t of it with
pleasure, and partaken of the delight with which I have supposed their
pretty hearts must be filled with on that occasion. And why may not
such little triumphs be, in proportion, as incentives, to children,
to make them try to master laudable tasks; as the Roman triumphs, of
different kinds, and their mural and civic crowns, all which I have
heard you speak of, were to their heroes and warriors of old? For Mr.
Dryden well observes, that--

"Men are but children of a larger growth;
Our appetites are apt to change as theirs,
And full as craving too, and full as vain."

Permit me. Sir, to transcribe four or five lines more, for the
beauty of the thought:

"And yet the soul, shut up in her dark room,
Viewing so clear abroad, at home sees nothing:
But like a mole in earth, busy and blind,
Works all her folly up, and casts it outward
To the world's open view--"

Improving the thought: methinks I can see the dear little Miss, who
has, in some eminent task, borne away the palm, make her public entry,
as I may call it, after her dairy breakfast and pretty airing, into
the governess's court-yard, through a row of her school-fellows, drawn
out on each side to admire her; her governess and assistants receiving
her at the porch, their little capitol, and lifting her out with
applauses and encomiums, with a _Thus shall it be done to the Miss,
whom her governess delighteth to honour!_ I see not why the dear Miss
in this case, as she moves through her admiring school-fellows, may
not have her little heart beat with as much delight, be as gloriously
elated, proportionably, as that of the greatest hero in his triumphal
car, who has returned from exploits, perhaps, much less laudable.

But how I ramble!--Yet surely, Sir, you don't expect method or
connection from your girl. The education of our sex will not permit
that, where it is best. We are forced to struggle for knowledge, like
the poor feeble infant in the month, who is pinned and fettered down
upon the nurse's lap; and who, if its little arms happen, by chance,
to escape its nurse's observation, and offer but to expand themselves,
are immediately taken into custody, and pinioned down to their passive
behaviour. So, when a poor girl, in spite of her narrow education,
breaks out into notice, her genius is immediately tamed by trifling
employments, lest, perhaps, she should become the envy of one sex, and
the equal of the other. But you. Sir, a