other
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