The Happy Hypocrite.

by Max Beerbohm.

I

None, it is said, of all who revelled with the Regent, was half so wicked as Lord George h.e.l.l. I will not trouble my little readers with a long recital of his great naughtiness. But it were well they should know that he was greedy, destructive, and disobedient. I am afraid there is no doubt that he often sat up at Carlton House until long after bedtime, playing at games, and that he generally ate and drank far more than was good for him. His fondness for fine clothes was such that he used to dress on week-days quite as gorgeously as good people dress on Sundays.

He was thirty-five years old and a great grief to his parents.

And the worst of it was that he set such a bad example to others. Never, never did he try to conceal his wrong-doing; so that, in time, every one knew how horrid he was. In fact, I think he was proud of being horrid. Captain Tarleton, in his account of _Contemporary Bucks_, suggested that his Lordship"s great Candour was a virtue and should incline us to forgive some of his abominable faults. But, painful as it is to me to dissent from any opinion expressed by one who is now dead, I hold that Candour is good only when it reveals good actions or good sentiments, and that when it reveals evil, itself is evil, even also.

Lord George h.e.l.l did, at last, atone for all his faults, in a way that was never revealed to the world during his life-time. The reason of his strange and sudden disappearance from that social sphere in which he had so long moved, and never moved again, I will unfold. My little readers will then, I think, acknowledge that any angry judgment they may have pa.s.sed upon him must be reconsidered and, maybe, withdrawn. I will leave his Lordship in their hands. But my plea for him will not be based upon that Candour of his, which some of his friends so much admired. There were, yes! some so weak and so wayward as to think it a fine thing to have an historic t.i.tle and no scruples. "Here comes George h.e.l.l," they would say. "How wicked my Lord is looking!" _n.o.blesse oblige_, you see, and so an aristocrat should be very careful of his good name. Anonymous naughtiness does little harm.

It is pleasant to record that many persons were in.o.bnoxious to the magic of his t.i.tle and disapproved of him so strongly that, whenever he entered a room where they happened to be, they would make straight for the door and watch him very severely through the key-hole. Every morning, when he strolled up Piccadilly, they crossed over to the other side in a compact body, leaving him to the companionship of his bad companions on that which is still called the "shady" side. Lord George--[Greek: schetlios]--was quite indifferent to this demonstration.

Indeed, he seemed wholly hardened, and when ladies gathered up their skirts as they pa.s.sed him, he would lightly appraise their ankles.

I am glad I never saw his Lordship. They say he was rather like Caligula, with a dash of Sir John Falstaff, and that sometimes on wintry mornings in St. James"s Street young children would hush their prattle and cling in disconsolate terror to their nurses" skirts, as they saw him come (that vast and fearful gentleman!) with the east wind ruffling the rotund surface of his beaver, ruffling the fur about his neck and wrists, and striking the purple complexion of his cheeks to a still deeper purple. "King Bogey" they called him in the nurseries. In the hours when they too were naughty, their nurses would predict his advent down the chimney or from the linen-press, and then they always "behaved." So that, you see, even the unrighteous are a power for good, in the hands of nurses.

It is true that his Lordship was a non-smoker--a negative virtue, certainly, and due, even that, I fear, to the fashion of the day--but there the list of his good qualities comes to an abrupt conclusion. He loved with an insatiable love the town and the pleasures of the town, whilst the enn.o.bling influences of our English lakes were quite unknown to him. He used to boast that he had not seen a b.u.t.tercup for twenty years, and once he called the country "a Fool"s Paradise." London was the only place marked on the map of his mind. London gave him all he wished for. Is it not extraordinary to think that he had never spent a happy day nor a day of any kind in Follard Chase, that desirable mansion in Herts, which he had won from Sir Follard Follard, by a chuck of the dice, at Boodle"s, on his seventeenth birthday? Always cynical and unkind, he had refused to give the broken baronet his "revenge." Always unkind and insolent, he had offered to instal him in the lodge--an offer which was, after a little hesitation, accepted. "On my soul, the man"s place is a sinecure," Lord George would say; "he never has to open the gate to me."[1] So rust has covered the great iron gates of Follard Chase, and moss had covered its paths. The deer browsed upon its terraces. There were only wild flowers anywhere. Deep down among the weeds and water-lilies of the little stone-rimmed pond he had looked down upon, lay the marble faun, as he had fallen.

[Footnote 1: _Lord Coleraine"s Correspondence_, page 101.]

Of all the sins of his Lordship"s life surely not one was more wanton than his neglect of Follard Chase. Some whispered (nor did he ever trouble to deny) that he had won it by foul means, by loaded dice.

Indeed no card-player in St. James"s cheated more persistently than he.

As he was rich and had no wife and family to support, and as his luck was always capital, I can offer no excuse for his conduct. At Carlton House, in the presence of many bishops and cabinet ministers, he once dunned the Regent most arrogantly for 5000 guineas out of which he had cheated him some months before, and went so far as to declare that he would not leave the house till he got it; whereupon His Royal Highness, with that unfailing tact for which he was ever famous, invited him to stay there as a guest; which, in fact, Lord George did, for several months. After this, we can hardly be surprised when we read that he "seldom sat down to the fashionable game of Limbo with less than four, and sometimes with _as many as seven_ aces up his sleeve."[2] We can only wonder that he was tolerated at all.

[Footnote 2: _Contemporary Bucks_, vol. i, page 73.]

At Garble"s, that nightly resort of t.i.tled rips and roysterers, he usually spent the early hours of his evenings. Round the illuminated garden, with La Gambogi, the dancer, on his arm, and a Bacchic retinue at his heels, he would amble leisurely, clad in Georgian costume, which was not then, of course, fancy dress, as it is now.[3] Now and again, in the midst of his noisy talk, he would crack a joke of the period, or break into a sentimental ballad, dance a little, or pick a quarrel. When he tired of such fooling, he would proceed to his box in the tiny _al fresco_ theatre and patronize the jugglers, pugilists, play-actors and whatever eccentric persons happened to be performing there.

[Footnote 3: It would seem, however, that, on special occasions, his Lordship indulged in odd costumes. "I have seen him," says Captain Tarleton (vol. i, p. 69), "attired as a French clown, as a sailor, or in the crimson hose of a Sicilian grandee--_peu beau spectacle_. He never disguised his face, whatever his costume, however."]

The stars were splendid and the moon as beautiful as a great camelia, one night in May, as his Lordship laid his arms upon the cushioned ledge of his box and watched the antics of the Merry Dwarf, a little, curly-headed creature, whose _debut_ it was. Certainly Garble had found a novelty. Lord George led the applause, and the Dwarf finished his frisking with a pretty song about lovers. Nor was this all. Feats of archery were to follow. In a moment the Dwarf reappeared with a small, gilded bow in his hand and a quiverful of arrows slung at his shoulder.

Hither and thither he shot these vibrant arrows, very precisely, several into the bark of the acacias that grew about the overt stage, several into the fluted columns of the boxes, two or three to the stars. The audience was delighted. "_Bravo! Bravo Sagittaro!_" murmured Lord George, in the language of La Gambogi, who was at his side. Finally, the waxen figure of a man was carried on by an a.s.sistant and propped against the trunk of a tree. A scarf was tied across the eyes of the Merry Dwarf, who stood in a remote corner of the stage. _Bravo_ indeed! For the shaft had pierced the waxen figure through the heart, or just where the heart would have been if the figure had been human and not waxen.

Lord George called for port and champagne and beckoned the bowing homuncule to his box, that he might compliment him on his skill and pledge him in a b.u.mper of the grape.

"On my soul, you have a genius for the bow," his Lordship cried with florid condescension. "Come and sit by me; but first let me present you to my divine companion the Signora Gambogi--Virgo and Sagittarius, egad!

You may have met on the Zodiac."

"Indeed, I met the Signora many years ago," the Dwarf replied, with a low bow. "But not on the Zodiac, and the Signora perhaps forgets me."

At this speech the Signora flushed angrily, for she was indeed no longer young, and the Dwarf had a childish face. She thought he mocked her; her eyes flashed. Lord George"s twinkled rather maliciously.

"Great is the experience of youth," he laughed. "Pray, are you stricken with more than twenty summers?"

"With more than I can count," said the Dwarf. "To the health of your Lordship!" and he drained his long gla.s.s of wine. Lord George replenished it, and asked by what means or miracle he had acquired his mastery of the bow.

"By long practice," the little thing rejoined; "long practice on human creatures." And he nodded his curls mysteriously.

"On my heart, you are a dangerous box-mate."

"Your Lordship were certainly a good target."

Little liking this joke at his bulk, which really rivalled the Regent"s, Lord George turned brusquely in his chair and fixed his eyes upon the stage. This time it was the Gambogi who laughed.

A new operette, _The Fair Captive of Samarcand_, was being enacted, and the frequenters of Garble"s were all curious to behold the _debutante_, Jenny Mere, who was said to be both pretty and talented. These predictions were surely fulfilled, when the captive peeped from the window of her wooden turret. She looked so pale under her blue turban.

Her eyes were dark with fear; her parted lips did not seem capable of speech. "Is it that she is frightened of us?" the audience wondered. "Or of the flashing scimitar of Aphoschaz, the cruel father who holds her captive?" So they gave her loud applause, and when at length she jumped down, to be caught in the arms of her gallant lover, Nissarah, and, throwing aside her Eastern draperies, did a simple dance in the convention of Columbine, their delight was quite unbounded. She was very young and did not dance very well, it is true, but they forgave her that. And when she turned in the dance and saw her father with his scimitar, their hearts beat swiftly for her. Nor were all eyes tearless when she pleaded with him for her life.

Strangely absorbed, quite callous of his two companions, Lord George gazed over the footlights. He seemed as one who is in a trance. Of a sudden, something shot sharp into his heart. In pain he sprang to his feet and, as he turned, he seemed to see a winged and laughing child, in whose hand was a bow, fly swiftly away into the darkness. At his side, was the Dwarf"s chair. It was empty. Only La Gambogi was with him, and her dark face was like the face of a fury.

Presently he sank back into his chair, holding one hand to his heart, that still throbbed from the strange transfixion. He breathed very painfully and seemed scarce conscious of his surroundings. But La Gambogi knew he would pay no more homage to her now, for that the love of Jenny Mere had come into his heart.

When the operette was over, his lovesick Lordship s.n.a.t.c.hed up his cloak and went away without one word to the lady at his side. Rudely he brushed aside Count Karoloff and Mr. FitzClarence, with whom he had arranged to play hazard. Of his comrades, his cynicism, his reckless scorn--of all the material of his existence--he was oblivious now. He had no time for penitence or diffident delay. He only knew that he must kneel at the feet of Jenny Mere and ask her to be his wife.

"Miss Mere," said Garble, "is in her room, resuming her ordinary attire.

If your Lordship deign to await the conclusion of her humble toilet, it shall be my privilege to present her to your Lordship. Even now, indeed, I hear her footfall on the stair."

Lord George uncovered his head and with one hand nervously smoothed his rebellious wig.

"Miss Mere, come hither," said Garble. "This is my Lord George h.e.l.l, that you have pleased whom by your poor efforts this night will ever be the prime gratification of your pa.s.sage through the roseate realms of art."

Little Miss Mere, who had never seen a lord, except in fancy or in dreams, curtseyed shyly and hung her head. With a loud crash, Lord George fell on his knees. The manager was greatly surprised, the girl greatly embarra.s.sed. Yet neither of them laughed, for sincerity dignified his posture and sent eloquence from its lips.

"Miss Mere," he cried, "give ear, I pray you, to my poor words, nor spurn me in misprision from the pedestal of your Beauty, Genius, and Virtue. All too conscious, alas! of my presumption in the same, I yet abase myself before you as a suitor for your adorable Hand. I grope under the shadow of your raven Locks. I am dazzled in the light of those translucent Orbs, your Eyes. In the intolerable Whirlwind of your Fame I faint and am afraid."

"Sir----" the girl began, simply.

"Say "My Lord,"" said Garble, solemnly.

"My Lord, I thank you for your words. They are beautiful. But indeed, indeed, I can never be your bride."

Lord George hid his face in his hands.

"Child," said Mr. Garble, "let not the sun rise ere you have retracted those wicked words."

"My wealth, my rank, my irremeable love for you, I throw them at your feet," Lord George cried piteously. "I would wait an hour, a week, a l.u.s.tre, even a decade, did you but bid me hope!"

"I can never be your wife," she said, slowly. "I can never be the wife of any man whose face is not saintly. Your face, my Lord, mirrors, it may be, true love for me, but it is even as a mirror long tarnished by the reflexion of this world"s vanity. It is even as a tarnished mirror.

Do not kneel to me, for I am poor and humble. I was not made for such impetuous wooing. Kneel, if you please, to some greater, gayer lady. As for my love, it is my own, nor can it be ever torn from me, but given, as true love must needs be given, freely. Ah, rise from your knees. That man, whose face is wonderful as are the faces of the saints, to him I will give my true love."

Miss Mere, though visibly affected, had spoken this speech with a gesture and elocution so superb, that Mr. Garble could not help applauding, deeply though he regretted her att.i.tude towards his honoured patron. As for Lord George, he was immobile as a stricken oak. With a sweet look of pity, Miss Mere went her way, and Mr. Garble, with some solicitude, helped his Lordship to rise from his knees. Out into the night, without a word, his Lordship went. Above him the stars were still splendid. They seemed to mock the festoons of little lamps, dim now and guttering, in the garden of Garble"s. What should he do? No thoughts came; only his heart burnt hotly. He stood on the brim of Garble"s lake, shallow and artificial as his past life had been. Two swans slept on its surface. The moon shone strangely upon their white, twisted necks.

Should he drown himself? There was no one in the garden to prevent him, and in the morning they would find him floating there, one of the n.o.blest of love"s victims. The garden would be closed in the evening.

There would be no performance in the little theatre. It might be that Jenny Mere would mourn him. "Life is a prison, without bars," he murmured, as he walked away.