Memoirs of Miss Sidney Biddulph / Extracted from her own Journal, and now first published

by Frances Chamberlaine Sheridan

They never shall, madam, said I: I thank you for this frank acknowlegement of your heart; such a proof of your confidence in me, I should be a wretch to abuse; and I hope to make such a use of the candid confession you have now made me, as will greatly promote your interest.

And is it possible, madam, said she, you can yield up the interest you have in Mr Faulkland without a pang? Oh! the exquisite charmer! and she said it with such an emphasis, drawing out her breath in long sighs. But you are heroic, as I said before: Nature did not mold your heart, as she has done those of the rest of your sex. Who that was beloved by Mr Faulkland, would yield him to another? Worlds! ten thousand worlds would I give to be beloved by him as you are! but you are a prodigy of a woman! I stopped Miss Burchell in her transports. There is less merit, madam, than you ascribe to me in my conduct: I readily acquiesced under my mother’s rejection of Mr Faulkland, when he had some interest in my heart; but there is no self-denial in what I am now about to do for you. My affections have long since changed their object, and now lie buried with him in his grave.

My tears here bore witness to the truth of what I said: Miss Burchell wept too. Her mind was agitated; the confession she had made to me had humbled her; her heart overflowed with fondness; I had filled her with pleasing hopes: all these sensations combined together, melting her into tenderness: she is made up of tears, and sighs, and romantic wishes.

I can now, said I, assure Mr Faulkland, that you have done him justice, and that he is highly obliged to your candour.

She interrupted me; But, madam, if he should know how late my acknowlegements came—He need not know it, said I; my mother shall not know it either; leave every thing to my management, and depend upon my word. She snatched my hand eagerly, and kissed it.

But oh! madam, above all things, said she, let not Sir George Bidulph know any thing of your intended goodness, in mediating for me. He hates me, implacably he hates me. I upbraid him not for it: his strong attachment to Mr Faulkland is the cause of it: he accuses me in his heart of being the occasion (which I own I was, though ignorantly) of Mr Faulkland’s disappointment. I am sure, were he to know what you design in my favour, he would counterwork you, and use all his influence over his friend to ruin me.

I made her easy on this head, by assuring her Sir George should know nothing of the matter; and put her in mind how lucky it was for her that he was absent.

I cannot help thinking, my Cecilia, that there is a sort of fatality has attended Mr Faulkland’s attachment to me. By what a strange accident did we come to the knowledge of Miss Burchell’s affair! How strong were my mother’s prepossessions against Mr Faulkland; and how many little circumstances concurred her to encourage in this disposition! His letter from Bath to my brother helped to confirm her in her dislike of his conduct; Miss Burchell’s letter to Mr Faulkland, though meant very differently, was a strong motive of condemnation. The only means of justification left for him, my mother did not apply to, till it was too late; and then that very circumstances of it’s being too late to serve him, Miss Burchell acknowleges, was the reason that the very method which he had proposed for his defence, was turned to his condemnation.

Rooted, as my mother’s prejudices were, she engages herself, she engages me, in a promise, to use my endeavours to promote Miss Burchell’s marriage with Mr Faulkland. Does this not look as if some unseen power, who guides our actions, had set a stamp of disapprobation on the union between this man and me.

I wish I had seen that letter which Mr Faulkland wrote to my brother from Bath: my mother said, she did not read it through. He treated the subject lightly, and there was one circumstance in particular in it that shocked her; and yet surely, if the whole might not have borne a favourable construction, Sir George would not have shewn her that account, by way of justifying his friend. This reflection comes too late! Why did it not occur sooner to my mother or to me? We drew no other inference from Sir George’s disclosing this letter, than that as Mr Faulkland treated the affair ludicrously, it was therefore expected, both by him and my brother, that we should consider it so too. That could not have been the case. Miss Burchell’s confession has opened my eyes.—Poor Mr Faulkland! What wayward fate is thine! But let me beware of relenting; that might be fatal. There is still one indelible blot remains upon his conduct. Miss Burchell, blameable as she acknowleges herself, was still betrayed; and though not by Mr Faulkland, yet sure his having paid the price of her innocence to the wicked aunt, renders him so far guilty, as that he owes her a great reparation. This was a particular I durst not touch upon; the unhappy girl herself being ignorant of it. There is a wide gulph fixed between Mr Faulkland and me. How many things are leagued against him! Alas! he thinks the principal bar to his hopes is removed, and that if Miss Burchell has been just, he ought to be forgiven. But he little knows thy Sidney’s heart; critically delicate as my situation is, in regard him, I am removed a thousand times farther than ever from his wishes. Neither knows he the engagements I am under to Miss Burchell; which alone would put an ever-lasting bar between us. Unhappy Miss Burchell! She has bound me to her by stronger ties than ever. She has been ingenuous; she has owned her weakness to me; she declares she would have done this sooner, if it could have promoted my happiness: perhaps she would; shall I not then endeavour to promote her’s? I will, I must; my word is given. Yet Faulkland deserves—oh! he deserves a worthier lot.