The fellow in the orange-tawny livery with blue lace and facings was in waiting when Esmond came out of prison, and, taking the young gentleman’s slender baggage, led the way out of that odious Newgate, and by Fleet Conduit, down to the Thames, where a pair of oars was called, and they went up the river to Chelsey.  Esmond thought the sun had never shone so bright; nor the air felt so fresh and exhilarating.  Temple Garden, as they rowed by, looked like the garden of Eden to him, and the aspect of the quays, wharves, and buildings by the river, Somerset House, and Westminster (where the splendid new bridge was just beginning), Lambeth tower and palace, and that busy shining scene of the Thames swarming with boats and barges, filled his heart with pleasure and cheerfulness—­as well such a beautiful scene might to one who had been a prisoner so long, and with so many dark thoughts deepening the gloom of his captivity.  They rowed up at length to the pretty village of Chelsey, where the nobility have many handsome country-houses; and so came to my Lady Viscountess’s house, a cheerful new house in the row facing the river, with a handsome garden behind it, and a pleasant look-out both towards Surrey and Kensington, where stands the noble ancient palace of the Lord Warwick, Harry’s reconciled adversary.

Here in her ladyship’s saloon, the young man saw again some of those pictures which had been at Castlewood, and which she had removed thence on the death of her lord, Harry’s father.  Specially, and in the place of honor, was Sir Peter Lely’s picture of the honorable Mistress Isabella Esmond as Diana, in yellow satin, with a bow in her hand and a crescent in her forehead; and dogs frisking about her.  ’Twas painted about the time when royal Endymions were said to find favor with this virgin huntress; and, as goddesses have youth perpetual, this one believed to the day of her death that she never grew older:  and always persisted in supposing the picture was still like her.

After he had been shown to her room by the groom of the chamber, who filled many offices besides in her ladyship’s modest household, and after a proper interval, his elderly goddess Diana vouchsafed to appear to the young man.  A blackamoor in a Turkish habit, with red boots and a silver collar, on which the Viscountess’s arms were engraven, preceded her and bore her cushion; then came her gentlewoman; a little pack of spaniels barking and frisking about preceded the austere huntress—­then, behold, the Viscountess herself “dropping odors.”  Esmond recollected from his childhood that rich aroma of musk which his mother-in-law (for she may be called so) exhaled.  As the sky grows redder and redder towards sunset, so, in the decline of her years, the cheeks of my Lady Dowager blushed more deeply.  Her face was illuminated with vermilion, which appeared the brighter from the white paint employed to set it off.  She wore the ringlets which had been in fashion in King Charles’s time; whereas the ladies of King William’s had head-dresses like the towers of Cybele.  Her eyes gleamed out from the midst of this queer structure of paint, dyes, and pomatums.  Such was my Lady Viscountess, Mr. Esmond’s father’s widow.