He flew into a violent passion.  “Is it thus,” said he, “I am to be answered?  Begone from my sight!”

The next day he sent me up by Mrs. Jewkes his proposals.  They were seven in number, and included the promise of an estate of L250 a year in Kent, to be settled on my father; and a number of suits of rich clothing and diamond rings were to be mine if I would consent to be his mistress.

My answer was that my parents and their daughter would much rather choose to starve in a ditch or rot in a noisome dungeon, than accept of the fortune of a monarch upon such wicked terms.

Mrs. Jewkes now tells me he is exceedingly wroth, and that I must quit the house, and may go home to my father and mother.

Sunday night.  Well, my dear parents, here I am at an inn in a little village.  And Robin, the coachman, assures me he has orders to carry me to you.  O, that he may say truth and not deceive me again!

“I have proofs,” said my master to Mrs. Jewkes, when I left the house, “that her virtue is all her pride.  Shall I rob her of that?  No, let her go, perverse and foolish as she is; but she deserves to go away virtuous, and she shall.”

I think I was loth to leave the house.  Can you believe it?  I felt something so strange and my heart was so heavy.

IV.—­Virtue Triumphant—­Pamela’s Journal

Monday Morning, eleven o’clock. We are just come in here, to the inn kept by Mr. Jewkes’s relations.

Just as I sat down, before setting out to pursue my journey, comes my master’s groom, all in a foam, man and horse, with a letter for me, as follows: 

“I find it in vain, my Pamela, to struggle against my affection for you, and as I flatter myself you may be brought to love me, I begin to regret parting with you; but, God is my witness, from no dishonourable motives, but the very contrary.

“You cannot imagine the obligation your return will lay me under to your goodness, and if you are the generous Pamela I imagine you to be let me see by your compliance the further excellency of your disposition.  Spare me, my dearest girl, the confusion of following you to your father’s, which I must do if you go on—­for I find I cannot live without you, and I must be—­

“Yours, and only yours.”

What, my dear parents, will you say to this letter?  I am resolved to return to my master, and am sending this to you by Thomas the coachman.

It was one o’clock when we reach’d my master’s gate.  Everybody was gone to rest.  But one of the helpers got the keys from Mrs. Jewkes, and open’d the gates.  I was so tired when I went to get out of the chariot that I fell down, and two of the maids coming soon after helped me to get up stairs.

It seems my master was very ill, and had been upon the bed most of the day; but being in a fine sleep, he heard not the chariot come in.

Tuesday Morning.  Mrs. Jewkes, as soon as she got up, went to know how my master did, and he had had a good night.  She told him he must not be surprised—­that Pamela was come back.  He raised himself up.