'I cannot be ungenerous.' To the noble lady, I suppose? He must take compassion on her. And did he think himself under an obligation to my forwardness to make this declaration to me, as to one who wished him to be ungenerous to such a lady for my sake!--I cannot bear the thought of this. Is it not as if he had said, 'Fond Harriet, I see what you expect from me--But I must have compassion for, I cannot be ungenerous to, Clementina!'--But, what a poor word is compassion! Noble Clementina! I grieve for you, though the man be indeed a generous man!--O defend me, my better genius, from wanting the compassion even of a Sir Charles Grandison! But what means he by the word selfish! He cannot be selfish!--I comprehend not the meaning of this word--Clementina has a very high fortune--Harriet but a very middling one. He cannot be unjust, ungenerous to Clementina--Nor yet selfish--This word confounds me, from a man that says nothing at random! Well, but breakfast-time is come, while I am busy in self-debatings. I will go down, that I may not seem to affect parade. I will endeavour to see with indifference, him that we have all been admiring and studying for this last fortnight, in such a variety of lights. The christian: the hero: the friend:--Ah, Lucy! the lover of Clementina: the generous kinsman of Lord W----: the modest and delicate benefactor of the Mansfields: the free, gay, raillier of Lady Beauchamp; and, in her, of all our sex's foibles! But he is come! While I am prating to you with my pen, he is come--Why, Lucy, would you detain me?--Now must the fool go down in a kind of hurry: Yet stay till she is sent for.--And that is now. LETTER XI MISS BYRON.--IN CONTINUATION O Lucy, I have such a conversation to relate to you!--But let me lead to it. Sir Charles met me at the opening of the door. He was all himself. Such an unaffected modesty and politeness; yet such an ease and freedom! I thought, by his address, that he would have taken my hand; and both hands were so emulatively passive--How does he manage it to be so free in a first address, yet so respectful, that a princess could not blame him! After breakfast, my cousins being sent for out to attend Sir John Allestree and his Niece, Sir Charles and I were left alone: and then, with an air equally solemn and free, he addressed himself to me. The last time I had the honour of being alone with my good Miss Byron, I told her a very tender tale. I was sure it would raise in such a heart as hers generous compassion for the noblest lady on the continent; and I presumed, as my difficulties were not owing either to rashness or indiscretion, that she would also pity the relater. The story did indeed affect you; yet, for my own sake, as well as yours, I referred you to Dr. Bartlett, for the particulars of some parts of it, upon which I could not expatiate.