Clarissa, Volume 2 | Page 9

after a little lecture; and my head is so filled with
him, that I must resume my intention, in hopes to divert you for a few
moments.
Take it then--his best, and his worst, as I said before.
Hickman is a sort of fiddling, busy, yet, to borrow a word from you,
unbusy man: has a great deal to do, and seems to me to dispatch
nothing. Irresolute and changeable in every thing, but in teasing me
with his nonsense; which yet, it is evident, he must continue upon my
mother's interest more than upon his own hopes; for none have I given
him.
Then I have a quarrel against his face, though in his person, for a
well-thriven man, tolerably genteel--Not to his features so much neither;
for what, as you have often observed, are features in a man? --But
Hickman, with strong lines, and big cheek and chin bones, has not the
manliness in his aspect, which Lovelace has with the most regular and
agreeable features.
Then what a set and formal mortal he is in some things!--I have not
been able yet to laugh him out of his long bid and beads. Indeed, that is,
because my mother thinks they become him; and I would not be so free
with him, as to own I should choose to have him leave it off. If he did,
so particular is the man, he would certainly, if left to himself, fall into a
King-William's cravat, or some such antique chin-cushion, as by the

pictures of that prince one sees was then the fashion.
As to his dress in general, he cannot indeed be called a sloven, but
sometimes he is too gaudy, at other times too plain, to be uniformly
elegant. And for his manners, he makes such a bustle with them, and
about them, as would induce one to suspect that they are more strangers
than familiars to him. You, I know, lay this to his fearfulness of
disobliging or offending. Indeed your over-doers generally give the
offence they endeavour to avoid.
The man however is honest: is of family: has a clear and good estate;
and may one day be a baronet, an't please you. He is humane and
benevolent, tolerably generous, as people say; and as I might say too, if
I would accept of his bribes; which he offers in hopes of having them
all back again, and the bribed into the bargain. A method taken by all
corrupters, from old Satan, to the lowest of his servants. Yet, to speak
in the language of a person I am bound to honour, he is deemed a
prudent man; that is to say a good manager.
Then I cannot but confess, that now I like not anybody better, whatever
I did once.
He is no fox-hunter: he keeps a pack indeed; but prefers not his hounds
to his fellow-creatures. No bad sign for a wife, I own. He loves his
horse; but dislikes racing in a gaming way, as well as all sorts of
gaming. Then he is sober; modest; they say, virtuous; in short, has
qualities that mothers would be fond of in a husband for their daughters;
and for which perhaps their daughters would be the happier could they
judge as well for themselves, as experience possibly may teach them to
judge for their future daughters.
Nevertheless, to own the truth, I cannot say I love the man: nor, I
believe, ever shall.
Strange! that these sober fellows cannot have a decent sprightliness, a
modest assurance with them! Something debonnaire; which need not be
separated from that awe and reverence, when they address a woman,
which should shew the ardour of their passion, rather than the
sheepishness of their nature; for who knows not that love delights in
taming the lion-hearted? That those of the sex, who are most conscious
of their own defect in point of courage, naturally require, and therefore
as naturally prefer, the man who has most of it, as the most able to give
them the requisite protection? That the greater their own cowardice, as

it would be called in a man, the greater is their delight in subjects of
heroism? As may be observed in their reading; which turns upon
difficulties encountered, battles fought, and enemies overcome, four or
five hundred by the prowess of one single hero, the more improbable
the better: in short, that their man should be a hero to every one living
but themselves; and to them know no bound to his humility. A woman
has some glory in subduing a heart no man living can appall; and hence
too often the bravo, assuming the hero, and making himself pass for
one, succeeds as only a hero should.
But as for honest Hickman, the good man is