The Passionate Elopement

THE meagre sun that for thirteen pallid February days had shone with no more brilliance than a rushlight stuck amid the cobwebs of a garret, poured down at last his profuse glories, and Curtain Wells woke up to a fine morning and the burden of conscious existence, with an effort all the more completely unanimous on account of its reputation as an inland Spa. Residence there implied an almost monastick ideal of regularity. Other shrines of Æsculapius, falling from their primitive purity of worship, might set up for adoration a hooped Venus or bag-wigged Cupid, but Curtain Wells would never admit so naked and misleading a pair of Immortals. Her fountains ministered to bodily ailments—Vapours, Winds, Gouts, Quinsies, Consumptions, Fevers quartan and tertian—without pretending to the power of love-philtres or the sparkle of the Castalian Spring. 'Tis true, romantick dusk or sunset candlelight might consecrate the vows of many a shepherd and shepherdess, but those stretched hours of dalliance were always understood to be the sensuous reward of a strict matutinal discipline.

Consequently Curtain Wells woke up as to a bugle-call. Casement-hangings were flung back, shutters unbarred and, wonderful to relate, an occasional window-sash creaked and subsided. A simultaneous toilet would be followed by a simultaneous visit to the cleansing springs. Drums, routs, auctions, ridottos, and masquerades did not avail to keep their votaries abed. Perchance a velvet patch would hide the wearer's secret blemish less artfully; beneath young Miss Kitcat's eyes there might be a deeper violet than the state of her health warranted; my lady Bunbutter newly arrived from scurrilous Bath might see her nose sharpen to a richer carmine point; but half-past eight o'clock would behold them all bound for the Pump Room, somewhat reticent perhaps, a little fretful even, yet completely subjugated by their self-imposed renunciation.

St. Simon's clock struck the half-hour of seven, and the birds who live tropick days in the eternal summer of chintz curtains seemed to crow remorsefully at any sluggard who was inclined longer to indulge his laziness. The sun spangled their plumage with innumerable pin-points of light until they began to glow with all the astonishing dyes of printed fabricks. They glowed and ruffled until the sluggard forsook his couch and, creeping over the chilly floor, flung them back into a day-long folded tranquillity. Here, then, is an excellent opportunity to catch a few of our fine characters unaware. Follow the guidance of my Muses and you will see hero and heroine, comedian, villain, and chorus stripped of all outward aids to beauty. You may trust the modesty of Clio and Melpomene who will certainly treat their own sex with discretion and admit you to the keyhole not a moment before it becomes your disposition of mind. Pray do not expect a wanton exhibition because you are holding on to the draperies of two pagan young women.

See that fine house in the middle of the Crescent. Mark the flambeaux guttering and sputtering into an odorous death. Note the flattened Ionick columns which lend it such an air of superiority, and the extra story, and the fat bow-windows on either side of the door. Look well at the door with its cornice of airy Cupids for ever playing Hide and Seek behind solemn urns and festoons of carven flowers.

That is the Great House where Beau Ripple lives. Do you wonder at the early hour of rising when you know that his decree was responsible for the united achievement? I cannot think you do; especially if you have read his Epigrams published by Mr. Scratch at the Sign of the Claw in Paul's Churchyard—those epigrams with razor-keen edge translated into Latin by Doctor Fumble and into Greek by the Reverend Mr. Tootell. We read how, in ancient days, tyrants beguiled their political victims with Impromptus of their own composition and at Curtain Wells it was esteemed an honour to be reprimanded in such polished prose. Mr. Ripple scorned the easy allurements of metre and, although in himself he summed up the profound artificiality of his age, he was wont to say that Verse as a form of composition possessed all the disadvantages of prose without any of the advantages.