“I have not seen her,” said I, “in many years.”
“I know, however,” cried she, looking surprised, “she is your
godmother.”
“But she does not do her duty and answer for me, for I never see her.”
“Oh, you have answered very well for yourself! But I know by that your
name is Fanny.”
She then tripped to somebody else, and Mr. Burke very quietly came from
Mrs. Hampden, and sat down in the vacant place at my side. I could then
wait no longer, for I found he was more near-sighted than myself; I,
therefore, turned towards him and bowed: he seemed quite amazed, and
really made me ashamed, however delighted, by the expressive civility
and distinction with which he instantly rose to return my bow, and stood
the whole time he was making his compliments upon seeing me, and calling
himself the blindest of men for not finding me out sooner. And Mrs.
Burke, who was seated near me, said, loud enough for me to hear her--
“See, see what a flirtation Mr. Burke is beginning with Miss Burney and
before my face too!”
These ceremonies over, he sat down by me, and began a conversation which
you, my dearest Susy, would be glad to hear, for my sake, word for word;
but which I really could not listen to with sufficient ease, from
shame at his warm eulogiums, to remember with any accuracy. The general
substance, however, take as I recollect it.
After many most eloquent compliments upon the book, too delicate either
to shock or sicken the nicest ear, he very emphatically congratulated me
upon its most universal success, said, “he was now too late to speak of
it, since he could only echo the voice of the whole nation” and added,
with a laugh, “I had hoped to have made some merit of my enthusiasm; but
the moment I went about to hear what others say, I found myself merely
one in a multitude.”
He then told me that, notwithstanding his admiration, he was the man who
had dared to find some faults with so favourite and fashionable a work.
I entreated him to tell me what they were, and assured him nothing
would make me so happy as to correct them under his direction. He then
enumerated them: and I will tell you what they are, that you may not
conclude I write nothing but the fairer part of my adventures, which
I really always relate very honestly, though so fair they are at this
time, that it hardly seems possible they should not be dressed up.
The masquerade he thought too long, and that something might be spared
from Harrel's grand assembly; he did not like Morrice's part of the
pantheon; and he wished the conclusion either more happy or more
miserable “for in a work of imagination,” said he, “there is no medium.”
I was not easy enough to answer him, or I have much, though perhaps not
good for much, to say in defence of following life and nature as much in
the conclusion as in the progress of a tale; and when is life and nature
completely happy or miserable?