Letter LIV. LV. From the same.—
Now indeed is her heart broken, she says. A solemn
curse laid upon her by her father. Her sister’s
barbarous letters on the occasion.
Letter LVI. Miss Howe to Clarissa.—
A letter full of generous consolation and advice.
Her friendly vow.
Sends her fifty guineas in the leaves of a Norris’s
miscellanies.
Letter LVII. Clarissa to Miss Howe.—
A faithful friend the medicine of life. She is
just setting out for London. Lovelace has offered
marriage to her in so unreserved a manner, that she
wishes she had never written with diffidence of him.
Is sorry it was not in her power to comply with his
earnest solicitations. Returns her Norris:
and why.
Letter LVIII. LIX. Miss Howe to Clarissa.—
Sorry she has returned her Norris. Wishes she
had accepted of Lovelace’s unreserved offer
of marriage. Believes herself to have a sneaking
kindness for Hickman: and why. She blames
Mrs. Harlowe: and why.
In answer to Letter VIII. Clarissa states the
difference in the characters of Mr. Lovelace and Mr.
Hickman; and tells her, that her motives for suspending
marriage were not merely ceremonious ones. Regrets
Mrs. Howe’s forbidding the correspondence between
them. Her dutiful apology for her own mother.
Lesson to children.
Letter LX. Lovelace to Belford.—
Thinks he shall be inevitably manacled at last.
The lady’s extreme illness. Her filial
piety gives her dreadful faith in a father’s
curses. She lets not Miss Howe know how very
ill she was. His vows of marriage bring her
back to life. Absolutely in earnest in those
vows. [The only time he was so.] He can now talk
of love and marriage without check. Descants
upon Belford’s letter, No. LI.
Letter LXI. From the same.—
Is setting out for London. A struggle with his
heart. Owns it to be a villain of a heart.
A fit of strong, but transitory remorse. If
he do marry, he doubts he shall have a vapourish wife.
Thinks it would be better for both not to marry.
His libertine reasons. Lessons to the sex.
Letter LXII. From the same.—
They arrive at Mrs. Sinclair’s. Sally Martin
and Polly Horton set upon him. He wavers in
his good purposes. Dorcas Wykes proposed, and
reluctantly accepted for a servant, till Hannah can
come. Dorcas’s character. He has
two great points to carry. What they are.
OF
Miss Howe, to miss Clarissa Harlowe
Tuesday, nine o’clock.
I write, because you enjoin me to do so. Love
you still!—How can I help it, if I would?
You may believe how I stand aghast, your letter communicating
the first news—Good God of Heaven and Earth!—But
what shall I say?—I am all impatient for
particulars.
