berkeley's palace was of that character, which,
in the fashionable world, is described as brilliant; and was long
remembered by those who attended it, as the last scene of revelry that
was ever known in Jamestown. The park or lawn which we have described
was brilliantly illuminated with lamps and transparencies hung from the
trees. The palace itself was a perfect blaze of light. The coaches of
the cavaliers rolled in rapid succession around the circular path that
led to the palace, and deposited their fair burdens, and then rolled
rapidly away to await the breaking up of the ball. Young beaux, fairly
glittering with gold embroidery, with their handsome doublets looped
with the gayest ribbons, and their hair perfumed and oiled, and plaited
at the sides in the most captivating love-knots; their cheeks
beplastered with rouge, and their moustache carefully trimmed and
brushed, passed gracefully to and fro, through the vast hall, and looked
love to soft eyes that spake again. And those young eyes, how brightly
did they beam, and how freshly did the young cheeks of their lovely
owners blush, even above the rouge with which they were painted, as
they met the admiring glance of some favored swain bent lovingly upon
them! How graceful, too, the attitude which these fair maidens assumed,
with their long trails sweeping and fairly carpetting the floor, or when
held up by their tapering fingers, how proudly did they step, as they
crossed the room to salute the stately and dignified, but now smiling
Lady Frances Berkeley--and she the queenly centre of that vast throng,
leaning upon the arm of her noble and venerable husband, with what grace
and dignity she bowed her turbaned head in response to their
salutations; and with what a majestic air of gratified vanity did she
receive the courteous gratulations of the chivalrous cavaliers as they
wished her many returns of the happy day, and hoped that the hours of
her life would be marked by the lapse of diamond sands, while roses grew
under her feet!
Sir William Berkeley, of whose extraordinary character we know far more
than of any of the earlier governors of Virginia, was now in the evening
of his long and prosperous life. "For more than thirty years he had
governed the most flourishing country the sun ever shone upon,"[25] and
had won for himself golden opinions from all sorts of people. Happy for
him, and happy for his fame, if he had passed away ere he had become
"encompassed," as he himself expresses it, "with rebellion, like
waters." To all he had endeared himself by his firmness of character and
his suavity of manner. In 1659, he was called, by the spontaneous
acclaim of the people of Virginia, to assume the high functions of the
government, of which he had been deprived during the Protectorate, and,
under his lead, Virginia was the first to throw off her allegiance to
the Protector, and to declare herself the loyal realm of the banished
Charles. Had William Berkeley died before the troublous scenes which now
awaited him, and which have cast so dark a shadow upon his character,
scarce any man in colonial history had left so pure a name, or been
mourned by sincerer tears. Death is at last the seal of fame, and over
the grave alone can we form a just estimate of human worth and human
virtue.
In person he was all that we delight to imagine in one who is truly
great. Age itself had not bent his tall, majestic figure, which rose,
like the form of the son of Kish, above all the people. His full black
eye was clear and piercing, and yet was often softened by a benevolent
expression. And this was the true nature of his heart, formed at once
for softness and for rigour. His mouth, though frequently a pleasant
smile played around it, expressed the inflexible firmness and decision
of his character. No man to friends was more kind and gentle; no man to
a foe was more relentless and vindictive. The only indication of
approaching age was in the silver colour of his hair, which he did not
conceal with the recently introduced periwig, and which, combed back to
show to its full advantage his fine broad brow, fell in long silvery
clusters over his shoulders.
Around him were gathered the prominent statesmen of the colony, members
of the Council and of the House of Burgesses, conversing on various
subjects of political interest. Among those who chose this rational mode
of entertainment was our old friend, Colonel Henry Temple, who met many
an old colleague among the guests, and everywhere received the respect
and attention which his sound sense, his sterling worth, and his former
services so richly deserved.
The Lady Frances, too, withdrawing her arm from that of her husband,
engaged in elegant conversation with the elderly dames who sought her
society; now conversing with easy dignity with the accomplished wives of
the councillors; now, with high-bred refinement, overlooking the awkward
blunders of some of the plainer matrons, whose husbands were in the
Assembly; and now smiling good-humouredly at the old-fashioned vanity
and assumed dignity of Mrs. Temple. The comparison of the present order
of things with that to which she had been accustomed in her earlier
days, formed, as usual, the chief theme of this good lady's discourse.
But, to the attentive observer, the glance of pride with which from time
to time she looked at her daughter, who, with graceful step and glowing
cheek, was joining in the busy dance, plainly showed that, in some
respects at least, Mrs. Temple had to acknowledge that the bright
present had even eclipsed her favourite past.
Yes, to the gay sound of music, amid the bright butterflies of fashion,
who flew heartlessly through the mazes of the graceful dance, Virginia
Temple moved--with them, but not of them. She had not forgotten
Hansford, but she had forgotten self, and, determined to please her
mother, she had sought to banish from her heart, for the time, the
sorrow which was still there. She had come to the ball with Bernard, and
he, seeing well the effort she had made, bent all the powers of his
gifted mind to interest her thoughts, and beguile them from the
absorbing subject of her grief. She attributed his efforts to a generous
nature, and thanked him in her heart for thus devoting himself to her
pleasure. She had attempted to return his kindness by an assumed
cheerfulness, which gradually became real and natural, for shadows rest
not long upon a young heart. They fly from the blooming garden of youth,
and settle themselves amid the gloom and ruins of hoary age. And never
had Alfred Bernard thought the fair girl more lovely, as, with just
enough of pensive melancholy to soften and not to sadden her heart, she
moved among the gay and thoughtless throng around her.
The room next to the ball-room was appropriated to such of the guests as
chose to engage in cards and dice; for in this, as in many other
respects, the colony attempted to imitate the vices of the mother
country. It is true the habit of gaming was not so recklessly
extravagant as that which disgraced the corrupt court of Charles the
Second, and yet the old planters were sufficiently bold in their risks,
and many hundreds of pounds of tobacco often hung upon the turn of the
dice-box or the pip[26] of a card. Seated around the old fashioned
card-table of walnut, were sundry groups of those honest burgesses, who
were ready enough in the discharge of their political functions in the
state-house, but after the adjournment were fully prepared for all kinds
of fun. Some were playing at gleek, and, to the uninitiated,
incomprehensible was the jargon in which the players indulged. "Who'll
buy the stock?" cries the dealer. "I bid five"--"and I ten"--"and I
fifty." Vie, revie, surrevie, capote, double capote, were the terms that
rang through the room, as the excited gamesters, with anxious faces,
sorted and examined their cards. At another table was primero, or
thirty-one, a game very much resembling the more modern game of
vingt-et-un; and here, too, loud oaths of "damn the luck," escaped the
lips of the betters, as, with twenty-two in their hands, they drew a
ten, and burst with a pip too many. Others were moderate in their risks,
rattled the dice at tra-trap, and playing for only an angel a game,
smoked their pipes sociably together, and talked of the various measures
before the Assembly.
Thus the first hours of the evening passed rapidly away, when suddenly
the sound of the rebecks[27] ceased in the ball-room, the gaming was
arrested in an instant, and at the loud cry of hall-a-hall,[28] the
whole company repaired to the long, broad porch, crowding and pushing
each other, the unwary cavaliers treading on the long trains of the fair
ladies, and receiving a well-merited frown for their carelessness. The
object of this general rush was to see the masque, which was to be
represented in the porch, illuminated and prepared for the purpose. At
one end of the porch a stage was erected, with all the simple machinery
which the ingenuity of the youth of Jamestown could devise, to aid in
the representation--the whole concealed for the present from the view of
the spectators by a green baize curtain.
The object of the masque, imitated from the celebrated court masques of
the seventeenth century, which reflected so much honour on rare Ben
Jonson, and aided in establishing the early fame of John Milton, was to
celebrate under a simple allegory the glories of the Restoration. Alfred
Bernard, who had witnessed such a representation in England, first
suggested the idea of thus honouring the birth-night of the Lady
Frances, and the suggestion was eagerly taken hold of by the loyal young
men of the little colonial capital, who rejoiced in any exhibition that
might even faintly resemble the revels to which their loyal ancestors,
before the revolution, were so ardently devoted.
FOOTNOTES:
[25] This is his own language.
[26] Pip signified the spot on a card.
[27] Fiddles.
[28] The cry of the herald for silence at the beginning of the masque.