won’t, you are so good!—and I will work the harder, when I come home,
if I can get a little plain-work, or any thing, to do. But all your
neighbourhood is so poor, that I fear I shall want work, except, may
be, dame Mumford can help me to something, from any good family she is
acquainted with.
Here, what a sad thing it is! I have been brought up wrong, as matters
stand. For, you know, my good lady, now in heaven, loved singing and
dancing; and, as she would have it, I had a voice, she made me learn
both; and often and often has she made me sing her an innocent song,
and a good psalm too, and dance before her. And I must learn to flower
and draw too, and to work fine work with my needle; why, all this too I
have got pretty tolerably at my finger’s end, as they say; and she used
to praise me, and was a good judge of such matters.
Well now, what is all this to the purpose, as things have turned about?
Why, no more nor less, than that I am like the grasshopper in the
fable, which I have read of in my lady’s book, as follows:—[See the
Aesop’s Fables which have lately been selected and reformed from those
of Sir R. L’Estrange, and the most eminent mythologists.]
‘As the ants were airing their provisions one winter, a hungry
grasshopper (as suppose it was poor I) begged a charity of them. They
told him, That he should have wrought in summer, if he would not have
wanted in winter. Well, says the grasshopper, but I was not idle
neither; for I sung out the whole season. Nay, then, said they, you’ll
e’en do well to make a merry year of it, and dance in winter to the
time you sung in summer.’
So I shall make a fine figure with my singing and my dancing, when I
come home to you! Nay, I shall be unfit even for a May-day
holiday-time; for these minuets, rigadoons, and French dances, that I
have been practising, will make me but ill company for my milk-maid
companions that are to be. To be sure I had better, as things stand,
have learned to wash and scour, and brew and bake, and such like. Put I
hope, if I can’t get work, and can meet with a place, to learn these
soon, if any body will have the goodness to bear with me till I am
able: For, notwithstanding what my master says, I hope I have an humble
and teachable mind; and, next to God’s grace, that’s all my comfort:
for I shall think nothing too mean that is honest. It may be a little
hard at first; but woe to my proud heart, if I find it so on trial; for
I will make it bend to its condition, or break it.
I have read of a good bishop that was to be burnt for his religion; and
he tried how he could bear it, by putting his fingers into the lighted
candle: So I, t’other day, tried, when Rachel’s back was turned, if I
could not scour a pewter plate she had begun. I see I could do’t by
degrees: It only blistered my hand in two places.
All the matter is, if I could get plain-work enough, I need not spoil
my fingers. But if I can’t, I hope to make my hands as red as a
blood-pudding, and as hard as a beechen trencher, to accommodate them
to my condition.—But I must break off; here’s somebody coming.
’Tis only our Hannah with a message from Mrs. Jervis.—But, hold, here’s
somebody else. Well, it is only Rachel.
I am as much frighted, as were the city mouse and the country mouse, in
the same book of fables, at every thing that stirs. O! I have a power
of these things to entertain you with in winter evenings, when I come
home. If I can but get work, with a little time for reading, I hope we
shall be very happy over our peat fires.
What made me hint to you, that I should bring but little with me, is
this:
You must know, I did intend to do, as I have this afternoon: and that
is, I took all my clothes, and all my linen, and I divided them into
three parcels, as I had before told Mrs. Jervis I intended to do; and I
said, It is now Monday, Mrs. Jervis, and I am to go away on Thursday
morning betimes; so, though I know you don’t doubt my honesty, I beg
you will look over my poor matters, and let every one have what belongs
to them; for, said I, you know I am resolved to take with me only what
I can properly call my own.
Said she, (I did not know her drift then; to be sure she meant well;
but I did not thank her for it, when I did know it,) Let your things be
brought down in the green-room, and I will do any thing you will have
me do.
With all my heart, said I, green-room or any where; but I think you
might step up, and see ’em as they lie.
However, I fetched ’em down, and laid them in three parcels, as before;
and, when I had done, I went down to call her up to look at them.
Now, it seems, she had prepared my master for this scene, unknown to
me; and in this green-room was a closet, with a sash-door, and a
curtain before it; for there she puts her sweet-meats and such things;
and she did it, it seems, to turn his heart, as knowing what I
intended, I suppose that he should make me take the things; for, if he
had, I should have made money of them, to help us when we got together;
for, to be sure, I could never have appeared in them.
Well, as I was saying, he had got, unknown to me, into this closet; I
suppose while I went to call Mrs. Jervis: and she since owned to me, it
was at his desire, when she told him something of what I intended, or
else she would not have done it: though I have reason, I am sure, to
remember the last closet-work.
So I said, when she came up, Here, Mrs. Jervis, is the first parcel; I
will spread it all abroad. These are the things my good lady gave
me.—In the first place, said I—and so I went on describing the clothes
and linen my lady had given me, mingling blessings, as I proceeded, for
her goodness to me; and when I had turned over that parcel, I said,
Well, so much for the first parcel, Mrs. Jervis; that was my lady’s
gifts.
Now I come to the presents of my dear virtuous master: Hey, you know
closet for that! Mrs. Jervis. She laughed, and said, I never saw such a
comical girl in my life! But go on. I will, Mrs. Jervis, said I, as
soon as I have opened the bundle; for I was as brisk and as pert as
could be, little thinking who heard me.
Now here, Mrs. Jervis, said I, are my ever worthy master’s presents;
and then I particularised all those in the second bundle.
After which, I turned to my own, and said,
Now, Mrs. Jervis, comes poor Pamela’s bundle; and a little one it is to
the others. First, here is a calico nightgown, that I used to wear o’
mornings. ’Twill be rather too good for me when I get home; but I must
have something. Then there is a quilted calamanco coat, and a pair of
stockings I bought of the pedlar, and my straw-hat with blue strings;
and a remnant of Scots cloth, which will make two shirts and two
shifts, the same I have on, for my poor father and mother. And here are
four other shifts, one the fellow to that I have on; another pretty
good one, and the other two old fine ones, that will serve me to turn
and wind with at home, for they are not worth leaving behind me; and
here are two pair of shoes, I have taken the lace off, which I will
burn, and may be will fetch me some little matter at a pinch, with an
old silver buckle or two.
What do you laugh for, Mrs. Jervis? said I.—Why you are like an April
day; you cry and laugh in a breath.
Well, let me see; ay, here is a cotton handkerchief I bought of the
pedlar—there should be another somewhere. O, here it is! and here too
are my new-bought knit mittens; and this is my new flannel coat, the
fellow to that I have on and in this parcel, pinned together, are
several pieces of printed calico, remnants of silks, and such like,
that, if good luck should happen, and I should get work, would serve
for robins and facings, and such like uses. And here too are a pair of
pockets: they are too fine for me; but I have no worse. Bless me, said
I, I did not think I had so many good things!
Well, Mrs. Jervis, said I, you have seen all my store, and I will now
sit down, and tell you a piece of my mind.
Be brief then, said she, my good girl: for she was afraid, she said
afterwards, that I should say too much.
Why then the case is this: I am to enter upon a point of equity and
conscience, Mrs. Jervis; and I must beg, if you love me, you’d let me
have my own way. Those things there of my lady’s, I can have no claim
to, so as to take them away; for she gave them me, supposing I was to
wear them in her service, and to do credit to her bountiful heart. But,
since I am to be turned away, you know, I cannot wear them at my poor
father’s; for I should bring all the little village upon my back; and
so I resolve not to have them.
Then, Mrs. Jervis, said I, I have far less right to these of my worthy
master’s; for you see what was his intention in giving them to me. So
they were to be the price of my shame, and if I could make use of them,
I should think I should never prosper with them; and, besides, you
know, Mrs. Jervis, if I would not do the good gentleman’s work, why
should I take his wages? So, in conscience, in honour, in every thing,
I have nothing to say to thee, thou second wicked bundle!
But, said I, cone to my arms, my dear third parcel, the companion of my
poverty, and the witness of my honesty; and may I never deserve the
least rag that is contained in thee, when I forfeit a title to that
innocence, that I hope will ever be the pride of my life! and then I am
sure it will be my highest comfort at my death, when all the riches and
pomps of the world will be worse than the vilest rags that can be worn
by beggars! And so I hugged my third bundle.
But, said I, Mrs. Jervis, (and she wept to hear me,) one thing more I
have to trouble you with, and that’s all.
There are four guineas, you know, that came out of my good lady’s
pocket, when she died; that, with some silver, my master gave me: Now
these same four guineas I sent to my poor father and mother, and they
have broken them; but would make them up, if I would: and if you think
it should be so, it shall. But pray tell me honestly your mind: As to
the three years before my lady’s death, do you think, as I had no
wages, I may be supposed to be quits?—By quits, I cannot mean that my
poor services should be equal to my lady’s goodness; for that’s
impossible. But as all her learning and education of me, as matters
have turned, will be of little service to me now; for it had been
better for me to have been brought up to hard labour, to be sure; for
that I must turn to at last, if I can’t get a place: (and you know, in
places too, one is subject to such temptations as are dreadful to think
of:) so, I say, by quits I only mean, as I return all the good things
she gave me, whether I may not set my little services against my
keeping; because, as I said, my learning is not now in the question;
and I am sure my dear good lady would have thought so, had she lived;
but that too is now out of the question. Well then, if so, I would ask,
Whether, in above this year that I have lived with my master, as I am
resolved to leave all his gifts behind me, I may not have earned,
besides my keeping, these four guineas, and these poor clothes here
upon my back, and in my third bundle? Now tell me your mind freely,
without favour or affection.
Alas! my dear girl, says she, you make me unable to speak to you at
all: To be sure it will be the highest affront that can be offered, for
you to leave any of these things behind you; and you must take all your
bundles with you, or my master will never forgive you.
Well, well, Mrs. Jervis, said I, I don’t care; I have been too much
used to be snubbed and hardly treated by my master, of late. I have
done him no harm; and I shall always pray for him and wish him happy.
But I don’t deserve these things; I know I don’t. Then, I can’t wear
them, if I should take them; so they can be of no use to me: And I
trust I shall not want the poor pittance, that is all I desire to keep
life and soul together. Bread and water I can live upon, Mrs. Jervis,
with content. Water I shall get any where; and if I can’t get me bread,
I will live like a bird in winter upon hips and haws, and at other
times upon pig-nuts and potatoes, or turnips, or any thing. So what
occasion have I for these things?—But all I ask is about these four
guineas, and if you think I need not return them, that is all I want to
know.—To be sure, my dear, you need not, said she; you have well earned
them by that waistcoat only. No, I think not so, in that only; but in
the linen, and other things, do you think I have? Yes, yes, said she,
and more. And my keeping allowed for, I mean, said I, and these poor
clothes on my back, besides? Remember that, Mrs. Jervis. Yes, my dear
odd-one, no doubt you have. Well then, said I, I am as happy as a
princess. I am quite as rich as I wish to be: and once more, my dear
third bundle, I will hug thee to my bosom. And I beg you’ll say nothing
of all this till I am gone, that my master mayn’t be so angry, but that
I may go in peace; for my heart, without other matters, will be ready
to break to part with you all.
Now, Mrs. Jervis, said I, as to one matter more: and that is my
master’s last usage of me, before Mr. Longman.—Said she, Pr’ythee, dear
Pamela, step to my chamber, and fetch me a paper I left on my table. I
have something to shew you in it. I will, said I, and stepped down; but
that was only a fetch, to take the orders of my master, I found. It
seems he said, he thought two or three times to have burst out upon me;
but he could not stand it, and wished I might not know he was there.
But I tripped up again so nimbly, (for there was no paper,) that I just
saw his back, as if coming out of that green-room, and going into the
next to it, the first door that was open—I whipped in, and shut the
door, and bolted it. O Mrs. Jervis! said I, what have you done by me?—I
see I can’t confide in any body. I am beset on all hands. Wretched,
wretched Pamela, where shalt thou expect a friend, if Mrs. Jervis joins
to betray thee thus? She made so many protestations, (telling me all,
and that he owned I had made him wipe his eyes two or three times, and
said she hoped it would have a good effect, and remembered me, that I
had said nothing but what would rather move compassion than
resentment,) that I forgave her. But O! that I was safe from this
house! for never poor creature sure was so flustered as I have been so
many months together;—I am called down from this most tedious scribble.
I wonder what will next befall Your dutiful DAUGHTER.
Mrs. Jervis says, she is sure I shall have the chariot to carry me home
to you. Though this will look too great for me, yet it will shew as if
I was not turned away quite in disgrace. The travelling chariot is come
from Lincolnshire, and I fancy I shall go in that; for the other is
quite grand.
LETTER XXX
MY DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER,
I write again, though, may be, I shall bring it to you in my pocket:
for I shall have no writing, nor writing-time, I hope, when I come to
you. This is Wednesday morning, and I shall, I hope, set out to you
to-morrow morning; but I have had more trials and more vexations; but
of another complexion too a little, though all from the same quarter.
Yesterday my master, after he came from hunting, sent for me. I went
with great terror: for I expected he would storm, and be in a fine
passion with me for my freedom of speech before: so I was resolved to
begin first, with submission, to disarm his anger; and I fell upon my
knees as soon as I saw him; and said, Good sir, let me beseech you, as
you hope to be forgiven yourself, and for the sake of my dear good lady
your mother, who recommended me to you with her last words, to forgive
me all my faults; and only grant me this favour, the last I shall ask
you, that you will let me depart your house with peace and quietness of
mind, that I may take such a leave of my dear fellow-servants as befits
me; and that my heart be not quite broken.
He took me up, in a kinder manner than ever I had known; and he said,
Shut the door, Pamela, and come to me in my closet: I want to have a
little serious talk with you. How can I, sir, said I, how can I! and
wrung my hands. O pray, sir, let me go out of your presence, I beseech
you! By the God that made me, said he, I’ll do you no harm. Shut the
parlour door, and come to me in my library.
He then went into his closet, which is his library, and full of rich
pictures besides; a noble apartment, though called a closet, and next
the private garden, into which it has a door that opens. I shut the
parlour door, as he bid me; but stood at it irresolute. Place some
confidence in me, said he: Surely you may, when I have spoken thus
solemnly. So I crept towards him with trembling feet, and my heart
throbbing through my handkerchief. Come in, said he, when I bid you. I
did so. Pray, sir, said I, pity and spare me. I will, said he, as I
hope to be saved. He sat down upon a rich settee; and took hold of my
hand, and said, Don’t doubt me, Pamela. From this moment I will no more
consider you as my servant: and I desire you’ll not use me with
ingratitude for the kindness I am going to express towards you. This a
little emboldened me; and he said, holding both my hands between his,
You have too much wit and good sense not to discover, that I, in spite
of my heart, and all the pride of it, cannot but love you. Yes, look up
to me, my sweet-faced girl! I must say I love you; and have put on a
behaviour to you, that was much against my heart, in hopes to frighten
you from your reservedness. You see I own it ingenuously; and don’t
play your sex upon me for it.
I was unable to speak; and he, seeing me too much oppressed with
confusion to go on in that strain, said, Well, Pamela, let me know in
what situation of life is your father: I know he is a poor man; but is
he as low and as honest as he was when my mother took you?
Then I could speak a little; and with a down look, (and I felt my face
glow like fire,) I said, Yes, sir, as poor and as honest too; and that
is my pride. Says he, I will do something for him, if it be not your
fault, and make all your family happy. All, sir, said I, he is happier
already than ever he can be, if his daughter’s innocence is to be the
price of your favour: and I beg you will not speak to me on the only
side that can wound me. I have no design of that sort, said he. O sir,
said I, tell me not so, tell me not so!—’Tis easy, said he, for me to
be the making of your father, without injuring you. Well, sir, said I,
if this can be done, let me know how; and all I can do with innocence
shall be the study and practice of my life.—But, O! what can such a
poor creature as I do, and do my duty?—Said he, I would have you stay a
week or fortnight only, and behave yourself with kindness to me; I
stoop to beg it of you, and you shall see all shall turn out beyond
your expectation. I see, said he, you are going to answer otherwise
than I would have you; and I begin to be vexed I should thus meanly
sue; and so I will say, that your behaviour before honest Longman, when
I used you as I did, and you could so well have vindicated yourself,
has quite charmed me. And though I am not pleased with all you said
yesterday, while I was in the closet, yet you have moved me more to
admire you than before; and I am awakened to see more worthiness in
you, than ever I saw in any lady in the world. All the servants, from
the highest to the lowest, doat upon you, instead of envying you; and
look upon you in so superior a light, as speaks what you ought to be. I
have seen more of your letters than you imagine, (This surprised me!)
and am quite overcome with your charming manner of writing, so free, so
easy, and many of your sentiments so much above your years, and your
sex; and all put together, makes me, as I tell you, love you to
extravagance. Now, Pamela, when I have stooped to acknowledge all this,
oblige me only to stay another week or fortnight, to give me time to
bring about some certain affairs, and you shall see how much you may
find your account in it.
I trembled to find my poor heart giving way.—O good sir, said I, spare
a poor girl that cannot look up to you, and speak. My heart is full;
and why should you wish to undo me?—Only oblige me, said he, to stay a
fortnight longer, and John shall carry word to your father, that I will
see him in the time, either here, or at the Swan in his village. O sir,
said I, my heart will burst; but, on my bended knees, I beg you to let
me go to-morrow, as I designed: and don’t offer to tempt a poor
creature, whose whole will would be to do yours, if my virtue would
permit!—I shall permit it, said he; for I intend no injury to you, God
is my witness! Impossible! said I; I cannot, sir, believe you, after
what has passed: How many ways are there to undo poor creatures! Good
God, protect me this one time, and send me but to my dear father’s cot
in safety!—Strange, d——d fate! said he, that when I speak so solemnly,
I can’t be believed!—What should I believe, sir? said I, what can I
believe? What have you said, but that I am to stay a fortnight longer?
and what then is to become of me?—My pride of birth and fortune (d—n
them both! said he, since they cannot obtain credit with you, but must
add to your suspicions) will not let me descend all at once; and I ask
you but a fortnight’s stay, that, after this declaration, I may pacify
those proud demands upon me.
O how my heart throbbed! and I began (for I did not know what I did) to
say the Lord’s prayer. None of your beads to me Pamela! said he; thou
art a perfect nun, I think.
But I said aloud, with my eyes lifted up to heaven, Lead me not into
temptation: but deliver me from evil, O my good God! He hugged me in
his arms, and said, Well, my dear girl, then you stay this fortnight,
and you shall see what I will do for you—I’ll leave you a moment, and
walk into the next room, to give you time to think of it, and to shew
you I have no design upon you. Well, this, I thought, did not look
amiss.
He went out, and I was tortured with twenty different doubts in a
minute; sometimes I thought that to stay a week or fortnight longer in
this house to obey him, while Mrs. Jervis was with me, could do no
great harm: But then, thought I, how do I know what I may be able to
do? I have withstood his anger; but may I not relent at his
kindness?—How shall I stand that.—Well, I hope, thought I, by the same
protecting grace in which I will always confide!—But, then, what has he
promised? Why, he will make my poor father and mother’s life
comfortable. O! said I to myself, that is a rich thought; but let me
not dwell upon it, for fear I should indulge it to my ruin.—What can he
do for me, poor girl as I am!—What can his greatness stoop to! He
talks, thought I, of his pride of heart, and pride of condition; O
these are in his head, and in his heart too, or he would not confess
them to me at such an instant. Well then, thought I, this can be only
to seduce me.—He has promised nothing.—But I am to see what he will do,
if I stay a fortnight; and this fortnight, thought I again, is no such
great matter; and I shall see in a few days how he carries it.—But
then, when I again reflected upon this distance between him and me, and
his now open declaration of love, as he called it; and that after this
he would talk with me on that subject more plainly than ever, and I
shall be less armed, may be, to withstand him; and then I bethought
myself, why, if he meant no dishonour, he should not speak before Mrs.
Jervis; and the odious frightful closet came again into my head, and my
narrow escape upon it; and how easy it might be for him to send Mrs.
Jervis and the maids out of the way; and so that all the mischief he
designed me might be brought about in less than that time; I resolved
to go away and trust all to Providence, and nothing to myself. And how
ought I to be thankful for this resolution!—as you shall hear.
But just as I have writ to this place, John sends me word, that he is
going this minute your way; and so I will send you so far as I have
written, and hope by to-morrow night, to ask your blessings, at your
own poor, but happy abode, and tell you the rest by word of mouth; and
so I rest, till then, and for ever, Your dutiful DAUGHTER.
LETTER XXXI
DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER,
I will continue my writing still, because, may be, I shall like to read
it, when I am with you, to see what dangers I have been enabled to
escape; and though I bring it along with me.