"My mother is dead; I never knew her. My father has travelled for the past fifteen years in foreign lands; perhaps I shall never see him. While a mere child I was placed in Miss Hannah More's boarding-school at Bristol. One day we learned that our mistress was a poetic genius, that Dr. Johnson himself had deigned to encourage her. You cannot imagine, Sir Joshua, what a sensation the tidings created among us girls! We all sighed to compose verse--or to recite. It was discovered that I spoke rather better than the others. I swear to you that I was possessed of but one desire,--to appear in costume, to escape from that frightful gray gown and that horrible Quaker bonnet in which we were all hooded. One day I was made to declaim before Mr. Garrick. He wished to give me lessons and make an actress of me. And a few months later I made my _début_." "And a genuine triumph it was! I was there." "It was then that I was informed that I had an aunt, a sister of my mother, and I was forthwith placed in her care, in her guardianship." "And she has rigorously acquitted herself of the mission which was confided to her." The child heaved a deep sigh. "Ah, Sir Joshua! It is not that she is unkind in any way, but she is my constant shadow. In the wings, in the greenroom, at the rehearsals, she is ever at my side, answering questions which are put to me, refusing invitations, reading letters which are addressed to me, and forcing me to sing psalms to put to rout the evil thoughts which I find in Shakespeare!" "I see; and you long to be free?" "Oh, yes, passionately!" "And what use would you make of your liberty?" "Oh, I can't fancy. Perhaps I might love virtue if it were not crammed down my throat." "Good!" "But you do not know the worst yet." "Well?" "The worst--is Reuben!" "And who may Reuben be?" "My cousin, my aunt's son; but he is no Quaker. He belongs to one of those old, rigid, cruel sects which have been perpetuated in shadow since the days of the Puritans. He is a fanatic; it would rejoice his heart to plunge into a sea of papist blood; meanwhile he torments me." "Perhaps he loves you?" "Yes, according to his light, which surely is not a fair light." "And what is the proper method of loving?" The girl burst into a coquettish laugh. "You ask me more than I can tell, Sir Joshua." "Indeed? Pray how, then, can one who is ignorant of the sentiment impart its faithful presentment to others? How can she communicate an emotion which finds no echo in her own soul? Who has the ability to teach her to invest her voice, her gestures, her glance, her very smile, with the woes and joys of love?" "Garrick, I tell you!" That name, cast haphazard into their conversation, caused a divergence. "Poor Garrick!" exclaimed Reynolds ruefully; "it is scarcely yet a year since we left him alone in his glory beneath the pavement of Westminster."