The Virginians by William Makepeace Thackeray (top books to read txt) 📕

bosom friend of his Excellency the Commander-in-Chief, was not to be insulted by such a little smuggling slave-driver as him! I think it was in the year 1780 an accident happened, when the old Register Office at Williamsburg was burned down, in which there was a copy of the formal assignment of the Virginia property from Francis Lord Castlewood to my grandfather Henry Esmond, Esquire. “Oh,” says Fanny, “of course this is the work of Jack the Painter!” And Mr. Van den Bosch was for prosecuting her for libel, but that Fanny took to her bed at this juncture, and died.

Van den Bosch made contracts with the new Government, and sold them bargains, as the phrase is. He supplied horses, meat, forage, all of bad quality; but when Arnold came into Virginia (in the King's service) and burned right and left, Van den Bosch's stores and tobacco-houses somehow were spared. Some secret Whigs now took their revenge on the old rascal. A couple of his ships in James River, his stores, and a quantity of his cattle in their stalls were roasted amidst a hideous bellowing; and he got a note, as he was in Arnold's company, saying that friends had served him as he served others; and containing “Tom the Glazier's compliments to brother Jack the Painter.” Nobody pitied the old man, though he went well-nigh mad at his loss. In Arnold's suite came the Honourable Captain William Esmond, of the New York Loyalists, as aide-de-camp to the General. When Howe occupied Philadelphia, Will was said to have made some money keeping a gambling-house with an officer of the dragoons of Anspach. I know not how he lost it. He could not have had much when he consented to become an aide-de-camp of Arnold.

Now, the King's officers having reappeared in the province, Madam Esmond thought fit to open her house at Castlewood and invite them thither—and actually received Mr. Arnold and his suite. “It is not for me,” she said, “to refuse my welcome to a man whom my Sovereign has admitted to grace.” And she threw her house open to him, and treated him with great though frigid respect whilst he remained in the district. The General gone, and, his precious aide-de-camp with him, some of the rascals who followed in their suite remained behind in the house where they had received so much hospitality, insulted the old lady in her hall, insulted her people, and finally set fire to the old mansion in a frolic of drunken fury. Our house at Richmond was not burned, luckily, though Mr. Arnold had fired the town; and thither the undaunted old lady proceeded, surrounded by her people, and never swerving in her loyalty, in spite of her ill-usage. “The Esmonds,” she said, “were accustomed to Royal ingratitude.”

And now Mr. Van den Bosch, in the name of his grandson and my Lord Castlewood, in England, set up a claim to our property in Virginia. He said it was not my lord's intention to disturb Madam Esmond in her enjoyment of the estate during her life, but that his father, it had always been understood, had given his kinsman a life-interest in the place, and only continued it to his daughter out of generosity. Now my lord proposed that his second son should inhabit Virginia, for which the young gentleman had always shown the warmest sympathy. The outcry against Van den Bosch was so great that he would have been tarred and feathered, had he remained in Virginia. He betook himself to Congress, represented himself as a martyr ruined in the cause of liberty, and prayed for compensation for himself and justice for his grandson.

My mother lived long in dreadful apprehension, having in truth a secret, which she did not like to disclose to any one. Her titles were burned! the deed of assignment in her own house, the copy in the Registry at Richmond, had alike been destroyed—by chance? by villainy? who could say? She did not like to confide this trouble in writing to me. She opened herself to Hal, after the surrender of York Town, and he acquainted me with the fact in a letter by a British officer returning home on his parole. Then I remembered the unlucky words I had let slip before Will Esmond at the coffee-house at New York; and a part of this iniquitous scheme broke upon me.

As for Mr. Will: there is a tablet in Castlewood Church, in Hampshire, inscribed, Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, and announcing that “This marble is placed by a mourning brother, to the memory of the Honourable William Esmond, Esquire, who died in North America, in the service of his King.” But how? When, towards the end of 1781, a revolt took place in the Philadelphia Line of the Congress Army, and Sir Henry Clinton sent out agents to the mutineers, what became of them? The men took the spies prisoners, and proceeded to judge them, and my brother (whom they knew and loved, and had often followed under fire), who had been sent from camp to make terms with the troops, recognised one of the spies, just as execution was about to be done upon him—and the wretch, with horrid outcries, grovelling and kneeling at Colonel Warrington's feet, besought him for mercy, and promised to confess all to him. To confess what? Harry turned away sick at heart. Will's mother and sister never knew the truth. They always fancied it was in action he was killed.

As for my lord earl, whose noble son has been the intendant of an illustrious Prince, and who has enriched himself at play with his R—-l master: I went to see his lordship when I heard of this astounding design against our property, and remonstrated with him on the matter. For myself, as I showed him, I was not concerned, as I had determined to cede my right to my brother. He received me with perfect courtesy; smiled when I spoke of my disinterestedness; said he was sure of my affectionate feelings towards my brother, but what must be his towards his son? He had always heard from his father: he would take his Bible oath of that: that, at my mother's death, the property would return to the head of the family. At the story of the title which Colonel Esmond had ceded, he shrugged his shoulders, and treated it as a fable. “On ne fait pas de ces folies la!” says he, offering me snuff, “and your grandfather was a man of esprit! My little grandmother was eprise of him: and my father, the most good-natured soul alive, lent them the Virginian property to get them out of the way! C'etoit un scandale, mon cher, un joli petit scandale!” Oh, if my mother had but heard him! I might have been disposed to take a high tone: but he said, with the utmost good-nature, “My dear Knight, are you going to fight about the character of our grandmother? Allons donc! Come, I will be fair with you! We will compromise, if you like, about this Virginian property!” and his lordship named a sum greater than the actual value of the estate.

Amazed at the coolness of this worthy, I walked away to my coffee-house, where, as it happened, an old friend was to dine with me, for whom I have a sincere regard. I had felt a pang at not being able to give this gentleman my living of Warrington—on-Waveney, but I could not, as he himself confessed honestly. His life had been too loose, and his example in my village could never have been edifying: besides, he would have died of ennui there, after being accustomed to a town life; and he had a prospect finally, he told me, of settling himself most comfortably in London and the church. [He was the second Incumbent of Lady Whittlesea's Chapel, Mayfair, and married Elizabeth, relict of Hermann Voelcker, Esq., the eminent brewer.] My guest, I need not say, was my old friend Sampson, who never failed to dine with me when I came to town, and I told him of my interview with his old patron.

I could not have lighted upon a better confidant.