The angel whom Mr. Burney had lost—for an angel both without and within she had seemed to him—had the generous disinterestedness, on the bed of death, to recommend to her miserable husband that he would marry again; well knowing that the tenderness of female friendship would come nearest,—however distant,—to the softness of consolation: and, maternally weighing, no doubt, that a well chosen partner might prove a benediction to her poor children. And this injunction, though heard at the time with agony scarcely supportable, might probably, and strongly, influence his future conduct, when the desperation of hopelessness was somewhat worn away by all-subduing time, joined to forced exertions in business.
His Esther had even named to him the lady whom she thought most capable to suit him as a companion, and most tenderly disposed to becoming a mother to his children,—Miss Dorothy Young, who was her most valued friend. Mrs. Allen, Dorothy’s nearest competitor, was not then a widow. But Mr. Burney, sacred as he held the opinions and the wishes of his Esther, was too ardent an admirer of beauty to dispense, in totality, with that attractive embellishment of the female frame. He honoured and esteemed, with a brother’s affection, the excellent Dorothy Young: but those charms which awaken softer sensations, were utterly and unhappily denied to that estimable woman, through her peculiarly unfortunate personal defects.
Not early, and not easily, did Mr. Burney and Mrs. Allen reveal their mutual partiality. The wounded heart of Mr. Burney recoiled from such anodyne as demanded new vows to a new object: and Mrs. Allen, at that period, lived in a state of affluence that made such a marriage require severe worldly sacrifices. Only, however transiently; for by an unfortunate trust in an unfortunate, though honourable speculatist, Dr. King, she completely lost all that, independently, was at her own disposal of fortune. And the noble disinterestedness of Mr. Burney upon this occasion, rivetted to him her affections, with the highest esteem.
Yet even when these scruples were mutually overwhelmed by increasing force of regard, so many unlooked for obstacles stood in the way of their union, that, wearied by delays that seemed at once captious and interminable, Mr. Burney earnestly entreated that an immediate private marriage might avert, at least, a final breach of their engagement: solemnly promising, at the same time, that they should keep the alliance secret, and still live apart, till all prudential exactions should be satisfied.
As they were each wholly independent, save from the influence of opinion,—which, however, is frequently more difficult to subdue than that of authority,—Mrs. Allen saw no objection of sufficient force to counteract her pleasure in compliance.
Their plan was confided to four persons, indispensably requisite for its execution; Mrs., afterwards Lady Strange, Miss Young, Mr. Crisp, and the Rev. Mr. Pugh, curate of St. James’s church.
Mr. Pugh, who was of very long standing a friend of Mr. Burney, aided personally in promoting such measures as secured secrecy with success; and in St. James’s church, Mr. Pugh tied that indissoluble knot, which, however fairly promising, is inevitably rigorous, since it can be loosened only by Crime or by Death: but which, where it binds the destinies of those whose hearts are already knit together by reciprocated regard, gives a charm to captivity that robs liberty of regret.
At the porch of St. James’s church, Mrs. Strange and Mr. Pugh whispered their congratulations to the new married couple, as they entered a prepared post-chaise; which, in a very few hours, galloped them to the obscure skirts of the then pathless, and nearly uninhabited, Chesington common; where Mr. Crisp had engaged for them a rural and fragrant retreat, at a small farm-house in a little hamlet, a mile or two from Chesington Hall.
The secret, as usual in matrimonial concealments, was faithfully preserved, for a certain time, by scrupulous discretion in the parties, and watchful circumspection in the witnesses: but, as usual also, error and accident were soon at work to develop the transaction; and the loss of a letter, through some carelessness of conveyance, revealed suddenly but irrevocably the state of the connexion.
This circumstance, however, though, at the time, cruelly distressing, served ultimately but to hasten their own views; as the discovery was necessarily followed by the personal union for which their hands had been joined.