Mr. Esmond blushed up.  “My lady’s virtue is like that of a saint in heaven, madam,” he cried out.

“Eh!—­mon neveu.  Many saints get to heaven after having a deal to repent of.  I believe you are like all the rest of the fools, and madly in love with her.”

“Indeed, I loved and honored her before all the world,” Esmond answered.  “I take no shame in that.”

“And she has shut her door on you—­given the living to that horrid young cub, son of that horrid old bear, Tusher, and says she will never see you more.  Monsieur mon neveu—­we are all like that.  When I was a young woman, I’m positive that a thousand duels were fought about me.  And when poor Monsieur de Souchy drowned himself in the canal at Bruges because I danced with Count Springbock, I couldn’t squeeze out a single tear, but danced till five o’clock the next morning.  ’Twas the Count—­no, ’twas my Lord Ormond that played the fiddles, and his Majesty did me the honor of dancing all night with me.—­How you are grown!  You have got the bel air.  You are a black man.  Our Esmonds are all black.  The little prude’s son is fair; so was his father—­fair and stupid.  You were an ugly little wretch when you came to Castlewood—­you were all eyes, like a young crow.  We intended you should be a priest.  That awful Father Holt—­how he used to frighten me when I was ill!  I have a comfortable director now—­the Abbe Douillette—­a dear man.  We make meagre on Fridays always.  My cook is a devout pious man.  You, of course, are of the right way of thinking.  They say the Prince of Orange is very ill indeed.”

In this way the old Dowager rattled on remorselessly to Mr. Esmond, who was quite astounded with her present volubility, contrasting it with her former haughty behavior to him.  But she had taken him into favor for the moment, and chose not only to like him, as far as her nature permitted, but to be afraid of him; and he found himself to be as familiar with her now as a young man, as, when a boy, he had been timorous and silent.  She was as good as her word respecting him.  She introduced him to her company, of which she entertained a good deal—­of the adherents of King James of course—­and a great deal of loud intriguing took place over her card-tables.  She presented Mr. Esmond as her kinsman to many persons of honor; she supplied him not illiberally with money, which he had no scruple in accepting from her, considering the relationship which he bore to her, and the sacrifices which he himself was making in behalf of the family.  But he had made up his mind to continue at no woman’s apron-strings longer; and perhaps had cast about how he should distinguish himself, and make himself a name, which his singular fortune had denied him.  A discontent with his former bookish life and quietude,—­a bitter feeling of revolt at that slavery in which he had chosen to confine himself for the sake of those whose hardness towards him make his heart bleed,—­a restless wish to see men and the world,—­led him to think of the military profession:  at any rate, to desire to see a few campaigns, and accordingly he pressed his new patroness to get him a pair of colors; and one day had the honor of finding himself appointed an ensign in Colonel Quin’s regiment of Fusileers on the Irish establishment.