The characters of Mrs. Haywood's "Love in Excess" also inherited many traits from the debased but glittering Sir Fopling Flutters, Mirabells, Millamants, and Lady Wishforts of the Restoration stage. Of character drawing, indeed, there is practically none in the entire piece; the personages are distinguished only by the degree of their willingness to yield to the tender passion. The story in all its intricacies may best be described as thevie amoureuseof Count D'Elmont, a hero with none of the wit, but with all the gallantry of the rakes of late Restoration comedy. Two parts of the novel relate the aristocratic intrigues of D'Elmont and his friends; the third shows him, like Mrs. Centlivre's gallants in the fifth act, reformed and a model of constancy. It would be useless to detail the sensational extravagances of the plot in all its ramifications, but the hero's adventures before and after marriage may serve as a fair sample of the whole.
D'Elmont, returning to Paris from the French wars, becomes the admiration of both sexes, but especially in the eyes of the rich and noble Alovisa appears a conquest worthy of her powers. To an incoherent expression of her passion sent to him in an anonymous letter he pays no attention, having for diversion commenced an intrigue with the lovely Amena. Though Alovisa in a second billet bids him aim at a higher mark, "he had said too many fine things to be lost," and continues his pursuit until Amena's father takes alarm and locks her up. Through her maid she arranges for a secret meeting, and though touched by her father's reproofs, she is unable to withstand the pleas of the captivating count. Their tete-a-tete in the Tuilleries, however, is interrupted by Alovisa's spies, who alarm the house with cries of fire, so that the lovers find themselves locked out. Half senseless with dismay, Amena finds shelter in the house of Alovisa, who, though inwardly triumphant, receives her rival civilly and promises to reconcile her to her father. D'Elmont is so patently glad to be relieved of his fair charge that she demands back her letter, but he by mistake gives her one of Alovisa's, whose handwriting she immediately recognizes. When the polite Count returns to enquire after her health, she accuses her lover and friend of duplicity, faints, and letting fall Alovisa's letter from her bosom, brings about anéclaircissementbetween D'Elmont and that lady. Before Amena's recovery the Count hastens away to welcome his brother, and when the imprudent girl has been safely lodged in a convent, D'Elmont, moved more by ambition than by love, weds the languishing Alovisa.
After his marriage the Count soon quarrels with his wife and consoles himself by falling in love with his ward, the matchless Melliora, but the progress of his amour is interrupted by numerous unforeseen accidents. The mere suspicion of his inconstancy raises his wife's jealousy to a fever heat. To expose her rival she pretends to yield to the persuasions of her wooer, the Baron D'Espernay, but as a result of a very intricate intrigue both Alovisa and the Baron perish accidentally on the swords of D'Elmont and his brother.
Melliora retires to a convent, and her lover goes to travel in Italy, where his charms cause one lady to take poison for love of him, and another to follow him disguised as the little foot-page Fidelio. In helping Melliora's brother to elope with a beautiful Italian girl, the Count again encounters his beloved Melliora, now pursued by the Marquis de Sanguillier. In a dramaticdénouementshe deserts the Marquis at the altar and throws herself upon the protection of her guardian. The disappointed bridegroom is consoled by the discovery of an old flame who has long been serving him secretly in the capacity of chambermaid. Fidelio reveals her identity and dies of hopeless love, pitied by all. The three surviving couples marry at once, and this time the husbands "continue, with their fair Wives, great and lovely Examples of conjugal Affection."
Such, with the omission of all secondary narratives, is the main plot ofEliza Haywood's first novel.
"Love in Excess" best illustrates the similarity of sensational fiction to clap-trap drama, but others of her early works bear traces of the author's familiarity with the theatre. The escape of the pair of lovers from an Oriental court, already the theme of countless plays including Mrs. Haywood 's own "Pair Captive," was re-vamped to supply an episode in "Idalia" (1723), and parts of the same novel are written in concealed blank verse that echoes the heroic Orientalism of some of Dryden's tragedies. In the character of Grubguard, the amorous alderman of "The City Jilt" (1726), Mrs. Haywood apparently had in mind not Alderman Barber, whom the character little resembles, but rather Antonio in Otway's "Venice Preserved." And the plot of "The Distressed Orphan, or Love in a Mad-House" (c. 1726), where young Colonel Marathon feigns himself mad in order to get access to his beloved Annilia, may perhaps owe its inspiration to the coarser mad-house scenes of Middleton's "Changeling."[8] On the whole, however, the drama but poorly repaid its debt to prose fiction.
An indication of the multifarious origins of the short tales of love is to be found in the nominal diversity of the setting. The scene, though often laid in some such passion-ridden land as Spain or Italy, rarely affects the nature of the story. But as in such novels as "Philidore and Placentia" and "The Agreeable Caledonian" the characters wander widely over the face of Europe and even come in contact with strange Eastern climes, so the writers of romantic tales ransacked the remotest corners of literature and history for sensational matter. The much elaborated chronicle of the Moors was made to eke out substance for "The Arragonian Queen" (1724), a story of "Europe in the Eighth Century," while "Cleomelia: or, the Generous Mistress" was advertised as the "Secret History of a Lady Lately Arriv'd from Bengall." The tendency to exploit the romantic features of outlandish localities was carried to the ultimate degree by Mrs. Penelope Aubin, whose characters range over Africa, Turkey, Persia, the East and West Indies, and the North American continent, often with peculiar geographical results. But neither Mrs. Aubin nor Mrs. Haywood was able to use the gorgeous local color that distinguished Mrs. Behn's "Oroonoko," and still less did they command the realistic imagination that could make the travels of a Captain Singleton lifelike.
Even when, as in "The Mercenary Lover," the setting is transferred to "the Metropolis of one of the finest Islands in the World," and the action takes place "in the neighborhood of a celebrated Church, in the Sound of whose Bells the Inhabitants of that populous City think it an Honour to be born,"[9] the change is unaccompanied by any attempt at circumstantial realism. We are told that Belinda of "The British Recluse" is a young lady of Warwickshire, that Fantomina follows her lover to Bath in the guise of a chambermaid, or that "The Fair Hebrew" relates the "true, but secret history of two Jewish ladies who lately resided in London," but without the labels the settings could not be distinguished from the vague and unidentifiedmise en scèneof such a romance as "The Unequal Conflict." Placentia in England raves of her passion for Philidore exactly as Alovisa in Paris, Emanuella in Madrid,[10] or Cleomelia in Bengal expose the raptures and agonies of their passions. The hero of "The Double Marriage" (1726) rescues a distressed damsel in the woods outside of Plymouth exactly as one of Ariosto's or Spenser's knights-errant might have done in the fairy country of old romance. In the sordid tale of "Irish Artifice," printed in Curll's "Female Dunciad" (1728), no reader could distinguish in the romantic names Aglaura and Merovius the nationality or the meanness of a villainous Irish housekeeper and her son. And though the tale is the very reverse of romantic, it contains no hint of actual circumstance. The characters in Mrs. Haywood's early fiction move in an imaginary world, sometimes, it is true, marked with the names of real places, but no more truly realistic than the setting of "Arcadia" or "Parthenissa."
Nor are the figures that people the eighteenth century paradise of romance more definitely pictured than the landscape. They are generally unindividualized, lay figures swayed by the passions of the moment, or at best mere "humour" characters representing love's epitome, extravagant jealousy, or eternal constancy. Pope could make a portrait specific by the vigorous use of epigrams, but Mrs. Haywood's comments on her heroes and heroines are but feeble. The description of Lasselia, for instance, contains no trait that is particular, no characteristic definitely individual. The girl is simply the type of all that is conventionally charming in her sex, "splendidly null, dead perfection."
"But if the grave Part of the World were charm'd with her Wit and Discretion, the Young and Gay were infinitely more so with her Beauty; which tho' it was not of that dazzling kind which strikes the Eye at first looking on it with Desire and Wonder, yet it was such as seldom fail'd of captivating Hearts most averse to Love. Her features were perfectly regular, her Eyes had an uncommon Vivacity in them, mix'd with a Sweetness, which spoke the Temper of her Soul; her Mien was gracefully easy, and her Shape the most exquisite that could be; in fine, her Charms encreas'd by being often seen, every View discover'd something new to be admir'd; and tho' they were of that sort which more properly may be said to persuade than to command Adoration, yet they persuaded it in such a manner, that no Mortal was able to resist their Force." (p. 2.)
Mrs. Haywood's heroes are merely the masculine counterparts of her women. Bellcour, the type of many more, "had as much Learning as was necessary to a Gentleman who depended not on that alone to raise his Fortune: He had also admirable Skill in Fencing, and became a Horse as well as any Man in the World."[11] Victor over a thousand hearts, the Haywoodian male ranges through his glittering sphere, ever ready to fall in or out of love as the occasion demands. D'Elmont of "Love in Excess" possesses a soul large enough to contain both love and fury at almost the same moment. A "brulée" with his spouse merely increases his tenderness for his ward.
"You have done well, Madam, (said D'Elmont, looking on her with Eyes sparkling with Indignation) you have done well, by your impertinent Curiosity and Imprudence, to rouze me from my Dream of Happiness, and remind me that I am that wretched thing a Husband! 'Tis well indeed, answer'd Alovisa, (who saw now that there was no need of farther Dissimulation) that any thing can make you remember, both what you are, and what I am. You, resum'd he, hastily interrupting her, have taken an effectual Method to prove your self a Wife!—a very Wife!— Insolent—Jealous—and Censorious!—But Madam, continued he frowning, since you are pleased to assert your Privilege, be assur'd, I too shall take my turn, and will exert the—Husband! In saying this, he flung out of the Room in spite of her Endeavours to hinder him, and going hastily through a Gallery which had a large Window that look'd into the Garden, he perceiv'd Melliora lying on a green Bank, in a melancholy but a charming Posture, directly opposite to the place where he was; her Beauties appear'd, if possible more to advantage than ever he had seen them, or at least he had more opportunity thus unseen by her, to gaze upon them: he in a moment lost all the Rage of Temper he had been in, and his whole Soul was taken up with Softness…. Ambition, Envy, Hate, Fear, or Anger, every other Passion that finds entrance in the Soul, Art and Discretion may disguise; but Love, tho' it may be feign'd, can never be conceal'd, not only the Eyes (those true and most perfect Intelligencers of the Heart) but every Feature, every Faculty betrays it! It fills the whole Air of the Person possess'd of it; it wanders round the Mouth! plays in the Voice! trembles in the Accent! and shows itself a thousand different ways! even Melliora's care to hide it, made it more apparent; and the transported D'Elmont, not considering where he was, or who might be a witness of his Rapture, could not forbear catching her in his Arms, and grasping her with an extasy, which plainly told her what his thoughts were, tho' at that time he had not power to put 'em into words; and indeed there is no greater Proof of a vast and elegant Passion, than the being uncapable of expressing it." (p. 79.)
Oddly enough the early experimenters in fiction never perceived that to seem real a passion must be felt by a real person. They attempted again and again to heighten the picture of envy, fear, ambition, rage, or love by all manner of extraordinary circumstances, but they rarely succeeded in attaching the emotion to a lifelike character. It was indeed passion, but passion painted on the void, impalpable. Consequently they almost never succeeded in maintaining complete verisimilitude, nor was their character drawing any less shadowy than in the sentimental romances of Sidney and Lodge. Compare, for example, the first expression of Rosalynde's love with the internal debate of Mrs. Haywood's Placentia.[12] Both are cast in soliloquy form, and except that the eighteenth century romancer makes no attempt to decorate the style with fantastic conceits, the two descriptions are not essentially different.
"[Placentia] was no sooner at liberty to reflect, than she grew amazed at herself for having expresd, and still feeling so uncommon a Concern for the Service she had received from Jacobin [Philidore]; he did no more, said she, than was his Duty, nay, any Man would have done as much for a Woman to whom he had not the least obligation, if distressed and assaulted in the manner she had been—why then, continued she, does the action appear so charming, so meritorious from him?—'Tis certainly the surprize to find so much gallantry and courage in a Man of his mean birth, that has caused this disorder in my Soul—were he my Equal I should think it was Love had seized me, but Oh! far be it from me to debase myself so far—Yet, again would she retort, what can I wish in Man that is not to be found in this too lovely Slave?… Besides, who knows but that his Descent may be otherwise than he pretends—I have heard of Princes who have wandered in strange disguises—he may be in reality as far above me as he seems beneath…. The thought that there was a possibility for such a thing to be, had no sooner entered into her head than she indulged it with an infinity of rapture, she painted him in Imagination the most desperate dying Lover that ever was, represented the transports she shou'd be in when the blest discovery shou'd be made, held long discourses with him, and formed answers such as she supposed he wou'd make on such an occasion. Thus, for some hours did she beguile her Cares, but Love, who takes delight sometimes to torment his Votarys wou'd not long permit her to enjoy this satisfaction…. Reason, with stern remonstrances checked the Romantick turn of her late thoughts, and showed her the improbability of the hope she had entertained: Were he, cryed she, with an agony proportioned to her former transports, of any degree which you'd encourage his pretensions to my Love, he cou'd not for so long a Time have endured the servile Offices to which he has been put—Some way his ingenious passion wou'd have found out to have revealed itself—No, no, he is neither a Lover nor a Gentleman, and I but raise Chimera's to distract myself …but Ill [sic] retrieve all yet, Ill discharge him from my house and service—he is an Enchanter, and has bewitched me from my Reason, and never, never more shall he behold my face."
The normal character in Eliza Haywood's tales almost invariably conformed to some conventional type borrowed from the romance or the stage. The author's purpose was not to paint a living portrait, but to create a vehicle for the expression of vivid emotion, and in her design she was undoubtedly successful until the reading public was educated to demand better things.
On [Transcriber's note: sic] exception, however, to the customary conventionality of Mrs. Haywood's heroines ought to be noted. Ordinarily the novelist accepted the usual conception of man the pursuer and woman the victim, but sometimes instead of letting lovely woman reap the consequences of her folly after the fashion of Goldsmith's celebrated lyric, she violated romantic tradition by making her disappointed heroines retire into self-sufficient solitude, defying society. In real life the author of these stories was even more uncompromising. Far from pining in obscurity after her elopement from her husband, she continued to exist in the broad light of day, gaining an independent living by the almost unheard of occupation (as far as women were concerned) of writing. If she was blighted, she gave no indication of the fact. Something of the same defiant spirit actuated the unfortunate Belinda and Cleomira of "The British Recluse" (1722).
Belinda, a young lady of fortune in Warwickshire, comes to London on business and meets at her lodging-house a mysterious fair recluse. Imagining that their lots may be somewhat akin, she induces the retired beauty to relate the history of her misfortunes.
Cleomira upon her father's death is removed from the court to the country by a prudent mother. She does not take kindly to housewifery, and languishes until friends persuade her mother to let her attend a ball. There she meets the glorious Lysander, and in spite of her mother's care, runs away to join him in London. Her ruin and desertion inevitably follow. The sight of a rival in her place makes her frantically resolve to die by poison, but the apothecary gives her only a harmless opiate. Thinking herself dying, she sends a last letter to her faithless lover. When she awakes and hears how indifferently he has received the report of her death, she at length overcomes her unhappy passion, and retires from the world.
Belinda then relates how her marriage with the deserving Worthly was postponed by her father's death. In the interim the captivating Sir Thomas Courtal has occasion to render her a slight service at the overturn of her coach, and fires her with a passion which her mild esteem for Worthly is too weak to overcome. Courtal perceives and encourages her fondness, though he poses as Worthly's friend. She gives him an assignation in a wood, where she is saved from becoming a victim to his lust only by the timely arrival of her true admirer. In the duel that ensues Worthly falls, Courtal flees, and a little later Belinda goes to London in hopes of seeing him. At the playhouse she is only too successful in beholding him in a box accompanied by his wife and mistress. From the gossip of her friends she learns that his real name is Lord——, and from one of the ladies she hears such stories of his villainy that she can no longer doubt him to be a monster.
Worthly, meanwhile, has recovered from his wound and weds Belinda's sister. Lysander and Courtal prove to be in reality the same bland villain, the inconstant Bellamy. His two victims, sympathizing in their common misfortune, agree to retire together to a remote spot where they can avoid all intercourse with the race of men. "And where a solitary Life is the effect of Choice, it certainly yields more solid Comfort, than all the publick Diversions which those who are the greatest Pursuers of them can find."
The same admirable sentiment was shared by the surviving heroine of "The Double Marriage: or, the Fatal Release" (1726), who after witnessing a signal demonstration of the perfidy of man, resolves to shun for ever the false sex.
Dazzled by the numerous accomplishments of Bellcour, the charming Alathia weds him in secret. When he finds that his father has designed to bestow his hand upon the heiress of an India merchant, he dares not confess his fault, but lets himself be carried to Plymouth to meet his intended bride. There he determines to escape from his father during a hunting party, but while passing a wood, he hears cries and rescues a fair maiden from violation. The beautiful stranger allows him to conduct her back to Plymouth, and turns out to be Mirtamene, the woman he is to marry. Though very much in love with this new beauty, Bellcour cannot relinquish the thought of Alathia without a struggle. But in fatal hesitation the time slips by, and he is finally compelled to wed a second bride. Meanwhile the deserted Alathia hears disquieting reports of her husband's conduct. In disguise as a boy she travels to Plymouth to see for herself, confronts her guilty partner, and after hearing his confession, stabs herself. Overcome by remorse and love, Bellcour imitates her, while Mirtamene "warn'd by the example of Bellcour, that Interest, Absence, or a new Passion, can make the most seeming constant Lover false, took a Resolution ever to contemn and hate that betraying Sex to which she owed her Misfortune and the Sight of such a Disaster as she had beheld in Alathia."
Not content to retire in disgust from the world, Glicera, the victim of fickle man in "The City Jilt" (1726) determines to retaliate upon the lover who has ruined and abandoned her when the death of her father left her without a fortune or a protector. To secure her revenge she encourages the advances of a senile alderman, Grubguard by name, whom she takes infinite delight in deceiving by the help of an ingenious confidant. Meanwhile an unfortunate lawsuit and the extravagances of his wife have ruined the false Melladore, who is obliged to mortgage his estate to Grubguard. Glicera obtains the deeds from the amorous alderman, and then sends him packing. Melladore is forced to beg of her sufficient funds to purchase a commission and later dies in battle. With the fortune she has won from her various lovers Glicera retires from the world and henceforth shuns the society of men.
In these three tales Mrs. Haywood followed the guidance of her own experience when it ran counter to the traditions of romance. The betrayed heroine ought to have died, or at least to have been immured in a convent to suffer a living death, but instead of acquiescing in their fate, Belinda and Cleomira, Mirtamene, and Glicera defy the world, and in the last case prove that the worm may turn.
Among the works of her first decade of authorship a few effusions in which Mrs. Haywood has succeeded to a degree in motivating, characterizing, or analyzing the passions of her characters, must be exempted from the general charge of commonplaceness. The first of these is "Idalia: or, the Unfortunate Mistress" (1724), the story of a young Venetian beauty—like Lasselia, her charms can only be imagined not described—whose varied amorous adventures carry her over most of Italy.
She is sought by countless suitors, among them the base Florez, whom her father promptly forbids the house. Idalia's vanity is piqued at the loss of a single adorer, and more from perverseness than from love she continues to correspond with him. He makes no further use of her condescension than to boast of her favors, until at the command of his patron, Don Ferdinand, he induces Idalia to make an assignation with him. Ferdinand meets her and not without difficulty at length effects her ruin. Her lover's friend, Henriquez, in conducting her to a place of safety in Padua, becomes himself the victim of her charms, quarrels with Ferdinand, and slays him and is slain. Henriquez' brother, Myrtano, next succeeds as Idalia's adorer, but learning that he is about to make an advantageous marriage, she secretly decamps. In her flight the very guide turns out to be a noble lover in disguise. When she escapes from him in a ship bound for Naples, the sea-captain pays her crude court, but just in time to save her from his embraces the ship is captured by Barbary corsairs—commanded by a young married couple. Though the heroine is in peasant dress, she is treated with distinction by her captors. Her history moves them to tears, and they in turn are in the midst of relating to her the involved story of their courtship, when the vessel is wrecked by a gale. Borne ashore on a plank, Idalia is succored by cottagers, and continues her journey in man's clothes. She is loved by a lady, and by the lady's husband, who turns out to be her dear Myrtano. Their felicity is interrupted by the jealousy of Myrtano's wife, who appeals to the Pope and forces the lovers to separate by his order. Idalia leads a miserable life, persecuted by all the young gallants of Rome. One day she sees Florez, the first cause of all her misfortunes, pass the window, and with thoughts bent on revenge sends him a billet, which he carries to his master. Myrtano keeps the appointment, muffled in a cloak, and Idalia stabs him by mistake. Overcome by remorse, she dies by the same knife.
The motivation of the heroine at the beginning of the story, as Miss Morgan has pointed out,[13]is more elaborate than usual in Haywoodian romance. To show a young girl's vanity teasing her into an intrigue required a more delicate appreciation of the passions than the stock situations in love stories afforded. Obliged to draw upon her own resources, Mrs. Haywood handled the incidents with a niceness that could hardly have been expected from the author of "Love in Excess." Her sense forvraisemblanceprotected her from many absurdities, though not from all. For instance, when Idalia to preserve herself from the importunities of Ferdinand employs the same threat of stabbing herself that Clarissa Harlowe in similar circumstances holds over Lovelace, the Italian heroine very naturally tries first to stab her seducer. But realism vanishes when Idalia begins her romantic flight from place to place and from lover to lover. The incidents of romance crowd fast around her. When in man's clothes she is loved by a woman who takes her for what she seems, and by the woman's husband who knows her for what she is, the reader cannot help recalling a similar Gordian love-knot in Sidney's "Arcadia." Perhaps the only convincing detail in the latter part of the book is the heroine's miserable end. But although the sentiments of the characters are reported in concealed blank verse that smacks of theatrical rant, though the absurd Oriental digressions, the disguises, the frequent poisonings, and fortunate accidents all detract from the naturalness and plausibility of the tale, yet one cannot deny the piece occasional merits, which if smothered in extravagances, are hopeful signs of a coming change. The very excess of strained and unnatural incidents indicates that the popular palate was becoming cloyed; for a time the writers of fiction attempted to stimulate it by spicing the dish, but when the limit of mordancy was reached, a new diet became imperative.
Though in no sense a soothing draught for the overstrained sensibilities of romance readers, "The Fatal Secret: or, Constancy in Distress" (1724) nevertheless represents a valuable part of Mrs. Haywood's contribution to the technique of the novel. Few of her works indicate more clearly her power to display the operations of passion dominating a young and innocent heart.
When the story opens, Anadea is a heart-free maid of sixteen, better educated than most young girls, and chiefly interested in her studies. Fearing to leave her unprovided for, her father urges her to marry, and she, though inclined to a single life, returns a dutiful answer, begging him to direct her choice. He fixes upon the worthy Chevalier de Semar, and bids her prepare for the wedding.
"The Time which the necessary Preparations took up, Anadea pass'd in modelling her Soul, as much as possible, to be pleas'd with the State for which she was intended.—The Chevalier had many good Qualities, and she endeavoured to add to them in Imagination a thousand more. Never did any Woman take greater Pains to resist the Dictates of Desire, than she did to create them …yet she had it not in her Power to feel any of those soft Emotions, those Impatiencies for his Absence, those tender Thrillings in his Presence, nor any of those agreeable Perplexities which are the unfailing Consequences of Love …and she began, at length, to lay the Blame on her own want of Sensibility, and to imagine she had not a Heart fram'd like those of other Women."
At the house of a friend Anadea meets the Count de Blessure and feels the starts of hitherto unsuspected passion. Beside this new lover the Chevalier appears as nought. Her mind is racked by an alternation of hope and despair.
"In Anxieties, such as hopeless Lovers feel, did the discontented Anadea pass the Night:—She could not avoid wishing, though there was not the least Room for her to imagine a Possibility of what she wish'd:—She could not help praying, yet thought those Prayers a Sin. —Her once calm and peaceful Bosom was now all Hurry and Confusion:— The Esteem which she had been long labouring to feel for the Chevalier, was now turn'd to Aversion and Disdain; and the Indifference she had for all Mankind, now converted into the most violent Passion for one …she thought she could be contended to live a single Life, and knew so little of the encroaching Nature of the Passion she had entertained, that she believed she should never languish for any greater Joy, than that she might, without a Crime, indulge Contemplation with the Idea of his Perfections; and to destroy that pleasing Theory by marrying with another …was more terrible to her than the worst of Deaths.—Confounded what to do, or rather wild that there was nothing she could do that might be of Service to her in an Exigence like this, her Mind grew all a Chaos, and the unintermitting Inquietudes of her Soul not permitting any Repose, she …had a very good Pretence to keep her Chamber, and receive no Visits."
She passes the day in tormenting perplexities, sometimes relieved by intervals of unsubstantial joy, when she fancies that her affianced may break off the match for some reason, that his sickness, an accident, or death may leave her free to wed Blessure. In imagination she pictures to herself happy meetings with her lover, and even repeats their conversation. Then recollecting her true situation, she lapses into real woe and bitterness of heart. The Count, however, has been deeply affected by her charms, and though he learns that she is engaged to De Semar, he sends her an appealing letter to discover whether the match is the result of choice or duty. Upon the receipt of this billet the soul of Anadea is distracted between the impulses of love and the dictates of prudence. Finally she writes a discreet, but not too severe reply, intimating that her choice is due more to duty than to inclination. Naturally the Count protests vehemently against her sacrificing herself to a man for whom she cares nothing, vows that the day of her wedding with De Semar shall be his last upon earth, and entreats a meeting.
"What now became of the enamour'd Anadea? How was it possible for aHeart so prepossessed as hers, to hold out in a Reserve which was verynear breaking the Strings which held it—… Yet still theConsequences that might attend this Meeting, for a Time repelled theDictates of her Passion.—But it was no more than a faint Struggle;Love! all-conquering, all-o'er-powering Love! triumphed over everyother Consideration! and she consented to his and her own impatientWishes."
Under the pretence of a change of air she goes to a friend's house at Versailles, where Blessure secretly weds her. After a short period of felicity, they are betrayed by an officious maid. Blessure kills the Chevalier, but is himself wounded and cast into prison. His father secures a pardon by promising the king's mistress that the Count shall marry her daughter, but Blessure remains constant to Anadea, though keeping his marriage a secret for fear of infuriating his father. He is sent away by his displeased parent to learn the virtue of obedience, while Anadea retires to St. Cloud to await her husband's return. There the story ends in an unexpected tragedy of incest and blood.
The back-stairs intrigues and the sensational horrors which to the majority of Mrs. Haywood's readers doubtless seemed the chief attraction of the story are not different from the melodramatic features of countless other amatory tales, French and English. But when for a dozen pages the author seeks to discover and explain the motives of her characters both by impersonal comment and by the self-revelation of letters, she is making a noteworthy step—even if an unconscious one— toward the Richardsonian method of laying bare the inner natures of ordinary people. She has here pursued the analysis of character as an end in itself, for in "The Fatal Secret" there is no hint of disguised scandal, nor any appeal to the pruriency of degenerate readers. Sensational in the extreme the story is, but nevertheless the progress of the narrative is delayed while the sentiments of the heroine are examined in the minutest detail. While better known romancers exploited chiefly the strange and surprising adventures (other than amorous) of their characters, or used thevoyage imaginairefor the purposes of satire, Eliza Haywood and her female colleagues stimulated the popular taste for romances of the heart. In trying to depict the working of intense human passions they rendered a distinct service to the development of English fiction.
The story of "The Mercenary Lover" (1726) involved, besides the ability to body forth emotion, considerable power to show a gradual degradation in the character of one of the heroines.
The avaricious Clitander gains the moiety of a fortune by marrying the young, gay Miranda, but cannot rest without securing to himself the portion of the elder sister as well. Althea's thoughtful and less volatile nature has hitherto resisted the assaults of love, but her insidious brother-in-law undermines her virtue by giving her wanton books and tempting her with soft speeches until she yields to his wishes. When he attempts to make her sign a deed of gift instead of a will to provide for their child, she discovers his treachery and flees to the country. By playing upon her tenderness he coaxes her back and poisons her. Miranda is fully informed of her husband's villainy, but contents herself with removing from the house. Thus Clitander loses not only his sister-in-law's, but his wife's fortune as well, and is completely unmanned by remorse and apprehension.
The contrast between the characters of the gay and thoughtless wife and the pensive, pure-minded girl is skilfully managed, and the various steps in the downward course of Althea's nature are exhibited in detail. Like Anadea in "The Fatal Secret" she retires to her chamber not to sleep, but to indulge in the freedom of her thoughts, which are poured forth at length to let the reader into the secrets of her passion-ridden bosom. To reveal character in action was beyond the limit of Eliza Haywood's technique; and once the story is well under way, Althea becomes as colorless as only a heroine of romance can be. But the author's effort to differentiate the female characters before the action begins, and to make a portion of the plot turn upon a psychological change in one of them shows that even sensation-loving readers were demanding a stricter veracity of treatment than had hitherto been necessary.
But perhaps the most careful interlocking of character and event to be found among these embryo novels is contained in "The Life of Madam De Villesache. Written by a Lady, who was an Eye-witness of the greatest part of her Adventures, and faithfully Translated from her French Manuscript. By Mrs. Eliza Haywood" (1727). Since no original source for this story has come to light, we may probably assume that the French manuscript was a complete fabrication on the part of the English author. At any rate, the tale was one of passion and intrigue such as she delighted to compose.
Henrietta, daughter of a certain Duke, grows up in obscure circumstances to be a miracle of beauty. When her father comes to carry her to court, her rustic lover, Clermont, pleads so effectually that she consents to a secret union with him. In the glare of the court she half forgets her country husband until too fatally reminded of him by being sought in marriage by the Marquis of Ab——lle. Her attempts at evasion are vain, and rather than face her father's anger, she permits herself to be married a second time. She has not long enjoyed her new rank when Clermont, whom she has informed of her step, appears to reproach her and to claim his rights. Still irresolute, she persuades him by tears and prayers not to expose her perfidy, and secretly admits him to a husband's privileges. In due time the pair are caught by the Marquis, and to avoid his rage confess their prior marriage. Clermont is thrown into prison, where he dies not without suspicion of poison. Henrietta retires to convent, but the Duke, her father, in order to gain the Marquis's estate for her unborn infant, manages to stifle the evidence of her first marriage. Enraged that he cannot obtain a divorce, the Marquis resolves to be revenged upon his perjured wife. He intercepts her coach in a wood outside of Paris and brutally murders her. The Duke orders her magnificently buried. Although nothing against the Marquis can be proved, he is not allowed to escape the vengeance of heaven, but goes mad and in a lucid interval just before death confesses his crimes.
The weakness and irresolution of the heroine are made the pivot of each turning point in the plot. When she yields to her lover's entreaties to consummate a hasty marriage; when fear of her father's displeasure induces her to keep their union a secret; when her love of luxurious grandeur at court persuades her to contract a more exalted match; when her terror of Clermont forces her into a shameless expedient for the sake of mollifying his anger; and when after her exposure by her husband, the Marquis, she brazens out her trial in hopes of maintaining the splendor of her rank and fortune, she is welding link by link the chain of circumstance that draws her to ultimate disaster. She is by no means a simple heroine motivated by the elementary passions; instead she is constantly swayed by emotions and desires of the most diverse and complex nature. After her first taste of court life she learns to look back on her husband's rusticity with a sort of contempt, and to regret her precipitate action.
"Not that she hated Clermont; on the contrary, she had yet very great Remains of her former Passion for him, whenever she reflected on the Endearments which had past between them: but then she depis'd the Meanness of his Extraction, and the Thoughts that she had put him in possession of a Title, which gave him the Power, whenever he pleas'd to exert it, of calling her from the present Grandeur of her State, and obliging her to live with him in a mean Retirement; made all Desires instigated by her Affection, immediately give way to that new Idol of her Wishes, Greatness! And she more ardently endeavour'd to find some Stratagem to prevent him from ever seeing her again, than she had formerly pray'd in the Simplicity and Innocence of her Affections, never to be separated from him." (p. 14).
When an ambitious marriage is proposed, her first horror at the thought of deserting her country husband yields to a sort of resignation when she persuades herself of the necessity of the step. And when she considers the riches, title, and agreeable person of the Marquis, she almost disdains herself for hesitating to prefer him to Clermont. Her life is the tragedy of a soul too indolent to swim against the current of events. Mrs. Haywood managed to give extraordinary vividness and consistency to the character of the vacillating Henrietta by making the plot depend almost entirely upon the indecision of the heroine. Consequently none of the author's women are as sharply defined as this weak, pleasure-loving French girl. The character drawing, though too much subordinated to the sensational elements in the story, is nevertheless distinct and true to life.
Most probably, however, the few attempts at analysis of character or interrelation of character and plot were of little concern both to the author of emotional fiction and to her readers. The romancer's purpose was not to reveal an accurate picture of life and manners, but to thrill the susceptible bosom by scenes of tender love, amorous rapture, or desperate revenge. The department of sensationalism especially exploited by women writers and generally allowed to be most suited to their genius is sufficiently indicated by the words typographically emphasized on the title-page of one of Mrs. Haywood's few essays. "Reflections on the Various Effects of LOVE, According to the contrary Dispositions of the Persons on whom it operates. Illustrated with a great many Examples of the good and bad Consequences of that PASSION. Collected from the best Ancient and Modern HISTORIES. Intermix'd with the latest AMOURS and INTRIGUES of Persons of the First Rank of both Sexes, of a certain Island adjacent to the Kingdom of Utopia. Written by the Author of The Mercenary Lover, and the Memoirs of the said Island. Love is not sin, but where 'tis sinful Love. Never before made Publick." To any contemporary connoisseur of hectic literature such a feast of Love, Passion, Histories, Amours, and Intrigues as this, offered in the shop of N. Dobb in the Strand for the small price of one shilling, must have been irresistible. No less moving was the appeal of Eliza's fiction to such Biddy Tipkins and Polly Honeycombes as delighted in a tale of amorous adventure, particularly if it was set in the glittering atmosphere of the court. A typical story of intrigues among the great is "Lasselia: or, the Self-Abandoned" (1723).
The heroine, niece of Madame de Montespan, finding herself in danger of becoming her aunt's rival in the affections of Louis XIV, goes secretly into the country to visit her friends M. and Mme Valier, where she falls in love with De L'Amye, a married gentleman. Summoned back to court by the amorous monarch, Lasselia chooses rather to flee from the protection of her friends in the disguise of a pilgrim, and led by lucky chance casts herself on the protection of her lover, who conveys her to a country inn and there maintains her for some time to their mutual felicity. Mile Douxmourie, once affianced to De L'Amye but jilted by him, accidentally discovers the pair and immediately communicates with the gallant's wife, who with the Valiers soon appears to reclaim the recreants. The wife rages at her husband, he at the perfidious Douxmourie, while Lasselia offers to stab herself. By the good offices of her friends, however, the girl is persuaded to enter a nunnery where she becomes a pattern of piety. De L'Amye is reconciled to his wife.
In the first few pages of the story the author makes a noteworthy attempt to create an atmosphere of impending disaster. When De L'Amye first meets the heroine, three drops of blood fall from his nose and stain the white handkerchief in her hand, and the company rallies him on this sign of an approaching union, much to his wife's discomfiture. The accident and her yet unrecognized love fill Lasselia's mind with uneasy forebodings. "She wou'd start like one in a Frenzy, and cry out, Oh! it was not for nothing that those ominous Drops of Blood fell from him on my Handkerchief!—It was not for nothing I was seiz'd with such an unusual Horror—Nor is it in vain, that my Soul shrinks, and seems to dread a second Interview!—They are all, I fear, too sure Predictions of some fatal Consequence." These gloomy thoughts at length give way to an ecstasy of despairing love, and when her affection is reciprocated, to a series of passionate letters and poems, which indeed make necessary the author's apology for the "too great Warmth" of the style.
Since the ultimate disaster of adventurous heroines was regarded as a sop to moral readers, Mrs. Haywood frequently failed to gratify her audience with a happy ending, but occasionally a departure from strict virtue might be condoned, provided it took place in a country far removed from England. The scene of "The Padlock: or, No Guard without Virtue"[14] was appropriately laid in Spain.
Don Lepidio of Seville, by his jealous conduct, completely alienates the affections of his young and beautiful wife, Violante. She finally writes a reply to the earnest entreaties of an unknown lover, and though filled with apprehension at seeing her letter carried off by an ugly black slave, agrees to meet him. Don Honorius, for it was he who had assumed the disguise of the slave, proves to be the wonder of his sex. He persuades her to elope to the house of one of his relations, and after Lepidio has secured a divorce, marries her with great felicity.
That novels of intrigue, even without the tinsel of court dress and the romance of French or Spanish setting, were acceptable to Eliza Haywood's public is shown by the two parts of "The Masqueraders: or, Fatal Curiosity" (1724-5), which in the most luscious language of passion narrate the philanderings of a "charming Rover" called Dorimenus, "whose real Name, for some Reasons, I shall conceal." London masquerades, as the title indicates, play a large part in the plot. A more sprightly tale, though still of the unedifying sort, is "Fantomina: or, Love in a Maze. Being the Secret History of an Amour between two Persons of Condition." The story is so fantastic that it can hardly be suspected of having any connection with an actual occurrence, but the novelist was not unaware of the advertising value of hinted scandal.
A young lady of distinguished birth, beauty, wit, and spirit for a frolic goes masked to the theatre, and there falling in love with the agreeable Beauplaisir, begins an intrigue with him. When his ardor cools, she lures him on again under a different disguise, and thus manages four severalliaisonssuccessively as Fantomina, Celia the Chambermaid, the Widow Bloomer, and the fair Incognita. Meanwhile she meets her lover frequently in public assemblies without ever arousing his suspicion of her double, or rather manifold identity. But at length she is unable to disguise the effects of her imprudence, her gallant ungallantly refuses to marry her, and the fair intriguer is packed off to a convent in France.
Though the story cannot pretend to support the cause of morality, the style of this piece is unusually clear and straightforward, sometimes suitably periphrastic, but never inflated. The passion described is that of real life ungarnished by romance. Only greater refinement was needed to make the entertainment fit for ladies and gentlemen.
The cardinal defect of some of Mrs. Haywood's romances-in-little lay, however, in a romantic over-refinement of the passions rather than in a too vigorous animalism. Full of the most delicate scruples is "The Surprise: or, Constancy Rewarded" (1724),[15] appropriately dedicated to the Sir Galahad of comedy, Sir Richard Steele. The story relates how Euphemia discovers that the seemingly faithless Bellamant has, in reality, abandoned her on the day set for their marriage because he was unwilling to have her share in the loss of his fortune. She, meanwhile, has inherited a convenient sum, redeems him from his creditors, and after practicing a little mystification to test his constancy, leads him to the altar. Few of Mrs. Haywood's novels are more entirely moral or more essentially dull.
Though the scene of "The Rash Resolve: or, the Untimely Discovery" (1724) is laid in Porto Rico and in Spain, the romancer took little advantage of her opportunity to introduce the usual "cloak and sword" incidents of Spanish fiction. Instead her tale is one of generous love and melting pathos more characteristic of the romance than of thenovellaor its successors.
The Porto Rican heiress, Emanuella, is defrauded of her fortune by her guardian, Don Pedro, and imprisoned in his house to force her to marry his son, Don Marco. That generous lover helps her to escape to Madrid, and to emphasize the truth of her claims against his wily father, falls upon his sword in the presence of the court. Emanuella's title to her fortune cleared by this extraordinary measure, she continues to reside at the house of Don Jabin, whose daughter, Berillia, she saves from a monastery by making up the deficiency in her dowry. The ungrateful girl, however, resents Emanuella's disapproval of her foppish lover, and resolves to be revenged upon her benefactress. She, therefore, forwards Emanuella's affair with Emilius until the lovers are hopelessly compromised; then taking advantage of the loss of the lady's fortune at sea, blackens her character to Emilius and provokes him to desert her. The abandoned Emanuella enters a convent.
Emilius is challenged by Octavio as a rival in the love of Julia, and though he had never before heard of the lady, he soon becomes her lover in fact, and eventually marries her. Emanuella escapes from the nunnery and wanders to a little provincial town where she bears a son to Emilius. Berillia, who has been rusticated to a village near by in consequence of her amour, encounters her unfortunate friend by chance and runs away from her duenna to join her. She persuades Emanuella to draw a large sum on Don Jabin, robs her, and goes to join her gallant. The injured lady supports her child by mean drudgery until by chance she meets Emilius and his wife, who do all they can to comfort her. But worn out by her afflictions, she dies of a broken heart, leaving her son to be adopted by his father.
Dr. Johnson might with equal truth have said to Mrs. Haywood as to the author of the "Memoirs of Miss Sydney Biddulph," "I know not, Madam, that you have a right …to make your readers suffer so much." Even the pathetic "History of Jemmy and Jenny Jessamy" has nothing to surpass the train of woes exhibited in this earlier tale.
In the same "soft" style are two novels, "The Unequal Conflict: or, Nature Triumphant" (1725) and its sequel, "Fatal Fondness: or, Love its own Opposer." The plot begins with the writer's favorite situation.
Philenia, affianced to Coeurdemont, falls in love with Fillamour. By the help of a confidant, Antonia, the lovers are enabled to arrange a plan of escape. On the eve of the wedding Fillamour breaks into the house and, leaving his servants to bind and gag the father, flies immediately to his soul's adored.
"He threw himself on his knees, as he approach'd the dear mistress of his soul, and with a voice and manner all soft and love-inspiring.—Now madam, said he, if the adoring Fillamour is not unworthy the glory of your deliverance, I come to offer it, and to assure you, that not only this, but the service of my whole future life is entirely devoted to you. The innocent Philenia had not presently the power of replying, the different emotions of love, and shame, fear, and joy, made such a confusion in her sentiments, that she could only look the meanings of them all: Fillamour, however, found enough in this mute language to make him know, he was in as fair a way of happiness, as he cou'd wish; and returning her glances with others as languishing, as the most melting longing love cou'd teach the loveliest eyes in the world, they continued, for some moments, thus transmitting souls—" until their confidant hurries them out of the house.
After the elopement Fillamour is distracted by the opposing motives of love and interest. To marry Philenia means ruin, for his ambitious uncle, who has proposed an advantageous marriage to him, would never forgive him for a love match. The innocent cause of his distress finally discovers his perplexity and agrees to live a single life until they can marry without loss of fortune. In this state of affairs "their love seem'd to be a copy of that pure and immaterial passion, which angels regard each other with, and, which we are allow'd to hope shall be our portion, when, shaking off our earth, we meet in a happier world, where we are to live and love forever." The lovers' paradise is invaded by Philenia's father, who carries her home and locks her up more closely than before. In a short time she has the shocking intelligence that Fillamour has married according to the wishes of his worldly uncle. She still remains constant to him, but "the remainder of her yet surprising adventures," remarks the author, "and those of Antonia and Coeurdemont must be told another time, having good reason to doubt my reader will be tir'd, when I am so myself."
Eliza was perhaps the first to recover from the fatigue, for in a little more than two months the continuation, costing sixpence more than the first instalment, was offered to her readers.
After making his marriage ofconvenanceFillamour again pays his court to Philenia, and seizing a lucky moment to surprise her on her daily walk, half by persuasion, half by force, carries his point. But before they can meet a second time she is carried off by a gang of villains, who mistake her for another woman. The languishing Misimene, who has pursued Fillamour into the country in man's clothes, consoles him for the loss of his first love. Upon his return to town he finds that his wife has fled to join her lover. Meanwhile Philenia's honor is preserved by timely shipwreck of the vessel in which the ravishers are carrying her off. Washed ashore on the inevitable plank, she supports herself among the fisher folk by weaving nets until after a year's toil she is relieved by Antonia and Coeurdemont, now happily married. The relation of their adventures occupies some pages. Philenia comes back to town to find her lover weltering in his blood, stabbed by the jealous Misimene. Believing him dead, she seizes the same sword, plunges it into her bosom, and instantly expires. Misimene goes into frenzies, and Fillamour alone recovers to live out a life of undying grief.
"Thus was the crime of giving way to an unwarrantable passion, punish'd in the persons of Philenia and Misimene, and that of perjury and ingratitude in Fillamour; while the constancy of Antonia, and the honour of Coeurdemont, receiv'd the reward their virtues merited, and they continued, to their lives end, great and shining examples of conjugal affection."
Apparently Philenia's adventures were somewhat too improbable even for the taste of readers steeped in melodramatic romances, for if we may judge by the few copies that have survived, these effusions did not enjoy a wide popularity. But not to be discouraged by failure, Mrs. Haywood soon produced another extravagant and complicated romance, entitled "Cleomelia: or, the Generous Mistress. Being the Secret History of a Lady Lately arriv'd from Bengall" (1727). The scene might equally well have been laid in the Isle of Wight, but Bengal on the title-page doubtless served to whet the curiosity of readers.
Gasper, secretly affianced to Cleomelia, is conveyed out of Bengal by an avaricious father to prevent him from marrying, and she, believing him unfaithful, gives her hand to the generous Heartlove. Informed of the truth by a letter from her lover announcing his speedy return, she boards a ship bound for England, leaving her husband and lover to fight a duel in which Heartlove falls. Meanwhile the heroine is shipwrecked, finds a new suitor in the ship's captain, and hearing of her husband's death and of Gasper's marriage to a Spanish lady, marries the captain. Hardly has he departed on his first voyage, when the still faithful Gasper returns to claim her, only to find her again the bride of another. In despair he goes to England, and when her second husband is lost at sea, she follows to reward his constancy.
Cleomelia's generosity does not seem to be as notable as the sub-title would indicate, but the story was evidently intended to illustrate virtues exalted to a high romantic level.
With the same end in view Mrs. Haywood attempted an even loftier flight into the empyrean of romance, with the result that "Philidore and Placentia: or, L 'Amour trop Delicat" (1727) is more conventional and stilted than any other work from her pen. It imitates closely the heroic French romances, both in the inflated style and elaborate regard for the tender passion, and in the structure of the plot with little histories of the principal characters interspersed at intervals throughout the story. In substance the tale is simply a mosaic of romantic adventures, though some of the hero's wanderings in the desert after being marooned by pirates and especially his encounter with the "tyger" sound like a faint echo of "Captain Singleton" or of Captain John Smith's "True Travels."
The noble Philidore falls in love with the rich and beautiful Placentia, but as his estate is no match for hers, he contents himself with entering her service in disguise and performing menial offices for the pleasure of seeing her. One day she hears him singing in a grotto, and is charmed by the graceful replies he makes to her questions. A little later he saves her from robbers at the expense of a slight wound. She offers to make him groom of her chamber, but fearful of being recognized, he declines. Finally she lays her fortune at his feet, but he has too much generosity to accept the offer. Leaving a letter revealing his true rank and his poverty, he sails for Persia. Some time later, the return of Placentia's long lost brother, by depriving her of her fortune, puts her on a level with her lover.
Philidore is captured by pirates and with eleven others set on shore on a desert strand. Three of the little company reach civilization. After recuperating their strength, they set out for Persia overland, but a tiger deprives Philidore of his two companions. A little later he rescues an unknown youth from three assailants, but not before the stranger has been seriously wounded. A passing traveller carries them to the castle of a Persian nobleman. There Philidore waits with the utmost impatience for the wounded man to recover strength enough to relate his story, but this, as also the misfortunes, perplexities, and dangers to which the despairing passion of the enamoured Placentia occasioned her to reduce herself, and the catastrophe of Philidore's surprising fate, must be told in a Second Part.
Our hero is kindly received by his uncle in Persia, who soon dies and leaves him sole heir of an enormous fortune. He is now Placentia's equal in wealth as well as rank, and immediately embarks for England. Driven into Baravat by contrary winds, he is moved to ransom a female captive on hearing of her grief at her hard fate, but what is his surprise when the fair slave proves to be Placentia. "Kisses, embraces, and all the fond endearments of rewarded passion made up for their want of speech— in their expressive looks, and eager graspings, the violence of their mutual flame was more plainly demonstrated, than it could have been by the greatest elegance of language—those of the Persians that stood by, who understood not English, easily perceived, not only that they were lovers, but also that they were so to the most unbounded height of tender passion."
Placentia relates how she had eluded her brother and set sail to rejoin her lover, how she had been saved from the arms of the brutal ship's captain by a timely attack of pirates, and how, sold to a Moslem merchant and still annoyed by the attentions of the captain, she had abandoned all thoughts of life till redeemed by Philidore's generosity.
With Placentia, her maid, and young Tradewell, the maid's lover, ransomed, Philidore sails blissfully to England. But upon landing Placentia becomes suddenly cold to him. He forces his way into her house, and finds that her brother is the young stranger whose life he had saved in Persia. Meanwhile Placentia, whose fortune is now no match for Philidore's, flees to parts unknown, leaving a letter conjuring him to forget her. After a long search the brother and lover find her place of concealment, and the former removes her scruples by settling a large estate upon her. "Nothing could be more splendid than the celebration of their nuptials; and of their future bliss, the reader may better judge by their almost unexampled love, their constancy, their generosity and nobleness of soul, than by any description I am able to give of it."
"Philidore and Placentia" is one of the few novels by Mrs. Haywood that do not pretend to a moral purpose. Realism needed some justification, for realism at the time almost invariably meant a picture of vice and folly, and an author could not expose objectionable things except in the hope that they would lessen in fact as they increased in fiction. But in spite of the disapproval sometimes expressed for fables on the ground of their inherent untruth, idealistic romances were generally justified as mirrors of all desirable virtues. Pious Mrs. Penelope Aubin wrote no other kind of fiction, though she sometimes admitted a deep-dyed villain for the sake of showing his condign punishment at the hands of providence. It was perhaps due to the sale of this lady's novels, largely advertised toward the end of 1727 and apparently very successful, that Mrs. Haywood was encouraged to desert her favorite field of exemplary novels showing the dangerous effects of passion for an excursion into pure romance. That she found the attempt neither congenial nor profitable may be inferred from the fact that it was not repeated.
If the highly imaginary romances suffered from an excess of delicacy, certain other tales by Mrs. Haywood overleaped decency as far on the other side. The tendency of fiction before Richardson was not toward refinement. The models, French and Spanish, which writers in England found profit in imitating, racked sensationalism to the utmost degree by stories of horrible and perverted lust. All the excitement that could be obtained from incest, threatened, narrowly averted, or actually committed, was offered to eager readers. Usually, as in Defoe's "Moll Flanders" or Fielding's "Tom Jones," ignorance of birth was an essential element in the plot. A story of this type in which the catastrophe is prevented by a timely discovery of the hero's parentage, is "The Force of Nature: or, the Lucky Disappointment" (1725).
Felisinda, daughter of Don Alvario of Valladolid, falls in love with a dependent of her father's named Fernando, who returns her passion, but when by a dropped letter she reveals their mutual tenderness, her father becomes exceedingly disordered and threatens to marry her out of hand to Don Carlos, who had long solicited the match. That generous lover, however, refuses to marry her against her will. The disappointment proves mortal to Don Alvario, who leaves his estate to Felisinda and Fernando equally, provided they do not marry each other. Felisinda is committed to the care of an abbess named Berinthia, but by the aid of a probationer, Alantha, the lovers manage to correspond. They agree that Fernando shall convert his moiety to ready money, convey it to Brussels, and there await Felisinda, whose escape he entrusts to a friend, Cleomas. Alantha, meantime, has fallen in love with Fernando, and substitutes herself for Felisinda. Cleomas in conducting the supposed mistress of his friend to the nearest port falls under the influence of her beauty and attempts to betray her, but is prevented and slain by a chance passenger, who turns out to be Carlos. He brings Alantha to a better mind, and conducts her in search of Fernando, but they discover in Brussels that he has set out again for Spain. When Fernando reaches Valladolid to inquire what has become of Cleomas and his lady, he is arrested on the charge of abducting Alantha. At the trial he is accused of having made away with her, and is sentenced to death, whereupon Berinthia, the abbess, faints, and being revived, owns him for her son by Alvario, and "in tears and blessings pours out all the mother on him." At the proper moment Carlos comes in with Alantha to prove Fernando's innocence. Felisinda rewards the constancy of Carlos, and Fernando can do no less than marry Alantha.
Incest is almost the only crime not to be found in the extraordinary series of barefaced and infamous intrigues crowded into the pages of "The Injur'd Husband: or, the Mistaken Resentment" (1723). The author naively remarks in the dedication that "The Subject of the Trifle I presume to offer, is, The Worst of Women," and she has indeed out-villained the blackest of her male villains in the character of the wicked Baroness.
The doting Baron de Tortillee marries the lascivious and extravagant Mademoiselle La Motte, who promotes the villainous Du Lache to be the instrument of her vile pleasures. After enjoying several lovers of his procuring, she fixes her affections upon the worthy Beauclair. Du Lache despairs of ensnaring him, because he is about to marry the lovely Montamour, but by a series of base expedients he manages to blacken the character of that lady in her lover's eyes, and to put the charms of the Baroness in such a light that Beauclair is at length drawn in to pay his court to her. For some time she thus successfully deludes her husband, but when the despicable La Branche openly boasts of her favors and allows some of her letters to fall into the hands of one of her numerous lovers, her perfidy is soon completely exposed. To add to her confusion she hears that the Baron, whom she had drugged into idiocy and sent into the country, has been cured by a skilful physician and is about to return. Du Lache despatches two assassins to murder him on the road, but the Baron by a lucky chance escapes the murderers, forces them to confess, and sets out to punish his guilty wife. Meanwhile Beauclair suspects that he has wronged his innocent lady and endeavors to see her, but she at first refuses to see him, and when by a ruse he gains access to her presence, will not listen to him or give him any grounds for hope. In despair he returns to Paris and meets the young Vrayment. He discovers the infamous Du Lache hiding in a convent. To save his life the wretch offers to reveal the frauds he had put in practice against Montamour, but while he is doing so, the Baron meets them, and concluding that Beauclair is in collusion with the villain, attacks them both. Beauclair disarms his antagonist and is about to return him his weapon, when Du Lache stabs the Baron in the back. Vrayment has witnessed the quarrel and summoned assistance. Beauclair and Du Lache are haled before a magistrate and are about to be condemned equally for the crime, when Vrayment reveals herself as Montamour disguised as a man, and persuades the judge that Beauclair is innocent. Du Lache and his accomplices are broken on the wheel, the Baroness takes poison, and Beauclair is united to his faithful Montamour.
In the conduct of the story the writer shows no deficiency in expressing the passions, but rather a want of measure, for thrill follows thrill so fast that the reader can hardly realize what is happening. And as if the lusts and crimes of the Baroness did not furnish enough sensational incidents, the tender romance of Beauclair and Montamour is superadded. The hero is a common romantic type, easily inconstant, but rewarded above his merits by a faithful mistress. A woman disguised as a man was a favorite device with Mrs. Haywood as well as with other writers of love stories, but one need read only the brazen Mrs. Charke's memoirs or Defoe's realistic "Moll Flanders" to discover that it was a device not unheard of in real life. The actual occurrence of such disguises, however, made no difference to the female writers of fiction. Anything soul-stirring, whether from romances or from plays, was equally grist to their mills.
In seeking for the most dramaticdénouementssensational romancers were not long in perceiving the suspense that could be produced by involving the chief characters in a trial for their lives. Mrs. Behn had by that means considerably protracted the interest in "The Fair Jilt: or, the Amours of Prince Tarquin and Miranda" (1688), and Mrs. Haywood, following her example, succeeded in giving a last stimulus to the jaded nerves of the readers of "The Force of Nature" and "The Injur'd Husband." And finally the title-page of an anonymous work attributed to her indicates that the struggling authoress was not insensible to the popular demand for romances of roguery. A prospective buyer might have imagined that he was securing a criminal biography in "Memoirs of the Baron de Brosse, Who was Broke on the Wheel in the Reign of Lewis XIV. Containing, An Account of his Amours. With Several Particulars relating to the Wars in those Times," but the promise of the title was unfulfilled, for Mrs. Haywood was no journalist to make capital out of a malefactor's exit from the world. The whole book is a chronicle of the Baron's unsuccessful pursuit of a hard-hearted beauty named Larissa, mingled with little histories of the Baron's rivals, of a languishing Madam de Monbray, and of Larissa's mother. The fair charmer finally marries a count, and her lover, plunged into adequate despair, can barely exert himself to answer a false accusation trumped up by the revengeful Monbray. With the verdict in his favor the story ends abruptly, and the promised continuation was apparently never written. We read nothing of the wars, nor of the Baron's execution on the wheel.
Tortures, tragedies of blood, and heinous crimes added piquancy to Mrs. Haywood's love stories, but were not the normal material of her romances. Her talent was chiefly for "soft things." She preferred the novel of intrigue and passion in which the characters could be run through a breathless maze of amatory adventures, with a pause now and again to relate a digressive episode for variety's sake. Typical of this sort, the best adapted to the romancer's genius, is "The Agreeable Caledonian: or, Memoirs of Signiora di Morella, a Roman Lady, Who made her Escape from a Monastery at Viterbo, for the Love of a Scots Nobleman. Intermix'd with many other Entertaining little Histories and Adventures which presented themselves to her in the Course of her Travels." No moralizing, no romantic idealism disturbs the rapid current of events. It is a pure "cloak and sword" novel, definitely located in Italy, with all the machinery of secret assignations, escapes from convents, adventures on the road and at inns, sudden assaults, duels, seductions, and revenge characteristic of Spanish fiction.
Don Jaques di Morella determines to marry his daughter, Clementina, to a certain Cardinal, who has offered to renounce the scarlet hat for love of her. When she piques her lover by her evident unwillingness to wed, Don Jaques packs her off to a convent at Viterbo. By picking up a copy of verses Clementina becomes acquainted with Signiora Miramene, who relates the history of her correspondence with the Baron Glencairn.
Clementina becomes the instrument of the lovers, but no sooner sees the lovely North Briton than she herself is captivated. In response to her proffered affection, Glencairn manages by an extraordinary device to convey her out of the convent. In spite of the rage of Dan Jaques they escape to Sienna. The further surprising turns in their affairs to be later communicated to the public.
Still in pursuit of her lover, Clementina on Montelupe meets the funeral of a young woman who had been torn to pieces by wolves. The chief mourner proves to be Glencairn. She is hindered in an attempt to stab him and thrown into prison, where he visits her and disarms her resentment by offering to marry her. After the ceremony they proceed to Paris where each plunges into dissipation. Finally they separate, Clementina dies of a fever, and the Baron is left free to pursue his inclinations through a possible third part, which, however, was never written.
After a slumber of forty years "The Agreeable Caledonian" was reprinted, as the "Monthly Review" informs us, from a copy corrected by Mrs. Haywood not long before her death.[16] The review continues, "It is like the rest of Mrs. Haywood's novels, written in a tawdry style, now utterly exploded; the romances of these days being reduced much nearer the standard of nature, and to the manners of the living world." Realism is, indeed, far to seek in the brief but intricate tissue of incidents that made the novel of 1728. To a taste accustomed to "Sir Charles Grandison," and "Peregrine Pickle," and "The Sentimental Journey" the rehash of Eliza Haywood's novel must have seemed very far even from the manners of the world of fiction. The judgment of the "Critical Review" was still more savage in its accuracy.[17] "This is a republication of a dull, profligate Haywoodian production, in which all the males are rogues, and all the females whores, without a glimpse of plot, fable, or sentiment." In its uncompromising literalness the critic's verdict ranks with the learned Ascham's opinion of the "Morte D'Arthur,"—except that it has not been superseded. The same animadversion might be urged against Defoe's "Colonel Jacque" or "The Fortunate Mistress." If Mrs. Haywood sinned against the standards of the age to come, she was not out of touch with the spirit of her own generation.
As a writer she knew but one unfailing recipe for popularity: whatever she touched must be forthwith gilded with passion. The chiefraison d'êtrefor "The Fair Hebrew: or, a True, but Secret History of Two Jewish Ladies, Who lately resided in London" (1729) was to gratify the prejudices of anti-Semitic readers, yet it is hardly distinguishable from her sentimental love stories.
The young and gay Dorante, going to the synagogue for a lark, is tempted by the sight of a fair hand to break into the woman's apartment and to expose himself to the charms of the beautiful Kesiah. He engages her in a correspondence, but at their first interview she gives him clearly to understand that he can gain nothing from her but by marriage. Driven by his unhappy passion, he complies with her demand, and she becomes a Church of England woman. But once married, Kesiah is too proud to permit the concealment that prudence demands. Though his father is sure to disinherit them, she insists upon revealing the marriage.
Dorante entrusts his small stock of money to his wife's brother, Abimelech, in order to start him in trade. The Jew goes to Holland with a woman whom he has saved from religious murder at the hands of a Levite, and nothing further is heard from him or the money. Imprisoned by his creditors, Dorante is persuaded by his wife to sign away the entail of his estate in return for a sum of money. Thereupon she departs with the gold and a new gallant, leaving her unhappy husband to be rescued from want by the kindness, of a younger brother. After the poor solace of hearing that Kesiah and her paramour have been lost at sea, he dies of a broken heart.[18]