This observation, once for all, as I said, I thought proper to make, to convince you that, to the best of my judgment, my errors, in matters as well of lesser moment as of greater, shall rather be the fault of my judgment than of my will.
I am, my dearest friend, Your ever obliged, CLARISSA HARLOWE.
LETTER XXXII
MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO MISS HOWE TUESDAY NIGHT, MAY 16.
Mr. Lovelace has sent me, by Dorcas, his proposals, as follow:
'To spare a delicacy so extreme, and to obey you, I write: and the rather that you may communicate this paper to Miss Howe, who may consult any of her friends you shall think proper to have intrusted on this occasion. I say intrusted; because, as you know, I have given it out to several persons, that we are actually married.
'In the first place, Madam, I offer to settle upon you, by way of jointure, your whole estate: and moreover to vest in trustees such a part of mine in Lancashire, as shall produce a clear four hundred pounds a year, to be paid to your sole and separate use quarterly.
'My own estate is a clear not nominnal 2000l. per annum. Lord M. proposes to give me possession either of that which he has in Lancashire, [to which, by the way, I think I have a better title than he has himself,] or that we call The Lawn, in Hertfordshire, upon my nuptials with a lady whom he so greatly admires; and to make that I shall choose a clear 1000l. per annum.
'My too great contempt of censure has subjected me to much slander. It may not therefore be improper to assure you, on the word of a gentleman, that no part of my estate was ever mortgaged: and that although I lived very expensively abroad, and made large draughts, yet that Midsummer-day next will discharge all that I owe in the world. My notions are not all bad ones. I have been thought, in pecuniary cases, generous. It would have deserved another name, had I not first been just.