Concerning the cause of this duello, I may well say teterrima causa. His lordship’s own sister Milady Clarik was in question; she being, I fear me, rather akin in her way of life to Jean Drocheils (whom your lordship may remember; for, the Baillies expulsing her from Aberdeen, she migrated to St. Andrews, ad eundem, as the saying is) than like, in her walk and conduct, to a virtuous lady of a noble family. She was, indeed, as current rumour had it, the light o’love or belle amie of Monsieur d’Artagnan, his lordship’s adversary.
But of siclike least said soonest mended. I take cloak and sword, and follow with his lordship and two other experienced cavaliers unto the place of rencontre, being a waste croft whereon a loon was herding goats, behind the Palace of the Luxembourg. Here we find waiting us four soldados, proper tall men of their hands, who receive us courteously. He that first gave cause of quarrel to my Lord Winter bore a worthy name enough out of Gascony, that is arida nutrix, as we said at the Mareschal College, of honourable soldados—to wit, as I said, he was Monsieur d’Artagnan. To his friends, howbeit, he gave sic heathen titles as I never saw or heard of out of the Grecian books: namely, Monsieur Porthos, a very tall man, albeit something of a lourdaud; Monsieur Athos; and he that was to be mine own opposite, Monsieur Aramis. Hearing these outlandish and insolent appellations, I thought it becoming me, as an honourable cavalier, to resent this fashion of presenting: and demurred that a gentleman of the House of Dalgetty of Drumthwacket could neither take affront from, nor give honourable satisfaction to, a nameless landlouper. Wherein your lordship, I doubt me not, will hold me justificate.
Lord Winter homologating mine opinion, he that called himself Athos drew each of us apart, and whispered the true names and qualities territorial of these gentlemen; the whilk, as may befall honourable soldados, they had reason sufficient to conceal while serving as private gentlemen in a regiment, though disdaining to receive halberds, as unbecoming their birth. He that aligned himself forenenst me was styled the Chevalier d’Herblay; and, the word being given, we fell to.
Now, mine adversary declining to fight comminus gladio, but breaking ground in a manner unworthy of a gallant soldado, and the place, saving your presence, being somewhat slippery and treacherous because of the goats that were fed there, I delivered a sufficient onslaught; and he fell, his sword flying from his hand. When I had taken his weapon—the spolia opima, as we said at Mareschal College—I bid him rise, and then discoursed him on the dishonour of such a hasty defeat. Then, he confessing himself to me that, though under arms, he was a young fledgeling priest in Popish orders, I began upon him with such words on his disgracing the noble profession of arms as might have made him choose to return to his cloister; when suddenly he fled, and, being young and light-footed, robbed me, not only of such caduacs and casualties as an experienced cavalier might well take from his prisoner for ransom, but also, as now it appears, of my good name. For I doubt not that this musketeer priest, Monsieur Aramis, or l’Abbé d’Herblay (for he hath as many names as I have seen campaigns), was the loon that beguiled with a lying tale the newsman of the “Gallo Belgicus.” And I have ever seen that an honourable soldado will give the go-by to these newsmen and their flying sheets, as unworthy of the notice of honourable cavaliers; of whom (recommending your lordship for the truth of my tale to my Lord Winter, now with his gracious Majesty the King) I am fain to subscribe myself one, and your lordship’s poor officer, as ye shall entreat him,
Dugald Dalgetty, of Drumthwacket,
Late Commander of the whole stift of Dunklespiel
on the Lower Rhine.
X.
From Mr. Lovelace to John Belford, Esq.
The following letter must have been omitted from the papers to which Mr. Samuel Richardson, the editor of “Clarissa,” had access. It was written, apparently, after the disgraceful success of Lovelace’s disgraceful adventure, and shows us that scoundrel in company not choice, indeed, but better than he deserved, the society of Mr. Thomas Jones, a Foundling. Mr. Jones’s admirable wife (née Western), having heard of Lovelace’s conduct, sent her husband to execute that revenge which should have been competed for by every man of heart. It will be seen that Mr. Jones was no match for the perfidies of Mr. Lovelace. The cynical reflections of that bad man on Lord Fellamar, and his relations with Mrs. Jones, will only cause indignation and contempt among her innumerable and honourable admirers. They will remember the critical and painful circumstances as recorded in Mr. Henry Fielding’s biography of Mr. Jones.
Parcius junctas quatiunt fenestras
Ictibus crebris juvenes protervi.