Clarissa, Volume 6 | Page 6

thou hast
been for a number of days and nights with a close attendance upon a
dying man, beholding his drawing-on hour--pretending, for decency's
sake, to whine over his excruciating pangs; to be in the way to answer a
thousand impertinent inquiries after the health of a man thou wishedest
to die--to pray by him--for so once thou wrotest to me!--To read by
him--to be forced to join in consultation with a crew of solemn and
parading doctors, and their officious zanies, the apothecaries, joined
with the butcherly tribe of scarficators; all combined to carry on the
physical farce, and to cut out thongs both from his flesh and his

estate--to have the superadded apprehension of dividing thy interest in
what he shall leave with a crew of eager-hoping, never-to-be-satisfied
relations, legatees, and the devil knows who, of private gratifiers of
passions laudable and illaudable--in these circumstances, I wonder not
that thou lookest before servants, (as little grieved as thou after
heirship,) as if thou indeed wert grieved; and as if the most wry-fac'd
woe had befallen thee.
Then, as I have often thought, the reflection that must naturally arise
from such mortifying objects, as the death of one with whom we have
been familiar, must afford, when we are obliged to attend it in its slow
approaches, and in its face-twisting pangs, that it will one day be our
own case, goes a great way to credit the appearance of grief.
And that it is this, seriously reflected upon, may temporally give a fine
air of sincerity to the wailings of lively widows, heart-exulting heirs,
and residuary legatees of all denominations; since, by keeping down
the inward joy, those interesting reflections must sadden the aspect, and
add an appearance of real concern to the assumed sables.
Well, but, now thou art come to the reward of all thy watchings,
anxieties, and close attendances, tell me what it is; tell me if it
compensate thy trouble, and answer thy hope?
As to myself, thou seest, by the gravity of my style, how the subject has
helped to mortify me. But the necessity I am under of committing
either speedy matrimony, or a rape, has saddened over my gayer
prospects, and, more than the case itself, contributed to make me
sympathize with the present joyful-sorrow.
Adieu, Jack, I must be soon out of my pain; and my Clarissa shall be
soon out of her's--for so does the arduousness of the case require.

LETTER III
MR. LOVELACE, TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ. SUNDAY
MORNING.
I have had the honour of my charmer's company for two complete
hours. We met before six in Mrs. Moore's garden. A walk on the Heath
refused me.
The sedateness of her aspect and her kind compliance in this meeting
gave me hopes. And all that either the Captain and I had urged
yesterday to obtain a full and free pardon, that re-urged I; and I told her,

besides, that Captain Tomlinson was gone down with hopes to prevail
upon her uncle Harlowe to come up in person, in order to present to me
the greatest blessing that man ever received.
But the utmost I could obtain was, that she would take no resolution in
my favour till she received Miss Howe's next letter.
I will not repeat the arguments I used; but I will give thee the substance
of what she said in answer to them.
She had considered of every thing, she told me. My whole conduct was
before her. The house I carried her to must be a vile house. The people
early showed what they were capable of, in the earnest attempt made to
fasten Miss Partington upon her; as she doubted not, with my
approbation. [Surely, thought I, she has not received a duplicate of
Miss Howe's letter of detection!] They heard her cries. My insult was
undoubtedly premeditated. By my whole recollected behaviour to her,
previous to it, it must be so. I had the vilest of views, no question. And
my treatment of her put it out of all doubt.
Soul over all, Belford! She seems sensible of liberties that my passion
made me insensible of having taken, or she could not so deeply resent.
She besought me to give over all thoughts of her. Sometimes, she said,
she thought herself cruelly treated by her nearest and dearest relations;
at such times, a spirit of repining and even of resentment took place;
and the reconciliation, at other times so desirable, was not then so much
the favourite wish of her heart, as was the scheme she had formerly
planned--of taking her good Norton for her directress and guide, and
living upon her own estate in the manner her grandfather had intended
she should live.
This scheme she doubted not that her cousin Morden,