Page images
PDF
EPUB

Charms by accepting, by submitting, sways,
Yet has her humour most, when she obeys;
Let fops or fortune fly which way they will,
Disdains all loss of tickets, or codille;
Spleen, vapours, or small-pox, above them all,
And mistress of herself, though China fall. 26

265

And yet, believe me, good as well as ill, Woman's at best a contradiction still. Heaven, when it strives to polish all it can Its last best work, but forms a softer man ;

270

Picks from each sex, to make the favourite blest,

Your love of pleasure, our desire of rest:
Blends, in exception to all general rules,

275

Your taste of follies, with our scorn of fools:
Reserve with frankness, art with truth allied,
Courage with softness, modesty with pride;
Fix'd principles, with fancy ever new;
Shakes all together, and produces-you!

280

Be this a woman's fame; with this unblest,
Toasts live a scorn, and queens may die a jest.
This Phoebus promised (I forget the year)
When those blue eyes first open'd on the sphere;
Ascendant Phoebus watch'd that hour with care,
Averted half your parents' simple prayer;
And gave you beauty, but denied the pelf

285

That buys your sex a tyrant o'er itself.

The generous god, who wit and gold refines,

And ripens spirits as he ripens mines,

290

Kept dross for duchesses, the world shall know it,
To you gave sense, good humour, and a poet.

26 [The allusion to the fall of China, is taken from Addison in the Spectator. The tickets were, of course, lottery tickets, in which Pope and Miss Blount dabbled occasionally. It is curious to find small-pox-so deadly a distemper-classed with spleen, vapours, and broken china. Martha Blount appears to have had the small-pox. In a letter to Teresa, the poet wishes that Martha's beauty may continue as it always was; "but whatever ravages a merciless distemper may commit, I dare promise her boldly, what few, if any, of her makers of visits and compliments dare to do-she shall have one man as much her admirer as ever." See Life of Pope, in this edition, vol. I. p. 49.]

ADDITIONAL NOTES.

DUCHESS OF HAMILTON.

Ver. 53. Narcissa's nature, tolerably mild,

To make a wash would hardly stew a child.

The characters of Calypso and Narcissa in this passage were originally presented as one, under the name of Sylvia, in the Miscellanies, 1727. According to Warton, however, Narcissa was intended for the Duchess of Hamilton, and there are certainly points of resemblance, though it should be remembered that Pope stated, upon his honour, that no character in the Epistle as then published (including Narcissa) was drawn from the life. Such a positive declaration should, at least, give the duchess the benefit of a doubt as to her complete identity with the unamiable Narcissa. The Duchess of Hamilton of that day was Elizabeth Gerard, daughter of Digby, Lord Gerard, of Bromley, and widow of James, Duke of Hamilton, who was killed in a duel with Lord Mohun, Nov. 15, 1712. In that unfortunate duel both the principals were slain. Lord Mohun was a notorious profligate, who had frequently been engaged in duels and midnight brawls, and had been twice tried for murder. The only remark made by his widow, when his corpse was brought home, was an expression of high displeasure that the men had laid the body on her state bed, thereby staining with blood the rich and costly furniture ! The Duke and Lord Mohun had quarrelled about a lawsuit depending in the Court of Chancery, and political differences exasperated their dislike of each other. Hamilton was a Tory, and MasterGeneral of the Ordnance; Mohun was of the Whig party. The duel was fought in Hyde Park; Mohun fell mortally wounded, the duke being above him. The latter was lifted up, and walked about thirty yards, when he sank down, and expired. It would seem that while the duke was over Mohun, the desperate duellist must have shortened his sword, and stabbed him to the heart, the wound commencing below the left shoulder. Colonel Hamilton, the duke's second, afterwards swore that the mortal wound was given, not by Lord Mohun, but by his second, General Macartney, who, he said, made a push at the duke while he was down. This accusation was unsupported by proof, and Colonel Hamilton prevaricated, and was confused in his evidence. Macartney fled, and a reward of £500 from the Crown, and £300 from the widowed duchess, was offered for his apprehension. He escaped to Hanover, where he remained for some time, enjoying the favour of the Court, and on his return to England he surrendered himself for trial. The public feeling against him had by this time abated; and he was found guilty of manslaughter only. The Duchess of Hamilton continued a widow until her

[graphic][merged small]

death, February 10, 1744. We have some scanty notices of this lady in Swift's Journal and Correspondence. The Dean visited her on the morning of the fatal occurrence, and remained with her two hours. "I never saw so melancholy a scene," he says. Two months afterwards, he was again on a visit to the Duchess, but the tables were turned. She never grieved, but raged, and stormed, and railed: "She is pretty quiet now, but has a diabo. lical temper." Swift afterwards gives a very Irish-like supplement to this affair:

"March 4, 1712. I was to see the Duchess of Hamilton to-day, and met Blith of Ireland just going out of her house into his coach. I asked how she came to receive young fellows? It seems he had a ball in the Duke of Hamilton's house when the Duke died, and the Duchess got an advertisement put in the Postboy, reflecting on the ball, because the Marlboroughs were there: and Blith came to beg the Duchess's pardon, and clear himself. He is a

sad dog.

"March 5. I met Blith at the Duke of Ormond's, and he begged me to carry him to the Duchess of Hamilton, to beg her pardon again. I did, on purpose to see how the blunderbuss behaved himself; but I begged the Duchess to use him mercifully, for she is the devil of a teaser. The good of it is, she ought to beg his pardon, for he meant no harm; yet she would not

allow him to put in an advertisement to clear himself from hers, though hers was all a lie. He appealed to me, and I gravely gave it against him.”

One letter from the Duchess of Hamilton to Swift appears in his correspondence, and one addressed to her by Pope is also published. We subjoin both. Pope's letter was written in that gay and splendid period of his life when the success of his Homer had secured a competency, and when the favours of the great were profusely lavished upon him.

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors][merged small]

Dear Dean,-When we were together last, I remember we spoke of a certain stanza, which you suspected me parent of, by reason there were some things in it you were sure should have said twelve years ago. If this be a rule, I am certain you are not Dean Swift, for twelve years ago your promised letter had not been so long in coming to me. All I can say is, I wish you had been twelve years ago what I wish you now, [a bishop?] and that you were now what you was twelve years ago to

"Your real friend and humble servant,
"E. HAMILTON."

[ocr errors]

'London, October (between day and night). Madam, Mrs. Whitworth (who, as her epitaph on Twitnam highway assures us, had attained to as much perfection and purity as any since the Apostles) is now deposited, according to her own order, between a fig-tree and a vine, there to be found at the last resurrection.

"I am just come from seeing your Grace in much the like situation, between a honeysuckle and a rosebud; where you are to continue as long as canvas can last. I suppose the painter, by those emblems, intended to intimate, on the one hand, your Grace's sweet disposition to your friends: and, on the other, to show you are near enough related to the thistle of Scotland to deserve the same motto with regard to your enemies. Nemo me impune lacessit. (Lord William will conster this Latine if you send it to Thistleworth.)

"The two foregoing periods, methinks, are so mystical, learned, and perplexed, that if you have any statesmen or divines about you, they can't choose but be pleased with them. One divine you cannot be without as a good Christian; and a statesman you have lately had, for I hear my Lord Selkirk has been with you. But (that I may not be unintelligible quite to the bottom of this page) I must tell your Grace, in English, that I have made a painter bestow the aforesaid ornaments round about you (for upon you there needs none), and I am, upon the whole, pleased with my picture beyond expression. I may now say of your picture, it is the thing in the world the likest you, except yourself; as a cautious person once said of an elephant, it was the biggest in the world, except itself.

"You see, Madam, it is not impossible for you to be compared to an elephant and you must give me leave to show you one may carry on the simile. An elephant never bends his knees-and I am told your Grace says no prayers. An elephant has a most remarkable command of his snout-and so has your Grace when you imitate my Lady O

-y.1 An

elephant is a great lover of man-and so is your Grace for all I know; though, from your partiality to myself, I should rather think you loved little children.

"I beg you not to be discouraged in this point. Remember the text, which I'll preach upon the first day I am a parson: 'Suffer little children to come to me.' And 'despise not one of these little ones.' No, Madam, despise great bears, such as Gay, who now goes by the dreadful name of The Beast of Blois, where Mr. Pulteney and he are settled, and where he shows tricks gratis, to all the beasts of his own country (for strangers do not yet understand the voice of the beast). I have heard from him but once, Lord Warwick twice, Mrs. Lapell thrice: if there be any that has heard from him four times, I suppose it is you.2

"I beg Mr. Blondel may know Dr. Logg has received ordination, and enters upon his functions this winter at Mrs. Blount's. They have chosen this innocent man for their confessor; and I believe most Roman Catholic ladies, that have any sins, will follow their example. This good priest will be of the order of Melchisedec for ever, and serve a family from generation to generation. He'll stand in a corner as quietly as a clock; and, being wound up once a week, strike up a loud alarum to sin on a Sunday morning. Nay, if the Christian religion should be abolished (as indeed there is great reason to expect it from the wisdom of the legislature) he might, at worts, make an excellent bonfire, which is all that, upon a change of religion, can be desired from a heretic. I do not hope your Grace should be converted, but, however, I wish you would call at Mrs. B.'s out of curiosity. To meet people one likes, is thought by some the best reason for going to church, and I dare promise you'll like one another. They are extremely your servants, or else I should not think them my friends.

"I ought to keep up the custom, and ask you to send me something. Therefore pray, Madam, send me yourself—that is, a letter; and pray make haste to bring up yourself—that is, all I value-to town.

I am, with the truest respect, the least ceremony, and the most zeal, Madam Your Grace's most obedient, faithful, and most humble servant,

"Mr. Hamilton, I am yours. There is a short letter for you!"

HENRIETTA, DUCHESS OF MARLBOROUGH.

A. POPE.

Ver. 69. See Sin in state.] This character is said to have been designed for the young Duchess of Marlborough, Henrietta, eldest daughter of the great Duke, and married to Lord Godolphin. She was Duchess in her own

1 [Evidently Lady Orkney, a relation of the Duchess of Hamilton's, and often mentioned by Swift, who considered her the wisest woman he ever knew. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu gives a ludicrous description of her appearance at the coronation of George II. in 1727, mentioning her great size, the inimitable roll of her eyes, and her grey hairs, which, by good fortune, stood directly upright.]

2 [Pulteney took Gay with him in a trip to France in 1717, which fixes the date of this letter.]

« PreviousContinue »