Lady Mary Wortley Montague Part 2

Some typical pa.s.sages from the letters to "My dear Mrs. Wortley" may be given--it should be mentioned that it was the social custom of the day to address as "Mrs." maiden ladies as well as married women.

"Th.o.r.esby, August 8, 1709.

"I know no pretence I have to your good opinion but my hearty desiring it; I wish I had that imagination you talk of, to render me a fitter correspondent for you, who can write so well on every thing. I am now so much alone, I have leisure to pa.s.s whole days in reading, but am not at all proper for so delicate an employment as choosing you books. Your own fancy will better direct you. My study at present is nothing but dictionaries and grammars. I am trying whether it be possible to learn without a master; I am not certain (and dare hardly hope) I shall make any great progress; but I find the study so diverting I am not only easy, but pleased with the solitude that indulges it. I forget there is such a place as London, and wish for no company but yours. You see, my dear, in making my pleasures consist of these unfas.h.i.+onable diversions, I am not of the number who cannot be easy out of the mode. I believe more follies are committed out of complaisance to the world, than in following our own inclinations--Nature is seldom in the wrong, custom always; it is with some regret I follow it in all the impertinencies of dress; the compliance is so trivial it comforts me; but I am amazed to see it consulted even in the most important occasions of our lives; and that people of good sense in other things can make their happiness consist in the opinions of others, and sacrifice every thing in the desire of appearing in fas.h.i.+on. I call all people who fall in love with furniture, clothes, and equipage, of this number, and I look upon them as no less in the wrong than when they were five years old, and doated on sh.e.l.ls, pebbles, and hobby-horses: I believe you will expect this letter to be dated from the other world, for sure I am you never heard an inhabitant of this talk so before. I suppose you expect, too, I should conclude with begging pardon for this extreme tedious and very nonsensical letter; quite contrary, I think you will be obliged to me for it. I could not better show my great concern for your reproaching me with neglect I knew myself innocent of, than proving myself mad in three pages."

"August 21, 1709.

"I am infinitely obliged to you, my dear Mrs. Wortley, for the wit, beauty, and other fine qualities, you so generously bestow upon me. Next to receiving them from Heaven, you are the person from whom I would chuse to receive gifts and graces: I am very well satisfied to owe them to your own delicacy of imagination, which represents to you the idea of a fine lady, and you have good nature enough to fancy I am she. All this is mighty well, but you do not stop there; imagination is boundless.

After giving me imaginary wit and beauty, you give me imaginary pa.s.sions, and you tell me I'm in love: if I am, 'tis a perfect sin of ignorance, for I don't so much as know the man's name: I have been studying these three hours, and cannot guess who you mean. I pa.s.sed the days of Nottingham races, [at] Th.o.r.esby, without seeing or even wis.h.i.+ng to see one of the s.e.x. Now, if I am in love, I have very hard fortune to conceal it so industriously from my own knowledge, and yet discover it so much to other people. 'Tis against all form to have such a pa.s.sion as that, without giving one sigh for the matter. Pray tell me the name of him I love, that I may (according to the laudable custom of lovers) sigh to the woods and groves hereabouts, and teach it to the echo. You see, being I am _[sic]_ in love, I am willing to be so in order and rule: I have been turning over G.o.d knows how many books to look for precedents.

Recommend an example to me; and, above all, let me know whether 'tis most proper to walk in the woods, encreasing the winds with my sighs, or to sit by a purling stream, swelling the rivulet with my tears; may be, both may do well in their turns:--but to be a minute serious, what do you mean by this reproach of inconstancy? I confess you give me several good qualities I have not, and I am ready to thank you for them, but then you must not take away those few I have. No, I will never exchange them; take back the beauty and wit you bestow upon me, leave me my own mediocrity of agreeableness and genius, but leave me also my sincerity, my constancy and my plain dealing; 'tis all I have to recommend me to the esteem either of others or myself. How should I despise myself if I could think I was capable of either inconstancy or deceit! I know not how I may appear to other people, nor how much my face may belie my heart, but I know that I never was or can be guilty of dissimulation or inconstancy--you will think this vain, but 'tis all that I pique myself upon. Tell me you believe me and repent of your harsh censure. Tell it me in pity to my uneasiness, for you are one of those few people about whose good opinion I am in pain. I have always took so little care to please the generality of the world, that I am never mortified or delighted by its reports which is a piece of stoicism born with me; but I cannot be one minute easy while you think ill of

"Your faithful--"

"This letter is a good deal grave, and, like other grave things, dull; but I won't ask pardon for what I can't help."

Was the sentiment expressed in the following letter, written about the same time as that printed above, intended for Anne or her brother, or both?

"When I said it cost nothing to write tenderly, I believe I spoke of another s.e.x; I am sure not of myself: 'tis not in my power (I would to G.o.d it was!) to hide a kindness where I have one, or dissemble it where I have none. I cannot help answering your letter this minute, and telling you I infinitely love you, though, it may be, you'll call the one impertinence, and the other dissimulation; but you may think what you please of me, I must eternally think the same things of you."

Lady Mary was occasionally wearisome owing to the reiteration of the a.s.surance that she believed her letters to be dull, the more so as she certainly was conscious of the skill with which she composed them. "What do you mean by complaining I never write to you in the quiet situation of mind I do to other people?" she asks Anne Wortley. "My dear, people never write calmly, but when they write indifferently."

After a letter dated September 5, 1709, a pa.s.sage from which has been printed here, there is a break in the (preserved) correspondence. In the spring of the following year Anne Wortley died, and Lady Mary, on March 28, paid tribute to her departed friend, addressing herself for the first time direct to Montagu.

"Perhaps you'll be surprized at this letter; I have had many debates with myself before I could resolve on it. I know it is not acting in form, but I do not look upon you as I do upon the rest of the world, and by what I do for _you_, you are not to judge my manner of acting with others. You are brother to a woman I tenderly loved; my protestations of friends.h.i.+p are not like other people's, I never speak but what I mean, and when I say I love, 'tis for ever. I had that real concern for Mrs.

Wortley, I look with some regard on every one that is related to her.

This and my long acquaintance with you may in some measure excuse what I am now doing. I am surprized at one of the 'Tatlers' you send me; is it possible to have any sort of esteem for a person one believes capable of having such trifling inclinations? Mr. Bickerstaff has very wrong notions of our s.e.x. I can say there are some of us that despise charms of show, and all the pageantry of greatness, perhaps with more ease than any of the philosophers. In contemning the world, they seem to take pains to contemn it; we despise it, without taking the pains to read lessons of morality to make us do it. At least I know I have always looked upon it with contempt, without being at the expense of one serious reflection to oblige me to it. I carry the matter yet farther; was I to choose of two thousand pounds a year or twenty thousand, the first would be my choice. There is something of an unavoidable _embarras_ in making what is called a great figure in the world; [it]

takes off from the happiness of life; I hate the noise and hurry inseparable from great estates and t.i.tles, and look upon both as blessings that ought only to be given to fools, for 'tis only to them that they are blessings. The pretty fellows you speak of, I own entertain me sometimes; but is it impossible to be diverted with what one despises? I can laugh at a puppet-show; at the same time I know there is nothing in it worth my attention or regard. General notions are generally wrong. Ignorance and folly are thought the best foundations for virtue, as if not knowing what a good wife is was necessary to make one so. I confess that can never be my way of reasoning; as I always forgive an _injury_ when I think it not done out of malice, I never think myself _obliged_ by what is done without design."

Lady Mary, who was now one-and-twenty, was no bread-and-b.u.t.ter miss. She knew her mind and had the gift to express herself, and in this same letter she very prettily rebukes her laggard lover.

"Give me leave to say it, (I know it sounds vain,) I know how to make a man of sense happy; but then that man must resolve to contribute something towards it himself. I have so much esteem for you, I should be very sorry to hear you was unhappy; but for the world I would not be the instrument of making you so; which (of the humour you are) is hardly to be avoided if I am your wife. You distrust me--I can neither be easy, nor loved, where I am distrusted. Nor do I believe your pa.s.sion for me is what you pretend it; at least I am sure was I in love I could not talk as you do. Few women would have spoke so plainly as I have done; but to dissemble is among the things I never do. I take more pains to approve my conduct to myself than to the world; and would not have to accuse myself of a minute's deceit. I wish I loved you enough to devote myself to be for ever miserable, for the pleasure of a day or two's happiness. I cannot resolve upon it. You must think otherwise of me, or not at all."

"I don't enjoin you to burn this letter," she said in conclusion. "I know you will. 'Tis the first I ever writ to one of your s.e.x, and shall be the last. You must never expect another. I resolve against all correspondence of the kind--my resolutions are seldom made and never broken."

Whatever happened to most of Lady Mary's resolutions, this one, at least, was not kept. Actually, Lady Mary was not quite so emanc.i.p.ated at this time of her life as she may have imagined. She never sent a letter, except in fear and trembling. "I hazard a great deal if it falls into other hands, and I write for all that," was her constant cry. Yet, there was nothing in the correspondence, save the fact of it, to offend even a most austere maiden aunt of the day.

The correspondence, of course, continued. The lovers, if so they can be called, now indulged in a slightly acid academic discussion, or rather a number of slightly acid academic discussions, about marriage. It is evident that Montagu held strong views as to the duty of a wife; so undoubtedly did Lady Mary--only, the trouble was, the views were by no means identical. If he were determined to set himself up as the strong loquacious man, his _fiancee_ was certainly not prepared meekly to obey his behests in silence. They indulged in a somewhat candid examination of each other's character--and of their own. It is really rather amusing, this careful cold-blooded dissection of their feelings. It is a safe guess that at this game Lady Mary scored heavily.

"I wish, with all my soul, I thought as you do," she wrote on April 25, 1710. "I endeavour to convince myself by your arguments, and am sorry my reason is so obstinate, not to be deluded into an opinion, that 'tis impossible a man can esteem a woman. I suppose I should then be very easy at your thoughts of me; I should thank you for the wit and beauty you give me, and not be angry at the follies and weaknesses; but, to my infinite affliction, I can believe neither one nor t'other. One part of my character is not so good, nor t'other so bad, as you fancy it. Should we ever live together, you would be disappointed both ways; you would find an easy equality of temper you do not expect, and a thousand faults you do not imagine. You think, if you married me, I should be pa.s.sionately fond of you one month, and of somebody else the next: neither would happen. I can esteem, I can be a friend, but I don't know whether I can love. Expect all that is complaisant and easy, but never what is fond, in me. You judge very wrong of my heart, when you suppose me capable of views of interest, and that anything could oblige me to flatter any body. Was I the most indigent creature in the world, I should answer you as I do now, without adding or diminis.h.i.+ng. I am incapable of art, and 'tis because I will not be capable of it. Could I deceive one minute, I should never regain my own good opinion; and who could bear to live with one they despised? If you can resolve to live with a companion that will have all the deference due to your superiority of good sense, and that your proposals can be agreeable to those on whom I depend, I have nothing to say against them."

CHAPTER III

COURTs.h.i.+P, ELOPEMENT, AND MARRIAGE (1710-1712)

A lengthy courts.h.i.+p--Montagu a laggard lover--Lady Mary and Montagu exchange views on married life--Montagu proposes for her to Lord Dorchester--Dorchester refuses, since Montagu will not make settlements--Montagu's views on settlements expressed (by Steele) in the _Tatler_--Although not engaged, the young people continue to correspond--Lord Dorchester produces another suitor for his daughter--She consents to an engagement--The preparations for the wedding--She confides the whole story to Montagu--She breaks off the engagement--She and Montagu decide to elope--She runs up to London--Marriage--Lady Mary's diary destroyed by her sister, Lady Frances Pierrepont.

After seven years or so of acquaintance, matters at last looked like coming to a head. It would appear that Montagu, tentatively at least, had put the question, because Lady Mary gives her views as to the life they should lead after marriage. She is not averse from travelling; she has no objection to leaving London; in fact, she would be willing to spend a few months in the country, if it so pleased him. It is all so extraordinarily unloverlike. There is too much philosophy about it. Love does not see so clearly.

"Where people are tied for life, 'tis their mutual interest not to grow weary of one another," she wrote on April 25, 1710. "If I had all the personal charms that I want, a face is too slight a foundation for happiness. You would be soon tired with seeing every day the same thing.

Where you saw nothing else, you would have leisure to remark all the defects; which would increase in proportion as the novelty lessened, which is always a great charm. I should have the displeasure of seeing a coldness, which, though I could not reasonably blame you for, being involuntary, yet it would render me uneasy; and the more, because I know a love may be revived which absence, inconstancy, or even infidelity, has extinguished; but there is no returning from a _degout_ given by satiety."

Perhaps Lady Mary believed that, while it is well to hope for the best, it is sound policy to prepare for the worst.

Montagu may have found some comfort in the lady's a.s.surance that if she had a choice between two thousand a year or twenty thousand a year she would choose the smaller income.

An apartment in London would satisfy Lady Mary. She would not choose to live in a crowd, but would like to have a small circle of agreeable people--she was very precise as to her desires: actually she wants to see eight or nine pleasant folk. She does not believe that she can find entire happiness in solitude, not even (or perhaps especially not) in a solitude of two; and she is at least as sure that he would not either.

Anyhow she has not the slightest intention of taking the chance.

It becomes increasingly clear that she had had about enough of this epistolary philandering, and she indicated this in no uncertain manner.

"I will never think of anything without the consent of my family," she wrote. "Make no answer to this, if you can like me on my own terms. 'Tis not to me you must make the proposals; if not, to what purpose is our correspondence?"

And now comes a touch of the spur: "However, preserve me your friends.h.i.+p, which I think of with a great deal of pleasure. If ever you see me married, I flatter myself you'll see a conduct you would not be sorry your wife should imitate."

Even this did not bring Montagu to the point of asking Lord Dorchester for the hand of his daughter. The correspondence, however, still continued, and soon they were hard at it again.

"Kindness, you say, would be your destruction," she wrote in August, 1710. "In my opinion, this is something contradictory to some other expressions. People talk of being in love just as widows do of affliction. Mr. Steele has observed, in one of his plays, the most pa.s.sionate among them have always calmness enough to drive a hard bargain with the upholders. I never knew a lover that would not willingly secure his interest as well as his mistress; or, if one must be abandoned, had not the prudence (among all his distractions) to consider, a woman was but a woman, and money was a thing of more real merit than the whole s.e.x put together. Your letter is to tell me, you should think yourself undone if you married me; but if I would be so tender as to confess I should break my heart if you did not, then you'd consider whether you would or no; but yet you hoped you should not. I take this to be the right interpretation of--even your kindness can't destroy me of a sudden--I hope I am not in your power--I would give a good deal to be satisfied, &c.

"As to writing--that any woman would do that thought she writ well. Now I say, no woman of common sense would. At best, 'tis but doing a silly thing well, and I think it is much better not to do a silly thing at all. You compare it to dressing. Suppose the comparison just: perhaps the Spanish dress would become my face very well; yet the whole town would condemn me for the highest extravagance if I went to court in it, though it improved me to a miracle. There are a thousand things, not ill in themselves, which custom makes unfit to be done. This is to convince you I am so far from applauding my own conduct, my conscience flies in my face every time I think on't. The generality of the world have a great indulgence to their own follies: without being a jot wiser than my neighbours, I have the peculiar misfortune to know and condemn all the wrong things I do.

"You beg to know whether I would not be out of humour. The expression is modest enough; but that is not what you mean. In saying I could be easy, I have already said I should not be out of humour: but you would have me say I am violently in love; that is, finding you think better of me than you desire, you would have me give you a just cause to contemn me. I doubt much whether there is a creature in the world humble enough to do that. I should not think you more unreasonable if you was in love with my face, and asked me to disfigure it to make you easy. I have heard of some nuns that made use of that expedient to secure their own happiness; but, amongst all the popish saints and martyrs, I never read of one whose charity was sublime enough to make themselves deformed, or ridiculous, to restore their lovers to peace and quietness. In short, if nothing can content you but despising me heartily, I am afraid I shall be always so barbarous to wish you may esteem me as long as you live."

At last Montagu formally approached Lord Dorchester, who had no objection whatever to him as a suitor for the hand of Lady Mary. They could not come to terms in the matter of settlements. Dorchester demanded that the estates should be put into entail. Also he desired that his future son-in-law should provide a town residence for Lady Mary. This did not seem unreasonable, but Montagu did not see his way to agree to them. He was willing enough to make all proper provision for his wife, but he declined absolutely to settle his landed property upon a son who, as he put it, for aught he knew, might prove unworthy to inherit it, who might be a spendthrift, an idiot, or a villain--as a matter of fact, the only son of the marriage turned out most things he should not. Anyhow, Montagu held strong views on the subject, and these he expounded to Richard Steele, who presented them in No. 223 of the _Tatler_ (September 12, 1710).

"That this method of making settlements was first invented by a griping lawyer, who made use of the covetous tempers of the parents of each side, to force two young people into these vile measures of diffidence for no other end, but to increase the skins of parchment, by which they were put into each other's possession out of each other's power. The law of our country has given an ample and generous provision for the wife, even the third of her husband's estate, and left to her good-humour and his grat.i.tude the expectation of farther provision, but the fantastical method of going farther, with relation to the heirs, has a foundation in nothing but pride, and folly: for as all men with their children as like themselves, and as much better as they can possibly, it seems monstrous that we should give out of ourselves the opportunities of rewarding and discouraging them according to their defects. The wife inst.i.tution has no more sense in it, than if a man should begin a deed with 'Whereas no man living knows how long he shall continue to be a reasonable creature, or an honest man, and whereas I.B. am going to enter into the state of matrimony with Mrs. D., therefore I shall from henceforth make it indifferent to me whether from this time forward I shall be a fool or knave. And therefore, in full and perfect health of body, and a sound mind, not knowing which of my children will prove better or worse, I give to my first-born, be he perverse, ungrateful, impious, or cruel, the lump and bulk of my estate, and leave one year's purchase only to each of my younger children, whether they shall be brave or beautiful, modest or honourable, from the time of the date hereof, wherein I resign my senses, and hereby promise to employ my judgment no farther in the distribution of my worldly goods from the date hereof, hereby farther confessing and covenanting, that I am henceforth married, and dead in law....'

"How strangely men are sometimes partial to themselves, appears by the rapine of him, that has a daughter's beauty under his direction. He will make no scruple of using it to force from her lover as much of his estate, as is worth ten thousand pounds, and at the same time, as a justice on the bench, will spare no pains to get a man hanged that has taken but a horse from him.

"It is to be hoped that the legislature will in due time take this kind of robbery into consideration, and not suffer men to prey upon each other when they are about making the most solemn league, and entering into the strictest bonds. The only sure remedy is to fix a certain rate on every woman's fortune, one price for that of a maid, and another for that of a widow: for it is of infinite advantage, that there should be no frauds or uncertainties in the sale of our women."