_Cape Francois._
We are still here, my dear friend, and my disappointment and vexation
have been so great, that ten days have passed since I have written a
single line.
The general, thinking Clara was sent away against her will, and
determined to thwart the intentions of her husband, laid an embargo on
all the vessels in the port.
St. Louis raved, and swore she should not leave her room till he
conducted her on board.
To prevent all intercourse from without, he keeps her locked up in a
small room, adjoining her chamber.--Nobody, not even myself, can see
her, except in his presence; and thus all confidence is at an end
between them.
She weeps continually, and I am afraid the torments she suffers will
destroy her health.
St. Louis is unworthy of her: he thinks it possible to force her to
love him:--How much more would a generous confidence influence a heart
like her's!
Many of his friends have represented to him the impropriety of his
conduct. The challenge he gave general Rochambeau filled every body
with terror, for it exposed him to certain death. To have left his post
without orders was a crime equally serious; and, if the general has
passed them both over in silence, it is supposed that his vengeance
only slumbers for a time to be more sure in its effect.
He thinks Clara attached to the general. I know she is not! her vanity
alone has been interested. To be admired was her aim, and she knew
that, by attracting the notice of the general in chief, her end would
be accomplished. She succeeded even beyond her wishes, but it has been
a dangerous experiment; and will cost her, I fear, the small portion of
domestic _peace_ she enjoyed.--Domestic _felicity_ she never knew! I am
convinced that she has never been less happy than since her marriage!
Nothing can be more brutal than St. Louis in his rage! The day of his
affair with the general, he threw her on the ground, and then dragged
her by the hair:--I flew to her, but his aspect so terrified me that
I was obliged to withdraw: and when his fits of tenderness return he
is as bad in the other extreme. He kneels before her, entreats her
pardon, and overwhelms her with caresses more painful to her than the
most terrible effects of his ill-humour. And then his temper is so
capricious that he cannot be counted upon a moment. I have seen him
oblige her to stay at home and pass the evening alone with him, after
she had dressed for a ball.
This does not accord with the liberty French ladies are supposed to
enjoy. But I believe Clara is not the first wife that has been locked
up at St. Domingo, yet she excites little sympathy because she has not
the good fortune to be one of the privileged.
_In Continuation._
Certain events, which shall be related, prevented me from finishing my
letter. The same events have produced an entire change in our affairs,
and we are now fixed at St. Domingo for some time.
The embargo is raised:--the general in chief is gone to Port-au-Prince;
all the belles of the Cape have followed him. Clara is at liberty, and
her husband content!
As soon as we had an opportunity of conversing together, Clara related
to me occurrences which seem like scenes of romance, but I am convinced
of their reality. Under the window of the little apartment in which she
was confined, there is an old building standing in a court surrounded
by high walls. The general informed himself of the position of Clara's
chamber, and his intelligent valet, who makes love to one of her
servants, found that it would not be difficult to give her a letter,
which his dulcinea refused charging herself with. He watched the
moment of St. Louis's absence, entered the deserted court, mounted the
tottering roof, and, calling Clara to the window, gave her the letter,
glowing with the warmest professions of love, and suggesting several
schemes for her escape, one of which was, that she should embark on
board a vessel that he would indicate, and that he would agree with the
captain to put into Port-au-Prince, whither he would speedily follow
her.--Another was, to escape in the night by the same window, and go
to his house, where he would receive and protect her. But the heart of
Clara acknowledged not the empire of general Rochambeau, nor had she
even the slightest intention of listening to him.
If her husband knew all this it would cure him, I suppose, of his
passion for locking up. But, incapable of generosity himself, he cannot
admire it in another, and would attribute her refusal of the general's
offers to any motive but the real one.
How often has she assured me that she would prefer the most extreme
poverty to her present existence, but to abandon her husband was not to
be thought of. Yet to have abandoned him, and to have been presented
as the declared mistress of General Rochambeau, would not have been
thought a crime nor have excluded her from the best society!
Madame G----, who has nothing but her beauty to recommend her, (and
no excess of that) lives with the admiral on board his vessel. She
is visited by every body; and no party is thought fashionable if not
graced by her presence, yet her manners are those of a poissarde and
she was very lately in the lowest and most degraded situation. But she
gives splendid entertainments: and when good cheer and gaiety invite,
nobody enquires too minutely by whom they are offered.
Clara laughs at the security St. Louis felt when he had her locked
up. Yet in spite of bolts and bars love's messenger reached her. The
general's letters were most impassioned, for, unaccustomed to find
resistance, the difficulty his approach to Clara met added fuel to his
flame.
You say, that in relating public affairs, or those of Clara, I forget
my own, or conceal them under this appearance of neglect. My fate
is so intimately connected with that of my sister, that every thing
concerning her must interest you, from the influence it has on myself;
and, in truth, I have no adventures. I described in a former letter,
the gallantry of the French officers, but I have not repeated the
compliments they sometimes make me, and which have been offered,
perhaps, to every woman in town before they reach my ear. But a civil
thing I heard yesterday, had so much of originality in it that it
deserves to be remembered. I was copying a beautiful drawing of the
graces, when a Frenchman I detest entered the room. Approaching the
table he said. What mademoiselle do you paint? I did not know that you
possessed that talent. Vexed at his intrusion, I asked if he knew I
possessed any talents. Certainly, he replied, every body acknowledges
that you possess that of pleasing. Then looking at the picture that lay
before me, he continued: The modesty of the graces would prevent their
attempting to draw you. Why? I asked. Because in painting you, they
would be obliged to copy themselves.
With all this _bavardage_ receive my affectionate adieu!