WHEN young Mr. Sheridan returned to Bath after his happy little
journey to France with Miss Linley and back with Mr. Linley, he may have
believed that the incident was closed. He had done all that--and perhaps
a little more than--the most chivalrous man of experience and means
could be expected to do for the young woman toward whom he had stood
in the position of a protecting brother. He had conducted her to the
convent at Lille, on which she had set her heart, and he had been able
to explain satisfactorily to her father on his arrival at the hotel
where he and Miss Linley were sojourning in the meantime, what his
intentions had been when he had eloped with her from Bath. No doubt he
had also acted as Miss Linley's adviser in respect of those negotiations
with her father which resulted in the happy return of the whole family
party to London.
In London he heard that Mathews, the scoundrel who had been pursuing
Miss Linley in the most disreputable fashion, was in town also, and
that, previous to leaving Bath, he had inserted in the Chronicle
a defamatory advertisement regarding him (Sheridan); and on this
information coming to his ears he put his pistols into his pocket and
went in search of Mathews at the lodgings of the latter.
Miss Sheridan tells us about the pistols in the course of her lucid
narrative, and states on her own responsibility that when he came upon
Mathews the latter was dreadfully frightened at the sight of one of the
pistols protruding from Sheridan's pocket. Mr. Fraser Rae, the competent
biographer of Sheridan, smiles at the lady's statement. “The sight of
the pistols would have alarmed Sheridan's sisters,” he says, “but it
is in accordance with probability that he (Mathews) expected a hostile
meeting to follow as a matter of course. He must have been prepared for
it, and he would have been strangely ignorant of the world in which he
lived if he had deemed it unusual.”
[Illustration: 0301]
But Mr. Fraser Rae was not so strangely ignorant of the world in which
Sheridan and Mathews lived as to fancy that there was nothing unusual
in a gentleman's going to ask another gentleman whom he believed to have
affronted him, for an explanation, with a pair of pistols in his pocket.
In the circumstances a duel would have been nothing unusual; but surely
Mr. Fraser Rae could not have fancied that Sheridan set out with the
pistols in his pocket in order to fight a duel with Mathews in the man's
lodgings, without preliminaries and without seconds. If Mathews caught
sight of the butt of a pistol sticking out of Sheridan's pocket he had
every reason to be as frightened as Miss Sheridan declared he was, for
he must have believed that his visitor had come to murder him.
At any rate, frightened or not frightened, pistols or no pistols,
Mathews, on being interrogated by Sheridan as to the advertisement in
the _Bath Chronicle_, assured him that he had been grossly misinformed
as to the character of the advertisement. It was, he affirmed, nothing
more than an inquiry after Sheridan, which the family of the latter had
sanctioned. He then, according to Miss Sheridan, expressed the greatest
friendship for his visitor, and said that he would be made extremely
unhappy if any difference should arise between them.
So young Mr. Sheridan, balked of his murderous intentions, returned with
unsullied pistols to his hotel, and set out for Bath with Miss Linley
and her father.
But if he fancied that Mathews had passed out of his life he was quickly
undeceived. Before he had time to take his seat at the family table he
had got a copy of the newspaper containing the advertisement, of the
tenor of which Mathews had told him in London he had been misinformed;
and now his sisters made him fully aware of the action taken by the
same man on learning of the flight of Sheridan and Elizabeth Linley. The
result was that he now perceived what every one should have known long
before--namely, that Mathews was a scoundrel, who should never have
been allowed to obtain the footing to which he had been admitted in the
Sheridan and Linley families.
It appears that the moment Mathews heard that Miss Linley had been
carried beyond his reach, he rushed to the Sheridans' house, and
there found the girls and their elder brother, who had been wisely
communicated with by the landlord, and had left his retirement in the
farmhouse in the country to take charge of the sisters in the absence of
their brother Richard. Mathews behaved like a madman--no unusual _rôle_
for him--heaping reproaches upon the absent member of the family,
and demanding to be told of his whereabouts. He seems to have been
encouraged by Charles Sheridan, who had unwisely said something in
disparagement of his brother. Mathews had the effrontery to avow his
passion for Elizabeth Linley, and in the bitterest terms to accuse
Richard Sheridan of having acted basely in taking her beyond his reach.
Then he hastened to Richard Sheridan's friend and confidant, a young man
named Brereton, and to him he sent messages of friendship and, possibly,
condolence to Mr. Linley, though his object in paying this visit was
undoubtedly not to endeavour to exculpate himself as regards Mr. Linley,
but to find out where the fugitives were to be found. He may have had
visions of pursuing them, of fighting a duel with Richard Sheridan, and
if he succeeded in killing him, of getting the girl at last into his
power.
But Mr. Brereton not only did not reveal the whereabouts of his
friend--he knew that Sheridan meant to go to Lille, for he wrote to him
there--but he also refused to give his interrogator any sympathy for
having failed to accomplish the destruction of the girl. Brereton,
indeed, seems to have convinced him that the best thing he could do was
to leave Bath as quickly as possible. Mathews had probably by this time
discovered, as Brereton certainly had, that the feeling against him in
Bath was profound. There can be little doubt that in the course of the
day Charles Sheridan became aware of this fact also; he had only a few
months before confessed himself to be deeply in love with Elizabeth
Linley, and when he heard that his brother had run away with her he
could not but have been somewhat incensed against him, for Richard had
not taken him into his confidence. By the time his brother returned,
however, any ill-feeling that Charles may have felt had disappeared,
and as Charles always showed himself to be a cool and calculating
gentleman--one who always kept an eye on the jumping cat--it is not
going too far to assume that his change of tone in respect of his rather
impetuous brother was due to his perception of the trend of public
opinion on the subject of the elopement.
Brereton had persuaded Mathews that there was nothing left for him but
to quit Bath; but before taking this step the latter had inserted in the
_Bath Chronicle_ the advertisement of which Richard had heard, but which
he had not read when in London, thus leaving himself in no position to
contradict Mathews' assertion as to its amicable wording.
But now the newspaper was put into his hands by Charles, and he had
an opportunity of pronouncing an opinion on this point. It was dated
Wednesday, April the 8th, 1772, and it ran as follows:
“Mr. Richard S-------- having attempted in a letter left behind him for
that purpose, to account for his scandalous method of running away from
this place by insinuations derogating from my character and that of a
young lady, innocent as far as relates to me, or my knowledge, since
which he has neither taken any notice of letters or even informed his
own family of the place where he has hid himself; I cannot longer think
he deserves the treatment of a gentleman, and in this public method, to
post him as a L------, and a treacherous S--------.
“And as I am convinced there have been many malevolent incendiaries
concerned in the propagation of this infamous lie, if any of them,
unprotected by age, _infirmities_, or profession, they are to
acknowledge the part they have acted, and affirm _to_ what they have
said _of_ me, they may depend on receiving the proper reward of their
villainy, in the most public manner. The world will be candid enough to
judge properly (I make no doubt) of any private abuse on this subject
for the future, as nobody can defend himself from an accusation he is
ignorant of Thomas Mathews.” Such a piece of maundering imbecility as
this had probably never before appeared in a newspaper. It must have
been read in Bath with roars of laughter. But we do not hear that any of
the ready writers of the time and the town yielded to the temptation of
commenting upon the “malevolent incendiarism” of the composition. A man
of the world, had it been written about himself, would possibly
have thought that its illiteracy spoke for itself, and so would have
refrained from making any move in regard to it or its author. But one
can imagine what effect reading it would have upon a boy of Sheridan's
spirit. For a youth of twenty to find himself posted as a Liar and
a Scoundrel, to say nothing of a “malevolent incendiary,” and remain
indifferent would be impossible. Sheridan did not take long to make up
his mind what he should do in the circumstances.
The dramatic touch which his sister introduces in writing of Richard's
perusal of the paragraph is intensely true to nature. He simply put a
word or two to Charles relative to what Mathews had told him in
London about his, Sheridan's, family sanctioning the insertion of the
advertisement. Charles had no difficulty in vindicating his integrity on
this point. Richard knew perfectly well that it is one thing to say that
a man has acted too hastily, but quite another to suggest that that man
is “a L------ and a S--------.”
So apparently the matter ended, and Richard continued chatting with his
sisters, giving no sign of what was in his mind. The girls went to
their beds, suspecting nothing. The next morning their two brothers were
missing!
Of course the girls were dreadfully alarmed. Some people in the house
told them that they had heard high words being exchanged between the
brothers after the girls had retired, and shortly afterwards the two
former had gone out together. The sister, in her narrative, mentions
that she received a hint or two of a duel between Richard and Charles,
but she at once put these suggestions aside. The poor girls must have
been nearly distracted. Certainly the house of Sheridan was passing
through a period of great excitement. The estimable head of the family
was himself expecting a crisis in his affairs as manager of the theatre
in Dublin--Mr. Thomas Sheridan was never far removed from a crisis--and
in his absence his young people were doing pretty much as they pleased.
He had no power of controlling them; all that he had to do with them was
to pay their bills. Neither of the sons was earning anything, and while
one of them was living as a man of fashion, the other had thought it
well to cut himself off from his sisters, taking lodgings at a farm some
way out of Bath It is the girls of the house for whom one feels most.
Alicia, the elder, was seventeen, Elizabeth was but twelve. They must
have been distracted. So would their father have been if he had had a
chance of learning all that was going on at Bath.
But, of course, when young gentlemen of spirit are falling in love with
beauteous maidens, and retiring to cure themselves by mingling with
pastoral scenes reminiscent of the gentle melancholy of Mr. Alexander
Pope's shepherds and shepherdesses (done in Dresden), every one of
whom murmurs mournfully and melodiously of a rejected suit--when young
gentlemen are running away with afflicted damsels and returning to
fight their enemies, they cannot be expected to think of the incidental
expenses of the business, which are to be defrayed by their father, any
more than of the distraction which takes possession of their sisters.
The two young gentlemen were missing, and had left for their sisters
no explanation of their absence--no hint as to the direction of their
flight. And there were other people in the house talking about the high
words that had been exchanged between the brothers at midnight. It is
not surprising that the poor girls should be distressed and distracted.
Considering that Miss Linley was the first cause of the excitement in
the midst of which the family had been living for some weeks, it was
only natural that the elder of the girls should send for her with a view
to have some light thrown on this new development of the heroic incident
in which Miss Linley had assisted. But Miss Linley, on being applied
to, affirmed that she knew nothing of the disappearance of the brothers,
that she had heard of nothing that should cause them to leave Bath at a
moment's notice. She was, unfortunately, a young woman of imagination.
In a crisis such a one is either very helpful, or very helpless. Poor
Miss Linley was the latter. She had just come through a great crisis in
her own life, and she had not emerged from it without suffering. It was
too much to ask her to face another in the family of her friends. She
went off in a fainting fit on hearing the news of the disappearance of
the young men, and her father left her in the hands of a medical man,
and turned his attention to the condition of Miss Sheridan, who was
unable to walk back to her home, and had to be put into a chair,
Mr. Linley walking beside her with her young sister. It is more than
possible that Mr. Linley was beginning to feel that he had had quite
enough of the Sheridan family to last him for the remainder of his life.
For two days nothing whatever was heard of the missing brothers. We have
no means of knowing if Miss Sheridan communicated to their father in
Dublin the mysterious story she had to tell; the chances are that she
was advised by Mr. Linley to refrain from doing so until she might have
something definite to tell him. Mr. Linley never had any particular
regard for the elder Sheridan, and he had no wish to have him summoned
from his theatre at Dublin to make his remarks about the dangerous
attractiveness of Elizabeth Linley, and the culpable carelessness of
her father in allowing her to be carried off to France by a young man
without a penny except what he got from his own father.
At any rate, Tom Sheridan did not leave his theatre or his pupils
in elocution, and there was no need for him to do so, for on Tuesday
evening--they had been missing on the Sunday morning--Dick and his
brother returned. They were both greatly fatigued, and said that they
had not been in bed since they had left Bath. This meant that Dick had
actually not slept in Bath since he had originally left the city in the
company of Miss Linley. Between the Friday and the Tuesday he had posted
from London to Bath with the Linleys, and had forthwith returned to
London with his brother and then back once more to Bath without a pause.
He, at least, had very good reason for feeling fatigued.
His first act was to hand his sister an apology which had been made to
him by Mathews. This document is worthy of being reprinted. It ran thus:
“Being convinced that the expressions I made use of to Mr. Sheridan's
disadvantage, were the effects of passion and misrepresentation,
I intreat what I have said to that gentleman's disadvantage, and
particularly beg his pardon for my advertisement in the _Bath
Chronicle_. Th. Mathews.”
He handed this document to his sister, and then it may be supposed that
he went to bed. He had certainly good need of a sleep.
Such is the drift of the story up to this point, as told by Mrs. Lefanu
(Elizabeth Sheridan), and it differs in some particulars from that told
by her brother Charles in a letter to their uncle, and, in a lesser
degree, from the account given of the whole transaction by Richard
Sheridan himself, who was surely in the best position to know exactly
what happened upon the occasion of his first visit to Mathews in London,
as well as upon the occasion of his second, made so hurriedly in the
company of his brother.
His second visit was, as might have been expected, the more exciting.
It included the fighting of a duel with Mathews. The humours of duelling
have been frequently dealt with in prose and comedy, and, assuredly the
most amusing of all is to be found in Richard Brinsley Sheridan's _The
Rivals_. One must confess, however, that the serious account given by
the same writer of his hostile meeting with Mathews, on his return from
Bath, suggests a much more ludicrous series of situations than are to be
found in his play.
In Sheridan's account he mentions that while still in France he received
“several abusive threats” from Mathews, and these had such an effect
upon him that he wrote to Mathews, swearing that he would not close his
eyes in sleep in England till he had treated Mathews as he deserved.
In order to carry out this vow he had actually sat up all night at
Canterbury, where his party halted on their way from Dover to London.
He called upon Mathews on arriving in London, at the latter's lodging
in Crutched Friars; this was at midnight, and the key of the door being
mislaid, he had to wait two hours before he was admitted. He found
Mathews in bed, but he induced him to rise and dress, though, in spite
of his compliance as regards his raiment, he complained bitterly of the
cold. There does not seem to have been any great suffering on Sheridan's
part through a lack of heat. Then, as his sister's narrative put it, the
man declared that his visitor had been grossly misinformed in regard to
the libel in the Chronicle; and so he left for Bath, as has already been
stated.
And now comes the account given by Sheridan of the return visit, and,
told in his own laconic style, it suggests such comic situations as
border on farce.
“Mr. S.,” he wrote, “staid but three hours in Bath. He returned to
London. He sent to Mr. M. from Hyde Parck. He came with Captain Knight
his second. He objected frequently to the ground. They adjourned to the
Hercules Pillars. They returned to Hyde Parck. Mr. M. objected to the
observation of an officer. They returned to Hercules Pillars. They
adjourned to the Bedford Coffee house by agreement. Mr. M. was gone
to the Castel Tavern. Mr. S. followed with Mr. E. Mr. M. made many
declarations in favour of Mr. S. They engaged. Mr. M. was disarmed,
Captain Knight ran in. Mr. M. begged his life and afterwards denied the
advantage. Mr. S. was provoked by the (really well-meant) interposition
of Captain Knight and the illusion of Mr. M. He insisted since Mr. M.
denied the advantage, that he should give up his sword. Mr. M. denied,
but sooner than return to his ground he gave it up. It was broke, and
Mr. M. offered another. He was then called on to retract his abuse
and beg Mr. S.'s pardon. With much altercation and much ill grace he
complied.”
The remainder of this remarkably succinct composition is devoted to the
subsequent misrepresentations of the transaction by Mathews, and by the
writer's appeal to the seconds to say if his version of the encounter
was not correct.
But whatever Mathews' account may have been it could scarcely be more
ludicrous than Sheridan's. The marching and countermarching of the
four gentlemen--it appears that brother Charles, although accompanying
Richard to London, thought it more prudent to remain under cover during
the actual engagement; he waited at Brereton's lodgings--the excuses
made by Mathews in order to get away without fighting, and then at the
last moment, the carrying out (by agreement) of a manouvre which landed
Mathews in one tavern and the rest of the party in another--the set-to
of the principals immediately after the “declarations” of one of them in
favour of the other, and the final catastrophe could hardly be surpassed
by the actions of a pair of burlesque duellists in what is technically
known as a “knockabout” entertainment.
And after all this scrupulousness of detail one is left in doubt as
to the exact _locale_ of the encounter. Did it take place in the
coffee-room of the Castell Inn, or did the eager combatants retrace
their steps to the “parck”? The document written by Sheridan, though
dealing very fully with the forced marches of the army in the field,
throws no light upon this question of the scene of the battle. In
respect of the signing of the treaty of peace, and the payment of the
indemnity, it is, however, moderately lucid. Sheridan must have told his
sister that Mathews signed the apology immediately after the encounter;
she states this in her narrative. But Mathews did not merely sign the
apology, he wrote every word of it, as one may see by referring to the
facsimile, thoughtfully given in Mr. Fraser Rae's _Life of Sheridan_,
and it would be impossible to say that the caligraphy of the apology
shows the least sign of that perturbation from which one must believe
the writer was suffering at the moment. Its characteristic is neatness.
It is in the fine old-fashioned Italian hand. Even an expert, who sees
possibilities--when paid for it--in handwriting which would never occur
to less imaginative observers, would scarcely venture to say that this
neat little document was written by a man with another's sword at his
throat.
This is another element in the mystery of the duel, and it cannot be
said that when we read the letter which the elder of the brothers
wrote to his uncle, giving his account of the whole business, we feel
ourselves in a clearer atmosphere. It really seems a pity that Mr.
Browning did not make another _Ring and the Book_ series of studies out
of this amazing duel. Charles Sheridan told his uncle that an apology
was given to Richard by Mathews as a result of Richard's first visit to
him in London, but when Richard read the advertisement in the Chronicle,
which was the original casus belli, he considered this apology so
inadequate that he set off for London to demand another. Charles also
mentions, what neither his brother nor his sister had stated, that he
himself, on reaching London on the Sunday evening, went to Mathews to
endeavour to get a suitable apology--according to Richard's narrative
Charles had good grounds for sending a challenge to Mathews on his own
account--but “after two hours' altercation” he found that he had made no
impression upon the man, so that his brother had no alternative but to
call him out.
But however the accounts of the lesser details of this affair of honour
may differ, there can be no question that public opinion in Bath was all
in favour of young Mr. Sheridan. It was acknowledged on every hand that
he had acted from the first--that is, from the moment he assumed the
duties of the protector of Miss Linley--with admirable courage, and with
a full sense of what honour demanded of him. In short he came back from
London, after so many sleepless nights, covered with glory. He was a
tall, handsome fellow of twenty, with brilliant eyes; he had run away
with the most beautiful girl in the world to save her from the clutches
of a scoundrel; he had had four nights without sleep, and then he had
fought a duel with the scoundrel and had obtained from him an apology
for insertion in the newspapers. Few young gentlemen starting life
wholly without means attain to so proud a position of achievement before
they reach their majority.
But of course all these feats of errantry and arms run up a bill.
Young Mr. Sheridan's posting account must have been by itself pretty
formidable, and, knowing that his father had never looked on him with
the favour which he gave to his brother, Richard may now and again have
felt a trifle uneasy at the prospect of meeting Mr. Sheridan. If his
sister's memory is to be trusted, however, this meeting took place
within a week or two of his duel, and no bones were broken. Mr. Sheridan
had a few chiding words to say respecting the debts which his son had
incurred, but these he paid, after obtaining from the boy the usual
promise made under similar conditions before a like tribunal. The
prodigal invariably acts up to his character for prodigality in the
matter of promises of reform.
Richard Sheridan, being something of a wit, though we do not get many
examples of his faculty in the accounts extant of his early life, and
assuredly not a single example in any of his letters that came into the
hands of his biographers, may have sworn to his father never to run away
with a girl who might be anxious to enter upon a conventual life. At
any rate, his father did not show any great displeasure when he was made
aware of the boy's conduct, though it is worth noting that Mr. Sheridan
took exception to the general conviction that his son's act had been
prompted by the most chivalrous aspirations.
Mathews, however, had not yet been shaken off. He was back in Bath
almost as soon as the Sheridans, and “malevolent incendiarism” was
in the air. No slander was too base for him to use against Richard
Sheridan, no insinuation too vile. But the popularity of the object of
his calumny was now too firmly established in Bath to be shaken by the
vaporous malevolence of his enemy. Mathews, finding himself thoroughly
discredited in every quarter, did the only sensible thing recorded in
his squalid history--he ran away to his home in Wales.
He was here unfortunate enough to meet with a man named Barnard, or
Barnett, who acted upon him pretty much as Sir Lucius O'Trigger did upon
Squire Acres, explaining to him that it was quite impossible that
the affair between him and Sheridan should remain as it was. It was
absolutely necessary, he said, that another duel should take place. All
the “incendiarism” in Mathews' nature was aroused by the fiery words of
this man, and the precious pair hurried to Bath, where a challenge was
sent to Sheridan through the hands of his eldest sister, under the guise
of an invitation to some festivity.
Sheridan was foolish enough to accept the challenge apparently without
consulting with any one competent to advise him. According to his
father the challenge had been preceded by several letters of the
most scurrilous abuse. His wiser brother, who had just received an
appointment as Secretary to the British Legation in Sweden, had gone
to London with their father to make preparations for his departure for
Stockholm, and immediately on hearing of the duel he wrote to Richard a
typical elder brother's letter. It is dated July 3rd, 1772, so that, as
the duel had only taken place the previous day, it cannot be said
that he lost much time in expressing his deep sense of his brother's
foolishness in meeting so great a scoundrel for the second time. “All
your friends have condemned you,” he wrote. “You risked everything,
where you had nothing to gain, to give your antagonist the thing he
wished, a chance for recovering his reputation; he wanted to get rid
of the contemptible opinion he was held in, and you were good-natured
enough to let him do it at your expense. It is not a time to scold, but
all your friends were of opinion you could, with the greatest propriety,
have refused to meet him.”
Without going into the question as to whether this sort of letter was
the ideal one for one brother to write to another who was lying on his
bed with several wounds in his throat, it is impossible to question the
soundness of the opinion expressed by Charles Sheridan in respect of
Richard's acceptance of Mathews' challenge. The challenge was, however,
accepted, and the duel took place on King's Down, at three o'clock
in the morning. Mathews' friend was Barnett, and Sheridan's a young
gentleman named Paumier, who, it was said, was quite unacquainted with
the rules of the game, and had never even seen a duel being fought. The
accounts which survive of this second meeting of Sheridan and Mathews
make it apparent that, if the first was a scene of comedy, this one was
a tragic burlesque. It is said that Sheridan, on the signal being given,
at once rushed in on his antagonist, endeavouring to disarm him as he
had done upon the former occasion of their meeting, but, tripping over
something, he literally, and not figuratively, fell upon the other,
knocking him down with such violence that he was not only disarmed, but
his sword was broken as well. Sheridan's own sword was also broken, so
that one might fancy that the meeting would have terminated here. It did
nothing of the sort. The encounter was only beginning, and anything more
savagely burlesque than the sequel could not be imagined.
The combatants must have rolled over, after the manner of the negro
duellists on the variety stage, and when they had settled themselves
each made a grab for the most serviceable fragment of his sword. Mathews
being the heavier man contrived to keep uppermost in the scuffle, and,
what gave him a decided advantage over his opponent, he managed to get
his fingers on the hilt of his broken weapon. An appeal at this stage
was made by the lad who was acting as Sheridan's second to put a stop
to the fight; but the second ruffian, or the ruffian's second--either
description applies to Barnett--declared that as both the antagonists
were on the ground one could not be said to have any advantage over the
other. This delicate question being settled, Mathews held the jagged,
saw-like end--point it had none--of the broken sword at the other's
throat and told him to beg for his life. Sheridan replied that he
should refuse to beg his life from such a scoundrel, and forthwith the
scoundrel began jabbing at his throat and face with the fragment of his
weapon, a method of attack which was not robbed of its butchery by the
appeal that it makes to a reader's sense of its comical aspect.
It is doubtful, however, if the comic side of the transaction appealed
very forcibly to the unfortunate boy who was being lacerated to death.
He just managed to put aside a thrust or two before the end of the blade
penetrated the flesh of his throat and pinned him to the ground. With a
chuckle and, according to Tom Sheridan's account, an oath, Mathews got
upon his feet, and, entering the coach which was waiting for him, drove
away from the scene of his butchery. Sheridan was thereupon raised from
the ground, and driven in his chaise with his second to the White Hart
Inn. Two surgeons were immediately in attendance, and it was found
that his wounds, though numerous, were not such as placed his life
in jeopardy. They were, however, sufficiently serious to prevent his
removal to his home that day.
It does not appear that young Paumier told the sisters of the
occurrence; but an account of the duel having appeared in the _Bath
Chronicle_ the same afternoon, every one in the town must have been
talking of it, though Mrs. Lefanu says neither she nor her sister heard
a word of the matter until the next day. Then they hastened to the
White Hart, and prevailed upon the surgeons to allow them to take their
brother home. In a surprisingly short time he had quite recovered.
Indeed, although there was a report that Sheridan's life was despaired
of, there was no excuse for any one taking so gloomy a view of his
hurts, for the exact truth was known to Charles Sheridan and his father
in London early on the day following that of the fight.
The pathetic part of the story of this ludicrous encounter is to be
found in the story of the reception of the news by Elizabeth Linley. Her
father had read in some of the papers that Sheridan was at the point of
death, but, like the worldly-wise man that Mr. Linley was, he kept
the news from his daughter. They were at Oxford together, and she was
announced to sing at a concert, and he knew that had she learned all
that the newspapers published, she might possibly not be able to do
herself--and her father--justice. But, as one of the audience told his
sister afterwards, the fact that every one who had come to hear Miss
Linley sing was aware of the serious condition (as the papers alleged)
of young Sheridan, and of her attachment to him, a feeling of sympathy
for the lovely young creature added immeasurably to the interest of her
performance.
At the conclusion of the concert her father set out with her for Bath;
and it was not until they had almost reached their home that their
chaise was met by a clergyman named Pauton, and he summoned all his
tact to enable him to prepare Elizabeth Linley for the news which he was
entrusted to communicate to her. It is said that under the stress of
her emotion the girl declared that Richard Sheridan was her husband, and
that her place was by his side.
Whatever truth there may be in this story it is certain that if she
believed at that moment that Sheridan was her husband, she gave no sign
of continuing in that belief, for though her numerous letters to him
show that she was devoted to him, there is no suggestion in any of them
that she believed herself to be his wife. On the contrary, there are
many passages which prove that no idea of the sort was entertained by
her.
The exertions of the heads of the two families were for long directed
against the union of the lovers. Mr. Linley felt more forcibly than
ever that he had had quite enough of the Sheridans, and Tom Sheridan
doubtless wished never to hear again the name of Linley. The one made
his daughter promise on her knees to give up Richard Sheridan, and Mr.
Sheridan compelled his son to forswear any association with Elizabeth
Linley. Jove must have been convulsed with laughter. Richard Brinsley
Sheridan and Elizabeth Ann Linley were married on the 13th of April,
1773.