Part 25 (1/2)

This was my lord's crowning freak, and the Rev. Thomas Tusher, domestic chaplain to the Right Honorable the Lord Viscount Castlewood, finding his prayers and sermons of no earthly avail to his lords.h.i.+p, gave up his duties of governor; went and married his brewer's widow at Southampton, and took her and her money to his parsonage house at Castlewood.

My lady could not be angry with her son for drinking King James's health, being herself a loyal Tory, as all the Castlewood family were, and acquiesced with a sigh, knowing, perhaps, that her refusal would be of no avail to the young lord's desire for a military life. She would have liked him to be in Mr. Esmond's regiment, hoping that Harry might act as a guardian and adviser to his wayward young kinsman; but my young lord would hear of nothing but the Guards, and a commission was got for him in the Duke of Ormond's regiment; so Esmond found my lord, ensign and lieutenant, when he returned from Germany after the Blenheim campaign.

The effect produced by both Lady Castlewood's children when they appeared in public was extraordinary, and the whole town speedily rang with their fame: such a beautiful couple, it was declared, never had been seen; the young maid of honor was toasted at every table and tavern, and as for my young lord, his good looks were even more admired than his sister's. A hundred songs were written about the pair, and as the fas.h.i.+on of that day was, my young lord was praised in these Anacreontics as warmly as Bathyllus. You may be sure that he accepted very complacently the town's opinion of him, and acquiesced with that frankness and charming good-humor he always showed in the idea that he was the prettiest fellow in all London.

The old Dowager at Chelsey, though she could never be got to acknowledge that Mistress Beatrix was any beauty at all, (in which opinion, as it may be imagined, a vast number of the ladies agreed with her), yet, on the very first sight of young Castlewood, she owned she fell in love with him: and Henry Esmond, on his return to Chelsey, found himself quite superseded in her favor by her younger kinsman. The feat of drinking the King's health at Cambridge would have won her heart, she said, if nothing else did. ”How had the dear young fellow got such beauty?” she asked. ”Not from his father--certainly not from his mother.

How had he come by such n.o.ble manners, and the perfect bel air? That countrified Walcote widow could never have taught him.” Esmond had his own opinion about the countrified Walcote widow, who had a quiet grace and serene kindness, that had always seemed to him the perfection of good breeding, though he did not try to argue this point with his aunt.

But he could agree in most of the praises which the enraptured old dowager bestowed on my Lord Viscount, than whom he never beheld a more fascinating and charming gentleman. Castlewood had not wit so much as enjoyment. ”The lad looks good things,” Mr. Steele used to say; ”and his laugh lights up a conversation as much as ten repartees from Mr. Congreve. I would as soon sit over a bottle with him as with Mr.

Addison; and rather listen to his talk than hear Nicolini. Was ever man so gracefully drunk as my Lord Castlewood? I would give anything to carry my wine” (though, indeed, d.i.c.k bore his very kindly, and plenty of it, too), ”like this incomparable young man. When he is sober he is delightful; and when tipsy, perfectly irresistible.” And referring to his favorite, Shakspeare (who was quite out of fas.h.i.+on until Steele brought him back into the mode), d.i.c.k compared Lord Castlewood to Prince Hal, and was pleased to dub Esmond as ancient Pistol.

The Mistress of the Robes, the greatest lady in England after the Queen, or even before her Majesty, as the world said, though she never could be got to say a civil word to Beatrix, whom she had promoted to her place as maid of honor, took her brother into instant favor. When young Castlewood, in his new uniform, and looking like a prince out of a fairy tale, went to pay his duty to her Grace, she looked at him for a minute in silence, the young man blus.h.i.+ng and in confusion before her, then fairly burst out a-crying, and kissed him before her daughters and company. ”He was my boy's friend,” she said, through her sobs. ”My Blandford might have been like him.” And everybody saw, after this mark of the d.u.c.h.ess's favor, that my young lord's promotion was secure, and people crowded round the favorite's favorite, who became vainer and gayer, and more good-humored than ever.

Meanwhile Madam Beatrix was making her conquests on her own side, and amongst them was one poor gentleman, who had been shot by her young eyes two years before, and had never been quite cured of that wound; he knew, to be sure, how hopeless any pa.s.sion might be, directed in that quarter, and had taken that best, though ign.o.ble, remedium amoris, a speedy retreat from before the charmer, and a long absence from her; and not being dangerously smitten in the first instance, Esmond pretty soon got the better of his complaint, and if he had it still, did not know he had it, and bore it easily. But when he returned after Blenheim, the young lady of sixteen, who had appeared the most beautiful object his eyes had ever looked on two years back, was now advanced to a perfect ripeness and perfection of beauty, such as instantly enthralled the poor devil, who had already been a fugitive from her charms. Then he had seen her but for two days, and fled; now he beheld her day after day, and when she was at Court watched after her; when she was at home, made one of the family party; when she went abroad, rode after her mother's chariot; when she appeared in public places, was in the box near her, or in the pit looking at her; when she went to church was sure to be there, though he might not listen to the sermon, and be ready to hand her to her chair if she deigned to accept of his services, and select him from a score of young men who were always hanging round about her. When she went away, accompanying her Majesty to Hampton Court, a darkness fell over London.

G.o.ds, what nights has Esmond pa.s.sed, thinking of her, rhyming about her, talking about her! His friend d.i.c.k Steele was at this time courting the young lady, Mrs. Scurlock, whom he married; she had a lodging in Kensington Square, hard by my Lady Castlewood's house there. d.i.c.k and Harry, being on the same errand, used to meet constantly at Kensington.

They were always prowling about that place, or dismally walking thence, or eagerly running thither. They emptied scores of bottles at the ”King's Arms,” each man prating of his love, and allowing the other to talk on condition that he might have his own turn as a listener. Hence arose an intimacy between them, though to all the rest of their friends they must have been insufferable. Esmond's verses to ”Gloriana at the Harpsichord,” to ”Gloriana's Nosegay,” to ”Gloriana at Court,” appeared this year in the Observator.--Have you never read them? They were thought pretty poems, and attributed by some to Mr. Prior.

This pa.s.sion did not escape--how should it?--the clear eyes of Esmond's mistress: he told her all; what will a man not do when frantic with love? To what baseness will he not demean himself? What pangs will he not make others suffer, so that he may ease his selfish heart of a part of its own pain? Day after day he would seek his dear mistress, pour insane hopes, supplications, rhapsodies, raptures, into her ear. She listened, smiled, consoled, with untiring pity and sweetness. Esmond was the eldest of her children, so she was pleased to say; and as for her kindness, who ever had or would look for aught else from one who was an angel of goodness and pity? After what has been said, 'tis needless almost to add that poor Esmond's suit was unsuccessful. What was a nameless, penniless lieutenant to do, when some of the greatest in the land were in the field? Esmond never so much as thought of asking permission to hope so far above his reach as he knew this prize was and pa.s.sed his foolish, useless life in mere abject sighs and impotent longing. What nights of rage, what days of torment, of pa.s.sionate unfulfilled desire, of sickening jealousy can he recall! Beatrix thought no more of him than of the lackey that followed her chair. His complaints did not touch her in the least; his raptures rather fatigued her; she cared for his verses no more than for Dan Chaucer's, who's dead these ever so many hundred years; she did not hate him; she rather despised him, and just suffered him.

One day, after talking to Beatrix's mother, his dear, fond, constant mistress--for hours--for all day long--pouring out his flame and his pa.s.sion, his despair and rage, returning again and again to the theme, pacing the room, tearing up the flowers on the table, twisting and breaking into bits the wax out of the stand-dish, and performing a hundred mad freaks of pa.s.sionate folly; seeing his mistress at last quite pale and tired out with sheer weariness of compa.s.sion, and watching over his fever for the hundredth time, Esmond seized up his hat, and took his leave. As he got into Kensington Square, a sense of remorse came over him for the wearisome pain he had been inflicting upon the dearest and kindest friend ever man had. He went back to the house, where the servant still stood at the open door, ran up the stairs, and found his mistress where he had left her in the embrasure of the window, looking over the fields towards Chelsey. She laughed, wiping away at the same time the tears which were in her kind eyes; he flung himself down on his knees, and buried his head in her lap. She had in her hand the stalk of one of the flowers, a pink, that he had torn to pieces. ”Oh, pardon me, pardon me, my dearest and kindest,” he said; ”I am in h.e.l.l, and you are the angel that brings me a drop of water.”

”I am your mother, you are my son, and I love you always,” she said, holding her hands over him: and he went away comforted and humbled in mind, as he thought of that amazing and constant love and tenderness with which this sweet lady ever blessed and pursued him.

CHAPTER XI.

THE FAMOUS MR. JOSEPH ADDISON.

The gentlemen ushers had a table at Kensington, and the Guard a very splendid dinner daily at St. James's, at either of which ordinaries Esmond was free to dine. d.i.c.k Steele liked the Guard-table better than his own at the gentlemen ushers', where there was less wine and more ceremony; and Esmond had many a jolly afternoon in company of his friend, and a hundred times at least saw d.i.c.k into his chair. If there is verity in wine, according to the old adage, what an amiable-natured character d.i.c.k's must have been! In proportion as he took in wine he overflowed with kindness. His talk was not witty so much as charming.

He never said a word that could anger anybody, and only became the more benevolent the more tipsy he grew. Many of the wags derided the poor fellow in his cups, and chose him as a b.u.t.t for their satire: but there was a kindness about him, and a sweet playful fancy, that seemed to Esmond far more charming than the pointed talk of the brightest wits, with their elaborate repartees and affected severities. I think Steele shone rather than sparkled. Those famous beaux-esprits of the coffee-houses (Mr. William Congreve, for instance, when his gout and his grandeur permitted him to come among us) would make many brilliant hits--half a dozen in a night sometimes--but, like sharp-shooters, when they had fired their shot, they were obliged to retire under cover till their pieces were loaded again, and wait till they got another chance at their enemy; whereas d.i.c.k never thought that his bottle companion was a b.u.t.t to aim at--only a friend to shake by the hand. The poor fellow had half the town in his confidence; everybody knew everything about his loves and his debts, his creditors or his mistress's obduracy. When Esmond first came on to the town, honest d.i.c.k was all flames and raptures for a young lady, a West India fortune, whom he married. In a couple of years the lady was dead, the fortune was all but spent, and the honest widower was as eager in pursuit of a new paragon of beauty, as if he had never courted and married and buried the last one.

Quitting the Guard-table one Sunday afternoon, when by chance d.i.c.k had a sober fit upon him, he and his friend were making their way down Germain Street, and d.i.c.k all of a sudden left his companion's arm, and ran after a gentleman who was poring over a folio volume at the book-shop near to St. James's Church. He was a fair, tall man, in a snuff-colored suit, with a plain sword, very sober, and almost shabby in appearance--at least when compared to Captain Steele, who loved to adorn his jolly round person with the finest of clothes, and shone in scarlet and gold lace. The Captain rushed up, then, to the student of the book-stall, took him in his arms, hugged him, and would have kissed him--for d.i.c.k was always hugging and bussing his friends--but the other stepped back with a flush on his pale face, seeming to decline this public manifestation of Steele's regard.

”My dearest Joe, where hast thou hidden thyself this age?” cries the Captain, still holding both his friend's hands; ”I have been languis.h.i.+ng for thee this fortnight.”

”A fortnight is not an age, d.i.c.k,” says the other, very good-humoredly.

(He had light blue eyes, extraordinary bright, and a face perfectly regular and handsome, like a tinted statue.) ”And I have been hiding myself--where do you think?”

”What! not across the water, my dear Joe?” says Steele, with a look of great alarm: ”thou knowest I have always--”

”No,” says his friend, interrupting him with a smile: ”we are not come to such straits as that, d.i.c.k. I have been hiding, sir, at a place where people never think of finding you--at my own lodgings, whither I am going to smoke a pipe now and drink a gla.s.s of sack: will your honor come?”

”Harry Esmond, come hither,” cries out d.i.c.k. ”Thou hast heard me talk over and over again of my dearest Joe, my guardian angel?”

”Indeed,” says Mr. Esmond, with a bow, ”it is not from you only that I have learnt to admire Mr. Addison. We loved good poetry at Cambridge as well as at Oxford; and I have some of yours by heart, though I have put on a red coat... . 'O qui canoro blandius Orpheo vocale ducis carmen;'

shall I go on, sir?” says Mr. Esmond, who, indeed, had read and loved the charming Latin poems of Mr. Addison, as every scholar of that time knew and admired them.

”This is Captain Esmond who was at Blenheim,” says Steele.

”Lieutenant Esmond,” says the other, with a low bow, ”at Mr. Addison's service.