Cherry & Violet: A Tale of the Great Plague

by Anne Manning

For a Moment, when the Party that had hired our first-floor Window had thrown off their Clokes, I felt a dreadful Presentiment that their Characters could not be over-good; or else, thought I, they never could dress in such a Manner. Only, knowing who they were, I thought again, that can never be—dear Heart! what can they be thinking of? we shall have Stones and Mud thrown up at the Window. “Sure, Madam,” said I to the youngest and prettiest, “you will catch Cold at the open Window ... the Wind blows in very fresh from the River—will you just have this Scarf a little over your Shoulders?” “No, thank you,” says she, shaking back quite a Bush of fair Hair, and looking up at me with her Eyes half shut, as if she were sleepy already. “Forsooth,” thought I, “those Curls are equal to a Fur Tippet”—And, looking across at our Neighbours’ Windows, I saw we need not fear pelting, for that all the other Ladies were dressed just the same. Then thought I, Oh, this is the Restoration, is it? If you, fair Ladies, provoke ill Thoughts of you, you must not feel aggrieved if People think not of you very well.

I disliked this Symptom of the Restoration from the very first—not that it had, naturally, any Connexion with it.—The King had lived long abroad, had become fond of foreign Fashions; but were the modest Ladies of England, therefore, to give in to them? Then, what the upper Classes affect, the lower Classes soon ape: I knew we should presently have Mistress Blenkinsop and Violet trying which could wear the longest Curls and shortest Petticoats, and look the most languishing. The only Difference would be, that the one would become the Fashion, and the other make it ridiculous. Perhaps, thought I, I am growing prudish and old-maidish, I am Eight and Twenty; but so is Violet.

I have often thought, that if the Ladies of England had at this Time been what they ought, a good Deal of Folly and Sin that presently stained this Reign would never have happened. What! could the merry Glance and free Word of a light young Monarch break down Barriers that were not tottering already? What had Mothers and Teachers been about? Where were the Lady Fanshawes and Lucy Hutchinsons? There must have been Something wrong in the Bringing-up—I can never believe all these fair young Ladies were so good one Day and so bad the next.

But the joyfullest Event, to ourselves, on that glorious Twenty-ninth of May, was the Restoration to his Country and Home of our excellent Friend and Lodger, Master Blower. He seemed to be rejuvenized by the general Spirit of Hilariousness; for I protest it seemed as though ten Years were taken off his Shoulders. And he talked of being soon replaced in his Curacy; but, instead of that, his Friends presently got him a Living in the City, which took him away from us, as there was a Parsonage House. But we went to his Church on Sundays; and, as he was not one of those who forget old Friends or humble ones, he would make my Father and me sup with him about once a Quarter, and come to us of his own Accord about as often, and talk over the Times, which in some Respects, as far as Sabbath-keeping and general Morality went, we could not say were bettered.

And now a shocking Sight was to be seen at the Bridge Gate,—the Heads, namely, of those Traitors who brought about the Death of the late King, and who richly deserved their bad End. There they have remained for many a Year, a Terror to all Evil-doers.

And now a shocking sight was to be seen at the Bridge Gate

It was in the Spring following the Restoration, in the Month of March, that we and the Braidfoots were taking our Supper together on the Leads, the Weather being very warm for the Season, when our Attention was attracted by the uncommon Appearance of the Clouds, which, as will often be the Case after much Rain, were exceeding gorgeous and grotesque. Master Braidfoot was the first of us who noticed them, and cried, “See, see, Neighbours! Cannot you now credit how Lovers of the Marvellous have oft-times set Tales afloat of Armies seen fighting in the Air? Do not those two Battalions of Clouds, impelled by opposite Currents, look like two great Armies with Spears and Banners, about to encounter each other? Now they meet, now they fall together, now one vanishes away! Now, they both are gone!”

“And see, dear Hugh,” cries Kitty, “there’s another that looks like a Cathedral; and another like an exceeding big Mountain, with a Rent in its Side; and out of the Rent comes Something that looks like a Crocodile, with its Jaws wide open; no! now it is liker to a Bull, or rather to a Lion.”

“Very like a Whale!” said a Man, as if to himself, on the Top of the next House. It was Master Benskin’s Lodger, who wrote for the Booksellers.