Hath he a heart? I know not. That sunset was a grave between us; and had the corpse risen and stared him in the face, I think he had run mad. In my solitary hours, I would imagine I spoke. Sometimes I would kneel before him entreating, and he would raise me up, as a certain king did another Esther. Sometimes he would fall at my knees, and I would bow my head upon him, weeping for joy.
But yet always I knew that, if we glanced near that secret, he would rise and stare upon me with a ghastly face, and I would see him no more. Yet at that time he loved me. To himself he will not lie in reading this.
'Twas in 1699 Sir William Temple died, and the household at Moor Park was broke up. Mr Swift took the kindest part in my settlement and the laying out of my little fortune. "And be easy about money, you nauti-nauti, dear girls," says he to old Dingley and me; "for what is mine is yours; and were it my blood, 't is all one."
And so laid his plans that we should come to Ireland, where he had preferment at Laracor near Dublin, and the prebend of Dunlavin in St. Patrick's Cathedral. And, God forgive me, I asked myself if the thought to keep me under his guidance mingled not itself with all his kindness.
So I, being twenty years old, and Dingley a kind bustling woman, we went; and Ireland was a kindly home, for 't was near him, and I might see him. Not as I would--oh, never that! but as a friend, provided 't was with caution. For as he now mounted in the Church, and his ambition strengthened on him (and sure Wolsey himself did not more suffer from that failing of noble minds), caution grew to be his main thought; for he said the adventure of our coming looked so like a frolic that censure might hold as if there were a secret history in such a removal; but this would soon blow over by circumspect conduct, and this too was used to put a distance between us. But 't was the condition of our intercourse, and thus I accepted it. For aught I could discern, all else was clean forgot, and we lodged near him and met as friends--no more.
Nor could I think otherwise when Mr Tisdall, his friend, made suit to me. I was cold,--what else,--for I thought myself a wife, if a forsaken one, and Mr Tisdall imagined that Dr Swift opposed his suit, objecting that his means did not come up to the expectation he formed for me, who was, he said, in a manner, his ward.
Poor Mr Tisdall writ in haste on this, and brought me Dr Swift's reply (who had not broke the matter to me) and thus it ran:--
My conjecture is that you think I obstruct your inclinations to please my own. In answer to all which I will, upon my conscience and honour, tell you the naked truth, [The naked truth! O God, if it were told!] If my fortunes and humour served me to think of that state, I should certainly make your choice, because I never saw that person whose conversation I entirely valued but hers. This was the utmost I ever gave way to. [But once--but once!] And this regard of mine never once entered my head as an impediment to you, since it is held so necessary and convenient a thing for ladies to marry, and that time takes off the lustre of virgins in all other eyes but mine.
This Mr Tisdall offered on his knees, declaring it must remove my last objections, since the worthy friend of my childhood supported his suit. I received it sedately, and dismist him with the compunction so worthy a gentleman merited. Was this letter honest to his friend? I say not.
Henceforth he disliked Mr Tisdall. Could I impute this to jealousy? Why not? A man will be jealous if his dog but lick the hand of another; and, though he reserve himself perfect freedom, no man must so much as sigh for the woman he hath once honoured with his regard. Truly there is a something Oriental in the passions of men; and if a woman break through this, 'tis at her peril.