The History of Henry Esmond, Esq., a Colonel in the Service of Her Majesty Queen Anne

by William Makepeace Thackeray

  CHAPTER XI.

  I COME HOME FOR A HOLIDAY TO CASTLEWOOD, AND FIND A SKELETON IN THEHOUSE.

  At his third long vacation, Esmond came as usual to Castlewood, alwaysfeeling an eager thrill of pleasure when he found himself once morein the house where he had passed so many years, and beheld the kindfamiliar eyes of his mistress looking upon him. She and her children(out of whose company she scarce ever saw him) came to greet him. MissBeatrix was grown so tall that Harry did not quite know whether hemight kiss her or no; and she blushed and held back when he offeredthat salutation, though she took it, and even courted it, when they werealone. The young lord was shooting up to be like his gallant father inlook, though with his mother's kind eyes: the lady of Castlewood herselfseemed grown, too, since Harry saw her--in her look more stately, inher person fuller, in her face still as ever most tender and friendly, agreater air of command and decision than had appeared in that guilelesssweet countenance which Harry remembered so gratefully. The tone of hervoice was so much deeper and sadder when she spoke and welcomed him,that it quite startled Esmond, who looked up at her surprised as shespoke, when she withdrew her eyes from him; nor did she ever look at himafterwards when his own eyes were gazing upon her. A something hintingat grief and secret, and filling his mind with alarm undefinable, seemedto speak with that low thrilling voice of hers, and look out of thoseclear sad eyes. Her greeting to Esmond was so cold that it almost painedthe lad, (who would have liked to fall on his knees, and kiss the skirtof her robe, so fond and ardent was his respect and regard for her,)and he faltered in answering the questions which she, hesitating on herside, began to put to him. Was he happy at Cambridge? Did he study toohard? She hoped not. He had grown very tall, and looked very well.

  "He has got a moustache!" cries out Master Esmond.

  "Why does he not wear a peruke like my Lord Mohun?" asked Miss Beatrix."My lord says that nobody wears their own hair."

  "I believe you will have to occupy your old chamber," says my lady. "Ihope the housekeeper has got it ready."

  "Why, mamma, you have been there ten times these three days yourself!"exclaims Frank.

  "And she cut some flowers which you planted in my garden--do youremember, ever so many years ago? when I was quite a little girl," criesout Miss Beatrix, on tiptoe. "And mamma put them in your window."

  "I remember when you grew well after you were ill that you used to likeroses," said the lady, blushing like one of them. They all conductedHarry Esmond to his chamber; the children running before, Harry walkingby his mistress hand-in-hand.

  The old room had been ornamented and beautified not a little to receivehim. The flowers were in the window in a china vase; and there was afine new counterpane on the bed, which chatterbox Beatrix said mamma hadmade too. A fire was crackling on the hearth, although it was June. Mylady thought the room wanted warming; everything was done to make himhappy and welcome: "And you are not to be a page any longer, but agentleman and kinsman, and to walk with papa and mamma," said thechildren. And as soon as his dear mistress and children had left him tohimself, it was with a heart overflowing with love and gratefulness thathe flung himself down on his knees by the side of the little bed, andasked a blessing upon those who were so kind to him.

  The children, who are always house tell-tales, soon made him acquaintedwith the little history of the house and family. Papa had been to Londontwice. Papa often went away now. Papa had taken Beatrix to Westlands,where she was taller than Sir George Harper's second daughter, thoughshe was two years older. Papa had taken Beatrix and Frank both toBellminster, where Frank had got the better of Lord Bellminster's son ina boxing-match--my lord, laughing, told Harry afterwards. Many gentlemencame to stop with papa, and papa had gotten a new game from London,a French game, called a billiard--that the French king played it verywell: and the Dowager Lady Castlewood had sent Miss Beatrix a present;and papa had gotten a new chaise, with two little horses, which he drovehimself, beside the coach, which mamma went in; and Dr. Tusher was across old plague, and they did not like to learn from him at all; andpapa did not care about them learning, and laughed when they were attheir books, but mamma liked them to learn, and taught them; and "Idon't think papa is fond of mamma," said Miss Beatrix, with her greateyes. She had come quite close up to Harry Esmond by the time thisprattle took place, and was on his knee, and had examined all the pointsof his dress, and all the good or bad features of his homely face.

  "You shouldn't say that papa is not fond of mamma," said the boy, atthis confession. "Mamma never said so; and mamma forbade you to say it,Miss Beatrix."

  'Twas this, no doubt, that accounted for the sadness in LadyCastlewood's eyes, and the plaintive vibrations of her voice. Whodoes not know of eyes, lighted by love once, where the flame shines nomore?--of lamps extinguished, once properly trimmed and tended? Everyman has such in his house. Such mementoes make our splendidest chamberslook blank and sad; such faces seen in a day cast a gloom upon oursunshine. So oaths mutually sworn, and invocations of heaven, andpriestly ceremonies, and fond belief, and love, so fond and faithfulthat it never doubted but that it should live for ever, are all of noavail towards making love eternal: it dies, in spite of the banns andthe priest; and I have often thought there should be a visitation of thesick for it, and a funeral service, and an extreme unction, and anabi in pace. It has its course, like all mortal things--its beginning,progress, and decay. It buds and it blooms out into sunshine, and itwithers and ends. Strephon and Chloe languish apart; join in a rapture:and presently you hear that Chloe is crying, and Strephon has brokenhis crook across her back. Can you mend it so as to show no marks ofrupture? Not all the priests of Hymen, not all the incantations to thegods, can make it whole!

  Waking up from dreams, books, and visions of college honors, in whichfor two years, Harry Esmond had been immersed, he found himself,instantly, on his return home, in the midst of this actual tragedy oflife, which absorbed and interested him more than all his tutor hadtaught him. The persons whom he loved best in the world, and to whom heowed most, were living unhappily together. The gentlest and kindest ofwomen was suffering ill usage and shedding tears in secret: the man whomade her wretched by neglect, if not by violence, was Harry's benefactorand patron. In houses where, in place of that sacred, inmost flameof love, there is discord at the centre, the whole household becomeshypocritical, and each lies to his neighbor. The husband (or it maybe the wife) lies when the visitor comes in, and wears a grin ofreconciliation or politeness before him. The wife lies (indeed, herbusiness is to do that, and to smile, however much she is beaten),swallows her tears, and lies to her lord and master; lies in biddinglittle Jackey respect dear papa; lies in assuring grandpapa that sheis perfectly happy. The servants lie, wearing grave faces behind theirmaster's chair, and pretending to be unconscious of the fighting;and so, from morning till bedtime, life is passed in falsehood. Andwiseacres call this a proper regard of morals, and point out Baucis andPhilemon as examples of a good life.

  If my lady did not speak of her griefs to Harry Esmond, my lord wasby no means reserved when in his cups, and spoke his mind very freely,bidding Harry in his coarse way, and with his blunt language, bewareof all women as cheats, jades, jilts, and using other unmistakablemonosyllables in speaking of them. Indeed, 'twas the fashion of the day,as I must own; and there's not a writer of my time of any note, with theexception of poor Dick Steele, that does not speak of a woman as ofa slave, and scorn and use her as such. Mr. Pope, Mr. Congreve, Mr.Addison, Mr. Gay, every one of 'em, sing in this key, each according tohis nature and politeness, and louder and fouler than all in abuse isDr. Swift, who spoke of them as he treated them, worst of all.

  Much of the quarrels and hatred which arise between married people comein my mind from the husband's rage and revolt at discovering thathis slave and bedfellow, who is to minister to all his wishes, and ischurch-sworn to honor and obey him--is his superior; and that HE,and not she, ought to be the subordinate of the twain; and in thesecontroversies, I think, lay the cause of
my lord's anger against hislady. When he left her, she began to think for herself, and her thoughtswere not in his favor. After the illumination, when the love-lamp isput out that anon we spoke of, and by the common daylight we look at thepicture, what a daub it looks! what a clumsy effigy! How many men andwives come to this knowledge, think you? And if it be painful to a womanto find herself mated for life to a boor, and ordered to love and honora dullard; it is worse still for the man himself perhaps, whenever inhis dim comprehension the idea dawns that his slave and drudge yonderis, in truth, his superior; that the woman who does his bidding, andsubmits to his humor, should be his lord; that she can think a thousandthings beyond the power of his muddled brains; and that in yonder head,on the pillow opposite to him, lie a thousand feelings, mysteries ofthought, latent scorns and rebellions, whereof he only dimly perceivesthe existence as they look out furtively from her eyes: treasures oflove doomed to perish without a hand to gather them; sweet fancies andimages of beauty that would grow and unfold themselves into flower;bright wit that would shine like diamonds could it be brought into thesun: and the tyrant in possession crushes the outbreak of all these,drives them back like slaves into the dungeon and darkness, and chafeswithout that his prisoner is rebellious, and his sworn subject undutifuland refractory. So the lamp was out in Castlewood Hall, and the lordand lady there saw each other as they were. With her illness and alteredbeauty my lord's fire for his wife disappeared; with his selfishness andfaithlessness her foolish fiction of love and reverence was rent away.Love!--who is to love what is base and unlovely? Respect!--who is torespect what is gross and sensual? Not all the marriage oaths swornbefore all the parsons, cardinals, ministers, muftis, and rabbins inthe world, can bind to that monstrous allegiance. This couple was livingapart then; the woman happy to be allowed to love and tend her children(who were never of her own good-will away from her), and thankful tohave saved such treasures as these out of the wreck in which the betterpart of her heart went down.

  These young ones had had no instructors save their mother, and DoctorTusher for their theology occasionally, and had made more progress thanmight have been expected under a tutor so indulgent and fond as LadyCastlewood. Beatrix could sing and dance like a nymph. Her voice washer father's delight after dinner. She ruled over the house with littleimperial ways, which her parents coaxed and laughed at. She had longlearned the value of her bright eyes, and tried experiments in coquetry,in corpore vili, upon rustics and country squires, until she shouldprepare to conquer the world and the fashion. She put on a new ribbon towelcome Harry Esmond, made eyes at him, and directed her young smiles athim, not a little to the amusement of the young man, and the joy of herfather, who laughed his great laugh, and encouraged her in her thousandantics. Lady Castlewood watched the child gravely and sadly: thelittle one was pert in her replies to her mother, yet eager in herprotestations of love and promises of amendment; and as ready to cry(after a little quarrel brought on by her own giddiness) until shehad won back her mamma's favor, as she was to risk the kind lady'sdispleasure by fresh outbreaks of restless vanity. From her mother's sadlooks she fled to her father's chair and boozy laughter. She alreadyset the one against the other: and the little rogue delighted in themischief which she knew how to make so early.

  The young heir of Castlewood was spoiled by father and mother both. Hetook their caresses as men do, and as if they were his right. He hadhis hawks and his spaniel dog, his little horse and his beagles. He hadlearned to ride, and to drink, and to shoot flying: and he had asmall court, the sons of the huntsman and woodman, as became theheir-apparent, taking after the example of my lord his father. If he hada headache, his mother was as much frightened as if the plague were inthe house: my lord laughed and jeered in his abrupt way--(indeed, 'twason the day after New Year's Day, and an excess of mince-pie)--and saidwith some of his usual oaths--"D--n it, Harry Esmond--you see how mylady takes on about Frank's megrim. She used to be sorry about me, myboy (pass the tankard, Harry), and to be frightened if I had a headacheonce. She don't care about my head now. They're like that--womenare--all the same, Harry, all jilts in their hearts. Stick tocollege--stick to punch and buttery ale: and never see a woman that'shandsomer than an old cinder-faced bed-maker. That's my counsel."

  It was my lord's custom to fling out many jokes of this nature, inpresence of his wife and children, at meals--clumsy sarcasms which mylady turned many a time, or which, sometimes, she affected not to hear,or which now and again would hit their mark and make the poor victimwince (as you could see by her flushing face and eyes filling withtears), or which again worked her up to anger and retort, when,in answer to one of these heavy bolts, she would flash back with aquivering reply. The pair were not happy; nor indeed was it happy to bewith them. Alas that youthful love and truth should end in bitternessand bankruptcy! To see a young couple loving each other is no wonder;but to see an old couple loving each other is the best sight of all.Harry Esmond became the confidant of one and the other--that is, mylord told the lad all his griefs and wrongs (which were indeed of LordCastlewood's own making), and Harry divined my lady's; his affectionleading him easily to penetrate the hypocrisy under which LadyCastlewood generally chose to go disguised, and see her heart achingwhilst her face wore a smile. 'Tis a hard task for women in life, thatmask which the world bids them wear. But there is no greater crime thanfor a woman who is ill used and unhappy to show that she is so. Theworld is quite relentless about bidding her to keep a cheerful face; andour women, like the Malabar wives, are forced to go smiling and paintedto sacrifice themselves with their husbands; their relations being themost eager to push them on to their duty, and, under their shouts andapplauses, to smother and hush their cries of pain.

  So, into the sad secret of his patron's household, Harry Esmond becameinitiated, he scarce knew how. It had passed under his eyes two yearsbefore, when he could not understand it; but reading, and thought, andexperience of men, had oldened him; and one of the deepest sorrows of alife which had never, in truth, been very happy, came upon him now, whenhe was compelled to understand and pity a grief which he stood quitepowerless to relieve.

  It hath been said my lord would never take the oath of allegiance, norhis seat as a peer of the kingdom of Ireland, where, indeed, he had buta nominal estate; and refused an English peerage which King William'sgovernment offered him as a bribe to secure his loyalty.

  He might have accepted this, and would doubtless, but for the earnestremonstrances of his wife, who ruled her husband's opinions better thanshe could govern his conduct, and who being a simple-hearted woman,with but one rule of faith and right, never thought of swerving from herfidelity to the exiled family, or of recognizing any other sovereign butKing James; and though she acquiesced in the doctrine of obedience tothe reigning power, no temptation, she thought, could induce her toacknowledge the Prince of Orange as rightful monarch, nor to let herlord so acknowledge him. So my Lord Castlewood remained a nonjuror allhis life nearly, though his self-denial caused him many a pang, and lefthim sulky and out of humor.

  The year after the Revolution, and all through King William's life, 'tisknown there were constant intrigues for the restoration of the exiledfamily; but if my Lord Castlewood took any share of these, as isprobable, 'twas only for a short time, and when Harry Esmond was tooyoung to be introduced into such important secrets.

  But in the year 1695, when that conspiracy of Sir John Fenwick, ColonelLowick, and others, was set on foot, for waylaying King William as hecame from Hampton Court to London, and a secret plot was formed, inwhich a vast number of the nobility and people of honor were engaged,Father Holt appeared at Castlewood, and brought a young friend withhim, a gentleman whom 'twas easy to see that both my lord and the Fathertreated with uncommon deference. Harry Esmond saw this gentleman, andknew and recognized him in after life, as shall be shown in its place;and he has little doubt now that my Lord Viscount was implicatedsomewhat in the transactions which always kept Father Holt employedand travelling hither and thither under a dozen of
different names anddisguises. The Father's companion went by the name of Captain James;and it was under a very different name and appearance that Harry Esmondafterwards saw him.

  It was the next year that the Fenwick conspiracy blew up, which is amatter of public history now, and which ended in the execution of SirJohn and many more, who suffered manfully for their treason, and whowere attended to Tyburn by my lady's father Dean Armstrong, Mr.Collier, and other stout nonjuring clergymen, who absolved them at thegallows-foot.

  'Tis known that when Sir John was apprehended, discovery was made of agreat number of names of gentlemen engaged in the conspiracy; when, witha noble wisdom and clemency, the Prince burned the list of conspiratorsfurnished to him, and said he would know no more. Now it was after thisthat Lord Castlewood swore his great oath, that he would never, sohelp him heaven, be engaged in any transaction against that brave andmerciful man; and so he told Holt when the indefatigable priest visitedhim, and would have had him engage in a farther conspiracy. After thismy lord ever spoke of King William as he was--as one of the wisest, thebravest, and the greatest of men. My Lady Esmond (for her part) said shecould never pardon the King, first, for ousting his father-in-lawfrom his throne, and secondly, for not being constant to his wife, thePrincess Mary. Indeed, I think if Nero were to rise again, and be kingof England, and a good family man, the ladies would pardon him. My lordlaughed at his wife's objections--the standard of virtue did not fit himmuch.

  The last conference which Mr. Holt had with his lordship took place whenHarry was come home for his first vacation from college (Harry saw hisold tutor but for a half-hour, and exchanged no private words with him),and their talk, whatever it might be, left my Lord Viscount very muchdisturbed in mind--so much so, that his wife, and his young kinsman,Henry Esmond, could not but observe his disquiet. After Holt wasgone, my lord rebuffed Esmond, and again treated him with the greatestdeference; he shunned his wife's questions and company, and looked athis children with such a face of gloom and anxiety, muttering, "Poorchildren--poor children!" in a way that could not but fill those whoselife it was to watch him and obey him with great alarm. For which gloom,each person interested in the Lord Castlewood, framed in his or her ownmind an interpretation.

  My lady, with a laugh of cruel bitterness said, "I suppose the personat Hexton has been ill, or has scolded him" (for my lord's infatuationabout Mrs. Marwood was known only too well). Young Esmond feared for hismoney affairs, into the condition of which he had been initiated; andthat the expenses, always greater than his revenue, had caused LordCastlewood disquiet.

  One of the causes why my Lord Viscount had taken young Esmond into hisspecial favor was a trivial one, that hath not before been mentioned,though it was a very lucky accident in Henry Esmond's life. A very fewmonths after my lord's coming to Castlewood, in the winter time--thelittle boy, being a child in a petticoat, trotting about--it happenedthat little Frank was with his father after dinner, who fell asleep overhis wine, heedless of the child, who crawled to the fire; and, as goodfortune would have it, Esmond was sent by his mistress for the boy justas the poor little screaming urchin's coat was set on fire by a log;when Esmond, rushing forward, tore the dress off the infant, so that hisown hands were burned more than the child's, who was frightened ratherthan hurt by this accident. But certainly 'twas providential that aresolute person should have come in at that instant, or the child hadbeen burned to death probably, my lord sleeping very heavily afterdrinking, and not waking so cool as a man should who had a danger toface.

  Ever after this the father, loud in his expressions of remorse andhumility for being a tipsy good-for-nothing, and of admiration for HarryEsmond, whom his lordship would style a hero for doing a very triflingservice, had the tenderest regard for his son's preserver, and Harrybecame quite as one of the family. His burns were tended with thegreatest care by his kind mistress, who said that heaven had sent himto be the guardian of her children, and that she would love him all herlife.

  And it was after this, and from the very great love and tenderness whichhad grown up in this little household, rather than from the exhortationsof Dean Armstrong (though these had no small weight with him), thatHarry came to be quite of the religion of his house and his dearmistress, of which he has ever since been a professing member. As forDr. Tusher's boasts that he was the cause of this conversion--even inthese young days Mr. Esmond had such a contempt for the Doctor, that hadTusher bade him believe anything (which he did not--never meddling atall), Harry would that instant have questioned the truth on't.

  My lady seldom drank wine; but on certain days of the year, such asbirthdays (poor Harry had never a one) and anniversaries, she took alittle; and this day, the 29th December, was one. At the end, then, ofthis year, '96, it might have been a fortnight after Mr. Holt's lastvisit, Lord Castlewood being still very gloomy in mind, and sitting attable--my lady bidding a servant bring her a glass of wine, and lookingat her husband with one of her sweet smiles, said--

  "My lord, will you not fill a bumper too, and let me call a toast?"

  "What is it, Rachel?" says he, holding out his empty glass to be filled.

  "'Tis the 29th of December," says my lady, with her fond look ofgratitude: "and my toast is, 'Harry--and God bless him, who saved myboy's life!'"

  My lord looked at Harry hard, and drank the glass, but clapped it downon the table in a moment, and, with a sort of groan, rose up, and wentout of the room. What was the matter? We all knew that some great griefwas over him.

  Whether my lord's prudence had made him richer, or legacies had fallento him, which enabled him to support a greater establishment than thatfrugal one which had been too much for his small means, Harry Esmondknew not; but the house of Castlewood was now on a scale much morecostly than it had been during the first years of his lordship's comingto the title. There were more horses in the stable and more servants inthe hall, and many more guests coming and going now than formerly, whenit was found difficult enough by the strictest economy to keep the houseas befitted one of his lordship's rank, and the estate out of debt. Andit did not require very much penetration to find that many of the newacquaintances at Castlewood were not agreeable to the lady there: notthat she ever treated them or any mortal with anything but courtesy; butthey were persons who could not be welcome to her; and whose society alady so refined and reserved could scarce desire for her children. Therecame fuddling squires from the country round, who bawled their songsunder her windows and drank themselves tipsy with my lord's punch andale: there came officers from Hexton, in whose company our little lordwas made to hear talk and to drink, and swear too, in a way that madethe delicate lady tremble for her son. Esmond tried to console her bysaying what he knew of his College experience; that with this sortof company and conversation a man must fall in sooner or later in hiscourse through the world: and it mattered very little whether he heardit at twelve years old or twenty--the youths who quitted mother'sapron-strings the latest being not uncommonly the wildest rakes. But itwas about her daughter that Lady Castlewood was the most anxious,and the danger which she thought menaced the little Beatrix from theindulgences which her father gave her, (it must be owned that my lord,since these unhappy domestic differences especially, was at once violentin his language to the children when angry, as he was too familiar, notto say coarse, when he was in a good humor,) and from the company intowhich the careless lord brought the child.

  Not very far off from Castlewood is Sark Castle, where the Marchionessof Sark lived, who was known to have been a mistress of the late KingCharles--and to this house, whither indeed a great part of the countrygentry went, my lord insisted upon going, not only himself, but ontaking his little daughter and son, to play with the children there. Thechildren were nothing loth, for the house was splendid, and the welcomekind enough. But my lady, justly no doubt, thought that the children ofsuch a mother as that noted Lady Sark had been, could be no good companyfor her two; and spoke her mind to her lord. His own language when hewas thwarted was not indeed of the g
entlest: to be brief, there was afamily dispute on this, as there had been on many other points--and thelady was not only forced to give in, for the other's will was law--norcould she, on account of their tender age, tell her children whatwas the nature of her objection to their visit of pleasure, or indeedmention to them any objection at all--but she had the additional secretmortification to find them returning delighted with their new friends,loaded with presents from them, and eager to be allowed to go back toa place of such delights as Sark Castle. Every year she thought thecompany there would be more dangerous to her daughter, as from a childBeatrix grew to a woman, and her daily increasing beauty, and manyfaults of character too, expanded.

  It was Harry Esmond's lot to see one of the visits which the old Lady ofSark paid to the Lady of Castlewood Hall: whither she came in state withsix chestnut horses and blue ribbons, a page on each carriage step, agentleman of the horse, and armed servants riding before and behind her.And, but that it was unpleasant to see Lady Castlewood's face, it wasamusing to watch the behavior of the two enemies: the frigid patienceof the younger lady, and the unconquerable good-humor of the elder--whowould see no offence whatever her rival intended, and who never ceasedto smile and to laugh, and to coax the children, and to pay complimentsto every man, woman, child, nay dog, or chair and table, in Castlewood,so bent was she upon admiring everything there. She lauded the children,and wished as indeed she well might--that her own family had beenbrought up as well as those cherubs. She had never seen such acomplexion as dear Beatrix's--though to be sure she had a right toit from father and mother--Lady Castlewood's was indeed a wonder offreshness, and Lady Sark sighed to think she had not been born a fairwoman; and remarking Harry Esmond, with a fascinating superannuatedsmile, she complimented him on his wit, which she said she could seefrom his eyes and forehead; and vowed that she would never have HIM atSark until her daughter were out of the way.