"Who would not be good?" was the inference: and the repetition from Billy, with his hands clapt together, "Poor widow woman!" gave me much pleasure.
So my childish story ended, with a kiss of each pretty dear, and their thanks for my story: and then came on Miss's request for a woman's story, as she called it. I dismissed my babies to their play; and taking Miss's hand, she standing before me, all attention, began in a more womanly strain to her; for she is very fond of being thought a woman; and indeed is a prudent sensible dear, comprehends any thing instantly, and makes very pretty reflections upon what she hears or reads as you will observe in what follows:
"There is nothing, my dear Miss Goodwin, that young ladies should be so watchful over, as their reputation: 'tis a tender flower that the least frost will nip, the least cold wind will blast; and when once blasted, it will never flourish again, but wither to the very root. But this I have told you so often, I need not repeat what I have said. So to my story.
"There were four pretty ladies lived in one genteel neighbourhood, daughters of four several families; but all companions and visitors; and yet all of very different inclinations. Coquetilla we will call one, Prudiana another, Profusiana the third, and Prudentia the fourth; their several names denoting their respective qualities.
"Coquetilla was the only daughter of a worthy baronet, by a lady very gay, but rather indiscreet than unvirtuous, who took not the requisite care of her daughter's education, but let her be over-run with the love of fashion, dress, and equipage; and when in London, balls, operas, plays, the Park, the Ring, the withdrawing-room, took up her whole attention. She admired nobody but herself, fluttered about, laughing at, and despising a crowd of men-followers, whom she attracted by gay, thoughtless freedoms of behaviour, too nearly treading on the skirts of immodesty: yet made she not one worthy conquest, exciting, on the contrary, in all sober minds, that contempt of herself, which she so profusely would be thought to pour down upon the rest of the world. After she had several years fluttered about the dangerous light, like some silly fly, she at last singed the wings of her reputation; for, being despised by every worthy heart, she became too easy and cheap a prey to a man the most unworthy of all her followers, who had resolution and confidence enough to break through those few cobweb reserves, in which she had encircled her precarious virtue; and which were no longer of force to preserve her honour, when she met with a man more bold and more enterprising than herself, and who was as designing as she was thoughtless. And what then became of Coquetilla?-Why, she was forced to pass over sea to Ireland, where nobody knew her, and to bury herself in a dull obscurity; to go by another name, and at last, unable to support a life so unsuitable to the natural gaiety of her temper, she pined herself into a consumption, and died, unpitied and unlamented, among strangers, having not one friend but whom she bought with her money."
"Poor Lady Coquetilla!" said Miss Goodwin; "what a sad thing it is to have a wrong education; and how happy am I, who have so good a lady to supply the place of a dear distant mamma!-But be pleased, Madam, to proceed to the next."
"Prudiana, my dear, was the daughter of a gentleman who was a widower, and had, while the young lady was an infant, buried her mamma. He was a good sort of man; but had but one lesson to teach to Prudiana, and that was to avoid all sort of conversation with the men; but never gave her the right turn of mind, nor instilled into it that sense of her religious duties, which would have been her best guard in all temptations. For, provided she kept out of the sight and conversation of the gentlemen, and avoided the company of those ladies who more freely conversed with the other sex, it was all her papa desired of her. This gave her a haughty, sullen, and reserved turn; made her stiff, formal, and affected. She had sense enough to discover early the faults of Coquetilla, and, in dislike to them, fell the more easily into that contrary extreme, which a recluse education, and her papa's cautions, naturally led her. So that pride, reserve, affectation, and censoriousness, made up the essentials of her character, and she became more unamiable even than Coquetilla; and as the other was too accessible, Prudiana was quite unapproachable by gentlemen, and unfit for any conversation, but that of her servants, being also deserted by those of her own sex, by whom she might have improved, on account of her censorious disposition. And what was the consequence? Why this: every worthy person of both sexes despising her, and she being used to see nobody but servants, at last throws herself upon one of that class: in an evil hour, she finds something that is taking to her low taste in the person of her papa's valet, a wretch so infinitely beneath her (but a gay coxcomb of a servant), that every body attributed to her the scandal of making the first advances; for, otherwise, it was presumed, he durst not have looked up to his master's daughter. So here ended all her pride. All her reserves came to this! Her censoriousness of others redoubled people's contempt upon herself, and made nobody pity her. She was finally turned out of doors, without a penny of fortune: the fellow was forced to set up a barber's shop in a country town; for all he knew was to shave and dress a peruke: and her papa would never look upon her more: so that Prudiana became the outcast of her family, and the scorn of all that knew her; and was forced to mingle in conversation and company with the wretches of her husband's degree!"
"Poor, miserable Prudiana!" said Miss—"What a sad, sad fall was hers. And all owing to the want of a proper education too!—And to the loss of such a mamma, as I have an aunt; and so wise a papa as I have an uncle!—How could her papa, I wonder, restrain her person as he did, like a poor nun, and make her unacquainted with the generous restraints of the mind?
"I am sure, my dear good aunt, it will be owing to you, that I shall never be a Coquetilla, nor a Prudiana neither. Your table is always surrounded with the best of company, with worthy gentlemen as well as ladies: and you instruct me to judge of both, and of every new guest, in such a manner, as makes me esteem them all, and censure nobody; but yet to see faults in some to avoid, and graces in others to imitate; but in nobody but yourself and my uncle, any thing so like perfection, as shall attract one's admiration to one's own ruin."
"You are young, yet, my love, and must always doubt your own strength; and pray to God, more and more, as your years advance, to give you more and more prudence, and watchfulness over your conduct.