The Luck of Barry Lyndon by William Makepeace Thackeray (good english books to read TXT) 📕

had taken to gambling, and that I had not adopted a more regular means of advancement. “Sir,” said I, “if you will allow me to speak frankly to your Highness, play with me is only a means to an end. Where should I have been without it? A private still in King Frederick’s grenadiers. I come of a race which gave princes to my country; but persecutions have deprived them of their vast possessions. My uncle’s adherence to his ancient faith drove him from our country. I too resolved to seek advancement in the military service; but the insolence and ill-treatment which I received at the hands of the English were not bearable by a highborn gentleman, and I fled their service. It was only to fall into another bondage to all appearance still more hopeless; when my good star sent a preserver to me in my uncle, and my spirit and gallantry enabled me to take advantage of the means of escape afforded me. Since then we have lived, I do not disguise it, by play; but who can say I have done him a wrong? Yet, if I could find myself in an honourable post, and with an assured maintenance, I would never, except for amusement, such as every gentleman must have, touch a card again. I beseech your Highness to inquire of your resident at Berlin if I did not on every occasion act as a gallant soldier. I feel that I have talents of a higher order, and should be proud to have occasion to exert them; if, as I do not doubt, my fortune shall bring them into play.”

The candour of this statement struck his Highness greatly, and impressed him in my favour, and he was pleased to say that he believed me, and would be glad to stand my friend.

Having thus the two Dukes, the Duchess, and the reigning favourite enlisted on my side, the chances certainly were that I should carry off the great prize; and I ought, according to all common calculations, to have been a Prince of the Empire at this present writing, but that my ill luck pursued me in a matter in which I was not the least to blame⁠—the unhappy Duchess’s attachment to the weak, silly, cowardly Frenchman. The display of this love was painful to witness, as its end was frightful to think of. The Princess made no disguise of it. If Magny spoke a word to a lady of her household, she would be jealous, and attack with all the fury of her tongue the unlucky offender. She would send him a half-dozen of notes in the day: at his arrival to join her circle or the courts which she held, she would brighten up, so that all might perceive. It was a wonder that her husband had not long ere this been made aware of her faithlessness; but the Prince Victor was himself of so high and stern a nature that he could not believe in her stooping so far from her rank as to forget her virtue: and I have heard say, that when hints were given to him of the evident partiality which the Princess showed for the equerry, his answer was a stern command never more to be troubled on the subject. “The Princess is light-minded,” he said; “she was brought up at a frivolous Court; but her folly goes not beyond coquetry: crime is impossible; she has her birth, and my name, and her children, to defend her.” And he would ride off to his military inspections and be absent for weeks, or retire to his suite of apartments, and remain closeted there whole days; only appearing to make a bow at her Highness’s levée, or to give her his hand at the Court galas, where ceremony required that he should appear. He was a man of vulgar tastes, and I have seen him in the private garden, with his great ungainly figure, running races, or playing at ball with his little son and daughter, whom he would find a dozen pretexts daily for visiting. The serene children were brought to their mother every morning at her toilette; but she received them very indifferently: except on one occasion, when the young Duke Ludwig got his little uniform as colonel of hussars, being presented with a regiment by his godfather the Emperor Leopold. Then, for a day or two, the Duchess Olivia was charmed with the little boy; but she grew tired of him speedily, as a child does of a toy. I remember one day, in the morning circle, some of the Princess’s rouge came off on the arm of her son’s little white military jacket; on which she slapped the poor child’s face, and sent him sobbing away. Oh, the woes that have been worked by women in this world! the misery into which men have lightly stepped with smiling faces; often not even with the excuse of passion, but from mere foppery, vanity, and bravado! Men play with these dreadful two-edged tools, as if no harm could come to them. I, who have seen more of life than most men, if I had a son, would go on my knees to him and beg him to avoid woman, who is worse than poison. Once intrigue, and your whole life is endangered: you never know when the evil may fall upon you; and the woe of whole families, and the ruin of innocent people perfectly dear to you, may be caused by a moment of your folly.

When I saw how entirely lost the unlucky Monsieur de Magny seemed to be, in spite of all the claims I had against him, I urged him to fly. He had rooms in the palace, in the garrets over the Princess’s quarters (the building was a huge one, and accommodated almost a city of noble retainers of the family); but the infatuated young fool would not budge, although he had not even the excuse