Clarissa Harlowe; or the history of a young lady — Volume 1 by Samuel Richardson Page B
Authors: Samuel Richardson
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uttermost. Nor has he complaisance enough to spare your uncles.
But were he deep, and ever so deep, you would soon penetrate him, if they would leave you to yourself. His vanity would be your clue. Never man had more: Yet, as Mrs. Fortescue observed, 'never did man carry it off so happily.' There is a strange mixture in it of humourous vivacity:--Since but for one half of what he says of himself, when he is in the vein, any other man would be insufferable.
***
Talk of the devil, is an old saying. The lively wretch has made me a visit, and is but just gone away. He is all impatience and resentment at the treatment you meet with, and full of apprehensions too, that they will carry their point with you.
I told him my opinion, that you will never be brought to think of such a man as Solmes; but that it will probably end in a composition, never to have either.
No man, he said, whose fortunes and alliances are so considerable,
ever had so little favour from a woman for whose sake he had borne so
much.
I told him my mind as freely as I used to do. But whoever was in fault, self being judge? He complained of spies set upon his conduct, and to pry into his life and morals, and this by your brother and uncles.
I told him, that this was very hard upon him; and the more so, as neither his life nor morals perhaps would stand a fair inquiry.
He smiled, and called himself my servant.--The occasion was too fair, he said, for Miss Howe, who never spared him, to let it pass.--But, Lord help the shallow souls of the Harlowes! Would I believe it! they were for turning plotters upon him. They had best take care he did not pay them in their own coin. Their hearts were better turned for such works than their heads.
I asked him, If he valued himself upon having a head better turned than theirs for such works, as he called them?
He drew off: and then ran into the highest professions of reverence
and affection for you.
The object so meritorious, who can doubt the reality of his
professions?
Adieu, my dearest, my noble friend!--I love and admire you for the generous conclusion of your last more than I can express. Though I began this letter with impertinent raillery, knowing that you always loved to indulge my mad vein; yet never was there a heart that more glowed with friendly love, than that of
Your own
ANNA HOWE.
LETTER XIII
MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO MISS HOWE
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 1.
I now take up my pen to lay before you the inducements and motive
which my friends have to espouse so earnestly the address of this Mr.
Solmes.
In order to set this matter in a clear light, it is necessary to go a little back, and even perhaps to mention some things which you already know: and so you may look upon what I am going to relate, as a kind of supplement to my letters of the 15th and 20th of January last.*
* Letters IV. and V.
In those letters, of which I have kept memorandums, I gave you an account of my brother's and sister's antipathy to Mr. Lovelace; and the methods they took (so far as they had then come to my knowledge) to ruin him in the opinion of my other friends. And I told you, that after a very cold, yet not a directly affrontive behaviour to him, they all of a sudden* became more violent, and proceeded to personal insults; which brought on at last the unhappy rencounter between my brother and him.
* See Letter IV.
Now you must know, that from the last conversation that passed between my aunt and me, it comes out, that this sudden vehemence on my brother's and sister's parts, was owing to stronger reasons than to the college-begun antipathy on his side, or to slighted love on hers; to wit, to an apprehension that my uncles intended to follow my grandfather's example in my favour; at least in a higher degree than they wish they should. An apprehension founded it seems on a conversation between my two uncles and my brother and sister: which my aunt communicated to me in confidence, as an argument to prevail upon me to accept of
But were he deep, and ever so deep, you would soon penetrate him, if they would leave you to yourself. His vanity would be your clue. Never man had more: Yet, as Mrs. Fortescue observed, 'never did man carry it off so happily.' There is a strange mixture in it of humourous vivacity:--Since but for one half of what he says of himself, when he is in the vein, any other man would be insufferable.
***
Talk of the devil, is an old saying. The lively wretch has made me a visit, and is but just gone away. He is all impatience and resentment at the treatment you meet with, and full of apprehensions too, that they will carry their point with you.
I told him my opinion, that you will never be brought to think of such a man as Solmes; but that it will probably end in a composition, never to have either.
No man, he said, whose fortunes and alliances are so considerable,
ever had so little favour from a woman for whose sake he had borne so
much.
I told him my mind as freely as I used to do. But whoever was in fault, self being judge? He complained of spies set upon his conduct, and to pry into his life and morals, and this by your brother and uncles.
I told him, that this was very hard upon him; and the more so, as neither his life nor morals perhaps would stand a fair inquiry.
He smiled, and called himself my servant.--The occasion was too fair, he said, for Miss Howe, who never spared him, to let it pass.--But, Lord help the shallow souls of the Harlowes! Would I believe it! they were for turning plotters upon him. They had best take care he did not pay them in their own coin. Their hearts were better turned for such works than their heads.
I asked him, If he valued himself upon having a head better turned than theirs for such works, as he called them?
He drew off: and then ran into the highest professions of reverence
and affection for you.
The object so meritorious, who can doubt the reality of his
professions?
Adieu, my dearest, my noble friend!--I love and admire you for the generous conclusion of your last more than I can express. Though I began this letter with impertinent raillery, knowing that you always loved to indulge my mad vein; yet never was there a heart that more glowed with friendly love, than that of
Your own
ANNA HOWE.
LETTER XIII
MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO MISS HOWE
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 1.
I now take up my pen to lay before you the inducements and motive
which my friends have to espouse so earnestly the address of this Mr.
Solmes.
In order to set this matter in a clear light, it is necessary to go a little back, and even perhaps to mention some things which you already know: and so you may look upon what I am going to relate, as a kind of supplement to my letters of the 15th and 20th of January last.*
* Letters IV. and V.
In those letters, of which I have kept memorandums, I gave you an account of my brother's and sister's antipathy to Mr. Lovelace; and the methods they took (so far as they had then come to my knowledge) to ruin him in the opinion of my other friends. And I told you, that after a very cold, yet not a directly affrontive behaviour to him, they all of a sudden* became more violent, and proceeded to personal insults; which brought on at last the unhappy rencounter between my brother and him.
* See Letter IV.
Now you must know, that from the last conversation that passed between my aunt and me, it comes out, that this sudden vehemence on my brother's and sister's parts, was owing to stronger reasons than to the college-begun antipathy on his side, or to slighted love on hers; to wit, to an apprehension that my uncles intended to follow my grandfather's example in my favour; at least in a higher degree than they wish they should. An apprehension founded it seems on a conversation between my two uncles and my brother and sister: which my aunt communicated to me in confidence, as an argument to prevail upon me to accept of
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