It filled the whole company with a deep melancholy, to compare the description of the letter with the person that occasioned it, who was now reduced to a few crumbling bones, and a little mouldering heap of earth. With much ado I deciphered another letter, which begun with "My dear, dear wife." This gave me a curiosity to see how the style of one written in marriage differed from one written in courtship. To my surprise, I found the fondness rather augmented than lessened, though the panegyric turned upon a different accomplishment. The words were as follow:
"Before this short absence from you, I did not know that I loved you so much as I really do; though at the same time, I thought I loved you as much as possible. I am under great apprehensions, lest you should have any uneasiness whilst I am defrauded of my share in it, and can't think of tasting any pleasures that you don't partake with me. Pray, my dear, be careful of your health, if for no other reason because you know I could not outlive you. It is natural in absence to make professions of an inviolable constancy; but towards so much merit, it is scarce a virtue, especially when it is but a bare return to that of which you have given me such continued proofs ever since our first acquaintance.
"I am, &c."
It happened that the daughter of these two excellent persons was by when I was reading this letter. At the sight of the coffin, in which was the body of her mother, near that of her father, she melted into a flood of tears. As I had heard a great character of her virtue, and observed in her this instance of filial piety, I could not resist my natural inclination of giving advice to young people, and therefore addressed myself to her: "Young lady," said I, "you see how short is the possession of that beauty in which Nature has been so liberal to you. You find the melancholy sight before you, is a contradiction to the first letter that you heard on that subject; whereas you may observe, the second letter, which celebrates your mother's constancy, is itself, being found in this place, an argument of it. But, Madam, I ought to caution you, not to think the bodies that lie before you, your father and your mother. Know their constancy is rewarded by a nobler union than by this mingling of their ashes, in a state where there is no danger or possibility of a second separation."
FOOTNOTES:
[328] We are told that a son of Sir Thomas Chicheley, one of King William's admirals, said that this lady was his mother, and that the letters were genuine. There is a mezzotint of Mrs. Sarah Chicheley, by Smith, from a painting by Kneller. Sir Thomas Chicheley (1618-1694) was Master-general of the Ordnance; the admiral was Sir John Chicheley, who died in 1691, leaving a son John.
[No. 105. [Steele.]
From Thursday, Dec. 8, to Saturday, Dec. 10, 1709.
Sheer Lane, Dec. 9.
As soon as my midnight studies are finished, I take but a very short repose, and am again up at an exercise of another kind; that is to say, my fencing. Thus my life passes away in a restless pursuit of fame, and a preparation to defend myself against such as attack it. This anxiety on the point of reputation is the peculiar distress of fine spirits, and makes them liable to a thousand inquietudes, from which men of grosser understandings are exempt; so that nothing is more common than to see one part of mankind live at perfect ease under such circumstances as would make another part of them entirely miserable.
This may serve for a preface to the history of poor Will Rosin, the fiddler of Wapping[329], who is a man as much made for happiness, and a quiet life, as any one breathing; but has been lately entangled in so many intricate and unreasonable distresses, as would have made him (had he been a man of too nice honour) the most wretched of all mortals. I came to the knowledge of his affairs by mere accident. Several of the narrow end of our lane having made an appointment to visit some friends beyond St. Katherine's[330], where there was to be a merry meeting, they would needs take with them the old gentleman, as they are pleased to call me. I, who value my company by their good-will, which naturally has the same effect as good-breeding, was not too stately, or too wise, to accept of the invitation. Our design was to be spectators of a sea-ball; to which I readily consented, provided I might be incognito, being naturally pleased with the survey of human life in all its degrees and circumstances.