Theresa Marchmont | Page 9

life; and that she had passed the period intervening between the death of her father, General Marchmont, and her appointment at court, in the family of an aged relative in the county of Devon, by whom indeed she had been principally educated. It was at the dying instigation of this, her last surviving friend and protector, that her destitute situation had been represented to the king by the Lady Wriothesly, to whose good offices she was indebted for her present honourable station. Being however, as it were, friendless as well as dowerless, and backed in my suit by the powerful assistance of the king's approbation, I did not anticipate much opposition to my pretensions to the hand of Miss Marchmont, which had now become the object of my dearest ambition. I knew myself to be naturally formed for domestic life; and while the disastrous position of public affairs had obliged me to waste the days of my early youth in camps or courts, and in exile from my own hereditary possessions, I resolved to pass the evening of my life in the repose of a happy and well-ordered home in my native country.
"To the vitiated taste of the gallants of the court, many of whom might have proved powerful rivals, had they been so inclined, marriage had no attractions. The acknowledged distaste of Charles for a matrimonial life, and his avowed infidelities, sanctioned the disdain of his dissolute companions for all the more holy and endearing ties of existence. I had therefore little to fear from competition; indeed among the maids of honour of the Queen, whose situation threw them into hourly scenes of revelry and dissipation, Theresa Marchmont, who was universally acknowledged to be the loveliest of the train, excited less than any those attentions of idle gallantry, which however, sought and prized by her livelier companions, are offensive to true modesty. I attributed this flattering distinction to the respect ensured by the extreme _reténue_ and propriety of her manners, but I have had reason since to ascribe the reserve of the courtiers to a less commendable motive. On occasion of a masqued festival given by Her Majesty on her birth-day at Kew, the king, in distributing the characters, allotted to Miss Marchmont that of Diana. 'Your Majesty' said the Duchess of Grafton, 'has judiciously assigned the part of the frigid goddess, to the only statue of snow visible among us. _Mademoiselle se renchérit sur son petit air de province, si glacial et si arrangé_,' continued she, turning to the Comt de Gramont. 'Madam,' said the king, bowing respectfully to Theresa, with all that captivating grace of address for which he was distinguished, 'if every frozen statue were as lovely and attractive as this, I should forget to wish for their animation; and become myself a votary of the
"'Queen and huntress, chaste and fair!'
"'Ay,' whispered the Duke of Buckingham, 'even at the perilous risk of being termed Charles, king and Lunatic.'
"This sobriquet of Diana had passed into a proverb; and such was Theresa's character for coldness and reserve, that I attributed to her temper of mind, the evident indifference with which she received my attentions. Meeting her as I did, either in public assemblies, or in the antechamber of the Queen among the other ladies in waiting, I had no opportunity of making myself more particularly acquainted with her sentiments and character. When I addressed her in the evening circle, although she readily entered into conversation on general subjects, and displayed powers of mind of no common order, yet, if I attempted to introduce any topic, which might lead to a discussion of our mutual situation, she relapsed into silence. At times her countenance became so pensive, so touchingly sorrowful, that I could not help suspecting she nourished some secret and hidden cause of grief; and once on hinting this opinion to the king, who frequently in our familiar intercourse rallied me on my passion for Theresa, and questioned me as to the progress of my suit, he told me that Miss Marchmont's dejection was generally attributed to her regret, for the loss of Lady Wriothesly, the kind patroness who had first recommended her to his protection, and by whose death, immediately before my return from Holland, she had lost her only surviving friend. 'It remains to be proved,' added he, 'whether her lingering affection for the memory of an old woman will yield readily to her dawning attachment for her future husband.'
"Another suspicion sometimes crossed my mind, but in so uncertain a form, that I could scarcely myself resolve the nature of the evil I apprehended. I observed that Theresa constantly and anxiously watched the eye of the king, whenever she formed a part of the royal suite; and if she perceived his attention fixed on herself, or