Love Letters of Dorothy Osborne — 04 - Letters 16-20

SIR,--If it were the carrier's fault that you stayed so long for your letters, you are revenged, for I have chid him most unreasonably.

But I must confess 'twas not for that, for I did not know it then, but going to meet him (as I usually do), when he gave me your letter I found the upper seal broken open, and underneath where it uses to be only closed with a little wax, there was a seal, which though it were an anchor and a heart, methought it did not look like yours, but less, and much worse cut.

This suspicion was so strong upon me, that I chid till the poor fellow was ready to cry, and swore to me that it had never been touched since he had it, and that he was careful of it, as he never put it with his other letters, but by itself, and that now it come amongst his money, which perhaps might break the seal; and lest I should think it was his curiosity, he told me very ingenuously he could not read, and so we parted for the present.

But since, he has been with a neighbour of mine whom he sometimes delivers my letters to, and begged her that she would go to me and desire my worship to write to your worship to know how the letter was sealed, for it has so grieved him that he has neither eat nor slept (to do him any good) since he came home, and in grace of God this shall be a warning to him as long as he lives.

He takes it so heavily that I think I must be friends with him again; but pray hereafter seal your letters, so that the difficulty of opening them may dishearten anybody from attempting it.

It was but my guess that the ladies at Heams' were unhandsome; but since you tell me they were remarkably so, sure I know them by it; they are two sisters, and might have been mine if the Fates had so pleased.

They have a brother that is not like them, and is a baronet besides.

'Tis strange that you tell me of my Lords Shandoys [Chandos] and Arundel; but what becomes of young Compton's estate?

Sure my Lady Carey cannot neither in honour nor conscience keep it; besides that, she needs it less now than ever, her son (being, as I hear) dead.

Sir T. , I suppose, avoids you as a friend of mine.

My brother tells me they meet sometimes, and have the most ado to pull off their hats to one another that can be, and never speak.

If I were in town I'll undertake he would venture the being choked for want of air rather than stir out of doors for fear of meeting me.

But did you not say in your last that you took something very ill from me?

If 'twas my humble thanks, well, you shall have no more of them then, nor no more servants.

I think that they are not necessary among friends.

I take it very kindly that your father asked for me, and that you were not pleased with the question he made of the continuance of my friendship.

I can pardon it him, because he does not know me, but I should never forgive you if you could doubt it.

Were my face in no more danger of changing than my mind, I should be worth the seeing at threescore; and that which is but very ordinary now, would then be counted handsome for an old woman; but, alas!

I am more likely to look old before my time with grief.

Never anybody had such luck with servants; what with marrying and what with dying, they all leave me.

Just now I have news brought me of the death of an old rich knight that has promised me this seven years to marry me whensoever his wife died, and now he's dead before her, and has left her such a widow, it makes me mad to think on't, £1200 a year jointure and £20,000 in money and personal estate, and all this I might have had if Mr. Death had been pleased to have taken her instead of him.

Well, who can help these things?

But since I cannot have him, would you had her!

What say you?

Shall I speak a good word for you?

She will marry for certain, and perhaps, though my brother may expect I should serve him in it, yet if you give me commission I'll say I was engaged beforehand for a friend, and leave him to shift for himself.

You would be my neighbour if you had her, and I should see you often.

Think on't, and let me know what you resolve?

My lady has writ me word that she intends very shortly to sit at Lely's for her picture for me; I give you notice on't, that you may have the pleasure of seeing it sometimes whilst 'tis there.

I imagine 'twill be so to you, for I am sure it would be a great one to me, and we do not use to differ in our inclinations, though I cannot agree with you that my brother's kindness to me has anything of trouble in't; no, sure, I may be just to you and him both, and to be a kind sister will take nothing from my being a perfect friend.

_Letter 17. _--Lady Newcastle was Margaret Duchess of Newcastle.

"The thrice noble, chaste, and virtuous, but again somewhat fantastical and original-brained, generous Margaret Newcastle," as Elia describes her.

She was the youngest daughter of Sir Charles Lucas, and was born at Colchester towards the end of the reign of James I. Her mother appears to have been remarkably careful of her education in all such lighter matters as dancing, music, and the learning of the French tongue; but she does not seem to have made any deep study of the classics.

In 1643 she joined the Court at Oxford, and was made one of the Maids of Honour to Henrietta Maria, whom she afterwards attended in exile.

At Paris she met the Marquis of Newcastle, who married her in that city in 1645. From Paris they went to Rotterdam, she leaving the Queen to follow her husband's fortunes; and after stopping at Rotterdam and Brabant for short periods, they settled at Antwerp.

At the Restoration she returned to England with her husband, and employed her time in writing letters, plays, poems, philosophical discourses, and orations.

There is a long catalogue of her works in Ballard's _Memoirs_, but all published at a date subsequent to 1653. However, from Anthony Wood and other sources one gathers somewhat different details of her life and writings; and the book to which Dorothy refers here and in Letter 21, is probably the _Poems and Fancies_, an edition of which was published, I believe, in this year [1653].

Many of her verses are more strangely incomprehensible than anything even in the poetry of to-day.

Take, for instance, a poem of four lines, from the _Poems and Fancies_, entitled-- THE JOINING OF SEVERAL FIGUR'D ATOMS MAKES

OTHER FIGURES.

Several figur'd Atoms well agreeing When joined, do give another figure being.

For as those figures joined several ways The fabrick of each several creature raise.

This seems to be a rhyming statement of the Atomic theory, but whether it is a poem or a fancy we should find it hard to decide.

It is not, however, an unfair example of Lady Newcastle's fantastic style.

Lady Newcastle died in 1673, and was buried in Westminster Abbey,--"A wise, witty, and learned Lady, which her many books do well testify."

SIR,--I received your letter to-day, when I thought it almost impossible that I should be sensible of anything but my father's sickness and my own affliction in it.

Indeed, he was then so dangerously ill that we could not reasonably hope he should outlive this day; yet he is now, I thank God, much better, and I am come so much to myself with it, as to undertake a long letter to you whilst I watch by him.

Towards the latter end it will be excellent stuff, I believe; but, alas!

you may allow me to dream sometimes.

I have had so little sleep since my father was sick that I am never thoroughly awake.

Lord, how I have wished for you!

Here do I sit all night by a poor moped fellow that serves my father, and have much ado to keep him awake and myself too.

If you heard the wise discourse that is between us, you would swear we wanted sleep; but I shall leave him to-night to entertain himself, and try if I can write as wisely as I talk.

I am glad all is well again.

In earnest, it would have lain upon my conscience if I had been the occasion of making your poor boy lose a service, that if he has the wit to know how to value it, he would never have forgiven me while he had lived.

But while I remember it, let me ask you if you did not send my letter and _Cléopâtre_ where I directed you for my lady?

I received one from her to-day full of the kindest reproaches, that she has not heard from me this three weeks.

I have writ constantly to her, but I do not so much wonder that the rest are lost, as that she seems not to have received that which I sent to you nor the books.

I do not understand it, but I know there is no fault of yours in't. But, mark you!

if you think to 'scape with sending me such bits of letters, you are mistaken.

You say you are often interrupted, and I believe it; but you must use then to begin to write before you receive mine, and whensoever you have any spare time allow me some of it.

Can you doubt that anything can make your letters cheap?

In earnest, 'twas unkindly said, and if I could be angry with you it should be for that.

No, certainly they are, and ever will be, dear to me as that which I receive a huge contentment by.

How shall I long when you are gone your journey to hear from you!

how shall I apprehend a thousand accidents that are not likely nor will ever happen, I hope!

Oh, if you do not send me long letters, then you are the cruellest person that can be!

If you love me you will; and if you do not, I shall never love myself.

You need not fear such a command as you mention.

Alas!

I am too much concerned that you should love me ever to forbid it you; 'tis all that I propose of happiness to myself in the world.

The burning of my paper has waked me; all this while I was in a dream.

But 'tis no matter, I am content you should know they are of you, and that when my thoughts are left most at liberty they are the kindest.

I swear my eyes are so heavy that I hardly see what I write, nor do I think you will be able to read it when I have done; the best on't is 'twill be no great loss to you if you do not, for, sure, the greatest part on't is not sense, and yet on my conscience I shall go on with it.

'Tis like people that talk in their sleep, nothing interrupts them but talking to them again, and that you are not like to do at this distance;

besides that, at this instant you are, I believe, more asleep than I, and do not so much as dream that I am writing to you.

My fellow-watchers have been asleep too, till just now they begin to stretch and yawn; they are going to try if eating and drinking can keep them awake, and I am kindly invited to be of their company; and my father's man has got one of the maids to talk nonsense to to-night, and they have got between them a bottle of ale.

I shall lose my share if I do not take them at their first offer.

Your patience till I have drunk, and then I'll for you again.

And now on the strength of this ale, I believe I shall be able to fill up this paper that's left with something or other; and first let me ask you if you have seen a book of poems newly come out, made by my Lady Newcastle?

For God's sake if you meet with it send it to me; they say 'tis ten times more extravagant than her dress.

Sure, the poor woman is a little distracted, she could never be so ridiculous else as to venture at writing books, and in verse too.

If I should not sleep this fortnight I should not come to that.

My eyes grow a little dim though, for all the ale, and I believe if I could see it this is most strangely scribbled.

Sure, I shall not find fault with your writing in haste, for anything but the shortness of your letter; and 'twould be very unjust in me to tie you to a ceremony that I do not observe myself.

No, for God's sake let there be no such thing between us; a real kindness is so far beyond all compliment, that it never appears more than when there is least of t'other mingled with it.

If, then, you would have me believe yours to be perfect, confirm it to me by a kind freedom.

Tell me if there be anything that I can serve you in, employ me as you would do that sister that you say you love so well.

Chide me when I do anything that is not well, but then make haste to tell me that you have forgiven me, and that you are what I shall ever be, a faithful friend.

_Letter 18. _--I cannot pass by this letter without saying that the first part of it is, to my thinking, the most dainty and pleasing piece of writing that Dorothy has left us.

The account of her life, one day and every day, is like a gust of fresh country air clearing away the mist of time and enabling one to see Dorothy at Chicksands quite clearly.

It is fashionable to deny Macaulay everything but memory; but he had the good taste and discernment to admire this letter, and quote from it in his Essay on Sir William Temple,--a quotation for which I shall always remain very grateful to him.

Sir Thomas Peyton, "Brother Peyton," was born in 1619, being, I believe, the second baronet of that name; his seat was at Knowlton, in the county of Kent.

Early in the reign of Charles I. we find him as Member of Parliament for Sandwich, figuring in a Committee side by side with the two Sir Harry Vanes; the Committee having been sent into Kent to prevent the dispersal of rumours to the scandal of Parliament,--no light task, one would think.

In 1643 he is in prison, charged among other things with being a malignant.

An unjust charge, as he thinks; for he writes to his brother, "If to wish on earth peace, goodwill towards men, be a malignant, none is greater than your affectionate brother, Thomas Peyton."

But in spite of these peaceful thoughts in prison, in May 1648 he is heading a loyalist rising in Kent.

The other counties not joining in at the right moment, in accordance with the general procedure at Royalist risings, it is defeated by Fairfax.

Sir Thomas's house is ransacked, he himself is taken prisoner near Bury St. Edmunds, brought to the House of Commons, and committed to the Tower.

A right worthy son-in-law of good Sir Peter.

We are glad to find him at large again in 1653, his head safe on his shoulders, and do not grudge him his grant of duties on sea-coal, dated 1660; nor are we sorry that he should once again grace the House of Commons with his presence as one of the members for loyal Kent in the good days when the King enjoyed his own again.

SIR,--I have been reckoning up how many faults you lay to my charge in your last letter, and I find I am severe, unjust, unmerciful, and unkind.

Oh me, how should one do to mend all these!

'Tis work for an age, and 'tis to be feared I shall be so old before I am good, that 'twill not be considerable to anybody but myself whether I am so or not.

I say nothing of the pretty humour you fancied me in, in your dream, because 'twas but a dream.

Sure, if it had been anything else, I should have remembered that my Lord L. loves to have his chamber and his bed to himself.

But seriously, now, I wonder at your patience.

How could you hear me talk so senselessly, though 'twere but in your sleep, and not be ready to beat me?

What nice mistaken points of honour I pretended to, and yet could allow him room in the same bed with me!

Well, dreams are pleasant things to people whose humours are so; but to have the spleen, and to dream upon't, is a punishment I would not wish my greatest enemy.

I seldom dream, or never remember them, unless they have been so sad as to put me into such disorder as I can hardly recover when I am awake, and some of those I am confident I shall never forget.

You ask me how I pass my time here.

I can give you a perfect account not only of what I do for the present, but of what I am likely to do this seven years if I stay here so long.

I rise in the morning reasonably early, and before I am ready I go round the house till I am weary of that, and then into the garden till it grows too hot for me.

About ten o'clock I think of making me ready, and when that's done I go into my father's chamber, from whence to dinner, where my cousin Molle and I sit in great state in a room, and at a table that would hold a great many more.

After dinner we sit and talk till Mr. B.

comes in question, and then I am gone.

The heat of the day is spent in reading or working, and about six or seven o'clock I walk out into a common that lies hard by the house, where a great many young wenches keep sheep and cows, and sit in the shade singing of ballads.

I go to them and compare their voices and beauties to some ancient shepherdesses that I have read of, and find a vast difference there; but, trust me, I think these are as innocent as those could be.

I talk to them, and find they want nothing to make them the happiest people in the world but the knowledge that they are so.

Most commonly, when we are in the midst of our discourse, one looks about her, and spies her cows going into the corn, and then away they all run as if they had wings at their heels.

I, that am not so nimble, stay behind; and when I see them driving home their cattle, I think 'tis time for me to return too.

When I have supped, I go into the garden, and so to the side of a small river that runs by it, when I sit down and wish you were with me (you had best say this is not kind neither).

In earnest, 'tis a pleasant place, and would be much more so to me if I had your company.

I sit there sometimes till I am lost with thinking; and were it not for some cruel thoughts of the crossness of our fortunes that will not let me sleep there, I should forget that there were such a thing to be done as going to bed.

Since I writ this my company is increased by two, my brother Harry and a fair niece, the eldest of my brother Peyton's children.

She is so much a woman that I am almost ashamed to say I am her aunt; and so pretty, that, if I had any design to gain of servants, I should not like her company; but I have none, and therefore shall endeavour to keep her here as long as I can persuade her father to spare her, for she will easily consent to it, having so much of my humour (though it be the worst thing in her) as to like a melancholy place and little company.

My brother John is not come down again, nor am I certain when he will be here.

He went from London into Gloucestershire to my sister who was very ill, and his youngest girl, of which he was very fond, is since dead.

But I believe by that time his wife has a little recovered her sickness and loss of her child, he will be coming this way.

My father is reasonably well, but keeps his chamber still, and will hardly, I am afraid, ever be so perfectly recovered as to come abroad again.

I am sorry for poor Walker, but you need not doubt of what he has of yours in his hands, for it seems he does not use to do his work himself.

I speak seriously, he keeps a Frenchman that sets all his seals and rings.

If what you say of my Lady Leppington be of your own knowledge, I shall believe you, but otherwise I can assure you I have heard from people that pretend to know her very well, that her kindness to Compton was very moderate, and that she never liked him so well as when he died and gave her his estate.

But they might be deceived, and 'tis not so strange as that you should imagine a coldness and an indifference in my letters when I so little meant it; but I am not displeased you should desire my kindness enough to apprehend the loss of it when it is safest.

Only I would not have you apprehend it so far as to believe it possible,--that were an injury to all the assurances I have given you, and if you love me you cannot think me unworthy.

I should think myself so, if I found you grew indifferent to me, that I have had so long and so particular a friendship for; but, sure, this is more than I need to say.

You are enough in my heart to know all my thoughts, and if so, you know better than I can tell you how much I am Yours.

_Letter 19. _--Lady Ruthin is Susan, daughter and heiress of Charles Longueville Lord Grey de Ruthin.

She married Sir Harry Yelverton, a match of which Dorothy thoroughly approved.

We hear more of Dorothy's beautiful friend at the time when the treaty with Sir Harry Yelverton is going forward.

Of Mr. Talbot I find nothing; we must rest contented in knowing him to be a fellow-servant.

R.

Spencer is Robert Spencer, Earl of Sunderland, Lady Sunderland's brother-in-law.

He was afterwards one of the inner council of four in Temple's Scheme of Government.

"In him," says Macaulay, in a somewhat highly-coloured character-sketch, "the political immortality of his age was personified in the most lively manner.

Nature had given him a keen understanding, a restless and mischievous temper, a cold heart, and an abject spirit.

His mind had undergone a training by which all his vices had been nursed up to the rankest maturity."

Lady Lexington was Mary, daughter of Sir Anthony Leger; she was the third wife of Robert Sutton, Earl of Lexington.

I cannot find that her daughter married one of the Spencers.

SIR,--If to know I wish you with me pleases you, 'tis a satisfaction you may always have, for I do it perpetually; but were it really in my power to make you happy, I could not miss being so myself, for I know nothing else I want towards it.

You are admitted to all my entertainments; and 'twould be a pleasing surprise to me to see you amongst my shepherdesses.

I meet some there sometimes that look very like gentlemen (for 'tis a road), and when they are in good humour they give us a compliment as they go by; but you would be so courteous as to stay, I hope, if we entreated you; 'tis in your way to this place, and just before the house.

'Tis our Hyde Park, and every fine evening, anybody that wanted a mistress might be sure to find one there.

I have wondered often to meet my fair Lady Ruthin there alone; methinks it should be dangerous for an heir.

I could find in my heart to steal her away myself, but it should be rather for her person than her fortune.

My brother says not a word of you, nor your service, nor do I expect he should; if I could forget you, he would not help my memory.

You would laugh, sure, if I could tell you how many servants he has offered me since he came down; but one above all the rest I think he is in love with himself, and may marry him too if he pleases, I shall not hinder him.

'Tis one Talbot, the finest gentleman he has seen this seven years;

but the mischief on't is he has not above fifteen or sixteen hundred pound a year, though he swears he begins to think one might bate £500 a year for such a husband.

I tell him I am glad to hear it; and if I was as much taken (as he) with Mr. Talbot, I should not be less gallant; but I doubted the first extremely.

I have spleen enough to carry me to Epsom this summer; but yet I think I shall not go.

If I make one journey, I must make more, for then I have no excuse.

Rather than be obliged to that, I'll make none.

You have so often reproached me with the loss of your liberty, that to make you some amends I am contented to be your prisoner this summer; but you shall do one favour for me into the bargain.

When your father goes into Ireland, lay your commands upon some of his servants to get you an Irish greyhound.

I have one that was the General's; but 'tis a bitch, and those are always much less than the dogs.

I got it in the time of my favour there, and it was all they had.

Henry Cromwell undertook to write to his brother Fleetwood for another for me; but I have lost my hopes there.

Whomsoever it is that you employ, he will need no other instructions but to get the biggest he can meet with; 'tis all the beauty of those dogs, or of any kind, I think.

A

masty [mastif] is handsomer to me than the most exact little dog that ever lady played withal.

You will not offer to take it ill that I employ you in such a commission, since I have told you that the General's son did not refuse it; but I shall take it ill if you do not take the same freedom with me whensoever I am capable of serving you.

The town must needs be unpleasant now, and, methinks, you might contrive some way of having your letters sent to you without giving yourself the trouble of coming to town for them when you have no other business; you must pardon me if I think they cannot be worth it.

I am told that R. Spencer is a servant to a lady of my acquaintance, a daughter of my Lady Lexington's. Is it true?

And if it be, what is become of the £2500 lady?

Would you think it, that I have an ambassador from the Emperor Justinian, that comes to renew the treaty?

In earnest, 'tis true, and I want your counsel extremely, what to do in it.

You told me once that of all my servants you liked him the best.

If I could do so too, there were no dispute in't. Well, I'll think on't, and if it succeed I will be as good as my word; you shall take your choice of my four daughters.

Am not I beholding to him, think you?

He says that he has made addresses, 'tis true, in several places since we parted, but could not fix anywhere; and, in his opinion, he sees nobody that would make so fit a wife for him as I. He has often inquired after me to hear if I were marrying, and somebody told him I had an ague, and he presently fell sick of one too, so natural a sympathy there is between us; and yet for all this, on my conscience, we shall never marry.

He desires to know whether I am at liberty or not.

What shall I tell him?

Or shall I send him to you to know?

I think that will be best.

I'll say that you are much my friend, and that I have resolved not to dispose of myself but with your consent and approbation, and therefore he must make all his court to you; and when he can bring me a certificate under your hand, that you think him a fit husband for me, 'tis very likely I may have him.

Till then I am his humble servant and your faithful friend.

_Letter 20. _--In this letter the journey into Sweden is given up finally, and Temple is once more without employment or the hope of employment.

This was probably brought about by the alteration of the Government plans; and as Lord Lisle was not to go to Sweden, there was no chance of Temple's being attached to the Embassy.

SIR,--I am sorry my last letter frighted you so; 'twas no part of my intention it should; but I am more sorry to see by your first chapter that your humour is not always so good as I could wish it.

'Twas the only thing I ever desired we might differ in, and therefore I think it is denied me.

Whilst I read the description on't, I could not believe but that I had writ it myself, it was so much my own.

I pity you in earnest much more than I do myself; and yet I may deserve yours when I shall have told you, that besides all that you speak of, I have gotten an ague that with two fits has made me so very weak, that I doubted extremely yesterday whether I should be able to sit up to-day to write to you.

But you must not be troubled at this; that's the way to kill me indeed.

Besides, it is impossible I should keep it long, for here is my eldest brother, and my cousin Molle, and two or three more that have great understanding in agues, as people that have been long acquainted with them, and they do so tutor and govern me, that I am neither to eat, drink, nor sleep without their leave; and, sure, my obedience deserves they should cure me, or else they are great tyrants to very little purpose.

You cannot imagine how cruel they are to me, and yet will persuade me 'tis for my good.

I know they mean it so, and therefore say nothing on't, I admit, and sigh to think those are not here that would be kinder to me.

But you were cruel yourself when you seemed to apprehend I might oblige you to make good your last offer.

Alack!

if I could purchase the empire of the world at that rate, I should think it much too dear; and though, perhaps, I am too unhappy myself ever to make anybody else happy, yet, sure, I shall take heed that my misfortunes may not prove infectious to my friends.

You ask counsel of a person that is very little able to give it.

I cannot imagine whither you should go, since this journey is broke.

You must e'en be content to stay at home, I think, and see what will become of us, though I expect nothing of good;

and, sure, you never made a truer remark in your life than that all changes are for the worse.

Will it not stay your father's journey too?

Methinks it should.

For God's sake write me all that you hear or can think of, that I may have something to entertain myself withal.

I have a scurvy head that will not let me write longer.

I am your.

[Directed]-- For Mrs. Paynter, at her house in Bedford Street, next ye Goate, In Covent Garden.

_Letter 21. _--Sir Thomas Osborne is Dorothy's "Cousin Osborne" here mentioned.

He was, you remember, a suitor for Dorothy's hand, but has now married Lady Bridget Lindsay.

The "squire that is as good as a knight," is, in all probability, Richard Bennet.

Thomas Bennet, his father, an alderman of the city of London, had bought a seat near Cambridge, called Babraham or Babram, that had belonged to Sir Toby Palavicini.

The alderman appears to have been a loyal citizen, as he was created baronet in 1660. His two sons, Sir Richard and Sir Thomas, married daughters of Sir Lavinius Munck;--so we need not accuse Dorothy of irretrievably breaking hearts by her various refusals.

When Dorothy says she will "sit like the lady of the lobster, and give audience at Babram," she simply means that she will sit among magnificent surroundings unsuited to her modest disposition.

The "lady" of a lobster is a curious-shaped substance in the head of that fish, bearing some distant resemblance to the figure of a woman.

The expression is still known to fishmongers and others, who also refer to the "Adam and Eve" in a shrimp, a kindred formation.

Curiously enough, this very phrase has completely puzzled Dr. Grosart, the learned editor of Herrick, who confesses that he can make nothing of the allusion in the following passage from _The Fairie Temple_:-- "The saint to which the most he prayes, And offers Incense Nights and Dayes, The Lady of the Lobster is Whose foot-pace he doth stroak and kiss."

Swift, too, uses the phrase in his _Battle of the Books_ in describing the encounter between Virgil and Dryden, where he says, "The helmet was nine times too large for the head, which appeared situate far in the hinder part, even like the lady in a lobster, or a mouse under a canopy of state, or like a shrivelled beau from within the penthouse of a modern periwig."