LETTER XXII
MR. MOWBRAY, TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ.UXBRIDGE, SUNDAY MORN. NINE O'CLOCK.
DEAR JACK,
I send you enclosed a letter from Mr. Lovelace; which, though written inthe cursed Algebra, I know to be such a one as will show what a queer wayhe is in; for he read it to us with the air of a tragedian. You will seeby it what the mad fellow had intended to do, if we had not all of usinterposed. He was actually setting out with a surgeon of this place, tohave the lady opened and embalmed.--Rot me if it be not my fullpersuasion that, if he had, her heart would have been found to be eitheriron or marble.
We have got Lord M. to him. His Lordship is also much afflicted at thelady's death. His sisters and nieces, he says, will be ready to breaktheir hearts. What a rout's here about a woman! For after all she wasno more.
We have taken a pailful of black bull's blood from him; and this haslowered him a little. But he threatens Col. Morden, he threatens you foryour cursed reflections, [cursed reflections indeed, Jack!] and cursesall the world and himself still.
Last night his mourning (which is full as deep as for a wife) was broughthome, and his fellows' mourning too. And, though eight o'clock, he wouldput it on, and make them attend him in theirs.
Every body blames him on this lady's account. But I see not for why.She was a vixen in her virtue. What a pretty fellow she has ruined--Hey,Jack!--and her relations are ten times more to blame than he. I willprove this to the teeth of them all. If they could use her ill, whyshould they expect him to use her well?--You, or I, or Tourville, in hisshoes, would have done as he has done. Are not all the girls forewarned?--'Has he done by her as that caitiff Miles did to the farmer's daughter,whom he tricked up to town, (a pretty girl also, just such another asBob.'s Rosebud,) under a notion of waiting on a lady?--Drilled her on,pretending the lady was abroad. Drank her light-hearted--then carriedher to a play--then it was too late, you know, to see the pretended lady--then to a bagnio--ruined her, as they call it, and all this the sameday. Kept her on (an ugly dog, too!) a fortnight or three weeks, thenleft her to the mercy of the people of the bagnio, (never paying for anything,) who stript her of all her clothes, and because she would not takeon, threw her into prison; where she died in want and despair!'--A truestory, thou knowest, Jack.--This fellow deserved to be d----d. But hasour Bob. been such a villain as this?--And would he not have married thisflinty-hearted lady?--So he is justified very evidently.
Why, then, should such cursed qualms take him?--Who would have thought hehad been such poor blood? Now [rot the puppy!] to see him sit silent in acorner, when he has tired himself with his mock majesty, and with hisargumentation, (Who so fond of arguing as he?) and teaching his shadow tomake mouths against the wainscot--The devil fetch me if I have patiencewith him!
But he has had no rest for these ten days--that's the thing!--You mustwrite to him; and pr'ythee coax him, Jack, and send him what he writesfor, and give him all his way--there will be no bearing him else. Andget the lady buried as fast as you can; and don't let him know where.
This letter should have gone yesterday. We told him it did. But were inhopes he would have inquired after it again. But he raves as he has notany answer.
What he vouchsafed to read of other of your letters has given my Lordsuch a curiosity as makes him desire you to continue your accounts. Praydo; but not in your hellish Arabic; and we will let the poor fellow onlyinto what we think fitting for his present way.
I live a cursed dull poking life here. What with I so lately saw of poorBelton, and what I now see of this charming fellow, I shall be as crazyas he soon, or as dull as thou, Jack; so must seek for better company intown than either of you. I have been forced to read sometimes to divertme; and you know I hate reading. It presently sets me into a fit ofdrowsiness; and then I yawn and stretch like a devil.
Yet in Dryden's Palemon and Arcite have I just now met with a passage,that has in it much of our Bob.'s case. These are some of the lines.
Mr. Mowbray then recites some lines from that poem, describing a distracted man, and runs the parallel; and then, priding himself in his performance, says:
Let me tell you, that had I begun to write as early as you and Lovelace,I might have cut as good a figure as either of you. Why not? But boy orman I ever hated a book. 'Tis folly to lie. I loved action, my boy. Ihated droning; and have led in former days more boys from their book,than ever my master made to profit by it. Kicking and cuffing, andorchard-robbing, were my early glory.
But I am tired of writing. I never wrote such a long letter in my life.My wrist and my fingers and thumb ache d----n----y. The pen is anhundred weight at least. And my eyes are ready to drop out of my headupon the paper.--The cramp but this minute in my fingers. Rot the gooseand the goose-quill! I will write no more long letters for atwelve-month to come. Yet one word; we think the mad fellow coming to.Adieu.