able to afford

To the poor
JUDITH NORTON.

LETTER XXVII

MISS HOWE, TO MRS. JUDITH NORTON
SATURDAY EVENING, MAY 13.

DEAR, GOOD WOMAN,

Your beloved's honour is inviolate!--Must be inviolate! and will be so,
in spite of men and devils. Could I have had hope of a reconciliation,
all my view was, that she should not have had this man.--All that can be
said now, is, she must run the risk of a bad husband: she of whom no man
living is worthy!

You pity her mother--so do not I! I pity no mother that puts it out of
her power to show maternal love, and humanity, in order to patch up for
herself a precarious and sorry quiet, which every blast of wind shall
disturb.

I hate tyrants in ever form and shape: but paternal and maternal tyrants
are the worst of all: for they can have no bowels.

I repeat, that I pity none of them. Our beloved friend only deserves
pity. She had never been in the hands of this man, but for them. She is
quite blameless. You don't know all her story. Were I to tell you that
she had no intention to go off with this man, it would avail her nothing.
It would only deserve to condemn, with those who drove her to
extremities, him who now must be her refuge. I am

Your sincere friend and servant,
ANNA HOWE.

LETTER XXVIII

MRS. HARLOWE, TO MRS. NORTON
[NOT COMMUNICATED TILL THE LETTERS CAME TO BE COLLECTED.]
SATURDAY, MAY 13.

I return an answer in writing, as I promised, to your communication. But
take no notice either to my Bella's Betty, (who I understand sometimes
visits you,) or to the poor wretch herself, nor to any body, that I do
write. I charge you don't. My heart is full: writing may give some vent
to my griefs, and perhaps I may write what lies most upon my heart,
without confining myself strictly to the present subject.

You know how dear this ungrateful creature ever was to us all. You know
how sincerely we joined with every one of those who ever had seen her, or
conversed with her, to praise and admire her; and exceeded in our praise
even the bounds of that modesty, which, because she was our own, should
have restrained us; being of opinion, that to have been silent in the
praise of so apparent a merit must rather have argued blindness or
affectation in us, than that we should incur the censure of vain
partiality to our own.

When therefore any body congratulated us on such a daughter, we received
their congratulations without any diminution. If it was