_August 30_ Are you not tired of my Grimston journal, my Cecilia? Day after day rolls on, and the same dull repetition! Lady Grimston, the Dean, and Mr Arnold, perpetually! there is no bearing this, you cry. Well, but here is a new personage arrived to diversity the scene a little. Lady Grimston's daughter, a sweet woman; but her mother does not seem fond of her. It amazes me, for she is perfectly amiable, both in temper and person; she is a widow of about eight and twenty. Lady Grimston appears to treat her with a distance very unmaternal; and the poor young woman seems so humbled, that I pity her. She is come but on a visit, and we shall lose her in a week, for which I am very sorry, as I have taken a fancy to her. _September 1_ Poor Mrs Vere! that is the name of Lady Grimston's daughter. I can now give you the cause of her mother's coldness to her; I had it from herself; she told me her little history this evening in the garden, with a frankness that charmed me. How happy you are, dear Miss Bidulph, said she! you seem to be blessed with one of the tenderest of parents. I am indeed, I answered; she is one of the best of mothers, and the best of women. She sighed, and a tear started into her eye; I too was happy once, said she, when my indulgent father lived. I hope, madam, Lady Grimston is to you, what my good mother is to me. She shook her head: No, Miss Bidulph, it must be but too obvious to you that she is not. I should not have introduced the subject, if the cold severity of her looks were not so apparent that you must have taken notice of them. My mother is, undoubtedly, a very good woman; and you may naturally suppose, that my conduct has been such as to deserve her frowns; I will therefore tell you my melancholy, though short story. It is now about twelve years since Mr Vere paid his addresses to me. He was the eldest son of a gentleman of family and fortune, who then lived in this country. I was about sixteen, and the darling of my father; who was perhaps the more indulgent to me, as he knew my mother's severity. Mr Vere was but two years older than myself, and a childish courtship had gone on for some time between us, before it was suspected by any body; and to say the truth, before I was well aware of the consequences myself. It happened, that an elderly gentleman of a great estate, just at that time saw and liked me, and directly made proposals to my mother, as she was very well known to hold the reins of government in her family. This offer, I suppose, was advantageous; for she immediately consulted my father upon it, or rather gave him to understand that she meant to dispose of her daughter in marriage.