Lady Mansfield and Miss Mansfield are all that is polite and good.

The three brothers were there. The eldest, who was once a melancholy man, is now one of the cheerfullest.

With what pleasure did I meditate, as I looked upon them, the restoration of such a worthy and ancient family to affluence! They were born to it; yet when they were deprived of it, how glorious was the resignation of mother and daughters! And now, how easy sits their prosperity upon them! Never saw I eyes more expressive of gratitude to a benefactor, than those both of ladies and gentlemen, as they were often cast upon my dear Sir Charles.

I heartily wish Mr Orme may find his expectations answered in the second voyage, Nancy tells me he is preparing for to Lisbon. She will make known my best wishes for the restoration of his health. How good is his sister to accompany him!-I always loved her.

I received yesterday yours, madam, acquainting me with Mr Greville's visit and proposal, and asking my opinion of the latter; and whether I would choose to mention it to Lucy and my aunt. What can I say? You once told me, madam, that you believed Lucy would not have refused Mr Greville, had he first applied to her. Lucy's grandmother, you say, is not averse to the match; and you think my uncle would not. refuse his consent, because of the contiguity of their respective estates, and in hopes, that he might resume with success, on such an event, his favourite project of exchange of lands. Yet

I am sure this consideration would have no weight with him, if he thought Lucy could not be happy with Mr Greville.

I have mentioned it to my aunt. She says, Mr Greville is not a bashful man. He knows how to apply to Lucy himself. And she has no notion, in such a case, of that pride which withholds him till he thinks himself sure of the family-interest.

He will, if possible, he says, be related to me; let that be mentioned to Lucy, as one of his principal motives, and his business with her is done for ever.

Lady G would laugh at the notion of a difficulty from a first love. First love she calls first nonsense. Too frequently it is so. Lucy is a noble girl. She has overcome a first attachment; the more laudably, as it cost her some struggles to do it. Mr Greville, I doubt, has had several first loves; this transition, therefore, is nothing to him. So neither of them will be first love to the other. It may, therefore, be a match of discretion. Yet his character! The reformation he boasts of!-I hope he is reformed; but I have no notion of a good young woman, as Lucy is, trusting her person, I may say her principles, to the arbitrary will of an impetuous man, who has been an avowed libertine, and pretends not to have reformed from proper convictions. A scoffer too! How came he by his new lights!-You, madam, have told us young folks the difficulty of overcoming evil habits. I own that Lucy always spoke of him with more favour than anybody else. She was inclined to think him a good-natured man; and was pleased with what she called humour in him. Humour! I never could call it so. Humour, I used to tell her, is a gentle, a decent, though a lively thing. Mr Greville is boisterous, impetuous, rude, I had almost said; his courtship to me was either rant, or affront; the one to shew his plain dealing, the other his love. He knows not what respectful love is. In short, his mirth, his good-nature, as it is called, has fierceness in it; it always gave me apprehension.

He

As to worldly matters, there can be no excep tion to him; but I cannot be of the opinion of Lucy's grandmother, that he is a generous man. He has only qualities that look like generosity. His start to me, when he resigned his pretensions to me, as they have been called, ̃(for_I ̃ know not any he had,) was only a start. could not hold it. But, be all these things as they may, how can I, who love Lucy as myself, propose to the dear girl a man, whom I could not think of for myself? Lucy has a fine fortune, and surely there are men enough in the world, who have never made pretensions to Lucy's cousin, who would think themselves honoured by her acceptance; otherwise I should, after Sir Rowland's hint, and earnest wishes in his nephew's favour, much sooner have recommended Mr Fowler to her than Mr Greville.

My aunt had said, that, for her part, she should choose to leave the above affair to its own workings; yet could not forbear to acquaint Lucy with it. The dear girl came to me, to demand a sight of your letter, and of what I had written upon it. I could not (though I had some little reluctance to shew her the letter) deny her. I will give you, madam, the substance of a short dialogue that passed between us on the occasion; and leave it to you to draw such conclusions from it, as you shall judge proper, with regard to my Lucy's inclinations.

She did not know what I meant, she said, by writing to you, that she had always spoken of Mr Greville with more favour than anybody else. It is ungenerous, Lucy, if you are angry at what you would oblige me to shew you against my will.

I am not angry. But-She stopt, and would not explain her half-sullen BUT. O Lucy, thought I, you are a woman, my dear!

As to what you write, said she, of his desire of being related to you; who would not ?-If that be not his principal motive.-Very well, Lucy, thought I.

I know, said she, that my grandmamma Selby has often wished Mr Greville would make his addresses to her grand-daughter!-So! So! So! Lucy, thought I.

His libertinism, indeed, is an objection-But I have not heard lately of any enormitiesGo on, Lucy, thought I; hitherto appears not any reason for Mr Greville to despair. He may have seen his folly.

No doubt but he has! thought I. He saw it all the time he was committing it; but, perhaps, he is the more determined bad man for that. Is not purity of heart, thought I, as well as of manners, an eligible thing?

If a woman is not to marry till she meet with a strictly virtuous man

You have too often pleaded that argument, Lucy, to me-I am sorry-I stopt; willing to hear her quite out; for she held before her what I had written.

How came he, you ask, said she, by his new lights? I have nothing to do with how he came by them. I should rather, indeed, he had them from proper convictions-But if he has them, that's enough.

Is it, my dear, let him have been what he will?

I am for judging charitably Charming! thought I-Judging charitably! So I have lost a virtue, and you, Lucy, have found it!

Mr Greville is nothing to me; nor ever will be. Not quite so sure of that, thought I to myself. You say, Harriet, you have no notion of a good young woman trusting her principles to the arbitrary will of a man who has been a free

liver-Must the man be arbitrary!-Were a husband a free liver, must a wife's own principles be endangered?

These questions from my Lucy! thought I. A scoffer, you say, Harriet !-The man's a fool for that!-But what a poor soul must she be that could not silence a scoffer!

Silence a scoffer! Ah, Lucy! said I; and would you marry a man with a hope to be able to silence him? Mr Greville is a conceited man ; my Lucy has six times his sense; but he will not be convinced of that. You will have the less influence upon him if he is jealous of the superiority of your understanding. Mr Greville is obstinate as well as conceited. Few men, I believe, will own conviction from a wife's argu

ment.

To be sure the man is not a Sir Charles Grandison. Who is?-Let him, as my Aunt Selby says, apply to me; I shall give him his answer. You would wish he should, Lucy?

I don't say so.

I fancy, Lucy, you would not be very cruel if he did.

You fancy I would not-But I can, as you always did, treat the man who professes to love me, with civility, yet not throw myself into his arms at the first word

First word, Lucy! No! the second, or third, or fourth, is time enough; so the man is not meantime rendered quite hopeless.

Very well, Lady Grandison; but let me go on with what you have written-Good-natured man!-I do think he is not an ill-natured man. So much the better for himself, and his future wife, Lucy.

That will not be I, Lady Grandison.
Perhaps not, Lucy.

-Humour! I do think he is a humorous, good-natured man. A little too vehement, perhaps, in his mirth; a little too frolic: But who is faultless?

Proceed, my Lucy.

-Generous!" Not a generous man!""Qualities that look like generous ones!"—You are a nice distinguisher, Harriet; you always were-But here you tell your grandmamma, that you had rather I should have Mr Fowler than Mr Greville

Well, my dear, and what say you to that? Why, I say, I think you are not so nice for me in this case, as you are in others. How so?

How so! Why, is there not a difference between the actual proposals made by Mr Greville to Mrs Shirley; and Sir Rowland's undertaking to try to prevail upon Mr Fowler to make his addresses to me?

Granted, my dear-I have not a word more to say in behalf of Mr Fowler. Mr Greville, Lucy

Is a man I never will have

No rash resolutions, my dear. And yet I be

lieve a woman has seen the same man in a very different light, when he has offered himself to her acceptance, from what she did before.

I believe so-But I had a mind to sound you, .Harriet; and to come at your opinion

You are entitled to it, Lucy, without attempting to sound me for it.

True. But we women sometimes choose to come at a point by the round-abouts, rather than by the fore-rights.

That is, Lucy, either when we think the foreright way would not answer our wishes; or when we are not willing to open our hearts.

Your servant, my dear; but the cap fits not. Whenever I speak to you my heart is upon my lips.

Let me try, then, in this first doubtful instance, that I ever had from you of its being so -Do you think of encouraging Mr Greville's proposal?

It is not a proposal, till it comes in a direct way to myself.

Very well, my dear-I say no more till it

does.

SIR CHARLES has just now heard that Mr Lowther is arrived in London. He longs (so I am sure do I) to know how affairs are situated in Italy. O for good news from thence! Then will my happiness in this life be perfected!

LETTER CCLXXII.

LADY GRANDISON.

[In continuation.]

Grandison Hall, Thursday, Jan. 25. MR LOWTHER arrived here last night. Sir Charles gave him a most welcome reception. He presented him to all our guests, with expressions of the warmest friendship; and then retired with him to his study. He soon led him back to company, and, seating him, drew a chair between my aunt and me.-You must have curiosity, my dear, said he. Behold the sister-excellence of Lady Clementina, Mr Lowther! Not a person of her family is more concerned for the happiness of that lady, than this dearest and most generous of women. Every one of my friends present (looking around him) is an admirer of her-We cannot, my dear, (applying to me,) know for certainty the destiny of that excellent lady from Mr Lowther. He passed a week at Lyons, a fortnight at Paris, on his return to England. But my Jeronymo is in a fine way, thank God! and resolves to visit us in the spring.

I hope, sir, said my aunt to Mr Lowther, you left Lady Clementina well, and happy in her mind.

She was at Florence, answered he, when I left Italy. She has been pretty much indisposed there. The General, the Bishop, and Father Marescotti, had been with her. She was expected at Bologna very soon. By this time, I have no doubt, she is Countess of Belvedere.

By her own consent, I hope then, Mr Lowther? said I eagerly.

He shook his head-As to that, said he, she has the most indulgent of parents

They cannot be so, Mr Lowther, if they would compel her to marry any man to whom she has an indifference.

They will not compel her, madamPersuasion, sir, in the circumstances this excellent lady is in, is compulsion.

I think it may be justly called so, said Sir Charles. Mr Lowther, they should not have been so precipitating.

So you have always told them, Sir Charles. Signor Jeronymo is entirely of your opinion; yet is earnest in the Count of Belvedere's favour. The Count adores her.

Adores her, sir, said I. Adores himself! for so it should be said (pardon me, sir,) of a man who prefers not the happiness of the object beloved, to his own. I felt my face glow.

Generous warmth! said Sir Charles-laying his hand on mine.

For my part, replied Mr Lowther, I am only afraid of the return of her malady. If it do not return, and she can be prevailed on, her piety will reconcile her to duty.

A duty, Mr Lowther, interrupted I-So imposed!-A duty!

I knew not what I said. I thought at that instant I did not like Mr Lowther.

My uncle, aunt, and the rest of us, thought Sir Charles and Mr Lowther would be glad to be left alone; and retired early.

My aunt, my Lucy, and I, had a good deal of discourse upon this interesting subject; Emily present.

We all foresaw, that the situation of this admirable lady would overcloud a little (we hoped but a little) the happiest days that ever mortals knew. The sincere value, said my aunt, that you have for so deserving a woman, and your native generosity, will be your security for happiness, my dear; and will fix on a durable base your mutual love; but this lady's trials will, however, be trials to you. God give her peace of mind! It is all we can hope for in her favour to you, the continuance of your present happiness: greater cannot fall to the lot of mortal.

She left me, I retired to my pen.

dearest grandmamma. Pray for your Harriet, and pray for Clementina.

Friday Morning.

SIR CHARLES would have withdrawn to his study when he found me at my pen. I besought him to sit down in my closet.

Remove your papers then, my dear.

No need, sir. These (putting what I had been just writing, and those I had written the day before, on one side of my desk) I would not, sir, except you have a curiosity, wish you to see at present: These, sir, you may, if you please, amuse yourself with.

I will take down one of your books, my love. I will not look into any of your written papers. Dear, generous sir, look into them all-Look into both parcels. Something about Lucy; something of what Mr Lowther has talked of in that parcel-Read any of the written papers before you.

A generous mind, my love, will not take all that is offered by a generous mind. Hasten, my Harriet: it is late. My mind is a little disturbed: yours, I am afraid, is generously uneasy. In your faithful bosom will I repose all my cares.

I pressed his hand between both mine, and would have pressed it with my lips: but, kissing my hand, first one, and then the other Condescending goodness! said he. God continue to me my Harriet's love, and make Clementina not unhappy; and what can befall me, that will not add thankfulness to thankfulness? With what soothing tenderness did he afterwards open his generous heart to his Harriet! He was indeed disturbed: for Mr Lowther had told him that the General (I don't love him) was quite cruel—At one time he threatened the excellent creature: he called her ungenerous, ungrateful, undutiful!-She fell down at his feet, in a fainting fit: He left her in anger-Staid not to recover or sooth her-Yet returned in about two hours, (his conscience stinging him,) and on his knees besought her pardon-Received it-The dear saint forgave the soldierly manYet he persisted, and turned his threatenings into worse, if possible, than threatenings,―into persuasion.

If I have an enemy, said the dear creature to her brother, who has conceived a mortal antipathy to me, let him insinuate himself into the favour of those most dear to me, and prevail upon them to attack me with all the powers of persuading love, in order to induce me to do the thing, whatever it be, most contrary to my heart and then will the instigator wreak upon me his whole vengeance, and make me think death itself an eligible refuge.

Sir Charles sighed at repeating this. I wept. How happy, thought I, more than once, are you, best of men, in your own reflections, that a wo

man so excellent, who cannot be happy with any other man, herself refused you, and persisted in her refusal; though you sought all ways, and used all arguments, to bring her to a change of determination! What, otherwise, would have been your regret! And how unhappy should I have been in the consciousness of being in her place; and of having dispossessed her of a heart to which she had so much better pretensions! Now has he no room for remorse, but for friendly pity only, and for wishes to relieve her afflicted heart. Of what a blessing is that man possessed, who, when calamity assails him, can acquit himself, his intentions at least; and say, "This I have not brought upon myself: it is an inevitable evil: a dispensation of Providence, I will call it, and submit to it as such !"

Methinks, madam, I could spare this excellent woman some of my happiness. Have I not more than mortal ever knew before?

Sir Charles mentioned to me, that Lady Olivia, in her last letter to him, intimated her desire to come over once more to England: but he hoped what he had written to dissuade her from it, would have weight with her. I told him, I wished that lady the wife of some worthy man, whose gratitude and affection she, by her great fortune, might engage. But, sir, said I, I cannot, cannot wish (the Count of Belvedere ever so good a man) that Lady Clementina were married.

What would my Harriet wish for Lady Clementina, circumstanced as she is?

I don't know. But the woman who has loved Sir Charles Grandison with a heart so pure, can never be happy with any other man.

You are ever obliging, my love. You judge of Clementina as she deserves to be judged of, as to the purity of her heart. But-He stopt.

But what, my dear sir?-Alas! she says that you have strengthened the hands of her friends: am I forgiven before I go any farther?

Not, my Harriet, if you think it necessary to ask such a question. Blame me always when you think me wrong: I shall doubt your love, if you give me reason to question your freedom.

Dear sir!-But answer me: Would you have Clementina, circumstanced as she is, marry?

What answer can I return to my Harriet's question; when sometimes I am ready to favour the parents' pleas; at others, the daughter's? I would not have her either compelled, or overearnestly persuaded. The family plead, “That their happiness, her health and peace, depend on her marriage: they cannot bear to think of rewarding Laurana for her cruelty, with an estate that never was designed for her; and to the cutting it off, as it may happen, from their Giacomo and his descendants for ever, in case Clementina assumes the veil. The healths of the father and mother are declining: they wish but to live to see the alliance with the Count of Belvedere take place. The noble lady gave reasons

that could be answered. She had, by her own magnanimity, got over a greater difficulty, if I may presume to say so, than they had required her to struggle with: how could I avoid advising her to yield to the supplications of parents, of brothers, of an uncle, who, however mistaken in the means by which they seek to obtain their wishes, love not their own souls better than they love their Clementina?

It was, besides, a measure by which only, at the time, I could demonstrate (and the General, I know, considered it as a test) that I really gave up all hopes of her myself. And when I had owned, that there was a woman, with whom I had no doubt of being happy, could I engage her to accept of me, they all besought me, for their sakes, for Clementina's, to court that acceptance, having hopes, that though she could not set me an example, she would follow

mine.

This, my dearest life, was the occasion, as I told your friends, of accelerating my declaration to you. I could not else, either for the sake of your delicacy or my own, so soon have made proposals, not even to Mrs Shirley; for, situated as I was, I could not think of applying to you till I had strengthened myself, as I hoped to do, by her interest. Your generous acceptance, signified to me by that good lady, has for ever obliged me. I regarded it, my Harriet, circumstanced as I have been, and shall ever regard it, as a condescension, which, as I told that lady, at the time, laid me under an obligation that I never, by my utmost gratitude, shall be able to repay.

O sir, well have you shewn that you meant what you said. How poor a return is my love for so much goodness, and kind consideration!

He clasped me to the faithfullest of human hearts.

But, dear șir, I find, on the whole, that you think Lady Clementina has not so much reason on her side, as her parents have on theirs.

My tenderness for her, my dear, because of her unhappy malady, and my apprehension of a return of it, together with my admiration of her noble qualities, prejudice me strongly in her favour. If she could be convinced by their motives, I should be ready to own my convictions in favour of these. But if she cannot, neither can I; so partial am I in the cause of a lady I so sincerely admire, and who has been so much afflicted. But what, in the situation they and she were in, remained for me to do, but to advise the family to proceed with tenderness and patience; that their Clementina might have time to weigh, to consider, their reasons, their indulgence? You, my dear, shall see, in the copies of the letters I have written since I have been in England, my remonstrances to them in their precipitating her. But they were in a train: they presumed on the characteristic duty of their Clementina: they flattered themselves, that some

times she seemed to relent: they conceived hopes from the expressions of compassion for the Count of Belvedere, which sometimes she let fall. The General, who, though a generous man, can do nothing moderately, would not be satisfied with cold measures, as he called them; and, not doubting his sister's acquiescence with her duty, if once she could be prevailed upon to think her compliance such, they were resolved to pursue the train they were in: But, in order to avoid their importunities, how has the dear Clementina shifted the scene from Bologna to Florence, from Florence to Bologna; and once, for that purpose, wanted to go to Urbino, once to Naples, and even, as you have seen, to come to England!-But now, by this time, most probably they have succeeded. God give happiness to the dear Clementina!

Most cordially did I join in the prayer.

The next letters from Italy must acquaint us with the unwished-for success of the family; and the poor lady's thraldom. Can, my dear grandmamma, the Count of Belvedere really be a good, a generous man, to solicit the favour of a hand, that he knows will not be accompanied by a heart? Can the man be said to know what true love is, who prefers not the happiness of the beloved object to his own; who thinks he can be happy, though the person he professes to love shall be unhappy?

Thank God, this dreadful lot has not been drawn by your HARRIET GRANDISON.

I am glad, my dear Lady G, that you are returned to Grosvenor Square. Be easy, be patient, my Charlotte. We shall have, I hope, many happy days together at Grandison-Hall, at Grosvenor Square; at every place where we shall be. You are a dear, fretful creature!But not half so petulant, I hope, in behaviour, as on paper to me. Let us think of nothing grievous, my Charlotte; but of the unhappy situation of poor Lady Clementina: and let us join to pray for her happiness.

LETTER CCLXXIII.

LADY GRANDISON.

[In continuation.]

Saturday Morning, Feb. 3. EMILY and I have had another conversation. She had been more grave and solemn than usual from the time of the last, of which I gave you

an account.

Her Anne had taken notice to Sally of a change in the temper of her young mistress. She knew not how to please her, she said. From the bestnatured young lady in the world, she was grown