CHAPTER XXVI.
LADY MARCHMONT TO SIR JASPER MEREDITH.
There is in life no blessing like affection:
It soothes, it hallows, elevates, subdues,
And bringeth down to earth its native heaven.
It sits beside the cradle patient hours,
Whose sole contentment is to watch and love;
It bendeth o'er the death-bed, and conceals
Its own despair with words of faith and hope.
Life has nought else that may supply its place:
Void is ambition, cold is vanity,
And wealth an empty glitter, without love.
My Dearest Uncle,—I have this morning been returning the visit of the young Duchess of Marlborough. I should lose the reputation that I am gradually acquiring among our impenetrables here, were I to confess the excitement which I felt at the idea of entering his house—the house of that great general under whose command you made your first charge. It was to be quite a visit d'amitié, so she was almost alone, in her closet richly furnished with crimson silk hangings, and the portraits of her father and mother. I was struck, not so much with the extraordinary beauty of the latter, though extraordinary it is, as with its extreme sweetness. I never saw such a loveable face. The imperious duchess had the eyes of a dove, and the mouth of a child; and the hair had that soft glossy silkness which I fancy usually belongs to a gentle and sensitive temperament. I could not help alluding to its loveliness.
"Yes," said the young duchess, "my mother's hair was quite remarkable, both for its length and profusion. But will you believe that she cut it all off one day, in order to plague my father, whose especial admiration it was. He had left her displeased about some trifle, and she severed the favourite tresses, and laid them in a conspicuous place on a table in his room. The long curls disappeared, no one knew how, and my father never made the slightest allusion to their loss; but, after his death, they were found in his cabinet, where he kept all that he had most precious. Even my mother's haughty temper was fairly subdued by this; she never could allude to the circumstance without tears."
"After all," said Mr. Congreve, who was present, "madame la duchesse well understood the principles by which your sex obtain dominion. I always thought that there was great truth in what the French lover said, on being asked by what means his mistress had obtained such an empire over him: C'est qu'elle me querelle toujours."
"I rather think," said a youthful Italian, just presented to me as la Signora Rosalba, and who was employed in finishing a miniature of the duchess, "that nothing gives offence between people who really love each other. The tempers may be irritated, but there is still a secret sympathy in the hearts."
"Moreover," replied Congreve, "it was a sort of flattery to the duke. It showed that she valued the power of plaguing him more than her own fairest ornament. Flattery is the real secret by which a woman keeps her lover."
"Ah!" exclaimed the Italian, raising the softest dark eyes that I ever saw, " you speak of the love in crowds and cities, made up of falsehood and vanity, not of that high and holy passion, sent to elevate and redeem our nature—the religion of the heart."
There was something about the youthful artist that interested me exceedingly. I must ask her to take my likeness for you. Painted by one so enthusiastic, it will come less surrounded by the vanities and follies of my present life. I never feel the value of affection so much as when I think of yours; nor its want, but when I look at my own home.
Well, I sometimes think that I should be glad to quarrel with Lord Marchmont, even like the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough: it would show that we cared for each other. But I must write something else than these vague fantasies: and now for their very antipodes, Mr. Congreve. He is not bad-looking, and dresses to desperation; with a peculiarly soft and flattering manner. He seems to be witty against his will; and if, by some sally that will have its way, he makes you laugh, he is at once ashamed, and starts back into his usual languid and affected strain of compliment. Nature has made him an author and a wit; he blushes for both, and trusts that they are forgotten in the very fine gentleman. I was struck with the difference between his small affectation of denying and despising his own talents and their laudable use, and the earnest belief in their nobility which exists in the Italian artist. The one belongs to a higher order of intelligence than the other.
Well, enthusiasm is the divine particle in our composition: with it we are great, generous, and true: without it, we are little, false, and mean. Do let me tell you one thing the signora said: "I always pray in German—the language is so expressive and energetic." I wished at the moment that I knew it, that I might pray for you, my dear uncle—my more than parent.
We are going to-night to a ball at the Duchess of Queensberry's. I wonder she is not afraid at the world of disappointment her invitations have created. She has asked every body but those who expected it. People are really not half thankful enough to her, she gives them so much to talk about. What, after all, is the great staple of conversation?—why, the faults and follies of others; and, generally speaking, they are insipid enough. How grateful, therefore, we ought to be to her Grace, whose follies are all of the most original order! Why, there is invention enough in them for a history,—
"As histories are in these degenerate days."
And now for the toilet of your affectionate
Henrietta.