CLEMENT MONTGOMERY
LETTER XVII
FROM LORD FILMAR
TO
SIR WALTER BOYER
Say, dear Sir Walter, to which of the gods shall my hecatomb blaze a burnt offering? Behold, entering within those gates, I see the Valmont coach!——I fly to greet the welcome visitants—more welcome to me than gold to the miser, than conquest to the warrior.——Lie still, thou throbbing mischief, down, down, ye struggling expectations! And let the for once spiritless countenance of Filmar conceal his hopes.
Tis true, Boyer, as—as—as any thing that's most true. Here, in this very Monkton Hall, is Mr. Valmont, ay, and Mrs. Valmont too; and here I mean to keep them:—only to-morrow though.——To-morrow! Walter!——Hail the dawn of to morrow!—Whips cracking, horses flying, and thy friend driving as fast as four can carry him into 6000l. a-year!
If you want cash, call on me any day next week. You, being a particular friend, I'll oblige. But to any one else—Somerville now for instance or Nugent—'It will be curst unfortunate, but I shall have had a hard run of late—or, I shall be building, and want to borrow myself—or, there will be great arrears on my estates not yet paid up.'—But see, here comes a bowing cringing tradesman, who in my days of worse fortune has buffeted me with his purse-proud looks many a time and often. 'Really Mr.——a—a—the amount of your bill seems a little enormous, but I can't fatigue myself with looking into these matters——the steward pays you,—Ay, ay, be not troublesome, and (throwing myself along the sopha) I may probably still deal with you.—Sibella, my dear, raise these cushions under my head—Psha, child, you are devilishly awkward—there—. Pooh!—throw that gauze shade of your's over me.——Sit down, and watch, lest Ponto or Rosetta should leap upon or disturb me.'
By the bye, Walter, as I am determined to reform when I'm married, and become an obedient hopeful son and nephew, if uncle Valmont should think (and pray heaven he may) my wife's——
Oh, lord, what a shudder!——There! 'tis a radical cure, I assure you.—I seized a square piece of paper; and, writing thereon in large characters 6000l. per annum, placed it exactly opposite me, and the qualm vanished.—Walter, you shall see wife written on my page—my wife!—Oh, I declare this scrap of paper is a charm of infinite value!—
If uncle Valmont, I say, should deem my wife's education incomplete, and desires to have her longer under his tuition, I will yield her up for one year, or two, or twenty, if he pleases.—There's forbearance, there's magnanimity! Dub me a hero, sir knight! and place me among the foremost!—Talk of conquering a world, indeed! Why philosophers of all ages have agreed that the truest heroism is to conquer self.—Dub me a hero, I say!