Mrs. H⸺.
She was the sister of John Wilkes, of famous memory, had a large portion of his intellectual endowments, and was very little his inferior in vivacity, humour, and wit. She was married first to an opulent merchant, who was succeeded in his business by his head clerk, Mr. Hayley, whose fortunes were made by his obtaining the hand of the widow. He was afterwards Alderman Hayley, and was a near relation of Hayley, the poet. He was a plain, sensible, good sort of man, wholly absorbed in commercial pursuits, and soon found it expedient, for the sake of a quiet life, to suffer his cara sposa to do as she liked. She was exceedingly well informed, had read a great deal, possessed a fine taste, and, with respect to literary merit, considerable judgment. She accordingly sought, with much avidity, the society of those who were distinguished in the world by their talents and their writings. When the expression of those is used, it must be understood to apply to men only, for on all occasions she was at no pains to conceal her contemptuous opinion of her own sex; and it was no uncommon thing to see her at table, surrounded with ten or twelve eminent men, without a single female.
She had great conversation talents, and unfortunately, like her brother, she seldom permitted any ideas of religion, or even of delicacy, to impose a restraint upon her observations.
Her disregard of propriety was also and conspicuously manifested on other occasions. She invariably attended all the more remarkable trials at the Old Bailey, where she regularly had a certain place reserved for her. When the discussion or trial was of such a nature, that decorum, and indeed the Judges themselves, desired women to withdraw, she never stirred from her place, but persisted in remaining to hear the whole, with the most unmoved and unblushing earnestness of attention.
She every summer made an excursion to such parts of the kingdom as she had not before visited, and was always accompanied by a single male friend, who for a great number of years was an American gentleman, connected with the house of Hayley by the ties of mercantile interests. Upon one occasion, she visited the Highlands with this gentleman, and though accustomed to a very luxurious style of living, she submitted to the greatest privations and hardships in the indulgence of her curiosity. This indeed was unbounded; it extended to the manufactories, manners, high and low, and worse than low, in whatever place she visited. Her professed object was to see every body, and every thing, which deserved or excited attention.
The season in which she visited the Highlands proved moreover to be very wet and tempestuous, and the character of her mind cannot perhaps be more accurately delineated, than by an extract of a letter which she wrote to her brother, John Wilkes, from Scotland. It began—
“Dear Brother,
“The rain has been and still is so incessant, that I have serious intentions of constructing another ark, into which, however, I shall be exceedingly scrupulous whom I admit. As I know your particular taste, I shall have a cabin for your use, fitted up and adorned with scripture and other prints. But I will on no consideration whatever suffer any unclean animals to enter; for example, nothing shall prevail upon me to admit either Scotch men or Scotch women,” &c. &c.
The whole of the epistle was of the same strain and character, full of wit, humour, and ingenious (however unjust) raillery.