Lament for a lost lover

The heat was great that summer and people saw in this a reason for the spread of the plague. In the gutters the filth stank and rotted and the rats multiplied. The city was the scene of desolation; the shops closed, the streets emptied except for the pest carts and those who were dying on the cobbles. Orders were given that fires should be lighted in the streets for three days and nights in accession in the hope of destroying the rotting rubbish and purifying the air. The deaths, which in the beginning had been one thousand a week, were reaching ten thousand. The King and the Court had moved to Salisbury, but when the plague reached that town they adjourned to Oxford.

At Eversleigh we were ever on the alert. I was terrified that some harm would come to my son. Every morning, as soon as I arose, I would hurry to the nursery to assure myself that he was in perfect health.

Sir Geoffrey stayed on. We impressed on him that it would be folly to return to London just yet. He seemed very willing to agree to this and interested himself in the estate and made himself useful in several ways. He himself had estates much closer to London and he told me that he really should be there. However, it was pleasant to linger and his affairs were in the best of hands.

“It has been so pleasant here,” he went on. “I have grown so fond of the little boys.

I always wanted a boy of my own and I would have liked him to be just like Edwin.” Nothing he said could have pleased me more. He had made me see too how fortunate I was. I had lost my husband, but fate had been kind in giving me my son. What a relief it was when September came and the weather turned cold. The good news came that the number of deaths in the capital had dropped considerably. There was no doubt that the excessively hot weather had been in some respects responsible. Rain came and that was a further help and gradually parishes began to be declared free of the plague.

There was great rejoicing throughout the country and those who had left London were now eager to return.

Geoffrey went, declaring he would soon be back. We must visit i, he said. He would enjoy riding round his land and showing it to young Edwin. We missed him when he had gone, and this applied particularly to my son. We all said we must meet again soon. The kind of experience we had had was a firm foundation for friendship.

It was disconcerting to hear that ninety-seven thousand people were known to have died from the plague but, as Carleton pointed out, many deaths would not have been recorded. One hundred and thirty thousand was more like the number. It was a sobering thought.

“There is too much filth in the streets of big cities,” he said. “They are saying that the rats carry the plague and where they are this will be. We could clean up our streets and then perhaps we should not be cursed with this periodic plague.” We were all greatly relieved to have come through safely. Uncle Toby said what a delight it would be to visit London and the Court again. He was fascinated by the theatres which had improved considerably since the King had come home. “The King loves the play,” said Carleton, “and since the fashionable world will follow its king, we have improved playhouses.”

“Very different from what they were when I went away,” agreed Uncle Toby. “Though we had the apron stage then.”

“Ah,” said Carleton, “but not the proscenium arch with the window opening onto a music room and the shutters which can be open and shut, thus make a change of scene.”

“A great improvement!” agreed Toby enthusiastically. “But I’ll tell you what is best on the stage today, Carl, my boy.”

“Don’t tell me, I know,” said Carleton. And they said simultaneously: “The worn en players.”

“Think of it!” went on Uncle Toby. “We used to see a delicious creature on the stage and just as we were getting interested we’d remind ourselves that it was a boy, not the pretty lady it seemed.”

“There is nothing to compare with the real thing,” said Carleton. “The King is all for the playhouses. He thinks they make his capital gay. The people need to laugh, he says. Odds fish, they’ve been solemn enough for too long. He won’t have them taxed, although some of our ministers have tried to make it difficult for them. The answer was that the players were the King’s servants and part of his pleasure.”

“Was it right,” asked Uncle Toby, “that Sir John Coventry asked whether the King’s pleasure lay with the men or the women?”

“He did, the fool,” replied Carleton, “and for once His Majesty did not appreciate the joke. Nor did others, for Coventry was set on in Suffolk Street and ever after bears the mark of a slit nose for that bit of foolery.”

“It seems a harsh punishment for a remark which might be considered reasonable,” I put in.

“Dear Cousin, have a care,” said Carleton lightly. “What a tragedy if that charming little nose of yours should suffer the same treatment.”