Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Lewis Melville
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"I give you many thanks (my dear sister) for the trouble you have given
yourself in my affair; but am afraid 'tis not yet effectual. I must beg
you to let him know I am now at Twickenham, and that whoever has his
procuration may come here on divers pretences, but must by no means go
to my house at London. I wonder you can think Lady Stafford has not writ
to him; she shewed me a long plain letter to him several months ago; as
a demonstration he received it, I saw his answer. 'Tis true she treated
him with the contempt he deserved, and told him she would never give
herself the trouble of writing again to so despicable a wretch. She is
willing to do yet further, and write to the Duke of Villeroi about it,
if I think it proper. Remond does nothing but lie, and either does not,
or will not, understand what is said to him. You will forgive me
troubling you so often with this business; the importance of it is the
best excuse; in short,
'--'tis joy or sorrow, peace or strife.
'Tis all the colour of remaining life.'
I can foresee nothing else to make me unhappy, and, I believe, shall
take care another time not to involve myself in difficulties by an
overplus of heroic generosity.
"I am, dear sister, ever yours, with the utmost esteem and affection. If
I get over this cursed affair, my style may enliven."
[June, 1721.]
"I have just received your letter of May 30th, and am surprised, since
you own the receipt of my letter, that you give me not the least hint
concerning the business that I writ so earnestly to you about. Till that
is over, I am as little capable of hearing or repeating news, as I
should be if my house was on fire. I am sure, a great deal must be in
your power; the hurting of me can be in no way his interest. I am ready
to assign, or deliver the money for L500 stock, to whoever he will name,
if he will send my letters into Lady Stafford's hands; which, were he
sincere in his offer of burning them, he would readily do. Instead of
that, he has writ a letter to Mr. W. [Wortley] to inform him of the
whole affair: luckily for me, the person he has sent it to assures me it
shall never be delivered; but I am not the less obliged to his good
intentions. For God's sake, do something to set my mind at ease from
this business, and then I will not fail to write you regular accounts of
all your acquaintance."
[July (?), 1721.]
"I cannot enough thank you, dear sister, for the trouble you give
yourself in my affairs, though I am still so unhappy to find your care
very ineffectual. I have actually in my present possession a formal
letter directed to Mr. Wortley to acquaint him with the whole business.
You may imagine the inevitable eternal misfortunes it would have thrown
me into, had it been delivered by the person to whom it was intrusted. I
wish you would make him sensible of the infamy of this proceeding, which
can no way in the world turn to his advantage. Did I refuse giving the
strictest account, or had I not the clearest demonstration in my hands
of the truth and sincerity with which I acted, there might be some
temptation to this baseness; but all he can expect by informing Mr.
Wortley is to hear him repeat the same things I assert; he will not
retrieve one farthing, and I am for ever miserable. I beg no more of him
than to direct any person, man or woman, either lawyer, broker, or a
person of quality, to examine me; and as soon as he has sent a proper
authority to discharge me on enquiry, I am ready to be examined. I think
no offer can be fairer from any person whatsoever; his conduct towards
me is so infamous, that I am informed I might prosecute him by law if he
was here; he demanding the whole sum as a debt from Mr. Wortley, at the
same time I have a note under his hand signed to prove the contrary. I
beg with the utmost earnestness that you would make him sensible of his
error. I believe 'tis very necessary to say something to fright him. I
am persuaded, if he was talked to in a style of that kind, he would not
dare to attempt to ruin me. I have a great inclination to write
seriously to your lord about it, since I desire to determine this affair
in the fairest and the clearest manner. I am not at all afraid of making
any body acquainted with it; and if I did not fear making Mr. Wortley
uneasy (who is the only person from whom I would conceal it), all the
transactions should have been long since enrolled in Chancery. I have
already taken care to have the broker's depositions taken before a
lawyer of reputation and merit. I deny giving him no satisfaction; and
after that offer, I think there is no man of honour that would refuse
signifying to him that as 'tis all he can desire, so, if he persists in
doing me an injury, he may repent it. You know how far 'tis proper to
take this method, I say nothing of the uneasiness I am under, 'tis far
beyond any expression; my obligation would be proportionable to any body
that would deliver me from it, and I should not think it paid by all the
services of my life."
[Twickenham, June (?), 1721.]
"Dear Sister,
"Having this occasion, I would not omit writing, though I have received
no answer to my two last. The bearer is well acquainted with my affair,
though not from me, till he mentioned it to me first, having heard it
from those to whom Remond had told it with all the false colours he
pleased to lay on. I shewed him the formal commission I had to employ
the money, and all the broker's testimonies taken before Delpeeke, with
his certificate. Your remonstrances have hitherto had so little effect,
that R. [Remond] will neither send a letter of attorney to examine my
accounts, or let me be in peace. I received a letter from him but two
posts since, in which he renews his threats except I send him the whole
sum, which is as much in my power as it is to send a million. I can
easily comprehend that he may be ashamed to send a procuration, which
must convince the world of all the lies he has told. For my part, I am
so willing to be rid of the plague of hearing from him, I desire no
better than to restore him with all expedition the money I have in my
hands; but I will not do it without a general acquittance in due form,
not to have fresh demands every time he wants money. If he thinks that
he has a larger sum to receive than I offer, why does he not name a
procurator to examine me? If he is content with that sum, I only insist
on the acquittance for my own safety. I am ready to send it to him, with
full license to tell as many lies as he pleases afterwards. I am weary
with troubling you with repetitions which cannot be more disagreeable to
you than they are to me. I have had, and still have, so much vexation
with this execrable affair, 'tis impossible to describe it. I had rather
talk to you of any thing else, but it fills my whole head."
Lady Mary was no coward, but when she heard that Remond intended to come
to London in connection with this business, she was at first in despair
However, she summoned her courage to aid, and asked Lady Mar to tell him
that if he was spoiling for a fight she would do her best to indulge him.
"I send you, dear sister, by Lady Lansdowne this letter, accompanied
with the only present that was ever sent me by that monster. I beg you
to return it immediately. I am told he is preparing to come to London.
Let him know that 'tis not at all necessary for receiving his money or
examining my accounts; he has nothing to do but to send a letter of
attorney to whom he pleases (without exception), and I will readily
deliver up what I have in my hands, and his presence will not obtain one
farthing more: his design then can only be to expose my letters here. I
desire you would assure him that my first step shall be to acquaint my
Lord Stair[4] with all his obligations to him, as soon as I hear he is
in London; and if he dares to give me further trouble, I shall take care
to have him rewarded in a stronger manner than he expects; there is
nothing more true than this; and I solemnly swear, that if all the
credit or money that I have in the world can do it, either for
friendship or hire, I shall not fail to have him used as he deserves;
and since I know this journey can only be designed to expose me, I shall
not value what noise is made. Perhaps you may prevent it; I leave you to
judge of the most proper method; 'tis certain no time should be lost;
fear is his predominant passion, and I believe you may fright him from
coming hither, where he will certainly find a reception very
disagreeable to him."
[Footnote 4: John Dalrymple, second Earl of Stair (1673-1747), British
Ambassador at Paris, 1715-1720.]
"September 6, 1721.
"I have consulted my lawyer, and he says I cannot, with safety to
myself, deposit the money I have received into other hands, without the
express order of Remond; and he is so unreasonable, that he will neither
send a procuration to examine my accounts, or any order for me to
transfer his stock into another name. I am heartily weary of the trust,
which has given me so much trouble, and can never think myself safe till
I am quite got rid of it: rather than be plagued any longer with the
odious keeping, I am willing to abandon my letters to his discretion. I
desire nothing more of him than an order to place his money in other
hands, which methinks should not be so hard to obtain, since he is so
dissatisfied with my management; but he seems to be bent to torment me,
and will not even touch his money, because I beg it of him. I wish you
would represent these things to him; for my own part, I live in so much
uneasiness about it, that I sometimes weary of life itself."
[October (?) 1721.]
"I cannot forbear (dear sister) accusing you of unkindness that you take
so little care of a business of the last consequence to me. R. [Remond]
writ to me some time ago, to say if I would immediately send him L2,000
sterling, he would send me an acquittance. As this was sending him
several hundreds out of my own pocket, I absolutely refused it; and, in
return, I have just received a threatening letter, to print I know not
what stuff against me. I am too well acquainted with the world (of which
poor Mrs. Murray's affair is a fatal instance), not to know that the
most groundless accusation is always of ill consequence to a woman;
besides the cruel misfortune it may bring upon me in my own family. If
you have any compassion either for me or my innocent children, I am sure
you will try to prevent it. The thing is too serious to be delayed. I
think (to say nothing either of blood or affection), that humanity and
Christianity are interested in my preservation. I am sure I can answer
for my hearty gratitude and everlasting acknowledgment of a service much
more important than that of saving my life."
In Lady Mary's correspondence there is no further reference to this
sorry business, and so it cannot be said how it ended. Nor can it be
decided whether Remond really believed he had been swindled or whether
he was just a blackmailer.
The intimacy between Lady Mary and Pope is especially interesting
because it culminated in one of the most famous quarrels in the literary
annals of this country, and second only to that between Pope and
Addison.
When Lady Mary went abroad in 1716 Pope, who always wanted to make the
best of both worlds, thought, it has been related by his biographers, of
what dramatic situation describing the separation of lovers would best
suit him to express his feelings, and he found exactly what he wanted on
the supposed authentic letters of Eloisa to Abelard. Pope sent Lady Mary
a volume of his poems, saying: "Among the rest you have all I am worth,
that is, my works. There are few things in them but what you have
already seen, except the 'Epistle of Eloisa to Abelard,' in which you
will find one passage that I cannot tell whether to wish you should
understand or not."
Pope corresponded with Lady Mary during the two years of her stay
abroad. The first letter from Pope begins:
"So natural as I find it is to me to neglect every body else in your
company, I am sensible I ought to do anything that might please you, and
I fancied upon recollection, our writing the letter you proposed was of
that nature. I therefore sate down to my part of it last night, when I
should have gone out of town. Whether or no you will order me, in
recompense, to see you again, I leave to you, for indeed I find I begin
to behave myself worse to you than to any other woman, as I value you
more, and yet if I thought I should not see you again, I would say some
things here, which I could not to your person. For I would not have you
die deceived in me, that is, go to Constantinople without knowing that I
am to some degree of extravagance, as well as with the utmost reason,
madam, your, etc."
Some passages from Pope's subsequent letters must be given to indicate
the lines on which this correspondence was conducted.
"You may easily imagine how desirous I must be of correspondence with a
person who had taught me long ago, that it was as possible to esteem at
first sight, as to love; and who has since ruined me for all the
conversation of one sex and almost all the friendship of the other. I am
but too sensible, through your means, that the company of men, wants a
certain softness to recommend it, and that of women wants everything
else. How often have I been quietly going to take possession of that
tranquility and indolence I had so long found in the country, when one
evening of your conversation has spoiled me for a solitaire too! Books
have lost their effect upon me, and I was convinced since I saw you,
that there is something more powerful than philosophy, and since I heard
you, that there is one alive wiser than all the sages. A plague of
female wisdom! it makes a man ten times more uneasy than his own. What
is very strange, Virtue herself, when you have the dressing of her, is
too amiable for one's repose. What a world of good might you have done
in your time, if you had allowed half the fine gentlemen who have seen
you to have but conversed with you! They would have been strangely
caught, while they thought only to fall in love with a fair face, and
you had bewitched them with reason and virtue, two beauties that the
very fops pretend to have an acquaintance with."
"August 20, 1716.
"Madam,
"You will find me more troublesome than ever Brutus did his evil genius,
I shall meet you in more places than one, and often refreshen your
memory before you arrive at your Philippi. These shadows of me (my
letters) will be haunting you from time to time, and putting you in mind
of the man who has really suffered by you, and whom you have robbed of
the most valuable of his enjoyments, your conversation. The advantage of
learning your sentiments by discovering mine, was what I always thought
a great one, and even with the risk I run of manifesting my own
indiscretion. You then rewarded my trust in you the moment it was given,
for you pleased and informed me the minute you answered. I must now be
contented with slow returns. However, it is some pleasure, that your
thoughts upon paper will be a more lasting possession to me, and that I
shall no longer have cause to complain of a loss I have so often
regretted, that of anything you said, which I happened to forget. In
earnest, Madam, if I were to write you as often as I think of you, it
must be every day of my life. I attend you in spirit through all your
ways, I follow in books of travel through every stage, I wish for you,
fear for you through whole folios, you make me shrink at the past
dangers of dead travellers, and when I read an agreeable prospect or
delightful place, I hope it yet subsists to give you pleasure. I inquire
the roads, the amusements, the company of every town and country you
pass through, with as much diligence, as if I were to set out next week
to overtake you. In a word no one can have you more constantly in mind,
not even your guardian-angel (if you have one), and I am willing to
indulge so much Popery as to fancy some Being takes care of you who
knows your value better than you do yourself. I am willing to think that
Heaven never gave so much self-neglect and resolution to a woman, to
occasion her calamity, but am pious enough to believe those qualities
must be intended to her benefit and her glory."
Pope's letters of this period to Lady Mary were all written in a strain
of adulation, which may well have pleased Lady Mary and must certainly
have amused her. She can, however, scarcely have been led into any
self-deception as regards the sincerity of her correspondent, in spite
of the fact that in one of the earliest epistles he addressed to her he
subscribed himself: "I am, with all unalterable esteem and sincerity,
Madam, your most faithful, obedient, humble servant." Yet, no doubt, she
was pleased enough to read: "I communicated your letter to Mr. Congreve;
he thinks of you as he ought, I mean as I do, for one always thinks that
to be just as it ought.... We never meet but we lament over you: we pay
a kind of weekly rites to your memory, when we strew flowers of rhetoric
and offer such libations to your name as if it were a profaneness to
call toasting." Well, alcoholic refreshment by any other name is just as
potent. It must have been grateful and comforting to be told when in
exile: "I must tell you, too, that the Duke of Buckingham has been more
than once your high priest in performing the office of your praises: and
upon the whole I believe there are few men who do not deplore your
departure, as women that sincerely do."
Most excellent Pope, who would play at make-believe. It is almost a pity
that he could not persuade the lady that he meant even a tithe of what
he wrote to her. Listen to him again: "For my part, I hate a great many
women for your sake, and undervalue all the rest. 'Tis you who are to
blame, and may God revenge it upon you, with all those blessings and
earthy prosperities which the divines tell us, are the cause of our
perdition: for if He makes you happy in this world, I dare trust your
own virtue to do it in the other." These poets!
Lady Mary took all this in the right way, and as love-letters appraised
them at their true value. "Perhaps you'll laugh at me for thanking you
very gravely for all the obliging concern you express for me," she wrote
from Vienna in September, with, perhaps, just a touch of irony. "'Tis
certain that I may, if I please, take the fine things you say to me for
wit and raillery; and it may be, it would be taking them right. But I
never in my life was half so well disposed to believe you in earnest;
and that distance which makes the continuation of your friendship
improbable, has very much increased my faith for it, and I find that I
have (as well as the rest of my sex), whatever face I set on't, a strong
disposition to believe in miracles." As regards the rest, her side of
the correspondence was matter-of-fact to such a degree that it suggests
that she adopted that tone in order to lease him. Her replies can
scarcely have given Pope any satisfaction. From Vienna she gave him a
detailed account of the opera and the theatre; from Belgrade she told
him of the war and of an Arabic scholar and also of the climate; from
Adrianople she discoursed of the Hebrus, of the lads of the village, of
Addison and Theocritus, pays him compliments on his translation of
Homer, and a copy of some Turkish verses; and so on. The most striking
thing about her letters is the absence of the personal note, which is so
often introduced when she was writing to others. They read more like
essays than communications to a friend.
Pope, in a letter dated September 1, 1718, sent Lady Mary a copy of his
verses.
ON JOHN HUGHES AND SARAH DREW
When Eastern lovers fear'd the fun'eral fire
On the same pile the faithful pair expire!
Here pitying Heav'n that virtue mutual found,
And blasted both, that it might neither wound.
Hearts so sincere th' Almighty saw well pleas'd,
Sent his own lightning and the victims seiz'd.
I
Think not by vig'rous judgment seiz'd,
A pair so faithful could expire;
Victims so pure Heav'n saw well pleas'd,
And snatch'd them in celestial fire.
II
Live well, and fear no sudden fate:
When God calls virtue to the grave;
Alike 'tis justice, soon or late,
Mercy alike to kill or save.
Virtue unmov'd can hear the call.
And face the flash that melts the ball.
These verses she acknowledged in a letter which, written while on the
homeward path, she sent from Dover, where she arrived at the beginning
of November.
"I have this minute received a letter of yours, sent me from Paris. I
believe and hope I shall very soon see both you and Mr. Congreve; but as
I am here in an inn, where we stay to regulate our march to London, bag
and baggage, I shall employ some of my leisure time in answering that
part of yours that seems to require an answer.
"I must applaud your good nature, in supposing that your pastoral lovers
(vulgarly called haymakers) would have lived in everlasting joy and
harmony, if the lightning had not interrupted their scheme of happiness.
I see no reason to imagine that John Hughes and Sarah Drew were either
wiser or more virtuous than their neighbours. That a well-set man of
twenty five should have a fancy to marry a brown woman of eighteen, is
nothing marvellous; and I cannot help thinking, that, had they married,
their lives would have passed in the common track with their fellow
parishioners. His endeavouring to shield her from the storm, was a
natural action, and what he would have certainly done for his horse, if
he had been in the same situation. Neither am I of opinion, that their
sudden death was a reward of their mutual virtue. You know the Jews were
reproved for thinking a village destroyed by fire more wicked than those
that had escaped the thunder. Time and chance happen to all men. Since
you desire me to try my skill in an epitaph, I think the following lines
perhaps more just, though not so poetical as yours:
Here lies John Hughes and Sarah Drew;
Perhaps you'll say, what's that to you?
Believe me, friend, much may be said
On this poor couple that are dead.
On Sunday next they should have married;
But see how oddly things are carried!
On Thursday last it rain'd and lighten'd;
These tender lovers, sadly frighten'd,
Shelter'd beneath the cocking hay,
In hopes to pass the storm away;
But the bold thunder found them out
(Commissioned for that end, no doubt),
And, seizing on their trembling breath,
Consign'd them to the shades of death.
Who knows if 'twas not kindly done?
For had they seen the next year's sun,
A beaten wife and cuckold swain
Had jointly curs'd the marriage chain;
Now they are happy in their doom,
For P. has wrote upon their tomb.
"I confess, these sentiments are not altogether so heroic as yours; but
I hope you will forgive them in favour of the two last lines. You see
how much I esteem the honour you have done them; though I am not very
impatient to have the same, and had rather continue to be your stupid
living humble servant, than be celebrated by all the pens in Europe.
"I would write to Mr. Congreve, but suppose you will read this to him,
if he enquires after me."
CHAPTER XI
AT TWICKENHAM
The Montagus take a house at Twickenham--Lady Mary's liking for country
life--Neighbours and visitors--Pope--Bononcini, Anastasia Robinson,
Senesino--Lord Peterborough--Sir Geoffrey Kneller--Henrietta
Howard--Lord Bathurst--The Duke of Wharton--His early history--He comes
to Twickenham--His relations with Lady Mary--Horace Walpole's reference
to them--Pope's bitter onslaught on the Duke--An Epilogue by Lady
Mary--"On the death of Mrs. Bowes"--The Duke quarrels with Lady Mary.
Pope went to live at Twickenham in 1718, and it was generally believed
that it was by his persuasion that the Montagus rented a house in that
little riverside hamlet. It was not until 1722 that they bought "the
small habitation."
Lady Mary divided her time between London and Twickenham, but apparently
enjoyed herself more at her country retreat. "I live in a sort of
solitude that wants very little of being such as I would have it," she
wrote to her sister, Lady Mar, in August, 1721. As a matter of fact, the
solitude was more imaginary than real, for round about there was a small
colony of friends.
She was, indeed, very rarely lonely. "My time is melted away in almost
perpetual concerts," she told her sister. "I do not presume to judge,
but I'll assure you I am a very hearty as well as an humble admirer. I
have taken my little thread satin beauty into the house with me; she is
allowed by Bononcini to have the finest voice he ever heard in England.
He and Mrs. Robinson and Senesino lodge in this village, and sup often
with me: and this easy indolent life would make me the happiest
in the world, if I had not this execrable affair [of Remond] still
hanging over my head." To Anastasia Robinson there is more than one
allusion in Lady Mary's correspondence, and she gives a most amusing
account of an incident in that lady's career.