At the time Lady Frances returned to England, Mrs Lee was taken out of the convent to be married. Her parents, dazzled with Mr Lee's wealth, forgot to attend to other requisites to render that state happy. Without his being a man of very shining parts, he had such talents as made him acceptable to women, in particular to a girl so young as she was when this alliance took place. He sung and danced well, was lively to extravagance, full of agreeable trifling, and always in good humour: add to this, he was handsome in his person, liberal to excess, and calculated for the seduction of the fair. Mrs Lee's great beauty, her parents partially flattered themselves would fix his affections.—All the graces of which the figure and emotions of a female were capable, were united in her; but his love for her was nothing but an impulse of passion which soon subsided. Addicted by his natural disposition to pleasure, he despised those which a tender sensibility renders so exquisitely delightful; such would have trespassed too much on his vanity. Unexperienced and artless, his innocent wife could not long retain his affections, and in the few years she lived with him, encountered many mortifications; first from the alienation of his affections, afterwards from the distressed situation of his affairs, which entirely changed his temper, rendering him impatient and passionate. His very footmen were taught to insult her, and every one in the family knew the most effectual way to ingratiate themselves with him, was to disregard his wife. Yet she bore it all with patience, and acted her part with prudence, endeavouring to disarm his anger with gentleness. She sometimes, indeed, lamented and complained, but the dove and the lamb do so too—'The poison of grief exhales only in complaints.'—She was neither sullen nor gay when he was out of humour; nor impertinent or melancholy when he was pleased—She obliged her affections to wait and submit to the various turns of his temper—trying to bribe his passions to her interest. She endeavoured also, by economy and proper attention, to retard as long as possible, the ruin that threatened him; and considerably diminished the household expenses.
This pleased her husband; he wanted to retrench, without appearing less magnificent; for his prudence (or rather his desire of saving at home to squander abroad) was still subordinate to his ostentation. But all these innocent stratagems were ineffectual; spending his whole time between women, racing, and gaming, one excess succeeded another, until his affairs were intirely involved. Previous to this, Mrs Lee had resigned her jewels to pay one of his game debts, which she afterwards saw adorning a girl he kept. The world saw he devoted himself only to objects of contempt, and pitied his neglect of a woman of her merit, and who was still handsome, having that style of beauty which is the image of a sensible heart, though sorrow and tears had deprived it of its freshness. This laid her open to the assiduity of men of gallantry, who are generally obliging enough, upon such occasions, to offer their assistance to dry up a pretty woman's tears. It is to be confessed a woman under these circumstances is in a very dangerous situation.
None of Mr Lee's conduct was founded on propriety—he was witty, kind, cold, angry, easy, stiff, jealous, careless, cautious, confident, close, open, but all in the wrong place. She often retired into her closet, and wept the silent hours away for his hard-heartedness—yet without one unkind word or reproach. Her parents were dead, Lady Frances at a distance, her sorrows of a complicated kind, which required great delicacy to discover; she had no person to open her heart to, none to whom she could pour forth the sorrows of the soul! she had a susceptible heart, and no object she took any interest in, or who participated in her trials.—This situated, (the candid must acknowledge) she was perhaps more to be pitied than blamed, in permitting another object to glide insensibly into her affections—more especially as he was introduced by Mr Lee, as one to whom she was indebted for his life and fortune.
The first he had defended, when two gamblers, his adversaries, were on the point of killing him; the last he had preserved by discovering a scheme that had been practised on him by them when inebriated by liquor, to which he was much addicted. Her husband left her young and unexperienced heart to all the tortures and pangs of jealousy, and that ennui attending an unoccupied heart; after flattering herself, as she had done nothing to deserve the estrangement of his affections, that they would be as permanent as her own. Why did he forsake her; why did he lay her open to temptations? her heart might have been his own, had he not cruelly abandoned her—at any rate it was too good to form another tye, had he not at last added contempt to neglect and his cruel usage at last would have animated a statue, at least I may safely declare nothing warmed with flesh and blood could bear it. A man of this humour is to be beloved only in the way of christianity—that is the utmost obedience which can be allowed to the commandments of God, and the authority of religion.
Were I obliged to draw a picture that should represent the happy union between an elevated soul, a penetrating mind, and a heart in which sweet humanity resides, I would form it entirely of the person and features of Mr Villars; and I fancy that all who had any just idea of those three qualities might perceive them plainly expressed in his form, look, and demeanor. Mr Lee pressed him to be much at his house; and as his innocent, though oppressed, wife had been kept in constant alarms concerning the consequences of his gaming——she could not but look on Mr Villars as the favour of her fortune, and on one to whom she might be indebted for her husband's reformation. I shall not expatiate on the sweetness and charms of his voice, of his noble appearance, and of the tincture of melancholy which softens the vivacity of his fine eyes; but what distinguishes him from most other men is the sentimental look of modest virtue, which never gives offence. He is not in the least a slave to interest; but as he is no stranger to the necessities of life, his conduct is always regular, and he never abandons himself to any excess. Such is and was Mr Villars. Mrs Lee very soon perceived his partiality for her—circumstanced as she was, his attentions were dangerous—but she could not with any propriety forbid him a house to which her husband so constantly invited him, without letting him see she mistrusted herself—more especially as he never failed in his respect for her.
He became her only comforter and friend; and if from her youth and inexperience she was likely to fall into even the appearance of any error, it was this kind, this friendly monitor that guarded her from it.
His attentions became as necessary to her soul, as aliments of food are to the support of the body, while the respectful distance of his behaviour proved to her his passion was controlled by his respect.
Some surmises were at length insinuated to Mr Lee, to his wife's dishonour. He paid little attention to them—but coming home one night flushed with wine, and finding Mr Villars alone at supper with her, (no unusual matter, and by his own request) he drew his sword, and wounded him before he had time to defend himself! Mrs Lee fainted away——on her recovery she removed herself from a house to which no entreaties on his part could prevail on her to return—declaring she would live no longer with a man who could at once suspect her virtue, endanger his friend's life, and ruin her reputation.
The world talked differently about this affair. Should not the example of the law be followed, which is so tender in criminal cases, that delinquents are often found not guilty, for want of legal evidence, at the same time that the court, the jury, and every one present at the trial feel the strongest moral conviction of their guilt? Scandal on the contrary always gives its most important and fatal decisions from appearances and suppositions, though reputation is dearer to a woman of honor than life itself. Mrs Lee experienced the malevolence of her own sex particularly. What, said they, could engage Mr Villars to devote all his time to her? is not friendship between a man and a woman a chimera, the mark of a passion which honor or self-interest bids them conceal? But whilst the world represented this affair in the worst colours, Lady Frances wrote her an affectionate letter, offering her assistance, and begging she would communicate her real situation, that she might the more effectually be enabled to serve her; to which Mrs Lee returned the following answer.
'Dear Madam.