He is arrived (Mr. Woodley, I mean); we are all charmed with him. I knew
him instantly; tho' the beautiful boy is now flushed with manliness. It
is five years since we saw him last--he did not meet us without the
utmost emotion, which we attributed to the recollection that we now
owned those lands which ought in right to have been his. He has,
however, by Mr. Spencer's account, been very successful in life, and is
master of a plentiful fortune. He seems to merit the favour of all the
world.
Adieu!
Your's most truly,
LOUISA GRENVILLE.
LETTER LIV.
TO Lady STANLEY.
Melford-Abbey.
Mr. Spencer tells me, it is a proof I have great ascendancy over him,
since he has made me the _confidante_ of his friend Woodley's
attachment. And who do you think is the object of it? To whom has the
constant youth paid his vows in secret, and worn away a series of years
in hopeless, pining love? Ah! my Julia, who can inspire so tender, so
lasting, a flame as yourself? Yes! you are the saint before whose shrine
the faithful Woodley has bent his knee, and sworn eternal truth.
You must remember the many instances of esteem we have repeatedly
received from him. To me it was friendship; to my sister it was
love--and _love_ of the purest, noblest kind.
He left Woodley-vale, you recollect, about five years ago. He left all
he held dear; all the soft hope which cherished life, in the flattering
idea of raising himself, by some fortunate stroke, to such an eminence,
that he might boldly declare how much, how fondly, he adored his Julia.
In the first instance, he was not mistaken--he has acquired a noble
fortune. Plumed with hope and eager expectation, he flew to
Woodley-vale, and the first sound that met his ear was--that the object
of his tenderest wishes was, a few weeks before his arrival, married. My
Julia! will not your tender sympathizing heart feel, in some degree, the
cruel anxiety that must take place in the bosom which had been, during a
long journey, indulging itself in the fond hope of being happy--and just
at that point of time, and at that place, where the happiness was to
commence, to be dashed at once from the scene of bliss, with the account
of his beloved's being married to another? What then remained for the
ill-fated youth, but to fly from those scenes where he had sustained so
keen a disappointment; and, without calling one glance on the plains the
extravagance of his father had wrested from him, seek in the bosom of
his friends an asylum?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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