I have, at last, a letter from my unrelenting sister. Would to Heaven I had not provoked it by my second letter to my aunt Hervey! It lay ready for me, it seems. The thunder slept, till I awakened it. I enclose the letter itself. Transcribe it I cannot. There is no bearing the thoughts of it: for [shocking reflection!] the curse extends to the life beyond this.
I am in the depth of vapourish despondency. I can only repeat—shun, fly, correspond not with a wretch so devoted as
CL. HARLOWE. [ [!-- H2 anchor --] ]
LETTER LV
TO MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE TO BE LEFT AT MR. OSGOOD'S, NEAR SOHO-SQUARE FRIDAY, APRIL 21.
It was expected you would send again to me, or to my aunt Hervey. The enclosed has lain ready for you, therefore, by direction. You will have no answer from any body, write to whom you will, and as often as you will, and what you will.
It was designed to bring you back by proper authority, or to send you whither the disgraces you have brought upon us all should be in the likeliest way, after a while, to be forgotten. But I believe that design is over: so you may range securely—nobody will think it worth while to give themselves any trouble about you. Yet my mother has obtained leave to send you your clothes of all sorts: but your clothes only. This is a favour you'll see by the within letter not designed you: and now not granted for your sake, but because my poor mother cannot bear in her sight any thing you used to wear. Read the enclosed, and tremble.
ARABELLA HARLOWE.
TO THE MOST UNGRATEFUL AND UNDUTIFUL OF DAUGHTERS HARLOWE-PLACE, APRIL 15.
SISTER THAT WAS!