occupying the position of governess to that daughter of Lord Kingston's who became the heroine of the tragedy in which, through the vengeance of her father, her lover lost his life. Mr. Rickman's house must, in fact, have been at the moment a favourite place of resort for all who were in sympathy with the more extreme revolutionary opinions, moral, social, and political; and from those to be met there Lord Edward was doubtless learning to apply to practical purposes the abstract theories of Whig politicians. But, drawn thither as he might be by a like interest, he can, by birth, training, and character, have had little in common with the group of clever and middle-class Bohemians of whom the circle was plainly made up. Their company would indeed have had for him the charm of novelty; but it is difficult to imagine that it offered other or more intrinsic attractions to a man of his tastes, or that among the needy literary men, the artists, and the more or less genuine political fanatics who sought Paine's society, he may not have felt himself a trifle out of place. Community of principles, like misfortune, brings together strange bed-fellows. Winning though Lord Edward was, he possessed neither brilliant talents nor deep intellectual gifts. So far as negative evidence may be accepted as proof, he rarely opened a book save for the purposes of military education, while for any indication of artistic taste it is necessary to go back to the days of Aubigny, and to that " very pretty survey" of the country round the Garonne, of which the fields, bordered with colour, and the trees, delineated with Indian ink, were regarded by the draughtsman with such pardonable pride. Of learned ladies too-from which class one would imagine that Mr. Paine's feminine disciples were chiefly recruited-he had so great a dread that he is said to have declined more than once the proffered opportunity of meeting Madame de Genlis, at this time on a visit to England, and thus to have deferred to a later date the inauguration of his acquaintance with her foster-daughter, his own future wife. In matters of religion Lord Edward must have stood no less apart from the group of arrogant and aggressive sceptics into whose company circumstances had thrown him; since he remained to the last, according to the testimony of his friend Valentine Lawless, afterwards Lord Cloncurry, a Christian, devout and sincere, in spite of the efforts, repeated and persevering, which were made to shake his convictions. Nor was the son of the Duchess of Leinster likely to have found himself more in accord on social than on religious questions with this little knot of thinkers and writers-adventurers in doubtful paths. Nevertheless, uncongenial as they might be in many ways, association with the men who formed Thomas Paine's clientèle in London was likely to have had too material an influence in the ripening of Lord Edward's political convictions to make it irrelevant to dwell upon them in detail here; while for Paine himself his admiration was so genuine, and apparently so blind, as to cause him to declare that there was attaching to the philosopher a simplicity of manner, a goodness of heart, and a strength of mind, which he never before had known a man to possess. For some part, at least, of the year 1791 master and disciple must have been parted, since Paine is said to have been compelled, in order to elude the clutches of the bailiffs, to seek some place of concealment known only to Horne Tooke and to his printer. If this account of the straits to which an ungrateful public permitted the popular author to be reduced is to be credited, it must have been all the more gratifying when, quitting England in September of the following year, in consequence of the prosecution instituted by Government on the publication of the second part of the "Rights of Man," he found himself received on his arrival at Calais with a royal salute, entertained at a public dinner, and finally returned by that town as deputy to the Assembly. A few months later Lord Edward was once more, under changed circumstances, under the same roof as his political oracle in Paris, the consequences being this time more serious, both to himself and to Ireland, than those which had attended their former intercourse. It was on the occasion of this visit to Paris that two events, each productive of important results, took place. He was cashiered and dismissed from the army. He also became acquainted with Pamela. CHAPTER VIII Pamela-Her Birth and Origin-Introduced into the Orleans WHO HO was Pamela? It was a question often asked during her lifetime, and which has not unfrequently been repeated since she has gone to a place where birth and parentage are of comparatively small moment. The interest that has been felt in the matter has been indeed altogether incommensurate with its importance. But it is not uncommon for a work to be the more successful by reason of its anonymity, and to the mystery which veiled her origin has been doubtless due part at least of the curiosity testified for the last hundred years with regard to Madame de Genlis's adopted daughter; the touch of romance belonging to her early history, her beauty, and the tragic circumstances connected with her marriage and widowhood investing her with an interest scarcely justified by what is known of her personality. The theory which has found most favour, and which, though discredited alike by facts comparatively recently come to light and by the distinct disclaimers of the persons chiefly concerned, still widely prevails among those who have in any way interested themselves in the matter, would make her the daughter of Egalité, Duc d'Orléans, by Madame de Genlis, his children's governess a lady in whose person qualities commonly supposed to be antagonistic present a combination which, other alleged facts of her history taken into account, has not been considered such as necessarily to give the lie to the surmise. In support of this hypothesis the supposed likeness of Pamela to the Orleans family has been cited, together with the fact of the fortune settled upon her by her reputed father. It should be remembered, however, with regard to this last piece of evidence, that, according to Madame de Genlis's own account of the matter, this fortune was no free gift on the part of the Duke, but was provided by the commutation of monies due to herself, and would therefore afford no proof of the recognition on his part of paternal obligations. To set against the arguments, such as they are, based upon these circumstances, we have Madame de Genlis's distinct denial, made in later years in the presence of Pamela's daughter; the equally explicit contradiction of the Orleans, their conduct on this occasion contrasting with the admission of the claims of kinship in another case; and the disbelief in the story said to have been entertained by the FitzGerald family themselves. |