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,_