The effect produced by both Lady Castlewood’s children when they appeared in public was extraordinary, and the whole town speedily rang with their fame:  such a beautiful couple, it was declared, never had been seen; the young maid of honor was toasted at every table and tavern, and as for my young lord, his good looks were even more admired than his sister’s.  A hundred songs were written about the pair, and as the fashion of that day was, my young lord was praised in these Anacreontics as warmly as Bathyllus.  You may be sure that he accepted very complacently the town’s opinion of him, and acquiesced with that frankness and charming good-humor he always showed in the idea that he was the prettiest fellow in all London.

The old Dowager at Chelsey, though she could never be got to acknowledge that Mistress Beatrix was any beauty at all, (in which opinion, as it may be imagined, a vast number of the ladies agreed with her), yet, on the very first sight of young Castlewood, she owned she fell in love with him:  and Henry Esmond, on his return to Chelsey, found himself quite superseded in her favor by her younger kinsman.  The feat of drinking the King’s health at Cambridge would have won her heart, she said, if nothing else did.  “How had the dear young fellow got such beauty?” she asked.  “Not from his father—­certainly not from his mother.  How had he come by such noble manners, and the perfect bel air?  That countrified Walcote widow could never have taught him.”  Esmond had his own opinion about the countrified Walcote widow, who had a quiet grace and serene kindness, that had always seemed to him the perfection of good breeding, though he did not try to argue this point with his aunt.  But he could agree in most of the praises which the enraptured old dowager bestowed on my Lord Viscount, than whom he never beheld a more fascinating and charming gentleman.  Castlewood had not wit so much as enjoyment.  “The lad looks good things,” Mr. Steele used to say; “and his laugh lights up a conversation as much as ten repartees from Mr. Congreve.  I would as soon sit over a bottle with him as with Mr. Addison; and rather listen to his talk than hear Nicolini.  Was ever man so gracefully drunk as my Lord Castlewood?  I would give anything to carry my wine” (though, indeed, Dick bore his very kindly, and plenty of it, too), “like this incomparable young man.  When he is sober he is delightful; and when tipsy, perfectly irresistible.”  And referring to his favorite, Shakspeare (who was quite out of fashion until Steele brought him back into the mode), Dick compared Lord Castlewood to Prince Hal, and was pleased to dub Esmond as ancient Pistol.