Chapter 19

by William Makepeace Thackeray

　　CONCLUSION.If the world were not composed of a race of ungrateful scoundrels,who share your prosperity while it lasts, and, even when gorged withyour venison and Burgundy, abuse the generous giver of the feast, Iam sure I merit a good name and a high reputation: in Ireland, atleast, where my generosity was unbounded, and the splendour of mymansion and entertainments unequalled by any other nobleman of mytime. As long as my magnificence lasted, all the country was free topartake of it; I had hunters sufficient in my stables to mount aregiment of dragoons, and butts of wine in my cellar which wouldhave made whole counties drunk for years. Castle Lyndon became theheadquarters of scores of needy gentlemen, and I never rode a-hunting but I had a dozen young fellows of the best blood of thecountry riding as my squires and gentlemen of the horse. My son,little Castle Lyndon, was a prince; his breeding and manners, evenat his early age, showed him to be worthy of the two noble familiesfrom whom he was descended: I don't know what high hopes I had forthe boy, and indulged in a thousand fond anticipations as to hisfuture success and figure in the world. But stern Fate haddetermined that I should leave none of my race behind me, andordained that I should finish my career, as I see it closing now--poor, lonely, and childless. I may have had my faults; but no manshall dare to say of me that I was not a good and tender father. Iloved that boy passionately; perhaps with a blind partiality: Idenied him nothing. Gladly, gladly, I swear, would I have died thathis premature doom might have been averted. I think there is not aday since I lost him but his bright face and beautiful smiles lookdown on me out of heaven, where he is, and that my heart does notyearn towards him. That sweet child was taken from me at the age ofnine years, when he was full of beauty and promise: and so powerfulis the hold his memory has of me that I have never been able toforget him; his little spirit haunts me of nights on my restlesssolitary pillow; many a time, in the wildest and maddest company, asthe bottle is going round, and the song and laugh roaring about, Iam thinking of him. I have got a lock of his soft brown hair hanginground my breast now: it will accompany me to the dishonouredpauper's grave; where soon, no doubt, Barry Lyndon's worn-out oldbones will be laid.My Bryan was a boy of amazing high spirit (indeed how, coming fromsuch a stock, could he be otherwise?), impatient even of my control,against which the dear little rogue would often rebel gallantly; howmuch more, then, of his mother's and the women's, whose attempts todirect him he would laugh to scorn. Even my own mother ('Mrs. Barryof Lyndon' the good soul now called herself, in compliment to my newfamily) was quite unable to check him; and hence you may fancy whata will he had of his own. If it had not been for that, he might havelived to this day: he might--but why repine? Is he not in a betterplace? would the heritage of a beggar do any service to him? It isbest as it is--Heaven be good to us!--Alas! that I, his father,should be left to deplore him.It was in the month of October I had been to Dublin, in order to seea lawyer and a moneyed man who had come over to Ireland to consultwith me about some sales of mine and the cut of Hackton timber; ofwhich, as I hated the place and was greatly in want of money, I wasdetermined to cut down every stick. There had been some difficultyin the matter. It was said I had no right to touch the timber. Thebrute peasantry about the estate had been roused to such a pitch ofhatred against me, that the rascals actually refused to lay an axeto the trees; and my agent (that scoundrel Larkins) declared thathis life was in danger among them if he attempted any furtherdespoilment (as they called it) of the property. Every article ofthe splendid furniture was sold by this time, as I need not say; andas for the plate, I had taken good care to bring it off to Ireland,where it now was in the best of keeping--my banker's, who hadadvanced six thousand pounds on it: which sum I soon had occasionfor.I went to Dublin, then, to meet the English man of business; and sofar succeeded in persuading Mr. Splint, a great shipbuilder andtimber-dealer of Plymouth, of my claim to the Hackton timber, thathe agreed to purchase it off-hand at about one-third of its value,and handed me over five thousand pounds: which, being pressed withdebts at the time, I was fain to accept. He had no difficulty ingetting down the wood, I warrant. He took a regiment of shipwrightsand sawyers from his own and the King's yards at Plymouth, and intwo months Hackton Park was as bare of trees as the Bog of Allen.I had but ill luck with that accursed expedition and money. I lostthe greater part of it in two nights' play at 'Daly's,' so that mydebts stood just as they were before; and before the vessel sailedfor Holyhead, which carried away my old sharper of a timber-merchant, all that I had left of the money he brought me was acouple of hundred pounds, with which I returned home verydisconsolately: and very suddenly, too, for my Dublin tradesmen werehot upon me, hearing I had spent the loan, and two of my wine-merchants had writs out against me for some thousands of pounds.I bought in Dublin, according to my promise, however--for when Igive a promise I will keep it at any sacrifices--a little horse formy dear little Bryan; which was to be a present for his tenthbirthday, that was now coming on: it was a beautiful little animaland stood me in a good sum. I never regarded money for that dearchild. But the horse was very wild. He kicked off one of my horse-boys, who rode him at first, and broke the lad's leg; and, though Itook the animal in hand on the journey home, it was only my weightand skill that made the brute quiet.When we got home I sent the horse away with one of my grooms to afarmer's house, to break him thoroughly in, and told Bryan, who wasall anxiety to see his little horse, that he would arrive by hisbirthday, when he should hunt him along with my hounds; and Ipromised myself no small pleasure in presenting the dear fellow tothe field that day: which I hoped to see him lead some time or otherin place of his fond father. Ah me! never was that gallant boy toride a fox-chase, or to take the place amongst the gentry of hiscountry which his birth and genius had pointed out for him!Though I don't believe in dreams and omens, yet I can't but own thatwhen a great calamity is hanging over a man he has frequently manystrange and awful forebodings of it. I fancy now I had many. LadyLyndon, especially, twice dreamed of her son's death; but, as shewas now grown uncommonly nervous and vapourish, I treated her fearswith scorn, and my own, of course, too. And in an unguarded moment,over the bottle after dinner, I told poor Bryan, who was alwaysquestioning me about the little horse, and when it was to come, thatit was arrived; that it was in Doolan's farm, where Mick the groomwas breaking him in. 'Promise me, Bryan,' screamed his mother, 'thatyou will not ride the horse except in company of your father.' But Ionly said, 'Pooh, madam, you are an ass!' being angry at her sillytimidity, which was always showing itself in a thousand disagreeableways now; and, turning round to Bryan, said, 'I promise yourLordship a good flogging if you mount him without my leave.'I suppose the poor child did not care about paying this penalty forthe pleasure he was to have, or possibly thought a fond father wouldremit the punishment altogether; for the next morning, when I roserather late, having sat up drinking the night before, I found thechild had been off at daybreak, having slipt through his tutor'sroom (this was Redmond Quin, our cousin, whom I had taken to livewith me), and I had no doubt but that he was gone to Doolan's farm.I took a great horsewhip and galloped off after him in a rage,swearing I would keep my promise. But, Heaven forgive me! I littlethought of it when at three miles from home I met a sad processioncoming towards me: peasants moaning and howling as our Irish do, theblack horse led by the hand, and, on a door that some of the folkcarried, my poor dear dear little boy. There he lay in his littleboots and spurs, and his little coat of scarlet and gold. His dearface was quite white, and he smiled as he held a hand out to me, andsaid painfully, 'You won't whip me, will you, papa?' I could onlyburst out into tears in reply. I have seen many and many a mandying, and there's a look about the eyes which you cannot mistake.There was a little drummer-boy I was fond of who was hit down beforemy company at Kuhnersdorf; when I ran up to give him some water, helooked exactly like my dear Bryan then did--there's no mistakingthat awful look of the eyes. We carried him home and scoured thecountry round for doctors to come and look at his hurt.But what does a doctor avail in a contest with the grim invincibleenemy? Such as came could only confirm our despair by their accountof the poor child's case. He had mounted his horse gallantly, sathim bravely all the time the animal plunged and kicked, and, havingovercome his first spite, ran him at a hedge by the roadside. Butthere were loose stones at the top, and the horse's foot caughtamong them, and he and his brave little rider rolled over togetherat the other side. The people said they saw the noble little boyspring up after his fall and run to catch the horse; which hadbroken away from him, kicking him on the back, as it would seem, asthey lay on the ground. Poor Bryan ran a few yards and then droppeddown as if shot. A pallor came over his face, and they thought hewas dead. But they poured whisky down his mouth, and the poor childrevived: still he could not move; his spine was injured; the lowerhalf of him was dead when they laid him in bed at home. The rest didnot last long, God help me! He remained yet for two days with us;and a sad comfort it was to think he was in no pain.During this time the dear angel's temper seemed quite to change: heasked his mother and me pardon for any act of disobedience he hadbeen guilty of towards us; he said often he should like to see hisbrother Bullingdon. 'Bully was better than you, papa,' he said; 'heused not to swear so, and he told and taught me many good thingswhile you were away.' And, taking a hand of his mother and mine ineach of his little clammy ones, he begged us not to quarrel so, butlove each other, so that we might meet again in heaven, where Bullytold him quarrelsome people never went. His mother was very muchaffected by these admonitions from the poor suffering angel's mouth;and I was so too. I wish she had enabled me to keep the counselwhich the dying boy gave us.At last, after two days, he died. There he lay, the hope of myfamily, the pride of my manhood, the link which had kept me and myLady Lyndon together. 'Oh, Redmond,' said she, kneeling by the sweetchild's body, 'do, do let us listen to the truth out of his blessedmouth: and do you amend your life, and treat your poor loving fondwife as her dying child bade you.' And I said I would: but there arepromises which it is out of a man's power to keep; especially withsuch a woman as her. But we drew together after that sad event, andwere for several months better friends.I won't tell you with what splendour we buried him. Of what availare undertakers' feathers and heralds' trumpery? I went out and shotthe fatal black horse that had killed him, at the door of the vaultwhere we laid my boy. I was so wild, that I could have shot myselftoo. But for the crime, it would have been better that I should,perhaps; for what has my life been since that sweet flower was takenout of my bosom? A succession of miseries, wrongs, disasters, andmental and bodily sufferings which never fell to the lot of anyother man in Christendom.Lady Lyndon, always vapourish and nervous, after our blessed boy'scatastrophe became more agitated than ever, and plunged intodevotion with so much fervour, that you would have fancied heralmost distracted at times. She imagined she saw visions. She saidan angel from heaven had told her that Bryan's death was as apunishment to her for her neglect of her first-born. Then she woulddeclare Bullingdon was alive; she had seen him in a dream. Thenagain she would fall into fits of sorrow about his death, and grievefor him as violently as if he had been the last of her sons who haddied, and not our darling Bryan; who, compared to Bullingdon, waswhat a diamond is to a vulgar stone. Her freaks were painful towitness, and difficult to control. It began to be said in thecountry that the Countess was going mad. My scoundrelly enemies didnot fail to confirm and magnify the rumour, and would add that I wasthe cause of her insanity: I had driven her to distraction, I hadkilled Bullingdon, I had murdered my own son; I don't know what elsethey laid to my charge. Even in Ireland their hateful calumniesreached me: my friends fell away from me. They began to desert myhunt, as they did in England, and when I went to race or marketfound sudden reasons for getting out of my neighbourhood. I got thename of Wicked Barry, Devil Lyndon, which you please: the country-folk used to make marvellous legends about me: the priests said Ihad massacred I don't know how many German nuns in the Seven Years'War; that the ghost of the murdered Bullingdon haunted my house.Once at a fair in a town hard by, when I had a mind to buy awaistcoat for one of my people, a fellow standing by said, ''Tis astrait-waistcoat he's buying for my Lady Lyndon.' And from thiscircumstance arose a legend of my cruelty to my wife; and manycircumstantial details were narrated regarding my manner andingenuity of torturing her.The loss of my dear boy pressed not only on my heart as a father,but injured my individual interests in a very considerable degree;for as there was now no direct heir to the estate, and Lady Lyndonwas of a weak health, and supposed to be quite unlikely to leave afamily, the next in succession-that detestable family of Tiptoff--began to exert themselves in a hundred ways to annoy me, and were atthe head of the party of enemies who were raising reports to mydiscredit. They interposed between me and my management of theproperty in a hundred different ways; making an outcry if I cut astick, sunk a shaft, sold a picture, or sent a few ounces of plateto be remodelled. They harassed me with ceaseless lawsuits, gotinjunctions from Chancery, hampered my agents in the execution oftheir work; so much so that you would have fancied my own was not myown, but theirs, to do as they liked with. What is worse, as I havereason to believe, they had tamperings and dealings with my owndomestics under my own roof; for I could not have a word with LadyLyndon but it somehow got abroad, and I could not be drunk with mychaplain and friends but some sanctified rascals would get hold ofthe news, and reckon up all the bottles I drank and all the oaths Iswore. That these were not few, I acknowledge. I am of the oldschool; was always a free liver and speaker; and, at least, if I didand said what I liked, was not so bad as many a canting scoundrel Iknow of who covers his foibles and sins, unsuspected, with a mask ofholiness. As I am making a clean breast of it, and am no hypocrite,I may as well confess now that I endeavoured to ward off the devicesof my enemies by an artifice which was not, perhaps, strictlyjustifiable. Everything depended on my having an heir to the estate;for if Lady Lyndon, who was of weakly health, had died, the next dayI was a beggar: all my sacrifices of money, &c., on the estate wouldnot have been held in a farthing's account; all the debts would havebeen left on my shoulders; and my enemies would have triumphed overme: which, to a man of my honourable spirit, was 'the unkindest cutof all,' as some poet says.I confess, then, it was my wish to supplant these scoundrels; and,as I could not do so without an heir to my property, I determinedto find one. If I had him near at hand, and of my own blood too,though with the bar sinister, is not here the question. It was thenI found out the rascally machinations of my enemies; for, havingbroached this plan to Lady Lyndon, whom I made to be, outwardly atleast, the most obedient of wives,--although I never let a letterfrom her or to her go or arrive without my inspection,--although Iallowed her to see none but those persons who I thought, in herdelicate health, would be fitting society for her; yet the infernalTiptoffs got wind of my scheme, protested instantly against it, notonly by letter, but in the shameful libellous public prints, andheld me up to public odium as a 'child-forger,' as they called me.Of course I denied the charge--I could do no otherwise, and offeredto meet any one of the Tiptoffs on the field of honour, and provehim a scoundrel and a liar: as he was; though, perhaps, not in thisinstance. But they contented themselves by answering me by a lawyer,and declined an invitation which any man of spirit would haveaccepted. My hopes of having an heir were thus blighted completely:indeed, Lady Lyndon (though, as I have said, I take her oppositionfor nothing) had resisted the proposal with as much energy as awoman of her weakness could manifest; and said she had committed onegreat crime in consequence of me, but would rather die than performanother. I could easily have brought her Ladyship to her senses,however: but my scheme had taken wind, and it was now in vain toattempt it. We might have had a dozen children in honest wedlock,and people would have said they were false.As for raising money on annuities, I may say I had used her lifeinterest up. There were but few of those assurance societies in mytime which have since sprung up in the city of London; underwritersdid the business, and my wife's life was as well known among themas, I do believe, that of any woman in Christendom. Latterly, when Iwanted to get a sum against her life, the rascals had the impudenceto say my treatment of her did not render it worth a year'spurchase,--as if my interest lay in killing her! Had my boy lived,it would have been a different thing; he and his mother might havecut off the entail of a good part of the property between them, andmy affairs have been put in better order. Now they were in a badcondition indeed. All my schemes had turned out failures; my lands,which I had purchased with borrowed money, made me no return, and Iwas obliged to pay ruinous interest for the sums with which I hadpurchased them. My income, though very large, was saddled withhundreds of annuities, and thousands of lawyers' charges; and I feltthe net drawing closer and closer round me, and no means toextricate myself from its toils.To add to all my perplexities, two years after my poor child'sdeath, my wife, whose vagaries of temper and wayward follies I hadborne with for twelve years, wanted to leave me, and absolutely madeattempts at what she called escaping from my tyranny.My mother, who was the only person that, in my misfortunes, remainedfaithful to me (indeed, she has always spoken of me in my truelight, as a martyr to the rascality of others and a victim of my owngenerous and confiding temper), found out the first scheme that wasgoing on; and of which those artful and malicious Tiptoffs were, asusual, the main promoters. Mrs. Barry, indeed, though her temper wasviolent and her ways singular, was an invaluable person to me in myhouse; which would have been at rack and ruin long before, but forher spirit of order and management, and for her excellent economy inthe government of my numerous family. As for my Lady Lyndon, she,poor soul! was much too fine a lady to attend to household matters--passed her days with her doctor, or her books of piety, and neverappeared among us except at my compulsion; when she and my motherwould be sure to have a quarrel.Mrs. Barry, on the contrary, had a talent for management in allmatters. She kept the maids stirring, and the footmen to their duty;had an eye over the claret in the cellar, and the oats and hay inthe stable; saw to the salting and pickling, the potatoes and theturf-stacking, the pig-killing and the poultry, the linen-room andthe bakehouse, and the ten thousand minutiae of a greatestablishment. If all Irish housewives were like her, I warrant manya hall-fire would be blazing where the cobwebs only grow now, andmany a park covered with sheep and fat cattle where the thistles areat present the chief occupiers. If anything could have saved me fromthe consequences of villainy in others, and (I confess it, for I amnot above owning to my faults) my own too easy, generous, andcareless nature, it would have been the admirable prudence of thatworthy creature. She never went to bed until all the house was quietand all the candles out; and you may fancy that this was a matter ofsome difficulty with a man of my habits, who had commonly a dozen ofjovial fellows (artful scoundrels and false friends most of themwere!) to drink with me every night, and who seldom, for my part,went to bed sober. Many and many a night, when I was unconscious ofher attention, has that good soul pulled my boots off, and seen melaid by my servants snug in bed, and carried off the candle herself;and been the first in the morning, too, to bring me my drink ofsmall-beer. Mine were no milksop times, I can tell you. A gentlemanthought no shame of taking his half-dozen bottles; and, as for yourcoffee and slops, they were left to Lady Lyndon, her doctor, and theother old women. It was my mother's pride that I could drink morethan any man in the country,--as much, within a pint, as my fatherbefore me, she said.That Lady Lyndon should detest her was quite natural. She is not thefirst of woman or mankind either that has hated a mother-in-law. Iset my mother to keep a sharp watch over the freaks of her Ladyship;and this, you may be sure, was one of the reasons why the latterdisliked her. I never minded that, however. Mrs. Barry's assistanceand surveillance were invaluable to me; and, if I had paid twentyspies to watch my Lady, I should not have been half so well servedas by the disinterested care and watchfulness of my excellentmother. She slept with the house-keys under her pillow, and had aneye everywhere. She followed all the Countess's movements like ashadow; she managed to know, from morning to night, everything thatmy Lady did. If she walked in the garden, a watchful eye was kept onthe wicket; and if she chose to drive out, Mrs. Barry accompaniedher, and a couple of fellows in my liveries rode alongside of thecarriage to see that she came to no harm. Though she objected, andwould have kept her room in sullen silence, I made a point that weshould appear together at church in the coach-and-six every Sunday;and that she should attend the race-balls in my company, wheneverthe coast was clear of the rascally bailiffs who beset me. This gavethe lie to any of those maligners who said I wished to make aprisoner of my wife. The fact is, that, knowing her levity, andseeing the insane dislike to me and mine which had now begun tosupersede what, perhaps, had been an equally insane fondness for me,I was bound to be on my guard that she should not give me the slip.Had she left me, I was ruined the next day. This (which my motherknew) compelled us to keep a tight watch over her; but as forimprisoning her, I repel the imputation with scorn. Every manimprisons his wife to a certain degree; the world would be in apretty condition if women were allowed to quit home and return to itwhenever they had a mind. In watching over my wife, Lady Lyndon, Idid no more than exercise the legitimate authority which awardshonour and obedience to every husband.Such, however, is female artifice, that, in spite of all mywatchfulness in guarding her, it is probable my Lady would havegiven me the slip, had I not had quite as acute a person as herselfas my ally: for, as the proverb says that 'the best way to catch onethief is to set another after him,' so the best way to get thebetter of a woman is to engage one of her own artful sex to guardher. One would have thought that, followed as she was, all herletters read, and all her acquaintances strictly watched by me,living in a remote part of Ireland away from her family, Lady Lyndoncould have had no chance of communicating with her allies, or ofmaking her wrongs, as she was pleased to call them, public; and yet,for a while, she carried on a correspondence under my very nose, andacutely organised a conspiracy for flying from me; as shall be told.She always had an inordinate passion for dress, and, as she wasnever thwarted in any whimsey she had of this kind (for I spared nomoney to gratify her, and among my debts are milliners' bills to theamount of many thousands), boxes used to pass continually to and frofrom Dublin, with all sorts of dresses, caps, flounces, andfurbelows, as her fancy dictated. With these would come letters fromher milliner, in answer to numerous similar injunctions from myLady; all of which passed through my hands, without the leastsuspicion, for some time. And yet in these very papers, by the easymeans of sympathetic ink, were contained all her Ladyship'scorrespondence; and Heaven knows (for it was some time, as I havesaid, before I discovered the trick) what charges against me.But clever Mrs. Barry found out that always before my lady-wifechose to write letters to her milliner, she had need of lemons tomake her drink, as she said; this fact, being mentioned to me, setme a-thinking, and so I tried one of the letters before the fire,and the whole scheme of villainy was brought to light. I will give aspecimen of one of the horrid artful letters of this unhappy woman.In a great hand, with wide lines, were written a set of directionsto her mantua-maker, setting forth the articles of dress for whichmy Lady had need, the peculiarity of their make, the stuff sheselected, &c. She would make out long lists in this way, writingeach article in a separate line, so as to have more space fordetailing all my cruelties and her tremendous wrongs. Between theselines she kept the journal of her captivity: it would have made thefortune of a romance-writer in those days but to have got a copy ofit, and to have published it under the title of the 'LovelyPrisoner, or the Savage Husband,' or by some name equally taking andabsurd. The journal would be as follows:-- * * * * * * * 'MONDAY.--Yesterday I was made to go to church. My odious,monstrous, vulgar she-dragon of a mother in law, in a yellow satinand red ribands, taking the first place in the coach; Mr. L. ridingby its side, on the horse he never paid for to Captain Hurdlestone.The wicked hypocrite led me to the pew, with hat in hand and asmiling countenance, and kissed my hand as I entered the coach afterservice, and patted my Italian greyhound--all that the few peoplecollected might see. He made me come downstairs in the evening tomake tea for his company; of whom three-fourths, he himselfincluded, were, as usual, drunk. They painted the parson's faceblack, when his reverence had arrived at his seventh bottle; and athis usual insensible stage, they tied him on the grey mare with hisface to the tail. The she-dragon read the "Whole Duty of Man" allthe evening till bedtime; when she saw me to my apartments, lockedme in, and proceeded to wait upon her abominable son: whom sheadores for his wickedness, I should think, as Stycorax did Caliban.' * * * * * * * You should have seen my mother's fury as I read her out thispassage! Indeed, I have always had a taste for a joke (thatpractised on the parson, as described above, is, I confess, a truebill), and used carefully to select for Mrs. Barry's hearing all thecompliments that Lady Lyndon passed upon her. The dragon was thename by which she was known in this precious correspondence: orsometimes she was designated by the title of the 'Irish Witch.' Asfor me, I was denominated 'my gaoler,' 'my tyrant,' 'the dark spiritwhich has obtained the mastery over my being,' and so on; in termsalways complimentary to my power, however little they might be so tomy amiability. Here is another extract from her 'Prison Diary,' bywhich it will be seen that my Lady, although she pretended to be soindifferent to my goings on, had a sharp woman's eye, and could beas jealous as another:-- * * * * * * * 'WEDNESDAY.--This day two years my last hope and pleasure in lifewas taken from me, and my dear child was called to heaven. Has hejoined his neglected brother there, whom I suffered to grow upunheeded by my side: and whom the tyranny of the monster to whom Iam united drove to exile, and perhaps to death? Or is the childalive, as my fond heart sometimes deems? Charles Bullingdon! come tothe aid of a wretched mother, who acknowledges her crimes, hercoldness towards thee, and now bitterly pays for her error! But no,he cannot live! I am distracted! My only hope is in you, my cousin--you whom I had once thought to salute by a still fonder title, mydear George Poynings! Oh, be my knight and my preserver, the truechivalric being thou ever wert, and rescue me from the thrall of thefelon caitiff who holds me captive--rescue me from him, and fromStycorax, the vile Irish witch, his mother!'(Here follow some verses, such as her Ladyship was in the habit ofcomposing by reams, in which she compares herself to Sabra, in the'Seven Champions,' and beseeches her George to rescue her from thedragon, meaning Mrs. Barry. I omit the lines, and proceed:)--'Even my poor child, who perished untimely on this sad anniversary,the tyrant who governs me had taught to despise and dislike me.'Twas in disobedience to my orders, my prayers, that he went on thefatal journey. What sufferings, what humiliations have I had toendure since then! I am a prisoner in my own halls. I should fearpoison, but that I know the wretch has a sordid interest in keepingme alive, and that my death would be the signal for his ruin. But Idare not stir without my odious, hideous, vulgar gaoler, the horridIrishwoman, who pursues my every step. I am locked into my chamberat night, like a felon, and only suffered to leave it when orderedinto the presence of my lord (I ordered!), to be present at hisorgies with his boon companions, and to hear his odious converse ashe lapses into the disgusting madness of intoxication! He has givenup even the semblance of constancy--he, who swore that I alone couldattach or charm him! And now he brings his vulgar mistresses beforemy very eyes, and would have had me acknowledge, as heir to my ownproperty, his child by another!'No, I never will submit! Thou, and thou only, my George, my earlyfriend, shalt be heir to the estates of Lyndon. Why did not Fatejoin me to thee, instead of to the odious man who holds me under hissway, and make the poor Calista happy?' * * * * * * * So the letters would run on for sheets upon sheets, in the closestcramped handwriting; and I leave any unprejudiced reader to saywhether the writer of such documents must not have been as silly andvain a creature as ever lived, and whether she did not want beingtaken care of? I could copy out yards of rhapsody to Lord GeorgePoynings, her old flame, in which she addressed him by the mostaffectionate names, and implored him to find a refuge for heragainst her oppressors; but they would fatigue the reader to peruse,as they would me to copy. The fact is, that this unlucky lady hadthe knack of writing a great deal more than she meant. She wasalways reading novels and trash; putting herself into imaginarycharacters and flying off into heroics and sentimentalities with aslittle heart as any woman I ever knew; yet showing the most violentdisposition to be in love. She wrote always as if she was in a flameof passion. I have an elegy on her lap-dog, the most tender andpathetic piece she ever wrote; and most tender notes of remonstranceto Betty, her favourite maid; to her housekeeper, on quarrellingwith her; to half-a-dozen acquaintances, each of whom she addressedas the dearest friend in the world, and forgot the very moment shetook up another fancy. As for her love for her children, the abovepassage will show how much she was capable of true maternal feeling:the very sentence in which she records the death of one child servesto betray her egotisms, and to wreak her spleen against myself; andshe only wishes to recall another from the grave, in order that hemay be of some personal advantage to her. If I did deal severelywith this woman, keeping her from her flatterers who would have breddiscord between us, and locking her up out of mischief, who shallsay that I was wrong? If any woman deserved a strait-waistcoat,--itwas my Lady Lyndon; and I have known people in my time manacled, andwith their heads shaved, in the straw, who had not committed halfthe follies of that foolish, vain, infatuated creature.My mother was so enraged by the charges against me and herself whichthese letters contained, that it was with the utmost difficulty Icould keep her from discovering our knowledge of them to LadyLyndon; whom it was, of course, my object to keep in ignorance ofour knowledge of her designs: for I was anxious to know how far theywent, and to what pitch of artifice she would go. The lettersincreased in interest (as they say of the novels) as they proceeded.Pictures were drawn of my treatment of her which would make yourheart throb. I don't know of what monstrosities she did not accuseme, and what miseries and starvation she did not profess herself toundergo; all the while she was living exceedingly fat and contented,to outward appearances, at our house at Castle Lyndon. Novel-readingand vanity had turned her brain. I could not say a rough word to her(and she merited many thousands a day, I can tell you), but shedeclared I was putting her to the torture; and my mother could notremonstrate with her but she went off into a fit of hysterics, ofwhich she would declare the worthy old lady was the cause.At last she began to threaten to kill herself; and though I by nomeans kept the cutlery out of the way, did not stint her in garters,and left her doctor's shop at her entire service,--knowing hercharacter full well, and that there was no woman in Christendom lesslikely to lay hands on her precious life than herself; yet thesethreats had an effect, evidently, in the quarter to which they wereaddressed; for the milliner's packets now began to arrive with greatfrequency, and the bills sent to her contained assurances of comingaid. The chivalrous Lord George Poynings was coming to his cousin'srescue, and did me the compliment to say that he hoped to free hisdear cousin from the clutches of the most atrocious villain thatever disgraced humanity; and that, when she was free, measuresshould be taken for a divorce, on the ground of cruelty and everyspecies of ill-usage on my part.I had copies of all these precious documents on one side and theother carefully made, by my beforementioned relative, godson, andsecretary, Mr. Redmond Quin at present the worthy agent of theCastle Lyndon property. This was a son of my old flame Nora, whom Ihad taken from her in a fit of generosity; promising to care for hiseducation at Trinity College, and provide for him through life. Butafter the lad had been for a year at the University, the tutorswould not admit him to commons or lectures until his college billswere paid; and, offended by this insolent manner of demanding thepaltry sum due, I withdrew my patronage from the place, and orderedmy gentleman to Castle Lyndon; where I made him useful to me in ahundred ways. In my dear little boy's lifetime, he tutored the poorchild as far as his high spirit would let him; but I promise you itwas small trouble poor dear Bryan ever gave the books. Then he keptMrs. Barry's accounts; copied my own interminable correspondencewith my lawyers and the agents of all my various property; took ahand at piquet or backgammon of evenings with me and my mother; or,being an ingenious lad enough (though of a mean boorish spirit, asbecame the son of such a father), accompanied my Lady Lyndon'sspinet with his flageolet; or read French and Italian with her: inboth of which languages her Ladyship was a fine scholar, and withwhich he also became conversant. It would make my watchful oldmother very angry to hear them conversing in these languages; for,not understanding a word of either of them, Mrs. Barry was furiouswhen they were spoken, and always said it was some scheming theywere after. It was Lady Lyndon's constant way of annoying the oldlady, when the three were alone together, to address Quin in one orother of these tongues.I was perfectly at ease with regard to his fidelity, for I had bredthe lad, and loaded him with benefits; and, besides, had had variousproofs of his trustworthiness. He it was who brought me three ofLord George's letters, in reply to some of my Lady's complaints;which were concealed between the leather and the boards of a bookwhich was sent from the circulating library for her Ladyship'sperusal. He and my Lady too had frequent quarrels. She mimicked hisgait in her pleasanter moments; in her haughty moods, she would notsit down to table with a tailor's grandson. 'Send me anything forcompany but that odious Quin,' she would say, when I proposed thathe should go and amuse her with his books and his flute; for,quarrelsome as we were, it must not be supposed we were always atit: I was occasionally attentive to her. We would be friends for amonth together, sometimes; then we would quarrel for a fortnight;then she would keep her apartments for a month: all of whichdomestic circumstances were noted down, in her Ladyship's peculiarway, in her journal of captivity, as she called it; and a prettydocument it is! Sometimes she writes, 'My monster has been almostkind to-day;' or, 'My ruffian has deigned to smile.' Then she willbreak out into expressions of savage hate; but for my poor mother itwas always hatred. It was, 'The she-dragon is sick to-day; I wish toHeaven she would die!' or, 'The hideous old Irish basketwoman hasbeen treating me to some of her Billingsgate to-day,' and so forth:all which expressions, read to Mrs. Barry, or translated from theFrench and Italian, in which many of them were written, did not failto keep the old lady in a perpetual fury against her charge: and soI had my watch-dog, as I called her, always on the alert. Intranslating these languages, young Quin was of great service to me;for I had a smattering of French--and High Dutch, when I was in thearmy, of course, I knew well--but Italian I knew nothing of, and wasglad of the services of so faithful and cheap an interpreter.This cheap and faithful interpreter, this godson and kinsman, onwhom and on whose family I had piled up benefits, was actuallytrying to betray me; and for several months, at least, was in leaguewith the enemy against me. I believe that the reason why they didnot move earlier was the want of the great mover of all treasons--money: of which, in all parts of my establishment, there was a wofulscarcity; but of this they also managed to get a supply through myrascal of a godson, who could come and go quite unsuspected: thewhole scheme was arranged under our very noses, and the post-chaiseordered, and the means of escape actually got ready; while I neversuspected their design.A mere accident made me acquainted with their plan. One of mycolliers had a pretty daughter; and this pretty lass had for herbachelor, as they call them in Ireland, a certain lad, who broughtthe letter-bag for Castle Lyndon (and many a dunning letter for mewas there in it, God wot!): this letter-boy told his sweetheart howhe brought a bag of money from the town for Master Quin; and howthat Tim the post-boy had told him that he was to bring a chaisedown to the water at a certain hour. Miss Rooney, who had no secretsfrom me, blurted out the whole story; asked me what scheming I wasafter, and what poor unlucky girl I was going to carry away with thechaise I had ordered, and bribe with the money I had got from town?Then the whole secret flashed upon me, that the man I had cherishedin my bosom was going to betray me. I thought at one time ofcatching the couple in the act of escape, half drowning them in theferry which they had to cross to get to their chaise, and ofpistolling the young traitor before Lady Lyndon's eyes; but, onsecond thoughts, it was quite clear that the news of the escapewould make a noise through the country, and rouse the confoundedjustice's people about my ears, and bring me no good in the end. SoI was obliged to smother my just indignation, and to content myselfby crushing the foul conspiracy, just at the moment it was about tobe hatched.I went home, and in half-an-hour, and with a few of my terriblelooks, I had Lady Lyndon on her knees, begging me to forgive her;confessing all and everything; ready to vow and swear she wouldnever make such an attempt again; and declaring that she was fiftytimes on the point of owning everything to me, but that she fearedmy wrath against the poor young lad her accomplice: who was indeedthe author and inventor of all the mischief. This--though I knew howentirely false the statement was--I was fain to pretend to believe;so I begged her to write to her cousin, Lord George, who hadsupplied her with money, as she admitted, and with whom the plan hadbeen arranged, stating, briefly, that she had altered her mind as tothe trip to the country proposed; and that, as her dear husband wasrather in delicate health, she preferred to stay at home and nursehim. I added a dry postscript, in which I stated that it would giveme great pleasure if his Lordship would come and visit us at CastleLyndon, and that I longed to renew an acquaintance which in formertimes gave me so much satisfaction. 'I should seek him out,' Iadded, 'so soon as ever I was in his neighbourhood, and eagerlyanticipated the pleasure of a meeting with him.' I think he musthave understood my meaning perfectly well; which was, that I wouldrun him through the body on the very first occasion I could come athim.Then I had a scene with my perfidious rascal of a nephew; in whichthe young reprobate showed an audacity and a spirit for which I wasquite unprepared. When I taxed him with ingratitude, 'What do I oweyou?' said he. 'I have toiled for you as no man ever did foranother, and worked without a penny of wages. It was you yourselfwho set me against you, by giving me a task against which my soulrevolted,--by making me a spy over your unfortunate wife, whoseweakness is as pitiable as are her misfortunes and your rascallytreatment of her. Flesh and blood could not bear to see the mannerin which you used her. I tried to help her to escape from you; and Iwould do it again, if the opportunity offered, and so I tell you toyour teeth!' When I offered to blow his brains out for hisinsolence, 'Pooh!' said he,--'kill the man who saved your poor boy'slife once, and who was endeavouring to keep him out of the ruin andperdition into which a wicked father was leading him, when aMerciful Power interposed, and withdrew him from this house ofcrime? I would have left you months ago, but I hoped for some chanceof rescuing this unhappy lady. I swore I would try, the day I sawyou strike her. Kill me, you woman's bully! You would if you dared;but you have not the heart. Your very servants like me better thanyou. Touch me, and they will rise and send you to the gallows youmerit!'I interrupted this neat speech by sending a water-bottle at theyoung gentleman's head, which felled him to the ground; and then Iwent to meditate upon what he had said to me. It was true the fellowhad saved poor little Bryan's life, and the boy to his dying day wastenderly attached to him. 'Be good to Redmond, papa,' were almostthe last words he spoke; and I promised the poor child, on hisdeath-bed, that I would do as he asked. It was also true, that roughusage of him would be little liked by my people, with whom he hadmanaged to become a great favourite: for, somehow, though I gotdrunk with the rascals often, and was much more familiar with themthan a man of my rank commonly is, yet I knew I was by no meansliked by them; and the scoundrels were murmuring against meperpetually.But I might have spared myself the trouble of debating what his fateshould be, for the young gentleman took the disposal of it out of myhands in the simplest way in the world: viz. by washing and bindingup his head so soon as he came to himself: by taking his horse fromthe stables; and, as he was quite free to go in and out of the houseand park as he liked, he disappeared without the least let orhindrance; and leaving the horse behind him at the ferry, went offin the very post-chaise which was waiting for Lady Lyndon. I saw andheard no more of him for a considerable time; and now that he wasout of the house, did not consider him a very troublesome enemy.But the cunning artifice of woman is such that, I think, in the longrun, no man, were he Machiavel himself, could escape from it; andthough I had ample proofs in the above transaction (in which mywife's perfidious designs were frustrated by my foresight), andunder her own handwriting, of the deceitfulness of her character andher hatred for me, yet she actually managed to deceive me, in spiteof all my precautions and the vigilance of my mother in my behalf.Had I followed that good lady's advice, who scented the danger fromafar off, as it were, I should never have fallen into the snareprepared for me; and which was laid in a way that was as successfulas it was simple.My Lady Lyndon's relation with me was a singular one. Her life waspassed in a crack-brained sort of alternation between love andhatred for me. If I was in a good-humour with her (as occurredsometimes) there was nothing she would not do to propitiate mefurther; and she would be as absurd and violent in her expressionsof fondness as, at other moments, she would be in her demonstrationsof hatred. It is not your feeble easy husbands who are loved best inthe world; according to my experience of it. I do think the womenlike a little violence of temper, and think no worse of a husbandwho exercises his authority pretty smartly. I had got my Lady intosuch a terror about me, that when I smiled, it was quite an era ofhappiness to her; and if I beckoned to her, she would come fawningup to me like a dog. I recollect how, for the few days I was atschool, the cowardly mean-spirited fellows would laugh if ever ourschoolmaster made a joke. It was the same in the regiment wheneverthe bully of a sergeant was disposed to be jocular--not a recruitbut was on the broad grin. Well, a wise and determined husband willget his wife into this condition of discipline; and I brought myhigh-born wife to kiss my hand, to pull off my boots, to fetch andcarry for me like a servant, and always to make it a holiday, too,when I was in good-humour. I confided perhaps too much in theduration of this disciplined obedience, and forgot that the veryhypocrisy which forms a part of it (all timid people are liars intheir hearts) may be exerted in a way that may be far fromagreeable, in order to deceive you.After the ill-success of her last adventure, which gave me endlessopportunities to banter her, one would have thought I might havebeen on my guard as to what her real intentions were; but shemanaged to mislead me with an art of dissimulation quite admirable,and lulled me into a fatal security with regard to her intentions:for, one day, as I was joking her, and asking her whether she wouldtake the water again, whether she had found another lover, and soforth, she suddenly burst into tears, and, seizing hold of my hand,cried passionately out,--'Ah, Barry, you know well enough that I have never loved but you!Was I ever so wretched that a kind word from you did not make mehappy! ever so angry, but the least offer of goodwill on your partdid not bring me to your side? Did I not give a sufficient proof ofmy affection for you, in bestowing one of the first fortunes inEngland upon you? Have I repined or rebuked you for the way you havewasted it? No, I loved you too much and too fondly; I have alwaysloved you. From the first moment I saw you, I felt irresistiblyattracted towards you. I saw your bad qualities, and trembled atyour violence; but I could not help loving you. I married you,though I knew I was sealing my own fate in doing so; and in spite ofreason and duty. What sacrifice do you want from me? I am ready tomake any, so you will but love me; or, if not, that at least youwill gently use me.'I was in a particularly good humour that day, and we had a sort ofreconciliation: though my mother, when she heard the speech, and sawme softening towards her Ladyship, warned me solemnly, and said,'Depend on it, the artful hussy has some other scheme in her headnow.' The old lady was right; and I swallowed the bait which herLadyship had prepared to entrap me as simply as any gudgeon takes ahook.I had been trying to negotiate with a man for some money, for whichI had pressing occasion; but since our dispute regarding the affairof the succession, my Lady had resolutely refused to sign any papersfor my advantage: and without her name, I am sorry to say, my ownwas of little value in the market, and I could not get a guinea fromany money-dealer in London or Dublin. Nor could I get the rascalsfrom the latter place to visit me at Castle Lyndon: owing to thatunlucky affair I had with Lawyer Sharp when I made him lend me themoney he brought down, and old Salmon the Jew being robbed of thebond I gave him after leaving my house,--[Footnote: These exploits ofMr. Lyndon are not related in the narrative. He probably, in thecases above alluded to, took the law into his own hands.] --the peoplewould not trust themselves within my walls any more. Our rents, too,were in the hands of receivers by this time, and it was as much as Icould do to get enough money from the rascals to pay my wine-merchants their bills. Our English property, as I have said, wasequally hampered; and, as often as I applied to my lawyers andagents for money, would come a reply demanding money of me, fordebts and pretended claims which the rapacious rascals said they hadon me.It was, then, with some feelings of pleasure that I got a letterfrom my confidential man in Gray's Inn, London, saying (in reply tosome ninety-ninth demand of mine) that he thought he could get mesome money; and inclosing a letter from a respectable firm in thecity of London, connected with the mining interest, which offered toredeem the incumbrance in taking a long lease of certain property ofours, which was still pretty free, upon the Countess's signature;and provided they could be assured of her free will in giving it.They said they heard she lived in terror of her life from me, andmeditated a separation, in which case she might repudiate any deedssigned by her while in durance, and subject them, at any rate, to adoubtful and expensive litigation; and demanded to be made assuredof her Ladyship's perfect free will in the transaction before theyadvanced a shilling of their capital.Their terms were so exorbitant, that I saw at once their offer mustbe sincere; and, as my Lady was in her gracious mood, had nodifficulty in persuading her to write a letter, in her own hand,declaring that the accounts of our misunderstandings were uttercalumnies; that we lived in perfect union, and that she was quiteready to execute any deed which her husband might desire her tosign.This proposal was a very timely one, and filled me with great hopes.I have not pestered my readers with many accounts of my debts andlaw affairs; which were by this time so vast and complicated that Inever thoroughly knew them myself, and was rendered half wild bytheir urgency. Suffice it to say, my money was gone--my credit wasdone. I was living at Castle Lyndon off my own beef and mutton, andthe bread, turf, and potatoes off my own estate: I had to watch LadyLyndon within, and the bailiffs without. For the last two years,since I went to Dublin to receive money (which I unluckily lost atplay there, to the disappointment of my creditors), I did notventure to show in that city: and could only appear at our owncounty town at rare intervals, and because I knew the sheriffs: whomI swore I would murder if any ill chance happened to me. A chance ofa good loan, then, was the most welcome prospect possible to me, andI hailed it with all the eagerness imaginable.In reply to Lady Lyndon's letter, came, in course of time, an answerfrom the confounded London merchants, stating that if her Ladyshipwould confirm by word of mouth, at their counting-house in BirchinLane, London, the statement of her letter, they, having surveyed herproperty, would no doubt come to terms; but they declined incurringthe risk of a visit to Castle Lyndon to negotiate, as they wereaware how other respectable parties, such as Messrs. Sharp andSalmon of Dublin, had been treated there. This was a hit at me; butthere are certain situations in which people can't dictate their ownterms: and, 'faith, I was so pressed now for money, that I couldhave signed a bond with Old Nick himself, if he had come providedwith a good round sum.I resolved to go and take the Countess to London. It was in vainthat my mother prayed and warned me. 'Depend on it,' says she,'there is some artifice. When once you get into that wicked town,you are not safe. Here you may live for years and years, in luxuryand splendour, barring claret and all the windows broken; but assoon as they have you in London, they'll get the better of my poorinnocent lad; and the first thing I shall hear of you will be, thatyou are in trouble.''Why go, Redmond?' said my wife. 'I am happy here, as long as youare kind to me, as you are now. We can't appear in London as weought; the little money you will get will be spent, like all therest has been. Let us turn shepherd and shepherdess, and look to ourflocks and be content.' And she took my hand and kissed it; while mymother only said, 'Humph! I believe she's at the bottom of it--thewicked schamer!'I told my wife she was a fool; bade Mrs. Barry not be uneasy, andwas hot upon going: I would take no denial from either party. How Iwas to get the money to go was the question; but that was solved bymy good mother, who was always ready to help me on a pinch, and whoproduced sixty guineas from a stocking. This was all the ready moneythat Barry Lyndon, of Castle Lyndon, and married to a fortune offorty thousand a year, could command: such had been the havoc madein this fine fortune by my own extravagance (as I must confess), butchiefly by my misplaced confidence and the rascality of others.We did not start in state, you may be sure. We did not let thecountry know we were going, or leave notice of adieu with ourneighbours. The famous Mr. Barry Lyndon and his noble wife travelledin a hack-chaise and pair to Waterford, under the name of Mr. andMrs. Jones, and thence took shipping for Bristol, where we arrivedquite without accident. When a man is going to the deuce, how easyand pleasant the journey is! The thought of the money quite put mein a good humour, and my wife, as she lay on my shoulder in thepost-chaise going to London, said it was the happiest ride she hadtaken since our marriage.One night we stayed at Reading, whence I despatched a note to myagent at Gray's Inn, saying I would be with him during the day, andbegging him to procure me a lodging, and to hasten the preparationsfor the loan. My Lady and I agreed that we would go to France, andwait there for better times; and that night, over our supper, formeda score of plans both for pleasure and retrenchment. You would havethought it was Darby and Joan together over their supper. O woman!woman! when I recollect Lady Lyndon's smiles and blandishments--howhappy she seemed to be on that night! what an air of innocentconfidence appeared in her behaviour, and what affectionate namesshe called me!--I am lost in wonder at the depth of her hypocrisy.Who can be surprised that an unsuspecting person like myself shouldhave been a victim to such a consummate deceiver!We were in London at three o'clock, and half-an-hour before the timeappointed our chaise drove to Gray's Inn. I easily found out Mr.Tapewell's apartments--a gloomy den it was, and in an unlucky hour Ientered it! As we went up the dirty back-stair, lighted by a feeblelamp and the dim sky of a dismal London afternoon, my wife seemedagitated and faint.'Redmond,' said she, as we got up to the door, 'don't go in: I amsure there is danger. There's time yet; let us go back--to Ireland--anywhere!' And she put herself before the door, in one of hertheatrical attitudes, and took my hand.I just pushed her away to one side. 'Lady Lyndon,' said I, 'you arean old fool!''Old fool!' said she; and she jumped at the bell, which was quicklyanswered by a mouldy-looking gentleman in an unpowdered wig, to whomshe cried, 'Say Lady Lyndon is here;' and stalked down the passagemuttering 'Old fool.' It was 'old' which was the epithet thattouched her. I might call her anything but that.Mr. Tapewell was in his musty room, surrounded by his parchments andtin boxes. He advanced and bowed; begged her Ladyship to be seated;pointed towards a chair for me, which I took, rather wondering athis insolence; and then retreated to a side-door, saying he would beback in one moment.And back he did come in one moment, bringing with him--whom do youthink? Another lawyer, six constables in red waistcoats withbludgeons and pistols, my Lord George Poynings, and his aunt LadyJane Peckover.When my Lady Lyndon saw her old flame, she flung herself into hisarms in an hysterical passion. She called him her saviour, herpreserver, her gallant knight; and then, turning round to me, pouredout a flood of invective which quite astonished me.'Old fool as I am,' said she, 'I have outwitted the most crafty andtreacherous monster under the sun. Yes, I was a fool when I marriedyou, and gave up other and nobler hearts for your sake--yes, I was afool when I forgot my name and lineage to unite myself with a base-born adventurer--a fool to bear, without repining, the mostmonstrous tyranny that ever woman suffered; to allow my property tobe squandered; to see women, as base and low-born as yourself'--'For Heaven's sake, be calm!' cries the lawyer; and then boundedback behind the constables, seeing a threatening look in my eyewhich the rascal did not like. Indeed. I could have torn him topieces, had he come near me. Meanwhile, my Lady continued in astrain of incoherent fury; screaming against me, and against mymother especially, upon whom she heaped abuse worthy ofBillingsgate, and always beginning and ending the sentence with theword fool.'You don't tell all, my Lady,' says I bitterly; 'I said old fool.''I have no doubt you said and did, sir, everything that a blackguardcould say or do,' interposed little Poynings. 'This lady is now safeunder the protection of her relations and the law, and need fearyour infamous persecutions no longer.''But you are not safe,' roared I; 'and, as sure as I am a man ofhonour, and have tasted your blood once, I will have your heart'sblood now.''Take down his words, constables: swear the peace against him!'screamed the little lawyer, from behind his tipstaffs.'I would not sully my sword with the blood of such a ruffian,' criedmy Lord, relying on the same doughty protection. 'If the scoundrelremains in London another day, he will be seized as a commonswindler.' And this threat indeed made me wince; for I knew thatthere were scores of writs out against me in town, and that once inprison my case was hopeless.'Where's the man will seize me!' shouted I, drawing my sword, andplacing my back to the door. 'Let the scoundrel come. You--youcowardly braggart, come first, if you have the soul of a man!''We're not going to seize you!' said the lawyer; my Ladyship, heraunt, and a division of the bailiffs moving off as he spoke. 'Mydear sir, we don't wish to seize you: we will give you a handsomesum to leave the country; only leave her Ladyship in peace!''And the country will be well rid of such a villain!' says my Lord,retreating too, and not sorry to get out of my reach: and thescoundrel of a lawyer followed him, leaving me in possession of theapartment, and in company of the bullies from the police-office, whowere all armed to the teeth. I was no longer the man I was attwenty, when I should have charged the ruffians sword in hand, andhave sent at least one of them to his account. I was broken inspirit; regularly caught in the toils: utterly baffled and beaten bythat woman. Was she relenting at the door, when she paused andbegged me turn back? Had she not a lingering love for me still? Herconduct showed it, as I came to reflect on it. It was my only chancenow left in the world, so I put down my sword upon the lawyer'sdesk.'Gentlemen,' said I, 'I shall use no violence; you may tell Mr.Tapewell I am quite ready to speak with him when he is at leisure!'and I sat down and folded my arms quite peaceably. What a changefrom the Barry Lyndon of old days! but, as I have read in an oldbook about Hannibal the Carthaginian general, when he invaded theRomans, his troops, which were the most gallant in the world, andcarried all before them, went into cantonments in some city wherethey were so sated with the luxuries and pleasures of life, thatthey were easily beaten in the next campaign. It was so with me now.My strength of mind and body were no longer those of the brave youthwho shot his man at fifteen, and fought a score of battles withinsix years afterwards. Now, in the Fleet Prison, where I write this,there is a small man who is always jeering me and making game of me;who asks me to fight, and I haven't the courage to touch him. But Iam anticipating the gloomy and wretched events of my history ofhumiliation, and had better proceed in order.I took a lodging in a coffee-house near Gray's Inn; taking care toinform Mr. Tapewell of my whereabouts, and anxiously expecting avisit from him. He came and brought me the terms which Lady Lyndon'sfriends proposed-a paltry annuity of L300 a year; to be paid on thecondition of my remaining abroad out of the three kingdoms, and tobe stopped on the instant of my return. He told me what I very wellknew, that my stay in London would infallibly plunge me in gaol;that there were writs innumerable taken out against me here, and inthe West of England; that my credit was so blown upon that I couldnot hope to raise a shilling; and he left me a night to consider ofhis proposal; saying that, if I refused it, the family wouldproceed: if I acceded, a quarter's salary should be paid to me atany foreign port I should prefer.What was the poor, lonely, and broken-hearted man to do? I took theannuity, and was declared outlaw in the course of next week. Therascal Quin had, I found, been, after all, the cause of my undoing.It was he devised the scheme for bringing me up to London; sealingthe attorney's letter with a seal which had been agreed upon betweenhim and the Countess formerly: indeed he had always been for tryingthe plan, and had proposed it at first; but her Ladyship, with herinordinate love of romance, preferred the project of elopement. Ofthese points my mother wrote me word in my lonely exile, offering atthe same time to come over and share it with me; which proposal Ideclined. She left Castle Lyndon a very short time after I hadquitted it; and there was silence in that hall where, under myauthority, had been exhibited so much hospitality and splendour. Shethought she would never see me again, and bitterly reproached me forneglecting her; but she was mistaken in that, and in her estimate ofme. She is very old, and is sitting by my side at this moment in theprison, working: she has a bedroom in Fleet Market over the way;and, with the fifty-pound annuity, which she has kept with a wiseprudence, we manage to eke out a miserable existence, quite unworthyof the famous and fashionable Barry Lyndon.Mr. Barry Lyndon's personal narrative finishes here, for the handof death interrupted the ingenious author soon after the period atwhich the Memoir was compiled; after he had lived nineteen years aninmate of the Fleet Prison, where the prison records state he diedof delirium tremens. His mother attained a prodigious old age, andthe inhabitants of the place in her time can record with accuracythe daily disputes which used to take place between mother and son;until the latter, from habits of intoxication, falling into a stateof almost imbecility, was tended by his tough old parent as a babyalmost, and would cry if deprived of his necessary glass of brandy.His life on the Continent we have not the means of followingaccurately; but he appears to have resumed his former profession ofa gambler, without his former success.He returned secretly to England, after some time, and made anabortive attempt to extort money from Lord George Poynings, under athreat of publishing his correspondence with Lady Lyndon, and sopreventing his Lordship's match with Miss Driver, a great heiress,of strict principles, and immense property in slaves in the WestIndies. Barry narrowly escaped being taken prisoner by the bailiffswho were despatched after him by his lordship, who would havestopped his pension; but Lady Lyndon would never consent to that actof justice, and, indeed, broke with my Lord George the very momenthe married the West India lady.The fact is, the old Countess thought her charms were perennial, andwas never out of love with her husband. She was living at Bath; herproperty being carefully nursed by her noble relatives the Tiptoffs,who were to succeed to it in default of direct heirs: and such wasthe address of Barry, and the sway he still held over the woman,that he actually had almost persuaded her to go and live with himagain; when his plan and hers was interrupted by the appearance of aperson who had been deemed dead for several years.This was no other than Viscount Bullingdon, who started up to thesurprise of all; and especially to that of his kinsman of the houseof Tiptoff. This young nobleman made his appearance at Bath, withthe letter from Barry to Lord George in his hand; in which theformer threatened to expose his connection with Lady Lyndon--aconnection, we need not state, which did not reflect the slightestdishonour upon either party, and only showed that her Ladyship wasin the habit of writing exceedingly foolish letters; as many ladies,nay gentlemen, have done ere this. For calling the honour of hismother in question, Lord Bullingdon assaulted his stepfather (livingat Bath under the name of Mr. Jones), and administered to him atremendous castigation in the Pump-Room.His Lordship's history, since his departure, was a romantic one,which we do not feel bound to narrate. He had been wounded in theAmerican War, reported dead, left prisoner, and escaped. Theremittances which were promised him were never sent; the thought ofthe neglect almost broke the heart of the wild and romantic youngman, and he determined to remain dead to the world at least, and tothe mother who had denied him. It was in the woods of Canada, andthree years after the event had occurred, that he saw the death ofhis half-brother chronicled in the Gentleman's Magazine, under thetitle of 'Fatal Accident to Lord Viscount Castle Lyndon;' on whichhe determined to return to England: where, though he made himselfknown, it was with very great difficulty indeed that he satisfiedLord Tiptoff of the authenticity of his claim. He was about to pay avisit to his lady mother at Bath, when he recognised the well-knownface of Mr. Barry Lyndon, in spite of the modest disguise which thatgentleman wore, and revenged upon his person the insults of formerdays.Lady Lyndon was furious when she heard of the rencounter; declinedto see her son, and was for rushing at once to the arms of heradored Barry; but that gentleman had been carried off, meanwhile,from gaol to gaol, until he was lodged in the hands of Mr. Bendigo,of Chancery Lane, an assistant to the Sheriff of Middlesex; fromwhose house he went to the Fleet Prison. The Sheriff and hisassistant, the prisoner, nay, the prison itself, are now no more.As long as Lady Lyndon lived, Barry enjoyed his income, and wasperhaps as happy in prison as at any period of his existence; whenher Ladyship died, her successor sternly cut off the annuity,devoting the sum to charities: which, he said, would make a nobleruse of it than the scoundrel who had enjoyed it hitherto. At hisLordship's death, in the Spanish campaign, in the year 1811, hisestate fell in to the family of the Tiptoffs, and his title mergedin their superior rank; but it does not appear that the Marquis ofTiptoff (Lord George succeeded to the title on the demise of hisbrother) renewed either the pension of Mr. Barry or the charitieswhich the late lord had endowed. The estate has vastly improvedunder his Lordship's careful management. The trees in Hackton Parkare all about forty years old, and the Irish property is rented inexceedingly small farms to the peasantry; who still entertain thestranger with stories of the daring and the devilry, and thewickedness and the fall of Barry Lyndon.THE END. * * * * * * * * * * * *