CHARLOTTE G.

Letter XLIV.

Lady Grandison to Mrs. Shirley.

Grand ison-liall, Monday, April 16. And must I, my dear grandmamma, be more par-ticular in relation to ourselves, our guests, our amuse — ments, diversions, conversations Why then does not Lucy write as usual, every tender, every engaging, every lively occurrence that happens at Selby — hoiise, and Shirley-manor? Is she so much taken up with her agreeable peer, that she must leave the obliging task wholly to Nancy and Emily? I don’t care. Thei/ shall be my best girls; and I will put down my Lucy as a mere woman of quality before shs has the title. Yet let me tell her, that could honest Mr. Fowler have courted for himself, have suffered his heart to rise to his lips, I should have wished by her means, to have been related to him and Sir Rowland. But that matter, it seems, is as good as over; and 1 will proceed to do mj duty, whether she does hers or not.

I have told you, madam, how much our guests are pleased with us and the place. How much we are charmed with them, I need not tell you. Every praise you have heard of them, is confirmed and heightened, on a more intimate knowledge of them.

Lord and Lady L. are with us. Lord and Lady G. will come as soon as they can. Lady L. has her sweet infant Avith lier. And I hope Lady G. will not come without my god-child.

Sir Edward Beauchamp is at present our guest. The good doctor, you know, is at home here; and how beloved, how revered, by every one!

Sir Charles! The soul of us all! O madam! never surely was one spot blessed with so many per-sons of one mind, as are now rejoicing together at Cirandison-hall.

And pray, my dear grandmanmia, let me ask; Would it notbeafi’c’ctatioii rather than modesty, were I to leave myself unnamed in this noble circle? I will )i()t. luvery body, for:5’ir Charles’s sake, looks on me. witii the kindest partiality, and my heart tells me tiiat being his as much as my own, it deserves that partiality.

Except at certain devotional hours of retirement, we knov. — not, but that we are all of one faith. No-thing of religious subjects is ever mentioned among us, but in those points in which all good Christians are agreed. You, madam, who have a true catholic charity for the worthy of all persuasions, would be delighted to see the ail’ectionate behaviour of the i^uo fathers (I will call them) to each other. When they are not in tiie general company, they are alv,-ays together, walking, riding out; or in the aparN ment of each other, reading, conversing. The dear Clementina cannot but see, that charitable and great minds, however difll’ring in some even esseiitial articles of religion, might mingle hearts, and love each other; and from Sir Charles’s Catholicism, that she might have been happy with him, and kept her own faith. But, no! it would in her notion, now I recollect, have been a dangerous trial. She could not trust her ox-n heart Great and noble lady! how much is she to be revered!