Doth any young gentleman of my progeny, who may read his old grandfather’s papers, chance to be presently suffering under the passion of Love? There is a humiliating cure, but one that is easy and almost specific for the malady — which is, to try an alibi. Esmond went away from his mistress and was cured a half-dozen times; he came back to her side, and instantly fell ill again of the fever. He vowed that he could leave her and think no more of her, and so he could pretty well, at least, succeed in quelling that rage and longing he had whenever he was with her; but as soon as he returned he was as bad as ever again. Truly a ludicrous and pitiable object, at least exhausting everybody’s pity but his dearest mistress’s, Lady Castlewood’s, in whose tender breast he reposed all his dreary confessions, and who never tired of hearing him and pleading for him.
Sometimes Esmond would think there was hope. Then again he would be plagued with despair, at some impertinence or coquetry of his mistress. For days they would be like brother and sister, or the dearest friends — she, simple, fond, and charming — he, happy beyond measure at her good behavior. But this would all vanish on a sudden. Either he would be too pressing, and hint his love, when she would rebuff him instantly, and give his vanity a box on the ear; or he would be jealous, and with perfect good reason, of some new admirer that had sprung up, or some rich young gentleman newly arrived in the town, that this incorrigible flirt would set her nets and baits to draw in. If Esmond remonstrated, the little rebel would say —“Who are you? I shall go my own way, sirrah, and that way is towards a husband, and I don’t want YOU on the way. I am for your betters, Colonel, for your betters: do you hear that? You might do if you had an estate and were younger; only eight years older than I, you say! pish, you are a hundred years older. You are an old, old Graveairs, and I should make you miserable, that would be the only comfort I should have in marrying you. But you have not money enough to keep a cat decently after you have paid your man his wages, and your landlady her bill. Do you think I am going to live in a lodging, and turn the mutton at a string whilst your honor nurses the baby? Fiddlestick, and why did you not get this nonsense knocked out of your head when you were in the wars? You are come back more dismal and dreary than ever. You and mamma are fit for each other. You might be Darby and Joan, and play cribbage to the end of your lives.”
“At least you own to your worldliness, my poor Trix,” says her mother.
“Worldliness. Oh, my pretty lady! Do you think that I am a child in the nursery, and to be frightened by Bogey! Worldliness, to be sure; and pray, madam, where is the harm of wishing to be comfortable? When you are gone, you dearest old woman, or when I am tired of you and have run away from you, where shall I go? Shall I go and be head nurse to my Popish sister-inlaw, take the children their physic, and whip ’em, and put ’em to bed when they are naughty? Shall I be Castlewood’s upper servant, and perhaps marry Tom Tusher? Merci! I have been long enough Frank’s humble servant. Why am I not a man? I have ten times his brains, and had I worn the — well, don’t let your ladyship be frightened — had I worn a sword and periwig instead of this mantle and commode to which nature has condemned me —(though ’tis a pretty stuff, too — Cousin Esmond! you will go to the Exchange tomorrow, and get the exact counterpart of this ribbon, sir; do you hear?)— I would have made our name talked about. So would Graveairs here have made something out of our name if he had represented it. My Lord Graveairs would have done very well. Yes, you have a very pretty way, and would have made a very decent, grave speaker.” And here she began to imitate Esmond’s way of carrying himself and speaking to his face, and so ludicrously that his mistress burst out a-laughing, and even he himself could see there was some likeness in the fantastical malicious caricature.
“Yes,” says she, “I solemnly vow, own, and confess, that I want a good husband. Where’s the harm of one? My face is my fortune. Who’ll come?— buy, buy, buy! I cannot toil, neither can I spin, but I can play twenty-three games on the cards. I can dance the last dance, I can hunt the stag, and I think I could shoot flying. I can talk as wicked as any woman of my years, and know enough stories to amuse a sulky husband for at least one thousand and one nights. I have a pretty taste for dress, diamonds, gambling, and old China. I love sugar-plums, Malines lace (that you brought me, cousin, is very pretty), the opera, and everything that is useless and costly. I have got a monkey and a little black boy — Pompey, sir, go and give a dish of chocolate to Colonel Graveairs,— and a parrot and a spaniel, and I must have a husband. Cupid, you hear?”
“Iss, Missis!” says Pompey, a little grinning negro Lord Peterborrow gave her, with a bird of Paradise in his turbant, and a collar with his mistress’s name on it.
“Iss, Missis!” says Beatrix, imitating the child. “And if husband not come, Pompey must go fetch one.”
And Pompey went away grinning with his chocolate tray as Miss Beatrix ran up to her mother and ended her sally of mischief in her common way, with a kiss — no wonder that upon paying such a penalty her fond judge pardoned her.
When Mr. Esmond came home, his health was still shattered; and he took a lodging near to his mistresses, at Kensington, glad enough to be served by them, and to see them day after day. He was enabled to see a little company — and of the sort he liked best. Mr. Steele and Mr. Addison both did him the honor to visit him; and drank many a glass of good claret at his lodging, whilst their entertainer, through his wound, was kept to diet drink and gruel. These gentlemen were Whigs, and great admirers of my Lord Duke of Marlborough; and Esmond was entirely of the other party. But their different views of politics did not prevent the gentlemen from agreeing in private, nor from allowing, on one evening when Esmond’s kind old patron, Lieutenant-General Webb, with a stick and a crutch, hobbled up to the Colonel’s lodging (which was prettily situate at Knightsbridge, between London and Kensington, and looking over the Gardens), that the Lieutenant-General was a noble and gallant soldier — and even that he had been hardly used in the Wynendael affair. He took his revenge in talk, that must be confessed; and if Mr. Addison had had a mind to write a poem about Wynendael, he might have heard from the commander’s own lips the story a hundred times over.
Mr. Esmond, forced to be quiet, betook himself to literature for a relaxation, and composed his comedy, whereof the prompter’s copy lieth in my walnut escritoire, sealed up and docketed, “The Faithful Fool, a Comedy, as it was performed by her Majesty’s Servants.” ’Twas a very sentimental piece; and Mr. Steele, who had more of that kind of sentiment than Mr. Addison, admired it, whilst the other rather sneered at the performance; though he owned that, here and there, it contained some pretty strokes. He was bringing out his own play of “Cato” at the time, the blaze of which quite extinguished Esmond’s farthing candle; and his name was never put to the piece, which was printed as by a Person of Quality. Only nine copies were sold, though Mr. Dennis, the great critic, praised it, and said ’twas a work of great merit; and Colonel Esmond had the whole impression burned one day in a rage, by Jack Lockwood, his man.
All this comedy was full of bitter satiric strokes against a certain young lady. The plot of the piece was quite a new one. A young woman was represented with a great number of suitors, selecting a pert fribble of a peer, in place of the hero (but ill-acted, I think, by Mr. Wilks, the Faithful Fool,) who persisted in admiring her. In the fifth act, Teraminta was made to discover the merits of Eugenio (the F. F.), and to feel a partiality for him too late; for he announced that he had bestowed his hand and estate upon Rosaria, a country lass, endowed with every virtue. But it must be owned that the audience yawned through the play; and that it perished on the third night, with only half a dozen persons to behold its agonies. Esmond and his two mistresses came to the first night, and Miss Beatrix fell asleep; whilst her mother, who had not been to a play since King James the Second’s time, thought the piece, though not brilliant, had a very pretty moral.
Mr. Esmond dabbled in letters, and wrote a deal of prose and verse at this time of leisure. When displeased with the conduct of Miss Beatrix, he would compose a satire, in which he relieved his mind. When smarting under the faithlessness of women, he dashed off a copy of verses, in which he held the whole sex up to scorn. One day, in one of these moods, he made a little joke, in which (swearing him to secrecy) he got his friend Dick Steele to help him; and, composing a paper, he had it printed exactly like Steele’s paper, and by his printer, and laid on his mistress’s breakfast-table the following —
“SPECTATOR.
“No. 341. “Tuesday, April 1, 1712.
Mutato nomine de te Fabula narratur.— HORACE.
Thyself the morain of the fable see.— CREECH.
“Jocasta is known as a woman of learning and fashion, and as one of the most amiable persons of this court and country. She is at home two mornings of the week, and all the wits and a few of the beauties of London flock to her assemblies. When she goes abroad to Tunbridge or the Bath, a retinue of adorers rides the journey with her; and besides the London beaux, she has a crowd of admirers at the Wells, the polite amongst the natives of Sussex and Somerset pressing round her tea-tables, and being anxious for a nod from her chair. Jocasta’s acquaintance is thus very numerous. Indeed, ’tis one smart writer’s work to keep her visiting-book — a strong footman is engaged to carry it; and it would require a much stronger head even than Jocasta’s own to remember the names of all her dear friends.
“Either at Epsom Wells or at Tunbridge (for of this important matter Jocasta cannot be certain) it was her ladyship’s fortune to become acquainted with a young gentleman, whose conversation was so sprightly, and manners amiable, that she invited the agreeable young spark to visit her if ever he came to London, where her house in Spring Garden should be open to him. Charming as he was, and without any manner of doubt a pretty fellow, Jocasta hath such a regiment of the like continually marching round her standard, that ’tis no wonder her attention is distracted amongst them. And so, though this gentleman made a considerable impression upon her, and touched her heart for at least three-and-twenty minutes, it must be owned that she has forgotten his name. He is a dark man, and may be eight-and-twenty years old. His dress is sober, though of rich materials. He has a mole on his forehead over his left eye; has a blue ribbon to his cane and sword, and wears his own hair.
“Jocasta was much flattered by beholding her admirer (for that everybody admires who sees her is a point which she never can for a moment doubt) in the next pew to her at St. James’s Church last Sunday; and the manner in which he appeared to go to sleep during the sermon — though from under his fringed eyelids it was evident he was casting glances of respectful rapture towards Jocasta — deeply moved and interested her. On coming out of church, he found his way to her chair, and made her an elegant bow as she stepped into it. She saw him at Court afterwards, where he carried himself with a most distinguished air, though none of her acquaintances knew his name; and the next night he was at the play, where her ladyship was pleased to acknowledge him from the side-box.
“During the whole of the comedy she racked her brains so to remember his name that she did not hear a word of the piece: and having the happiness to meet him once more in the lobby of the playhouse, she went up to him in a flutter, and bade him remember that she kept two nights in the week, and that she longed to see him at Spring Garden.
“He appeared on Tuesday, in a rich suit, showing a very fine taste both in the tailor and wearer; and though a knot of us were gathered round the charming Jocasta, fellows who pretended to know every face upon the town, not one could tell the gentleman’s name in reply to Jocasta’s eager inquiries, flung to the right and left of her as he advanced up the room with a bow that would become a duke.
“Jocasta acknowledged this salute with one of those smiles and curtsies of which that lady hath the secret. She curtsies with a languishing air, as if to say, ‘You are come at last. I have been pining for you:’ and then she finishes her victim with a killing look, which declares: ‘O Philander! I have no eyes but for you.’ Camilla hath as good a curtsy perhaps, and Thalestris much such another look; but the glance and the curtsy together belong to Jocasta of all the English beauties alone.
“‘Welcome to London, sir,’ says she. ‘One can see you are from the country by your looks.’ She would have said ‘Epsom,’ or ‘Tunbridge,’ had she remembered rightly at which place she had met the stranger; but, alas! she had forgotten.
“The gentleman said, ‘he had been in town but three days; and one of his reasons for coming hither was to have the honor of paying his court to Jocasta.’
“She said, ‘the waters had agreed with her but indifferently.’
“‘The waters were for the sick,’ the gentleman said: ‘the young and beautiful came but to make them sparkle. And as the clergyman read the service on Sunday,’ he added, ‘your ladyship reminded me of the angel that visited the pool.’ A murmur of approbation saluted this sally. Manilio, who is a wit when he is not at cards, was in such a rage that he revoked when he heard it.
“Jocasta was an angel visiting the waters; but at which of the Bethesdas? She was puzzled more and more; and, as her way always is, looked the more innocent and simple, the more artful her intentions were.
“‘We were discoursing,’ says she, ‘about spelling of names and words when you came. Why should we say goold and write gold, and call china chayney, and Cavendish Candish, and Cholmondeley Chumley? If we call Pulteney Poltney, why shouldn’t we call poultry pultry — and —’
“‘Such an enchantress as your ladyship,’ says he, ‘is mistress of all sorts of spells.’ But this was Dr. Swift’s pun, and we all knew it.
“‘And — and how do you spell your name?’ says she, coming to the point at length; for this sprightly conversation had lasted much longer than is here set down, and been carried on through at least three dishes of tea.
“‘Oh, madam,’ says he, ‘I SPELL MY NAME WITH THE Y.’ And laying down his dish, my gentleman made another elegant bow, and was gone in a moment.
“Jocasta hath had no sleep since this mortification, and the stranger’s disappearance. If balked in anything, she is sure to lose her health and temper; and we, her servants, suffer, as usual, during the angry fits of our Queen. Can you help us, Mr. Spectator, who know everything, to read this riddle for her, and set at rest all our minds? We find in her list, Mr. Berty, Mr. Smith, Mr. Pike, Mr. Tyler — who may be Mr. Bertie, Mr. Smyth, Mr. Pyke, Mr. Tiler, for what we know. She hath turned away the clerk of her visiting-book, a poor fellow with a great family of children. Read me this riddle, good Mr. Shortface, and oblige your admirer — OEDIPUS.”
“THE TRUMPET COFFEE-HOUSE, WHITEHALL.
“MR. SPECTATOR,— I am a gentleman but little acquainted with the town, though I have had a university education, and passed some years serving my country abroad, where my name is better known than in the coffee-house and St. James’s.
“Two years since my uncle died, leaving me a pretty estate in the county of Kent; and being at Tunbridge Wells last summer, after my mourning was over, and on the look-out, if truth must be told, for some young lady who would share with me the solitude of my great Kentish house, and be kind to my tenantry (for whom a woman can do a great deal more good than the best-intentioned man can), I was greatly fascinated by a young lady of London, who was the toast of all the company at the Wells. Every one knows Saccharissa’s beauty; and I think, Mr. Spectator, no one better than herself.
“My table-book informs me that I danced no less than seven-and-twenty sets with her at the Assembly. I treated her to the fiddles twice. I was admitted on several days to her lodging, and received by her with a great deal of distinction, and, for a time, was entirely her slave. It was only when I found, from common talk of the company at the Wells, and from narrowly watching one, who I once thought of asking the most sacred question a man can put to a woman, that I became aware how unfit she was to be a country gentleman’s wife; and that this fair creature was but a heartless worldly jilt, playing with affections that she never meant to return, and, indeed, incapable of returning them. ’Tis admiration such women want, not love that touches them; and I can conceive, in her old age, no more wretched creature than this lady will be, when her beauty hath deserted her, when her admirers have left her, and she hath neither friendship nor religion to console her.
“Business calling me to London, I went to St. James’s Church last Sunday, and there opposite me sat my beauty of the Wells. Her behavior during the whole service was so pert, languishing, and absurd; she flirted her fan, and ogled and eyed me in a manner so indecent, that I was obliged to shut my eyes, so as actually not to see her, and whenever I opened them beheld hers (and very bright they are) still staring at me. I fell in with her afterwards at Court, and at the playhouse; and here nothing would satisfy her but she must elbow through the crowd and speak to me, and invite me to the assembly, which she holds at her house, not very far from Ch-r-ng Cr-ss.
“Having made her a promise to attend, of course I kept my promise; and found the young widow in the midst of a half-dozen of card tables, and a crowd of wits and admirers. I made the best bow I could, and advanced towards her; and saw by a peculiar puzzled look in her face, though she tried to hide her perplexity, that she had forgotten even my name.
“Her talk, artful as it was, convinced me that I had guessed aright. She turned the conversation most ridiculously upon the spelling of names and words; and I replied with as ridiculous fulsome compliments as I could pay her: indeed, one in which I compared her to an angel visiting the sick wells, went a little too far; nor should I have employed it, but that the allusion came from the Second Lesson last Sunday, which we both had heard, and I was pressed to answer her.
“Then she came to the question, which I knew was awaiting me, and asked how I SPELT my name? ‘Madam,’ says I, turning on my heel, ‘I spell it with a Y.’ And so I left her, wondering at the light-heartedness of the town-people, who forget and make friends so easily, and resolved to look elsewhere for a partner for your constant reader,
“CYMON WYLDOATS.”
“You know my real name, Mr. Spectator, in which there is no such a letter as HUPSILON. But if the lady, whom I have called Saccharissa, wonders that I appear no more at the tea-tables, she is hereby respectfully informed the reason Y.”
The above is a parable, whereof the writer will now expound the meaning. Jocasta was no other than Miss Esmond, Maid of Honor to her Majesty. She had told Mr. Esmond this little story of having met a gentleman somewhere, and forgetting his name, when the gentleman, with no such malicious intentions as those of “Cymon” in the above fable, made the answer simply as above; and we all laughed to think how little Mistress Jocasta-Beatrix had profited by her artifice and precautions.
As for Cymon, he was intended to represent yours and her very humble servant, the writer of the apologue and of this story, which we had printed on a “Spectator” paper at Mr. Steele’s office, exactly as those famous journals were printed, and which was laid on the table at breakfast in place of the real newspaper. Mistress Jocasta, who had plenty of wit, could not live without her Spectator to her tea; and this sham Spectator was intended to convey to the young woman that she herself was a flirt, and that Cymon was a gentleman of honor and resolution, seeing all her faults, and determined to break the chains once and for ever.
For though enough hath been said about this love-business already — enough, at least, to prove to the writer’s heirs what a silly fond fool their old grandfather was, who would like them to consider him as a very wise old gentleman; yet not near all has been told concerning this matter, which, if it were allowed to take in Esmond’s journal the space it occupied in his time, would weary his kinsmen and women of a hundred years’ time beyond all endurance; and form such a diary of folly and drivelling, raptures and rage, as no man of ordinary vanity would like to leave behind him.
The truth is, that, whether she laughed at him or encouraged him; whether she smiled or was cold, and turned her smiles on another; worldly and ambitious, as he knew her to be; hard and careless, as she seemed to grow with her court life, and a hundred admirers that came to her and left her; Esmond, do what he would, never could get Beatrix out of his mind; thought of her constantly at home or away. If he read his na............