b-bridle!

* Letter I.

** Letter II.

Upon the whole, I have now no doubt of their persevering in favour of
the despicable Solmes; and of their dependence upon the gentleness of
your temper, and the regard you have for their favour, and for your own
reputation. And now I am more than ever convinced of the propriety of
the advice I formerly gave you, to keep in your own hands the estate
bequeathed to you by your grandfather.--Had you done so, it would have
procured you at least an outward respect from your brother and sister,
which would have made them conceal the envy and ill-will that now are
bursting upon you from hearts so narrow.

I must harp a little more upon this string--Do not you observe, how much
your brother's influence has overtopped yours, since he has got into
fortunes so considerable, and since you have given some of them an
appetite to continue in themselves the possession of your estate, unless
you comply with their terms?

I know your dutiful, your laudable motives; and one would have thought,
that you might have trusted to a father who so dearly loved you. But had
you been actually in possession of that estate, and living up to it, and
upon it, (your youth protected from blighting tongues by the company
of your prudent Norton, as you had proposed,) do you think that your
brother, grudging it to you at the time as he did, and looking upon it
as his right as an only son, would have been practising about it, and
aiming at it? I told you some time ago, that I thought your trials but
proportioned to your prudence:* but you will be more than woman, if
you can extricate yourself with honour, having such violent spirits and
sordid minds in some, and such tyrannical and despotic wills in others,
to deal with. Indeed, all may be done, and the world be taught further
to admire you for your blind duty and will-less resignation, if you can
persuade yourself to be Mrs. Solmes.

* Letter I.

I am pleased with the instances you give me of Mr. Lovelace's
benevolence to his own tenants, and with his little gift to your
uncle's. Mrs. Fortescue allows him to be the best of landlords: I might
have told you that, had I thought it necessary to put you into some
little conceit of him. He has qualities, in short, that may make him
a tolerable creature on the other side of fifty: but God help the
poor woman to whose lot he shall fall till then! women, I should say,
perhaps; since he may br