Читать книгу The Diary and Collected Letters of Madame D'Arblay, Frances Burney - Frances Burney - Страница 39

October 20.—I must now have the honour to present to you a new acquaintance, who this day dined here.

Mr. B——y,⁸⁰ an Irish gentleman, late a commissary in Germany. He is between sixty and seventy, but means to pass for about thirty; gallant, complaisant, obsequious, and humble to the fair sex, for whom he has an awful reverence; but when not immediately addressing them, swaggering, blustering, puffing, and domineering. These are his two apparent characters; but the real man is worthy, moral, religious, though conceited and parading.

He is as fond of quotations as my poor Lady Smatter,⁸¹ and, like her, knows little beyond a song, and always blunders about the author of that. His whole conversation consists in little French phrases, picked up during his residence abroad, and in anecdotes and story-telling, which are sure to be retold daily and daily in the same words.

Speaking of the ball in the evening, to which we were all going, “Ah, madam!” said he to Mrs. Thrale, “there was a time when—fol-derol, fol-derol (rising, and dancing and Singing), fol-derol!—I could dance with the best of them; but now a man, forty and upwards, as my Lord Ligonier used to say—but—fol-derol!—there was a time!”

“Ay, so there was, Mr. B——y,” said Mrs. Thrale, “and I think you and I together made a very venerable appearance!”

“Ah! madam, I remember once, at Bath, I was called out to dance with one of the finest young ladies I ever saw. I was just preparing to do my best, when a gentleman of my acquaintance was so cruel as to whisper me—‘B——y! the eyes of all Europe are upon you!’ for that was the phrase of the times. ‘B——y!’ says he, ‘the eyes of all Europe are upon you!’—I vow, ma’am, enough to make a man tremble!-fol-derol, fol-derol! (dancing)—the eyes of all Europe are upon you!—I declare, ma’am, enough to put a man out of countenance.”

I am absolutely almost ill with laughing. This Mr. B——y half convulses me; yet I cannot make you laugh by writing his speeches, because it is the manner which accompanies them, that, more than the matter, renders them so peculiarly ridiculous. His extreme pomposity, the solemn stiffness of his person, the conceited twinkling of his little old eyes, and the quaint importance of his delivery, are so much more like some pragmatical old coxcomb represented on the stage, than like anything in real and common life, that I think, were I a man, I should sometimes be betrayed into clapping him for acting so well. As it is, I am sure no character in any comedy I ever saw has made me laugh more extravagantly.

He dines and spends the evening here constantly, to my great satisfaction.

At dinner, when Mrs. Thrale offers him a seat next her, he regularly says,

“But where are les charmantes?” meaning Miss T. and me. “I can do nothing till they are accommodated!”

And, whenever he drinks a glass of wine, he never fails to touch either Mrs. Thrale’s, or my glass, with “est-il permis?”

But at the same time that he is so courteous, he is proud to a most sublime excess, and thinks every person to whom he speaks honoured beyond measure by his notice, nay, he does not even look at anybody without evidently displaying that such notice is more the effect of his benign condescension, than of any pretension on their part to deserve such a mark of his perceiving their existence. But you will think me mad about this man.

Nov. 3—Last Monday we went again to the ball. Mr. B——y, who was there, and seated himself next to Lady Pembroke, at the top of the room, looked most sublimely happy! He continues still to afford me the highest diversion.

As he is notorious for his contempt of all artists, whom he looks upon with little more respect than upon day-labourers, the other day, when painting was discussed, he spoke of Sir Joshua Reynolds as if he had been upon a level with a carpenter or farrier.

“Did you ever,” said Mrs. Thrale, “see his Nativity?”

“No, madam,—but I know his pictures very well; I knew him many years ago, in Minorca; he drew my picture there; and then he knew how to take a moderate price; but now, I vow, ma’am, ’tis scandalous—scandalous indeed! to pay a fellow here seventy guineas for scratching out a head!”

“Sir,” cried Dr. Delap, “you must not run down Sir Joshua Reynolds, because he is Miss Burney’s friend.”

“Sir,” answered he, “I don’t want to run the man down; I like him well enough in his proper place; he is as decent as any man of that sort I ever knew; but for all that, sir, his prices are shameful. Why, he would not (looking at the poor doctor with an enraged contempt) he would not do your head under seventy guineas!”

“Well,” said Mrs. Thrale, “he had one portrait at the last exhibition, that I think hardly could be paid enough for; it was of a Mr. Stuart; I had never done admiring it.”

“What stuff is this, ma’am!” cried Mr. B——y, “how can two or three dabs of paint ever be worth such a sum as that?”

“Sir,” said Mr. Selwyn⁸² (always willing to draw him out), “you know not how much he is improved since you knew him in Minorca; he is now the finest painter, perhaps, in the world.”

“Pho, pho, sir,” cried he, “how can you talk so? you, Mr. Selwin, who have seen so many capital pictures abroad?”

“Come, come, sir,” said the ever odd Dr. Delap, “you must not go on so undervaluing him, for, I tell you, he is a friend of Miss Burney’s.”

“Sir,” said Mr. B——y, “I tell you again I have no objection to the man; I have dined in his company two or three times; a very decent man he is, fit to keep company with gentlemen; but, ma’am, what are all your modern dabblers put together to one ancient? nothing!—a set of—not a Rubens among them! I vow, ma’am, not a Rubens among them!”. . . .

To go on with the subject I left off with last—my favourite subject you will think it——Mr. B——y. I must inform you that his commendation was more astonishing to me than anybody’s could be, as I had really taken it for granted he had hardly noticed my existence. But he has also spoken very well of Dr. Delap—that is to say, in a very condescending manner. “That Mr. Delap,” said he, “seems a good sort of man; I wish all the cloth were like him; but, lackaday! ’tis no such thing; the clergy in general are but odd dogs.”

Whenever plays are mentioned, we have also a regular speech about them. “I never,” he says, “go to a tragedy,—it’s too affecting; tragedy enough in real life: tragedies are only fit for fair females; for my part, I cannot bear to see Othello tearing about in that violent manner—and fair little Desdemona, ma’am, ’tis too affecting! to see your kings and your princes tearing their pretty locks,—oh, there’s no standing it! ‘A straw-crown’d monarch,’—what is that, Mrs. Thrale?

‘A straw-crown’d monarch in mock majesty.’

“I can’t recollect now where that is; but for my part, I really cannot bear to see such sights. And then out come the white handkerchiefs, and all their pretty eyes are wiping, and then come poison and daggers, and all that kind of thing,—O ma’am, ’tis too much; but yet the fair tender hearts, the pretty little females, all like it!”

This speech, word for word, I have already heard from him literally four times.

When Mr. Garrick was mentioned, he honoured him with much the same style of compliment as he had done Sir Joshua Reynolds.

“Ay, ay,” said he, “that Garrick was another of those fellows that people run mad about. Ma’am, ’tis a shaine to think of such things! an actor living like a person of quality scandalous! I vow, scandalous!”

“Well,—commend me to Mr. B——y!” cried Mrs. Thrale “for he is your only man to put down all the people that everybody else sets up.”

“Why, ma’am,” answered he, “I like all these people very well in their proper places; but to see such a set of poor beings living like persons of quality,—’tis preposterous! common sense, madam, common sense is against that kind of thing. As to Garrick, he was a very good mimic, an entertaining fellow enough, and all that kind of thing——but for an actor to live like a person of quality—oh, scandalous!”

Some time after the musical tribe was mentioned. He was at cards at the time with Mr. Selwyn, Dr. Delap, and Mr. Thrale, while we “fair females,” as he always calls us, were speaking of Agujari.⁸³ He constrained himself from flying out as long as he was able; but upon our mentioning her having fifty pounds a song, he suddenly, in a great rage, called out, “Catgut and rosin! ma’am, ’tis scandalous!” . . .

The other day, at dinner, the subject was married life, and among various husbands and wives Lord L— being mentioned, Mr. B——y pronounced his panegyric, and called him his friend. Mr. Selwyn, though with much gentleness, differed from him in opinion, and declared he could not think well of him, as he knew his lady, who was an amiable woman, was used very ill by him.

“How, sir?” cried Mr. B——y.

“I have known him,” answered Mr. Selwyn, “frequently pinch her till she has been ready to cry with pain, though she has endeavoured to prevent its being observed.”

“And I,” said Mrs. Thrale, “know that he pulled her nose, in his frantic brutality, till he broke-some of the vessels of it, and when she was dying she still found the torture he had given her by it so great, that it was one of her last complaints.”

The general, who is all for love and gallantry, far from attempting to vindicate his friend, quite swelled with indignation on this account, and, after a pause, big with anger, exclaimed,

“Wretched doings, sir, wretched doings!”

“Nay, I have known him,” added Mr. Selwyn, “insist upon handing her to her carriage, and then, with an affected kindness, pretend to kiss her hand, instead of which he has almost bit a piece out of it.”

“Pitiful!—pitiful! sir,” cried the General, “I know nothing more shabby!”

“He was equally inhuman to his daughter,” said Mrs. Thrale, “for, in one of his rages, he almost throttled her.”

“Wretched doings!” again exclaimed Mr. B——y, “what! cruel to a fair female! Oh fie! fie! fie!—a fellow who can be cruel to females and children, or animals, must be a pitiful fellow indeed. I wish we had had him here in the sea. I should like to have had him stripped, and that kind of thing, and been well banged by ten of our clippers here with a cat-o’-nine-tails. Cruel to a fair female? Oh fie! fie! fie!”

I know not how this may read, but I assure you its sound was ludicrous enough.

However, I have never yet told you his most favourite story, though we have regularly heard it three or four times a day—and this is about his health.

“Some years ago,” he says,—“let’s see, how many? in the year ‘71,—ay, ‘71, ‘72—thereabouts—I was taken very ill, and, by ill-luck, I was persuaded to ask advice of one of these Dr. Gallipots:—oh, how I hate them all! Sir, they are the vilest pick-pockets—know nothing, sir! nothing in the world! poor ignorant mortals! and then they pretend—In short, sir, I hate them all!—I have suffered so much by them, sir—lost four years of the happiness of my life—let’s see, ‘71, ‘72, ‘73, ‘74—ay, four years, sir!—mistook my case, sir!—and all that kind of thing. Why, sir, my feet swelled as big as two horses’ heads! I vow I will never consult one of these Dr. Gallipot fellows again! lost me, sir, four years of the happiness of my life!—why, I grew quite an object!——you would hardly have known me!—lost all the calves of my legs!—had not an ounce of flesh left!—and as to the rouge—why, my face was the colour of that candle!—those deuced Gallipot fellows!—why, they robbed me of four years—let me see, ay, ‘71, ‘72—”

And then it was all given again!

We had a large party of gentlemen to dinner. Among them was Mr. Hamilton, commonly called Single-speech Hamilton, from having made one remarkable speech in the House of Commons against government, and receiving some douceur to be silent ever after. This Mr. Hamilton is extremely tall and handsome; has an air of haughty and fashionable superiority; is intelligent, dry, sarcastic, and clever. I should have received much pleasure from his conversational powers, had I not previously been prejudiced against him, by hearing that he is infinitely artful, double, and crafty.

The dinner conversation was too general to be well remembered; neither, indeed, shall I attempt more than partial scraps relating to matters of what passed when we adjourned to tea.

Mr. Hamilton, Mr. Selwyn, Mr. Tidy, and Mr. Thrale seated themselves to whist; the rest looked on: but the General, as he always does, took up the newspaper, and, with various comments, made aloud, as he went on reading to himself, diverted the whole company. Now he would cry, “Strange! strange that!”—presently, “What stuff! I don’t believe a word of it!”—a little after, “Mr. Bate,⁸⁴ I wish your ears were cropped!”—then, “Ha! ha! ha! funnibus! funnibus! indeed!”—and, at last, in a great rage, he exclaimed, “What a fellow is this, to presume to arraign the conduct of persons of quality!”

Having diverted himself and us in this manner, till he had read every column methodically through, he began all over again, and presently called out, “Ha! ha! here’s a pretty thing!” and then, in a plaintive voice, languished out some wretched verses.

⁴³ This was not the famous philosopher and statesman, but the Rev. Thomas Franklin, D.D., who was born in 1721, and died in 1784. He published various translations from the classics, as well as plays and miscellaneous works; but is best known for his translation of Sophocles, published in 1759.

⁴⁴ “Warley: a Satire,” then just published, by a Mr. Huddisford. “Dear little Burney’s” name was coupled in it with that of Sir Joshua Reynolds, in a manner which seemed to imply that Sir Joshua had special reasons for desiring her approbation. It will be remembered that, before he knew that Miss Burney was the author of “Evelina,” Sir Joshua had jestingly remarked that If the author proved to be a woman, he should be sure to make love to her. See ante, p. 94.

⁴⁵ Mrs. Horneck and Mrs. Bunbury (her eldest daughter) had declared that they would walk a hundred and sixty miles, to see the author of “Evelina.”

⁴⁶ See note 37 ante.

⁴⁷ A kinsman of the great Edmund Burke, and, like him, a politician and member of Parliament. Goldsmith has drawn his character in “Retaliation.”

“Here lies honest William, whose heart was a mint,

While the owner ne’er knew half the good that was in ’t;

The pupil of impulse, it forced him along,

His conduct still right, with his argument wrong

Still aiming at honour, yet fearing to roam,

The coachman was tipsy, the chariot drove home;

Would-you ask for his merits? alas! he had none;

What was good was spontaneous, his faults were his own.”

⁴⁸ Henry Temple, second Viscount Palmerston, and father of the celebrated Lord Palmerston.

⁴⁹ Mrs. Cholmondeley imitates the language of Madame Duval, the French woman in “Evelina.”

⁵⁰ A character in “Evelina.”

⁵¹ Sir Joshua Reynolds, who was born at Plympton, in Devonshire, in 1723

⁵² Mr. Qwatkin afterwards married Miss Offy Palmer.

⁵³ Afterwards Lady Crewe; the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Greville, and a famous Political beauty. At a supper after the Westminster election on the Prince of Wales toasting, “True blue and Mrs. Crewe,” the lady responded, “True blue and all of you.”

⁵⁴ A celebrated Italian singer and intimate friend of the Burneys.

⁵⁵ See note 15: ante, The intended marriage above referred to above came to nothing, Miss Cumberland, the eldest daughter of the dramatist subsequently marrying Lord Edward Bentinck, son of the Duke of Portland.

⁵⁶ Miss Hannah More, the authoress.

⁵⁷ Hannah More gave Dr. Johnson, when she was first introduced to him, such a surfeit of flattery, that at last, losing patience, he turned to her and said, “Madam, before you flatter a man so grossly to his face, you should consider whether or not your flattery is worth his having.”

⁵⁸ Mrs. Vesey was the lady at whose house were held the assemblies from which the term “blue-stocking” first came into use. (See ante.) Fanny writes of her in 1779, “She is an exceeding well-bred woman, and of agreeable manners; but all her name in the world must, I think, have been acquired by her dexterity and skill in selecting parties, and by her address in rendering them easy with one another—an art, however, that seems to imply no mean understanding.”

⁵⁹ Joseph Warton, author of the “Essay on the Genius and Writings of Pope.”

⁶⁰ Sheridan was at this time manager of Drury-lane Theatre

⁶¹ Sir P. J. Clerke’s bill was moved on the 12th of February. It passed the first and second readings, but was afterwards lost on the motion for going into committee. It was entitled a “Bill for restraining any person, being a member of the House of Commons, from being concerned himself, or any person in trust for him, in any contract made by the commissioners of his Majesty’s Treasury, the commissioners of the Navy, the board of Ordnance, or by any other person or persons for the public service, Unless the said contract shall be made at a public bidding.”

⁶² Arthur Murphy, the well-known dramatic author, a very intimate friend of the Thrales. He was born in Ireland in 1727, and died at Knightsbridge in 1805. Among his most successful plays were “The Orphan of China” and “The Way to Keep Him.”

⁶³ “The Good-natured Man.”

⁶⁴ Sophy Streatfield, a young lady who understood Greek, and was consequently looked upon as a prodigy of learning. Mrs. Thrale appears to have been slightly jealous of her about this time, though without serious cause. In January, 1779, she writes (in “Thraliana”): “Mr. Thrale has fallen in love, really and seriously, with Sophy Streatfield; but there is no wonder in that; she is very pretty, very gentle, soft and insinuating; hangs about him, dances round him, cries when she parts from him, squeezes his hand slily, and with her sweet eyes full of tears looks fondly in his face—and all for love of me, as she pretends, that I can hardly sometimes help laughing in her face. A man must not be a man, but an it, to resist such artillery.”

⁶⁵ Characters in the comedy which Fanny was then engaged upon.

⁶⁶ Sir Philip Jennings Clerke

⁶⁷ The Rev. John Delap, D.D., born 1725, died 1812. He was a man “of deep learning, but totally ignorant of life and manners,” and wrote several tragedies, two or three of which were acted, but generally without success,

⁶⁸ Mrs. Piozzi (then Mrs. Thrale) relates this story in her “Anecdotes of Dr. Johnson.” “I came into the room one evening where he (Johnson) and a gentleman (Seward), whose abilities we all respect exceedingly, were sitting. A lady (Miss Streatfield), who walked in two minutes before me, had blown ’em both into a flame by whispering something to Mr. S—d, which he endeavoured to explain away so as not to affront the doctor, whose suspicions were all alive. ‘And have a care, sir,’ said he, just as I came in, ‘the Old Lion will not bear to be tickled.’ The other was pale with rage, the lady wept at the confusion she had caused, and I could only say with Lady Macbeth—‘Soh! you’ve displaced the mirth, broke the good meeting with most admired disorder.’"

⁶⁹ The following note is in the hand-writing of Miss Burney, at a subsequent period. The objection of Mr. Crisp to the MS play of ‘The Witlings,’ was its resemblance to Moliere’s ‘Femmes Savantes,’ and consequent immense inferiority. It is, however, a curious fact, and to the author a consolatory one, that she had literally never read the ‘Femmes Savantes’ when she composed ‘The Witlings.’

⁷⁰ Mr. Rose Fuller.

⁷¹ Anthony Chamier, M.P. for Tamworth, and an intimate friend of Dr. Burney’s. He was Under Secretary of State from 1775 till his death in 1780. We find him at one of Dr. Burney’s famous music-parties in 1775. Fanny writes of him then as “an extremely agreeable man, and the very pink of gallantry.” (“Early Diary,” vol, ii. p. 106.)

⁷² Afterwards Sir William Weller Pepys, Master in Chancery, and brother of the physician, Sir Lucas Pepys. He was an ardent lover of literature, and gave “blue-stocking” parties, which Dr. Burney frequently attended. Fanny extols his urbanity and benevolence. See “Memoirs of Dr. Burney,” vol. ii. p. 285.

⁷³ His dog.

⁷⁴ Mrs. Pleydell was a friend of Dr. Burney’s, and greatly admired for her beauty and the sweetness of her disposition. She was the daughter of Governor Holwell, one of the survivors from the Black Hole of Calcutta.

⁷⁵ Mr. Thrale was Member of Parliament for Southwark.

⁷⁶ Samuel Foote, the famous actor and writer of farces,

⁷⁷ Lady Diana Spencer, eldest daughter of Charles, second Duke of Marlborough. She was born in 1734, married in 1760 to Viscount Bolingbroke, divorced from him in 1768, and married soon after to Dr. Johnson’s friend, Topham Beauclerk. Lady Di was an amateur artist, and the productions of her pencil were much admired by Horace Walpole and other persons of fashion. Elizabeth, Countess of Pembroke, was the sister of Lady Di Beauclerk, being the second daughter of the Duke of Marlborough.

⁷⁸ See note 15 ante.

⁷⁹ Young Cumberland, son of the author.

⁸⁰ General Blakeney.

⁸¹ A character in Fanny’s suppressed comedy, “The Witlings.”

⁸² Not the celebrated George Selwyn, but a wealthy banker of that name.

⁸³ Lucrezia Agujari was one of the most admired Italian singers of the day. She died at Parma in 1783.

⁸⁴ The Rev. Henry Bate, afterwards Sir Henry Bate Dudley, editor of the “Morning Post” from its establishment in 1772 till 1780, in which year his connection with that paper came to an end in consequence of a quarrel with his coadjutors. On the 1st of November, 1780, he brought out the “Morning Herald” in opposition to his old paper, the “Post.” He assumed the name of Dudley in 1784, was created a baronet in 1813, and died in 1824. Gainsborough has painted the portrait of this ornament of the Church, who was notorious, in his younger days, for his physical strength, and not less so for the very unclerical use which he made of it. He was popularly known as the “Fighting Parson.”