Laurana blushed, and wept.  Her aunt promised her, that every body would love her, and comfort her, and not be angry with her, if she would make her heart easy.

I am very particular, my dear Grandison.  I know you love I should be so.  From this minuteness, you will judge of the workings of her mind.  They are resolved to take your advice, (it was very seasonable,) and treat her with indulgence.  The count is earnest to have it so.

***

Camilla has just left me.  She says, that her young lady had a tolerable night.  She thinks it owing, in a great measure, to her being indulged in asking the servants, who saw you depart, how you looked; and being satisfied that you went away unhurt, and unaffronted.

Adieu, my dearest, my best friend.  Let me hear from you, as often as you can.

***

I just now understand from Camilla, that the dear girl has made an earnest request to my father, mother, and aunt; and been refused.  She came back from them deeply afflicted; and, as Camilla fears, is going into one of her gloomy fits again.  I hope to write again, if you depart not from Bologna before to-morrow:  but I must, for my own sake, write shorter letters.  Yet how can I?  Since, however melancholy the subject, when I am writing to you, I am conversing with you.  My dear Grandison, once more adieu.

O Lucy, my dear!  Whence come all the tears this melancholy story has cost me?  I cannot dwell upon the scenes!—­Begone, all those wishes that would interfere with the interest of that sweet distressed saint at Bologna!

How impolitic, Lucy, was it in them, not to gratify her impatience to see him!  She would, most probably, have been quieted in her mind, if she had been obliged by one other interview.

What a delicacy, my dear, what a generosity, is there in her love!

Sir Charles, in Lord L——­’s study, said to me, that his compassion was engaged, but his honour was free:  and so it seems to be:  but a generosity in return for her generosity, must bind such a mind as his.

LETTER III

MISS BYRON, TO MISS SELBY

In the doctor’s next letter, enclosed, you will find mention made of Sir Charles’s Literary Journal.  I fancy, my dear, it must be a charming thing.  I wish we could have before us every line he wrote while he was in Italy.  Once the presumptuous Harriet had hopes, that she might have been entitled—­But no more of these hopes—­It can’t be helped, Lucy.

***

DR. BARTLETT’S TWELFTH LETTER

Mr. Grandison proceeds thus: 

The next morning I employed myself in visiting and taking leave of several worthy members of the university, with whom I had passed many very agreeable and improving hours, during my residence in this noble city.  In my Literary Journal you have an account of those worthy persons, and of some of our conversations.  I paid my duty to the cardinal legate, and the gonfaloniere, and to three of his counsellors, by whom, you know, I had been likewise greatly honoured.  My mind was not free enough to enjoy their conversation:  such a weight upon my heart, how could it?  But the debt of gratitude and civility was not to be left unpaid.