I am very sorry for the cause of Lady Ik’tty’s af-fliction. Pity! the good lady took not But I will not be severe, after I have said, that children’s faults are not always origiiialli/ their own.

Poor Miss Cantillon! But she was not under age; and a.s her punishment was of her own choosing I am sorry, however, for both. I hope, after they have smarted, something will be done for the poor wretches. Good parents xuill be placable; bad ones, or such as have not given good examples, ought to be so,

God continue to you, my dear cousins both, your present comforts, and increase your pleasures! for all your pleasures are innocent ones! prays Your ever-obliged and affectionate

HARRIET BYRON

Letter VIII.

Miss Byron to Lady G.

Selby-house, Wednesday, September 20.

MY DEAREST LADY G.

Do you know what is become of your brother? My grandmamma Shirley has seen his ghost; and talked with it near an hour; and then it vanished. Be not surprised, my dear creature. I am still in amaze at the account my grandmamma gives us of its ap-peai’ance, discourse, and vanishing! Nor was the dear parent in a reverie. It happened in the mid-dle of the afternoon, all in broad day.

Thus she tells it: ‘ I was sitting,’ said she, ‘ in my own drawing-room, yesterday, by myself; when, in came James, to whom it first appeared, and told me, that a gentleman desired to be introduced to me. I was reading Slierlock upon Death, with that cheer-fulness with which I always meditate the subject. I gave orders for his admittance; and in came, to appearance, one of the handsomest men I ever saw in my life, in a riding-dress. It was a courteous ghost: it saluted me; or at least I thought it did: for it answering to the description that you my Harriet, had given me of that amiable man, I was surprised. But, contrary to the manner of ghosts, it spoke first Venerable lady, it called me; and said its name was Grandison, in a voice so like what I had heard you speak of his, that I had no doubt but it was Sir Charles Grandison himself; and was ready to fall down to welcome him.

‘ It took its place by me: You, madam, it said, will forgive this intrusion: and it made several fine speeches, with an air so modest, .sy; manly It had almost all the talk to itself. I could only bow, and be pleased; for still I thought it was corporally, and indeed. Sir Charles Grandison. It said, that it had but a very little while to stay: it must reach, I don’t know what place, that night What, said I, will you not go to Selby-house? Will you notsee my daughter Byron? Will you not see her aunt Selby? No, it desired to be excused. It talked of leaving a pacquet behind it; and seemed to pull out of its pocket a parcel of letters sealed up. It broke the seal, and laid the parcel on the table before me. It refused refreshment, it desired, in a courtly manner, an answer to what it had discoursed upon Made a profound reverence and vanished.’