"Here," pursued Lady Belfield, "the sweet creature looked so contrite, that Sir John and I were both deeply affected."
"'You are not accustomed, Sir John,' resumed she, with a faint smile, 'to the office of a confessor, nor I to that of a penitent. But I make it a test to myself of my own sincerity to tell you the whole truth.
"'I wandered from room to room, fancying I should be more at ease in any other than that in which I was. I envied the starving tenant of the meanest garret. I envied Mrs. Stokes herself. Both might have pitied the pangs which rent my heart as I roamed through the decorated apartments of our spacious house. In the gayest part of London I felt the dreariness of a desert. Surrounded with magnificence, I endured a sense of want and woe, of which a blameless beggar can form no idea.
"'I went into the library: I took up a book which my lord had left on the table. It was a translation from a Roman classic. I opened it at the speech of the tragedian to Pompey: 'The time will come that thou shalt mourn deeply, because thou didst not mourn sooner!' I was struck to the heart. 'Shall a pagan,' said I, 'thus forcibly reprove me; and shall I neglect to search for truth at the fountain?'
"'I knew my lord would not come home from his club till the morning. The struggle in my soul between principle and pride was severe; but after a bitter conflict, I resolved to employ the night in writing him a long letter. In it I ingenuously confessed the whole state of my mind, and what had occasioned it. I implored his permission for my setting out next morning for Melbury Castle. I entreated him to prevail on his excellent aunt, Lady Jane, whom I had so shamefully slighted, to accompany me. I knew she was a character of that singular class who would be glad to revenge herself for any ill-treatment by doing me a service. Her company would be at once a pledge to my lord of the purity of my intentions, and to myself a security against falling into worse society. I assured him that I had no safeguard but in flight. An additional reason which I alleged for my absence was, that as I had promised to give a grand masquerade in a fortnight, the evading this expense would nearly enable me to discharge the debt which sat so heavy on my conscience.
"'I received a note from him as soon as he came home. With his usual complaisance he complied with my request. With his usual nonchalance, he neither troubled me with reproaches, nor comforted me with approbation.
"'As he knew that Lady Jane usually rose about the hour he came home from St. James's street, he obligingly went to her at once. I had not been in bed. He came to my dressing-room, and informed me that his aunt had consented at the first word. I expressed my gratitude to them both, saying that I was ready to set out that very day.'
"'You must wait till to-morrow,' said he. 'There is no accounting for the oddities of some people. Lady Jane told me she could not possibly travel on a Sunday. I wondered where was the impossibility. Sunday, I assured her, was the only day for traveling in comfort, as the road was not obstructed by wagons and carts. She replied, with a gravity which made me laugh, 'That she should be ashamed to think that a person of her rank and education should be indebted, for her being able to trample with more convenience on a divine law, to the piety of the vulgar who durst not violate it.' Did you ever hear any thing so whimsical, Matilda?' I said nothing, but my heart smote me. Never will I repeat this offense.
"'On the Monday we set out. I had kept close the preceding day, under pretense of illness. This I also assigned as an excuse in the cards sent to my invited guests, pleading the necessity of going into the country for change of air. Shall I own I dreaded being shut up in a barouche, and still more in the lonely castle, with Lady Jane? I looked for nothing every moment but 'the thorns and briars of reproof.' But I soon found that the woman whom I thought was a Methodist, was a most entertaining companion. Instead of austerity in her looks and reproach in her language, I found nothing but kindness and affection, vivacity and elegance. While she soothed my sorrows, she strengthened my better purposes. Her conversation gradually revived in my mind tastes and principles which had been early sown in it, but which the world seemed completely to have eradicated.
"'In the neighborhood of the castle, Lady Jane carried me to visit the abodes of poverty and sickness. I envied her large but discriminating liberality, and the means she had of gratifying it, while I shed tears at the remembrance of my own squandered thousands. I had never been hard-hearted, but I had always given to importunity, rather than to want or merit. I blushed, that while I had been absurdly profuse to cases of which I knew nothing, my own village had been perishing with a contagious sickness.