{What a never-to-be satisfied _Length_ has this Subject always the Power of attracting me into! And yet, before I have done, I must by your means tell the Author a _Story_, which a Judge not so skilful in Nature as he is, might be in Danger perhaps of mistaking, for a trifling and silly one. I expect it shou’d give him the clearest Conviction, in a Case he is subject to question.} [_del._ 8th] {We have a lively little Boy in the Family, about seven Years old---but, alas for him, poor Child! quite unfriended; and born to no Prospect. He is the Son of an honest, poor Soldier, by a Wife, grave, unmeaning, and innocent. Yet the Boy, (see the Power of connubial _Simplicity_) is so pretty, so genteel, and gay-spirited, that we have made him, and design’d him, our _own_, ever since he could totter, and waddle. The wanton Rogue is half Air: and every Motion he acts by has a Spring, like _Pamela_’s when she threw down the Card-table. All this Quickness, however, is temper’d by a good-natur’d Modesty: so that the wildest of his Flights are thought rather diverting than troublesome. He is an hourly Foundation for Laughter, from the Top of the House to the Parlours: and, to borrow an Attribute from the Reverend Mr. _Peters_, (tho’ without any Note of his Musick) _plays a very good_ FIDDLE in the Family. I have told you the History of this _Tom-tit_ of a Prater, because, ever since my first reading of PAMELA, he puts in for a Right to be _one_ of her Hearers; and, having got half her Sayings by heart, talks in no other Language but hers: and, what really surprises, and has charm’d me into a _certain_ Fore-taste of her Influence, he is, at once, become fond of his Book; which (before) he cou’d never be brought to attend to---that _he may read_ PAMELA, he says, _without stopping_. The first Discovery we made of this Power over so unripe and unfix’d an Attention, was, one Evening, when I was reading her Reflections at the _Pond_ to some Company. The little rampant Intruder, being kept out by the Extent of the Circle, had crept under my Chair, and was sitting before me, on the Carpet, with his Head almost touching the Book, and his Face bowing down toward the Fire.---He had sat for some time in this Posture, with a Stillness, that made us conclude him asleep: when, on a sudden, we heard a Succession of heart-heaving Sobs; which while he strove to conceal from our Notice, his little Sides swell’d, as if they wou’d burst, with the throbbing Restraint of his Sorrow. I turn’d his innocent Face, to look toward me; but his Eyes were quite lost, in his _Tears_: which running down from his Cheeks in free Currents, had form’d two sincere little Fountains, on that Part of the Carpet he hung over. All the Ladies in Company were ready to devour him with Kisses: and he has, since, become doubly a Favourite---and is perhaps the youngest of _Pamela’s Converts_.}