Clarissa, Volume 2 (of 9)

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* See Vol. I. Letter XXVIII.

Permit me, however, to subjoin, that well may your father love your
mother, as you say he does. A wife who has no will but his! But were
there not, think you, some struggles between them at first, gout out of
the question?--Your mother, when a maiden, had, as I have heard (and it
is very likely) a good share of those lively spirits which she liked in
your father. She has none of them now. How came they to be dissipated?
--Ah! my dear!--she has been too long resident in Trophonius's cave, I
doubt.*

* Spectator, Vol. VIII. No. 599.

Let me add one reflection upon this subject, and so entitle myself to
your correction for all at once.--It is upon the conduct of those wives
(for you and I know more than one such) who can suffer themselves to be
out-blustered and out-gloomed of their own wills, instead of being fooled
out of them by acts of tenderness and complaisance.--I wish, that it does
not demonstrate too evidently, that, with some of the sex, insolent
controul is a more efficacious subduer than kindness or concession. Upon
my life, my dear, I have often thought, that many of us are mere babies
in matrimony: perverse fools when too much indulged and humoured;
creeping slaves, when treated harshly. But shall it be said, that fear
makes us more gentle obligers than love?--Forbid it, Honour! Forbid it,
Gratitude! Forbid it, Justice! that any woman of sense should give
occasion to have this said of her!

Did I think you would have any manner of doubt, from the style or
contents of this letter, whose saucy pen it is that has run on at this
rate, I would write my name at length; since it comes too much from my
heart to disavow it: but at present the initials shall serve; and I will
go on again directly.

A.H.

LETTER IV

MISS HOWE, TO MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE
THURSDAY MORN. 10 O'CLOCK (MAR. 23).

I will postpone, or perhaps pass by, several observations which I had to
make on other parts of your letters; to acquaint you, that Mr. Hickman,
when in London, found an opportunity to inquire after Mr. Lovelace's town
life and conversation.

At the Cocoa-tree, in Pall-mall, he fell in with two of his intimates,
the one named Belton, the other Mowbray; both very free of speech, and
probably as free in their lives: but the waiters paid them great respect,
and on Mr. Hickman's inquiry after their characters, called them men of
fortune and honour.

They began to talk of Mr. Lovelace of their own accord; and upon some
gentlemen in the room asking, when they expected him in town, answered,
that very day. Mr. Hickman (as they both went on praising Lovelace)
said, he had indeed heard, that Mr. Lovelace was a very fine gentleman--
and was proceeding, when one of them, interrupting him, said,--Only, Sir,
the finest gentleman in the world; that's all.

And so he led them on to expatiate more particularly on his qualities;
which they were very fond of doing: but said not one single word in
behalf of his morals--Mind that also, in your uncle's style.

Mr. Hickman said, that Mr. Lovelace was very happy, as he understood, in
the esteem of the ladies; and smiling, to make them believe he did not
think amiss of it, that he pushed his good fortune as far as it would go.

Well put, Mr. Hickman! thought I; equally grave and sage--thou seemest
not to be a stranger to their dialect, as I suppose this is. But I said
nothing; for I have often tried to find out this might sober man of my
mother's: but hitherto have only to say, that he is either very moral, or
very cunning.

No doubt of it, replied one of them; and out came an oath, with a Who
would not?--That he did as every young fellow would do.

Very true! said my mother's puritan--but I hear he is in treaty with a
fine lady--

So he was, Mr. Belton said--The devil fetch her! [vile brute!] for she
engrossed all his time--but that the lady's family ought to be--
something--[Mr. Hickman desired to be excused repeating what--though he
had repeated what was worse] and might dearly repent their usage of a man
of his family and merit.

Perhaps they may think him too wild, cries Hickman: and theirs is, I
hear, a very sober family--

SOBER! said one of them: A good honest word, Dick!--Where the devil has
it lain all this time?--D-- me if I have heard of it in this sense ever
since I was at college! and then, said he, we bandied it about among
twenty of us as an obsolete.

These, my dear, are Mr. Lovelace's companions: you'll be pleased to take
notice of that!

Mr. Hickman said, this put him out of countenance.

I stared at him, and with such a meaning in my eyes, as he knew how to
take; and so was out of countenance again.

Don't you remember, my dear, who it was that told a young gentleman
designed for the gown, who owned that he was apt to be too easily put out
of countenance when he came into free company, 'That it was a bad sign;
that it looked as if his morals were not proof; but that his good
disposition seemed rather the effect of accident and education, than of
such a choice as was founded upon principle?' And don't you know the
lesson the very same young lady gave him, 'To endeavour to stem and
discountenance vice, and to glory in being an advocate in all companies
for virtue;' particularly observing, 'That it was natural for a man to
shun or to give up what he was ashamed of?' Which she should be sorry to
think his case on this occasion: adding, 'That vice was a coward, and
would hide its head, when opposed by such a virtue as had presence of
mind, and a full persuasion of its own rectitude to support it.' The
lady, you may remember, modestly put her doctrine into the mouth of a
worthy preacher, Dr. Lewen, as she used to do, when she has a mind not to
be thought what she is at so early an age; and that it may give more
weight to any thing she hit upon, that might appear tolerable, was her
modest manner of speech.

Mr. Hickman, upon the whole, professed to me, upon his second recovery,
that he had no reason to think well of Mr. Lovelace's morals, from what
he heard of him in town; yet his two intimates talked of his being more
regular than he used to be. That he had made a very good resolution,
that of old Tom Wharton, was the expression, That he would never give a
challenge, nor refuse one; which they praised in him highly: that, in
short, he was a very brave fellow, and the most agreeable companion in
the world: and would one day make a great figure in his country; since
there was nothing he was not capable of--

I am afraid that his last assertion is too true. And this, my dear, is
all that Mr. Hickman could pick up about him: And is it not enough to
determine such a mind as yours, if not already determined?

Yet it must be said too, that if there be a woman in the world that can
reclaim him, it is you. And, by your account of his behaviour in the
interview between you, I own I have some hope of him. At least, this I
will say, that all the arguments he then used with you, seemed to be just
and right. And if you are to be his--But no more of that: he cannot,
after all, deserve you.

LETTER V

MISS HOWE, TO MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE
THURSDAY AFTERNOON, MARCH 23.

An unexpected visitor has turned the course of my thoughts, and changed
the subject I had intended to pursue. The only one for whom I would have
dispensed with my resolution not to see any body all the dedicated day:
a visiter, whom, according to Mr. Hickman's report from the expectations
of his libertine friends, I supposed to be in town.--Now, my dear, have I
saved myself the trouble of telling you, that it was you too-agreeable
rake. Our sex is said to love to trade in surprises: yet have I, by my
promptitude, surprised myself out of mine. I had intended, you must
know, to run twice the length, before I had suffered you to know so much
as to guess who, and whether man or woman, my visiter was: but since you
have the discovery at so cheap a rate, you are welcome to it.

The end of his coming was, to engage my interest with my charming friend;
and he was sure that I knew all your mind, to acquaint him what he had to
trust to.

He mentioned what had passed in the interview between you: but could not
be satisfied with the result of it, and with the little satisfaction he
had obtained from you: the malice of your family to him increasing, and
their cruelty to you not abating. His heart, he told me, was in tumults,
for fear you should be prevailed upon in favour of a man despised by
every body.

He gave me fresh instance of indignities cast upon himself by your uncles
and brother; and declared, that if you suffered yourself to be forced
into the arms of the man for whose sake he was loaded with undeserved
abuses, you should be one of the youngest, as you would be one of the
loveliest widows in England. And that he would moreover call your
brother to account for the liberties he takes with his character to every
one he meets with.

He proposed several schemes, for you to choose some one of them, in order
to enable you to avoid the persecutions you labour under: One I will
mention--That you will resume your estate; and if you find difficulties
that can be no otherwise surmounted, that you will, either avowedly or
privately, as he had proposed to you, accept of Lady Betty Lawrance's or
Lord M.'s assistance to instate you in it. He declared, that if you did,
he would leave absolutely to your own pleasure afterwards, and to the
advice which your cousin Morden on his arrival should give you, whether
to encourage his address, or not, as you should be convinced of the
sincerity of the reformation which his enemies make him so much want.

I had now a good opportunity to sound him, as you wished Mr. Hickman
would Lord M. as to the continued or diminished favour of the ladies, and
of his Lordship, towards you, upon their being acquainted with the
animosity of your relations to them, as well as to their kinsman. I laid
hold of the opportunity, and he satisfied me, by reading some passages of
a letter he had about him, from Lord M. That an alliance with you, and
that on the foot of your own single merit, would be the most desirable
event to them that could happen: and so far to the purpose of your wished
inquiry does his Lordship go in this letter, that he assures him, that
whatever you suffer in fortune from the violence of your relations on his
account, he and Lady Sarah and Lady Betty will join to make it up to him.
And yet that the reputation of a family so splendid, would, no doubt, in
a case of such importance to the honour of both, make them prefer a
general consent.

I told him, as you yourself I knew had done, that you were extremely
averse to Mr. Solmes; and that, might you be left to your own choice, it
would be the single life. As to himself, I plainly said, That you had
great and just objections to him on the score of his careless morals:
that it was surprising, that men who gave themselves the liberties he was
said to take, should presume to think, that whenever they took it into
their heads to marry, the most virtuous and worthy of the sex were to
fall to their lot. That as to the resumption, it had been very strongly
urged by myself, and would be still further urged; though you had been
hitherto averse to that measure: that your chief reliance and hopes were
upon your cousin Morden; and that to suspend or gain time till he
arrived, was, as I believed, your principal aim.

I told him, That with regard to the mischief he threatened, neither the
act nor the menace could serve any end but theirs who persecuted you; as
it would give them a pretence for carrying into effect their compulsory
projects; and that with the approbation of all the world; since he must
not think the public would give its voice in favour of a violent young
man, of no extraordinary character as to morals, who should seek to rob a
family of eminence of a child so valuable; and who threatened, if he
could not obtain her in preference to a man chosen by themselves, that he
would avenge himself upon them all by acts of violence.

I added, That he was very much mistaken, if he thought to intimidate you
by such menaces: for that, though your disposition was all sweetness, yet
I knew not a steadier temper in the world than yours; nor one more
inflexible, (as your friends had found, and would still further find, if
they continued to give occasion for its exertion,) whenever you thought
yourself in the right; and that you were ungenerously dealt with in
matters of too much moment to be indifferent about. Miss Clarissa
Harlowe, Mr. Lovelace, let me tell you, said I, timid as her foresight
and prudence may make her in some cases, where she apprehends dangers to
those she loves, is above fear, in points where her honour, and the true
dignity of her sex, are concerned.--In short, Sir, you must not think to
frighten Miss Clarissa Harlowe into such a mean or unworthy conduct as
only a weak or unsteady mind can be guilty of.

He was so very far from intending to intimidate you, he said, that he
besought me not to mention one word to you of what had passed between us:
that what he had hinted at, which carried the air of menace, was owing to
the fervour of his spirits, raised by his apprehensions of losing all
hope of you for ever; and on a supposition, that you were to be actually
forced into the arms of a man you hated: that were this to be the case,
he must own, that he should pay very little regard to the world, or its
censures: especially as the menaces of some of your family now, and their
triumph over him afterwards, would both provoke and warrant all the
vengeance he could take.

He added, that all the countries in the world were alike to him, but on
your account: so that, whatever he should think fit to do, were you lost
to him, he should have noting to apprehend from the laws of this.

I did not like the determined air he spoke this with: he is certainly
capable of great rashness.

He palliated a little this fierceness (which by the way I warmly
censured) by saying, That while you remain single, he will bear all the
indignities that shall be cast upon him by your family. But would you
throw yourself, if you were still farther driven, into any other
protection, if not Lord M.'s, or that of the ladies of his family, into
my mother's,* suppose; or would you go to London to private lodgings,
where he would never visit you, unless he had your leave (and from whence
you might make your own terms with your relations); he would be entirely
satisfied; and would, as he had said before, wait the effect of your
cousin's arrival, and your free determination as to his own fate.
Adding, that he knew the family so well, and how much fixed they were
upon their measures, as well as the absolute dependence they had upon
your temper and principles, that he could not but apprehend the worst,
while you remained in their power, and under the influence of their
persuasions and menaces.

* Perhaps it will be unnecessary to remind the reader, that although Mr.
Lovelace proposes (as above) to Miss Howe, that her fair friend should
have recourse to the protection of Mrs. Howe, if farther driven; yet he
had artfully taken care, by means of his agent in the Harlowe family, not
only to inflame the family against her, but to deprive her of Mrs.
Howe's, and of every other protection, being from the first resolved to
reduce her to an absolute dependence upon himself. See Vol. I. Letter
XXXI.

We had a great deal of other discourse: but as the reciting of the rest
would be but a repetition of many of the things that passed between you
and him in the interview between you in the wood-house, I refer myself to
your memory on that occasion.*

* See Vol. I. Letter XXXVI.

And now, my dear, upon the whole, I think it behoves you to make yourself
independent: all then will fall right. This man is a violent man. I
should wish, methinks, that you should not have either him or Solmes.
You will find, if you get out of your brother's and sister's way, what
you can or cannot do, with regard to either.

If your relations persist in their foolish scheme, I think I will take
his hint, and, at a proper opportunity, sound my mother. Mean time, let
me have your clear opinion of the resumption, which I join with Lovelace
in advising. You can but see how your demand will work. To demand, is
not to litigate. But be your resolution what it will, do not by any
means repeat to them, that you will not assert your right. If they go on
to give you provocation, you may have sufficient reason to change your
mind: and let them expect that you will change it. They have not the
generosity to treat you the better for disclaiming the power they know
you have. That, I think, need not now be told you. I am, my dearest
friend, and ever will be,

Your most affectionate and faithful
ANNA HOWE.

LETTER VI

MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO MISS HOWE
WEDN. NIGHT, MARCH 22.

On the report made by my aunt and sister of my obstinacy, my assembled
relations have taken an unanimous resolution (as Betty tells me it is)
against me. This resolution you will find signified to me in the
inclosed letter from my brother, just now brought me. Be pleased to
return it, when perused. I may have occasion for it, in the altercations
between my relations and me.

***

MISS CLARY,

I am commanded to let you know, that my father and uncles having heard
your aunt Hervey's account of all that has passed between her and you:
having heard from your sister what sort of treatment she has had from
you: having recollected all that has passed between your mother and you:
having weighed all your pleas and proposals: having taken into
consideration their engagements with Mr. Solmes; that gentleman's
patience, and great affection for you; and the little opportunity you
have given yourself to be acquainted either with his merit, or his
proposals: having considered two points more; to wit, the wounded
authority of a father; and Mr. Solmes's continued entreaties (little as
you have deserved regard from him) that you may be freed from a
confinement to which he is desirous to attribute your perverseness to him
[averseness I should have said, but let it go], he being unable to
account otherwise for so strong a one, supposing you told truth to your
mother, when you asserted that your heart was free; and which Mr. Solmes
is willing to believe, though nobody else does--For all these reasons, it
is resolved, that you shall go to your uncle Antony's: and you must
accordingly prepare yourself to do so. You will have but short notice of
the day, for obvious reasons.

I will honestly tell you the motive for your going: it is a double one;
first, That they may be sure, that you shall not correspond with any body
they do not like (for they find from Mrs. Howe, that, by some means or
other, you do correspond with her daughter; and, through her, perhaps
with somebody else): and next, That you may receive the visits of Mr.
Solmes; which you have thought fit to refuse to do here; by which means
you have deprived yourself of the opportunity of knowing whom and what
you have hitherto refused.

If after one fortnight's conversation with Mr. Solmes, and after you have
heard what your friends shall further urge in his behalf, unhardened by
clandestine correspondencies, you shall convince them, that Virgil's amor
omnibus idem (for the application of which I refer you to the Georgic as
translated by Dryden) is verified in you, as well as in the rest of the
animal creation; and that you cannot, or will not forego your
prepossession in favour of the moral, the virtuous, the pious Lovelace,
[I would please you if I could!] it will then be considered, whether to
humour you, or to renounce you for ever.

It is hoped, that as you must go, you will go cheerfully. Your uncle
Antony will make ever thing at his house agreeable to you. But indeed he
won't promise, that he will not, at proper times, draw up the bridge.

Your visiters, besides Mr. Solmes, will be myself, if you permit me that
honour, Miss Clary; your sister; and, as you behave to Mr. Solmes, your
aunt Hervey, and your uncle Harlowe; and yet the two latter will hardly
come neither, if they think it will be to hear your whining vocatives.--
Betty Barnes will be your attendant: and I must needs tell you, Miss,
that we none of us think the worse of the faithful maid for your dislike
of her: although Betty, who would be glad to oblige you, laments it as a
misfortune.

Your answer is required, whether you cheerfully consent to go? And your
indulgent mother bids me remind you from her, that a fortnight's visit
from Mr. Solmes, are all that is meant at present.

I am, as you shall be pleased to deserve,
Yours, &c.
JAMES HARLOWE, JUN.

So here is the master-stroke of my brother's policy! Called upon to
consent to go to my uncle Antony's avowedly to receive Mr. Solmes's
visits!--A chapel! A moated-house!--Deprived of the opportunity of
corresponding with you!--or of any possibility of escape, should
violence be used to compel me to be that odious man's!*

* These violent measures, and the obstinate perseverance of the whole
family in them, will be the less wondered at, when it is considered, that
all the time they were but as so many puppets danced upon Mr. Lovelace's
wires, as he boasts, Vol. I. Letter XXXI.

Late as it was when I received this insolent letter, I wrote an answer to
it directly, that it might be ready for the writer's time of rising. I
inclose the rough draught of it. You will see by it how much his vile
hint from the Georgic; and his rude one of my whining vocatives, have set
me up. Besides, as the command to get ready to go to my uncle's is in
the name of my father and uncles, it is but to shew a piece of the art
they accuse me of, to resent the vile hint I have so much reason to
resent in order to palliate my refusal of preparing to go to my uncle's;
which refusal would otherwise be interpreted an act of rebellion by my
brother and sister: for it seems plain to me, that they will work but
half their ends, if they do not deprive me of my father's and uncles'
favour, even although it were possible for me to comply with their own
terms.

You might have told me, Brother, in three lines, what the determination
of my friends was; only, that then you would not have had room to display
your pedantry by so detestable an allusion or reference to the Georgic.
Give me leave to tell you, Sir, that if humanity were a branch of your
studies at the university, it has not found a genius in you for mastering
it. Nor is either my sex or myself, though a sister, I see entitled to
the least decency from a brother, who has studied, as it seems, rather to
cultivate the malevolence of his natural temper, than any tendency which
one might have hoped his parentage, if not his education, might have
given him to a tolerable politeness.

I doubt not, that you will take amiss my freedom: but as you have
deserved it from me, I shall be less and less concerned on that score, as
I see you are more and more intent to shew your wit at the expense of
justice and compassion.

The time is indeed come that I can no longer bear those contempts and
reflections which a brother, least of all men, is entitled to give. And
let me beg of you one favour, Sir:--It is this, That you will not give
yourself any concern about a husband for me, till I shall have the
forwardness to propose a wife to you. Pardon me, Sir; but I cannot help
thinking, that could I have the art to get my father of my side, I should
have as much right to prescribe for you, as you have for me.

As to the communication you make me, I must take upon me to say, That
although I will receive, as becomes me, any of my father's commands; yet,
as this signification is made by a brother, who has shewn of late so much
of an unbrotherly animosity to me, (for no reason in the world that I
know if, but that he believes he has, in me, one sister too much for his
interest,) I think myself entitled to conclude, that such a letter as you
have sent me, is all your own: and of course to declare, that, while I so
think it, I will not willingly, nor even without violence, go to any
place, avowedly to receive Mr. Solmes's visits.

I think myself so much entitled to resent your infamous hint, and this as
well for the sake of my sex, as for my own, that I ought to declare, as I
do, that I will not receive any more of your letters, unless commanded to
do so by an authority I never will dispute; except in a case where I
think my future as well as present happiness concerned: and were such a
case to happen, I am sure my father's harshness will be less owing to
himself than to you; and to the specious absurdities of your ambitious
and selfish schemes.--Very true, Sir!

One word more, provoked as I am, I will add: That had I been thought as
really obstinate and perverse as of late I am said to be, I should not
have been so disgracefully treated as I have been--Lay your hand upon
your heart, Brother, and say, By whose instigations?--And examine what I
have done to deserve to be made thus unhappy, and to be obliged to style
myself

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