ur ladyship has with you; _as_ the joy of my fond heart
can be better judged of by your ladyship than described by me; and as
you are acquainted with all the particulars that can be worthy of any
other person's notice but my dear parents: I am sure your ladyship
will dispense with your commands; and I make it my humble request that
you will.

For, Madam, you must needs think, that _when_ my doubts were
dispelled; _when_ confident all my trials were over; _when_ I had a
prospect of being so abundantly rewarded for what I suffered: _when
every_ hour rose upon me with new delight, and fraught with fresh
instances of generous kindness from such a dear gentleman, my master,
my benefactor, the son of my honoured lady: your ladyship must needs
think, I say, that I must be _too_ much affected, my heart _too_ much
opened; and especially as it then (relieved from its past anxieties
and fears, which had kept down and damped the latent flame)
first discovered impressions of which before I hardly thought it
susceptible.--So that it is scarce possible, that my _joy_ and my
_prudence_, if I were to be tried by such judges of delicacy and
decorum as Lord and Lady Davers, the honoured countess, and Lady
Betty, could be so _intimately_, so _laudably_ coupled, as were to
be wished: although the continued sense of my unworthiness, and the
disgrace the dear gentleman would bring upon himself by his generous
goodness to me, always went hand in hand with my _joy_ and my
_prudence_; and what these considerations took from the _former_,
being added to the _latter_, kept me steadier and more equal to
myself, than otherwise it was possible such a young creature as I
could have been.

Wherefore my good lady, I hope I stand excused, and shall not bring
upon myself the censure of being disobedient to your commands.

Besides, Madam, since you inform me that my good Lord Davers will
attend you hither, I should never dare to look his lordship in the
face, if all the emotions of my heart, on such affecting occasions,
stood confessed to his lordship; and if I am ashamed they should to
your ladyship, to the countess, and Lady Betty, whose goodness must
induce you all three to think favourably, in such circumstances, of
one who is of your own sex, how would it concern me, for the same
to appear before such gentlemen as my lord and his nephew?--Indeed I
could not look up to either of them in the sense of this.--And give me
leave to hope, that some of th