As a contrast to his imperiousness, there is an affectionate simplicity
in the fancy names he used to bestow upon his female friends. Sir William
Temple's wife, Dorothea, became Dorinda; Esther Johnson, Stella; Hester
Vanhomrigh, Vanessa; Lady Winchelsea, Ardelia; while to Lady Acheson he
gave the nicknames of Skinnybonia, Snipe, and Lean. But all was taken by
them in good part; for his rather dictatorial ways were softened by the
fascinating geniality and humour which he knew so well how to employ when
he used to "deafen them with puns and rhyme."
Into the vexed question of the relations between Swift and Stella I do
not purpose to enter further than to record my conviction that she was
never more to him than "the dearest friend that ever man had." The
suggestion of a concealed marriage is so inconsistent with their whole
conduct to each other from first to last, that if there had been such a
marriage, instead of Swift having been, as he was, a man of _intense
sincerity_, he must be held to have been a most consummate hypocrite.
In my opinion, Churton Collins settled this question in his essays on
Swift, first published in the "Quarterly Review," 1881 and 1882.
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