The nymph thus accomplished is feared by the men and hated by the women; and Swift has shown his utter want of heart and good taste, by making his homage to the woman he loved, a vehicle for the bitterest satire on the rest of her sex. What right had he to accuse us of a universal preference for mere coxcombs,--he who, through the sole power of his wit and intellect, had inspired with the most passionate attachment two lovely women not half his own age? Be it remembered, that while Swift was playing the Abelard with such effect, he was in his forty-fifth year, and though He moved and bowed, and talked with so much grace, Nor showed the parson in his gait or face,[112] he was one of the ugliest men in existence,--of a bilious, saturnine complexion, and a most forbidding countenance. The poem of Cadenus and Vanessa was written immediately on his return to Ireland and to Stella, (where he describes himself devoured by melancholy and regret,) and sent to Vanessa. Her passion and her inexperience seem to have blinded her to what was humiliating to herself in this poem, and left her sensible only to the admiration it expressed, and the hopes it conveyed. She wrote him the most impassioned letters; and he replied in a style which, without committing himself, kept alive all her tenderness, and rivetted his influence over her. Meanwhile, what became of Stella? Too quick-sighted not to perceive the difference in Swift's manner, pining under his neglect, and struck to the heart by jealousy, grief, and resentment, her health gave way. His pitiful resolve never to see her alone, precluded all complaint or explanation. The Mrs. Dingley who had been chosen for her companion, was merely calculated to save appearances;--respectable, indeed, in point of reputation, but selfish, narrow-minded and weak. Thus abandoned to sullen, silent sorrow, the unhappy Stella fell into an alarming state; and her destroyer was at length roused to some remorse, by the daily spectacle of the miserable wreck he had caused. He commissioned his friend Dr. Ashe, "to learn the secret cause of that dejection of spirits which had so visibly preyed on her health; and to know whether it was by any means in his power to remove it?" She replied, "that the peculiarity of her circumstances, and her singular connexion with Swift for so many years, had given great occasion for scandal; that she had learned to bear this patiently, hoping that all such reports would be effaced by marriage; but she now saw, with deep grief, that his behaviour was totally changed, and that a cold indifference had succeeded to the warmest professions of eternal affection. That the necessary consequences would be, an indelible stain fixed on her character, and the loss of her good name, which was dearer to her than life."[113]