If you do, it will be impossible
for me to send it, or that it should answer the good end I propose by it.
'I have promised, that I will not approach you without your leave. If I
find you easy, and not attempting to dispute or avoid your present lot, I
will keep to my word, although it is a difficulty upon me. Nor shall
your restraint last long: for I will assure you, that I am resolved very
soon to convince you of my good intentions, and with what ardour I am
'Yours, etc.'
The letter he prescribed for me was as this:
'DEAR Mrs. JERVIS,
'I have, instead of being driven by Robin to my dear father's, been
carried off, where I have no liberty to tell. However, at present, I am
not used hardly; and I write to beg you to let my dear father and mother,
whose hearts must be well nigh broken, know that I am well; and that I
am, and, by the grace of God, ever will be, their honest, as well as
dutiful daughter, and 'Your obliged friend.'
'I must neither send date nor place; but have most solemn assurances of
honourable usage.'
I knew not what to do on this most strange request and occasion. But my
heart bled so much for you, my dear father, who had taken the pains to go
yourself, and inquire after your poor daughter, as well as for my dear
mother, that I resolved to write, and pretty much in the above form, that
it might be sent to pacify you, till I could let you, somehow or other,
know the true state of the matter.
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