Jewkes came
up in a great fright, guessing at the mistake, and that I had her letter,
and she found me with it open in my hand, just sinking away. What
business, said she, had you to read my letter? and snatched it from me.
You see, said she, looking upon it, it says Mrs. Jewkes, at top: You
ought, in manners, to have read no further. O add not, said I, to my
afflictions! I shall be soon out of all your ways! This is too much!
too much! I never can support this--and threw myself upon the couch, in
my closet, and wept most bitterly. She read it in the next room, and
came in again afterwards. Why, this, said she, is a sad letter indeed: I
am sorry for it: But I feared you would carry your niceties too far!--
Leave me, leave me, Mrs. Jewkes, said I, for a while: I cannot speak nor
talk.--Poor heart! said she; Well, I'll come up again presently, and hope
to find you better. But here, take your own letter; I wish you well; but
this is a sad mistake! And so she put down by me that which was intended
for me: But I have no spirit to read it at present. O man! man! hard-
hearted, cruel man! what mischiefs art thou not capable of, unrelenting
persecutor as thou art!
I sat ruminating, when I had a little come to myself, upon the terms of
this wicked letter; and had no inclination to look into my own.
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