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Pamela, Volume II

by Samuel Richardson · English · Gutenberg #12958 · 1,181,340 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Pamela, Volume II

Author: Samuel Richardson


        
Release date: July 20, 2004 [eBook #12958]
                Most recently updated: October 28, 2024

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12958

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PAMELA, VOLUME II ***

PAMELA

Volume II


By Samuel Richardson


AUTHOR'S ORIGINAL PREFACE TO VOLUME II

The First part of PAMELA met with a success greatly exceeding the most
sanguine expectations: and the Editor hopes, that the Letters which
compose this Part will be found equally written to NATURE, avoiding
all romantic nights, improbable surprises, and irrational machinery;
and the passions are touched, where requisite; and rules, equally
_new_ and _practicable_, inculcated throughout the whole, for the
_general conduct of life_; and, therefore, he flatters himself, that
they may expect the good fortune, which _few continuations_ have met
with, to be judged not unworthy the _First_ Part; nor disproportioned
to the more exalted condition in which PAMELA was destined to shine
as an affectionate _wife_, a faithful _friend_, a polite and kind
_neighbour_, an indulgent _mother_, and a beneficent _mistress_;
after having in the former Part supported the character of a dutiful
_child_, a spotless _virgin_, and a modest and amiable _bride_.

The reader will easily see, that in so great a choice of materials, as
must arise from a multitude of important subjects, in a married life,
to such geniuses and friendships as those of Mr. and Mrs. B. the
Editor's greatest difficulty was how to bring them within the compass
which he was determined not to exceed. And it having been left to
his own choice, in what manner to digest and publish the letters, and
where to close the work, he had intended, at first, in regard to his
other avocations, to have carried the piece no farther than the First
Part.

It may be expected, therefore, that he should enter into an
explanation of the reasons whereby he was provoked into a necessity of
altering his intention. But he is willing to decline saying any thing
upon so well-known a subject.

The Editor has been much pressed with importunities and conjectures,
in relation to the person and family of the gentleman, who are the
principal persons in the work; all he thinks himself at liberty to
say, or is necessary to be said, is only to repeat what has already
been hinted, that the story has its foundation in truth; and that
there was a necessity, for obvious reasons, to vary and disguise some
facts and circumstances, as also the names of persons, places, &c.





LETTER I

My dear father and mother,

We arrived here last night, highly pleased with our journey, and the
occasion of it. May God bless you both with long life and health,
to enjoy your sweet farm, and pretty dwelling, which is just what I
wished it to be. And don't make your grateful hearts too uneasy in the
possession of it, by your modest diffidence of your own unworthiness:
for, at the same time, that it is what will do honour to the best of
men, it is not so _very_ extraordinary, considering his condition,
as to cause any one to censure it as the effect of a too partial and
injudicious kindness for the parents of one whom he _delighteth to
honour_.

My dear master (why should I not still call him so, bound to reverence
him as I am, in every light he can shine in to the most obliging and
sensible heart?) still proposes to fit up the large parlour, and
three apartments in the commodious dwelling he calls yours, for his
entertainment and mine, when I pay my duty to you both, for a few
happy days; and he has actually given orders to that effect; and that
the three apartments be _so_ fitted up, as to be rather suitable
to _your_ condition, than his own; for, he says, the plain simple
elegance, which he will have observed in the rooms, as well as the
furniture, will be a variety in his retirement to this place, that
will make him return to his own with the greater pleasure; and, at the
same time, when we are not there, will be of use for the reception of
any of your friends; and so he shall not, as he kindly says, rob the
good couple of any of their accommodations.

The old bow-windows he will have preserved, but will not have them
sashed, nor the woodbines, jessamines, and vines, that run up against
them, destroyed: only he will have larger panes of glass, and more
convenient casements to let in the sweet air and light, and make
amends for that obstructed by the shades of those fragrant climbers.
For he has mentioned, three or four times, how gratefully they
dispensed their intermingled odours to us, when, the last evening
we stood at the window, to hear the responsive songs of two warbling
nightingales, one at a distance, the other near, which delighted us
for above two hours, and the more, as we thought their season had been
over. And when they had done, he made _me_ sing him one, for which
he rewarded me with a kiss, saying, "How greatly do the innocent
pleasures I now hourly taste, exceed the guilty tumults that used
formerly to agitate my unequal mind!--Never talk, my Pamela, as you
frequently do, of obligation to me: one such hour as I now enjoy is an
ample reward for all the benefits I can confer on you and yours in my
whole life!"

The parlour will indeed be more elegant; though that is to be rather
plain than rich, as well in its wainscot as furniture, and to be
new-floored. The dear gentleman has already given orders, and you will
soon have workmen to put them in execution. The parlour-doors are to
have brass-hinges and locks, and to shut as close, he tells them, as
a watch-case: "For who knows," said he, "my dear, but we shall have
still added blessings, in two or three charming boys and girls,
to place there in their infancy, before they can be of age to be
benefited by your lessons and example? And besides, I shall no doubt
entertain there some of my chosen friends, in their excursions for a
day or two."

How am I, every hour of my life, overwhelmed with instances of God
Almighty's goodness and his! O spare, blessed Father of Mercies, the
precious life of this excellent man; increase my thankfulness, and
my worthiness;--and then--But what shall I say?--Only that I may
_continue_ to be what I am; for more blessed and happy, in my own
mind, I cannot be.

The beds he will have of cloth, as he thinks the situation a little
cold, especially when the wind is easterly, and purposes to be down
in the early spring season, now and then, as well as in the latter
autumn; and the window curtains of the same, in one room red, in
the other green; but plain, lest you should be afraid to use them
occasionally. The carpets for them will be sent with the other
furniture; for he will not alter the old oaken floors of the
bed-chamber, nor the little room he intends for my use, when I choose
not to join in such company as may happen to fall in: "Which, my
dear," says he, "shall be as little as is possible, only particular
friends, who may be disposed, once in a year or two, to see when I am
there, how I live with my Pamela and her parents, and how I pass my
time in my retirement, as I shall call this: or, perhaps, they will be
apt to think me ashamed of company I shall always be pleased with.
Nor are you, my dear, to take this as a compliment to yourself, but
a piece of requisite policy in me: for who will offer to reproach me
with marrying, as the world thinks, below me, when they shall see that
I not only pride myself in my Pamela, but take pleasure in owning her
relations as mine, and visiting them, and receiving visits from them:
and yet offer not to set them up in such a glaring light, as if I
would have the world forget (who in that case would always take
the more pleasure in remembering) what they were! And how will it
anticipate low reflection, when they shall see, I can bend my mind to
partake with them the pleasure of their humble but decent life?--Ay,"
continued he, "and be rewarded for it too, with better health, better
spirits, and a better mind; so that, my dear," added he, "I shall reap
more benefit by what I propose to do, than I shall confer."

In this generous manner does this best of men endeavour to disclaim
(though I must be very ungrateful, if, with me, it did not enhance)
the proper merit of a beneficence natural to him; and which, indeed,
as I tell him, may be in one respect deprecated, inasmuch as (so
excellent is his nature) he cannot help it if he would. O that it was
in my power to recompense him for it! But I am poor, as I have often
said, in every thing but will--and that is wholly his: and what a
happiness is it to me, a happiness I could not so early have hoped
for, that I can say so without reserve; since the dear object of it
requires nothing of me but what is consistent with my duty to
the Supreme Benefactor, the first mover and cause of all his own
happiness, of my happiness, and that of my dear, my ever dear parents.

_Your dutiful and happy daughter._





LETTER II

MY DEAREST DAUGHTER,

I need not repeat to you the sense your good mother and I have of our
happiness, and of our obligations to your honoured spouse; you both
were pleased witnesses of it every hour of the happy fortnight you
passed with us. Yet, my dear, we hardly know how to address ourselves
even to _you_, much less to the _'squire_, with the freedom he so
often invited us to take: for I don't know how it is, but though
you are our daughter, and so far from being lifted up by your high
condition, that we see no difference in your behaviour to us, your
poor parents, yet, viewing you as the lady of so fine a gentleman,
we cannot forbear having a kind of respect, and--I don't know what to
call it--that lays a little restraint upon us. And yet, we should not,
methinks, let our minds be run away with the admiration of worldly
grandeur, so as to set too much by it. But your merit and prudence are
so much above all we could ever have any notion of: and to have gentry
come only to behold and admire you, not so much for your gentleness,
and amiableness, or for your behaviour, and affability to poor as well
as rich, and to hear every one calling you an angel, and saying, you
deserve to be what you are, make us hardly know how to look upon you,
but as an angel indeed! I am sure you have been a good angel to us;
since, for your sake, God Almighty has put it into your honoured
husband's heart to make us the happiest couple in the world. But
little less we should have been, had we only in some far distant land
heard of our dear child's happiness and never partaken of the benefits
of it ourselves. But thus to be provided for! thus kindly to be owned,
and called Father and Mother by such a brave gentleman! and so placed
as to have nothing to do but to bless God, him, and you, and hourly
pray for you _both_, is a providence too mighty to be borne by us,
with equalness of temper: we kneel together every morning, noon, and
night, and weep and rejoice, and rejoice and weep, to think how our
unworthiness is distinguished, and how God has provided for us in our
latter days; when all our fear was, that, as we grew older and more
infirm, and worn out by hard labour, we should be troublesome where,
not our pride, but our industrious wills, would have made us wish not
to be so;--but to be entitled to a happier lot: for this would have
grieved us the more, for the sake of you, my dear child, and your
unhappy brother's children: for it is well known, that, though we
pretend not to boast of our family, and indeed have no reason, yet
none of us were ever sunk so low as I was: to be sure, partly by my
own fault; for, had it been for your poor aged mother's sake only, I
ought not to have done what I did for John and William; for so unhappy
were they, poor lads! that what I could do, was but as a drop of water
to a bucket.

You command me--Let me, as writing to Mr. B.'s lady, say _command_,
though, as to my dear _daughter_, I will only say _desire_: and,
indeed, I will not, as you wish me not to do, let the one condition,
which was accidental, put the other, which was natural, out of my
thought: you spoke it in better words, but this was the sense. But you
have the gift of utterance; and education is a fine thing, where it
meets with such talents to improve upon, as God has given you. Yet
let me not forget what I was going to say--You _command_--or, if you
please--you _desire_ me to write long letters, and often--And how can
I help it, if I would? For when here, in this happy dwelling, and this
well-stocked farm, in these rich meadows, and well-cropt acres, we
look around us, and which way soever we turn our head, see blessings
upon blessings, and plenty upon plenty, see barns well stored, poultry
increasing, the kine lowing and crowding about us: and are bid to
call them our own. Then think, that all is the reward of our child's
virtue!--O my dear daughter, who can bear these things!--Excuse me!
I must break off a little! For my eyes are as full as my heart: and I
will retire to bless God, and your honoured husband.

So, my dear child, I now again take up my pen: but reading what I had
written, in order to carry on the thread, I can hardly forbear again
being in one sort affected. But do you think I will call all these
things my own?--Do you think I would live rent-free? Can the honoured
'squire believe, that having such a generous example before me, if I
had no gratitude in my temper before, I could help being touched by
such an one as he sets me? If this goodness makes him know no mean in
giving, shall I be so greedy as to know none in receiving? Come, come,
my dear child, your poor father is not so sordid a wretch, neither. He
will shew the world that all these benefits are not thrown away upon
one, who will disgrace you as much by his temper, as by his condition.
What though I cannot be as worthy of all these favours as I wish, I
will be as worthy as I can. And let me tell you, my dear child, if the
king and his royal family (God bless 'em!) be not ashamed to receive
taxes and duties from his subjects; if dukes and earls, and all the
top gentry, cannot support their bravery, without having their rents
paid; I hope I shall not affront the 'squire, to pay to his steward,
what any other person would pay for his noble stock, and improving
farm: and I will do it, if it please God to bless me with life and
health. I should not be worthy to crawl upon the earth, if I did not.
And what did I say to Mr. Longman, the faithful Mr. Longman! Sure no
gentleman had ever a more worthy steward than he: it was as we were
walking over the grounds together, and observing in what good order
every thing was, he was praising some little contrivances of my own,
for the improvement of the farm, and saying, how comfortably he hoped
we might live upon it. "Ay, Mr. Longman," said I, "comfortably indeed:
but do you think I could be properly said to _live_, if I was not to
pay as much rent for it as another?"

--"I can tell you," said he, "the 'squire will not receive any thing
from you, Goodman Andrews. Why, man, he has no occasion for it: he's
worth a power of money, besides a noble and clear estate in land.
Ad's-heartlikens, you must not affront him, I can tell you that: he's
as generous as a prince, where he takes; but he is hasty, and will
have his own way."--"Why, for that reason, Mr. Longman," said I, "I
was thinking to make _you_ my friend!"--"Make _me_ your friend! You
have not a better in the world, to my power, I can tell you that,
nor your dame neither; for I love such honest hearts: I wish my own
brother would let me love him as well; but let that pass. What I can
do for you, I will, and here's my hand upon it."

"Well, then," said I, "it is this: let me account to you at the rent
Farmer Dickens offered, and let me know what the stock cost, and
what the crops are valued at; and pay the one as I can, and the other
quarterly; and not let the 'squire know it till you can't choose; and
I shall be as happy as a prince; for I doubt not, by God's blessing,
to make a comfortable livelihood of it besides."--"Why, dost believe,
Goodman Andrews," said he, "that I would do such a thing? Would not
his honour think if I hid one thing from him, I might hide another? Go
to, honest heart, I love thee dearly; but can Mr. B. do too much for
his lady, think'st thou? Come, come" (and he jeered me so, I knew not
what to say), "I wish at bottom there is not some pride in this. What,
I warrant, you would not be too much beholden to his honour, would
you?"--"No," said I, "it is not that, I'm sure. If I have any pride,
it is only in my dear child--to whom, under God, all this is owing.
But some how or other it shall be so."

And so, my dear daughter, I resolve it shall; and it will be, over
and above, one of the greatest pleasures to me, to do the good 'squire
service, as well as to be so much benefited and obliged by him.

Our eldest grandson Thomas desires to come and live with us: the boy
is honest, and, I hear, industrious. And cousin Borroughs wants me
to employ his son Roger, who understands the business of a farm very
well. It is no wonder, that all one's relations should wish to partake
of our happy lot; and if they _can_ and _will_ do their business as
well as others, I see not why relationship should be an objection:
but, yet, I think, one should not _beleaguer_, as one may say, your
honoured husband with one's relations. You, my best child, will give
me always your advice, as to my carriage in this my new lot; for I
would not for the world be thought an encroacher. And you have so
followed than yours.

Our blessing (I am sure you have blessed us!) attend you, my dearest
child; and may you be as happy as you have made us (I cannot wish you
to be happier, because I have no notion how it can be in this life).
Conclude us, _your ever-loving father and mother_,

JOHN _and_ ELIZ. ANDREWS.

May we hope to be favoured now and then with a letter from you, my
dear child, like some of your former, to let us know how you go on? It
would be a great joy to us; indeed it would. But we know you'll have
enough to do without obliging us in this way. So must acquiesce.





LETTER III

MY DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER,

I have shewed your letter to my beloved. Don't be uneasy that I have;
for you need not be ashamed of it, since it is my pride to have such
honest and grateful parents: and I'll tell you what he said to it, as
the best argument I can use, why you should not be uneasy, but enjoy
without pain or anxiety all the benefits of your happy lot.

"Dear good souls!" said he, "now every thing they say and write
manifests the worthiness of their hearts! No wonder, Pamela, you love
and revere such honest minds; for that you would do, were they not
your parents: and tell them, that I am so far from having them believe
what I have done for them were only from my affection for their
daughter, that let 'em find out another couple as worthy as they are,
and I will do as much for them. I would not place them," he continued,
"in the _same_ county, because I would wish _two_ counties to be
blessed for their sakes. Tell them, my dear, that they have a right
to what they enjoy on the foot of their own _proper_ merit; and _bid_
them enjoy it as their patrimony; and if any thing arise that is more
than they themselves can wish for, in their way of life, let them look
among their own relations, where it may be acceptable, and communicate
to them the like solid reasons for rejoicing in the situation they are
pleased with: and do you, my dear, still farther enable them, as you
shall judge proper, to gratify their enlarged hearts, for fear they
should deny any comfort to themselves, in order to do good to others."

I could only fly to his generous bosom (for this is a subject which
most affects me), and, with my eyes swimming in tears of grateful joy,
and which overflowed as soon as my bold lips touched his dear face,
bless God, and bless him, with my whole heart; for speak I could
not! But, almost chok'd with my joy, sobb'd to him my grateful
acknowledgments. He clasped me in his arms, and said, "How, my
dearest, do you overpay me for the little I have done for your
parents! If it be thus to be bless'd for conferring benefits so
insignificant to a man of my fortune, what joys is it not in the power
of rich men to give themselves, whenever they please!--Foretastes,
indeed, of those we are bid to hope for: which can surely only exceed
these, as _then_ we shall be all intellect, and better fitted to
receive them."--"'Tis too much!--too much," said I, in broken accents:
"how am I oppressed with the pleasure you give me!--O, Sir, bless
me more gradually, and more cautiously--for I cannot bear it!" And,
indeed, my heart went flutter, flutter, flutter, at his dear breast,
as if it wanted to break its too narrow prison, to mingle still more
intimately with his own.

Surely, my beloved parents, nobody's happiness is so great as
mine!--If it proceeds thus from degree to degree, and is to be
augmented by the charming hope, that the dear second author of our
blessings, be the uniformly good as well as the partially kind man to
us, what a felicity will this be! and if our prayers shall be heard,
and we shall have the pleasure to think, that his advances in piety
are owing not a little to them, and to the example God shall give us
grace to set; then, indeed, may we take the pride to think, we have
repaid his goodness to us, and that we have satisfied the debt, which
nothing less can discharge.

Forgive me, my worthy parents, if my style on this subject be raised
above the natural simplicity, more suited to my humble talents. But
how can I help it! For when the mind is elevated, ought not the sense
we have of our happiness to make our expressions soar equally? Can the
affections be so highly raised as mine are on these occasions, and the
thoughts creep grovelling like one's ordinary self? No, indeed!--Call
not this, therefore, the gift of utterance, if it should appear to
you in a better light than it deserves. It is the gift of gratitude; a
gift which makes you and me to _speak_ and _write_, as I hope it
will make us _act_, above ourselves. Thus will our gratitude be the
inspirer of joy to our common benefactor; and his joy will heighten
our gratitude; and so we shall proceed, as cause and effect to each
other's happiness, to bless the dear man who blesses us. And will it
be right then to say, you are uneasy under such (at least as to your
wills) returned and discharged obligations? God Almighty requires only
a thankful heart for all the mercies he heaps upon the children of
men; my dear Mr. B., who in these particulars imitates Divinity,
desires no more. You _have_ this thankful heart; and that to such a
high degree of gratitude, that nobody can exceed you.

But yet, when your worthy minds would be too much affected with your
gratitude, so as to lay under the restraints you mention, to the dear
gentleman, and for his sake, to your dependent daughter; let me humbly
advise you, with more particular, more abstracted aspirations, than
at other times, to raise your thoughts upwards, and consider who it
is that gives _him_ the opportunity; and pray for him and for me; for
_him_, that all his future actions may be of a piece with this
noble disposition of mind; for _me_, that I may continue humble, and
consider myself blest for your sakes, and in order that I may be, in
some sort, a rewarder, in the hands of Providence, of this its dear
excellent agent; and then we shall look forward, all of us, with
pleasure, _indeed_, to that state, where there is no distinction of
degree, and where the humble cottager shall be upon a par with the
proudest monarch.

O my dear parents, how can you, as in your _postscript_, say, "May
we not be _favoured_ now-and-then with a letter?" Call _me_ your
daughter, your Pamela--I am no lady to you. I have more pleasure to be
called your comfort, and thought to act worthy of the sentiments with
which your example and instructions have inspired me, than in any
other thing in this life; my determined duty to our common benefactor,
the best of gentlemen and husbands, excepted. God has blessed me for
your sakes, and has thus answered for me all your prayers; nay, _more_
than answered all you or I could have wished or hoped for. We only
prayed, only hoped, that God would preserve _you_ honest, and _me_
virtuous: and, O see, my excellent parents, how we are crowned with
blessings upon blessings, till we are the talk of all that know us.

Hence, my dear parents (I mean, from the delight I have in writing to
you, which transports me far above my own sphere), you'll see, that I
_must_ write, and cannot help it, if I would. And _will_ it be a great
joy to you?--And is there any thing that can add to your joy, think
you, in the power of your Pamela, that she would not _do_? O that the
lives and healths of my dearest Mr. B. and you, my parents, may be
continued to me! And who can then be so blest as your Pamela?

I _will_ write, _depend_ upon it, on every occasion--and you augment
my joys to think it is in my power to add to your comforts. Nor can
you conceive my pleasure in hoping that this your new happy lot may,
by relieving you from corroding care, and the too wearying effects
of hard labour, add, in these your advanced years, to both your days.
For, so happy am I, I can have no grief, no pain, in looking forward,
but from reflecting, that one day we must be separated.

But it is fit that we so comport ourselves as not to embitter our
present happiness with prospects too gloomy--but bring our minds to be
cheerfully thankful for the present, wisely to enjoy that _present_
as we go along--and at last, when all is to be wound up--lie down, and
say, "_Not mine_, but _Thy will be done_."

I have written much; yet have still more to say relating to other
parts of your kind acceptable letter; and so will soon write again:
for I must think every opportunity happy, whereby I can assure you,
how much I am, and will ever be, without any addition to my name, if
it will make you easier, _your dutiful_

PAMELA.





LETTER IV

MY DEAREST FATHER AND MOTHER,

I now write again, as I told you I should in my last; but I am half
afraid to look at the copy of it; for your worthy hearts, so visible
in your letter and my beloved's kind deportment upon shewing it to
him, raised me into a frame of mind, bordering on ecstasy: yet I wrote
my heart. But you must not, my dear father, write to your Pamela so
affectingly. Your _steadier_ mind could hardly bear your own moving
strain, and you were forced to lay down your pen, and retire: how then
could I, who love you so dearly, if you had not _increased_ that love
by fresh and stronger instances of your worthiness, forbear being
affected, and raised above myself! But I will not again touch upon
this subject.

You must know then, that my dearest spouse commands me, with his kind
respects, to tell you, he has thought of a method to make your _worthy
hearts_ easy; those were his words: "And this is," said he, "by
putting that whole estate, with the new purchase, under your father's
care, as I at first intended: he shall receive and pay, and order
every thing as he pleases: and Longman, who grows in years, shall be
eased of that burden. Your father writes a very legible hand,
and shall take what assistants he pleases; and do you, Pamela,
see that this new task be made as easy and pleasant to him as
possible. He shall make up his accounts only to you, my dear.
And there will be several pleasures arise to me upon it: first,
that it will be a relief to honest Longman, who has business
enough on his hands. Next, it will make the good couple easy, to have
an opportunity of enjoying that as their due, which now their too
grateful hearts give them so many causeless scruples about. Thirdly,
it will employ your father's time, more suitably to _your_ liking and
mine, because with more ease to himself; for you see his industrious
will cannot be satisfied without doing something. In the fourth place,
the management of this estate will gain him more respect and reverence
among the tenants and his neighbours: and yet be all in his own way.
For," added he, "you'll see, that it is always one point in view with
me, to endeavour to convince every one, that I esteem and value them
for their own intrinsic merit, and want not any body to distinguish
them in any other light than that in which they have been accustomed
to appear."

So, my dear father, the instrument will be drawn, and brought you by
honest Mr. Longman, who will be with you in a few days to put the
last hand to the new purchase, and to give you possession of your new
commission, if you accept it, as I hope you will; and the rather, for
my dear Mr. B.'s third reason; and knowing that this trust will be
discharged as worthily and as sufficiently, after you are used to
it, as if Mr. Longman himself was in it--and better it cannot be. Mr.
Longman is very fond of this relief, and longs to be down to settle
every thing with you, as to the proper powers, the method, &c. And
he says, in his usual phrase, that he'll make it as easy to you as a
glove.

If you do accept it, my dear Mr. B. will leave every thing to you,
as to rent, where not already fixed, and, likewise, as to acts of
kindness and favour to be done where you think proper; and he says,
that, with his bad qualities, he was ever deemed a kind landlord; and
that I can confirm in fifty instances to his honour: "So that the old
gentleman," said he, "need not be afraid of being put upon severe or
harsh methods of proceeding, where things will do without; and he can
always befriend an honest man; by which means the province will
be entirely such a one as suits with his inclination. If any thing
difficult or perplexing arises," continued he, "or where a little
knowledge in law-matters is necessary, Longman shall do all that: and
your father will see that he will not have in those points a coadjutor
too hard-hearted for his wish; for it was a rule my father set me,
and I have strictly followed, that although I have a lawyer for
my steward, it was rather to know how to do _right_ things, than
oppressive ones; and Longman has so well answered this intention, that
he was always more noted for composing differences, than promoting
lawsuits."

I dare say, my dear father, this will be acceptable to you, on the
several accounts my dearest Mr. B. was pleased to mention: and what a
charming contrivance is here! God for ever bless his considerate heart
for it! To make you useful to him, and easy to yourself: as well as
respected by, and even a benefactor to all around you! What can one
say to all things? But what signifies exulting on one's gratitude for
_one_ benefit;--every hour the dear man heaps new ones upon us, and we
can hardly thank him for one, but a second, and a third, and so on
to countless degrees, confound one, and throw back our words upon our
hearts before they are well formed, and oblige us to sit down under
all with profound silence and admiration.

As to the desire of cousin Thomas, and Roger, to live with you, I
endeavoured to sound what our dear benefactor's opinion was. He was
pleased to say, "I have no choice in this case, my dear. Your father
is his own master: he may employ whom he pleases; and, if they shew
respect to him and your mother, I think, as he rightly observes,
relationship should rather have the preference; and as he can remedy
inconveniences, if he finds any, by all means to let every branch of
your family have reason to rejoice with him."

But I have thought of this matter a good deal, since I had the favour
of your letter; and I hope, since you condescend to ask my advice, you
will excuse me, if I give it freely; yet entirely submitting all to
your liking.

First, then, I think it better to have _any body_ than relations; and
for these reasons:

One is apt to expect more regard from them, and they more indulgence
than strangers can hope for.

That where there is such a difference in the expectations of both,
uneasiness cannot but arise.

That this will subject you to bear it, or to resent it, and to part
with them. If you bear it, you will know no end of impositions: if you
dismiss them, it will occasion ill-will. They will call you unkind;
and you them ungrateful: and as your prosperous lot may raise you
enviers, such will be apt to believe _them_ rather than _you_.

Then the world will be inclined to think that we are crowding upon a
generous gentleman a numerous family of indigent people; and it will
be said, "The girl is filling every place with her relations,
and _beleaguering_," as you significantly express it, "a worthy
gentleman;" should one's kindred behave ever so worthily. So, in the
next place, one would not, for _their_ sakes, that this should be
done; who may live with _less_ reproach, and _equal_ benefit, any
where else; for I would not wish any one of them to be lifted out
of his station, and made independent, at Mr. B.'s expense, if their
industry will not do it; although I would never scruple to do any
thing reasonable to promote or assist that industry, in the way of
their callings.

Then, my dear father, I apprehend, that our honoured benefactor would
be under some difficulty, from his natural politeness, and regard for
you and me. You see how kindly, on all occasions, he treats you both,
not only as the parents of his Pamela, but as if you were his own; and
if you had any body as your servants there, who called you cousin, or
grandfather, or uncle, he would not care, when he came down, to
treat them on the foot of common servants, though they might think
themselves honoured (as they would be, and as I shall always think
_myself_) with his commands. And would it not, if they are modest
and worthy, be as great a difficulty upon _them_, to be thus
distinguished, as it would be to _him_ and to _me_, for _his_ sake?
For otherwise (believe me, I hope you will, my dear father and
mother), I could sit down and rejoice with the meanest and remotest
relation I have. But in the world's eye, to every body but my best of
parents, I must, if ever so reluctant to it, appear in a light that
may not give discredit to his choice.

Then again, as I hinted, you will be able, without the least injury
to our common benefactor, to do kinder things by any of our relations,
when _not_ with you, than you can do, if they _live_ with you.

You may lend them a little money to put them in a way, if any thing
offers that you think will be to their advantage. You can fit out
my she-cousins to good reputable places. The younger you can put to
school, or, when fit, to trades, according to their talents; and
so they will be of course in a way to get an honest and creditable
livelihood.

But, above all things, one would discourage such a proud and ambitious
spirit in any of them, as should want to raise itself by favour
instead of merit; and this the rather, for, undoubtedly, there are
many more happy persons in low than in high life, take number for
number all the world over. I am sure, although four or five years of
different life had passed with me, I had so much pride and pleasure
in the thought of working for my living with you, if I could but get
honest to you, that it made my confinement the more grievous, and, if
possible, aggravated the apprehensions attending it.

But I beg of you, not to think these my reasons proceed from the bad
motives of a heart tainted with pride on its high condition.
Indeed there can be no reason for it, to one who thinks after this
manner--the greatest families on earth have some among them who are
unhappy and low in life; and shall such a one reproach me with having
twenty low relations, because they have, peradventure, not above five?

Let us then, my dear parents, endeavour to judge of one another,
as God, at the last day, will judge of us all: and then the honest
peasant will stand fairer in our esteem than the guilty peer.

In short, this shall be my own rule--Every one who acts justly and
honestly, I will look upon as my relation, whether so or not; and the
more he wants my assistance, the more entitled to it he shall be, as
well as to my esteem; while those who deserve it not, must expect only
compassion from me, and my prayers were they my brothers or sisters.
'Tis true had I not been poor and lowly, I might not have thought
thus; but if it be a right way of thinking, it is a blessing that I
was so; and that shall never be matter of reproach to me, which one
day will be matter of justification.

Upon the whole, I should think it advisable, my dear father and
mother, to make such kind excuses to the offered service of my
cousins, as your better reason shall suggest to you; and to do any
thing else for them of _more_ value, as their circumstances may
require, or occasions offer to serve them.

But if the employing and having them about you, will add comfort to
your lives, I give up entirely my own opinion, and doubt not every
thing will be thought well of, that you shall think fit to do.

And so I conclude with assuring you, that I am, my ever-dear parents,
_your dutiful and happy daughter_.

The copy of this letter I will keep to myself, till I have your
answer, that you may be under no difficulty how to act in either of
the cases mentioned in it.





LETTER V

MY DEAREST DAUGHTER,

How shall I do to answer, as they deserve, your two last letters? Sure
no happy couple ever had such a child as we have! But it is in vain
to aim at words like yours: and equally in vain for us to offer to set
forth the thankfulness of our hearts, on the kind office your honoured
husband has given us; for no reason but to favour us still more, and
to quiet our minds in the notion of being useful to him. God grant
I may be able to be so!--Happy shall I be, if I can! But I see the
generous drift of his proposal; it is only to make me more easy from
the nature of my employment, and, in my mind too, over-loaded as I may
say, with benefits; and at the same time to make me more respected in
my new neighbourhood.

I can only say, I most gratefully accept of the kind offer; and since
it will ease the worthy Mr. Longman, shall with still greater pleasure
do all I can in it. But I doubt I shall want ability; but I will be
just and honest, however. That, by God's grace, will be within my own
capacity; and that, I hope, I may answer for.

It is kind, indeed, to put it in my power to do good to those who
shall deserve it; and I will take _double_ pains to find out the
true merit of such as I shall recommend to favour, and that their
circumstances be really such as I shall represent them.

But one thing let me desire, that I make up my accounts to Mr.
Longman, or to his honour himself, when he shall be here with us.
I don't know how-but it will make me uneasy, if I am to make up my
accounts to you: for so well known is your love to us, that though
you would no more do an unjust thing, than, by God's grace, we should
desire you; yet this same ill-willing world might think it was like
making up accounts to one's self.

Do, my dearest child, get me off this difficulty, and I can have no
other; for already I am in hopes I have hit upon a contrivance to
improve the estate, and to better the condition of the tenants, at
least not to worst them, and which, I hope, will please every body;
but I will acquaint Mr. Longman with this, and take his advice; for I
will not be too troublesome either to you, my dear child, or to your
spouse.--If I could act so for his interest, as not to be a burden,
what happy creatures should we both be in our own minds!--We find
ourselves more and more respected by every one; and so far as shall be
consistent with our new trust, we will endeavour to deserve it, that
we may interest as many as know us in our own good wishes and prayers
for the happiness of you both.

But let me say, how much convinced I am by your reasons for not taking
to us any of our relations. Every one of those reasons has its force
with us. How happy are we to have so prudent a daughter to advise
with! And I think myself obliged to promise this, that whatever I do
for any of them above the amount of--forty shillings at one time, I
will take your direction in it, that your wise hints, of making every
one continue their industry, and not to rely upon favour instead
of merit, may be followed. I am sure this is the way to make them
_happier_ as well as _better_ men and women; for, as I have often
thought, if one were to have a hundred pounds a year, it would not do
without industry; and with it, one may do with a quarter of it, and
less.

In short, my dear child, your reasons are so good, that I wonder they
came not into my head before, and then I needed not to have troubled
you about the matter: but yet it ran in my own thought, that I could
not like to be an encroacher:--for I hate a dirty thing; and, in the
midst of my distresses, never could be guilty of one. Thank God for
it.

You rejoice our hearts beyond expression at the hope you give us of
receiving letters from you now-and-then: it will be the chief comfort
of our lives, next to seeing you, as we expect we sometimes shall.
But yet, my dear child, don't let us inconvenience you neither. Pray
don't; you'll have enough upon your hands without--to be sure you
will.

The workmen have made a good progress, and wish for Mr. Longman to
come down; as we also do.

You need not be afraid we should think you proud, or lifted up with
your condition. You have weathered the first dangers, and but for your
fine clothes and jewels, we should not see any difference between our
dear Pamela and the much respected Mrs. B. But God has given you
too much sense to be proud or lifted up. I remember, in your former
writings, a saying of your 'squire's, speaking of you, that it was for
persons not used to praise, and who did not deserve it, to be proud of
it.

Every day brings us instances of the good name his honour and you, my
dear child, have left behind you in this country. Here comes one, and
then another, and a third, and a fourth;

"Goodman Andrews," cries one, and, "Goody Andrews," cries
another--(and some call us Mr. and Mrs., but we like the other full as
well) "when heard you from his honour? How does his lady do?--What a
charming couple are they!--How lovingly do they live!--What an example
do they give to all about them!" Then one cries, "God bless them
both," and another cries, "Amen;" and so says a third and a fourth;
and all say, "But when do you expect them down again?--Such-a-one
longs to see 'em--and will ride a day's journey, to have but a sight
of 'em at church." And then they say, "How this gentleman praises
them, and that lady admires them."--O what a happiness is this! How
do your poor mother and I stand fixed to the earth to hear both your
praises, our tears trickling down our cheeks, and our hearts heaving
as if they would burst with joy, till we are forced to take leave in
half words, and hand-in-hand go in together to bless God, and bless
you both. O my daughter, what a happy couple have God and you made us!

Your poor mother is very anxious about her dear child. I will not
touch upon a matter so very irksome to you to hear of. But, though the
time may be some months off, she every hour prays for your safety and
happiness, and all the increase of felicity that his honour's generous
heart can wish for.--That is all we will say at present; only, that
we are, with continued prayers and blessings, my dearest child, _your
loving father and mother_,

J. _and_ E. ANDREWS.





LETTER VI

_From Lady Davers to Mrs. B._

MY DEAR PAMELA,

I intended to have been with you before this: but my lord has been a
little indisposed with the gout, and Jackey has had an intermitting
fever: but they are pretty well recovered, and it shall not be long
before I see you, now I understand you are returned from your Kentish
expedition.

We have been exceedingly diverted with your papers. You have given us,
by their means, many a delightful hour, that otherwise would have hung
heavy upon us; and we are all charmed with you. Lady Betty, and
her noble mamma, has been of our party, whenever we have read your
accounts. She is a dear generous lady, and has shed with us many a
tear over them; and my lord has not been unmoved, nor Jackey neither,
at some of your distresses and reflections. Indeed, Pamela, you are a
charming creature, and an ornament to your sex. We wanted to have had
you among us a hundred times, as we read, that we might have loved,
and kissed, and thanked you.

But after all, my brother, generous and noble as he seemed, when your
trials were over, was a strange wicked young fellow; and happy it was
for you both, that he was so cleverly caught in the trap he had laid
for your virtue.

I can assure you, my lord longs to see you, and will accompany me;
for, he says, he has but a faint idea of your person. I tell him,
and them all, that you are the finest girl, and the most improved
in person and mind, I ever beheld; and I am not afraid although they
should imagine all they can in your favour, from my account, that
they will be disappointed when they see and converse with you. But one
thing more you must do, and then we will love you still more; and that
is, send us the rest of your papers, down to your marriage at least;
and farther, it you have written farther; for we all long to see the
rest, as you relate it, though we know in general what has passed.

You leave off with an account of an angry letter I wrote to my
brother, to persuade him to give you your liberty, and a sum of money;
not doubting but his designs would end in your ruin, and, I own, not
wishing he would marry you; for little did I know of your merit and
excellence, nor could I, but for your letters so lately sent me, have
had any notion of either. I don't question, but if you have recited
my passionate behaviour to you, when at the hall, I shall make a
ridiculous figure enough; but I will forgive all that, for the sake of
the pleasure you _have_ given me, and will still farther give me, if
you comply with my request.

Lady Betty says, it is the best story she has heard, and the most
instructive; and she longs to have the conclusion of it in your own
words. She says now and then, "What a hopeful brother you have, Lady
Davers! O these intriguing gentlemen!--What rogueries do they not
commit! I should have had a fine husband of him, had I received your
proposal! The _dear_ Pamela would have run in his head, and had I been
the first lady in the kingdom, I should have stood but a poor chance
in his esteem; for, you see, his designs upon her began early."

She says, you had a good heart to go back again to him, when the
violent wretch had driven you from him on such a slight occasion: but
yet, she thinks the reasons you give in your relation, and your love
for him (which then you began to discover was your case), as well as
the event, shewed you did right.

But we'll tell you all our judgments, when we have read the rest of
your accounts. So pray send them as soon as you can, to (I won't write
myself _sister_ till then) _your affectionate_, &c.

B. DAVERS.





LETTER VII

My good dear Lady,

You have done me great honour in the letter your ladyship has been
pleased to send me; and it is a high pleasure to me, now all is so
happily over, that my poor papers in the least diverted you, and such
honourable and worthy persons as your ladyship mentions. I could wish
I might be favoured with such remarks on my conduct, so nakedly set
forth (without any imagination that they would ever appear in such an
assembly), as may be of use to me in my future life, and thus make me
more worthy than it is otherwise possible I can be, of the honour to
which I am raised. Do, dearest lady, favour me so far. I am prepared
to receive blame, and to benefit by it, and cannot expect praise so
much from my _actions_ as from my _intentions_; for indeed, these
were always just and honourable: but why, even for these do I talk of
praise, since, being prompted by impulses I could not resist, it can
be no merit in me to have been governed by them?

As to the papers following those in your hands, when I say, that they
must needs appear impertinent to such judges, after what you know,
I dare say, your ladyship will not insist upon them: yet I will not
scruple briefly to mention what they contain.

All my dangers and trials were happily at an end: so that they only
contain the conversations that passed between your ladyship's generous
brother and me; his kind assurances of honourable love to me; my
acknowledgments of unworthiness to him; Mrs. Jewkes's respectful
change of behaviour towards me; Mr. B.'s reconciliation to
Mr. Williams; his introducing me to the good families in the
neighbourhood, and avowing before them his honourable intentions. A
visit from my honest father, who (not knowing what to conclude from my
letter to him before I returned to your honoured brother, desiring
my papers from him) came in great anxiety of heart to know the worst,
doubting I had at last been caught by a stratagem, ending in my ruin.
His joyful surprise to find how happy I was likely to be. All
the hopes given me, answered by the private celebration of our
nuptials--an honour so much above all that my utmost ambition could
make me aspire to, and which I never can deserve! Your ladyship's
arrival, and anger, not knowing I was actually married, but supposing
me a vile wicked creature; in which case I should have deserved the
worst of usage. Mr. B.'s angry lessons to me, for daring to interfere;
though I thought in the tenderest and most dutiful manner, between
your ladyship and himself. The most acceptable goodness and favour of
your ladyship afterwards to me, of which, as becomes me, I shall ever
retain the most grateful sense. My return to this sweet mansion in a
manner so different from my quitting it, where I had been so happy
for four years, in paying my duty to the best of mistresses, your
ladyship's excellent mother, to whose goodness, in taking me from my
poor honest parents, and giving me what education I have, I owe, under
God, my happiness. The joy of good Mrs. Jervis, Mr. Longman, and all
the servants, on this occasion. Mr. B.'s acquainting me with Miss
Godfrey's affair, and presenting to me the pretty Miss Goodwin, at the
dairy-house. Our appearance at church; the favour of the gentry in the
neighbourhood, who, knowing your ladyship had not disdained to look
upon me, and to be favourable to me, came the more readily into a
neighbourly intimacy with me, and still so much the more readily, as
the continued kindness of my dear benefactor, and his condescending
deportment to me before them (as if I had been worthy of the honour
done me), did credit to his own generous act.

These, my lady, down to my good parents setting out to this place,
in order to be settled, by my honoured benefactor's bounty, in the
Kentish farm, are the most material contents of my remaining papers:
and though they might be the most agreeable to those for whom only
they were written, yet, _as_ they were principally matters of course,
after what your ladyship has with you; _as_ the joy of my fond heart
can be better judged of by your ladyship than described by me; and as
you are acquainted with all the particulars that can be worthy of any
other person's notice but my dear parents: I am sure your ladyship
will dispense with your commands; and I make it my humble request that
you will.

For, Madam, you must needs think, that _when_ my doubts were
dispelled; _when_ confident all my trials were over; _when_ I had a
prospect of being so abundantly rewarded for what I suffered: _when
every_ hour rose upon me with new delight, and fraught with fresh
instances of generous kindness from such a dear gentleman, my master,
my benefactor, the son of my honoured lady: your ladyship must needs
think, I say, that I must be _too_ much affected, my heart _too_ much
opened; and especially as it then (relieved from its past anxieties
and fears, which had kept down and damped the latent flame)
first discovered impressions of which before I hardly thought it
susceptible.--So that it is scarce possible, that my _joy_ and my
_prudence_, if I were to be tried by such judges of delicacy and
decorum as Lord and Lady Davers, the honoured countess, and Lady
Betty, could be so _intimately_, so _laudably_ coupled, as were to
be wished: although the continued sense of my unworthiness, and the
disgrace the dear gentleman would bring upon himself by his generous
goodness to me, always went hand in hand with my _joy_ and my
_prudence_; and what these considerations took from the _former_,
being added to the _latter_, kept me steadier and more equal to
myself, than otherwise it was possible such a young creature as I
could have been.

Wherefore my good lady, I hope I stand excused, and shall not bring
upon myself the censure of being disobedient to your commands.

Besides, Madam, since you inform me that my good Lord Davers will
attend you hither, I should never dare to look his lordship in the
face, if all the emotions of my heart, on such affecting occasions,
stood confessed to his lordship; and if I am ashamed they should to
your ladyship, to the countess, and Lady Betty, whose goodness must
induce you all three to think favourably, in such circumstances, of
one who is of your own sex, how would it concern me, for the same
to appear before such gentlemen as my lord and his nephew?--Indeed I
could not look up to either of them in the sense of this.--And give me
leave to hope, that some of the scenes, in the letters your ladyship
had, were not read to gentlemen; your ladyship must needs know which
I mean, and will think of my two grand trials of all. For though I was
the innocent subject of wicked attempts, and so cannot, I hope, suffer
in any one's opinion for what I could not help; yet, for your dear
brother's sake, as well as for the decency of the matter, one would
not, when having the honour to appear before my lord and his nephew,
he looked upon, methinks, with that levity of eye and thought, which,
perhaps, hard-hearted gentlemen may pass upon one, by reason of
those very scenes, which would move pity and concern in a good lady's
breast, for a poor creature so attempted.

So, my dear lady, be pleased to tell me, if the gentlemen _have_ heard
all--I hope not--and also to point out to me such parts of my conduct
as deserve blame: indeed, I will try to make a good use of your
censure, and am sure I shall be thankful for it; for it will make me
hope to be more and more worthy of the honour I have, of being exalted
into such a distinguished family, and the right the best of gentlemen
has given me to style myself _your ladyship's most humble, and most
obliged servant_,

P.B.





LETTER VIII

_From Lady Davers, in reply._

MY DEAR PAMELA,

You have given us all a great disappointment in declining to oblige me
with the sequel of your papers. I was a little out of humour with you
at first;--I must own I was:--for I cannot bear denial, when my heart
is set upon any thing. But Lady Betty became your advocate, and said,
she thought you very excusable: since, no doubt, there might be many
tender things, circumstanced as you were, well enough for your parents
to see, but for nobody else; and relations of our side, the least of
all, whose future intimacy, and frequent visits, might give occasions
for raillery and remarks, not otherwise agreeable. I regard her
apology for you the more, because I knew it was a great baulk to her,
that you did not comply with my request. But now, child, when you know
me more, you'll find, that if I am obliged to give up one point, I
always insist on another, as near it as I can, in order to see if it
be only _one_ thing I am to be refused, or _every_ thing; in which
last case, I know how to take my measures, and resent.

Now this is what I insist upon; that you correspond with me the same
as you did with your parents, and acquaint me with every passage that
is of concern to you; beginning with your account how both of you
spent your time when in Kent; for you must know we are all taken with
your duty to your parents, and the discretion of the good couple, and
think you have given a very edifying example of filial piety to all
who shall hear your story; for if so much duty is owing to parents,
where nothing can be done for one, how much more is it to be expected,
where there is power to add to the natural obligation, all the
comforts and conveniences of life? We people in upper life love to
hear how gratitude and unexpected benefits operate upon honest minds,
who have little more than plain artless nature for their guide; and
we flatter ourselves with the hopes of many a delightful hour, by your
means, in this our solitary situation, if obliged to pass the next
winter in it, as my lord and the earl threaten me, and the countess,
and Lady Betty, that we shall. Then let us hear of every thing that
gives you joy or trouble: and if my brother carries you to town, for
the winter, while he attends parliament, the advices you can give
us of what passes in London, and of the public entertainments and
diversions he will take you to, related in your own artless and
natural observations, will be as diverting to us, as if at them
ourselves. For a young creature of your good understanding, to whom
all these things will be quite new, will give us, perhaps, a better
taste of them, their beauties and defects, than we might have before;
for we people of quality go to those places, dressed out and adorned
in such a manner, outvying one another, as if we considered ourselves
as so many parts of the public entertainment, and are too much pleased
with ourselves to be able so to attend to what we see, as to form a
right judgment of it; but some of us behave with so much indifference
to the entertainment, as if we thought ourselves above being diverted
by what we come to see, and as if our view was rather to trifle away
our time, than improve ourselves by attending to the story of the
action.

See, Pamela, I shall not make an unworthy correspondent altogether,
for I can get into thy grave way, and moralize a little now and then:
and if you'll promise to oblige me by your constant correspondence in
this way, and divest yourself of all restraint, as if you were writing
to your parents (and I can tell you, you'll write to one who will be
as candid and as favourable to you as they can be), then I am sure we
shall have truth and nature from you; and these are things which we
are generally so much lifted above, by our conditions, that we hardly
know what they are.

But I have written enough for one letter; and yet, having more to say,
I will, after this, send another, without waiting for your answer,
which you may give to both together; and am, _yours_, &c. B. DAVERS.





LETTER IX

DEAR PAMELA,

I am very glad thy honest man has let thee into the affair of Sally
Godfrey. But pr'ythee, Pamela, tell us how he did it, and thy thoughts
upon it, for that is a critical case, and as he has represented it,
so shall I know what to say of it before you and him: for I would not
make mischief between you for the world.

This, let me tell you, will be a trying part of your conduct. For he
loves the child, and will judge of you by your conduct towards it.
He dearly loved her mother; and notwithstanding her fault, she well
deserved it: for she was a sensible, ay, and a modest lady, and of an
ancient and genteel family. But he was heir to a noble estate, was
of a bold and enterprising spirit, fond of intrigue--Don't let this
concern you--You'll have the greater happiness, and merit too, if you
can hold him; and, 'tis my opinion, if any body can, you will. Then
he did not like the young lady's mother, who sought artfully to entrap
him. So that the poor girl, divided between her inclination for him,
and her duty to her designing mother, gave into the plot upon him: and
he thought himself--vile wretch as he was for all that!--at liberty
to set up plot against plot, and the poor lady's honour was the
sacrifice.

I hope you spoke well of her to him--I hope you received the child
kindly--I hope you had presence of mind to do this--For it is a nice
part to act; and all his observations were up, I dare say, on the
occasion--Do let me hear how it was. And write without restraint; for
although I am not your mother, yet am I _his_ eldest sister, you know,
and as such--Come, I will say so, in hopes you'll oblige me--_your_
sister, and so entitled to expect a compliance with my request: for is
there not a duty, in degree, to elder sisters from younger?

As to our remarks upon your behaviour, they have been much to your
credit: but nevertheless, I will, to encourage you to enter into this
requested correspondence with me, consult Lady Betty, and will go over
your papers again, and try to find fault with your conduct, and if we
see any thing censurable, will freely let you know our minds.

But, before-hand, I can tell you, we shall be agreed in one opinion;
and that is, that we know not who would have acted as you have done,
upon the whole. So, Pamela, you see I put myself upon the same foot
of correspondence with you. Not that I will promise to answer every
latter: no, you must not expect that. Your part will be a kind of
narrative, purposely designed to entertain us here; and I hope to
receive six, seven, eight, or ten letters, as it may happen, before I
return one: but such a part I will bear in it, as shall let you know
our opinion of your proceedings, and relations of things. And as you
wish to be found fault with, you shall freely have it (though not in
a splenetic or ill-natured way), as often as you give occasion.
Now, Pamela, I have two views in this. One is to see how a man of my
brother's spirit, who has not denied himself any genteel liberties
(for it must be owned he never was a common town rake, and had always
a dignity in his roguery), will behave himself to you, and in wedlock,
which used to be freely sneered at by him; the next, that I may
love you more and more as by your letters, I shall be more and more
acquainted with you, as well as by conversation; so that you can't be
off, if you would.

'I know, however, you will have one objection to this; and that is,
that your family affairs will require your attention, and not give the
time you used to have for this employment. But consider, child, the
station you are raised to does not require you to be quite a domestic
animal. You are lifted up to the rank of a lady, and you must act up
to it, and not think of setting such an example, as will draw upon
you the ill-will and censure of other ladies. For will any of our sex
visit one who is continually employing herself in such works as either
must be a reproach to herself, or to them?--You'll have nothing to do
but to give orders. You will consider yourself as the task-mistress,
and the common herd of female servants as so many negroes directing
themselves by your nod; or yourself as the master-wheel, in some
beautiful pieces of mechanism, whose dignified grave motions is to
set a-going all the under-wheels, with a velocity suitable to their
respective parts. Let your servants, under your direction, do all that
relates to household management; they cannot write to entertain and
instruct as you can: so what will you have to do?--I'll answer my own
question: In the first place, endeavour to please your sovereign lord
and master; and let me tell you, any other woman in England, be her
quality ever so high, would have found enough to do to succeed in
that. Secondly, to receive and pay visits, in order, for his credit
as well as your own, to make your fashionable neighbours fond of you.
Then, thirdly, you will have time upon your hands (as your monarch
himself rises early, and is tolerably regular for such a brazen face
as he has been) to write to me in the manner I have mentioned, and
expect; and I see plainly, by your style, nothing can be easier for
you than to do this.

Thus, and with reading, may your time be filled up with reputations to
yourself, and delight to others, till a fourth employment puts itself
upon you: and that is (shall I tell you boys, [Transcriber's note:
text missing in original] to perpetuate a family, for many hundred
years esteemed worthy and eminent, which, being now reduced,
in the direct line, to him and me, _expects_ it from you; or
else let me tell you (nor will I baulk it), my brother, by descending
to the wholesome cot--excuse me, Pamela--will want one apology for his
conduct, be as excellent as you may.

I say this, child, not to reflect upon you, since the thing is done;
for I love you dearly, and will love you more and more--but to let
you know what is expected from you, and encourage you in the prospect
already opening to you both, and to me, who have the welfare of the
family I sprung from so much at heart, although I know this will be
attended with some anxieties to a mind so thoughtful and apprehensive
as yours seems to be.

O but this puts me in mind of your solicitude, lest the gentlemen
should have seen every thing contained in your letters-But this I will
particularly speak to in a third letter, having filled my paper on all
sides: and am, till then,_ yours_, &c.

B. DAVERS.

You see, and I hope will take it as a favour, that I break the ice,
and begin first in the indispensably expected correspondence between
us.





LETTER X

_From the same._

And so, Pamela, you are solicitous to know, if the gentlemen have seen
every part of your papers? I can't say but they have: nor, except in
regard to the reputation of your saucy man, do I see why the part you
hint at might not be read by those to whom the rest might be shewn.

I can tell you, Lady Betty, who is a very nice and delicate lady, had
no objection to any part, though read before men: only now and then
crying out, "O the vile man!--See, Lord Davers, what wretches you men
are!" And, commiserating you, "Ah! the poor Pamela!" And expressing
her impatience to hear how you escaped at this time, and at that, and
rejoicing in your escape. And now-and-then, "O, Lady Davers, what a
vile brother you have!--I hate him perfectly. The poor girl cannot be
made amends for all this, though he has married her. Who, that
knows these things of him, would wish him to be hers, with all his
advantages of person, mind, and fortune?" and his wicked attempts.

But I can tell you this, that except one had heard every tittle of
your danger, how near you were to ruin, and how little he stood
upon taking any measures to effect his vile purposes, even daring to
attempt you in the presence of a _good_ woman, which was a wickedness
that every _wicked_ man could not be guilty of; I say, except one had
known these things, one could not have judged of the merit of your
resistance, and how shocking those attempts were to your virtue, for
that life itself was endangered by them: nor, let me tell you, could
I, in particular, have so well justified him for marrying you (I mean
with respect to his own proud and haughty temper of mind), if there
had been room to think he could have had you upon easier terms.

It was necessary, child, on twenty accounts, that we, your and his
well-wishers and his relations, should know that he had tried every
stratagem to subdue you to his purpose, before he married you: and how
would it have answered to his intrepid character, and pride of heart,
had we not been particularly led into the nature of those attempts,
which you so nobly resisted, as to convince us all, that you have
deserved the good fortune you have met with, as well as all the kind
and respectful treatment he can possibly shew you?

Nor ought you to be concerned who sees any the most tender parts of
your story, except, as I said, for his sake; for it must be a very
unvirtuous mind that can form any other ideas from what you relate
than those of terror and pity for you. Your expressions are too
delicate to give the nicest ear offence, except at him. You paint no
scenes but such as make his wickedness odious: and that gentleman,
much more lady, must have a very corrupt heart, who could from such
circumstances of distress, make any reflections, but what should be to
your honour, and in abhorrence of such actions. I am so convinced of
this, that by this rule I would judge of any man's heart in the world,
better than by a thousand declarations and protestations. I do assure
you, rakish as Jackey is, and freely as I doubt not that Lord Davers
has formerly lived (for he has been a man of pleasure), they gave me,
by their behaviour on these tender occasions, reason to think they had
more virtue than not to be very apprehensive for your safety; and my
lord often exclaimed, that he could not have thought his brother such
a libertine, neither.

Besides, child, were not these things written in confidence had not
recited all you could recite, would there not have been room for any
one, who saw what you wrote, to imagine they had been still worse? And
how could the terror be supposed to have had such effects upon you, as
to endanger your life, without imagining you had undergone the worst a
vile man _could_ offer, unless you had told us what that was which he
_did_ offer, and so put a bound, as it were, to one's fears of what
you suffered, which otherwise must have been injurious to your purity,
though you could not help it?

Moreover, Pamela, it was but doing justice to the libertine himself
to tell your mother the whole truth, that she might know he was not so
very abandoned, but he could stop short of the execution of his wicked
purposes, which he apprehended, if pursued, would destroy the life,
that, of all lives, he would choose to preserve; and you owed also
thus much to your parents' peace of mind, that, after all their
distracting fears for you, they might see they had reason to rejoice
in an uncontaminated daughter. And one cannot but reflect, now he has
made you his wife, that it must be satisfaction to the wicked man, as
well as to yourself, that he was not more guilty than he _was_, nor
took more liberties than he _did_.

For my own part, I must say, that I could not have accounted for your
fits, by any descriptions short of those you give; and had you been
less particular in the circumstances, I should have judged he had been
still _worse_, and your person, though not your mind, less pure, than
his pride would expect from the woman he should marry; for this is
the case of all rakes, that though they indulge in all manner of
libertinism themselves, there is no class of men who exact greater
delicacy from the persons they marry, though they care not how bad
they make the wives, the sisters, and daughters of others.

I will only add (and send all my three letters together), that we all
blame you in some degree for bearing the wicked Jewkes in your sight,
after her most impudent assistance in his lewd attempt; much less, we
think, ought you to have left her in her place, and rewarded her; for
her vileness could hardly be equalled by the worst actions of the most
abandoned procuress.

I know the difficulties you labour under, in his arbitrary will, and
intercession for her: but Lady Betty rightly observes, that he knew
what a vile woman she was, when he put you into her power, and no
doubt employed her, being sure she would answer all his purposes:
and that therefore she should have had very little opinion of the sincerity
of his reformation, while he was so solicitous in keeping her, and having
her put upon a foot, in the present on your nuptials, with honest Jervis.

She would, she says, had she been in your case, have had _one_
struggle for her dismission, let it have been taken as it would; and
he that was so well pleased with your virtues, must have thought this
a natural consequence of it, if he was in earnest to reclaim.

I know not whether you shew him all I write: but I have written this
last part in the cover, as well for want of room, as that you may keep
it from him, if you please. Though if you think it will serve any
good end, I am not against shewing to him all I write. For I must ever
speak my mind, though I were to smart for it; and that nobody can or
has the heart to make me do, but my bold brother. So, Pamela, for this
time, _Adieu_.





LETTER XI

MY GOOD LADY,

I am honoured with your ladyship's three letters, the contents of
which are highly obliging to me: and I should be inexcusable if I did
not comply with your injunctions, and be very proud and thankful for
your ladyship's condescension in accepting of my poor scribble, and
promising such a rich and valuable return; of which you have already
given such ample and delightful instances. I will not plead my
defects, to excuse my obedience. I only fear that the awe which will
be always upon me, when I write to your ladyship, will lay me under so
great a restraint, that I shall fall short even of the merit my
papers have already made for me, through your kind indulgence.--Yet,
sheltering myself under your goodness, I will cheerfully comply with
every thing your ladyship expects from me, that it is in my power to
do.

You will give me leave, Madam, to put into some little method, the
particulars of what you desire of me, that I may speak to them all:
for, since you are so good as to excuse me from sending the rest of
my papers (which indeed would not bear in many places), I will omit
nothing that shall tend to convince you of my readiness to obey you in
every thing else.

First, then, your ladyship would have the particulars of the happy
fortnight we passed in Kent, on one of the most agreeable occasions
that could befall me.

Secondly, an account of the manner in which your dear brother
acquainted me with the affecting story of Miss Godfrey, and my
behaviour upon it.

And, thirdly, I presume your ladyship, and Lady Betty, expect me to
say something upon your welcome remarks on my conduct towards Mrs.
Jewkes.

The other particulars your ladyship mentions, will naturally fall
under one or other of these three heads--But expect not, my lady,
though I begin in method thus, that I shall keep up to it. If you will
not allow for me, and keep in view the poor Pamela Andrews in all I
write, but have Mrs. B. in your eye, what will become of me?--But I
promise myself so much improvement from this correspondence, that
I enter upon it with a greater delight than I can express,
notwithstanding the mingled awe and diffidence that will accompany me,
in every part of the agreeable task. To begin with the first article:

Your dear brother and my honest parents (I know your ladyship will
expect from me, that on all occasions I should speak of them with the
duty that becomes a good child) with myself, set out on the Monday
morning for Kent, passing through St. Albans to London, at both which
places we stopped a night; for our dear benefactor would make us take
easy journeys: and on Wednesday evening we arrived at the sweet place
allotted for the good couple. We were attended only by Abraham and
John, on horseback: for Mr. Colbrand, having sprained his foot, was in
the travelling-coach, with the cook, the housemaid, and Polly Barlow,
a genteel new servant, whom Mrs. Brooks recommended to wait on me.

Mr. Longman had been there a fortnight, employed in settling the terms
of an additional purchase of this pretty well-wooded and well-watered
estate: and his account of his proceedings was very satisfactory to
his honoured principal. He told us, he had much ado to dissuade the
tenants from pursuing a formed resolution of meeting their landlord
on horseback, at some miles distance; for he had informed them when he
expected us; but knowing how desirous Mr. B. was of being retired, he
had ventured to assure them, that when every thing was settled, and
the new purchase actually entered upon, they would have his presence
among them often; and that he would introduce them all at different
times to their worthy landlord, before we left the country.

The house is large, and very commodious; and we found every thing
about it, and in it, exceeding neat and convenient; owing to the
worthy Mr. Longman's care and direction. The ground is well-stocked,
the barns and outhouses in excellent repair; and my poor parents have
only to wish, that they and I may be deserving of half the goodness we
experience from your bountiful brother.

But, indeed. Madam, I have the pleasure of discovering every day more
and more, that there is not a better disposed and more generous man in
the world than himself, for I verily think he has not been so
careful to conceal his _bad_ actions as his _good_ ones. His heart is
naturally beneficent, and his beneficence is the gift of God for the
most excellent purposes, as I have often freely told him. Pardon me,
my dear lady; I wish I may not be impertinently grave: but I find a
great many instances of his considerate charity, which few knew of,
and which, since I have been his almoner, could not avoid coming to my
knowledge. But this, possibly, is no news to your ladyship. Every body
knows the generous goodness of your _own_ heart: every one wanting
relief tasted the bounty of your excellent _mother_ my late honoured
lady: so that 'tis a _family grace_, and I have no need to speak of it
to you. Madam.

This cannot, I hope, be construed as if I would hereby suppose
ourselves less obliged. I know nothing so godlike in human nature as
this disposition to do good to our fellow-creatures: for is it not
following immediately the example of that generous Providence which
every minute is conferring blessings upon us all, and by giving power
to the rich, makes them but the dispensers of its benefits to those
that want them? Yet, as there are but too many objects of compassion,
and as the most beneficent cannot, like Omnipotence, do good to all,
how much are they obliged who are distinguished from others!-And
this being kept in mind, will always contribute to make the benefited
receive, as thankfully as they _ought_, the favours of the obliger.

I know not if I write to be understood, in all I mean; but my grateful
heart is so over-filled when on this subject, that methinks I want to
say a great deal more at the same time that I am apprehensive I say
too much. Yet, perhaps, the copies of the letters I here inclose (that
marked [I.] written by me to my parents, on our return to Kent; that
marked [II.] from my dear father in answer to it; and that marked
[III.] mine in reply to his) will (at the same time that they may
convince your ladyship that I will conceal nothing from you in the
course of this correspondence, which may in the least amuse and divert
you, or better explain our grateful sentiments), in a great measure,
answer what your ladyship expects from me, as to the happy fortnight
we passed in Kent.

I will now conclude, choosing to suspend the correspondence, till I
know from your ladyship, whether it will not be too low, too idle for
your attention; whether you will not dispense with your own commands
when you see I am so little likely to answer what you may possibly
expect from me: or whether, if you insist upon my scribbling, you
would have me write in any other way, be less tedious, less serious-in
short, less or more any thing. For all that is in my power, your
ladyship may command from, _Madam, your obliged and faithful servant_.

P.B.

Your dearest brother, from whose knowledge I would not keep any thing
that shall take up any considerable portion of my time, gives me leave
to proceed in this correspondence, if you command it; and is pleased
to say, he will content himself to see such parts of it, and _only_
such parts, as I shall shew him, or read to him.--Is not this very
good, Madam?--O, my lady, you don't know how happy I am!





LETTER XII

_From Lady Davers to Mrs. B._

My dear Pamela,

You very much oblige me by your cheerful compliance with my request: I
leave it entirely to you to write as you shall be in the humour,
when you take up your pen; and then I shall have you write with less
restraint: for, you must know, that what we admire in _you_, are truth
and nature, not studied or elaborate epistles. We can hear at church,
or read in our closets, fifty good things that we expect not from you:
but we cannot receive from any body else the pleasure of sentiments
flowing with that artless ease, which so much affects us when we read
your letters. Then, my sweet girl, your gratitude, prudence, integrity
of heart, your humility, shine so much in all your letters and
thoughts, that no wonder my brother loves you as he does.

But I shall make you proud, I doubt, and so by praise ruin those
graces which we admire, and, but for that, cannot praise you too much.
In my conscience, if thou canst hold as thou hast begun, I believe
thou wilt have him _all to thyself_; and that was more than I once
thought any woman on this side the seventieth year of his age would
ever be able to say. The letters to and from your parents, we are
charmed with, and the communicating of them to me, I take to be as
great an instance of your confidence in me, as it is of your judgment
and prudence; for you cannot but think, that we, his relations, are
a little watchful over your conduct, and have our eyes upon you, to
observe what use you are likely to make of your power over your man,
with respect to your own relations.

Hitherto all is unexampled prudence, and you take the right method to
reconcile even the proudest of us to your marriage, and make us not
only love you, but respect your parents: for their honesty will, I
perceive, be their distinguishing character, and they will not forget
themselves, nor their former condition.

I can tell you, you are exactly right; for if you were to be an
_encroacher_, as the good old man calls it, my brother would be the
first to see it, and would gradually think less and less of you, till
possibly he might come to despise you, and to repent of his choice:
for the least shadow of an imposition, or low cunning, or mere
selfishness, he cannot bear.

In short, you are a charming girl; and Lady Betty says so too; and
moreover adds, that if he makes you not the best and _faithfullest_ of
husbands, he cannot deserve you, for all his fortune and birth. And in
my heart, I begin to think so too.

But won't you oblige me with the sequel of your letter to your father?
For, you promise, my dear charming scribbler, in that you sent me, to
write again to his letter; and I long to see how you answer the latter
part of it, about your relations desiring already to come and live
with him. I know what I _expect_ from you. But let it be what it will,
send it to me exactly as you wrote it; and I shall see whether I have
reason to praise or reprove you. For surely, Pamela, you must leave
one room to blame you for something. Indeed I can hardly bear the
thought, that you should so much excel as you do, and have more
prudence, by nature, as it were, than the best of us get in a course
of the genteelest educations and with fifty advantages, at least,
in conversation, that _you_ could not have, by reason of my mother's
retired life, while you were with her, and your close attendance on
her person.

But I'll tell you what has been a great improvement to you; it is your
own writings. This itch of scribbling has been a charming help. For
here, having a natural fund of good sense, and prudence above your
years, you have, with the observations these have enabled you to make,
been flint and steel too, as I may say, to yourself: so that you have
struck _fire_ when you pleased, wanting nothing but a few dry leaves,
like the first pair in old Du Bartas, to serve as tinder to catch your
animating sparks. So that reading constantly, and thus using yourself
to write, and enjoying besides a good memory, every thing you heard
and read became your own; and not only so, but was improved by passing
through more salubrious ducts and vehicles; like some fine fruit
grafted upon a common free-stock, whose more exuberant juices serve to
bring to quicker and greater perfection the downy peach, or the smooth
nectarine, with its crimson blush.

Really, Pamela, I believe, I, too, shall improve by writing to
you-Why, you dear saucy-face, at this rate, you'll make every one that
converses with you, better, and wiser, and _wittier_ too, as far as I
know, than they ever before thought there was _room_ for 'em to be.

As to my own part, I begin to like what I have written myself, I
think; and your correspondence may revive the poetical ideas that used
to fire my mind, before I entered into the drowsy married life; for my
good Lord Davers's turn happens not to be to books; and so by degrees
my imagination was in a manner quenched, and I, as a dutiful wife
should, endeavoured to form my taste by that of the man I
chose.--But, after all, Pamela, you are not to be a little proud of my
correspondence; and I could not have thought it ever would have come
to this; but you will observe, that I am the more free and unreserved,
to encourage _you_ to write without restraint: for already you have
made us a family of writers and readers; so that Lord Davers himself
is become enamoured of your letters, and desires of all things he
may hear read every one that passes between us. Nay, Jackey, for that
matter, who was the most thoughtless, whistling, sauntering fellow you
ever knew, and whose delight in a book ran no higher than a song or a
catch, now comes in with an enquiring face, and vows he'll set pen
to paper, and turn letter-writer himself; and intends (if my brother
won't take it amiss, he says) to begin to _you_, provided he could be
sure of an answer.

I have twenty things still to say; for you have unlocked all our
bosoms. And yet I intended not to write above ten or a dozen lines
when I began; only to tell you, that I would have you take your own
way, in your subjects, and in your style. And if you will but give me
hope, that you are in the way I so much wish to have you in, I will
then call myself your affectionate sister; but till then, it shall
only barely be _your correspondent_,

B. DAVERS. You'll proceed with the account of your Kentish affair, I
doubt not.





LETTER XIII

MY DEAR GOOD LADY,

What kind, what generous things are you pleased to say of your happy
correspondent! And what reason have I to value myself on such an
advantage as is now before me, if I am capable of improving it as I
ought, from a correspondence with so noble and so admired a lady!
To be praised by such a genius, and my honoured benefactor's worthy
sister, whose favour, next to his, it was always my chief ambition to
obtain, is what would be enough to fill with vanity a steadier and a
more equal mind than mine.

I have heard from my late honoured lady, what a fine pen her beloved
daughter was mistress of, when she pleased to take it up. But I never
could have presumed, but from your ladyship's own motion, to hope
to be in any manner the subject of it, much less to be called your
correspondent.

Indeed, Madam, I _am_ very proud of this honour, and consider it as
such a heightening to my pleasures, as only _that_ could give; and I
will set about obeying your ladyship without reserve.

But, first, permit me to disclaim any merit, from my own poor
writings, to that improvement which your goodness imputes to me. What
I have to boast, of that sort, is owing principally, if it deserves
commendation, to my late excellent lady.

It is hard to be imagined what pains her ladyship took with her poor
servant. Besides making me keep a book of her charities dispensed by
me, I always set down, in my way, the cases of the distressed, their
griefs from misfortunes, and their joys of her bountiful relief; and
so I entered early into the various turns that affected worthy hearts,
and was taught the better to regulate my own, especially by the help
of her fine observations, when I read what I wrote. For many a time
has her generous heart overflowed with pleasure at my remarks, and
with praises; and I was her good girl, her dear Pamela, her hopeful
maiden; and she would sometimes snatch my hand with transport, and
draw me to her, and vouchsafe to kiss me; and always was saying,
what she would do for me, if God spared her, and I continued to be
deserving.

O my dear lady! you cannot think what an encouragement this
condescending behaviour and goodness was to me. Madam, you
_cannot_ think it.

I used to throw myself at her feet, and embrace her knees; and, my
eyes streaming with tears of joy, would often cry, "O continue to me,
my dearest lady, the blessing of your favour, and kind instructions,
and it is all your happy Pamela can wish for."

But I will proceed to obey your ladyship, and write with as much
freedom as I possibly _can_: for you must not expect, that I can
entirely divest myself of that awe which will necessarily lay me under
a greater restraint, than if writing to my parents, whose partiality
for their daughter made me, in a manner, secure of their good
opinions.

To shorten the work before me, in the account I am to give of the
sweet fortnight that we passed in Kent, I enclose not only the copy of
the letter your ladyship requested, but my father's answer to it.

The letters I sent before, and those I now send, will afford several
particulars; such as a brief description of the house and farm, and
your honoured brother's intentions of retiring thither now-and-then;
of the happiness and gratitude of my dear parents, and their wishes to
be able to deserve the comfort his goodness has heaped upon them; and
that in stronger lights than I am able to set them; I will only, in a
summary manner, mention the rest; and, particularly, the behaviour of
my dear benefactor to me, and my parents. He seemed always to delight
in being particularly kind to them before strangers, and before the
tenants, and before Mr. Sorby, Mr. Bennet, and Mr. Shepherd, three of
the principal gentlemen in the neighbourhood, who, with their ladies,
came to visit us, and whose visits we _all_ returned; for your
dear brother would not permit my father and mother to decline the
invitation of those worthy families.

Every day we rode out, or walked a little about the grounds; and while
we were there, he employed hands to cut a vista through a coppice,
as they call it, or rather a little wood, to a rising ground, which,
fronting an old-fashioned balcony, in the middle of the house, he
ordered it to be planted like a grove, and a pretty alcove to be
erected on its summit, of which he has sent them a draught, drawn by
his own hand. This and a few other alterations, mentioned in my letter
to my father, are to be finished against we go down next.

The dear gentleman was every hour pressing me, while there, to take
one diversion or other, frequently upbraiding me, that I seemed not to
_choose_ any thing, urging me to propose sometimes what I could _wish_
he should oblige me in, and not always to leave it to him to choose
for me: saying, he was half afraid that my constant compliance with
every thing he proposed, laid me sometimes under a restraint: and he
would have me have a will of my own, since it was impossible, that it
could be such as he should not take a delight in conforming to it.

I will not trouble your ladyship with any further particulars relating
to this happy fortnight, which was made up all of white and unclouded
days, to the very last; and your ladyship will judge better than I can
describe, of the parting between my dear parents, and their honoured
benefactor and me.

We set out, attended with the good wishes of crowds of persons of all
degrees; for your dear brother left behind him noble instances of his
bounty; it being the _first_ time, as he bid Mr. Longman say, that he
had been down among them since that estate had been in his hands.

But permit me to observe, that I could not forbear often, very often,
in this happy period, to thank God in private, for the blessed terms
upon which I was there, to what I should have been, had I gracelessly
accepted of those which formerly were tendered to me; for your
ladyship will remember, that the Kentish estate was to be part of the
purchase of my infamy.

We returned through London, by the like easy journeys, but tarried
not to see any thing of that vast metropolis, any more than we did
in going through it before; your beloved brother only stopping at his
banker's, and desiring him to look out for a handsome house, which he
proposes to take for his winter residence. He chooses it to be about
the new buildings called Hanover Square; and he left Mr. Longman there
to see one, which his banker believed would be fit for him.

And thus, my dear lady, I have answered your first commands, by the
help of the letters which passed between my dear parents and me; and
conclude this with the assurance that I am, with high respect, _your
ladyship's most obliged and faithful servant_,

P.B.





LETTER XIV

MY DEAREST LADY,

I now set myself to obey your ladyship's second command, which is,
to give an account in what manner your dear brother broke to me the
affair of the unfortunate Miss Godfrey, with my behaviour upon it; and
this I cannot do better, than by transcribing scribing the relation I
gave at that time, in letters to my dear parents, which your ladyship
has not seen, in these very words.

[See Vol. I, p. 431, beginning "My dear Mr. B.," down to p. 441.]

Thus far, my dear lady, the relation I gave to my parents, at the time
of my being first acquainted with this melancholy affair.

It is a great pleasure to me, that I can already flatter myself, from
the hints you kindly gave me, that I behaved as you wished I should
behave. Indeed, Madam, I could not help it, for I pitied most
sincerely the unhappy lady; and though I could not but rejoice, that
I had had the grace to escape the dangerous attempts of the dear
intriguer, yet never did the story of any unfortunate lady make such
an impression upon me as hers did: she loved _him_, and believed, no
doubt, he loved _her_ too well to take ungenerous advantages of her
soft passion for him: and so, by degrees, put herself into his power;
and too seldom, alas I have the noblest-minded of the seducing sex the
mercy or the goodness to spare the poor creatures that do!

Then 'tis another misfortune of people in love; they always think
highly of the beloved object, and lowly of themselves, such a dismal
mortifier is love!

I say not this, Madam, to excuse the poor lady's fall; nothing can
do that; because virtue is, and ought to be, preferable to all
considerations, and to life itself. But, methinks, I love this dear
lady so well for the sake of her edifying penitence, that I would
fain extenuate her crime, if I could; and the rather, as in all
probability, it was a _first love_ on _both_ sides; and so he could
not appear to her as a _practised_ deceiver.

Your ladyship will see, by what I have transcribed, how I behaved
myself to the dear Miss Goodwin; and I am so fond of the little
charmer, as well for the sake of her unhappy mother, though personally
unknown to me, as for the relation she bears to the dear gentleman
whom I am bound to love and honour, that I must beg your ladyship's
interest to procure her to be given up to my care, when it shall be
thought proper. I am sure I shall act by her as tenderly as if I
was her own mother. And glad I am, that the poor unfaulty baby is so
justly beloved by Mr. B.

But I will here conclude this letter, with assuring your ladyship, and
I am _your obliged and humble servant,_

P.B.





LETTER XV

MY GOOD LADY,

I now come to your ladyship's remarks on my conduct to Mrs. Jewkes:
which you are pleased to think too kind and forgiving considering the
poor woman's baseness.

Your ladyship says, that I ought not to have borne her in my sight,
after the impudent assistance she gave to his lewd attempts; much less
to have left her in her place, and rewarded her. Alas! my dear lady,
what could I do? a poor prisoner as I was made, for weeks together, in
breach of all the laws of civil society; without a soul who durst be
my friend; and every day expecting to be ruined and undone, by one of
the haughtiest and most determined spirits in the world!--and when it
pleased God to turn his heart, and incline him to abandon his wicked
attempts, and to profess honourable love to me, his poor servant, can
it be thought I was to insist upon conditions with such a gentleman,
who had me in his power; and who, if I had provoked him, might have
resumed all his wicked purposes against me?

Indeed, I was too much overjoyed, after all my dangers past (which
were so great, that I could not go to rest, nor rise, but with such
apprehensions, that I wished for death rather than life), to think of
refusing any terms that I could yield to, and keep my honour.

And though such noble ladies, as your ladyship and Lady Betty, who are
born to independency, and are hereditarily, as I may say, on a foot
with the highest-descended gentleman in the land, might have exerted
a spirit, and would have a right to choose your own servants, and to
distribute rewards and punishments to the deserving and undeserving,
at your own good pleasure; yet what had I, a poor girl, who owed even
my title to common notice, to the bounty of my late good lady, and had
only a kind of imputed sightliness of person, though enough to make
me the subject of vile attempts; who, from a situation of terror and
apprehension, was lifted up to an hope, beyond my highest ambition,
and was bid to pardon the bad woman, as an instance, that I could
forgive his own hard usage of me; who had experienced so often the
violence and impetuosity of his temper, which even his beloved mother
never ventured to oppose till it began to subside, and then, indeed,
he was all goodness and acknowledgment; of which I could give your
ladyship more than one instance.

What, I say, had I to do, to take upon me lady-airs, and to resent?
But, my dear ladies (let me, in this instance, bespeak the attention
of you both), I should be inexcusable, if I did not tell you all the
truth; and that is, that I not only forgave the poor wretch, in regard
to _his commands_, but from _my own inclination_ also. If I am wrong
in saying this, I must submit it to your ladyships; and, as I pretend
not to perfection, am ready to take the blame I deserve in your
ladyships' judgments: but indeed, were it to be again, I verily think,
I could not help forgiving her.--And were I not able to say this, I
should be thought to have made a mean court to my master's passions,
and to have done a wrong thing with my eyes open: which I humbly
conceive, no one should do.

When full power was given me over this poor creature (seemingly at
least, though it might possibly have been resumed, and I might have
been re-committed to hers, had I given him reason to think I made an
arrogant use of it), you cannot imagine what a triumph I had in my
mind over the mortified guilt, which (from the highest degree of
insolence and imperiousness, that before had hardened her masculine
features) appeared in her countenance, when she found the tables
likely to be soon turned upon her.

This change of behaviour, which at first discovered itself in a sullen
awe, and afterwards in a kind of silent respect, shewed me, what an
influence power had over her: and that when she could treat her late
prisoner, when taken into favour, so obsequiously, it was the less
wonder the bad woman could think it her duty to obey commands so
unjust, when her obedience to them was required from her master.

To be sure, if a look could have killed her, after some of her bad
treatment, she had been slain over and over, as I may say: but to
me, who was always taught to distinguish between the person and
the action, I could not hold my resentment against the poor passive
machine of mischief one day together, though her actions were so
odious to me.

I should indeed except that time of my grand trial when she appeared
so much a wretch to me, that I saw her not (even after two days that
she was kept from me) without great flutter and emotion of heart: and
I had represented to your brother before, how hard a condition it was
for me to forgive so much unwomanly wickedness.

But, my dear ladies, when I considered the latter in _one_ particular
light, I could the more easily forgive her; and _having_ forgiven
her, _bear her in my sight_, and act by her (as a consequence of that
forgiveness) as if she had not so horridly offended. Else how would it
have been forgiveness? especially as she was ashamed of her crime, and
there was no fear of her repeating it.

Thus then I thought on the occasion: "Poor wretched agent, for
purposes little less than infernal! I _will_ forgive thee, since _thy_
master and _my_ master will have it so. And indeed thou art beneath
the resentment even of such a poor girl as I. I will _pity_ thee,
base and abject as thou art. And she who is the object of my _pity_ is
surely beneath my _anger_."

Such were then my thoughts, my proud thoughts, so far was I from
being guilty of _intentional_ meanness in forgiving, at Mr. B.'s
interposition, the poor, low, creeping, abject _self_-mortified, and
_master_-mortified, Mrs. Jewkes.

And do you think, ladies, when you revolve in your thoughts, _who_ I
was, and _what_ I was, and what I had been _designed_ for; when you
revolve the amazing turn in my favour, and the prospects before me (so
much above my hopes, that I left them entirely to Providence to direct
for me, as it pleased, without daring to look forward to what those
prospects seemed naturally to tend); when I could see my haughty
persecutor become my repentant protector; the lofty spirit that used
to make me tremble, and to which I never could look up without awe,
except in those animating cases, where his guilty attempts, and the
concern I had to preserve my innocence, gave a courage more than
natural to my otherwise dastardly heart: when this impetuous spirit
could stoop to request one whom he had sunk beneath even her usual low
character of his servant, who was his prisoner, under sentence of a
ruin worse than death, as he had intended it, and had seized her for
that very purpose, could stoop to acknowledge the vileness of that
purpose; could say, at one time, that my forgiveness of Mrs. Jewkes
should stand me in greater stead than I was aware of: could tell her,
before me, that she must for the future shew me all the respect due
to one he must love; at another, acknowledged before her, that he
had been stark naught, and that I was very forgiving; again, to Mrs.
Jewkes, putting himself on a level with her, as to guilt, "We are
both in generous hands: and, indeed, if Pamela did not pardon _you_,
I should think she but half forgave _me_, because you acted by my
instructions:" another time to the same, "We have been both sinners,
and must be both included in one act of grace:"--when I was thus
lifted up to the state of a sovereign forgiver, and my lordly master
became a petitioner for himself, and the guilty creature, whom he put
under my feet; what a triumph was here for the poor Pamela? and could
I have been guilty of so mean a pride, as to trample upon the poor
abject creature, when I found her thus lowly, thus mortified, and
wholly in my power?

Then, my dear ladies, while I was enjoying the soul-charming fruits of
that innocence which the Divine Grace had enabled me to preserve, in
spite of so many plots and contrivances on my master's side, and such
wicked instigations and assistances on hers, and all my prospects were
improving upon me beyond my wishes; when all was unclouded sunshine,
and I possessed my mind in peace, and had only to be thankful to
Providence, which had been so gracious to my unworthiness; when I saw
my persecutor become my protector, my active enemy no longer my enemy,
but creeping with slow, doubtful feet, and speaking to me with awful
hesitating doubt of my acceptance; a stamp of an insolent foot
now turned into curtseying half-bent knees; threatening hands into
supplicating folds; and the eye unpitying to innocence, running
over with the sense of her own guilt; a faltering accent on her late
menacing tongue, and uplifted handkerchief, "I see she will be my
lady: and then I know how it will go with me!"--Was not this, my
ladies, a triumph of triumphs to the late miserable, now exalted,
Pamela!--could I do less than pardon her? And having declared that I
did so, was I not to shew the sincerity of my declaration?

Would it not have shewn my master, that the low-born Pamela was
incapable of a generous action, had she refused the only request her
humble condition had given her the opportunity of granting, at that
time, with innocence? Would he not have thought the humble cottager
as capable of insolence, and vengeance too, in her turn, as the better
born? and that she wanted but the power, to shew the like unrelenting
temper, by which she had so grievously suffered? And might not this
have given him room to think me (and to have resumed and prosecuted
his purposes accordingly) fitter for an arrogant kept mistress, than
an humble and obliged wife!

"I see" (might he not have said?), "the girl has strong passions and
resentments; and she that has, will be sometimes _governed_ by them.
I will improve upon the hint she herself has now given me, by her
inexorable temper: I will gratify her revenge, till I turn it upon
herself: I will indulge her pride, till I make it administer to
her fall; for a wife I cannot think of in the low-born cottager,
especially when she has lurking in her all the pride and arrogance"
(you know, my ladies, his haughty way of speaking of our sex) "of
the better descended. And by a little perseverance, and watching her
unguarded hours, and applying temptations to her passions, I shall
first discover them, and then make my advantage of them."

Might not this have been the language, and this the resolution, of
such a dear wicked intriguer?--For, my lady, you can hardly conceive
the struggles he apparently had to bring down his high spirit to so
humble a level. And though, I hope, all would have been, even in this
_worst_ case, ineffectual, through Divine Grace, yet how do I know
what lurking vileness might have appeared by degrees in this frail
heart, to encourage his designs, and to augment my trials and my
dangers? And perhaps downright violence might have been used, if he
could not, on one hand, have subdued his passions, nor, on the other,
have overcome his pride--a pride, that every one, reflecting upon the
disparity of birth and condition between us, would have dignified with
the name of _decency_; a pride that was become such an essential part
of the dear gentleman's character, in this instance of a wife, that
although he knew he could not keep it up, if he made _me_ happy, yet
it was no small motive of his choosing me, in one respect, because he
expected from me more humility, more submission, than he thought would
be paid him by a lady equally born and educated; and of this I will
send you an instance, in a transcription from that part of my
journal you have not seen, of his lessons to me, on my incurring
his displeasure by interposing between yourself and him in your
misunderstanding at the Hall: for, Madam, I intend to send, at times,
any thing I think worthy of your ladyship's attention, out of those
papers you were so kind as to excuse me from sending you in a lump,
and many of which must needs have appeared very impertinent to such
judges.

Thus (could your ladyship have thought it?) have I ventured upon a
strange paradox, that even this strongest instance of his debasing
himself, is not the weakest of his pride: and he ventured once at Sir
Simon Darnford's to say, in your hearing, as you may remember, that,
in his conscience, he thought he should hardly have made a tolerable
husband to any body but Pamela: and why? For the reasons you will
see in the inclosed papers, which give an account of the noblest and
earliest curtain-lecture that ever girl had: one of which is, that he
expects to be _borne_ with (_complied_ with, he meant) even when in
the wrong: another, that a wife should never so much as expostulate
with him, though he was in the wrong, till, by complying with all
he insisted upon, she should have shewn him, she designed rather to
convince him, for his _own_ sake, than for _contradiction's_ sake; and
then, another time, perhaps he might take better resolutions.

I hope, from what I have said, it will appear to your lady-ship,
and to Lady Betty too, that I am justified, or at least excused, in
pardoning Mrs. Jewkes.

But your dear brother has just sent me word, that supper waits for me:
and the post being ready to go off, I defer till the next opportunity
which I have to say as to these good effects: and am, in the mean
time, _your ladyship's most obliged and faithful servant_,

P.B.





LETTER XVI

MY DEAR LADY,

I will now acquaint you with the good effects my behaviour to Mrs.
Jewkes has had upon her, as a farther justification of my conduct
towards the poor woman.

That she began to be affected as I wished, appeared to me before I
left the Hall, not only in the conversations I had with her after
my happiness was completed; but in her general demeanour also to the
servants, to the neighbours, and in her devout behaviour at church:
and this still further appears by a letter I have received from Miss
Darnford. I dare say your ladyship will be pleased with the perusal
of the whole letter, although a part of it would answer my present
design; and in confidence, that you will excuse, for the sake of its
other beauties, the high and undeserved praises which she so lavishly
bestows upon me, I will transcribe it all.

_From Miss Darnford to Mrs. B._

"MY DEAR NEIGHBOUR THAT WAS,

"I must depend upon your known goodness to excuse me for not writing
before now, in answer to your letter of compliment to us, for the
civilities and favours, as you call them, which you received from us
in Lincolnshire, where we were infinitely more obliged to you than you
to us.

"The truth is, my papa has been much disordered with a kind of
rambling rheumatism, to which the physicians, learnedly speaking, give
the name of _arthritici vaga_, or the flying gout; and when he ails
ever so little (it signifies nothing concealing his infirmities, where
they are so well known, and when he cares not who knows them), he is
so peevish, and wants so much attendance, that my mamma, and her two
girls (one of which is as waspish as her papa; you may be sure I don't
mean myself) have much ado to make his worship keep the peace; and I
being his favourite, when he is indisposed, having most patience, if I
may give myself a good word, he calls upon me continually, to read to
him when he is grave, which is not often, and to tell him stories,
and sing to him when he is merry; and so I have been employed as a
principal person about him, till I have frequently become sad to make
him cheerful, and happy when I could do it at any rate. For once, in
a pet, he flung a book at my head, because I had not attended him for
two hours, and he could not bear to be slighted by little bastards,
that was his word, that were fathered upon him for his vexation! O
these men! Fathers or husbands, much alike! the one tyrannical, the
other insolent: so that, between one and t'other, a poor girl has
nothing for it, but a few weeks' courtship, and perhaps a first
month's bridalry, if that: and then she is as much a slave to her
husband, as she was a vassal to her father--I mean if the father be a
Sir Simon Darnford, and the spouse a Mr. B.

"But I will be a little more grave; for a graver occasion calls for
it, yet such as will give you real pleasure. It is the very great
change that your example has had upon your housekeeper.

"You desired her to keep up as much regularity as she could among the
servants there; and she is next to exemplary in it, so that she has
every one's good word. She speaks of her lady not only with respect,
but reverence; and calls it a blessed day for all the family, and
particularly for herself, that you came into Lincolnshire. She reads
prayers, or makes one of the servants read them, every Sunday night;
and never misses being at church, morning and afternoon; and is
preparing herself, by Mr. Peters's advice and direction, for receiving
the sacrament; which she earnestly longs to receive, and says it will
be the seal of her reformation.

"Mr. Peters gives us this account of her, and says she is full of
contrition for her past mis-spent life, and is often asking him, if
such and such sins can be forgiven? and among them, names her vile
behaviour to her angel lady, as she calls you.

"It seems she has written a letter to you, which passed Mr. Peters's
revisal, before she had the courage to send it; and prides herself
that you have favoured her with an answer to it, which, she says, when
she is dead, will be found in a cover of black silk next her heart;
for any thing from your hand, she is sure, will contribute to make her
keep her good purposes: and for that reason she places it there; and
when she has had any bad thoughts, or is guilty of any faulty word,
or passionate expression, she recollects her lady's letter, which
recovers her to a calm, and puts her again into a better frame.

"As she has written to you 'tis possible I might have spared you
the trouble of reading this account of her; but yet you will not
be displeased, that so free a liver and speaker should have some
testimonial besides her own assurances, to vouch for the sincerity of
her reformation.

"What a happy lady are you, that persuasion dwells upon your tongue,
and reformation follows your example!"

Your ladyship will forgive me what may appear like vanity in this
communication. Miss Darnford is a charming young lady. I always
admired her; but her letters are the sweetest, kindest!--Yet I am too
much the subject of her encomiums, and so will say no more; but add
here a copy of the poor woman's letter to me; and your ladyship will
see what an ample correspondence you have opened to yourself, if you
go on to countenance it.

"HONOURED MADAM,

"I have been long labouring under two difficulties; the desire I had
to write to you, and the fear of being thought presumptuous if I did.
But I will depend on your goodness, so often tried; and put pen to
paper, in that very closet, and on that desk, which once were so much
used by yourself, when I was acting a part that now cuts me to the
heart to think of. But you forgave me. Madam, and shewed me you
had too much goodness to revoke your forgiveness; and could I have
silenced the reproaches of my heart, I should have had no cause to
think I had offended.

"But, Oh I Madam, how has your goodness to me, which once filled me
with so much gladness, now, on reflection, made me sorrowful, and at
times, miserable.--To think I should act so barbarously as I did,
by so much sweetness, and so much forgiveness. Every place that I
remember to have used you hardly in, how does it now fill me with
sadness, and makes me often smite my breast, and sit down with tears
and groans, bemoaning my vile actions, and my hard heart!--How many
places are there in this melancholy fine house, that call one thing or
other to my remembrance, that give me remorse! But the pond, and the
woodhouse, whence I dragged you so mercilously, after I had driven you
to despair almost, what thoughts do they bring to my remembrance! Then
my wicked instigations.--What an odious wretch was I!

"Had his honour been as abandoned as myself, what virtue had been
destroyed between _his_ orders and _my_ too rigorous execution of
them; nay, stretching them to shew my wicked zeal, to serve a master,
whom, though I honoured, I should not (as you more than once hinted to
me, but with no effect at all, so resolutely wicked was my heart) have
so well obeyed in his unlawful commands!

"His honour has made you amends, has done justice to your merits, and
so atoned for _his_ fault. But as for _me_, it is out of my power ever
to make reparation.--All that is left me, is, to let your ladyship
see, that your pious example has made such an impression upon me, that
I am miserable now in the reflection upon my past guilt.

"_You_ have forgiven me, and _GOD_ will, I hope; for the creature
cannot be more merciful than the Creator; that is all my hope!--Yet,
sometimes, I dread that I am forgiven here, at least not punished, in
order to be punished the more hereafter!--What then will become of
the unhappy wretch, that has thus lived in a state of sin, and so
qualified herself by a course of wickedness, as to be thought a proper
instrument for the worst of purposes!

"Pray your ladyship, let not my honoured master see this letter. He
will think I have the boldness to reflect upon him: when, God knows my
heart, I only write to condemn myself, and my _unwomanly_ actions, as
you were pleased often most justly to call them.

"But I might go on thus for ever accusing myself, not considering whom
I am writing to, and whose precious time I am taking up. But what I
chiefly write for is, to beg your ladyship's prayers for me. For, oh!
Madam, I fear I shall else be ever miserable! We every week hear
of the good you do, and the charity you extend to the bodies of the
miserable. Extend, I beseech you, good Madam, to the unhappy Jewkes,
the mercy of your prayers, and tell me if you think I have not sinned
beyond hope of pardon; for there is a woe denounced against the
presumptuous sinner.

"Your ladyship assured me, at your departure, on the confession of my
remorse for my misdoings, and my promise of amendment, that you would
take it for proof of my being in earnest, if I would endeavour to keep
up a regularity among the servants here; if I would subdue them with
kindness, as I had owned myself subdued; and if I would endeavour to
make every one think, that the best security they could give of doing
their duty to their master in his _absence_, was by doing it to
God Almighty, from whose all-seeing eye nothing can be hid. This, I
remember, your ladyship told me, was the best test of fidelity and
duty, that any servants could shew; since it was impossible, without
religion, but that worldly convenience, or self-interest, must be the
main tie; and so the worst actions might succeed, if servants thought
they should find their sordid advantage in sacrificing their duty.

"So well am I convinced of this truth, that I hope I have begun the
example to good effect: and as no one in the family was so wicked as
I, it was therefore less difficult to reform them; and you will have
the pleasure to know, that you have now servants here, whom you need
not be ashamed to call yours.

"'Tis true, I found it a little difficult at first to keep them within
sight of their duty, after your ladyship departed: but when they saw I
was in earnest, and used them courteously, as you advised, and as your
usage of me convinced me was the rightest usage; when they were told
I had your commands to acquaint you how they conformed to your
injunctions; the task became easy: and I hope we shall all be still
more and more worthy of the favour of so good a lady and so bountiful
a master.

"I dare not presume upon the honour of a line to your unworthy
servant. Yet it would pride me much, if I could have it. But I shall
ever pray for your ladyship's and his honour's felicity, as becomes
_your undeserving servant_,

"K. JEWKES."

I have already, with these transcribed letters of Miss Darnford and
Mrs. Jewkes, written a great deal: but nevertheless, as there yet
remains one passage in your ladyship's letter, relating to Mrs.
Jewkes, that seems to require an answer, I will take notice of it, if
I shall not quite tire your patience.

That passage is this; Lady Betty rightly observes, says your ladyship,
that he knew what a vile woman she [Mrs. Jewkes] was, when he put you
into her power; and no doubt, employed her, because he was sure she
would answer all his purposes: and therefore she should have had very
little opinion of the sincerity of his reformation, while he was so
solicitous in keeping her there.

She would, she says, had she been in your case, have had one struggle
for her dismission, let it have been taken as it would; and he that
was so well pleased with your virtue, must have thought this a natural
consequence of it, if in earnest to become virtuous himself.

But, alas! Madam, he was not so well pleased with my virtue for
virtue's sake, as Lady Betty thinks he was.--He would have been glad,
even then, to have found me less resolved on that score. He did not so
much as _pretend_ to any disposition to virtue. No, not he!

He had entertained, as it proved, a strong passion for me, which had
been heightened by my _resisting_ it. His pride, and his advantages
both of person and fortune, would not let him brook control; and when
he could not have me upon his own terms, God turned his evil purposes
to good ones; and he resolved to submit to mine, or rather to such as
he found I would not yield to him without.

But Lady Betty thinks, I was to blame to put Mrs. Jewkes upon a foot,
in the present I made on my nuptials, with Mrs. Jervis. But I rather
put Mrs. Jervis on a foot with Mrs. Jewkes; for the dear gentleman had
_named_ the sum for me to give Mrs. Jewkes, and I would not give Mrs.
Jervis _less_, because I loved her better; nor _more_ could I give
her, on that occasion, without making such a difference between two
persons equal in station, on a solemnity too where one was present and
assisting, the other not, as would have shewn such a partiality, as
might have induced their master to conclude, I was not so sincere in
my forgiveness, as he hoped from me, and as I really was.

But a stronger reason still was behind; that I could, much more
agreeably, both to Mrs. Jervis and myself, shew my love and gratitude
to the dear good woman: and this I have taken care to do, in the
manner I will submit to your ladyship; at the tribunal of whose
judgment I am willing all my actions, respecting your dear brother,
shall be tried. And I hope you will not have reason to think me a
too profuse or lavish creature; yet, if you have, pray, my dear lady,
don't spare me; for if you shall judge me profuse in one article, I
will endeavour to save it in another.

But I will make what I have to say on this head the subject of a
letter by itself: and am, mean time, _your ladyship's most obliged and
obedient servant_,

P.B.





LETTER XVII

MY DEAR LADY,

It is needful, in order to let you more intelligibly into the subject
where I left off in my last, for your ladyship to know that your
generous brother has made me his almoner, as I was my late dear
lady's; and ordered Mr. Longman to pay me fifty pounds quarterly, for
purposes of which he requires no account, though I have one always
ready to produce.

Now, Madam, as I knew Mrs. Jervis was far from being easy in her
circumstances, thinking herself obliged to pay old debts for two
extravagant children, who are both dead, and maintaining in schooling
and clothes three of their children, which always keeps her bare, I
said to her one day, as she and I sat together, at our needles (for
we are always running over old stories, when alone)--"My good Mrs.
Jervis, will you allow me to ask you after your own private affairs,
and if you are tolerably, easy in them?"

"You are very good, Madam," said she, "to concern yourself about my
poor matters, so much as your thoughts are employed, and every moment
of your time is taken up, from the hour you rise, to the time of your
rest. But I can with great pleasure attribute it to your bounty, and
that of my honoured master, that I am easier and easier every day."

"But tell me, my dear Mrs. Jervis," said I, "how your matters
_particularly_ stand. I love to mingle concerns with my friends,
and as I hide nothing from _you_, I hope you'll treat me with equal
freedom; for I always loved you, and always will; and nothing but
death shall divide our friendship."

She had tears of gratitude in her eyes, and taking off her spectacles,
"I cannot bear," she said, "so much goodness!--Oh! my lady!"

"Oh! my Pamela, say," replied I. "How often must I chide you for
calling me any thing but your Pamela, when we are alone together?"

"My heart," said she, "will burst with your goodness! I cannot bear
it!"

"But you _must_ bear it, and bear still greater exercises to your
grateful heart, I can tell you that. A pretty thing, truly! Here I, a
poor helpless girl, raised from poverty and distress by the generosity
of the best of men, only because I was young and sightly, shall put
on lady-airs to a gentlewoman born, the wisdom of whose years, her
faithful services, and good management, make her a much greater merit
in this family, than I can pretend to have! And shall I return, in
the day of my power, insult and haughtiness for the kindness and
benevolence I received from her in that of my indigence!--Indeed,
I won't forgive you, my dear Mrs. Jervis, if I think you capable of
looking upon me in any other light than as your daughter; for you have
been a mother to me, when the absence of my own could not afford me
the comfort and good counsel I received every day from you."

Then moving my chair nearer, and taking her hand, and wiping, with my
handkerchief in my other, her reverend cheek, "Come, my dear second
mother," said I, "call me your daughter, your Pamela: I have passed
many sweet hours with you under that name; and as I have but too
seldom such an opportunity as this, open to me your worthy heart, and
let me know, if I cannot make my _second_ mother as easy and happy as
our dear master has made my _first_."

She hung her head, and I waited till the discharge of her tears gave
time for utterance to her words; provoking only her speech, by saying,
"You used to have three grand-children to provide for in clothes and
schooling. They are all living, I hope?"

"Yes, Madam, they are living: and your last bounty (twenty guineas was
a great sum, and all at once!) made me very easy and very happy!"

"How easy and how happy, Mrs. Jervis?"

"Why, my dear lady, I paid five to one old creditor of my unhappy
sons; five to a second; and two and a half to two others, in
proportion to their respective demands; and with the other five I paid
off all arrears of the poor children's schooling and maintenance;
and all are satisfied and easy, and declare they will never do harsh
things by me, if they are paid no more."

"But tell me, Mrs. Jervis, the whole you owe in the world; and you and
I will contrive, with justice to our best friend, to do all we can to
make you quite easy; for, at your time of life, I cannot bear that you
shall have any thing to disturb you, which I can remove, and so, my
dear Mrs. Jervis, let me know all. I know your debts (dear, just,
good woman, as you are!) like David's sins, are ever before you:
so come," putting my hand in her pocket, "let me be a friendly
pick-pocket; let me take out your memorandum-book, and we will see how
all matters stand, and what can be done. Come, I see you are too much
moved; your worthy heart is too much affected" (pulling out her book,
which she always had about her); "I will go to my closet, and return
presently."

So I left her, to recover her spirits, and retired with the good
woman's book to my closet.

Your dear brother stepping into the parlour just after I had gone out,
"Where's your lady, Mrs. Jervis?" said he. And being told, came up to
me:--"What ails the good woman below, my dear?" said he: "I hope you
and she have had no words?"

"No, indeed, Sir," answered I. "If we had, I am sure it would have
been my fault: but I have picked her pocket of her memorandum-book,
in order to look into her private affairs, to see if I cannot, with
justice to our common benefactor, make her as easy as you. Sir, have
made my other dear parents."

"A blessing," said he, "upon my charmer's benevolent heart!--I will
leave every thing to your discretion, my dear.--Do all the good you
prudently can to your Mrs. Jervis."

I clasped my bold arms about him, the starting tear testifying my
gratitude.--"Dearest Sir," said I, "you affect me as much as I did
Mrs. Jervis; and if any one but you had a right to ask, what ails your
Pamela? as you do, what ails Mrs. Jervis? I must say, I am hourly
so much oppressed by your goodness, that there is hardly any bearing
one's own joy."

He saluted me, and said, I was a dear obliging creature. "But," said
he, "I came to tell you, that after dinner we'll take a turn, if you
please, to Lady Arthur's: she has a family of London friends for her
guests, and begs I will prevail upon you to give her your company, and
attend you myself, only to drink tea with her; for I have told her we
are to have friends to sup with us."

"I will attend you, Sir," replied I, "most willingly; although I doubt
I am to be made a shew of."

"Something like it," said he, "for she has promised them this favour."

"I need not dress otherwise than I am?"

"No," he was pleased to say, I was always what he wished me to be.

So he left me to my _good works_ (those were his kind words) and I
ran over Mrs. Jervis's accounts, and found a balance drawn of all her
matters in one leaf, and a thankful acknowledgment to God, for her
master's last bounty, which had enabled her to give satisfaction to
others, and to do herself great pleasure, written underneath.

The balance of all was thirty-five pounds eleven shillings and odd
pence; and I went to my escritoir, and took out forty pounds, and down
I hasted to my good Mrs. Jervis, and I said to her, "Here, my dear
good friend, is your pocket-book; but are thirty-five or thirty-six
pounds all you owe, or are bound for in the world?"

"It is, Madam," said she, "and enough too. It is a great sum; but 'tis
in four hands, and they are all in pretty good circumstances, and so
convinced of my honesty, that they will never trouble me for it; for
I have reduced the debt every year something, since I have been in my
master's service."

"Nor shall it ever be in any body's _power_," said I, "to trouble you:
I'll tell you how we'll order it."

So I sat down, and made her sit by me. "Here, my dear Mrs. Jervis, is
forty pounds. It is not so much to me now, as the two guineas were to
you, that you would have given me at my going away from this house to
my father's, as I thought. I will not _give_ it you neither, at least
at _present_, as you shall hear: indeed I won't make you so uneasy as
that comes to. But take this, and pay the thirty-five pounds odd money
to the utmost farthing; and the remaining four pounds odd will be a
little fund in advance towards the children's schooling. And thus
you shall repay it; I always designed, as our dear master added five
guineas per annum to your salary, in acknowledgement of the pleasure
he took in your services, when I was Pamela Andrews, to add five
pounds per annum to it from the time I became Mrs. B. But from that
time, for so many years to come, you shall receive no more than you
did, till the whole forty pounds be repaid. So, my dear Mrs. Jervis,
you won't have any obligation to me, you know, but for the advance;
and that is a poor matter, not to be spoken of: and I will have leave
for it, for fear I should die."

Had your ladyship seen the dear good woman's behaviour, on this
occasion, you would never have forgotten it. She could not speak;
tears ran down her cheeks in plentiful currents: her modest hand put
gently from her my offering hand, her bosom heav'd, and she sobb'd
with the painful tumult that seemed to struggle within her, and which,
for some few moments, made her incapable of speaking.

At last, I rising, and putting my arm round her neck, wiping her eyes,
and kissing her cheek, she cried, "My excellent lady! 'tis too much!
I cannot bear all this."--She then threw herself at my feet; for I
was not strong enough to hinder it; and with uplifted hands--"May God
Almighty," said she--I kneeled by her, and clasping her hands in mine,
both uplifted together--"May God Almighty," said I, drowning her voice
with my louder voice, "bless us both together, for many happy years!
And bless and reward the dear gentleman, who has thus enabled me to
make _the widow's heart to sing for joy!_"

And thus, my lady, did I force upon the good woman's acceptance the
forty pounds.

Permit me, Madam, to close this letter here, and to resume the subject
in my next: till when I have the honour to be _your ladyship's most
obliged and faithful servant_,

P.B.





LETTER XVIII

MY DEAR LADY,

I now resume my last subject where I left off, that your ladyship may
have the whole before you at one view.

I went after dinner, with my dear benefactor, to Lady Arthur's; and
met with fresh calls upon me for humility, having the two natural
effects of the praises and professed admiration of that lady's guests,
as well as my dear Mr. B.'s, and those of Mr. and Mrs. Arthur, to
guard myself against: and your good brother was pleased to entertain
me in the chariot, going and coming, with an account of the orders he
had given in relation to the London house, which is actually
taken, and the furniture he should direct for it; so that I had no
opportunity to tell him what I had done in relation to Mrs. Jervis.

But after supper, retiring from company to my closet, when his friends
were gone, he came up to me about our usual bedtime: he enquired
kindly after my employment, which was trying to read in the French
Telemachus: for, my lady, I'm learning French, I'll assure you! And
who, do you think, is my master?--Why, the best I _could_ have in the
world, your dearest brother, who is pleased to say, I am no dunce: how
inexcusable should I be, if I was, with such a master, who teaches me
on his knee, and rewards me with a kiss whenever I do well, and says,
I have already nearly mastered the accent and pronunciation, which he
tells me is a great difficulty got over.

I requested him to render for me into English two or three places that
were beyond my reach; and when he had done it, he asked me, in French,
what I had done for Mrs. Jervis.

I said, "Permit me, Sir (for I am not proficient enough to answer
you in my new tongue), in English, to say, I have made the good woman
quite happy; and if I have your approbation, I shall be as much so
myself in this instance, as I am in all others."

"I dare answer for your prudence, my dear," he was pleased to say:
"but this is your favourite: let me know, when you have so bountiful a
heart to strangers, what you do for your favourites?"

I then said, "Permit my bold eye, Sir, to watch yours, as I obey you;
and you know you must not look full upon me then; for if you do, how
shall I look at you again; how see, as I proceed, whether you are
displeased? for you will not chide me in words, so partial have you
the goodness to be to all I do."

He put his arm round me, and looked down now and then, as I desired!
for O! Madam, he is all condescension and goodness to his unworthy,
yet grateful Pamela! I told him all I have written to you about the
forty pounds.--"And now, dear Sir," said I, half hiding my face on his
shoulder, "you have heard what I have done, chide or beat your Pamela,
if you please: it shall be all kind from you, and matter of future
direction and caution."

He raised my head, and kissed me two or three times, saying, "Thus
then I chide, I beat, my angel!--And yet I have one fault to find with
you, and let Mrs. Jervis, if not in bed, come up to us, and hear what
it is; for I will _expose_ you, as you deserve before her."--My Polly
being in hearing, attending to know if I wanted her assistance to
undress, I bade her call Mrs. Jervis. And though I thought from his
kind looks, and kind words, as well as tender behaviour, that I had
not much to fear, yet I was impatient to know what my fault was, for
which I was to be exposed.

The good woman came; and as she entered with all that modesty which
is so graceful in her, he moved his chair further from me, and, with
a set aspect, but not unpleasant, said, "Step in, Mrs. Jervis: your
lady" (for so, Madam, he will always call me to Mrs. Jervis, and to
the servants) "has incurred my censure, and I would not tell her in
what, till I had you face to face."

She looked surprised--now on me, now on her dear master; and I, not
knowing what he would say, looked a little attentive. "I am sorry--I
am very sorry for it, Sir," said she, curtseying low:--"but should be
more sorry, if _I_ were the unhappy occasion."

"Why, Mrs. Jervis, I can't say but it is on your account that I must
blame her."

This gave us both confusion, but especially the good woman; for still
I hoped much from his kind behaviour to me just before--and she said,
"Indeed, Sir, I could never deserve----"

He interrupted her--"My charge against you, Pamela," said he, "is that
of niggardliness, and no other; for I will put you both out of your
pain: you ought not to have found out the method of repayment.

"The dear creature," said he, to Mrs. Jervis, "seldom does any thing
that can be mended; but, I think, when your good conduct deserved an
annual acknowledgment from me, in addition to your salary, the lady
should have shewed herself no less pleased with your service than the
gentleman. Had it been for old acquaintance-sake, for sex-sake, she
should not have given me cause to upbraid her on this head. But I will
tell you, that you must look upon the forty pounds you have, as the
effect of just distinction on many accounts: and your salary from last
quarter-day shall be advanced, as the dear niggard intended it some
years hence; and let me only add, that when my Pamela first begins
to shew a coldness to her Mrs. Jervis, I shall then suspect she is
beginning to decline in that humble virtue, which is now peculiar to
herself and makes her the delight of all who converse with her."

He was thus pleased to say: thus, with the most graceful generosity,
and a nobleness of mind _truly_ peculiar to himself, was he pleased
to _act_: and what could Mrs. Jervis or I say to him?--Why, indeed,
nothing at all!--We could only look upon one another, with our eyes
and our hearts full of a gratitude that would not permit either of
us to speak, but which expressed itself at last in a manner he was
pleased to call more elegant than words--with uplifted folded hands,
and tears of joy.

O my dear lady! how many opportunities have the beneficent _rich_ to
make _themselves_, as well as their _fellow-creatures_, happy! All
that I could think, or say, or act, was but my duty before; what a
sense of obligation then must I lie under to this most generous of
men!

But here let me put an end to this tedious subject; the principal
part of which can have no excuse, if it may not serve as a proof of
my cheerful compliance with your ladyship's commands, that I recite
_every_ thing of concern to me, and with the same freedom as I used to
do to my dear parents.

I have done it, and at the same time offered what I had to plead in
behalf of my conduct to the two housekeepers, which you expected from
me; and I shall therefore close this my humble defence, if I may so
call it, with the assurance that I am, _my dearest lady, your obliged
and faithful servant_,

P.B.





LETTER XIX

_From Lady Davers to Mrs. B. in answer to the six last Letters._

"_Where she had it, I can't tell I but I think I never met with
the fellow of her in my life, at any age_;" are, as I remember, my
brother's words, speaking of his Pamela in the early part of your
papers. In truth, thou art a surprising creature; and every letter we
have from you, we have new subjects to admire you for.--"Do you think,
Lady Betty," said I, when I had read to the end of the subject about
Mrs. Jervis, "I will not soon set out to hit this charming girl a box
of the ear or two?"--"For what, Lady Davers?" said she.

"For what!" replied I.--"Why, don't you see how many slaps of the face
the bold slut hits me! _I'll_ LADY-AIRS her! I will. _I'll_ teach
her to reproach me, and so many of her betters, with her cottage
excellencies, and improvements, that shame our education."

Why, you dear charming Pamela, did you only excel me in _words_, I
could forgive you: for there may be a knack, and a volubility, as to
_words_, that a natural talent may supply; but to be thus out-done in
_thought_ and in _deed_, who can bear it? And in so young an insulter
too!

Well, Pamela, look to it, when I see you: you shall feel the weight
of my hand, or--the pressure of my lip, one or t'other, depend on it,
very quickly; for here, instead of my stooping, as I thought I would
be, to call _you_ sister, I shall be forced to think, in a little
while, that you ought not to own _me as yours_, till I am nearer your
standard.

But to come to business, I will summarily take notice of the following
particulars in all your obliging letters, in order to convince you of
my friendship, by the freedom of my observations on the subjects you
touch upon.

First, then, I am highly pleased with what you write of the advantages
you received from the favour of my dear mother; and as you know many
things of her by your attendance upon her the last three or four years
of her life, I must desire you will give me, as opportunity shall
offer, all you can recollect in relation to the honoured lady, and of
her behaviour and kindness to you, and with a retrospect to your own
early beginnings, the dawnings of this your bright day of excellence:
and this not only I, but the countess, and Lady Betty, with whom I am
going over your papers again, and her sister, Lady Jenny, request of
you.

2. I am much pleased with your Kentish account; though we wished you
had been more particular in some parts of it; for we are greatly taken
with your descriptions: and your conversation pieces: yet I own, your
honest father's letters, and yours, a good deal supply that _defect_.

3. I am highly delighted with your account of my brother's breaking
to you the affair of Sally Godfrey, and your conduct upon it. 'Tis a
sweet story as he brought it in, and as you relate it. The wretch
has been very just in his account of it. We are in love with your
charitable reflections in favour of the poor lady; and the more, as
she certainly deserved them, and a better mother too than she had, and
a faithfuller lover than she met with.

4. You have exactly hit his temper in your declared love of Miss
Goodwill. I see, child, you know your man; and never fear but you'll
hold him, if you can go on thus to act, and outdo your sex. But I
should think you might as well not insist upon having her with you;
you'd better see her now and then at the dairy-house, or at school,
than have her with you. But this I leave to your own discretion.

5. You have satisfactorily answered our objections to your behaviour
to Mrs. Jewkes. We had not considered your circumstances quite so
thoroughly as we ought to have done. You are a charming girl, and all
your motives are so just, that we shall be a little more cautious for
the future how we censure you.

In short, I say with the countess, "This good girl is not without
her pride; but it is the pride that becomes, and can only attend the
innocent heart; and I'll warrant," said her ladyship, "nobody will
become her station so well, as one who is capable of so worthy a pride
as this."

But what a curtain-lecture hadst thou, Pamela! A noble one, dost thou
call it?--Why, what a wretch hast thou got, to expect thou shouldst
never expostulate against his lordly will, even when in the wrong,
till thou hast obeyed it, and of consequence, joined in the evil he
imposes!

Much good may such a husband do you, says Lady Betty!--Every body will
_admire_ you, but no one will have reason to _envy_ you upon those
principles.

6. I am pleased with your promise of sending what you think I
shall like to see, out of those papers you choose not to shew me
collectively: this is very obliging. You're a good girl; and I love
you dearly.

7. We have all smiled at your paradox, Pamela, that his marrying you
was an instance of his pride.--The thought, though, is pretty enough,
and ingenious; but whether it will hold or not, I won't just now
examine.

8. Your observation on the _forget_ and _forgive_ we are much pleased
with.

9. You are very good in sending me a copy of Miss Darnford's letter.
She is a charming young lady. I always had a great opinion of
her merit; her letter abundantly confirms me in it. I hope you'll
communicate to me every letter that passes between you, and pray send
in your next a copy of your answer to her letter: I must insist upon
it, I think.

10. I am glad, with all my heart, to hear of poor Jewkes's
reformation: Your example carries all before it. But pray oblige me
with your answer to her letter, don't think me unreasonable: 'tis all
for your sake.

Pray--have you shewn Jewkes's letter to your good friend?--Lady Betty
wants to know (if you _have_) what he could say to it? For, she says,
it cuts him to the quick. And I think so too, if he takes it as he
ought: but, as you say, he's above loving virtue for _virtue's sake_.

11. Your manner of acting by Mrs. Jervis, with so handsome a regard to
my brother's interest, her behaviour upon it, and your relation of
the whole, and of his generous spirit in approving, reproving, and
improving, your prudent generosity, make no inconsiderable figure in
your papers. And Lady Betty says, "Hang him, he has some excellent
qualities too.--It is impossible not to think well of him; and his
good actions go a great way towards atoning for his bad." But you,
Pamela, have the glory of all.

12. I am glad you are learning French: thou art a happy girl in thy
teacher, and he is a happy man in his scholar. We are pleased with
your pretty account of his method of instructing and rewarding.
'Twould be strange, if you did not thus learn any language quickly,
with such encouragements, from the man you love, were your genius less
apt than it is. But we wished you had enlarged on that subject: for
such fondness of men to their wives, who have been any time married,
is so rare, and so unexpected from _my_ brother, that we thought you
should have written a side upon that subject at least.

What a bewitching girl art thou! What an exemplar to wives now, as
well as thou wast before to maidens! Thou canst tame lions, I
dare say, if thoud'st try.--Reclaim a rake in the meridian of his
libertinism, and make such an one as my brother, not only marry thee,
but love thee better at several months' end, than he did the first
day, if possible!

Now, my dear Pamela, I think I have taken notice of the most material
articles in your letters, and have no more to say to you; but write
on, and oblige us; and mind to send me the copy of your letter to Miss
Darnford, of that you wrote to poor penitent Jewkes, and every article
I have written about, and all that comes into your head, or that
passes, and you'll oblige _yours, &c,_

B. DAVERS.





LETTER XX

MY DEAR LADY,

I read with pleasure your commands, in your last kind and obliging
letter: and you may be sure of a ready obedience in every one of them,
that is in my power.

That which I can most easily do, I will first do; and that is, to
transcribe the answer I sent to Miss Darnford, and that to Mrs.
Jewkes, the former of which, (and a long one it is) is as follows:

"DEAR MISS DARNFORD,

"I begin now to be afraid I shall not have the pleasure and benefit I
promised myself of passing a fortnight or three weeks at the Hall, in
your sweet conversation, and that of your worthy family, as well
as those others in your agreeable neighbourhood, whom I must always
remember with equal honour and delight.

"The occasion will be principally, that we expect, very soon, Lord and
Lady Davers, who propose to tarry here a fortnight at least; and after
that, the advanced season will carry us to London, where Mr. B.
has taken a house for his winter residence, and in order to attend
parliament: a service he says, which he has been more deficient in
hitherto, than he can either answer to his constituents, or to his own
conscience; for though he is but one, yet if any good motion should be
lost by one, every absent member, who is independent, has to reproach
himself with the consequence of the loss of that good which might
otherwise redound to the commonwealth. And besides, he says, such
excuses as he could make, _every one_ might plead; and then public
affairs might as well be left to the administration, and no parliament
be chosen.

"See you, my dear Miss Darnford, from the humble cottager, what a
public person your favourite friend is grown! How easy is it for a
bold mind to look forward, and, perhaps, forgetting what she was, now
she imagines she has a stake in the country, takes upon herself to be
as important, as significant, as if, like my dear Miss Darnford, she
had been born to it!

"Well; but may I not ask, whether, if the mountain cannot come to
Mahomet, Mahomet will not come to the mountain? Since Lady Davers's
visit is so uncertain as to its beginning and duration, and so great
a favour as I am to look upon it, and really shall, it being her first
visit to _me_:--and since we must go and take possession of our London
residence, why can't Sir Simon spare to us the dear lady whom he could
use hardly, and whose attendance (though he is indeed entitled to all
her duty) he did not, just in that instance, quite so much deserve?

"'Well, but after all, Sir Simon,' would I say, if I had been in
presence at his peevish hour, 'you are a fine gentleman, are you not?
to take such a method to shew your good daughter, that because she did
not come _soon enough_ to you, she came _too soon_! And did ever papa
before you put a _good book_ (for such I doubt not it was, _because_
you were in affliction, though so little affected by its precepts) to
such a _bad use_? As parents' examples are so prevalent, suppose your
daughter had taken it, and flung it at her sister; Miss Nancy at her
waiting-maid; and so it had gone through the family; would it not have
been an excuse for every one to say, that the father, and head of the
family had set the example?

"'You almost wish, my dear Miss tells me, that I would undertake
_you_!--This is very good of you. Sir Simon,' I might (would his
patience have suffered me to run on thus) have added; 'but I hope,
since you are so sensible that you _want_ to be undertaken, (and
since this peevish rashness convinces me that you _do_) that you
will undertake _yourself_; that you will not, when your indisposition
requires the attendance and duty of your dear lady and daughter,
make it more uncomfortable to them, by _adding_ a difficulty of being
pleased, and an impatience of spirit, to the concern their duty and
affection make them have for you; and, _at least_, resolve never to
take a book into your hand again, if you cannot make a better use of
it, than you did then.'

"But Sir Simon will say, I have _already undertaken_ him, were he to
see this. Yet my Lady Darnford once begged I would give him a hint or
two on this subject, which, she was pleased to say, would be better
received from me than from any body: and if it be a little too severe,
it is but a just reprisal made by one whose ears, he knows, he has
cruelly wounded more than once, twice, or thrice, besides, by what
he calls his _innocent_ double entendres, and who, if she had not
resented it, when an opportunity offered, must have been believed, by
him, to be neither more nor less than a hypocrite. There's for you,
Sir Simon: and so here ends all my malice; for now I have spoken my
mind.

"Yet I hope your dear papa will not be so angry as to deny me, for
this my freedom, the request I make to _him_, to your _mamma_, and
to your _dear self_, for your beloved company, for a month or two in
Bedfordshire, and at London: and if you might be permitted to winter
with us at the latter, how happy should I be! It will be half done the
moment you desire it. Sir Simon loves you too well to refuse you, if
you are earnest in it. Your honoured mamma is always indulgent to
your requests: and Mr. B. as well in kindness to me, as for the great
respect he bears you, joins with me to beg this favour of you, and of
Sir Simon and my lady.

"If it can be obtained, what pleasure and improvement may I not
propose to myself, with so polite a companion, when we are carried by
Mr. B. to the play, the opera, and other of the town diversions! We
will work, visit, read, and sing together, and improve one another;
you _me_, in every word you shall speak, in every thing you shall do;
I _you_, by my questions, and desire of information, which will make
you open all your breast to me: and so unlocking that dear storehouse
of virtuous knowledge, improve your own notions the more for
communicating them. O my dear Miss Damford I how happy is it in your
power to make me!

"I am much affected with your account of Mrs. Jewkes's reformation,
I could have wished, had I not _other_ and _stronger_ inducements
(in the pleasure of so agreeable a neighbourhood, and so sweet a
companion), I could have been down at the Hall, in hopes to have
confirmed the poor woman in her newly assumed penitence. God give her
grace to persevere in it!--To be an humble means of saving a soul from
perdition! O my dear Miss Darnford, let me enjoy that heart-ravishing
hope!--To pluck such a brand as this out of the fire, and to assist to
quench its flaming susceptibility for mischief, and make it useful to
edifying purposes, what a pleasure does this afford one! How does it
encourage one to proceed in the way one has been guided to pursue!
How does it make me hope, that I am raised to my present condition,
in order to be an humble instrument in the hand of Providence to
communicate great good to others, and so extend to many those benefits
I have received, which, were they to go no further than myself, what a
vile, what an ungrateful creature should I be!

"I see, my dearest Miss Darnford, how useful in every condition of
life a virtuous and a serious turn of mind may be!

"In hopes of seeing you with us, I will not enlarge on several
agreeable subjects, which I could touch upon with pleasure, besides
what I gave you in my former (of my reception here, and of the
kindness of our genteel neighbours): such, particularly, as the
arrival here of my dear parents, and the kind, generous entertainment
they met with from my best friend; his condescension in not only
permitting me to attend them to Kent, but accompanying us thither, and
settling them in a most happy manner, beyond their wishes and my
own; but yet so much in character, as I may say, that every one must
approve his judicious benevolence; the favours of my good Lady Davers
to me, who, pleased with my letters, has vouchsafed to become my
correspondent; and a thousand things, which I want personally to
communicate to my dear Miss Darnford.

"Be pleased to present my humble respects to Lady Darnford, and to
Miss Nancy; to good Madam Jones, and to your kind friends at Stamford;
also to Mr. and Mrs. Peters, and their kins-woman: and beg of that
good gentleman from me to encourage his new proselyte all he can; and
I doubt not, she will do credit, poor woman! to the pains he shall
take with her. In hopes of your kind compliance with my wishes for
your company, I remain, _dearest Miss Darnford, your faithful and
obliged friend and servant,_

"P.B."

This, my good lady, is the long letter I sent to Miss Darnford, who,
at parting, engaged me to keep up a correspondence with her, and put
me in hopes of passing a month or two at the Hall, if we came down,
and if she could persuade Sir Simon and her mamma to spare her to my
wishes. Your ladyship will excuse me for so faintly mentioning the
honours you confer upon me: but I would not either add or diminish in
the communications I make to you.

The following is the copy of what I wrote to Mrs. Jewkes:

"You give me, Mrs. Jewkes, very great pleasure, to find, that, at
length, God Almighty has touched your heart, and let you see, while
health and strength lasted, the error of your ways. Many an unhappy
one has not been so graciously touched, till they have smarted under
some heavy afflictions, or been confined to the bed of sickness, when,
perhaps, they have made vows and resolutions, that have held them no
longer than the discipline lasted; but you give me much better hopes
of the sincerity of your conversion; as you are so well convinced,
before some sore evil has overtaken you: and it ought to be an earnest
to you of the Divine favour, and should keep you from despondency.

"As to me, it became me to forgive you, as I most cordially did; since
your usage of me, as it proved, was but a necessary means in the hand
of Providence, to exalt me to that state of happiness, in which I have
every day more and more cause given me to rejoice, by the kindest and
most generous of gentlemen.

"As I have often prayed for you, even when you used me the most
unkindly, I now praise God for having heard my prayers, and with high
delight look upon you as a reclaimed soul given to my supplication.
May the Divine goodness enable you to persevere in the course you have
begun! And when you can taste the all-surpassing pleasure that fills
the worthy breast, on being placed in a station where your example
may be of advantage to the souls of others, as well as to your own--a
pleasure that every good mind glories in, and none else can truly
relish; then may you be assured, that nothing but your perseverance,
and the consequential improvement resulting from it, is wanted to
convince you, that you are in a right way, and that the woe that is
pronounced against the presumptuous sinner, belongs not to you.

"Let me, therefore, dear Mrs. Jewkes (for now _indeed_ you are dear to
me), caution you against two things; the one, that you return not
to your former ways, and wilfully err after this repentance; for the
Divine goodness will then look upon itself as mocked by you, and will
withdraw itself from you; and more dreadful will your state then be,
than if you had never repented: the other, that you don't despair of
the Divine mercy, which has so evidently manifested itself in your
favour, and has awakened you out of your deplorable lethargy, without
those sharp medicines and operations, which others, and perhaps _not
more faulty_ persons, have suffered. But go on cheerfully in the same
happy path. Depend upon it, you are now in the right way, and turn not
either to the right hand or to the left; for the reward is before you,
in reputation and a good fame in this life, and everlasting felicity
beyond it.

"Your letter is that of a sensible woman, as I always thought you; and
of a truly contrite one, as I hope you will prove yourself to be: and
I the rather hope it, as I shall be always desirous, then of taking
every opportunity that offers of doing you real service, as well with
regard to your present as future life: for I am, _good_ Mrs. Jewkes,
as I now hope I may call you, _your loving friend to serve you_,

P.B.

"Whatever good books the worthy Mr. Peters will be so kind as to
recommend to you, and to those under your direction, send for them
either to Lincoln, Stamford, or Grantham, and place them to my
account: and may they be the effectual means of confirming you and
them in the good way you are in! I have done as much for all here:
and, I hope, to no bad effect: for I shall now tell them, by Mrs.
Jervis, if there be occasion, that I hope they will not let me be
out-done in Bedfordshire, by Mrs. Jewkes in Lincolnshire; but that the
servants of both houses may do credit to the best of masters. Adieu,
_good_ woman; as once more I take pleasure to style you."

       *       *       *       *       *

Thus, my good lady, have I obeyed you, in transcribing these two
letters. I will now proceed to your ladyship's twelve articles. As to
the

1. I will oblige your ladyship, as I have opportunity, in my future
letters, with such accounts of my dear lady's favour and goodness to
me, as I think will be acceptable to you, and to the noble ladies you
mention.

2. I am extremely delighted, that your ladyship thinks so well of my
dear honest parents: they are good people, and ever had minds that set
them above low and sordid actions: and God and your good brother has
rewarded them most amply in this world, which is more than they ever
expected, after a series of unprosperousness in all they undertook.

Your ladyship is pleased to say, that people in upper life love to see
how plain nature operates in honest minds, who have hardly any thing
else for their guide: and if I might not be thought to descend too
low for your ladyship's attention (for, as to myself, I shall, I hope,
always look back with pleasure to what I _was_, in order to increase
my thankfulness for what I _am_), I would give you a scene of
resignation, and contented poverty, of which otherwise you can hardly
have a notion. I _will_ give it, because it will be a scene of nature,
however low, which your ladyship loves, and it shall not tire you by
its length.

It was upon occasion of a great loss and disappointment which happened
to my dear parents; for though they were never high in life, yet they
were not always so low as my honoured lady found them, when she took
me. My poor father came home; and as the loss was of such a nature, as
that he could not keep it from my mother, he took her hand, and said,
after he had acquainted her with it, "Come, my dear, let us take
comfort, that we did for the best. We left the issue to Providence,
as we ought, and that has turned it as it pleased; and we must be
content, though not favoured as we wished.--All the business is, our
lot is not cast for this life. Let us resign ourselves to the Divine
will, and continue to do our duty, and this short life will soon be
past. Our troubles will be quickly overblown; and we shall be happy in
a better, I make no doubt."

Then my dear mother threw her arms about his neck, and said, with
tears, "God's will be done, my dear love! All cannot be rich and
happy. I am contented, and had rather say, I have a poor honest
husband, than a guilty rich one. What signifies repining: let the
world go as it will, we shall have our length and our breadth at last.
And Providence, I doubt not, will be a better friend to our good
girl here, because she is good, than we could be, if this had not
happened," pointing to me, who, then about eleven years old (for it
was before my lady took me), sat weeping in the chimney corner, over a
few dying embers of a fire, at their moving expressions.

I arose, and kissing both their hands, and blessing them, said, "And
this length and breadth, my dear parents, will be, one day, all that
the rich and the great can possess; and, it may be, their ungracious
heirs will trample upon their ashes, and rejoice they are gone: while
such a poor girl as I, am honouring the memories of mine, who, in
their good names, and good lessons, will have left me the best of
portions."

And then they both hugged me to their fond bosoms, by turns; and all
three were filled with comfort in one another.

For a farther proof that _honest poverty_ is not such a deplorable
thing as some people imagine, let me ask, what pleasure can those
over-happy persons know, who, from the luxury of their tastes, and
their affluent circumstances, always eat before they are hungry, and
drink before they are thirsty? This may be illustrated by the instance
of a certain eastern monarch, who, as I have read, marching at the
head of a vast army, through a wide extended desert, which afforded
neither river nor spring, for the first time, found himself (in common
with his soldiers) overtaken by a craving thirst, which made him pant
after a cup of water. And when, after diligent search, one of his
soldiers found a little dirty puddle, and carried him some of the
filthy water in his nasty helmet, the monarch greedily swallowing it,
cried out, that in all his life he never tasted so sweet a draught!

But when I talk or write of my worthy parents, how I run on!--Excuse
me, my good lady, and don't think me, in this respect, too much like
the cat in the fable, turned into a fine lady; for though I would
never forget what I was, yet I would be thought to know _how_
gratefully to enjoy my present happiness, as well with regard to my
obligations to God, as to your dear brother. But let me proceed to
your ladyship's third particular.

3. And you cannot imagine. Madam, how much you have set my heart at
rest, when you say, that my dear Mr. B. gave me a just narrative of
this affair with Miss Godfrey: for when your ladyship desired to
know how he had recounted that story, lest you should make a
misunderstanding between us unawares, I knew not what to think. I was
afraid some blood had been shed on the occasion by him: for the lady
was ruined, and as to her, nothing could have happened worse. The
regard I have for Mr. B.'s future happiness, which, in my constant
supplication for him in private, costs me many a tear, gave me great
apprehensions, and not a little uneasiness. But as your ladyship tells
me that he gave me a just account, I am happy again.

I now come to your ladyship's fourth particular.

And highly delighted I am for having obtained your approbation of
my conduct to the child, as well as of my behaviour towards the
dear gentleman, on the unhappy lady's score. Your ladyship's wise
intimations about having the child with me, make due impressions upon
me; and I see in them, with grateful pleasure, your unmerited regard
for me. Yet, I don't know how it is, but I have conceived a strange
passion for this dear baby; I cannot but look upon her poor mamma as
my sister in point of trial; and shall not the prosperous sister
pity and love the poor dear sister that, in so slippery a path, has
_fallen_, while _she_ had the happiness to keep her feet?

The rest of your ladyship's articles give me the greatest pleasure and
satisfaction; and if I can but continue myself in the favour of your
dear brother, and improve in that of his noble sister, how happy shall
I be! I will do all I can to deserve both. And I hope you will take as
an instance of it, my cheerful obedience to your commands, in writing
to so fine a judge, such crude and indigested stuff, as, otherwise I
ought to be ashamed to lay before you.

I am impatient for the honour of your presence here; and yet I perplex
myself with the fear of appearing so unworthy in your eye when near
you, as to suffer in your opinion; but I promise myself, that however
this may be the case on your first visit, I shall be so much improved
by the benefits I shall reap from your lessons and good example, that
whenever I shall be favoured with a _second_ you shall have fewer
faults to find with me; till, as I shall be more and more favoured, I
shall in time be just what your ladyship will wish me to be, and, of
consequence, more worthy than I am of the honour of stiling myself
_your ladyship's most humble and obedient servant_, P.B.





LETTER XXI

_From Miss Darnford, in answer to Mrs. B.'s, p_. 60.

MY DEAR MRS. B.,

You are highly obliging in expressing so warmly your wishes to have me
with you. I know not any body in this world, out of our own family, in
whose company I should be happier; but my papa won't part with me, I
think; though I have secured my mamma in my interest; and I know Nancy
would be glad of my absence, because the dear, perversely envious,
thinks _me_ more valued than _she_ is; and yet, foolish girl, she
don't consider, that if her envy be well grounded, I should return
with more than double advantages to what I now have, improved by your
charming conversation.

My papa affects to be in a fearful pet, at your lecturing of him So
justly; for my mamma would show him the letter; and he says he will
positively demand satisfaction of Mr. B. for your treating him so
freely. And yet he shall hardly think him, he says, on a rank with
him, unless Mr. B. will, on occasion of the new commission, take out
his Dedimus: and then if he will bring you down to Lincolnshire, and
join with him to commit you prisoner for a month at the Hall, all
shall be well.

It is very obliging in Mr. B. to join in your kind invitation:
but--yet I am loth to say it to you--the character of your worthy
gentleman, I doubt, stands a little in the way with my papa.

My mamma pleaded his being married. "Ads-dines, Madam," said he, "what
of all that!"

"But, Sir," said I, "I hope, if I may not go to Bedfordshire, you'll
permit me to go to London, when Mrs. B. goes?"

"No," said he, "positively no!"

"Well, Sir, I have done. I could hope, however, you would enable me to
give a better reason to good Mrs. B. why I am not permitted to accept
of the kind invitation, than that which I understand you have been
pleased to assign."

He stuck his hands in his sides, with his usual humourous
positiveness. "Why, then tell her she is a very saucy lady, for her
last letter to you, and her lord and master is not to be trusted; and
it is my absolute will and pleasure that you ask me no more questions
about it."

"I will very faithfully make this report, Sir."--"Do so." And so
I have. And your poor Polly Darnford is disappointed of one of the
greatest pleasures she could have had.

I can't help it--if you truly pity me you can make me easier under
the disappointment, than otherwise possible, by favouring me with
an epistolary conversation, since I am denied a personal one; and my
mamma joins in the request; particularly let us know how Lady Davers's
first visit passes; which Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Jones, who know my lady
so well, likewise long to hear. And this will make us the best amends
in your power for the loss of your good neighbourhood, which we had
all promised to ourselves.

This denial of my papa comes out, since I wrote the above, to be
principally owing to a proposal made him of an humble servant to
one of his daughters: he won't say which, he tells us, in his usual
humourous way, lest we should fall out about it.

"I suppose," I tell him, "the young gentleman is to pick and choose
which of the two he likes best." But be he a duke, 'tis all one to
Polly, if he is not something above our common Lincolnshire class of
fox-hunters.

I have shewn Mr. and Mrs. Peters your letter. They admire you beyond
expression; and Mr. Peters says, he does not know, that ever he did
any thing in his life, that gave him so much inward reproach, as his
denying you the protection of his family, which Mr. Williams sought to
move him to afford you, when you were confined at the Hall, before
Mr. B. came down to you, with his heart bent on mischief; and all
he comforts himself with is, that very denial, as well as the other
hardships you have met with, were necessary to bring about that work
of Providence which was to reward your unexampled virtue.

Yet, he says, he doubts he shall not be thought excusable by you, who
are so exact in _your_ own duty, since he had the unhappiness to lose
such an opportunity to have done honour to his function, had he had
the fortitude to have done _his;_ and he has begged of me to hint his
concern to you on this head; and to express his hopes, that neither
religion nor his cloth may suffer in your opinion, for the fault
of one of its professors, who never was wanting in his duty so much
before.

He had it often upon his mind, he says, to write to you on this very
subject; but he had not the courage; and besides, did not know _how_
Mr. B. might take it, if he should see that letter, as the case had
such delicate circumstances in it, that in blaming himself, as he
should very freely have done, he must, by implication, have cast still
greater blame upon him.

Mr. Peters is certainly a very good man, and my favourite for that
reason; and I hope _you,_ who could so easily forgive the late wicked,
but now penitent Jewkes, will overlook with kindness a fault in a good
man, which proceeded more from pusillanimity and constitution, than
from want of principle: for once, talking of it to my mamma, before
me, he accused himself on this score, to her, with tears in his eyes.
She, good lady, would have given you this protection at Mr. Williams's
desire; but wanted the power to do it.

So you see, my dear Mrs. B., how your virtue has shamed every one
into such a sense of what they ought to have done, that good, bad, and
indifferent, are seeking to make excuses for past misbehaviour, and
to promise future amendment, like penitent subjects returning to their
duty to their conquering sovereign, after some unworthy defection.

Happy, happy lady! May you ever be so! May you always convert your
enemies, invigorate the lukewarm, and every day multiply your friends,
wishes _your most affectionate,_

POLLY DARNFORD.


P.S. How I rejoice in the joy of your honest parents! God bless 'em!
I am glad Lady Davers is so wise. Every one I have named desire their
best respects. Write oftener, and omit not the minutest thing: for
every line of yours carries instruction with it.





LETTER XXII

From Sir Simon Darnford to Mr. B.

SIR,

Little did I think I should ever have occasion to make a formal
complaint against a person very dear to you, and who I believe
deserves to be so; but don't let her be so proud and so vain of
obliging and pleasing you, as to make her not care how she affronts
every body else.

The person is no other than the wife of your bosom, who has taken such
liberties with me as ought not to be taken, and sought to turn my own
child against me, and make a dutiful girl a rebel.

If people will set up for virtue, and all that, let 'em be uniformly
virtuous, or I would not give a farthing for their pretences.

Here I have been plagued with gouts, rheumatisms, and nameless
disorders, ever since you left us, which have made me call for a
little more attendance than ordinary; and I had reason to think myself
slighted, where an indulgent father can least bear to be so, that is,
where he most loves; and that by young upstarts, who are growing up to
the enjoyment of those pleasures which have run away from me, fleeting
rascals as they are! before I was willing to part with them. And I
rung and rung, and "Where's Polly?" (for I honour the slut with too
much of my notice), "Where's Polly?" was all my cry, to every one
who came up to ask what I rung for. And, at last, in burst the pert
baggage, with an air of assurance, as if she thought all must be well
the moment she appeared, with "Do you want me, papa?"

"Do I want you, Confidence? Yes, I do. Where have you been these two
hours, that you never came near me, when you knew 'twas my time
to have my foot rubbed, which gives me mortal pain?" For you must
understand, Mr. B., that nobody's hand's so soft as Polly's.

She gave me a saucy answer, as I was disposed to think it, because I
had just then a twinge, that I could scarce bear; for pain is a plaguy
thing to a man of my lively spirits.

She gave me, I say, a careless answer, and turning upon her heel; and
not coming to me at my first word, I flung a book which I had in my
hand, at her head. And, this fine lady of your's, this paragon of
meekness and humility, in so many words, bids me, or, which is worse,
tells my own daughter to bid me, never to take a book into my hands
again, if I won't make a better use of it:--and yet, what better
use can an offended father make of the best books, than to correct a
rebellious child with them, and oblige a saucy daughter to jump into
her duty all at once?

Mrs. B. reflects upon me for making her blush formerly, and saying
things before my daughters, that, truly, I ought to be ashamed of?
then avows malice and revenge. Why neighbour, are these things to be
borne?--Do you allow your lady to set up for a general corrector of
every body's morals but your own?--Do you allow her to condemn the
only instances of wit that remain to this generation; that dear polite
_double entendre_, which keeps alive the attention, and quickens the
apprehension, of the best companies in the world, and is the salt, the
sauce, which gives a poignancy to all our genteeler entertainments!

Very fine, truly! that more than half the world shall be shut out of
society, shall be precluded their share of conversation amongst the
gay and polite of both sexes, were your lady to have her will! Let
her first find people who can support a conversation with wit and good
sense like her own, and then something may be said: but till then,
I positively say, and will swear upon occasion, that double entendre
shall not be banished from our tables; and where this won't raise a
blush, or create a laugh, we will, if we please, for all Mrs. B. and
her new-fangled notions, force the one and the other by still plainer
hints; and let her help herself how she can.

Thus, Sir, you find my complaints are of a high nature, regarding the
quiet of a family, the duty of a child to a parent, and the freedom
and politeness of conversation; in all which your lady has greatly
offended; and I insist upon satisfaction from you, or such a
correction of the fair transgressor, as is in your power to inflict,
and which may prevent worse consequences from _your offended friend
and servant_,

SIMON DARNFORD.





LETTER XXIII

_From Mr. B. in Answer to the preceding one._

DEAR SIR SIMON,

You cannot but believe that I was much surprised at your letter,
complaining of the behaviour of my wife. I could no more have expected
such a complaint from such a gentleman, than I could, that she would
have deserved it: and I am very sorry on _both_ accounts. I have
talked to her in such a manner, that, I dare say, she will never give
you like cause to appeal to me.

It happened, that the criminal herself received it from her servant,
and brought it to me in my closet; and, making her honours (for I
can't say but she is very obliging to me, though she takes such saucy
freedoms with my friends) away she tript; and I, inquiring for her,
when, with surprise, as you may believe, I had read your charge, found
she was gone to visit a poor sick neighbour; of which indeed I knew
before because she took the chariot; but I had forgot it in my wrath.

At last, in she came, with that sweet composure in her face which
results from a consciousness of doing _generally_ just and generous
things. I resumed, therefore, that sternness and displeasure which her
entrance had almost dissipated. I took her hand; her charming eye
(you know what an eye she has, Sir Simon) quivered at my overclouded
aspect; and her lips, half drawn to a smile, trembling with
apprehension of a countenance so changed from what she left it.

And then, all stiff and stately as I could look, did I accost
her--"Come along with me, Pamela, to my closet. I want to talk with
you."

"What have I done? Let me know, good Sir!" looking round, with her
half-affrighted eyes, this way and that, on the books, and pictures,
and on me, by turns.

"You shall know soon," said I, "the _crime_ you have been guilty
of."--"_Crime_, Sir! Pray let me--This closet, I hoped, would not be a
_second_ time witness to the flutter you put me in."

_There_ hangs a tale, Sir Simon, which I am not very fond of relating,
since it gave beginning to the triumphs of this little sorceress. I
still held one hand, and she stood before me, as criminals ought to
do before their judge, but said, "I see, Sir, sure I do,--or what will
else become of me!--less severity in your eyes, than you affect to
put on in your countenance. Dear Sir, let me but know my fault: I will
repent, acknowledge, and amend."

"You must have great presence of mind, Pamela, such is the nature of
your fault, if you can look me in the face, when I tell it you."

"Then let me," said the irresistible charmer, hiding her face in my
bosom, and putting her other arm about my neck, "let me thus, my dear
Mr. B., hide this guilty face, while I hear my fault told; and I will
not seek to extenuate it, by my tears, and my penitence."

I could hardly hold out. What infatuating creatures are these women,
when they thus soothe and calm the tumults of an angry heart! When,
instead of _scornful_ looks darted in return for _angry_ ones, words
of _defiance_ for words of _peevishness,_ persisting to defend
_one_ error by _another_, and returning _vehement wrath_ for _slight
indignation,_ and all the hostile provocations of the marriage
warfare; they can thus hide their dear faces in our bosoms, and wish
but to _know_ their faults, to _amend_ them!

I could hardly, I say, resist the sweet girl's behaviour; nay, I
believe, I did, and in defiance to my resolved displeasure, press her
forehead with my lips, as the rest of her face was hid on my breast;
but, considering it was the cause of my _friend,_ I was to assert, my
_injured_ friend, wounded and insulted, in so various a manner by the
fair offender, thus haughtily spoke I to the trembling mischief, in a
pomp of style theatrically tragic:

"I will not, too inadvertent, and undistinguishing Pamela, keep
you long in suspense, for the sake of a circumstance, that, on this
occasion, ought to give you as much joy, as it has, till now, given
me--since it becomes an advocate in your favour, when otherwise you
might expect very severe treatment. Know then, that the letter you
gave me before you went out, is a letter from a friend, a neighbour, a
worthy neighbour, complaining of your behaviour to him;--no other than
Sir Simon Darnford" (for I would not amuse her too much), "a gentleman
I must always respect, and whom, as my friend, I expected _you_
should: since, by the value a wife expresses for one esteemed by her
husband, whether she thinks so well of him herself, or not, a man
ought always to judge of the sincerity of her regards to himself."

She raised her head at once on this:--"Thank Heaven," said she, "it is
no worse!--I was at my wit's end almost, in apprehension: but I know
how this must be. Dear Sir, how could you frighten me so?--I know how
all this is!--I can now look you in the face, and hear all that Sir
Simon can charge me with! For I am sure, I have not so affronted him
as to make him angry indeed. And truly" (ran she on, secure of pardon
as she seemed to think), "I should respect Sir Simon not only as your
friend, but on his own account, if he was not so sad a rake at a time
of life--"

Then I interrupted her, you must needs think. Sir Simon; for how could
I bear to hear my worthy friend so freely treated! "How now, Pamela!"
said I; "and is it thus, by _repeating_ your fault, that you _atone_
for it? Do you think I can bear to hear my friend so freely treated?"

"Indeed," said she, "I do respect Sir Simon very much as your
_friend_, permit me to repeat; but cannot for his wilful failings.
Would it not be, in some measure, to approve of faulty conversation,
if one can hear it, and not discourage it, when the occasion comes in
so pat?--And, indeed, I was glad of an opportunity," continued she,
"to give him a little rub; I must needs own it: but if it displeases
you, or has made him angry in earnest, I am sorry for it, and will be
less bold for the future."

"Read then," said I, "the heavy charge, and I'll return instantly to
hear your answer to it." So I went from her, for a few minutes. But,
would you believe it, Sir Simon? she seemed, on my return, very little
concerned at your just complaints. What self-justifying minds have the
meekest of these women!--Instead of finding her in repentant tears, as
one would expect, she took your angry letter for a jocular one; and
I had great difficulty to convince her of the heinousness of _her_
fault, or the reality of your resentment. Upon which, being determined
to have justice done to my friend, and a due sense of her own great
error impressed upon her, I began thus:

"Pamela, take heed that you do not suffer the purity of your own mind,
in breach of your charity, to make you too rigorous a censurer
of other people's actions: don't be so puffed up with your own
perfections, as to imagine, that, because other persons allow
themselves liberties you cannot take, _therefore_ they must be wicked.
Sir Simon is a gentleman who indulges himself in a pleasant vein, and,
I believe, as well as you, _has been_ a great rake and libertine:"
(You'll excuse me, Sir Simon, because I am taking your part), "but
what then? You see it is all over with him now. He says, that he
_must_, and therefore he _will_ be virtuous: and is a man for ever to
hear the faults of his youth, when so willing to forget them?"

"Ah! but, Sir, Sir," said the bold slut, "can you say he is _willing_
to forget them?--Does he not repine in this very letter, that
he _must_ forsake them; and does he not plainly cherish the
_inclination_, when he owns--" She hesitated--"Owns what?"--"You know
what I mean. Sir, and I need not speak it: and can there well be a
more censurable character?--Then before his maiden daughters! his
virtuous lady! _before_ any body!--What a sad thing is this, at a time
of life, which should afford a better example!

"But, dear Sir," continued the bold prattler, (taking advantage of
a silence more owing to displeasure than approbation) "let me, for
I would not be too _censorious_" (No, not she! in the very act of
censoriousness to say this!), "let me offer but one thing: don't
you think Sir Simon himself would be loth to be thought a reformed
gentleman? Don't you see his delight, when speaking of his former
pranks, as if sorry he could not play them over again? See but how he
simpers, and _enjoys_, as one may say, the relations of his own rakish
actions, when he tells a bad story!"

"But," said I, "were this the case" (for I profess, Sir Simon, I was
at a grievous loss to defend you), "for you to write all these free
things against a father to his daughter, is that right, Pamela?"

"O, Sir! the good gentleman himself has taken care, that such a
character as I presumed to draw to Miss of her papa, was no strange
one to her. You have seen yourself, Mr. B., whenever his arch leers,
and his humourous attitude on those occasions, have taught us to
expect some shocking story, how his lady and daughters (used to him as
they are), have suffered in their apprehensions of what he would say,
before he spoke it: how, particularly, dear Miss Darnford has looked
at me with concern, desirous, as it were, if possible, to save her
papa from the censure, which his faulty expressions must naturally
bring upon him. And, dear Sir, is it not a sad thing for a young lady,
who loves and honours her papa, to observe, that he is discrediting
himself, and _wants_ the example he ought to _give?_ And pardon me,
Sir, for smiling on so serious an occasion; but is it not a fine
sight to see a gentleman, as we have often seen Sir Simon, when he has
thought proper to read a passage in some bad book, pulling off _his
spectacles_, to talk filthily upon it? Methinks I see him now," added
the bold slut, "splitting his arch face with a broad laugh, shewing a
mouth, with hardly a tooth in it, and making obscene remarks upon what
he has read."

And then the dear saucy-face laughed out, to bear _me_ company; for I
could not, for the soul of me, avoid laughing heartily at the figure
she brought to my mind, which I have seen my old friend more than once
make, with his dismounted spectacles, arch mouth, and gums of shining
jet, succeeding those of polished ivory, of which he often boasts, as
one ornament of his youthful days.--And I the rather in my heart, Sir
Simon, gave you up, because, when I was a sad fellow, it was always my
maxim to endeavour to touch a lady's heart without wounding her
ears. And, indeed, I found my account sometimes in observing it. But,
resuming my gravity--"Hussy, said I, do you think I will have my old
friend thus made the object of your ridicule?--Suppose a challenge
should have ensued between us on your account--what might have been
the issue of it? To see an old gentleman, stumping, as he says, on
crutches, to fight a duel in defence of his wounded honour!"--"Very
bad, Sir, to be sure: I see that, and am sorry for it: for had you
carried off Sir Simon's crutch, as a trophy, he must have lain sighing
and groaning like a wounded soldier in the field of battle, till
another had been brought him, to have stumped home with."

But, dear Sir Simon, I have brought this matter to an issue, that
will, I hope, make all easy;--Miss Polly, and my Pamela, shall both be
punished as they deserve, if it be not your own fault. I am told, that
the sins of your youth don't sit so heavily upon your limbs, as in
your imagination; and I believe change of air, and the gratification
of your revenge, a fine help to such lively spirits as yours, will set
you up. You shall then take coach, and bring your pretty criminal to
mine; and when we have them together, they shall humble themselves
before us, and you can absolve or punish them, as you shall see
proper. For I cannot bear to have my worthy friend insulted in so
heinous a manner, by a couple of saucy girls, who, if not taken down
in time, may proceed from fault to fault, till there will be no living
with them.

If (to be still more serious) your lady and you will lend Miss
Darnford to my Pamela's wishes, whose heart is set upon the hope of
her wintering with us in town, you will lay an obligation upon us
both; which will be acknowledged with great gratitude by, dear Sir,
_your affectionate and humble servant_.





LETTER XXIV

_From Sir Simon Darnford in reply._

Hark ye, Mr. B.--A word in your ear:--to be plain: I like neither you
nor your wife well enough to trust my Polly with you.

But here's war declared against my poor gums, it seems. Well, I will
never open my mouth before your lady as long as I live, if I can help
it. I have for these ten years avoided to put on my cravat; and for
what reason, do you think?--Why, because I could not bear to see what
ruins a few years have made in a visage, that used to inspire love and
terror as it pleased. And here your--what-shall-I-call-her of a wife,
with all the insolence of youth and beauty on her side, follows me
with a glass, and would make me look in it, whether I will or not. I'm
a plaguy good-humoured old fellow--if I am an old fellow--or I should
not bear the insults contained in your letter. Between you and your
lady, you make a wretched figure of me, that's certain.--And yet 'tis
_taking my part_.

But what must I do?--I'd be glad at any rate to stand in your
lady's graces, that I would; nor would I be the last rake libertine
unreformed by her example, which I suppose will make virtue the
fashion, if she goes on as she does. But here I have been used to cut
a joke and toss the squib about; and, as far as I know, it has
helped to keep me alive in the midst of pains and aches, and with two
women-grown girls, and the rest of the mortifications that will attend
on _advanced years_; for I won't (hang me if I will) give it up as
absolute _old age!_

But now, it seems, I must leave all this off, or I must be mortified
with a looking glass held before me, and every wrinkle must be made
as conspicuous as a furrow--And what, pray, is to succeed to this
reformation?--I can neither fast nor pray, I doubt.--And besides, if
my stomach and my jest depart from me, farewell, Sir Simon Darnford!

But cannot I pass as one necessary character, do you think: as a foil
(as, by-the-bye, some of your own actions have been to your lady's
virtue) to set off some more edifying example, where variety of
characters make up a feast in conversation?

Well, I believe I might have trusted you with my daughter, under your
lady's eye, rake as you have been yourself; and fame says wrong, if
you have not been, for your time a bolder sinner than ever I was, with
your maxim of touching ladies' hearts, without wounding their ears,
which made surer work with them, that was all; though 'tis to be hoped
you are now reformed; and if you are, the whole country round you,
east, west, north, and south, owe great obligations to your fair
reclaimer. But here is a fine prim young fellow, coming out of
Norfolk, with one estate in one county, another in another, and
jointures and settlements in his hand, and more wit in his head, as
well as more money in his pocket, than he can tell what to do with, to
visit our Polly; though I tell her I much question the former quality,
his wit, if he is for marrying.

Here then is the reason I cannot comply with your kind Mrs. B.'s
request. But if this matter should go off; if he should not like
_her_, or she _him_; or if I should not like _his_ terms, or he
_mine_;--or still another _or_, if he should like Nancy better why,
then perhaps, if Polly be a good girl, I may trust to her virtue, and
to your honour, and let her go for a month or two.

Now, when I have said this, and when I say, further, that I can
forgive your severe lady, and yourself too, (who, however, are less to
be excused in the airs you assume, which looks like one chimney-sweeper
calling another a sooty rascal) I gave a proof of my charity, which
I hope with Mrs. B. will cover a multitude of faults; and the rather,
since, though I cannot be a _follower_ of her virtue in the strictest
sense, I can be an _admirer_ of it; and that is some little merit: and
indeed all that can be at present pleaded by _yourself_, I doubt, any
more than _your humble servant_,

SIMON DARNFORD.





LETTER XXV

MY HONOURED AND DEAR PARENTS,

I hope you will excuse my long silence, which has been owing to
several causes, and having had nothing new to entertain you with: and
yet this last is but a poor excuse to you, who think every trifling
subject agreeable from your daughter.

I daily expect here my Lord and Lady Davers. This gives me no small
pleasure, and yet it is mingled with some uneasiness at times; lest I
should not, when viewed so intimately near, behave myself answerably
to her ladyship's expectations. But I resolve not to endeavour to
move out of the sphere of my own capacity, in order to emulate her
ladyship. She must have advantages, by conversation, as well as
education, which it would be arrogance in me to assume, or to think of
imitating.

All that I will attempt to do, therefore, shall be, to shew such a
respectful obligingness to my lady, as shall be consistent with the
condition to which I am raised; so that she may not have reason to
reproach me of pride in my exaltation, nor her dear brother to rebuke
me for meanness in condescending: and, as to my family arrangement, I
am the less afraid of inspection, because, by the natural bias of
my own mind, I bless God, I am above dark reserves, and have not one
selfish or sordid view, to make me wish to avoid the most scrutinising
eye.

I have begun a correspondence with Miss Darnford, a young lady
of uncommon merit. But yet you know her character from my former
writings. She is very solicitous to hear of all that concerns me, and
particularly how Lady Davers and I agree together. I loved her from
the moment I saw her first; for she has the least pride, and the most
benevolence and solid thought, I ever knew in a young lady, and does
not envy any one. I shall write to her often: and as I shall have so
many avocations besides to fill up my time, I know you will excuse me,
if I procure from this lady the return of my letters to her, for your
perusal, and for the entertainment of your leisure hours. This will
give you, from time to time, the accounts you desire of all that
happens here. But as to what relates to our own particulars, I beg you
will never spare writing, as I shall not answering; for it is one of
my greatest delights, that I have such worthy parents (as I hope in
God, I long shall) to bless me and to correspond with me.

The papers I send herewith will afford you some diversion,
particularly those relating to Sir Simon Darnford; and I must desire,
that when you have perused them (as well as what I shall send for the
future), you will return them to me.

Mr. Longman greatly pleased me, on his last return, in his account of
your health, and the satisfaction you take in your happy lot; and I
must recite to you a brief conversation on this occasion, which, I
dare say, will please you as much as it did me.

After having adjusted some affairs with his dear principal, which took
up two hours, my best beloved sent for me. "My dear," said he, seating
me by him, and making the good old gentleman sit down, (for he will
always rise at my approach) "Mr. Longman and I have settled, in two
hours, some accounts, which would have taken up as many months with
some persons: for never was there an exacter or more methodical
accomptant. He gives me (greatly to my satisfaction, because I know
it will delight you) an account of the Kentish concern, and of the
pleasure your father and mother take in it.--Now, my charmer," said
he, "I see your eyes begin to glisten: O how this subject raises your
whole soul to the windows of it!--Never was so dutiful a daughter, Mr.
Longman; and never did parents better deserve a daughter's duty."

I endeavoured before Mr. Longman to rein in a gratitude, that my
throbbing heart confessed through my handkerchief, as I perceived: but
the good old gentleman could not hinder his from shewing itself at
his worthy eyes, to see how much I was favoured--_oppressed_, I should
say--with the tenderest goodness to me, and kind expressions.--"Excuse
me," said he, wiping his cheeks: "my delight to see such merit so
justly rewarded will not be contained, I think." And so he arose and
walked to the window.

"Well, good Mr. Longman," said I, as he returned towards us, "you give
me the pleasure to know that my father and mother are well; and happy
then they _must_ be, in a goodness and bounty, that I, and many more,
rejoice in."

"Well and happy, Madam;--ay, that they are, indeed! A worthier couple
never lived. Most nobly do they go on in the farm. Your honour is one
of the happiest gentlemen in the world. All the good you do, returns
upon you in a trice. It may well be said _you cast your bread upon the
waters_; for it presently comes to you again, richer and heavier
than when you threw it in. All the Kentish tenants, Madam, are hugely
delighted with their good steward: every thing prospers under his
management: the gentry love both him and my dame; and the poor people
adore them."

Thus ran Mr. Longman on, to my inexpressible delight, you may believe;
and when he withdrew--"'Tis an honest soul," said my dear Mr. B. "I
love him for his respectful love to my angel, and his value for the
worthy pair. Very glad I am, that every thing answers _their_ wishes.
May they long live, and be happy!"

The dear man makes me spring to his arms, whenever be touches this
string: for he speaks always thus kindly of you; and is glad to hear,
he says, that you don't live only to yourselves; and now and then
adds, that he is as much satisfied with your prudence, as he is with
mine; that parents and daughter do credit to one another: and that
the praises he hears of you from every mouth, make him take as great
pleasure in you, as if you were his own relations. How delighting, how
transporting rather, my dear

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