LETTER XXXVII
MISS HOWE, TO MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE. SUNDAY, MARCH 19.
I beg your pardon, my dearest friend, for having given you occasion toremind me of the date of my last. I was willing to have before me asmuch of the workings of your wise relations as possible; being verilypersuaded, that one side or the other would have yielded by thistime: and then I should have had some degree of certainty to found myobservations upon. And indeed what can I write that I have not alreadywritten?--You know, that I can do nothing but rave at your stupidpersecutors: and that you don't like. I have advised you to resume yourown estate: that you won't do. You cannot bear the thoughts of havingtheir Solmes: and Lovelace is resolved you shall be his, let who willsay to the contrary. I think you must be either the one man's or theother's. Let us see what their next step will be.
As to Lovelace, while he tells his own story (having also behaved sohandsomely on his intrusion in the wood-house, and intended so well atchurch) who can say, that the man is in the least blameworthy?--Wickedpeople! to combine against so innocent a man!--But, as I said, let ussee what their next step will be, and what course you will take upon it;and then we may be the more enlightened.
As to your change of style to your uncles, and brother and sister, sincethey were so fond of attributing to you a regard for Lovelace, and wouldnot be persuaded to the contrary; and since you only strengthened theirarguments against yourself by denying it; you did but just as I wouldhave done, in giving way to their suspicions, and trying what that woulddo--But if--but if--Pray, my dear, indulge me a little--you yourselfthink it was necessary to apologize to me for that change of style tothem--and till you will speak out like a friend to her unquestionablefriend, I must tease you a little--let it run therefore; for it willrun--
If, then, there be not a reason for this change of style, which you havenot thought fit to give me, be so good as to watch, as I once beforeadvised you, how the cause for it will come on--Why should it bepermitted to steal upon you, and you know nothing of the matter?
When we get a great cold, we are apt to puzzle ourselves to find outwhen it began, or how we got it; and when that is accounted for, downwe sit contented, and let it have its course; or, if it be verytroublesome, take a sweat, or use other means to get rid of it. Somy dear, before the malady you wot of, yet wot not of, grows soimportunate, as that you must be obliged to sweat it out, let me adviseyou to mind how it comes on. For I am persuaded, as surely as that I amnow writing to you, that the indiscreet violence of your friends on theone hand, and the insinuating address of Lovelace on the other, (if theman be not a greater fool than any body thinks him,) will effectuallybring it to this, and do all his work for him.
But let it--if it must be Lovelace or Solmes, the choice cannot admit ofdebate. Yet if all be true that is reported, I should prefer almost anyof your other lovers to either; unworthy as they also are. But who canbe worthy of a Clarissa?
I wish you are not indeed angry with me for harping so much on onestring. I must own, that I should think myself inexcusable so to do,(the rather, as I am bold enough to imagine it a point out of all doubtfrom fifty places in your letters, were I to labour the proof,) if youwould ingenuously own--
Own what? you'll say. Why, my Anna Howe, I hope you don't think that Iam already in love--!
No, to be sure! How can your Anna Howe have such a thought?--What thenshall we call it? You might have helped me to a phrase--A conditionalkind of liking!--that's it.--O my friend! did I not know how much youdespise prudery; and that you are too young, and too lovely, to be aprude--
But, avoiding such hard names, let me tell you one thing, my dear (whichnevertheless I have told you before); and that is this: that I shallthink I have reason to be highly displeased with you, if, when you writeto me, you endeavour to keep from me any secret of your heart.
Let me add, that if you would clearly and explicitly tell me, how farLovelace has, or has not, a hold in your affections, I could betteradvise you what to do, than at present I can. You, who are so famedfor prescience, as I may call it; and than whom no young lady ever hadstronger pretensions to a share of it; have had, no doubt, reasoningsin your heart about him, supposing you were to be one day his: [no doubtbut you have had the same in Solmes's case: whence the ground for thehatred of the one; and for the conditional liking of the other.] Willyou tell me, my dear, what you have thought of Lovelace's best and ofhis worst?--How far eligible for the first; how far rejectable for thelast?--Then weighing both parts in opposite scales, we shall see whichis likely to preponderate; or rather which does preponderate. Nothingless than the knowledge of the inmost recesses of your heart, cansatisfy my love and my friendship. Surely, you are not afraid to trustyourself with a secret of this nature: if you are, then you may the moreallowably doubt me. But, I dare say, you will not own either--nor isthere, I hope, cause for either.
Be pleased to observe one thing, my dear, that whenever I have givenmyself any of those airs of raillery, which have seemed to make you lookabout you, (when, likewise, your case may call for a more serious turnfrom a sympathizing friend,) it has not been upon those passages whichare written, though, perhaps not intended, with such explicitness [don'tbe alarmed, my dear!] as leaves little cause of doubt: but only when youaffect reserve; when you give new words for common things; when youcome with your curiosities, with your conditional likings, and with yourPRUDE-encies [mind how I spell the word] in a case that with every otherperson defies all prudence--over-acts of treason all these, against thesovereign friendship we have avowed to each other.
Remember, that you found me out in a moment. You challenged me. I owneddirectly, that there was only my pride between the man and me; for Icould not endure, I told you, to think of any fellow living to give me amoment's uneasiness. And then my man, as I have elsewhere said, was notsuch a one as yours: so I had reason to impute full as much as to my owninconsideration, as to his power over me: nay, more: but still moreto yours. For you reasoned me out of the curiosity first; and when theliking was brought to be conditional--why then, you know, I throbbed nomore about him.
O! pray now, as you say, now I have mentioned that my fellow was notsuch a charming fellow as yours, let Miss Biddulph, Miss Lloyd, MissCampion, and me, have your opinion, how far figure ought to engage us:with a view to your own case, however--mind that--as Mr. Tony says--andwhether at all, if the man be vain of it; since, as you observe in aformer, that vanity is a stop-short pride in such a one, that would makeone justly doubt the worthiness of his interior. You, our pattern, solovely in feature, so graceful in person, have none of it; and havetherefore with the best grace always held, that it is not excusable evenin a woman.
You must know, that this subject was warmly debated among us in our lastconversation: and Miss Lloyd wished me to write to you upon it for youropinion; to which, in every debated case, we always paid the greatestdeference. I hope you will not be so much engrossed by your weightycares, as not to have freedom of spirits enough to enter upon the task.You know how much we all admire your opinion on such topics; which everproduces something new and instructive, as you handle the subjects. Andpray tell us, to what you think it owing, that your man seems so carefulto adorn that self-adorned person of his! yet so manages, that onecannot for one's heart think him a coxcomb?--Let this question, and theabove tasks, divert, and not displease you, my dear. One subject, thoughever so important, could never yet engross your capacious mind. Ifthey should displease you, you must recollect the many instances of myimpertinence which you have forgiven, and then say, 'This is a mad girl:but yet I love her!--And she is my own'
ANNA HOWE.
Clarissa Harlowe; or the history of a young lady — Volume 1 Page 45