The Romance of Biography Volume II Part 20

The "Elegy to the memory of an unfortunate Lady," refers to a tragedy which occurred in Pope's early life, and over which he has studiously drawn an impenetrable veil. When his friend Mr. Caryl wrote to him on the subject, many years after the Elegy was published, Pope, in his reply, left this part of the letter unnoticed; and a second application was equally unsuccessful. His biographers are not better informed.

Johnson remarks upon the Elegy, that it commemorates the "amorous fury of a raving girl, who liked self-murder better than suspense;" and having given this deadly stroke with his critical fang, the grim old lion of literature stalks on, and "stays no farther question." But is this merciful, or is it just? by what right does he sit in judgment on the unhappy dead, of whom he knew nothing? or how could he tell by what course of suffering, disease, or tyranny, a gentle spirit may have been goaded to frenzy? It was said, on the authority of some French author, that she was secretly attached to one of the French princes: that, in consequence, her uncle and guardian ("the mean deserter of a brother's blood,") forced her into a convent, where, in despair and madness, she put an end to her existence; and that the lines

Why bade ye else, ye powers! her soul aspire Above the vulgar flight of low desire?

Ambition first sprung from your blest abodes; The glorious fault of angels and of G.o.ds,--

refer to this ambitious pa.s.sion. But then, again, this has been contradicted. Warton's story is improbable and inconsistent with the poem;[126] and the a.s.sertion of another author,[127] that she was in love with Pope, and as deformed as himself, is most unlikely. "O ever beauteous, ever friendly!" is rather a strange style of apostrophising one deformed in person; and exposed to misery, and driven to suicide, by a pa.s.sion for himself. In short, it is all mystery, wonder, and conjecture.

Other women who have been loved, celebrated, or satirized by Pope, are at least more notorious, if not so interesting. His most lasting and real attachment, was that which he entertained for Theresa and Martha Blount, who alternately, or with divided empire, reigned in his heart or fancy for five-and-thirty years. They were of an old Roman Catholic family of Oxfordshire; and his acquaintance with them appears to have begun as early as 1707, when he was only nineteen. Theresa, the handsomest and most intelligent of the two sisters, was a brunette, with black sparkling eyes. Martha was short in stature, fair, with blue eyes, and a softer expression. They appear to have been tolerably amiable, and much attached to each other: _au reste_, in no way distinguished, but by the flattering admiration of a celebrated man, who has immortalised both.

The verses addressed to them, convey in general, either counsel or compliment, or at the most playful gallantry. His letters express something beyond these. He began by admiring Theresa; then he wavered: there were misunderstandings, and petulance, and mutual bickerings. His susceptibility exposed him to be continually wounded; he felt deeply and acutely; he was conscious that he could inspire no sentiment corresponding with that which throbbed at his own heart: and some pa.s.sages in the correspondence cannot be read without a painful pity.

At length, upon some mutual offence, his partiality for Theresa was transferred to Martha. In one of his last letters to Theresa, he says, beautifully and feelingly, "We are too apt to resent things too highly, till we come to know, by some great misfortune or other, how much we are born to endure; and as for me, you need not suspect of resentment a soul which can feel nothing but grief."

His attachment to Martha increased after his quarrel with Lady Mary W.

Montagu, and ended only with his life.

"He was never," says Mr. Bowles, "indifferent to female society; and though his good sense prevented him, conscious of so many personal infirmities, from marrying, yet he felt the want of that sort of reciprocal tenderness and confidence in a female, to whom he might freely communicate his thoughts, and on whom, in sickness and infirmity, he could rely. All this Martha Blount became to him; by degrees, she became identified with his existence. She partook of his disappointments, his vexations, and his comforts. Wherever he went, his correspondence with her was never remitted; and when the warmth of gallantry was over, the cherished idea of kindness and regard remained."[128]

To Martha Blount is addressed the compliment on her birth-day--

O be thou blest with all that heaven can send,-- Long health, long youth, long pleasure, and a friend!

And an epistle sent to her, with the works of Voiture, in which he advises her against marriage, in this elegant and well-known pa.s.sage,--

Too much your s.e.x are by their forms confin'd, Severe to all, but most to womankind; Custom, grown blind with age, must be your guide; Your pleasure is a vice, but not your pride.

By nature yielding, stubborn but for fame, Made slaves by honour, and made fools by shame.

Marriage may all those petty tyrants chase, But sets up one, a greater, in their place: Well might you wish for change, by those accurst, But the last tyrant ever proves the worst.

Still in constraint your suffering s.e.x remains, Or bound in formal or in real chains: Whole years neglected, for some months adored, The fawning servant turns a haughty lord.

Ah, quit not the free innocence of life For the dull glory of a virtuous wife!

Nor let false shows, nor empty t.i.tles please,-- Aim not at joy, but rest content with ease.

Very excellent advice, and very disinterested, considering whence it came, and to whom it was addressed!!

The poem generally placed after this in his works, and ent.i.tled "Epistle to the _same_ Lady, on leaving town after the Coronation," was certainly not addressed to Martha, but to Theresa. It appears from the correspondence, that Martha was not at the Coronation in 1715, and that Theresa was. The whole tenour of this poem is agreeable to the sprightly person and character of Theresa, while "Parthenia's softer blush,"

evidently alludes to Martha. From an examination of the letters which were written at this time, I should imagine, that though Pope had previously a.s.sured the latter that she had gained the conquest over her fair sister, yet the public appearance of Theresa at the Coronation, and her superior charms, revived all his tenderness and admiration, and suggested this gay and pleasing effusion.

In some fair evening, on your elbow laid, You dream of triumphs in the rural shade; In pensive thought recall the fancy'd scene, See coronations rise on every green.

Before you pa.s.s th' imaginary sights Of lords, and earls, and dukes, and garter'd knights, While the spread fan o'ershades your closing eyes,-- Then give one flirt, and all the vision flies.

Thus vanish sceptres, coronets, and b.a.l.l.s, And leave you in lone woods or empty walls!

To Martha Blount is dedicated the "Epistle on the Characters of Women;"

which concludes with this elegant and flattering address to her.

O! blest with temper, whose unclouded ray Can make to-morrow cheerful as to-day; She who can love a sister's charms, or hear Sighs for a daughter with unwounded ear; She who ne'er answers till a husband cools, Or if she rules him, never shows she rules: 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.

The allusion to her affection for her sister, is just and beautiful; but the compliment to her temper is understood not to have been quite merited--perhaps, was rather administered as a corrective; for Martha was weak and captious; and Pope, who had suffered what torments a female wit could inflict, possibly found that peevishness and folly have also their _dsagrmens_. He complains frequently, in his letters to Martha, of the difficulty of pleasing her, or understanding her wishes.

Methinks, had I been a poet, or Pope, I would rather have been led about in triumph by the spirited, accomplished Lady Mary, than "chained to the footstool of two paltry girls."

They used to employ him constantly in the most trifling and troublesome commissions, in which he had seldom even the satisfaction of contenting them. He was accustomed to send them little presents almost daily, as concert-tickets, ribbons, fruit, &c. He once sent them a basket of peaches, which, with an affectation of careless gallantry, were separately wrapped in part of the ma.n.u.script translation of the Iliad: and he humbly requests them to return the wrappers, as he had no other copy. On another occasion he sent them fans, on which were inscribed his famous lines,

"Come, gentle air," th' Eolian shepherd said, &c.

Martha Blount was not so kind or so attentive to Pope in his last illness as she ought to have been. His love for _her_ seemed blended with his frail existence; and when he was scarcely sensible to any thing else in the world, he was still conscious of the charm of her presence.

"When she came into the room," says Spence, "it was enough to give a new turn to his spirits, and a temporary strength to him."

She survived him eighteen years, and died unmarried at her house in Berkeley Square, in 1762. She is described, about that time, as a little, fair, prim old woman, very lively, and inclined to gossip. Her undefined connexion with Pope, though it afforded matter for mirth and wonder, never affected her reputation while living; and has rendered her name as immortal as our language and our literature. One cannot help wishing that she had been more interesting, and more worthy of her fame.

FOOTNOTES:

[124] Lord Hervey, with an exterior the most forbidding, and almost ghastly, contrived to supersede Pope in the good graces of Lady M. W.

Montagu; carried off Mary Lepell, the beautiful maid of honour, from a host of rivals, and made her Lady Hervey: and won the whole heart of the poor Princess Caroline, who is said to have died of grief for his loss.--_See Walpole's Memoirs of George II._

[125] "Woman's at best a contradiction still."

[126] See Roscoe's Life of Pope, p. 87. Warton says her name was Wainsbury, and that she hung herself.

[127] Warburton.

[128] Bowles's edition of Pope, vol. i. page 69.

CHAPTER XVI.

POPE AND LADY M. W. MONTAGU.

In the same year with Martha Blount, and about the same age, died Lady Mary W. Montagu. Every body knows that she was one of Pope's early loves. She had, for several years, suspended his attachment to his first favourites, the Blounts; and she really deserved the preference. But the issue of this romantic attachment was the most bitter, the most irreconcilable enmity. The cause did not proceed so much from any one particular offence on either side, but rather from a mult.i.tude of trifling causes, arising naturally out of the characters of both.

When they first met, Pope was about six-and-twenty; and from the recent publication of the 'Rape of the Lock,' and 'The Temple of Fame,' &c. had reached the pinnacle of fashion and reputation. Lady Mary was in her twenty-third year, lately married to a man she loved, and had just burst upon the world in all the blaze of her wit and beauty. Her masculine acquirements and powers of mind--her strong good sense--her extensive views--her frankness, decision, and generosity--her vivacity, and her bright eyes, must altogether have rendered her one of the most fascinating, as she really was one of the most extraordinary, women that ever lived.

There stands, in a conspicuous part of this great city, a certain monument, erected, it is said, at the cost of the ladies of Britain; but in a spirit and taste which, I trust, are not those of my countrywomen at large. Is this our patriotism? We may applaud the brave, who go forth to battle to defend us, and preserve inviolate the sanct.i.ty of our hearths and homes; but does it become us to lend our voice to exult in victory, always bought at the expense of suffering, and aggravate the din and the clamour of war--we, who ought to be the peace-makers of the world, and plead for man against his own fierce pa.s.sions? A huge brazen image stands up, an impudent (false) witness of our martial enthusiasm; but who amongst us has thought of raising a public statue to Lady Wortley Montagu! to her who has almost banished from the world that pest which once extinguished families and desolated provinces? To her true patriotic spirit,--to her magnanimity, her generous perseverance, in surmounting all obstacles raised by the outcry of ignorance, and the obstinacy of prejudice, we owe the introduction of inoculation;--she ought to stand in marble beside Howard the good.[129]

I should imagine that a strong impression must have been made on Lady Mary's mind, by an incident which occurred just at the time she left England for Constantinople. Lord Petre,--he who is consecrated to fame in the Rape of the Lock, as the ravisher of Arabella Fermour's hair,--died of the small-pox at the age of three-and-twenty, just after his marriage with a young and beautiful heiress; his death caused a general sympathy, and added to the dread and horror which was inspired by this terrible disease: eighteen persons of his family had died of it within twenty-seven years. In those days it was not even allowable to mention, or allude to it in company.

Mr. Wortley was appointed to the Turkish emba.s.sy in 1716, and his wife accompanied him. The letters which pa.s.sed between her and Pope, during her absence, are well known. In point of style and liveliness, the superiority is on the lady's side; but the tone of feeling in Pope is better, more earnest; his language is not always within the bounds of that sprightly gallantry with which a man naturally addresses a young, beautiful, and virtuous woman, who had condescended to allow his homage.[130]

In one of his letters, written immediately after her departure, he asks her how he had looked? how he had behaved at the last moment? whether he had betrayed any deeper feeling than propriety might warrant? "For if,"

he says, "my parting looked like that of a common acquaintance, I am the greatest of all hypocrites that ever decency made." And in a subsequent letter he says, very feelingly and significantly, "May that person (her husband) for whom you have left the world, be so just as to prefer you to all the world. I believe his good sense leads him to do so now, as grat.i.tude will hereafter. May you continue to think him worthy of whatever you have done! may you ever look upon him with the eyes of a first lover, nay, if possible, with all the unreasonable happy fondness of an unexperienced one, surrounded with all the enchantments and ideas of romance and poetry! I wish this from my heart; and while I examine what pa.s.ses there in regard to you, I cannot but glory in my own heart, that it is capable of so much generosity."

This was sufficiently clear. I need scarcely remark _en pa.s.sant_, that Pope's generosity and wishes were all _en pure perte_; his spitefulness must have been gratified by the sequel of Lady Mary's domestic bliss; her marriage ended in disgust and aversion; which, on her separation from Mr. Wortley, subsided into a good-humoured indifference.[131]

After a union of twenty-seven years, she parted from him and went to reside abroad. There were errors on both sides; but I am obliged to admit that Lady Mary, with all her fine qualities, had two faults,--intolerable and unpardonable faults in the eyes of a husband or a lover. She wanted softness of mind, and refinement of feeling, in the first place: and she wanted--how shall I express it?--she wanted neatness and personal delicacy; and was, in short, that _odious_ thing, a female sloven, as well as that _dangerous_ thing, a female wit.

In those days the style of dress was the most hideous imaginable. The women wore a large quant.i.ty of artificial hair, in emulation of the tremendous periwigs of the men; and Pope, in one of his letters to Lady Mary, mentions her "full bottomed wig," which, he says, "I did but a.s.sert to be a _bob_" and was answered, "Love is blind!" On her return from Turkey, she sometimes allowed her own fine dark hair to flow loose, and was fond of dressing in her Turkish costume. In this she was imitated by several beautiful women of the day, and particularly by her lovely contemporary, Lady f.a.n.n.y Shirley, (Chesterfield's "f.a.n.n.y, blooming fair:" he seems to have admired her as much as he could possibly admire any thing, next to himself and the Graces.) In her picture at Clarendon Park, she too appears in the habit of Fatima.

_Apropos_, to the loves of the poets, Lady f.a.n.n.y deserves to be mentioned as the theme of all the rhymesters, and "the joy, the wish, the wonder, the despair," of all the beaux of her day.[132]

But it is time to return to Pope. The epistle of Helose to Abelard was published during Lady Mary's absence, and sent to her: and it is clear from a pa.s.sage in one of his letters, that he wished her to consider the last lines,--from