Pamela, Volume II

"Though this is to you, my Pamela, the renewal of griefs; yet hold up your dear face. You may—The triumph was yours—the shame and the blushes ought to be mine—And I will humour my saucy sister in all she would have me say."

"Nay," said Lady Davers, "you know the question; I cannot put it stronger."

"That's very true," replied he: "But would you expect I should give you a reason for an attempt that appears to you so very shocking?"

"Nay, Sir," said the countess, "don't say appears to Lady Davers; for (excuse me) it will appear so to every one who hears of it."

"I think my brother is too hardly used," said Lord Davers; "he has made all the amends he could make:—and you, my sister, who were the person offended, forgive him now, I hope; don't you?"

I could not answer; for I was quite confounded; and made a motion to withdraw: but Mr. B. said, "Don't go, my dear: though I ought to be ashamed of an action set before me in so full a glare, in presence of Lord Davers and the countess; yet I will not have you stir because I forget how you represented it, and you must tell me."

"Indeed, Sir, I cannot," said I; "pray, my dear ladies—pray, my good lord—and, dear Sir, don't thus renew my griefs, as you were pleased justly to phrase it."

"I have the representation of that scene in my pocket," said my lady; "for I was resolved, as I told Lady Betty, to shame the wicked wretch with it the first opportunity; and I'll read it to you; or rather, you shall read it yourself, Bold-face, if you can."

So she pulled those leaves out of her pocket, wrapped up carefully in a paper. "Here,—I believe he who could act thus, must read it; and, to spare Pamela's confusion, read it to yourself; for we all know how it was."

"I think," said he, taking the papers, "I can say something to abate the heinousness of this heavy charge, or else I should not stand thus at the insolent bar of my sister, answering her interrogatories."

I send you, my dear Miss Darnford, a transcript of the charge. To be sure, you'll say, he was a very wicked man.

Mr. B. read it to himself, and said, "This is a dark affair, as here stated; and I can't say, but Pamela, and Mrs. Jervis too, had great reason to apprehend the worst: but surely readers of it, who were less parties in the supposed attempt, and not determined at all events to condemn me, might have made a more favourable construction for me, than you, Lady Davers, have done in the strong light in which you have set this heinous matter before us.

"However, since my lady," bowing to the countess, "and Lord Davers seem to expect me particularly to answer this black charge, I will, at a proper time, if agreeable, give you a brief history of my passion for this dear girl; how it commenced and increased, and my own struggles with it, and this will introduce, with some little advantage to myself perhaps, what I have to say, as to this supposed attempt: and at the same time enable you the better to account for some facts which you have read in my pretty accuser's papers."

This pleased every one, and they begged him to begin then; but he said, it was time we should think of dressing, the morning being far advanced; and if no company came in, he would, in the afternoon, give them the particulars they desired to hear.

The three gentlemen rode out, and returned to dress before dinner: my lady and the countess also took an airing in the chariot. Just as they returned, compliments came from several of the neighbouring ladies to our noble guests, on their arrival in these parts; and to as many as sent, Lady Davers desired their companies for to-morrow afternoon, to tea; but Mr. B. having fallen in with some of the gentlemen likewise, he told me, we should have most of our visiting neighbours at dinner, and desired Mrs. Jervis might prepare accordingly for them.

After dinner Mr. H. took a ride out, attended by Mr. Colbrand, of whom he is very fond, ever since he frightened Lady Davers's footmen at the Hall, threatening to chine them, if they offered to stop his lady: for, he says, he loves a man of courage: very probably knowing his own defects that way, for my lady often calls him a chicken-hearted fellow. And then Lord and Lady Davers, and the countess, revived the subject of the morning; and Mr. B. was pleased to begin in the manner I shall mention by-and-bye. For here I am obliged to break off.

Now, my dear Miss Darnford, I will proceed.

"I began," said Mr. B., "very early to take notice of this lovely girl, even when she was hardly thirteen years old; for her charms increased every day, not only in my eye, but in the eyes of all who beheld her. My mother, as you (Lady Davers) know, took the greatest delight in her, always calling her, her Pamela, her good child: and her waiting-maid and her cabinet of rarities were her boasts, and equally shewn to every visitor: for besides the beauty of her figure, and the genteel air of her person, the dear girl had a surprising memory, a solidity of judgment above her years, and a docility so unequalled, that she took all parts of learning which her lady, as fond of instructing her as she of improving by instruction, crowded upon her; insomuch that she had masters to teach her to dance, sing, and play on the spinnet, whom she every day surprised by the readiness wherewith she took every thing.

"I remember once, my mother praising her girl before me, and my aunt B. (who is since dead), I could not but notice her fondness for her, and said, 'What do you design, Madam, to do with or for, this Pamela of yours? The accomplishments you give her will do her more hurt than good; for they will set her so much above her degree, that what you intend as a kindness, may prove her ruin.'

"My aunt joined with me, and spoke in a still stronger manner against giving her such an education: and added, as I well remember, 'Surely, sister, you do wrong. One would think, if one knew not my nephew's discreet pride, that you design her for something more than your own waiting-maid.'

"'Ah! sister,' said the old lady, 'there is no fear of what you hint at; his family pride, and stately temper, will secure my son: he has too much of his father in him. And as for Pamela, you know not the girl. She has always in her thoughts, and in her mouth, too, her parents' mean condition, and I shall do nothing for them, at least at present, though they are honest folks, and deserve well, because I will keep the girl humble.'

"'But what can I do with the little baggage?' continued my mother; 'she conquers every thing so fast, and has such a thirst after knowledge, and the more she knows, I verily think, the humbler she is, that I cannot help letting go, as my son, when a little boy, used to do to his kite, as fast as she pulls; and to what height she'll soar, I can't tell.

"'I intended,' proceeded the good lady, 'at first, only to make her mistress of some fine needle-work, to qualify her (as she has a delicacy in her person, that makes it a pity ever to put her to hard work) for a genteel place; but she masters that so fast, that now as my daughter is married and gone from me, I am desirous to qualify her to divert and entertain me in my thoughtful hours: and were you, sister, to know what she is capable of, and how diverting her innocent prattle is to me, and her natural simplicity, which I encourage her to preserve amidst all she learns, you would not, nor my son neither, wonder at the pleasure I take in her. Shall I call her in?'

"'I don't want,' said I, 'to have the girl called in: if you, Madam, are diverted with her, that's enough. To be sure, Pamela is a better companion for a lady, than a monkey or a harlequin: but I fear you'll set her above herself, and make her vain and pert; and that, at last, in order to support her pride, she may fall into temptations which may be fatal to herself, and others too.'

"'I'm glad to hear this from my son,' replied the good lady. 'But the moment I see my favour puffs her up, I shall take other measures.'

"'Well,' thought I to myself, 'I only want to conceal my views from your penetrating eye, my good mother; and I shall one day take as much delight in your girl, and her accomplishments, as you now do; so go on, and improve her as fast as you will. I'll only now and then talk against her, to blind you; and doubt not that all you do will qualify her the better for my purpose. Only,' thought I, 'fly swiftly on, two or three more tardy years, and I'll nip this bud by the time it begins to open, and place it in my bosom for a year or two at least: for so long, if the girl behaves worthy of her education, I doubt not, she'll be new to me.—Excuse me, ladies;—excuse me, Lord Davers;—if I am not ingenuous, I had better be silent."

I will not interrupt this affecting narration, by mentioning my own alternate blushes, confusions, and exclamations, as the naughty man went on; nor the censures, and many Out upon you's of the attentive ladies, and Fie, brother's, of Lord Davers; nor yet with apologies for the praises on myself, so frequently intermingled—contenting myself to give you, as near as I can recollect, the very sentences of the dear relator. And as to our occasional exclaimings and observations, you may suppose what they were.

"So," continued Mr. B., "I went on dropping hints against her now and then; and whenever I met her in the passages about the house, or in the garden, avoiding to look at, or to speak to her, as she passed me, curtseying, and putting on a thousand bewitching airs of obligingness and reverence; while I (who thought the best way to demolish the influence of such an education, would be not to alarm her fears on one hand, or to familiarize myself to her on the other, till I came to strike the blow) looked haughty and reserved, and passed by her with a stiff nod at most. Or, if I spoke, 'How does your lady this morning, girl?—I hope she rested well last night:' then, covered with blushes, and curtseying at every word, as if she thought herself unworthy of answering my questions, she'd trip away in a kind of confusion, as soon as she had spoken. And once I heard her say to Mrs. Jervis, 'Dear Sirs, my young master spoke to me, and called me by my name, saying—How slept your lady last night, Pamela?—Was not that very good, Mrs. Jervis?'—'Ay,' thought I, 'I am in the right way, I find: this will do in proper time. Go on, my dear mother, improving as fast as you will: I'll engage to pull down in three hours, what you'll be building up in as many years, in spite of all the lessons you can teach her.'

"'Tis enough for me, that I am establishing in you, ladies, and in you, my lord, a higher esteem for my Pamela (I am but too sensible I shall lose a good deal of my own reputation) in the relation I am now giving you.

"I dressed, grew more confident, and as insolent withal, as if, though I had not Lady Davers's wit and virtue, I had all her spirit—(excuse me, Lady Davers;) and having a pretty bold heart, which rather put me upon courting than avoiding a danger or difficulty, I had but too much my way with every body; and many a menaced complaint have I looked down, with a haughty air, and a promptitude, like that of Colbrand's to your footmen at the Hall, to clap my hand to my side; which was of the greater service to my bold enterprise, as two or three gentlemen had found I knew how to be in earnest."

"Ha!" said my lady, "thou wast ever an impudent fellow: and many a vile roguery have I kept from my poor mother.—Yet, to my knowledge, she thought you no saint."

"Ay, poor lady," continued he, "she used now-and-then to catechize me; and was sure I was not so good as I ought to be:—'For, son,' she would cry, 'these late hours, these all night works, and to come home so sober cannot be right.-I'm not sure, if I were to know all, (and yet I'm afraid of inquiring after your ways) whether I should not have reason to wish you were brought home in wine, rather than to come in so sober, and so late, as you do.'

"Once, I remember, in the summer-time, I came home about six in the morning, and met the good lady unexpectedly by the garden back-door, of which I had a key to let myself in at all hours. I started, and would have avoided her: but she called me to her, and then I approached her with an air, 'What brings you, Madam, into the garden at so early an hour?' turning my face from her; for I had a few scratches on my forehead—with a thorn, or so—which I feared she would be more inquisitive about than I cared she should.

"'And what makes you,' said she, 'so early here, Billy?—What a rakish figure dost thou make!—One time or other these courses will yield you but little comfort, on reflection: would to God thou wast but happily married!'

"'So, Madam, the old wish!—I'm not so bad as you think me:—I hope I have not merited so great a punishment.'

"These hints I give, not as matter of glory, but shame: yet I ought to tell you all the truth, or nothing. 'Meantime,' thought I, (for I used to have some compunction for my vile practices, when cool reflection, brought on by satiety, had taken hold of me) 'I wish this sweet girl was grown to years of susceptibility, that I might reform this wicked course of life, and not prowl about, disturbing honest folks' peace, and endangering myself.' And as I had, by a certain very daring and wicked attempt, in which, however, I did not succeed, set a hornet's nest about my ears, which I began to apprehend would sting me to death, having once escaped an ambush by dint of mere good luck; I thought it better to remove the seat of my warfare into another kingdom, and to be a little more discreet for the future in my amours. So I went to France a second time, and passed a year there in the best of company, and with some improvement both to my morals and understanding; and had a very few sallies, considering my love of intrigue, and the ample means I had to prosecute successfully all the desires of my heart.

"When I returned, several matches were proposed to me, and my good mother often requested me to make her so happy, as she called it, as to see me married before she died; but I could not endure the thoughts of the state: for I never saw a lady whose temper and education I liked, or with whom I thought I could live tolerably. She used in vain therefore to plead family reasons to me:—like most young fellows, I was too much a self-lover, to pay so great a regard to posterity; and, to say truth, had little solicitude at that time, whether my name were continued or not, in my own descendants. However, I looked upon my mother's Pamela with no small pleasure, and I found her so much improved, as well in person as behaviour, that I had the less inducement either to renew my intriguing life, or to think of a married state.

"Yet, as my mother had all her eyes about her, as the phrase is, I affected great shyness, both before her, and to the girl; for I doubted not, my very looks would be watched by them both; and what the one discovered would not be a secret to the other; and laying myself open too early to a suspicion, I thought, would but ice the girl over, and make her lady more watchful.

"So I used to go into my mother's apartment, and come out of it, without taking the least notice of her, but put on stiff airs; and as she always withdrew when I came in, I never made any pretence to keep her there.

"Once, indeed, my mother, on my looking after her, when her back was turned, said, 'My dear son, I don't like your eye following my girl so intently.—Only I know that sparkling lustre natural to it, or I should have some fear for my Pamela, as she grows older.'

"'I look after her. Madam!-My eyes sparkle at such a girl as that! No indeed! She may be your favourite as a waiting-maid; but I see nothing but clumsy curtseys and awkward airs about her. A little rustic affectation of innocence, that to such as cannot see into her, may pass well enough.'

"'Nay, my dear,' replied my mother, 'don't say that, of all things.

She has no affectation, I am sure.'

"'Yes, she has, in my eye, Madam, and I'll tell you how it is; you have taught her to assume the airs of a gentlewoman, to dance, and to enter a room with a grace; and yet bid her keep her low birth and family in view: and between the one character, which she wants to get into, and the other she dares not get out of, she trips up and down mincingly, and knows not how to set her feet: so 'tis the same in every gesture: her arms she knows not whether to swim with, or to hold before her, nor whether to hold her head up or down; and so does neither, but hangs it on one side: a little awkward piece of one-and-t'other I think her. And, indeed, you'd do the girl more kindness to put her into your dairy, than to keep her about your person; for she'll be utterly spoiled, I doubt, for any useful purpose.'

"'Ah, son!' said she, 'I fear, by your description, you have minded her too much in one sense, though not enough in another. 'Tis not my intention to recommend her to your notice, of all men; and I doubt not, if it please God I live, and she continues a good girl, but she will make a man of some middling, genteel business, very happy.'

"Pamela came in just then, with an air so natural, so humble, and yet so much above herself, that I was forced to turn my head from her, lest my mother should watch my eye again, and I be inclined to do her that justice, which my heart assented to, but which my lips had just before denied her.

"All my difficulty, in apprehension, was my good mother; the effect of whose lessons to her girl, I was not so much afraid of as her vigilance. 'For,' thought I, 'I see by the delicacy of her person, the brilliancy of her eye, and the sweet apprehensiveness that plays about every feature of her face, she must have tinder enough in her constitution, to catch a well-struck spark; and I'll warrant I shall know how to set her in a blaze, in a few months more.'

"Yet I wanted, as I passed, to catch her attention too: I expected her to turn after me, and look so as to shew a liking towards me; for I had a great opinion of my person and air, which had been fortunately distinguished by the ladies, whom, of course, my vanity made me allow to be very good judges of these outward advantages.

"But to my great disappointment, Pamela never, by any favourable glance, gave the least encouragement to my vanity. 'Well,' thought I, 'this girl has certainly nothing ethereal in her mould: all unanimated clay!—But the dancing and singing airs my mother is teaching her, will better qualify her in time, and another year will ripen her into my arms, no doubt of it. Let me only go on thus, and make her fear me: that will enhance in her mind every favour I shall afterwards vouchsafe to shew her: and never question old humdrum Virtue,' thought I, 'but the tempter without, and the tempter within, will be too many for the perversest nicety that ever the sex boasted.'

"Yet, though I could not once attract her eye towards me, she never failed to draw mine after her, whenever she went by me, or wherever I saw her, except, as I said, in my mother's presence; and particularly when she had passed me, and could not see me look at her, without turning her head, as I expected so often from her in vain.

"You will wonder, Lord Davers, who, I suppose, was once in love, or you'd never have married such an hostile spirit as my sister's there-"

"Go on, sauce—box," said she, "I won't interrupt you."

"You will wonder how I could behave so coolly as to escape all discovery so long from a lady so watchful as my mother, and from the apprehensiveness of the girl.

"But, to say nothing of her tender years, and that my love was not of this bashful sort, I was not absolutely determined, so great was my pride, that I ought to think her worthy of being my mistress, when I had not much reason, as I thought, to despair of prevailing upon persons of higher birth (were I disposed to try) to live with me upon my own terms. My pride, therefore, kept my passion at bay, as I may say: so far was I from imagining I should ever be brought to what has since happened! But to proceed:

"Hitherto my mind was taken up with the beauties of her person only. My EYE had drawn my HEART after it, without giving myself any trouble about that sense and judgment which my mother was always praising in her Pamela, as exceeding her years and opportunities: but an occasion happened, which, though slight in itself, took the HEAD into the party, and I thought of her, young as she was, with a distinction, that before I had not for her. It was this:

"Being with my mother in her closet, who was talking to me on the old subject, matrimony, I saw Pamela's commonplace book, as I may call it; in which, by her lady's direction, from time to time, she had transcribed from the Bible, and other good books, such passages as most impressed her as she read—A method, I take it, my dear" (turning to me), "of great service to you, as it initiated you into writing with that freedom and ease, which shine in your saucy letters and journals; and to which my present fetters are not a little owing: just as pedlars catch monkeys in the baboon kingdoms, provoking the attentive fools, by their own example, to put on shoes and stockings, till the apes of imitation, trying to do the like, entangle their feet, and so cannot escape upon the boughs of the tree of liberty, on which before they were wont to hop and skip about, and play a thousand puggish tricks.

"I observed the girl wrote a pretty hand, and very swift and free; and affixed her points or stops with so much judgment (her years considered), that I began to have an high opinion of her understanding. Some observations likewise upon several of the passages were so just and solid, that I could not help being tacitly surprised at them.

"My mother watched my eye, and was silent: I seemed not to observe that she did; and after a while, laid down the book, shutting it with great indifference, and talking of another subject.

"Upon this, my mother said, 'Don't you think Pamela writes a pretty hand, son?'

"'I did not mind it much,' said I, with a careless air. 'This is her writing, is it?' taking the book, and opening it again, at a place of Scripture. 'The girl is mighty pious!' said I.

"'I wish you were so, child.'

"'I wish so too, Madam, if it would please you.'

"'I wish so, for your own sake, child.'

"'So do I, Madam;' and down I laid the book again very carelessly.

"'Look once more in it,' said she, 'and see if you can't open it upon some place that may strike you.'

"I opened it at—'Train up a child in the way it should go,' &c. 'I fancy,' said I, 'when I was of Pamela's age, I was pretty near as good as she.'

"'Never, never,' said my mother; 'I am sure I took great pains with you; but, alas I to very little purpose. You had always a violent headstrong will.'

"'Some allowances for boys and girls, I hope, Madam; but you see I am as good for a man as my sister for a woman.'

"'No indeed, you are not, I do assure you.'

"'I am sorry for that. Madam; you give me a sad opinion of myself.'"

"Brazen wretch!" said my lady; "but go on."

"'Turn to one of the girl's observations on some text,' said my mother.

"I did; and was pleased with it more than I would own. 'The girl's well enough,' said I, 'for what she is; but let's see what she'll be a few years hence. Then will be the trial.'

"'She'll be always good, I doubt not.'

"'So much the better for her. But can't we talk of any other subject? You complain how seldom I attend you; and when you are always talking of matrimony, or of this low-born, raw girl, it must needs lessen the pleasure of approaching you.'

"But now, as I hinted to you, ladies, and my lord, I had a still higher opinion of Pamela; and esteemed her more worthy of my attempts. 'For,' thought I, 'the girl has good sense, and it will be some pleasure to watch by what gradations she may be made to rise into love, and into a higher life, than that to which she was born.' And so I began to think she would be worthy in time of being my mistress, which, till now, as I said before, I had been a little scrupulous about.

"I took a little tour soon after this in company of some friends, with whom I had contracted an intimacy abroad, into Scotland and Ireland, they having a curiosity to see those countries, and we spent six or eight months on this expedition; and when I had landed them in France, I returned home, and found my good mother in a very indifferent state of health, but her Pamela arrived to a height of beauty and perfection which exceeded all my expectations. I was so taken with her charms when I first saw her, which was in the garden, with a book in her hand, just come out of a little summer-house, that I then thought of obliging her to go back again, in order to begin a parley with her: but while I was resolving, she tript away with her curtesies and reverences, and was out of my sight before I could determine.