And, as Harry Esmond was her page, he also was called from duty at this time. “My lord has lived in the army and with soldiers,” she would say to the lad, “amongst whom great license is allowed. You have had a different nurture, and I trust these things will change as you grow older; not that any fault attaches to my lord, who is one of the best and most religious men in this kingdom.” And very likely she believed so. ’Tis strange what a man may do, and a woman yet think him an angel.
And as Esmond has taken truth for his motto, it must be owned, even with regard to that other angel, his mistress, that she had a fault of character which flawed her perfections. With the other sex perfectly tolerant and kindly, of her own she was invariably jealous; and a proof that she had this vice is, that though she would acknowledge a thousand faults that she had not, to this which she had she could never be got to own. But if there came a woman with even a semblance of beauty to Castlewood, she was so sure to find out some wrong in her, that my lord, laughing in his jolly way, would often joke with her concerning her foible. Comely servant-maids might come for hire, but none were taken at Castlewood. The housekeeper was old; my lady’s own waiting-woman squinted, and was marked with the smallpox; the housemaids and scullion were ordinary country wenches, to whom Lady Castlewood was kind, as her nature made her to everybody almost; but as soon as ever she had to do with a pretty woman, she was cold, retiring, and haughty. The country ladies found this fault in her; and though the men all admired her, their wives and daughters complained of her coldness and aims, and said that Castlewood was pleasanter in Lady Jezebel’s time (as the dowager was called) than at present. Some few were of my mistress’s side. Old Lady Blenkinsop Jointure, who had been at court in King James the First’s time, always took her side; and so did old Mistress Crookshank, Bishop Crookshank’s daughter, of Hexton, who, with some more of their like, pronounced my lady an angel: but the pretty women were not of this mind; and the opinion of the country was that my lord was tied to his wife’s apron-strings, and that she ruled over him.
The second fight which Harry Esmond had, was at fourteen years of age, with Bryan Hawkshaw, Sir John Hawkshaw’s son, of Bramblebrook, who, advancing this opinion, that my lady was jealous and henpecked my lord, put Harry in such a fury, that Harry fell on him and with such rage, that the other boy, who was two years older and by far bigger than he, had by far the worst of the assault, until it was interrupted by Doctor Tusher walking out of the dinner-room.
Bryan Hawkshaw got up bleeding at the nose, having, indeed, been surprised, as many a stronger man might have been, by the fury of the assault upon him.
“You little bastard beggar!” he said, “I’ll murder you for this!”
And indeed he was big enough.
“Bastard or not,” said the other, grinding his teeth, “I have a couple of swords, and if you like to meet me, as a man, on the terrace tonight—”
And here the Doctor coming up, the colloquy of the young champions ended. Very likely, big as he was, Hawkshaw did not care to continue a fight with such a ferocious opponent as this had been.
VIII
After Good Fortune Comes Evil
Since my Lady Mary Wortley Montagu brought home the custom of inoculation from Turkey (a perilous practice many deem it, and only a useless rushing into the jaws of danger), I think the severity of the smallpox, that dreadful scourge of the world, has somewhat been abated in our part of it; and remember in my time hundreds of the young and beautiful who have been carried to the grave, or have only risen from their pillows frightfully scarred and disfigured by this malady. Many a sweet face hath left its roses on the bed on which this dreadful and withering blight has laid them. In my early days, this pestilence would enter a village and destroy half its inhabitants: at its approach, it may well be imagined, not only the beautiful but the strongest were alarmed, and those fled who could. One day in the year 1694 (I have good reason to remember it), Doctor Tusher ran into Castlewood House, with a face of consternation, saying that the malady had made its appearance at the blacksmith’s house in the village, and that one of the maids there was down in the smallpox.
The blacksmith, besides his forge and irons for horses, had an alehouse for men, which his wife kept, and his company sat on benches before the inn-door, looking at the smithy while they drank their beer. Now, there was a pretty girl at this inn, the landlord’s men called Nancy Sievewright, a bouncing, fresh-looking lass, whose face was as red as the hollyhocks over the pales of the garden behind the inn. At this time Harry Esmond was a lad of sixteen, and somehow in his walks and rambles it often happened that he fell in with Nancy Sievewright’s bonny face; if he did not want something done at the blacksmith’s
