boasts its impression. It is chaste and pure in word and deed, and cannot bear to have the least indecency mingle with it. If therefore a man, be his birth or quality what it will, the higher the worse, presume to wound a lady's ears with indecent words: if he endeavour, in his expressions or sentiments, to convey gross or impure ideas to her mind: if he is continually pressing for her confidence in his honour: if he requests favours, which a lady ought to refuse if he can be regardless of his conduct or behaviour to her if he can use boisterous or rude freedoms, either to her person or dress-[Here poor Miss Cope, by her blushes, bore witness to her case]-if he avoids speaking of marriage, when he has a fair opportunity of doing it— [Here Miss Llooked down and blushed]—or leaves it once to a lady to wonder that he does not : In any, or in all these cases, he is to be suspected, and a lady can have little hope of such a person; nor, as I humbly apprehend, consistent with honour and discretion, encourage his address. The ladies were so kind as to applaud all I said, and so .did the dean. Miss Stapylton, and Miss Cope, and Miss L- were to try to recollect it when they came home, and to write down what they could remember of the conversation and our noble guests coming in soon after with Mr. B-, the ladies would have departed; but he prevailed upon them, with some difficulty, to pass the evening; and Miss L—, who has an admirable finger on the harpsichord, as I have heretofore told you, obliged us with two or three lessons. Each of the ladies did the like, and prevailed upon me to play a tune or two: but Miss Cope, as well as Miss L--, surpassed me much. We all sung too in turns; and Mr. B took the violin, in which he excels: Lord Davers obliged us on the violoncello: Mr. H—— played on the German flute, and sung us a fop's song, and performed it in character. So that we had an exceeding gay evening, and parted with great satisfaction on all sides, particularly on the young ladies; for this put them all into good humour and good spirits, enlivening the former scene, which otherwise might have closed perhaps more gravely than efficaciously. The distance of time since this conversation passed, enables me to add what I could not do when I wrote the account of it which you have mislaid; and which take briefly, as follows: Miss Stapylton, upon her return home, was as good as her word, and wrote down all she could recollect of the conversation; and I have already sent her the letter she had desired, containing my observations upon the flighty style she so much admired. She suffered it to have such an effect upon her, as to turn the course of her reading and studies to weightier and more solid subjects; and avoiding the gentleman she had begun to favour, gave way to her parents' recommendation; and is happily married to Sir Jonathan Barnes. Miss Cope came to me a week after, with the leave of both her parents, and tarried with me three days; in which time she opened all her heart to me; and returned in such a disposition, and with such resolutions, that she never would see her Peer again; nor receive letters from him, which she owned to me she had done clandestinely before and she is now the happy lady of Sir Michael Beaumont, who makes her the best of husbands, and permits her to follow her charitable inclinations, according to a scheme which she consulted me upon. Miss L, by the dean's indulgent prudence and discretion, has escaped her rake; and upon the discovery of an intrigue he was carrying on with another, conceived a just abhorrence of him; and is since married to Dr. Jenkins, as you know, with whom she lives very happily. Miss Sutton is not quite so well off as the three former; though not altogether unhappy neither, in her way. She could not indeed conquer her love of dress and tinsel; and so became the lady of Colonel Wilson: and they are thus far easy in the marriage state, that, being seldom together, in all probability they save a multitude of misunderstandings; for the colonel loves gaming, in which he is generally a winner; and so passes his time mostly in town. His lady has her pleasures, neither laudable nor criminal ones, which she pursues in the country. And now and then a letter passes on both sides; by the inscription and subscription of which, they remind one another that they have been once in their lives at one church together. And what now, my dear Lady G, have I to add to this tedious account (for letter I can hardly call it), but that I am, with great affection, Your true friend and servant, P. B LETTER CIII. Mrs. B to Lady G. MY DEAR LADY G——,—You desire me to send you a little specimen of my nursery tales and stories; with which, as Miss Fenwick told you, on her return to Lincolnshire, I entertain my Miss Goodwin and my little boys. But you make me too high a compliment, when you tell me it is for your own instruction and example. Yet you know, my dear Lady G, be your motives what they will, I must obey you; although, were others to see it, I might expose myself to the smiles and contempt of judges less prejudiced in my favour. So I will begin without any further apology; and, as near as I can, give you those very stories with which Miss Fenwick was so pleased, and of which she has made so favourable a report. Let me acquaint you then, that my method is to give characters of persons I have known in one part or other of my life, in feigned names, whose conduct may serve for imitation or warning to my dear attentive miss; and sometimes I give instances of good boys and naughty boys, for the sake of my Billy, and my Davers: and they are continually coming about me, Dear madam, a pretty story now, cries miss: and, Dear mamma, tell me of good boys, and of naughty boys, cries Billy. Miss is a surprising child for her age, and is very familiar with many of the best characters in the Spectators; and having a smattering of Latin, and more than a smattering of Italian, and being a perfect mistress of French, is seldom at a loss for the derivation of such words as are not of English original. And so I shall give you a story, in feigned names, with which she is so delighted that she has written it down. But I will first trespass on your patience with one of my childish tales. Every day, once or twice, if I am not hindered, I cause Miss Goodwin, who plays and sings very prettily, to give a tune or two to me and my Billy, and my Davers, who, as well as my Pamela, love and learn to touch the keys, young as the latter is; and she will have a sweet finger, I can observe that; and a charming ear; and her voice is music itself! Oh the fond, fond mother! I know you will say, on reading this. Then, madam, we all proceed hand-in-hand together to the nursery, to my Charley and Jemmy: and in this happy retirement, so much my delight in the absence of my best beloved, imagine you see me seated, surrounded with the joy and the hope of my future prospects, as well as my present comforts. Miss Goodwin imagine you see on my right hand, sitting on a velvet stool, because she is eldest, and a miss: Billy on my left, in a little cane elbow chair, because he is eldest, and a good boy: my Davers, and my sparkling-eyed Pamela, with my Charley between them, on little silken cushions at my feet, hand-in-hand, their pleased eyes looking up to my more delighted ones, and my sweet-natured, promising Jemmy in my lap; the nurses and the cradle just behind us, and the nursery-maids delightedly pursuing some useful needlework, for the dear charmers of my heart-all as hush and as still as silence itself, as the pretty creatures generally are, when their little watchful eyes see my lips beginning to open: for they take great notice already of my rule of two ears to one tongue; * insomuch, that if Billy or Davers are either of them for breaking the mum, as they call it, they are immediately hush, at any time, if I put my finger to my lip, or if miss points hers to her ears, even to the breaking of a word in two, as it were: and yet all my boys are as lively as so many birds; while my Pamela is cheerful, easy, soft, gentle, always smiling, but modest and harmless as a dove. I began with a story of two little boys, and two little. girls, the children of a fine gentleman and a fine lady, who loved them dearly: That they were all so good, and loved one another so well, that everybody who saw them admired them, and talked of them far and near: that they would part with anything to one another; loved the poor; spoke kindly to the servants; did everything they were bid to do; were not proud; and knew no strife, but who should learn their books best, and be the prettiest scholar: that the servants loved them, and would do anything they desired: that they were not proud of fine clothes; let not their heads run upon their playthings, when they should mind their books; said grace before they ate; their prayers before they went to bed, and as soon as they rose; were always clean and neat; would not tell a fib for the world, and were above doing anything that required one: that God blessed them more and more, and blessed their papa and mamma, and their uncles and aunts, and cousins, for their sakes. And there was a happy family, my dear loves! No one idle; all prettily employed; the masters at their books; the misses at their books too, or their needles; except at their play hours, when they were never rude, nor noisy, nor mischievous, nor quarrelsome: and no such word was ever heard from their mouth, as, Why mayn't I have this or * See page 367. |