other. Was it
because she was gloriously beautiful? Beautiful as she was, he had heard
people say a score of times in their company, that Beatrix's mother looked
as young, and was the handsomer of the two. Why did her voice thrill in
his ear so? She could not sing near so well as Nicolini or Mrs. Tofts;
nay, she sang out of tune, and yet he liked to hear her better than St.
Cecilia. She had not a finer complexion than Mrs. Steele (Dick's wife,
whom he had now got, and who ruled poor Dick with a rod of pickle), and
yet to see her dazzled Esmond; he would shut his eyes, and the thought of
her dazzled him all the same. She was brilliant and lively in talk, but
not so incomparably witty as her mother, who, when she was cheerful, said
the finest things; but yet to hear her, and to be with her, was Esmond's
greatest pleasure. Days passed away between him and these ladies, he
scarce knew how. He poured his heart out to them, so as he never could in
any other company, where he hath generally passed for being moody, or
supercilious and silent. This society(13) was more delightful than that of
the greatest wits to him. May Heaven pardon him the lies he told the
dowager at Chelsea, in order to get a pretext for going away to
Kensington; the business at the Ordnance which he invented; the interview
with his general, the courts and statesman's levees which he _didn't_
frequent and describe; who wore a new suit on Sunday at St. James's or at
the queen's birthday; how many coaches filled the street at Mr. Harley's
levee; how many bottles he had had the honour to drink overnight with Mr.
St. John at the "Cocoa Tree," or at the "Garter" with Mr. Walpole and Mr.
Steele.

Mistress Beatrix Esmond had been a dozen times on the point of making
great matches, so the Court scandal said; but for his part Esmond never
would believe the stories against her; and came back, after three years'
absence from her, not so frantic as he had been perhaps, but still
hungering after her and no other; still hopeful, still kneeling, with his
heart in his hand for the young lady to take. We were now got to 1709. She
was near twenty-two years old, and three years at Court, and without a
husband.

"'Tis not for want of being asked," Lady Castlewood said, looking into
Esmond's heart, as she could, with that perceptiveness affection gives.
"But she will make no mean match, Harry: she will not marry as I would
have her; the person whom I should like to call my son