In 1736 when Eliza's novel first appeared, Walpole's defeated Excise Bill of 1733-4 and his policy of non-interference on the Continent had made him cordially disliked by the people, and by 1741 his unpopular ministry, like Lady Mary Montagu's stairs, was "in a declining way." Sir Robert had never shown himself a friend to letters, and there were not a few writers, among them one so illustrious as Henry Fielding, who were ready to seize upon any pretext for attacking him.[6] There can be no doubt that in the character of the villainous, corrupt, greedy, vain, lascivious, but plausible Ochihatou Mrs. Haywood intended her readers to recognize a semblance of the English minister. "Of all the statesmen who have held high office, it would be impossible to find one who has been more systematically abused and more unjustly treated than Sir Robert Walpole…. He is the 'Father of Parliamentary Corruption,' the 'foe to English liberty,' the 'man who maintained his power by the basest and most venal tactics'…. Whenever his administration is alluded to in Parliament a shudder runs through the House … at the very thought that one so sordid, so interested, so schemingly selfish, should have attained to the position of Prime Minister, and have commanded a following. If we read the pamphlet literature of the eighteenth century, we see Walpole represented as the meanest and most corrupt of mankind."[7] Lord Chesterfield says of him: "His prevailing weakness was to be thought to have a polite and happy turn to gallantry, of which he had undoubtedly less than any man living; it was his favorite and frequent subject of conversation, which proved, to those who had any penetration, that it was his prevailing weakness, and they applied to it with success."[8] And Lord Hervey reports that the Queen remarked of Walpole's mistress, "dear Molly Skerritt": "She must be a clever gentlewoman to have made him believe she cares for him on any other score [but his money]; and to show you what fools we all are in some point or other, she has certainly told him some fine story or other of her love and her passion, and that poor man—avec ce gros corps, ces jambes enflées, et ce vilain ventre—believes her. Ah! what is human nature!"[9]
With this sketch of Walpole compare the account of Ochihatou, Prime Minister of Hypotofa. "This great Man was born of a mean Extraction, and so deformed in his own Person, that not even his own Parents cou'd look on him with Satisfaction…. As he was extremely amorous, and had so little in him to inspire the tender Passion, the first Proof he gave of his Art, was to … cast such a Delusion before the Eyes of all who saw him, that he appeared to them such as he wished to be, a most comely and graceful Man.
"With this Advantage, join'd to the most soothing and insinuating Behaviour, he came to Court, and, by his Artifices, so wound himself into the Favour of some great Officers, that he was not long without being put into a considerable Post. This he discharged so well, that he was soon promoted to a better, and at length to those of the highest Trust and Honour in the Kingdom. But that which was most remarkable in him, and very much contributed to endear him to all Sorts of People, was that his Elevation did not seem to have made the least Change in his Sentiments. His natural Pride, his Lust, his exorbitant Ambition, were disguised under the Appearance of Sweetness of Disposition, Chastity, and even more Condescension, than was consistent with the Rank he then possest. By this Behaviour, he render'd himself so far from exciting Envy, that those, by whose Recommendation he had obtained what he enjoy'd, and with some of whom he was now on more than an Equality, wish'd rather to see an Augmentation, than Diminution of a Power he so well knew to use; and so successful was his Hypocrisy, that the most Discerning saw not into his Designs, till he found means to accomplish them, to the almost total Ruin of both King and People."[10] Ochihatou worms his way into the favor of the king, and after gaining complete ascendancy over his royal master, uses the power for his own ends. He fills the positions at court with wretches subservient to his own interests. "He next proceeded to seize the publick Treasure into his own Hands, which he converted not to Works of Justice or Charity, or any Uses for the Honour of the Kingdom, but in building stately Palaces for himself, his Wives, and Concubines, and enriching his mean Family, and others who adhered to him, and assisted in his Enterprizes." Lest this reference should not be plain enough in its application to Walpole's extravagances at Houghton, Mrs. Haywood adds in a footnote, "Our Author might have saved himself the Trouble of particularizing in what manner Ochihatou apply'd the Nation's Money; since he had said enough in saying, he was a Prime Minister, to make the Reader acquainted with his Conduct in that Point." Further allusions to a standing army of mercenaries and to an odious tribe of tax-collectors—two of the most popular grievances against Walpole—give additional force to the satire. There is a suspicion that in the character of the young prince banished by Ochihatou readers of a right turn of mind were intended to perceive a cautious allusion to the Pretender. [Transcriber's note: Quotes in paragraph in original, not block quote.]
That Walpole not only perceived, but actively resented the affront, we may infer, though evidence is lacking, from the six years of silence that followed the publication of the satire. Perhaps the government saw fit to buy off the troublesome author by a small appointment, but such indulgent measures were not usually applied to similar cases. More probably Eliza found it wise to seek in France or some neighboring country the safety from the malignant power of the Prime Minister that her heroine sought in the kingdom of Oozoff.
The "Adventures of Eovaai" contains almost the last of the dedications written in a servile tone to a patron whose favor Mrs. Haywood hoped to curry. Henceforward she was to be more truly a woman of letters in that her books appealed ostensibly at least only to the reading public. The victim of her final eulogy was the redoubtable Sarah, Duchess Dowager of Marlborough, who, when finding herself addressed as "O most illustrious Wife, and Parent of the Greatest, Best, and Loveliest! it was not sufficient for you to adorn Posterity with the Amiableness of every Virtue," etc., etc., may perhaps have recalled how her shining character had been blackened some twelve years before in a licentious volume called "Memoirs of a Certain Island adjacent to the Kingdom of Utopia."[11] Had her Grace been aware that the reputed author of that comprehensive lampoon was none other than the woman who now outdid herself in praise, Eliza Haywood would probably have profited little by her panegyric. For though the "Memoirs of a Certain Island" like the "Adventures of Eovaai" made a pretence of being translated into English from the work of a celebrated Utopian author, the British public found no difficulty in attributing it by popular acclaim to Mrs. Haywood, and she reaped immense notoriety from it. In prefaces to some of her subsequent works she complained of the readiness of the world to pick meanings in whatever was published by a struggling woman, or protested that she had no persons or families in view in writing her stories, but she never disclaimed the authorship of this production. Undoubtedly the world was right in "smoking" the writer.[12]
If before she had retailed secret histories of late amours singly, Mrs. Haywood dealt in them now by the wholesale, and any reader curious to know the identity of the personages hidden under such fictitious names as Romanus, Beaujune, Orainos, Davilla, Flirtillaria, or Saloida could obtain the information by consulting a convenient "key" affixed to each of the two volumes. In this respect, as in the general scheme of her work, Mrs. Haywood was following the model set by the celebrated Mrs. Manley in her "New Atalantis." She in turn had derived her method from the French romans à clef or romances in which contemporary scandal was reported in a fictitious disguise. The imitation written by Mrs. Haywood became only less notorious than her original, and was still well enough known in 1760 to be included in the convenient list of novels prefixed to the elder Colman's "Polly Honeycombe." It consists of a tissue of anecdotes which, if retold, would (in Fuller's words) "stain through the cleanest language I can wrap them in," all set in an allegorical framework of a commonplace kind.
A noble youth arrives upon the shores of a happy island [England], where he encounters the God of Love, who conveys him to a spacious court in the midst of the city. There Pecunia and Fortuna, served by their high priest Lucitario [J. Craggs, the elder] preside over an Enchanted Well [South Sea Company] while all degrees of humanity stand about in expectation of some wonderful event. From amid the throng the God of Love selects certain persons as examples of perverted love. The stories he relates about them range from mere anecdotes to elaborate histories containing several love-letters. In substance these tales consist of the grossest scandal that could be collected from the gossip of profligate society. After hearing more than a satiety of these illustrations, the youth beholds the Genius of the Isle, supported by Astrea and Reason, exposing the fraud of the Enchanted Well to the dismay of the greedy rabble. The young stranger then sinks to rest in a perfumed bower, while the God of Love and the Genius of the Isle set about a much needed reformation of manners.
None of the skimmings of contemporary gossip poured out in the two volumes deserves the least consideration, save such as reveal the fair writer's relations with other authors. In return for Savage's eulogy of her "Love in Excess" and "Rash Resolve" the scribbling dame included in her scandal novel the story of his noble parentage substantially as it had already been told by Aaron Hill in the "Plain Dealer" for 24 June, 1724. But in addition she prefaced the account with a highly colored narrative of the amours of Masonia and Riverius.[13] However much the author of "The Bastard" may have desired to prove his noble origin, he might easily have resented a too open flaunting of his mother's disgrace. Moreover, Mrs. Haywood hinted that his unfeeling mother was not the only woman whom the poet had to fear. By the insinuations of a female fury, a pretender to the art of poetry, for whom Eliza has no words too black—in fact some of her epithets are too shady to be quoted—he has been led into actions, mean, unjust, and wicked. The vile woman, it seems, has been guilty of defaming the reputations of others.
"The Monster whose Soul is wholly compos'd of Hipocrisy, Envy, and Lust, can ill endure another Woman should be esteem'd Mistress of those Virtues she has acted with too barefaced an Impudence to pretend to, and is never so happy as when by some horrid Stratagem she finds the means to traduce and blast the Character of the Worthy…. With how much readiness the easily deceiv'd Riverius [Savage] has obliged her in spreading those Reports, coin'd in the hellish Mint of her own Brain, I am sorry to say…. It cannot be doubted but that he has lost many Friends on her account, in particular one there was who bore him a singular Respect, tho' no otherways capacitated to serve him than by good Wishes.—This Person receiv'd a more than common Injury from him, thro' the Instigations of that female Fury; but yet continuing to acknowledge his good Qualities, and pitying his falling into the contrary, took no other Revenge than writing a little Satire, which his having publish'd some admirable fine things in the praise of Friendship and Honour, gave a handsome opportunity for." (Vol. I, p. 184.)
From the exceptional animus displayed by Eliza Haywood in describing her colleague in the school for scandal, one may suspect that the lightning had struck fairly near home. One is almost forced to believe that Savage's well-wisher, the writer of the little satire, "To the Ingenious Riverius, on his writing in the Praise of Friendship," was none other than Eliza herself.[14] Exactly what injury she had sustained from him and his Siren is not known, but although he still stood high in her esteem, she was implacable against that "worse than Lais" whom in a long and pungent description she satirized under the name of Gloatitia.