There was no bearing of this, Harriet.—It was a cool evening; but I took up my fan—Hey-day! said I, what language is this?—You insist upon it, my lord!—I think I am married; am I not?—And I took my watch, half an hour after ten on Monday night—the—what day of the month is this?— Please the lord, I will note down this beginning moment of your authoritative demeanour.
My dear Lady G——, [The wretch called me by his own name, perhaps farther to insult me,] if I could bear this treatment, it is impossible for me to love you as I do.
So it is in love to me, that you are to put on already all the husband!— Jenny! [Do you see, my lord, affecting a whisper, how you dash the poor wench? How like a fool she looks at our folly!] Remember, Jenny, that to-morrow morning you carry my wedding-suits to Mrs. Arnold; and tell her, she has forgot the hanging-sleeves to the gowns. Let her put them on out of hand.
I was proceeding—But he rudely, gravely, and even with an air of scorn, [There was no bearing that, you know,] admonished me. A little less wit, madam, and a little more discretion, would perhaps better become you.
This was too true to be forgiven. You'll say it, Harriet, if I don't. And to come from a man that was not overburdened with either—But I had too great a command of myself to say so. My dependence, my lord, [This I did say,] is upon your judgment: that will always be a balance to my wit; and, with the assistance of your reproving love, will in time teach me discretion.
Now, my dear, was not this a high compliment to him? Ought he not to have taken it as such? Especially as I looked grave, and dropt him a very fine courtesy. But either his conscience or his ill-nature, (perhaps you'll say both,) made him take it as a reflection, [True as you are alive, Harriet!] He bit his lip. Jenny, begone, said he—Jenny, don't go, said I—Jenny knew not which to obey. Upon my word, Harriet, I began to think the man would have cuffed me.—And while he was in his airs of mock-majesty, I stept to the door, and whipt down to my company.
As married people are not to expose themselves to their friends, (who I once heard you sagely remark, would remember disagreeable things, when the honest pair had forgotten them,) I was determined to be prudent. You would have been charmed with me, my dear, for my discretion. I will cheat by-standers, thought I; I will make my Lord and Lady L——, Dr. Bartlett, and Emily, whom I had before set in at cards, think we are egregiously happy—And down I sat, intending, with a lamb-like peaceableness, to make observations on the play. But soon after, in whipt my indiscreet lord, his colour heightened, his features working: and though I cautioned him not to expose himself, yet he assumed airs that were the occasion, as you shall hear, of frightening away my company. He withdrew, in consequence of those airs; and, after a little while, (repenting, as I hoped,) he sent for me out. Some wives would have played the queen Vashti on their tyrant, and refused to go: but I, all obedience, (my vow, so recently made, in my head,) obeyed, at the very first word: yet you must think that I (meek as I am naturally) could not help recriminating. He was too lordly to be expostulated with.— There was, 'I tell you, madam,' and 'I won't be told, sir;' and when I broke from the passionate creature, and hoped to find my company, behold! they were all gone! None but Emily left. And thus might poor Lady L—— be sent home, weeping, perhaps, for such an early marriage-tyranny exerted on her meek sister.
Well, and don't you think that we looked like a couple of fools at each other, when we saw ourselves left alone, as I may say, to fight it out? I did expostulate with him as mildly as I could: he would have made it up with me afterwards; but, no! there was no doing that, as a girl of your nice notions may believe, after he had, by his violent airs, exposed us both before so many witnesses. In decency, therefore, I was obliged to keep it up: and now our misunderstanding blazes, and is at such a comfortable height, that if we meet by accident, we run away from each other by design. We have already made two breakfast-tables: yet I am meek; he is sullen: I make courtesies; he returns not bows.—Sullen creature, and a rustic!—I go to my harpsichord; melody enrages him. He is worse than Saul; for Saul could be gloomily pleased with the music even of the man he hated.
I would have got you to come to us: that I thought was tending to a compliance; for it would have been condescending too much, as he is so very perverse, if I had accompanied him to you. He has a great mind to appeal to you; but I have half rallied him out of his purpose. I sent to you. What an answer did you return me!—Cruel Harriet! to deny your requested mediation in a difference that has arisen between man and wife. —But let the fire glow. If it spares the house, and only blazes in the chimney, I can bear it.
Cross creature, adieu! If you know not such a woman as Grandison, Heaven grant that I may; and that my wishes may be answered as to the person; and then I will not know a Byron.