CHAP. XIII.

January 24.

My dear Lucy will not expect to find me in the broad road of folly and laughter, with so many admonitions of wisdom as I have of late been favoured with; I repeat the wordfavoured; for poor and weak must be the mind which does not profit from such lessons as I have had to study! Do not, however, take the alarm; I hope, I shall escape dullness, although I am become somewhat graver than in the days ofmy flippancy, andrudehealth. My poor Horace! But I dare not trust myself with the subject! But is it not wonderful that no one can be found to comfort the Earl of S——, but his son’s friend, whose heart is pierced with an anguish as bitter and acute as his own! I am selfish, I am ashamed to tell you that I am become fretful and nervous. You must come, my Lucy; I want you to sustain and to chide me. My spirits are weakened, and my mind is assailed by apprehensions which I dare not give to you. This news from Lisbon has been hurtful to me. I send you enclosed a letter which may make you smile: it did not move a muscle in my face. Lady Maclairn undertook to reply to it for me. She was obliged to answer a letter of condolence which Mrs. Serge thought it polite to send to her “dear cousin.” I believe her ladyship hazarded to give her correspondent a little wholesome advice, which will be well for herif she understands its value. Mrs. Heartley has received letters from her son Henry; he is coming home. His friend’s death, with his dying advice to the young man, make only a part of those motives which induce Henry to quit his present situation. Mr. Bembridge, the deceased, has left him an estate in Berkshire of three hundred poundsper annum; and Henry wisely thinks, that with this provision and Mary Howard, he shall be as rich as a Nabob, with a ruined constitution, and twenty lacks of rupees. “He will have letters before he embarks, which will dash from his lips this cup of happiness,” observed the anxious mother. “Miss Howard is now in a very different situation from that, under which my poor boy vowed to live, and to labour for her. I would not on any account have the captain made acquainted with my son’s hopes. He thinks Henry is right to return home; but I now wish him to remain where he is for a fewyears.” “Leave him to Providence,” replied I, “and enjoy the blessings before you. Alice will be soon happy, and who knows whether one wedding may not be followed by another? a little money will not spoil Mary Howard, or change Captain Flint’s nature.” “I shall take care,” observed she thoughtfully, “to prevent Henry from coming hither; I wish Alice were settled, I should immediately go to town, and wait there for my son’s arrival.” Cannot you, Lucy, find out whether Mary’scolouris yetlilac. Alice thinks it is; but we may be conjecturing on false grounds; for Alice Heartley and Rachel Cowley are very simple girls; yet I do believe the captain wishes to see Henry united to him by the tenderest ties. He even proposed the other day to Malcolm to wait for his brother’s arrival before he married. Malcolm smiled; but declined the advice.

You saw enough of our doctor, when you were at Farefield, to enter into the spirit of my allusion, when I call him the sun which cheers us. We may say with truth that we live in his smiles. Should you fancy this expression too poetical to suit with Douglass’s stern face, it is because you have not seen him when with a patient who he thinks wants comfort more than medicine. Did they inform you that he never quitted my room during six and thirty hours? Horace will love him, Lucy, and you will be grateful. Amongst other ingenious hypotheses which he maintained this morning was one that will please you; for he proved to demonstration that Miss Cowley “had the strength of a horse.” He has been scolding me for this last hour; and has provoked me to laugh at him and myself.

Oh! how tedious are the hours till I hear from you. Mrs. Allen sends her good wishes with your

Rachel Cowley’s.

P. S. I am well, quite well, Lucy! my cordial in my bosom! Do not mind a word in this letter. Douglass will triumph. He predicted how it would be; when the wind blew propitiously.

My Dear Miss Cowley,

It would give me inexpressible concern, could I for a moment believe that you “himagine” I have forgotten you, or the promise I made you, when at Farefield Hall. You can be no stranger to the “hevents” which have taken place in my family since that time; and of course thesewill account to you for my “happarent” neglect. I have endeavoured to practise what I preach, which is more, as Mrs. Dangle says, thanmanywho are paid for preaching do; for, as I have said in my letter to Lady Maclairn, I see that nothing good comes from sorrowing for those who are removed from this world. Death is appointed for all; and the best thing we can do is to submit to the loss of our friends and relations, who are summoned away before us. I dare say the death of Mr. Flamall has made her ladyship very unhappy, but time will restore her spirits, unless she do as my Jerry “do,” yield to grief, and mope in her room. My kind friend, Mrs. Dangle, would not permit me to remain at Putney, where it was impossible I could have recovered my spirits. She has a charming house in the Haymarket; and since I have been her guest, I am much better; and indeed should be quite well, were it not for the vexationNora “give” me. You will be quite astonished to see thehalterationa few months of matrimony “have” made in her; and it will give you a dread of love matches! But I would not discourage you. Nora “have” only to thank herself for all that “have” happened to disturb her. Captain Fairly is not to blame, because his wife is jealous; nor Mrs. Dangle, because her constant good humour “make” her the favourite withheverygentleman. But Nora was always perverse in her temper! she can be heasy no where now, but at Putney. When single, she detested the place. She have been very ill; and her disappointment have perhaps made her lower in spirits; but, as I tell her, “the worse luck now, the better in future.” She may have children enow by the time she is forty.

I hope, my dear Miss Cowley, nothing will prevent your visit to me in February. Captain Fairly has, very politely, offered to be your escort, and desires me to assureyou, that he will, with the utmost pleasure, come to Farefield to fetch you, if you will permit him to have that honour; but I conclude you will not be allowed to leave Mrs. Allen behind you; so that you willhappointthe captain to meet you on the road. I shall be very happy to see Mrs. Allen. She will be nice company for Mr. Serge, in our absence. I promise you, nothing shall be omitted for your amusement. Mrs. Dangle is quite in polite life; and she engages to “hintroduce” you every where. You will meet the best company at her table; for her husband is never happy without society. There is a Major Ogle in love with you only from description. He says, that I have entangled his heart, and that he must be our shadow; therefore, we shall not want for a beau, nor one that half the women in London are dying for.

I would advise you not to make up any thing when you are for your journey; itwould be only so much labour lost. But it may not be amiss for you to begin to accustom yourself to fewer petticoats. We wear here only one. But we have found out vays and means to obviate the mischief of going unclothed, and we contrive to keep ourselves warm; but this, as Mrs. Dangle says, is a secrethaunter nu; for if the gentlemen knew you were in the habit of wearing small clothes whilst single, they might fear for their privileges when you married. You will be delighted with this charming woman. She is the counter-part of you, only she has seen more of polite life, since her marriage, than you have been in the vay of seeing at Farefield; which, to say the truth, is a sad place for such a young lady as Miss Cowley.

I remain in the expectation of hearing from you the time fixed for seeing you; and I shall be impatient till I can show you that I am your affectionate friend,

Lydia Serge.

P. S. You need not be under any fear of meeting that disgrace to me, Lydia. I have not seen her since her leaving Putney, nor will I ever againhacknowledgeher as my child. Jerry may be as obstinate as he please. So will I, on this point. You will be astonished to hear, that he have set up the feller who married her like a gentleman, and even sent down a postchay for his lady’s use. I see into this malice. It is all done to spite the captain, whom he hate. I am sorry to say, Nora’s foolish complaints have done no good. I am sure, I can see nothing in the captain that would not please any reasonable woman; and to me, his behaviour is alwayshattentiveandrespectful. You need not shew this letter to my cousin; Sir Murdoch have made her quite amethodist.

What a shocking end Flamall have made! But he was always as proud as Lucifer.

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