Barry Lyndon

by William Makepeace Thackeray

  Though my intimacy with the knight was considerable, for a long time I never penetrated into any other apartments of his hotel but those which he himself occupied. His lady lived entirely apart from him; and it is only curious how they came to travel together at all. She was a goddaughter of old Mary Wortley Montagu: and, like that famous old woman of the last century, made considerable pretensions to be a blue-stocking and a bel esprit. Lady Lyndon wrote poems in English and Italian, which still may be read by the curious in the pages of the magazines of the day. She entertained a correspondence with several of the European savans upon history, science, and ancient languages, and especially theology. Her pleasure was to dispute controversial points with abbes and bishops; and her flatterers said she rivalled Madam Dacier in learning. Every adventurer who had a discovery in chemistry, a new antique bust, or a plan for discovering the philosopher's stone, was sure to find a patroness in her. She had numberless works dedicated to her, and sonnets without end addressed to her by all the poetasters of Europe, under the name of Lindonira or Calista. Her rooms were crowded with hideous China magots, and all sorts of objects of vertu.

  No woman piqued herself more upon her principles, or allowed love to be made to her more profusely. There was a habit of courtship practised by the fine gentlemen of those days, which is little understood in our coarse downright times: and young and old fellows would pour out floods of compliments in letters and madrigals, such as would make a sober lady stare were they addressed to her nowadays: so entirely has the gallantry of the last century disappeared out of our manners.

  Lady Lyndon moved about with a little court of her own. She had half-a-dozen carriages in her progresses. In her own she would travel with her companion (some shabby lady of quality), her birds, and poodles, and the favourite savant for the time being. In another would be her female secretary and her waiting-women; who, in spite of their care, never could make their mistress look much better than a slattern. Sir Charles Lyndon had his own chariot, and the domestics of the establishment would follow in other vehicles.

  Also must be mentioned the carriage in which rode her Ladyship's chaplain, Mr. Runt, who acted in capacity of governor to her son, the little Viscount Bullingdon,—a melancholy deserted little boy, about whom his father was more than indifferent, and whom his mother never saw, except for two minutes at her levee, when she would put to him a few questions of history or Latin grammar; after which he was consigned to his own amusements, or the care of his governor, for the rest of the day.

  The notion of such a Minerva as this, whom I saw in the public places now and then, surrounded by swarms of needy abbes and schoolmasters, who flattered her, frightened me for some time, and I had not the least desire to make her acquaintance. I had no desire to be one of the beggarly adorers in the great lady's train,— fellows, half friend, half lacquey, who made verses, and wrote letters, and ran errands, content to be paid by a seat in her Ladyship's box at the comedy, or a cover at her dinner-table at noon. 'Don't be afraid,' Sir Charles Lyndon would say, whose great subject of conversation and abuse was his lady: 'my Lindonira will have nothing to do with you. She likes the Tuscan brogue, not that of Kerry. She says you smell too much of the stable to be admitted to ladies' society; and last Sunday fortnight, when she did me the honour to speak to me last, said, "I wonder, Sir Charles Lyndon, a gentleman who has been the King's ambassador can demean himself by gambling and boozing with low Irish blacklegs!" Don't fly in a fury! I'm a cripple, and it was Lindonira said it, not I.'

  This piqued me, and I resolved to become acquainted with Lady Lyndon; if it were but to show her Ladyship that the descendant of those Barrys, whose property she unjustly held, was not an unworthy companion for any lady, were she ever so high. Besides, my friend the knight was dying: his widow would be the richest prize in the three kingdoms. Why should I not win her, and, with her, the means of making in the world that figure which my genius and inclination desired? I felt I was equal in blood and breeding to any Lyndon in Christendom, and determined to bend this haughty lady. When I determine, I look upon the thing as done.

  My uncle and I talked the matter over, and speedily settled upon a method for making our approaches upon this stately lady of Castle Lyndon. Mr. Runt, young Lord Bullingdon's governor, was fond of pleasure, of a glass of Rhenish in the garden-houses in the summer evenings, and of a sly throw of the dice when the occasion offered; and I took care to make friends with this person, who, being a college tutor and an Englishman, was ready to go on his knees to any one who resembled a man of fashion. Seeing me with my retinue of servants, my vis-a-vis and chariots, my valets, my hussar, and horses, dressed in gold, and velvet, and sables, saluting the greatest people in Europe as we met on the course, or at the Spas, Runt was dazzled by my advances, and was mine by a beckoning of the finger. I shall never forget the poor wretch's astonishment when I asked him to dine, with two counts, off gold plate, at the little room in the casino: he was made happy by being allowed to win a few pieces of us, became exceedingly tipsy, sang Cambridge songs, and recreated the company by telling us, in his horrid Yorkshire French, stories about the gyps, and all the lords that had ever been in his college. I encouraged him to come and see me oftener, and bring with him his little viscount; for whom, though the boy always detested me, I took care to have a good stock of sweetmeats, toys, and picture-books when he came.

  I then began to enter into a controversy with Mr. Runt, and confided to him some doubts which I had, and a very very earnest leaning towards the Church of Rome. I made a certain abbe whom I knew write me letters upon transubstantiation, &c., which the honest tutor was rather puzzled to answer. I knew that they would be communicated to his lady, as they were; for, asking leave to attend the English service which was celebrated in her apartments, and frequented by the best English then at the Spa, on the second Sunday she condescended to look at me; on the third she was pleased to reply to my profound bow by a curtsey; the next day I followed up the acquaintance by another obeisance in the public walk; and, to make a long story short, her Ladyship and I were in full correspondence on transubstantiation before six weeks were over. My Lady came to the aid of her chaplain; and then I began to see the prodigious weight of his arguments: as was to be expected. The progress of this harmless little intrigue need not be detailed. I make no doubt every one of my readers has practised similar stratagems when a fair lady was in the case.

  I shall never forget the astonishment of Sir Charles Lyndon when, on one summer evening, as he was issuing out to the play-table in his sedan-chair, according to his wont, her Ladyship's barouche and four, with her outriders in the tawny livery of the Lyndon family, came driving into the courtyard of the house which they inhabited; and in that carriage, by her Ladyship's side, sat no other than the 'vulgar Irish adventurer,' as she was pleased to call him: I mean Redmond Barry, Esquire. He made the most courtly of his bows, and grinned and waved his hat in as graceful a manner as the gout permitted; and her Ladyship and I replied to the salutation with the utmost politeness and elegance on our parts.

  I could not go to the play-table for some time afterwards for Lady Lyndon and I had an argument on transubstantiation, which lasted for three hours; in which she was, as usual, victorious, and, in which her companion, the Honourable Miss Flint Skinner, fell asleep; but when, at last, I joined Sir Charles at the casino, he received me with a yell of laughter, as his wont was, and introduced me to all the company as Lady Lyndon's interesting young convert. This was his way. He laughed and sneered at everything. He laughed when he was in a paroxysm of pain; he laughed when he won money, or when he lost it: his laugh was not jovial or agreeable, but rather painful and sardonic.

  'Gentlemen,' said he to Punter, Colonel Loder, Count du Carreau, and several jovial fellows with whom he used to discuss a flask of champagne and a Rhenish trout or two after play, 'see this amiable youth! He has been troubled by religious scruples, and has flown for refuge to my chaplain, Mr. Runt, who has asked for advice from my wife, Lady Lyndon;
and, between them both, they are confirming my ingenious young friend in his faith. Did you ever hear of such doctors, and such a disciple?'

  ''Faith, sir,' said I, 'if I want to learn good principles, it's surely better I should apply for them to your lady and your chaplain than to you!'

  'He wants to step into my shoes!' continued the knight.

  'The man would be happy who did so,' responded I, 'provided there were no chalk-stones included!' At which reply Sir Charles was not very well pleased, and went on with increased rancour. He was always free-spoken in his cups; and, to say the truth, he was in his cups many more times in a week than his doctors allowed.

  'Is it not a pleasure, gentlemen,' said he, 'for me, as I am drawing near the goal, to find my home such a happy one; my wife so fond of me, that she is even now thinking of appointing a successor? (I don't mean you precisely, Mr. Barry; you are only taking your chance with a score of others whom I could mention.) Isn't it a comfort to see her, like a prudent housewife, getting everything ready for her husband's departure?'

  'I hope you are not thinking of leaving us soon, knight?' said I, with perfect sincerity; for I liked him, as a most amusing companion. 'Not so soon, my dear, as you may fancy, perhaps,' continued he. 'Why, man, I have been given over any time these four years; and there was always a candidate or two waiting to apply for the situation. Who knows how long I may keep you waiting?' and he DID keep me waiting some little time longer than at that period there was any reason to suspect.

  As I declared myself pretty openly, according to my usual way, and authors are accustomed to describe the persons of the ladies with whom their heroes fall in love; in compliance with this fashion, I perhaps should say a word or two respecting the charms of my Lady Lyndon. But though I celebrated them in many copies of verses, of my own and other persons' writing; and though I filled reams of paper in the passionate style of those days with compliments to every one of her beauties and smiles, in which I compared her to every flower, goddess, or famous heroine ever heard of,—truth compels me to say that there was nothing divine about her at all. She was very well; but no more. Her shape was fine, her hair dark, her eyes good, and exceedingly active; she loved singing, but performed it as so great a lady should, very much out of tune. She had a smattering of half a-dozen modern languages, and, as I have said before, of many more sciences than I even knew the names of. She piqued herself on knowing Greek and Latin; but the truth is, that Mr. Runt, used to supply her with the quotations which she introduced into her voluminous correspondence. She had as much love of admiration, as strong, uneasy a vanity, and as little heart, as any woman I ever knew. Otherwise, when her son, Lord Bullingdon, on account of his differences with me, ran—but that matter shall be told in its proper time. Finally, my Lady Lyndon was about a year older than myself; though, of course, she would take her Bible oath that she was three years younger.

  Few men are so honest as I am; for few will own to their real motives, and I don't care a button about confessing mine. What Sir Charles Lyndon said was perfectly true. I made the acquaintance of Lady Lyndon with ulterior views. 'Sir,' said I to him, when, after the scene described and the jokes he made upon me, we met alone, 'let those laugh that win. You were very pleasant upon me a few nights since, and on my intentions regarding your lady. Well, if they are what you think they are,—if I do wish to step into your shoes, what then? I have no other intentions than you had yourself. I'll be sworn to muster just as much regard for my Lady Lyndon as you ever showed her; and if I win her and wear her when you are dead and gone, corbleu, knight, do you think it will be the fear of your ghost will deter me?'

  Lyndon laughed as usual; but somewhat disconcertedly: indeed I had clearly the best of him in the argument, and had just as much right to hunt my fortune as he had.

  But one day he said, 'If you marry such a woman as my Lady Lyndon, mark my words, you will regret it. You will pine after the liberty you once enjoyed. By George! Captain Barry,' he added, with a sigh, 'the thing that I regret most in life—perhaps it is because I am old, blase, and dying—is, that I never had a virtuous attachment.'

  'Ha! ha! a milkmaid's daughter!' said I, laughing at the absurdity.

  'Well, why not a milkmaid's daughter? My good fellow, I WAS in love in youth, as most gentlemen are, with my tutor's daughter, Helena, a bouncing girl; of course older than myself' (this made me remember my own little love-passages with Nora Brady in the days of my early life), 'and do you know, sir, I heartily regret I didn't marry her? There's nothing like having a virtuous drudge at home, sir; depend upon that. It gives a zest to one's enjoyments in the world, take my word for it. No man of sense need restrict himself, or deny himself a single amusement for his wife's sake: on the contrary, if he select the animal properly, he will choose such a one as shall be no bar to his pleasure, but a comfort in his hours of annoyance. For instance, I have got the gout: who tends me? A hired valet, who robs me whenever he has the power. My wife never comes near me. What friend have I? None in the wide world. Men of the world, as you and I are, don't make friends; and we are fools for our pains. Get a friend, sir, and that friend a woman—a good household drudge, who loves you. that is the most precious sort of friendship; for the expense of it is all on the woman's side. The man needn't contribute anything. If he's a rogue, she'll vow he's an angel; if he's a brute, she will like him all the better for his ill-treatment of her. They like it, sir, these women. They are born to be our greatest comforts and conveniences; our—our moral bootjacks, as it were; and to men in your way of life, believe me such a person would be invaluable. I am only speaking for your bodily and mental comfort's sake, mind. Why didn't I marry poor Helena Flower, the curate's daughter?'

  I thought these speeches the remarks of a weakly disappointed man; although since, perhaps, I have had reason to find the truth of Sir Charles Lyndon's statements. The fact is, in my opinion, that we often buy money very much too dear. To purchase a few thousands a year at the expense of an odious wife, is very bad economy for a young fellow of any talent and spirit; and there have been moments of my life when, in the midst of my greatest splendour and opulence, with half-a-dozen lords at my levee, with the finest horses in my stables, the grandest house over my head, with unlimited credit at my banker's, and—Lady Lyndon to boot, I have wished myself back a private of Bulow's, or anything, so as to get rid of her. To return, however, to the story. Sir Charles, with his complication of ills, was dying before us by inches! and I've no doubt it could not have been very pleasant to him to see a young handsome fellow paying court to his widow before his own face as it were. After I once got into the house on the transubstantiation dispute, I found a dozen more occasions to improve my intimacy, and was scarcely ever out of her Ladyship's doors. The world talked and blustered; but what cared I? The men cried fie upon the shameless Irish adventurer; but I have told my way of silencing such envious people: and my sword had by this time got such a reputation through Europe, that few people cared to encounter it. If I can once get my hold of a place, I keep it. Many's the house I have been to where I have seen the men avoid me. 'Faugh! the low Irishman,' they would say. 'Bah! the coarse adventurer!' 'Out on the insufferable blackleg and puppy!' and so forth. This hatred has been of no inconsiderable service to me in the world; for when I fasten on a man, nothing can induce me to release my hold: and I am left to myself, which is all the better. As I told Lady Lyndon in those days, with perfect sincerity, 'Calista' (I used to call her Calista in my correspondence)—' Calista, I swear to thee, by the spotlessness of thy own soul, by the brilliancy of thy immitigable eyes, by everything pure and chaste in heaven and in thy own heart, that I will never cease from following thee! Scorn I can bear, and have borne at thy hands. Indifference I can surmount; 'tis a rock which my energy will climb over, a magnet which attracts the dauntless iron of my soul!' And it was true, I wouldn't have left her—no, though they had kicked me downstairs every day I presented myself at her door.

  That is my way of fascinating women. Let
the man who has to make his fortune in life remember this maxim. attacking is his only secret. Dare, and the world always yields: or, if it beat you sometimes, dare again, and it will succumb. In those days my spirit was so great, that if I had set my heart upon marrying a princess of the blood, I would have had her!

  I told Calista my story, and altered very very little of the truth. My object was to frighten her: to show her that what I wanted, that I dared; that what I dared, that I won; and there were striking passages enough in my history to convince her of my iron will and indomitable courage. 'Never hope to escape me, madam,' I would say: 'offer to marry another man, and he dies upon this sword, which never yet met its master. Fly from me, and I will follow you, though it were to the gates of Hades.' I promise you this was very different language to that she had been in the habit of hearing from her Jemmy-Jessamy adorers. You should have seen how I scared the fellows from her.

  When I said in this energetic way that I would follow Lady Lyndon across the Styx if necessary, of course I meant that I would do so, provided nothing more suitable presented itself in the interim. If Lyndon would not die, where was the use of my pursuing the Countess? And somehow, towards the end of the Spa season, very much to my mortification I do confess, the knight made another rally: it seemed as if nothing would kill him. 'I am sorry for you, Captain Barry,' he would say, laughing as usual. 'I'm grieved to keep you, or any gentleman, waiting. Had you not better arrange with my doctor, or get the cook to flavour my omelette with arsenic? What are the odds, gentlemen,' he would add, 'that I don't live to see Captain Barry hanged yet?'