Clarissa, Volume 6 - The History Of A Young Lady

Clarissa, Volume 6 − The History Of A Young Lady 127
have the insolence to congratulate me on the recovery of the best of uncles; while I am forced to seem as
much delighted as they, when, would it do me good, I could sit down and cry my eyes out.
I had bespoke my mourning in imagination, after the example of a certain foreign minister, who, before the
death, or even last illness of Charles II., as honest White Kennet tells us, had half exhausted Blackwell−hall of
its sables−−an indication, as the historian would insinuate, that the monarch was to be poisoned, and the
ambassador in the secret.−−And yet, fool that I was, I could not take the hint−−What the devil does a man
read history for, if he cannot profit by the examples he find in it?
But thus, Jack, is an observation of the old Peer's verified, that one misfortune seldom comes alone: and so
concludes
Thy doubly mortified LOVELACE.
LETTER L
MISS CLARISSA HARLOWE, TO MISS HOWE WEDNESDAY NIGHT, JUNE 28.
O MY DEAREST MISS HOWE!
Once more have I escaped−−But, alas! I, my best self, have not escaped! −−Oh! your poor Clarissa Harlowe!
you also will hate me, I fear!−−−−
Yet you won't, when you know all!
But no more of my self! my lost self. You that can rise in a morning to be blest, and to bless; and go to rest
delighted with your own reflections, and in your unbroken, unstarting slumbers, conversing with saints and
angels, the former only more pure than yourself, as they have shaken off the incumbrance of body; you shall
be my subject, as you have long, long, been my only pleasure. And let me, at awful distance, revere my
beloved Anna Howe, and in her reflect upon what her Clarissa Harlowe once was!
***
Forgive, O forgive my rambling. My peace is destroyed. My intellects are touched. And what flighty nonsense
must you read, if you now will vouchsafe to correspond with me, as formerly!
O my best, my dearest, my only friend! what a tale have I to unfold!−− But still upon self, this vile, this hated
self!−−I will shake it off, if possible; and why should I not, since I think, except one wretch, I hate nothing so
much? Self, then, be banished from self one moment (for I doubt it will be for no longer) to inquire after a
dearer object, my beloved Anna Howe!−−whose mind, all robed in spotless white, charms and
irradiates−−But what would I say?−−−−
***
And how, my dearest friend, after this rhapsody, which on re−perusal, I would not let go, but to show you
what a distracted mind dictates to my trembling pen! How do you? You have been very ill, it seems. That you
are recovered, my dear, let me hear. That your mother is well, pray let me hear, and hear quickly. This
comfort surely is owing to me; for if life is no worse than chequer−work, I must now have a little white to
come, having seen nothing but black, all unchequered dismal black, for a great, great while.
***