e was advised to try the effects of a
southern climate; and, about the beginning of the year 1785, sailed for
Lisbon.

The first feeling with which Mary had contemplated her friend, was a
sentiment of inferiority and reverence; but that, from the operation of
a ten years' acquaintance, was considerably changed. Fanny had
originally been far before her in literary attainments; this disparity
no longer existed. In whatever degree Mary might endeavour to free
herself from the delusions of self-esteem, this period of observation
upon her own mind and that of her friend, could not pass, without her
perceiving that there were some essential characteristics of genius,
which she possessed, and in which her friend was deficient. The
principal of these was a firmness of mind, an unconquerable greatness of
soul, by which, after a short internal struggle, she was accustomed to
rise above difficulties and suffering. Whatever Mary undertook, she
perhaps in all instances accomplished; and, to her lofty spirit,
scarcely anything she desired, appeared hard to perform. Fanny, on the
contrary, was a woman of a timid and irresolute nature, accustomed to
yield to difficulties, and probably priding herself in this morbid
softness of her temper. One instance that I have heard Mary relate of
this sort, was, that, at a certain time, Fanny, dissatisfied with her
domestic situation, expressed an earnest desire to have a home of her
own. Mary, who felt nothing more pressing than to relieve the
inconveniences of her friend, determined to accomplish this object for
her. It cost her infinite exertions; but at length she was able to
announce to Fanny that a house was prepared, and that she was on the
spot to receive her. The answer which Fanny returned to the letter of
her friend, consisted almost wholly of an enumeration of objections to
the quitting her family, which she had not thought of before, but which
now appeared to her of considerable weight.

The judgment which experience had taught Mary to form of the mind of her
friend, determined her in the advice she gave, at the period to which I
have brought down the story. Fanny was recommended to seek a softer
climate, but she had no funds to defray the expence of such an
undertaking. At this time Mr. Hugh Skeys of Dublin, but then resident
in the kingdom of Portugal, paid his addresses to her. The state of her
health Mary considered as such as scarcely to afford the shadow of a
hope; it was not t