That is your fault, Pamela, said he. After I went
from you, I must needs look into your papers, and could not leave them
till I had read them through; and so 'twas three o'clock before I went to
sleep. I wish, sir, said I, you had had better entertainment. The worst
part of it, said he, was what I had brought upon myself; and you have not
spared me. Sir, said I--He interrupting me, said, Well, I forgive you.
You had too much reason for it. But I find, plainly enough, that if you
had got away, you would soon have been Williams's wife: and I can't see
how it could well have been otherwise. Indeed, sir, said I, I had no
notion of it, or of being any body's. I believe so, said he; but it must
have come as a thing of course; and I see your father was for it. Sir,
said he, I little thought of the honour your goodness would confer upon
her; and I thought that would be a match above what we could do for her,
a great deal. But when I found she was not for it, I resolved not to
urge her; but leave all to her own prudence.
I see, said he, all was sincere, honest, and open; and I speak of it, if
it had been done, as a thing that could hardly well be avoided; and I am
quite satisfied. But, said he, I must observe, as I have a hundred
times, with admiration, what a prodigious memory, and easy and happy
manner of narration, this excellent girl has! And though she is full of
her pretty tricks and artifices, to escape the snares I had laid for her,
yet all is innocent, lovely, and uniformly beautiful.
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