Life And Letters Of John Gay (1685-1732) Part 16

Twickenham, July 21st, 1730.

"If you consider this letter splenetic, consider I have just received the news of the death of a friend, whom I esteemed almost as many years as you--poor Fenton. He died at Easthampstead, of indolence and inactivity; let it not be your fate, but use exercise. I hope the d.u.c.h.ess [of Queensberry] will take care of you in this respect, and either make you gallop after her, or tease you enough at home to serve instead of exercise abroad.

"Mrs. Howard is so concerned about you, and so angry at me for not writing to you, and at Mrs. Blount for not doing the same, that I am piqued with jealousy and envy at you, and hate you as much as if you had a place at Court, which you will confess a proper cause of envy and hatred, in any poet, militant or unpensioned."

JOHN GAY AND THE d.u.c.h.eSS OF QUEENSBERRY TO THE HON. MRS. HOWARD.

Amesbury, August 20th, 1730.

"The d.u.c.h.ess says she cannot say a word more, if I would give her the world, and that her misery hath got the better of her pleasure in writing to you. She thanks you for your information, and says, that if she can bear herself, or think that anybody else can, she intends to make her visit next week. Now, it is my opinion that she need never have any scruples of this kind; but as to herself, you know she hath often an unaccountable way of thinking, and, say what you will to her, she will now and then hear you, but she will always think and act for herself. I have been waiting three or four minutes for what she hath to say, and at last she tells me she cannot speak one word more, and at the same time is so very unreasonable as to desire you would write her a long letter, as she knows you love it.

"I have several complaints to make to you of her treatment, but I shall only mention the most barbarous of them. She hath absolutely forbid her dog to be fond of me, and takes all occasions to snub her if she shows me the least civility. How do you think Lord Herbert would take such usage from you, or any lady in Christendom?

"Now she says I must write you a long letter; but to be sure I cannot say what I would about her, because she is looking over me as I write.

If I should tell any good of her, I know she would not like it, and I have said my worst of her already."

J.G.

"Do not think I am lazy, and so have framed an excuse, for I am really in pain (at some moments intolerable since this was begun). I think often I could be mighty glad to see you; and though you deserve vastly, that is saying much from me (for I can bear to be alone) and upon all accounts think I am much better here than anywhere else. I think to go on and prosper mighty prettily here, and like the habitation so well (that if I could in nature otherwise be forgetful) that would put me in mind of what I owe to those who helped me on to where I wished to be sooner than I feared I could be. Pray tell Miss Meadows that I was in hopes she would have made a dutiful visit to her father. If anyone else care for my respects, they may accept of them. I will present them to Lord Herbert, whether he care or not. I hope by this time he is able to carry himself and Fop wherever he pleases. If I had the same power over you I would not write you word that I am yours, etc.; but since I can only write, believe that I am to you everything that you have ever read at the bottom of a letter, but not that I am so only by way of conclusion."

C.Q.

JOHN GAY AND THE d.u.c.h.eSS OF QUEENSBERRY TO THE HON. MRS. HOWARD.

[Amesbury] Sat.u.r.day, September, 1730.

"I cannot neglect this opportunity of writing to you and begging you to be a mediator between my lady d.u.c.h.ess and me; we having at present a quarrel about a fishing rod; and at the same time to give her your opinion whether you think it proper for her to stay here till after Christmas, for I find that neither place nor preferment will let me leave her; and when she hath been long enough in one place, prevail with her, if you can, to go to another. I would always have her do what she will, because I am glad to be of her opinion, and because I know it is what I must always do myself."

J.G.

"To follow one's fancy is by much the best medicine; it has quite cured my face and left me no pain but the impossibility of being in two places at once, which is no small sorrow, since one of them would be near you.

But the boys [Lord Drumlanrig and Lord Charles Douglas] are too lean to travel as yet. Compa.s.sion being the predominant fashion of the place, we are preserved alive with as much care as the partridges, which no one yet has had the heart to kill, though several barbarous attempts have been made. If I could write I would for ever, but my pen is so much your friend that it will only let me tell you that I am extremely so.

"I pray it may not be difficult for my dear Mrs. Howard to forgive, as to read this provocation. By the next I hope to write plain."

C.Q.

ALEXANDER POPE TO JOHN GAY.

October, 1730.

"I continue, and ever shall, to wish you all good and happiness. I wish that some lucky event might set you in a state of ease and independency all at once, and that I might live to see you as happy as this silly world and fortune can make anyone. Are we never to live together more as once we did?"

THE HON. MRS. HOWARD TO JOHN GAY.

October 3rd, 1730.

"I hear you have had a house full of courtiers, and, what is more extraordinary, they were honest people; but I will take care, agreeably to your desire, that you shall not increase the number. I wish I could as easily gratify you in your other request about a certain person [the d.u.c.h.ess of Queensberry]'s health; but, indeed, John, that is not in my power. I have often thought it proceeds from thinking better of herself than she does of anybody else; for she has always confidence to inquire after those she calls friends, and enough a.s.surance to give them advice; at the same time, she will not answer a civil question about herself, and would certainly never follow any advice that was given her: you plainly see she neither thinks well of their heart or their head. I believe I have told you as much before; but a settled opinion of anything will naturally lead one into the same manner of expressing one's thoughts."

DEAN SWIFT TO JOHN GAY.

Dublin, November 10th, 1730.

"I hope you have now one advantage that you always wanted before, and the want of which made your friends as uneasy as it did yourself; I mean the removal of that solicitude about your own affairs, which perpetually filled your thoughts and disturbed your conversation. For if it be true, what Mr. Pope seriously tells me, you will have opportunity of saving every groat of the interest you receive; and so, by the time you and he grow weary of each other, you will be able to pa.s.s the rest of your wineless life in ease and plenty; with the additional triumphal comfort of never having received a penny from those tasteless, ungrateful people from which you deserved so much, and which deserve no better geniuses than those by whom they are celebrated."[5]

JOHN GAY TO DEAN SWIFT.

Amesbury, December 6th, 1730.

"The d.u.c.h.ess is a more severe check upon my finances than ever you were; and I submit, as I did to you, to comply to my own good. I was a long time before I could prevail with her to let me allow myself a pair of shoes with two heels; for I had lost one, and the shoes were so decayed that they were not worth mending. You see by this that those who are the most generous of their own, can be the most covetous for others. I hope you will be so good to me as to use your interest with her (for what ever she says, you seem to have some) to indulge me with the extravagance suitable to my fortune."[6]

d.u.c.h.eSS OF QUEENSBERRY AND JOHN GAY TO THE HON. MRS. HOWARD.

December 17th [1730].

"You cannot imagine in what due time your letter came; for I had given you up, and with great pains had very near brought our friend Mr. Gay to own that n.o.body cared for us, and a few more thoughts which shall now be nameless. I am sincerely sorry that you have been ill, and very very glad that you are better and think of life; for I know none whom one could more wish to have life than yourself. I do not in the least approve of your changing your way of thinking of me, for I was convinced it was a good one, and when such opinions change, it is seldom for the better; if it could on my account, I declare you would be in the wrong, for to my knowledge I improve in no one thing. The best thing I can say for myself is, that I feel no alteration in the regard and inclination I have to you. I have no comprehension of what I said in my letter; but at that time my body was distempered, and very likely my mind also.... I know nothing of coming to town; I only know that when I do I shall not be sorry to see you; and this is knowing a great deal; for I shall not be glad to come, and shall only come if it be unavoidable: this is the blunt truth. I own it would look less like indifference if I had written some civil lie."

C.Q.

"Everything that is above written is so plain and clear that it needs no comment; the writer I know to be so strictly addicted to truth, that I believe every word of it; if it is not written in the fashionable expression, I conclude you will impute it to her manner. She was really concerned very much, that, after she knew you were ill, we were so long before we could get a letter from you: let her contradict this if she can. You tell her you are riding for your life; I fancy she would do it for yours, though she will not for her own. I believe that she will not like that I should say anything more about her; so that I shall leave you to your own thoughts about what she hath said herself; for I find she doth not much care to be talked to, and as little likes to be talked of: if she writes truth, I hope she will allow me the liberty to do the same.... I have sometimes a great mind to answer the above letter, but I know she will do what she will; and as little as she likes herself, she likes her own advice better than anybody's else, and that is a reason, in my opinion, that should prevail with her to take more care of herself. I just before said I would say no more upon this subject; but if I do not lay down the pen, I find I cannot help it. I have no desire to come to town at all; for if I were there I cannot see you; so that unless she turns me away I am fixed for life at Amesbury: so that, as to everything that relates to me, I refer you to her letters."

J.G.

[Footnote 1: Swift: _Works_ (ed. Scott), XVII, p. 292.]

[Footnote 2: 'Swift: _Works_ (ed. Scott), XVII, p. 295.]

[Footnote 3:

Neither good nor bad, nor fool nor wise, They would not learn nor could advise; Without love, hatred, joy, or fear, They led a kind of--as it were; Nor wish'd nor cared, nor laugh'd nor cried: And so they lived, and so they died.]

[Footnote 4: Swift: _Works_ (ed. Scott), XVII, p. 308.]

[Footnote 5: Swift: _Works_ (ed. Scott), XVII, p. 319.]

[Footnote 6: Swift: _Works_ (ed. Scott), XVII, p. 333]