removed to a handsome, spacious house near Chelsea; and such was my father's solicitude for the quiet of his wife, that he placed Oliver, then thirteen, in a commercial academy in the city; Lucretia in a boarding-school; and in conformity with the wishes of his wife, who was not to be contradicted, I was sent to the Charter-house. My father, who loved children, and coveted them with as much avidity as he did money, received the promised blessing with transports of joy; and my sister Mary's birth was commemorated as the renewal of his own life. With fond delight he shewed the infant to his friends, and exultingly pointed out to them the promises of a face which was, indeed, angelic! She did not disappoint these early presages. As she advanced in age, she exhibited a form and face which perfectly corresponded with a temper of unequalled sweetness; and with such graces, it was no wonder she was beloved even to adulation by my father, and the whole house. An artist of some celebrity, and more skill, requested permission to take her picture. She was then in her eighth year, and the painter succeeded so happily, that he gained credit by exhibiting his work, and induced my father to have a full-length portrait of my mother, with Mary. This picture was my father's pride; an engraving was made from it, and scores of prints were sent to Jamaica, in order to convince our friends there, that the elaborate praises they had heard of this paragon of nature, did not exceed her beauty. This instance of my father's fond admiration of his child, and in which he was countenanced by all who knew her, would not have found a place here, but for the inferences I drew from it. I had long perceived that Lucretia did not partake with us in the partiality we manifested for the innocent and bewitching Mary. I had seen the envy with which she regarded every proof of kindness and favour shewn to her; the spiteful misrepresentations which she gave of her disposition to strangers; and the contempt she discovered for the weakness of my father's adulation of his darling. During the time she was sitting for her picture, the artist was become a favoured guest at our table; and, with apparent sincerity, he observed one day, that a Guido alone could do justice to Mary's style of beauty. I saw Lucretia colour with vexation; and that very afternoon I rescued the poor child from her correcting hands, to whom with some resentment, I said, that I should inform my father and mother of her severity and violence. "Do so!" answered she, bursting into tears, "tell them, that the _neglected, ugly_ Lucretia gave the _beauty_ a sound box on the ear, and a lesson that she needs. Tell them, her baby face will be her ruin, but it shall never excuse her faults with me." The sweet and mild creature, with tears, protested that she did not know how she had offended her, imploring her forgiveness and soliciting to be friends.