Teresa was the most
religious, and the greatest lover of London society. I have already
quoted a passage or two from the early letters addressed to the two
sisters. It has also to be said that he was guilty of writing to them
stuff which it is inconceivable that any decent man should have
communicated to a modest woman. They do not seem to have taken offence.
He professes himself the slave of both alternately or together. "Even
from my infancy," he says (in 1714) "I have been in love with one or
other of you week by week, and my journey to Bath fell out in the 376th
week of the reign of my sovereign lady Sylvia. At the present writing
hereof, it is the 389th week of the reign of your most serene majesty,
in whose service I was listed some weeks before I beheld your sister."
He had suggested to Lady Mary that the concluding lines of Eloisa
contained a delicate compliment to her; and he characteristically made a
similar insinuation to Martha Blount about the same passage. Pope was
decidedly an economist even of his compliments. Some later letters are
in less artificial language, and there is a really touching and natural
letter to Teresa in regard to an illness of her sister's. After a time,
we find that some difficulty has arisen. He feels that his presence
gives pain; when he comes he either makes her (apparently Teresa)
uneasy, or he sees her unkind. Teresa, it would seem, is jealous and
disapproves of his attentions to Martha. In the midst of this we find
that in 1717 Pope settled an annuity upon Teresa of 40_l.
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