"Only, Sir, that you have nothing to do, but to speak the word, and there is a child, whose papa and mamma too, I am sure, would consent to give up to me for my own instruction, as well as for her sake; and if, to speak in the Scripture phrase, I have found grace in your sight, kind Sir, speak this word to the dear child's papa."
"And have you thus come over me, Pamela!—Go, I am half angry with you, for leading me on in this manner against myself. This looks so artful, that I won't love you!"—"Dear Sir!"—"And dear Madam too! Be gone, I say!—You have surprised me by art, when your talent is nature, and you should keep to that!"
I was sadly baulked, and had neither power to go nor stay! At last, seeing I had put him into a kind of flutter, as now he had put me, I moved my unwilling feet towards the door.—He took a turn about the closet meantime.—"Yet stay," said he, "there is something so generous in your art, that, on recollection, I cannot part with you."
He took notice of the starting tear—"I am to blame!—You had surprised me so, that my hasty temper got the better of my consideration. Let me kiss away this pearly fugitive. Forgive me, my dearest love! What an inconsiderate brute am I, when compared to such an angel as my Pamela! I see at once now, all the force, and all the merit, of your amiable generosity: and to make you amends for this my hastiness, I will coolly consider of the matter, and will either satisfy you by my compliance, or by the reasons, which I will give you for the contrary.
"But, say, my Pamela, can you forgive my harshness?"—"Can I!—Yes, indeed, Sir," pressing his hand to my lips; "and bid me Go, and Be gone, twenty times a-day, if I am to be thus kindly called back to you, thus nobly and condescendingly treated, in the same breath!-I see, dear Sir," continued I, "that I must be in fault, if ever you are lastingly displeased with me. For as soon as you turn yourself about, your anger vanishes, and you make me rich amends for a few harsh words. Only one thing, dear Sir, let me add; if I have dealt artfully with you, impute it to my fear of offending you, through the nature of my petition, and not to design; and that I took the example of the prophet, to King David, in the parable of the Ewe-Lamb."
"I remember it, my dear—and you have well pointed your parable, and had nothing to do, but to say—'Thou art the man!'"
I am called upon by my dear benefactor for a little airing, and he suffers me only to conclude this long letter. So I am obliged, with greater abruptness than I had designed, to mention thankfully your ladyship's goodness to me; particularly in that kind, kind letter, in behalf of my dear parents, had a certain event taken place. Mr. B. shewed it to me this morning, and not before—I believe, for fear I should have been so much oppressed by the sense of your unmerited goodness to me, had he let me known of it before your departure from us, that I should not have been able to look up at you; heaping favours and blessings upon me, as you were hourly doing besides. What a happy creature am I!—But my gratitude runs me into length; and sorry I am, that I cannot have time just now to indulge it.
Is there nothing, my dear Lord and Lady Davers, my dear Lady Countess, and my good Lord C., that I can do, to shew at least, that I have a will, and am not an ungrateful, sordid creature?
And yet, if you give me power to do any thing that will have the appearance of a return, even that power will be laying a fresh obligation upon me—Which, however, I should be very proud of, because I should thereby convince you, by more than words, how much I am (most particularly, my dearest Lady Davers, my sister, my friend, my patroness), your most obliged and faithful servant, P.B.
Your dear brother joins in respectful thankfulness to his four noble gossips. And my Billy, by his lips, subscribed his. I hope so to direct his earliest notions, as to make him sensible of his dutiful obligation.