• • •
She is gone. Slipped down before I was aware. She had ordered a chair, on purpose to exclude my personal attendance.
But she would not be so careless of obliging me, if she knew what I have already come at, and how the women urge me on; for they are continually complaining of the restraint they lie under in their behaviour, in their attendance; neglecting all their concerns in the front house and keeping this elegant back one entirely free from company, that she may have no suspicion of them. They doubt not my generosity, they say: but why for my own sake, in Lord M.’s style, should I make so long a harvest of so little corn? Women, ye reason well. I think I will begin my operations the moment she comes in.
• • •
I have come at the letter brought her from Miss Howe today. Plot, conjuration, sorcery, witchcraft, all going forward! I shall not be able to see Miss Harlowe with patience. As the nymphs below say, why is night necessary? And Sally and Polly upbraidingly remind me of my first attempts upon themselves. Yet force answers not my end. And yet it may, if there be truth in that part of the libertine’s creed, that once subdued, is always subdued! And what woman answers affirmatively to the question?
• • •
She is returned. But refuses to admit me. Desires to have the day to herself.
But since I must not see her (she will be mistress of her own will, and of her time truly!), let me fill up mine by telling thee what I have come at.
The first letter the women met with is dated April 27. Where can she have put the preceding ones? It mentions Mr Hickman as a busy fellow between them. Hickman had best take care of himself.
The next letter is dated May 3. In this the little termagant expresses her astonishment that her mother should write to Miss Harlowe to forbid her to correspond with her daughter. Mr Hickman, she says, is of opinion that she ought not to obey her mother. How the creeping fellow trims between both! I am afraid I must punish him as well as this virago. But observe the vixen, ‘Tis well he is of her opinion; for her mother having set her up, she must have somebody to quarrel with. Could a Lovelace have allowed himself a greater license? This girl’s a devilish rake in her heart. Had she been a man, and one of us, she’d have outdone us all in enterprise and spirit.
Thou wilt say to thyself by this time: And can this proud and insolent girl be the same Miss Howe who sighed for honest Sir George Colmar; and who, but for this her beloved friend, would have followed him in all his broken fortunes, when he was obliged to quit the kingdom?
Yes, she is the very same. And I always found in others, as well as in myself, that a first passion thoroughly subdued, made the conqueror of it a rover; the conqueress a tyrant.
In another letter, She approves of her design to leave me, if she can be received by her friends.
In the next, wicked as I am, she fears I must be her lord and master. I hope so.
The fire of friendship then blazes out and crackles. I never before imagined that so fervent a friendship could subsist between two sister-beauties, both toasts. But even here it may be inflamed by opposition, and by that contradiction which gives spirit to female spirits of a warm and romantic turn.
She raves about coming up, if by so doing she could prevent so noble a creature from stooping too low, or save her from ruin. One reed to support another! These girls are frenzical in their friendship. They know not what a steady fire is.
How comes it to pass, that I cannot help being pleased with this virago’s spirit, though I suffer by it? Had I her but here, I’d engage in a week’s time to teach her submission without reserve. What pleasure should I have in breaking such a spirit! I should wish for her but for one month, in all, I think. She would be too tame and spiritless for me after that. How sweetly pretty to see the two lovely friends, when humbled and tame, both sitting in the darkest corner of a room, arm in arm, weeping and sobbing for each other! And I their emperor, their then acknowledged emperor, reclined on a sophee, in the same room, Grand Signor-like, uncertain to which I should first throw out my handkerchief?
Mind the girl: she is enraged at the Harlowes: she is angry at her own mother; she is exasperated against her foolish and low-vanitied Lovelace. FOOLISH, a little toad! (God forgive me for calling a virtuous girl a toad!) Let us stoop to lift the wretch out of his dirt, though we soil our fingers in doing it! He has not been guilty of direct indecency to you. It seems extraordinary to Miss Howe that I have not. Nor dare he. She should be sure of that. If women have such things in their heads, why should not I in my heart? Not so much of a devil as that comes to, neither. Such villainous intentions would have shown themselves before now, if I had them. Lord help them!
She then puts her friend upon urging for settlements, licence, and so forth. No room for delicacy now, she says. And tells her what she shall say, to bring all forward from me. Dost think, Jack, that I should not have carried my point long ago, but for this vixen? She reproaches her for having MODESTY’D away, as she calls it, more than one opportunity that she ought not to have slipped. Thus thou seest that the noblest of the sex mean nothing in the world by their shyness and distance, but to pound a poor fellow whom they dislike not, when he comes into their purlieus.
But I have still more unpardonable transcripts from other letters.
Letter 199: MR LOVELACE TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ.
The next letter is of such a nature, that I dare say these proud varletesses would not have had it fall into my hands for the world.
I see by it to what her displeasure with me, in relation to my proposals, was owing. They were not summed up, it seems, with the warmth, with the ardour, which she had expected. This whole letter was transcribed by Dorcas, to whose lot it fell. Thou shalt have copies of them all at full length shortly.
Men of our cast, this little devil says, she fancies, cannot have the ardours that honest men have. Miss Howe has very pretty fancies, Jack. Charming girl! Would to heaven I knew whether my fair one answers her as freely as she writes! ‘Twould vex a man’s heart, that this virago should have come honestly by her fancies.
His clenched fist to his forehead on your leaving him in just displeasure—that is, when she was not satisfied with my ardours, and please ye! I remember the motion: but her back was toward me at the time. Are these watchful ladies all eye? But observe her wish, I wish it had been a poleaxe, and in the hands of his worst enemy. I will have patience, Jack; I will have patience! My day is at hand. Then will I steel my heart with these remembrances.
How passion drives a man on! Now my resentments are warm, I will see, and perhaps will punish, this proud, this double-armed beauty. I have sent to tell her that I must be admitted to sup with her. We have neither of us dined: she refused to drink tea in the afternoon. And I believe neither of us will have much stomach to our supper.
Letter 200: MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE TO MISS HOWE
Sunday morning, May 21
Near nine o’clock
I have your kind letter of yesterday. He knows I have. And I shall expect that he will be inquisitive next time I see him after your opinion of his proposals. I doubted not your approbation of them, and had written an answer on that presumption; which is ready for him. He must study for occasions of procrastination, and to disoblige me, if now anything happens to set us at variance again.
• • •
He has just sent me word that he insists upon supping with me. As we had been in a good train for several days past, I thought it not prudent to break with him for little matters. Yet, to be in a manner threatened into his will, I know not how to bear that.
• • •
While I was considering, he came up and, tapping at my door, told me, in a very angry tone, he must see me this night. He could not rest, till he had been told what he had done to deserve this treatment.
I must go to him. Yet perhaps he has nothing new to say to me. I shall be very angry with him.
• • •
On my entering the dining-room, he took my hands in his, in such a humour as I saw plainly he was resolved to quarrel with me. And for what? I never in my life beheld in anybody such a wild, such an angry, such an impatient spirit. I was terrified; and instead of being as angry as I intended to be, I was forced to be all mildness. I can hardly remember what were his first words, I was so frighted. But, You hate me, madam! You hate me, madam! were some of them—with such a fierceness—I wished myself a thousand miles distant from him. I hate nobody, said I; I thank God I hate nobody. You terrify me, Mr Lovelace. Let me leave you. The man, my dear, looked quite ugly. I never saw a man look so ugly, as passion made him look. And for what? And he so grasped my hands—fierce creature! In short, he seemed by his looks, and by his words (once putting his arms about me), to wish me to provoke him. So that I had nothing to do but to beg of him, which I did repeatedly, to permit me to withdraw; and to promise to meet him at his own time in the morning.
It was with a very ill grace that he complied, on that condition; and at parting he kissed my hand with such a savageness, that a redness remains upon it still.
Perfect for me, my dearest Miss Howe, perfect for me, I beseech you, your kind scheme with Mrs Townsend—and I will then leave this man. See you not how from step to step, he grows upon me? I tremble to look back upon his encroachments. And now to give me cause to apprehend more evil from him than indignation will permit me to express!
I was so disgusted with him, as well as frighted by him, that on my return to my chamber, in a fit of passionate despair, I tore almost in two, the answer I had written to his proposals.
I will see him in the morning, because I promised I would. But I will go out, and that without him, or any attendant.
Your CLARISSA HARLOWE
Letter 201: MR LOVELACE TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ.
Monday morn. May 22
No generosity in this lady. None at all. Wouldst thou not have thought that after I had permitted her to withdraw, primed for mischief as I was, that she would meet me next morning early; and that with a smile; making me one of her best curtsies?
I was in the dining-room before six, expecting her. She opened not her door. I went upstairs and down, and hemmed, and called Will, called Dorcas: threw the doors hard to; but still she opened not her door. Thus till half an hour after eight, fooled I away my time; and then, breakfast ready, I sent Dorcas to request her company.
But I was astonished, when, following the wench at the first invitation, I saw her enter dressed, all but her gloves, and those and her fan in her hand; in the same moment, bidding Dorcas direct Will to get her a chair to the door.
Cruel creature, thought I, to expose me thus to the derision of the women below!
Going abroad, madam?
I am, sir.
I looked cursed silly, I am sure. You will breakfast first, I hope, madam, in a very humble strain: yet with an hundred tenter-hooks in my heart.
Had she given me more notice of her intention, I had perhaps wrought myself up to the frame I was in the day before, and begun my vengeance. And immediately came into my head all the virulence that had been transcribed for me from Miss Howe’s letters, and in that I had transcribed myself.
Yes, she would drink one dish; and then laid her gloves and fan in the window just by.
I was perfectly disconcerted. I hemmed and hawed, and was going to speak several times; but knew not in what key. Who’s modest now, thought I! Who’s insolent now! How a tyrant of a woman confounds a bashful man! She was my Miss Howe, I thought; and I the Spiritless Hickman.
At last, I will begin, thought I.
She a dish—I a dish.
Sip, her eyes her own, she; like an haughty and imperious sovereign, conscious of dignity, every look a favour.
Sip, like her vassal, I; lips and hands trembling, and not knowing that I sipped or tasted.
Dorcas came in just then. Dorcas, said she, is a chair gone for?
Damned impertinence, thought I, putting me out of my speech! And I was forced to wait for the servant’s answer to the insolent mistress’s question.
William is gone for one, madam.
What weather is it, Dorcas? said she, as regardless of me, as if I had not been present.
A little lowering, madam. The sun is gone in. It was very fine half an hour ago.
I had no patience. Up I rose. Down went the tea-cup, saucer and all. Confound the weather, the sunshine, and the wench! Begone for a devil, when I am speaking to your lady, and have so little opportunity given me.
Up rose the lady, half frighted; and snatched from the window her gloves and fan.
You must not go, madam!—by my soul, you must not—taking her hand.
Must not, sir! But I must. You can curse your maid in my absence, as well as if I were present. Except—except—you intend for me, what you direct to her.
Do not make me desperate, madam. Had Miss Howe been my friend, I had not been thus treated. It is but too plain to whom my difficulties are owing. I have long observed that every letter you receive from her makes an alteration in your behaviour to me. She would have you treat me, as she treats Mr Hickman, I suppose: but neither does that treatment become your admirable temper to offer, nor me to receive.
This startled her. She did not care to have me think hardly of Miss Howe.
But recollecting herself, Miss Howe, said she, is a friend to virtue, and to good men. If she like not you, it is because you are not one of those.
Yes, madam; and therefore, to speak of Mr Hickman and myself, as you both, I suppose, think of each, she treats him as she would not treat a Lovelace.
She would have flung from me: I will go out, Mr Lovelace. I will not be detained.
Indeed you must not, madam, in this humour. And I placed myself between her and the door. And then she threw herself into a chair, fanning herself, her sweet face all crimsoned over with passion.
• • •
Monday evening
At my repeated request she condescended to meet me in the dining-room to afternoon tea, and not before.
She entered with bashfulness, as I thought; in a pretty confusion for having carried her apprehensions too far. Sullen and slow moved she towards the tea-table. Dorcas present, busy in tea-cup preparations. I took her reluctant hand, and pressed it to my lips. Dearest, loveliest of creatures, why this distance? Why this displeasure? How can you thus torture the faithfullest heart in the world? She disengaged her hand.
Oh Mr Lovelace, we have been long enough together to be tired of each other’s humours and ways; ways and humours so different, that perhaps you ought to dislike me, as much as I do you. I think, I think, that I cannot make an answerable return to the value you profess for me. My temper is utterly ruined. You have given me an ill opinion of all mankind; of yourself in particular: and withal so bad a one of myself that I shall never be able to look up, having utterly and for ever lost all that self-complacency and conscious pride, which are so necessary to carry a woman through this life with tolerable satisfaction to herself.
She paused. I was silent. By my soul, thought I, this sweet creature will at last undo me!
She proceeded. What now remains, but that you pronounce me free of all obligation to you? And that you will not hinder me from pursuing the destiny that shall be allotted me?
Again she paused. I was still silent; meditating whether to renounce all further designs upon her; whether I had not received sufficient evidence of a virtue, and of a greatness of soul, that could not be questioned or impeached.
She went on: Propitious to me be your silence, Mr Lovelace! Tell me that I am free of all obligation to you. You know I never made you promises. You know that you are not under any to me. My broken fortunes I matter not.
I had not a word to say for myself. Such a war in my mind had I never known. Gratitude, and admiration of th
e excellent creature before me, combating with villainous habit, with resolutions so premeditately made, and with views so much gloried in! An hundred new contrivances in my head, and in my heart, that, to be honest, as it is called, must all be given up by a heart delighting in intrigue and difficulty. Miss Howe’s virulences endeavoured to be recollected—yet recollection refusing to bring them forward with the requisite efficacy.
One favour, dearest creature. Let me but know whether Miss Howe approves or disapproves of my proposals? I know her to be my enemy. Must not, madam, the sudden change in your conduct, the very next morning, astonish and distress me? And this persisted in with still stronger declarations, after you had received the impatiently-expected letter from Miss Howe; must I not conclude, that all was owing to her influence; and that some other application or project was meditating, that made it necessary to keep me again at distance till the result were known, and which was to deprive me of you for ever? for was not that your constantly proposed preliminary? Well, madam, might I be wrought up to a half-frenzy by this apprehension; and well might I charge you with hating me. And now, dearest creature, let me know, I once more ask you, what is Miss Howe’s opinion of my proposals?
Were I disposed to debate with you, Mr Lovelace, I could very easily answer your fine harangue. But at present, I shall only say that your ways have been very unaccountable. Whether owing in you to the want of a clear head, or a sound heart, I cannot determine; but it is to the want of one of them, I verily think, that I am to ascribe the greatest part of your strange conduct.
Curse upon the heart of the little devil, said I, who instigates you to think so hardly of the faithfullest heart in the world!