We lay together that night, when, after playing re- peated prizes of pleasure, nature, overspent and satisfy"d, gave us up to the arms of sleep: those of my dear youth en- circled me, the consciousness of which made even that sleep more delicious.
Late in the morning I wak"d first; and observing my lover slept profoundly, softly disengag"d myself from his arms, scarcely daring to breathe for fear of shortening his repose; my cap, my hair, my shift, were all in disorder from the rufflings I had undergone; and I took this opportunity to adjust and set them as well as I could: whilst, every now and then, looking at the sleeping youth with inconceivable fondness and delight, and reflecting on all the pain he had put me to, tacitly own"d that the pleasure had overpaid me for my sufferings.
It was then broad day. I was sitting up in the bed, the cloaths of which were all tossed, or rolled off, by the unquietness of our motions, from the sultry heat of the weather; nor could I refuse myself a pleasure that solicited me so irresistibly, as this fair occasion of feasting my sight with all those treasures of youthful beauty I had en- joy"d, and which lay now almost entirely naked, his shirt being truss"d up in a perfect wisp, which the warmth of the room and season made me easy about the consequence of. I hung over him enamour"d indeed! and devoured all his naked charms with only two eyes, when I could have wish"d them at least a hundred, for the fuller enjoyment of the gaze.
Oh! could I paint his figure as I see it now, still present to my transported imagination! a whole length of an allperfect, manly beauty in full view. Think of a face without a fault, glowing with all the opening bloom and vernal freshness of an age in which beauty is of either s.e.x, and which the first down over his upper lip scarce began to distinguish.
The parting of the double ruby pout of his lips seem"d to exhale an air sweeter and purer than what it drew in: ah!
what violence did it not cost me to refrain the so tempted kiss!
Then a neck exquisitely turn"d, grac"d behind and on the sides with his hair, playing freely in natural ringlets, connected his head to a body of the most perfect form, and of the most vigorous contexture, in which all the strength of manhood was conceal"d and soften"d to appearance by the delicacy of his complexion, the smoothness of his skin, and the plumpness of his flesh.
The platform of his snow-white bosom, that was laid out in a manly proportion, presented, on the vermilion summit of each pap, the idea of a rose about to blow.
Nor did his shirt hinder me from observing that symmetry of his limbs, that exactness of shape, in the fall of it to- wards the loins, where the waist ends and the rounding swell of the hips commences; where the skin, sleek, smooth, and dazzling white, burnishes on the stretch over firm, plump, ripe flesh, that crimp"d and ran into dimples at the least pressure, or that the touch could not rest upon, but slid over as on the surface of the most polished ivory.
His thighs, finely fashioned, and with a florid glossy roundness, gradually tapering away to the knees, seem"d pillars worthy to support that beauteous frame; at the bottom of which I could not, without some remains of terror, some tender emotions too, fix my eyes on that terrible mac- hine, which had, not long before, with such fury broke into, torn, and almost ruin"d those soft, tender parts of mine that had not yet done smarting with the effects of its rage; but behold it now! crest fall"n, reclining its half-capt vermilion head over one of his thighs, quiet, pliant, and to all appearance incapable of the mischiefs and cruelty it had committed. Then the beautiful growth of the hair, in short and soft curls round its root, its whiteness, branch"d veins, the supple softness of the shaft, as it lay foreshort"d, roll"d and shrunk up into a squab thickness, languid, and borne up from between his thighs by its globular appendage, that wondrous treasure-bag of nature"s sweets, which, rivell"d round, and purs"d up in the only wrinkles that are known to please, perfected the prospect, and all together formed the most interesting moving picture in nature, and surely infinitely superior to those nudities furnish"d by ]the painters, statuaries, or any art, which are purchas"d at immense prices; whilst the sight of them in actual life is scarce sovereignly tasted by any but the few whom nature has endowed with a fire of imagination, warmly pointed by a truth of judgment to the spring-head, the originals of beauty, of nature"s unequall"d composition, above all the imitation of art, or the reach of wealth to pay their price.
But every thing must have an end. A motion made by this angelic youth, in the listlessness of going off sleep, replac"d his shirt and the bed-cloaths in a posture that shut up that treasure from longer view.
I lay down then, and carrying my hands to that part of me in which the objects just seen had begun to raise a mutiny that prevail"d over the smart of them, my fingers now open"d themselves an easy pa.s.sage; but long I had not time to consider the wide difference there, between the maid and the now finish"d woman, before Charles wak"d, and turning towards me, kindly enquir"d how I had rested? and, scarce giving me time to answer, imprinted on my lips one of his burning rapture-kisses, which darted a flame to my heart, that from thence radiated to every part of me; and present- ly, as if he had proudly meant revenge for the survey I had smuggled of all his naked beauties, he spurns off the bed- cloaths, and trussing up my shift as high as it would go, took his turn to feast his eyes on all the gifts nature had bestow"d on my person; his busy hands, too, rang"d intemper- ately over every part of me. The delicious austerity and hardness of my yet unripe budding b.r.e.a.s.t.s, the whiteness and firmness of my flesh, the freshness and regularity of my features, the harmony of my limbs, all seem"d to confirm him in his satisfaction with his bargain; but when curious to explore the havoc he had made in the centre of his over- fierce attack, he not only directed his hands there, but with a pillow put under, placed me favourably for his wanton purpose of inspection. Then, who can express the fire his eyes glisten"d, his hands glow"d with! whilst sighs of plea- sure, and tender broken exclamations, were all the praises he could utter. By this time his machine, stiffly risen at me, gave me to see it in its highest state and bravery. He feels it himself, seems pleas"d at its condition, and, smil- ing loves and graces, seizes one of my hands, and carries it, with a gentle compulsion, to his pride of nature, and its richest masterpiece.
I, struggling faintly, could not help feeling what I could not grasp, a column of the whitest ivory, beautifully streak"d with blue veins, and carrying, fully uncapt, a head of the liveliest vermilion: no horn could be harder or stiffer; yet no velvet more smooth or delicious to the touch.
Presently he guided my hand lower, to that part in which nature and pleasure keep their stores in concert, so aptly fasten"d and hung on to the root of their first instrument and minister, that not improperly he might be styl"d their purse-bearer too: there he made me feel distinctly, through their soft cover, the contents, a pair of roundish b.a.l.l.s, that seem"d to play within, and elude all pressure but the tenderest, from without.
But now this visit of my soft warm hand in those so sensible parts had put every thing into such ungovernable fury that, disdaining all further preluding, and taking ad- vantage of my commodious posture, he made the storm fall where I scarce patiently expected, and where he was sure to lay it: presently, then, I felt the stiff insertion between the yielding, divided lips of the wound, now open for life; where the narrowness no longer put me to intolerable pain, and afforded my lover no more difficulty than what height- en"d his pleasure, in the strict embrace of that tender, warm sheath, round the instrument it was so delicately ad- justed to, and which, now cased home, so gorged me with pleasure that it perfectly suffocated me and took away my breath; then the killing thrusts! the unnumber"d kisses!
every one of which was a joy inexpressible; and that joy lost in a crowd of yet greater blisses! But this was a disorder too violent in nature to last long: the vessels, so stirr"d and intensely heated, soon boil"d over, and for that time put out the fire; meanwhile all this dalliance and disport had so far consum"d the morning, that it became a kind of necessity to lay breakfast and dinner into one.
In our calmer intervals Charles gave the following account of himself, every word of which was true. He was the only son of a father who, having a small post in the revenue, rather over-liv"d his income, and had given this young gentleman a very slender education: no profession had he bred him up to, but design"d to provide for him in the army, by purchasing him an ensign"s commission, that is to say, provided he could raise the money, or procure it by interest, either of which clauses was rather to be wish"d than hoped for by him. On no better a plan, however, had this improvident father suffer"d this youth, a youth of great promise, to run up to the age of manhood, or near it at least, in next to idleness; and had, besides, taken no sort of pains to give him even the common premonitions against the vices of the town, and the dangers of all sorts, which wait the unexperienc"d and unwary in it. He liv"d at home, and at discretion, with his father, who himself kept a mistress; and for the rest, provided Charles did not ask him for money, he was indolently kind to him: he might lie out when he pleas"d; any excuse would serve, and even his repri- mands were so slight that they carried with them rather an air of connivance at the fault than any serious control or constraint. But, to supply his calls for money, Charles, whose mother was dead, had, by her side, a grandmother who doted upon him. She had a considerable annuity to live on, and very regularly parted with every shilling she could spare to this darling of hers, to the no little heart-burn of his father; who was vex"d, not that she by this means fed his son"s extravagance, but that she preferr"d Charles to him- self; and we shall too soon see what a fatal turn such a mercenary jealousy could operate in the breast of a father.
Charles was, however, by the means of his grand- mother"s lavish fondness, very sufficiently enabled to keep a mistress so easily contented as my love made me; and my good fortune, for such I must ever call it, threw me in his way, in the manner above related, just as he was on the look-out for one.
As to temper, the even sweetness of it made him seem born for domestic happiness: tender, naturally polite, and gentle-manner"d; it could never be his fault if ever jars or animosities ruffled a calm he was so qualified in every way to maintain or restore. Without those great or shining qualities that const.i.tute a genius, or are fit to make a noise in the world, he had all those humble ones that com- pose the softer social merit: plain common sense, set off with every grace of modesty and good nature, made him, if not admir"d, what is much happier, universally belov"d and esteem"d. But, as nothing but the beauties of his person had at first attracted my regard and fix"d my pa.s.sion, neither was I then a judge of that internal merit, which I had afterward full occasion to discover, and which perhaps, in that season of giddiness and levity, would have touch"d my heart very little, had it been lodg"d in a person less the delight of my eyes and idol of my senses. But to re- turn to our situation.
After dinner, which we ate a-bed in a most voluptuous disorder, Charles got up, and taking a pa.s.sionate leave of me for a few hours, he went to town where, concerting mat- ters with a young sharp lawyer, they went together to my late venerable mistress"s, from whence I had, but the day before, made my elopement, and with whom he was determin"d to settle accounts in a manner that should cut off all after reckonings from that quarter.
Accordingly they went; but on the way, the Templar, his friend, on thinking over Charles"s information, saw reason to give their visit another turn, and, instead of offering satisfaction, to demand it.
On being let in, the girls of the house flock"d round Charles, whom they knew, and from the earliness of my escape, and their perfect ignorance of his ever having so much as seen me, not having the least suspicion of his being accessory to my flight, they were, in their way, making up to him; and as to his companion, they took him probably for a fresh cully. But the Templar soon check"d their forwardness, by enquiring for the old lady, with whom, he said, with a grave judge-like countenance, that he had some business to settle.
Madam was immediately sent down for, and the ladies being desir"d to clear the room, the lawyer ask"d her, severely, if she did know, or had not decoy"d, under pre- tence of hiring as a servant, a young girl, just come out of the country, called FRANCES or f.a.n.n.y HILL, describing me withal as particularly as he could from Charles"s des- cription.
It is peculiar to vice to tremble at the enquiries of justice; and Mrs. Brown, whose conscience was not entirely clear upon my account, as knowing as she was of the town, as hackney"s as she was in bluffing through all the dangers of her vocation, could not help being alarm"d at the ques- tion, especially when he went on to talk of a Justice of peace, Newgate, the Old Bailey, indictments for keeping a disorderly house, pillory, carting, and the whole process of that nature. She, who, it is likely, imagin"d I had lodg"d an information against her house, look"d extremely blank, and began to make a thousand protestations and excuses. However, to abridge, they brought away trium- phantly my box of things, which, had she not been under an awe, she might have disputed with them; and not only that; but a clearance and discharge of any demands on the house, at the expense of no more than a bowl of arrack-punch, the treat of which, together with the choice of the house con- veniences, was offer"d and not accepted. Charles all the time acted the chance-companion of the lawyer, who had brought him there, as he knew the house, and appear"d in no wise interested in the issue; but he had the collateral pleasure of hearing all that I had told him verified, so far as the bawd"s fears would give her leave to enter into my history, which, if one may guess by the composition she so readily came into, were not small.
Phoebe, my kind tutoress Phoebe, was at that time gone out, perhaps in search of me, or their cook"d-up story had not, it is probable, pa.s.s"d so smoothly.
This negotiation had, however, taken up some time, which would have appear"d much longer to me, left as I was, in a strange house, if the landlady, a motherly sort of a woman, to whom Charles had liberally recommended me, had not come up and borne me company. We drank tea, and her chat help"d to pa.s.s away the time very agreeably, since he was our theme; but as the evening deepened, and the hour set for his return was elaps"d, I could not dispel the gloom of impatience and tender fears which gathered upon me, and which our timid s.e.x are apt to feel in proportion to their love.
Long, however, I did not suffer: the sight of him over-paid me; and the soft reproach I had prepar"d for him expired before it reach"d my lips.
I was still a-bed, yet unable to use my legs otherwise than awkwardly, and Charles flew to me, catched me in his arms, rais"d and extending mine to meet his dear embrace, and gives me an account, interrupted by many a sweet paren- thesis of kisses, of the success of his measures.
I could not help laughing at the fright the old woman had been put into, which my ignorance, and indeed my want of innocence, had far from prepar"d me for bespeaking. She had, it seems, apprehended that I fled for shelter to some relation I had recollected in town, on my dislike of their ways and proceeding towards me, and that this application came from thence; for, as Charles had rightly judg"d not one neighbour had, at that still hour, seen the circ.u.m- stance of my escape into the coach, or, at least, notic"d him; neither had any in the house the least hint or clue of suspicion of my having spoke to him, much less of my having clapt up such a sudden bargain with a perfect stranger: thus the greatest improbability is not always what we should most mistrust.
We supped with all the gaiety of two young giddy crea- tures at the top of their desires; and as I had most joy- fully given up to Charles the whole charge of my future happiness, I thought of nothing beyond the exquisite plea- sure of possessing him.
He came to bed in due time; and this second night, the pain being pretty well over, I tasted, in full draughts, all the transports of perfect enjoyment: I swam, I bathed in bliss, till both fell fast asleep, through the natural con- sequences of satisfied desires, and appeas"d flames; nor did we wake but to renew"d raptures.
Thus, making the most of love and life, did we stay in this lodging in Chelsea about ten days; in which time Charles took care to give his excursions from home a favourable gloss, and to keep his footing with his fond indulgent grandmother, from whom he drew constant and sufficient supplies for the charge I was to him, and which was very trifling, in compari- sion with his former less regular course of pleasures.
Charles remov"d me then to a private ready furnish"d lodging in D . . . street, St. James"s, where he paid half a guinea a week for two rooms and a closet on the second floor, which he had been some time looking out for, and was more convenient for the frequency of his visits than where he had at first plac"d me, in a house which I cannot say but I left with regret, as it was infinitely endear"d to me by the first possession of my Charles, and the circ.u.mstance of losing, there, that jewel which can never be twice lost.
The landlord, however, had no reason to complain of any thing, but of a procedure in Charles too liberal not to make him regret the loss of us.
Arrived at our new lodgings, I remember I thought them extremely fine, though ordinary enough, even at that price; but, had it been a dungeon that Charles had brought me to, his presence would have made it a little Versailles.
The landlady, Mrs. Jones, waited on us to our apart- ment, and with great volubility of tongue explain"d to us all its conveniences--that her own maid should wait on us . . . that the best of quality had lodg"d at her house . . .
that her first floor was let to a foreign secretary of an emba.s.sy, and his lady . . . that I looked like a very good- natur"d lady. . . . At the word lady, I blush"d out of flatter"d vanity: this was too strong for a girl of my con- dition; for though Charles had had the precaution of dressing me in a less tawdry flaunting style than were the cloaths I escap"d to him in, and of pa.s.sing me for his wife, that he had secretly married, and kept private (the old story) on account of his friends, I dare swear this appear"d extremely apocryphal to a woman who knew the town so well as she did; but that was the least of her concern. It was impossible to be less scruple-ridden than she was; and the advantage of letting her rooms being her sole object, the truth itself would have far from scandaliz"d her, or broke her bargain.
A sketch of her picture, and personal history, will dis- pose you to account for the part she is to act in my concerns.
She was about forty-six years old, tall, meagre, red- hair"d, with one of those trivial ordinary faces you meet with everywhere, and go about unheeded and unmentioned. In her youth she had been kept by a gentleman who, dying, left her forty pounds a year during her life, in consideration of a daughter he had by her; which daughter, at the age of seven-teen, she sold, for not a very considerable sum nei- ther, to a gentleman who was going on Envoy abroad, and took his purchase with him, where he us"d her with the utmost tenderness, and it is thought, was secretly married to her: but had constantly made a point of her not keeping up the least correspondence with a mother base enough to make a market of her own flesh and blood. However, as she had no nature, nor, indeed, any pa.s.sion but that of money, this gave her no further uneasiness, than, as she thereby lost a handle of squeezing presents, or other after-advantages, out of the bargain. Indifferent then, by nature of const.i.tution, to every other pleasure but that of increasing the lump by any means whatever, she commenc"d a kind of private procur- ess, for which she was not amiss fitted, by her grave decent appearance, and sometimes did a job in the match-making way; in short, there was nothing that appear"d to her under the shape of gain that she would not have undertaken. She knew most of the ways of the town, having not only herself been upon, but kept up constant intelligences in it, dealing, be- sides her practice in promoting a harmony between the two s.e.xes, in private p.a.w.n-broking and other profitable secrets.
She rented the house she liv"d in, and made the most of it by letting it out in lodgings; though she was worth, at least, near three or four thousand pounds, she would not allow herself even the necessaries of life, and pinn"d her subsistence entirely on what she could squeeze out of her lodgers.
When she saw such a young pair come under her roof, her immediate notions, doubtless, were how she should make the most money of us, by every means that money might be made, and which, she rightly judged, our situation and inexperience would soon beget her occasions of.
In this hopeful sanctuary, and under the clutches of this harpy, did we pitch our residence. It will not be mighty material to you, or very pleasant to me, to enter into a detail of all the petty cut-throat ways and means with which she used to fleece us; all which Charles indol- ently chose to bear with, rather than take the trouble of removing, the difference of expense being scarce attended to by a young gentleman who had no idea of stint, or even of economy, and a raw country girl who knew nothing of the matter.
Here, however, under the wings of my sovereignly belov"d, did I flow the most delicious hours of my life; my Charles I had, and, in him, everything my fond heart could wish or desire. He carried me to plays, operas, masquerades, and every diversion of the town; all of which pleas"d me indeed, but pleas"d me infinitely the more for his being with me, and explaining everything to me, and enjoying, perhaps, the natural impressions of surprize and admiration, which such sights, at the first, never fail to excite in a country girl, new to the delights of them; but to me, they sensibly prov"d the power and full dominion of the sole pa.s.sion of my heart over me, a pa.s.sion in which soul and body were concentre"d, and left me no room for any other relish of life but love.
As to the men I saw at those places, or at any other, they suffer"d so much in the comparison my eyes made of them with my all-perfect Adonis, that I had not the infidel- ity even of one wandering thought to reproach myself with upon his account. He was the universe to me, and all that was not him was nothing to me.
My love, in fine, was so excessive, that it arriv"d at annihilating every suggestion or kindling spark of jealousy; for, one idea only tending that way, gave me such exquisite torment that my self-love, and dread of worse than death, made me for ever renounce and defy it: nor had I, indeed, occasion; for, were I to enter here on the recital of sev- eral instances wherein Charles sacrific"d to me women of greater importance than I dare hint (which, considering his form, was no such wonder), I might, indeed, give you full proof of his unshaken constancy to me; but would not you accuse me of warming up again a feast that my vanity ought long ago to have been satisfy"d with?
In our cessations from active pleasure, Charles fram"d himself one, in instructing me, as far as his own lights reach"d, in a great many points of life that I was, in con- sequence of my no-education, perfectly ignorant of: nor did I suffer one word to fall in vain from the mouth of my love- ly teacher: I hung on every syllable he utter"d, and re- ceiv"d as oracles, all he said; whilst kisses were all the interruption I could not refuse myself the pleasure of ad- mitting, from lips that breath"d more than Arabian sweetness.
I was in a little time enabled, by the progress I had made, to prove the deep regard I had paid to all that he had said to me: repeating it to him almost word for word; and to shew that I was not entirely the parrot, but that I reflected upon, that I enter"d into it, I join"d my own comments, and ask"d him questions of explanation.
My country accent, and the rusticity of my gait, man- ners, and deportment, began now sensibly to wear off, so quick was my observation, and so efficacious my desire of growing every day worthier of his heart.
As to money, though he brought me constantly all he receiv"d, it was with difficulty he even got me to give it room in my bureau; and what clothes I had, he could prevail on me to accept of on no other foot than that of pleasing him by the greater neatness in my dress, beyond which I had no ambition. I could have made a pleasure of the greatest toil, and worked my fingers to the bone, with joy, to have supported him: guess, then, if I could harbour any idea of being burdensome to him, and this disinterested turn in me was so unaffected, so much the dictate of my heart, that Charles could not but feel it: and if he did not love me as I did him (which was the constant and only matter of sweet contention between us), he manag"d so, at least, as to give me the satisfaction of believing it impossible for man to be more tender, more true, more faithful than he was.
Our landlady, Mrs. Jones, came frequently up to my apartment, from whence I never stirr"d on any pretext with- out Charles; nor was it long before she worm"d out, without much art, the secret of our having cheated the church of a ceremony, and, in course, of the terms we liv"d together upon; a circ.u.mstance which far from displeas"d her, con- sidering the designs she had upon me, and which, alas! she will, too soon, have room to carry into execution. But in the mean time, her own experience of life let her see that any attempt, however indirect or disguis"d to divert or break, at least presently, so strong a cement of hearts as ours was, could only end in losing two lodgers, of whom she made very competent advantages, if either of us came to smoke her commission; for a commission she had from one of her customers, either to debauch, or get me away from my keeper at any rate.
But the barbarity of my fate soon sav"d her the task of disuniting us. I had now been eleven months with this life of my life, which had pa.s.sed in one continu"d rapid stream of delight: but nothing so violent was ever made to last. I was about three months gone with child by him, a circ.u.mstance which would have added to his tenderness had he ever left me room to believe it could receive an addi- tion, when the mortal, the unexpected blow of separation fell upon us. I shall gallop post over the particulars, which I shudder yet to think of, and cannot to this instant reconcile myself how, or by what means, I could out-live it.
Two life-long days had I linger"d through without hearing from him, I who breath"d, who existed but in him, and had never yet seen twenty-four hours pa.s.s without seeing or hearing from him. The third day my impatience was so strong, my alarms had been so severe, that I perfectly sicken"d with them; and being unable to support the shock longer, I sunk upon the bed and ringing for Mrs. Jones, who had far from comforted me under my anxieties, she came up.
I had scarce breath and spirit enough to find words to beg of her, if she would save my life, to fall upon some means of finding out, instantly, what was become of its only prop and comfort. She pity"d me in a way that rather sharpen"d my affliction than suspended it, and went out upon this commission.