“Yes, a Jesuit, and a marvellously shrewd one: the Abbe Montreuil.”
“He was my tutor.”
“Ah, so I have heard.”
“And your acquaintance with him is positively and bona fide of a state nature?”
“Positively and bona fide.”
“I could tell you something of him; he is certainly in the service of the Court at St. Germains, and a terrible plotter on this side the Channel.”
“Possibly; but I wish to receive no information respecting him.”
One great virtue of business did St. John possess, and I have never known any statesman who possessed it so eminently: it was the discreet distinction between friends of the statesman and friends of the man. Much and intimately as I knew St. John, I could never glean from him a single secret of a state nature, until, indeed, at a later period, I leagued myself to a portion of his public schemes. Accordingly I found him, at the present moment, perfectly impregnable to my inquiries; and it was not till I knew Montreuil’s companion was that celebrated intriguant, the Abbe Gaultier, that I ascertained the exact nature of the priest’s business with St. John, and the exact motive of the civilities he had received from Abigail Masham.* Being at last forced, despairingly, to give over the attempt on his discretion, I suffered St. John to turn the conversation upon other topics, and as these were not much to the existent humour of my mind, I soon rose to depart.
* Namely, that Count Devereux ascertained the priest’s communications and overtures from the Chevalier. The precise extent of Bolingbroke’s secret negotiations with the exiled Prince is still one of the darkest portions of the history of that time. That negotiations were carried on, both by Harley and by St. John, very largely, and very closely, I need not say that there is no doubt.
“Stay, Count,” said St. John; “shall you ride to-day?”