sary good at her age, and as it suits her inclination it would divert and sweeten her temper, and something abase the eager desire of goeing abroad for divertion, and whilst Mrs. H. is with yr dauter I see no danger from the being with the Maid servant.

...

The girl was a true Wogan in this, at least-excessive energy, requiring outlet. The adventurous spirit of the Jacobite Charles coming out! Mischief and idle hands are devout lovers.

It would be sad to think so much affectionate solicitude wasted; though in a P.S. Mrs. Coke adds: Pray tell yr dauter that I hope'd she had loved me too well to have taken any advice ill, as I fear she did something in my last letter, because she has not answered it.'

But by the next time we hear of her, long, long after, 'wooed and married and a',' in the memorable year '45, one thing is certain that however she had developed meanwhile, the relationship existing then between father and daughter was of the closest and most tender description. Mr. Wogan is writing letters of consolation to her abt Great Deject: of Spirits,' the occasion being the sudden death of her own child.

The nature of those letters is easily guessed from the character of the man who composed them. Spiritual, high-minded, full of the loftiest resignation, hope and faith, one reads them with the more interest in that they show so clearly the success of a training not many would have had strength on the one hand to carry out, on the other to accept with profit. One feels that Kitty Wogan grown up and a wife must have turned out just what a descendant of and a mother of heroes' should be.

The stronger the nature, the more need of and profit in pruning. And as regards that mean time of slow ripening and fruition of a girl's mind, concerning which Mr. Wogan tells us nothing, it is interesting to note in connection this letter of that archmoralmonger, Samuel Richardson, to one of his young-lady' correspondents-at once a 'picture of and a comment upon those very questions which vexed Will Wogan's righteous soul. Kitty Wogan in Miss Grainger's place would not seem

amiss.

This letter (so far as can be ascertained) has not been published before, and its date (February 28, 1749) carries us far along the century's history in all that concerns its moral attitude. For what Richardson did not know on the subject of the young-ladyhood of his time was probably not worth reckoning with.

My Dear Miss Grainger,

You praised me too soon, as well as in terms too generous, for the early Answers I returned to your Letters, as I am afraid you yourself will think. But I am sure, if you knew my engagements for the last three weeks, you would excuse me. And then our sentiments are become so much the same that I have hardly anything to say, but by way of Acquiescence with most of yours.

You very ingenuously acknowledge that you should not have been able to submit to an Harlowe Government. There are so few young Ladies that would perform their Duties to their Parents, for the Duty's sake, and if their Parents did not their's by them; or even if their Parents used their own Discretion in controuling them, that it render'd the character of a Clarissa, of a young Lady who was good upon Principle, and who took not the Measures of her Duty from her being obliged, or complied with, in whatsoever she set her Heart upon, necessary to be drawn and exhibited.

I believe, Madam, you, for one, would not have borne what Clarissa bore.

I know not who would. But then you would have wanted her Merit. There is no Merit, you know, Madam, in doing a Duty. And the thing is, Not what we like to do, but what we ought to do, to intitle us to a future Reward for our Sufferings here. We are all apt to forget that the Doctrine of Self Denyal and Mortification are Christian Doctrines.

There is an uncouth and vulgar Proverb, That the Devil is good-humoured when he is pleased. And shall we Expect Children only to be good when they are obliged?

I am glad that the Doctrine laid down to Lady Drayton pleases you. I knew it would. And I think it good Doctrine. And would have it well considered by all Parents. Doctor Young is pleased to call The History of Clarissa The Whole Duty of a Woman: And further, which perhaps it behoves me not to repeat, That the whole Bench of B-ps need not be ashamed to go to school to her. I have every Day Compliments made me, that it is calculated to do great Good, as a History of Life and Manners wrought up in an amusing Dress-But what shall we do if we read for the Story's and not for the Instruction's Sake?

But what do I read in one Place of your Letter before me- After all, say you, tho' I subscribe to the justice of all your Arguments, I am very nearly of the same opinion, that I was before I set out!' Could I have read this Passage when I said at the Beginning of this Letter, I had little to say but by way of Acquiescence with your Sentiments? Then follow the Words Parental Fetters.'

Some Parents may too unreasonably fetter or confine their Children. But 'Parental Fetters!' as if all Parental Authority were to be stigmatized-Surely, surely, Miss Grainger, you are--Tell me what I shall say you are. You bid me not to think you a Rogue.-What would you have me think you?

You can't help thinking, you say, that it is scarce possible to adhere steadfastly to the Right, when the Commander is in the Wrong. Let me add to what I have said above, which may be applied to what you here say, That you would not surely condemn what you would practise! If your Commander do wrong, is that a Reason for you to do wrong too? Would you be quicksighted to the Faults of another, and be guilty of as bad or worse? What a World should we have if the Mother should be worse than the Grandmother, the Daughter than the Mother! What a Generation of Wrongheads! But, thank God, there are Children in ye world, who seeing the Odiousness and Inconvenience of some Views in Parents, can walk backwards with Noah's Good Son, and cover their Nakedness; and avoid following the bad Example.

You wish, my Dear, that there were a few Clarissas in Being who would write Anonymous Letters to Mothers who are in Want of Instruction.'

Take yourself the Hint, my dear Miss G., and write to such Mothers. You cannot know, till you try, whether your Arguments will harden, or Convince them, 'Your Aversion to the word Authority.'-I don't love you should so express yourself.

But you are supposing yourself a Mother. I wish you were happily so. But why should you suppose yourself a Mother in the Character of Lady Wronghead? I protest, Miss Grainger, you are a whimsical Young Lady! I would have supposed myself Lady Right-Head, had I been you. One was as easily supposed as the other; tho' perhaps more difficulty obtained. Lady Wronghead! Of all the Characters in the World!

In this case you should never,' you say, 'have had an opportunity of being in the right.'

But perhaps You must not necessarily have had such an Husband as Sir Francis.

Again, the Words 'Aversion to the word Authority! How came it into my Head, at sitting down to write this Letter, that I had more Reason given me to praise than to blame!

You have an high Idea of the Force of a Good Example. And so have I. But yet it is very far from being so general as were to be wished that good Parents have good Children, or that good Husbands make good Wives. A Woman and a Child whom Indulgence Spoils not must have Generosity of Spirit. And think you not (more's the Pity!) that there are not thro' the World Five Ungenerous to One Generous Person?

'You would not answer for your making a good Wife had you not a good Husband.'

I don't know that

Women born to be contract'd
Stoop to the Forward and the Bold.

Women, Madam, may be made to fear, when they love not! A Man who values not his own Peace will Govern any Spirit. A Man that does will be govern'd even by weak women-Will Compound for it. And his Wife will grow, as he will yield. What generous Woman, you'll say. But are there not, let me repeat, Five ungenerous to one truly generous, both Men and Women? Man to be sturdy. Woman to be perverse; if the Man be not sturdy. Lord, Child, you don't know what you say when you tell me you would not make a good Wife, but upon Terms: Yet know not who the Man is to whom you may give your Hand. The Rebel Daughter I have known to make a passive Wife. After some Struggles, then, you'll say: for a Woman of Spirit. Why, yes, I mean after some Struggles.

'Tis but the Man's setting out accordingly, Taking her down in her Wedding Shoes, as the saying is. No running from a Husband, as there may be to a Husband. Then by Degrees the Meek Child gets the Upper hand of the indulgent Parents.

But the Husband must conquer very early a perverse Wife or yield for ever. Prefers Pink and Yellow! Ay, Madam, and a very good Preference too! If a Woman. But Miss G., with all ye valour She pretends to, must make a good wife, and cannot help it, marry whom she will: since she has Generosity, and Worthiness, & Discretion, enough to make even an indifferent Husband a good one, while he beholds her chaste conversation, as the Text has it, coupled with Fear. So what need of putting Cases that can never happen to a Lady of her Prudence?

You are pleased, Madam, to make me and my Wife some Compliments as to our Management in our Family. I think the Tempers of my Four Girls, by what I have observed of them, are generous, and benevolent. They will all lead.

It would be Cruelty, Tyranny, Harlowe-Tyranny, to drive where you can lead. As to the Word Authority, it is a Word, in my Notion, that good Tempers need not ever heare used. You know this by Experience, I am sure. No Authority ought any Parent to use, but for a Child's good! But then the Child must not be ye Judge, in dissputable Cases, of the Means to be made Use of to attain that good! Foolish Parents will soon shew their Weakness: and wise Children their Strength. The one must only hope not to be despised at home. The other, if wise, will not despise them for their Weakness. But God help that Parent who is found out to be weak by its Child, and must lie at the Mercy of its Child's Generosity, whether Duty, Respect, or Fortune be in ye question!...

There is a good deal more, less to the purpose, but more to the showing us just how near akin Miss Grainger's upbringing may have been to Kitty Wogan's.

To what Purpose all this,' he says, 'to a young Lady so good as Miss Gr., and who has Parents that are evere Politely indulgent to her?'

Politely indulgent! It recalls one to nineteenth-century ethics quick enough. Poor parents of to-day, who spare the rod -and live to repent it!

Kitty Wogan would have been the better for such a brave. correspondent. And yet it is well that she wants not to be told her Duty, and is very near Perfection. Otherwise what should one be able to say to a young Lady who can declare that, altho' she subscribes to the justice of all the Arguments used by a Man who would mend her Theory (her Practice needs not mending), yet is she very nearly of the same Opinion that she was in? . . . A girl convinc'd against her will Is of the same opinion still.

Miss Kitty and Miss Grainger might certainly have shaken hands here.

6

'I will not allow you,' goes on Richardson, giving us a pretty clear insight, by the way, into the truly feminine nature of his fair correspondent, to write what you cannot think; nor opinions you cannot hold; nor justify what you cannot practise: Nor yet to tell me, that you cannot conform to argument you allow the force of! . .

One's only sorrow is that we have no further knowledge of 'Miss G.' One feels she had spirit and parts enough to have inspired a novel herself!

VIOLET A. SIMPSON.

HORROR leapt into Mademoiselle's eyes, but she commanded herself. She signed to Madame Carlat to be silent, and they listened, gazing at one another, hoping against hope that the woman was mistaken. A moment they waited, some were even beginning to breathe again, when the strident tones of Count Hannibal's voice rolled up the staircase, and put an end to doubt. Mademoiselle grasped the table and stood supporting herself by it. What are we to do?' she muttered. 'What are we to do?' and she turned distractedly towards the women. The courage which had supported her in her lover's absence had abandoned her now. 'If he finds him here I am lost! I am lost!'

'He will not know me,' Tignonville muttered. But he spoke uncertainly; and his gaze, shifting hither and thither, belied the boldness of his words.

Madame Carlat's eyes flew round the room; on her for once the burden seemed to rest. Alas! the room had no second door, and the windows looked on a courtyard guarded by Tavannes' people. And even now Count Hannibal's step rang on the stair! his hand was almost on the latch. The woman wrung her hands; then, a thought striking her, she darted to a corner where Mademoiselle's robes hung on pegs against the wall.

'Here!' she cried, raising them. 'Behind these! He may not be seen here! Quick, monsieur, quick! Hide yourself!'

It was a forlorn hope--the suggestion of one who had not thought out the position; and, whatever its promise, Mademoiselle's pride revolted against it.

'No,' she cried. 'Not there!' while Tignonville, who knew that the step was useless, since Count Hannibal must have

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Copyright, 1901, by Stanley J. Weyman, in the United States of America.