“Save me, Edward, if you can. I am now willing to do as you proposed. I can no longer endure these annoyances--these cruel persecutions! My mother tells me that I must submit and marry this man, if we would save ourselves from ruin. It seems he has a claim against the estate for professional services; and as we have no other means of payment, without the sale of all that is left, he is base enough to insist upon my hand as the condition of his forbearance. He uses threats now, since entreaties have failed him. Oh, Edward, if you can save me, come!--for of a certainty, I can not bear this persecution much long and live. I am now willing to consent to do what Aunt Sophy recommended. Do not think me bold to say so, dear Edward--if I am bold, it is despair which makes me so.” I read this letter with mingled feelings of indignation and delight--indignation, because of the cruelties to which the worthless mother and the base suitor subjected one so dear and innocent delight, since the consent which she now yielded placed the means of saving her at my control. The consent was to flight and clandestine marriage, to which I had, with the assistance of our mutual friend, endeavored to persuade her, in several instances, before. The question now was, how to effect this object, since we had no opportunities for communication; but, before I took any steps in the matter, I made it a point of duty to deprive the infamous attorney, Perkins, of his means of power over the unhappy family. I determined to pay his legal charges; and William Edgerton, at my request, readily undertook this part of the business. They were found to be extortionate, and far beyond anything either warranted by the practice or the fee bill. Edgerton counselled me to resist the claim; but the subject was too delicate in all its relations, and my own affair with Perkins would have made my active opposition seem somewhat the consequence of malice and inveterate hostility. I preferred to pay the excess, which was done by Edgerton, rather than have any further dispute or difficulty with one whom I so much despised. Complete satisfaction was entered upon the records of the court, and a certified discharge, under the hand of Perkins himself--which he gave with a reluctance full of mortification--was sent in a blank envelope to Mrs. Clifford. She was thus deprived of the only excuse--if, indeed, such a woman ever needs an excuse for wilfulness--for persecuting her unhappy daughter on the score of the attorney.