Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded

So my dear lord and master handed my lady into his chariot, and her kinsman and his servants rode after them and I went up to my closet to ruminate on these things. And, foolish thing that I am, this poor Miss Sally Godfrey runs into my head!—How soon the name and quality of a wife gives one privileges, in one’s own account!—Yet, methinks, I want to know more about her; for, is it not strange, that I, who lived years in the family, should have heard nothing of this? But I was so constantly with my lady, that I might the less hear of it; for she, I dare say, never knew it, or she would have told me.

But I dare not ask him about the poor lady.—Yet I wonder what became of her! Whether she be living? And whether any thing came of it?—May be I shall hear full soon enough!—But I hope not to any bad purpose.

As to the other unhappy case, I know it was talked of, that in his travels, before I was taken into the family long, he had one or two broils; and, from a youth, he was always remarkable for courage, and is reckoned a great master of his sword. God grant he may never be put to use it! and that he may be always preserved in honour and safety!

About seven o’clock my master sent word, that he would have me not expect him to supper; for that he, and my lady his sister, and nephew, were prevailed upon to stay with Lady Jones; and that Lady Darnford, and Mr. Peters’s family, had promised to meet them there. I was glad they did not send for me; and the rather, as I hoped those good families being my friends, would confirm my lady a little in my favour; and so I followed my writing closely.

About eleven o’clock they returned. I had but just come down, having tired myself with my pen, and was sitting talking with Mrs. Jewkes and Mrs. Worden, whom I would, though unwillingly on their sides, make sit down, which they did over against me. Mrs. Worden asked my pardon, in a good deal of confusion, for the part she had acted against me; saying, That things had been very differently represented to her; and that she little thought I was married, and that she was behaving so rudely to the lady of the house.

I said, I took nothing amiss; and very freely forgave her; and hoped my new condition would not make me forget how to behave properly to every one; but that I must endeavour to act not unworthy of it, for the honour of the gentleman who had so generously raised me to it.

Mrs. Jewkes said, that my situation gave me great opportunities of shewing the excellence of my nature, that I could forgive offences against me so readily, as she, for her own part, must always, she said, acknowledge, with confusion of face.

People, said I, Mrs. Jewkes, don’t know how they shall act, when their wills are in the power of their superiors; and I always thought one should distinguish between acts of malice, and of implicit obedience; though, at the same time, a person should know how to judge between lawful and unlawful. And even the great, though at present angry they are not obeyed, will afterwards have no ill opinion of a person for withstanding them in their unlawful commands.

Mrs. Jewkes seemed a little concerned at this; and I said, I spoke chiefly from my own experience: For that I might say, as they both knew my story, that I had not wanted both for menaces and temptations; and had I complied with the one, or been intimidated by the other, I should not have been what I was.

Ah, madam! replied Mrs. Jewkes, I never knew any body like you; and I think your temper sweeter, since the happy day, than before; and that, if possible, you take less upon you.

Why, a good reason, said I, may be assigned for that: I thought myself in danger: I looked upon every one as my enemy; and it was impossible that I should not be fretful, uneasy, jealous. But when my dearest friend had taken from me the ground of my uneasiness, and made me quite happy, I should have been very blamable, if I had not shewn a satisfied and easy mind, and a temper that should engage every one’s respect and love at the same time, if possible: And so much the more, as it was but justifying, in some sort, the honour I had received: For the fewer enemies I made myself, the more I engaged every one to think, that my good benefactor had been less to blame in descending as he has done.

This way of talking pleased them both very much; and they made me many compliments upon it, and wished me always to be happy, as, they said, I so well deserved.

We were thus engaged, when my master, and his sister and her nephew, came in: and they made me quite alive, in the happy humour in which they all returned. The two women would have withdrawn: but my master said, Don’t go, Mrs. Worden: Mrs. Jewkes, pray stay; I shall speak to you presently. So he came to me, and, saluting me, said, Well, my dear love, I hope I have not trespassed upon your patience, by an absence longer than we designed. But it has not been to your disadvantage; for though we had not your company, we have talked of nobody else but you.

My lady came up to me, and said, Ay, child, you have been all our subject. I don’t know how it is: but you have made two or three good families, in this neighbourhood, as much your admirers, as your friend here.

My sister, said he, has been hearing your praises, Pamela, from half a score mouths, with more pleasure than her heart will easily let her express.

My good Lady Davers’s favour, said I, and the continuance of yours, sir, would give me more pride than that of all the rest of the world put together.

Well, child, said she, proud hearts don’t come down all at once; though my brother, here, has this day set mine a good many pegs lower than I ever knew it: But I will say, I wish you joy with my brother; and so kissed me.

My dear lady, said I, you for ever oblige me!—I shall now believe myself quite happy. This was all I wanted to make me so!—And I hope I shall always, through my life, shew your ladyship, that I have the most grateful and respectful sense of your goodness.

But, child, said she, I shall not give you my company when you make your appearance. Let your own merit make all your Bedfordshire neighbours your friends, as it has done here, by your Lincolnshire ones; and you’ll have no need of my countenance, nor any body’s else.

Now, said her nephew, ‘tis my turn: I wish you joy with all my soul, madam; and, by what I have seen, and by what I have heard, ‘fore Gad, I think you have met with no more than you deserve; and so all the company says, where we have been: And pray forgive all my nonsense to you.

Sir, said I, I shall always, I hope, respect as I ought, so near a relation of my good Lord and Lady Davers; and I thank you for your kind compliment.

Gad, Beck, said he, I believe you’ve some forgiveness too to ask; for we were all to blame, to make madam, here, fly the pit, as she did. Little did we think we made her quit her own house.

Thou always, said my lady, sayest too much, or too little.

Mrs. Worden said, I have been treated with so much goodness and condescension since you went, that I have been beforehand, sir, in asking pardon myself.

So my lady sat down with me half an hour, and told me, that her brother had carried her a fine airing, and had quite charmed her with his kind treatment of her; and had much confirmed her in the good opinion she had begun to entertain of my discreet and obliging behaviour: But, continued she, when he would make me visit, without intending to stay, my old neighbours, (for, said she, Lady Jones being nearest, we visited her first; and she scraped all the rest of the company together,) they were all so full of your praises, that I was quite borne down; and, truly, it was Saul among the prophets!

You may believe how much I was delighted with this; and I spared not my due acknowledgments.

When her ladyship took leave, to go to bed, she said, Goodnight to you, heartily, and to your good man. I kissed you when I came in, out of form; but I now kiss you out of more than form, I’ll assure you.

Join with me, my dear parents, in my joy for this happy turn; the contrary of which I so much dreaded, and was the only difficulty I had to labour with. This poor Miss Sally Godfrey, I wonder what’s become of her, poor soul! I wish he would, of his own head, mention her again.—Not that I am very uneasy, neither.—You’ll say, I must be a little saucy, if I was.

My dear master gave me an account, when we went up, of the pains he had taken with his beloved sister, as he himself styled her; and of all the kind things the good families had said in my behalf; and that he observed she was not so much displeased with hearing them, as she was at first; when she would not permit any body to speak of me as his wife: And that my health, as his spouse, being put; when it came to her, she drank it; but said, Come, brother, here’s your Pamela to you: But I shall not know how to stand this affair, when the Countess–, and the young ladies, come to visit me. One of these young ladies was the person she was so fond of promoting a match for, with her brother.—Lady Betty, I know, she said, will rally me smartly upon it; and you know, brother, she wants neither wit nor satire. He said, I hope, Lady Betty, whenever she marries, will meet with a better husband than I should have made her; for, in my conscience, I think I should hardly have made a tolerable one to any but Pamela.

He told me that they rallied him on the stateliness of his temper; and said, They saw he would make an exceeding good husband where he was; but it must be owing to my meekness, more than to his complaisance; for, said Miss Darnford, I could see well enough, when your ladyship detained her, though he had but hinted his desire of finding her at our house, he was so out of humour at her supposed noncompliance, that mine and my sister’s pity for her was much more engaged, than our envy.

Ay, said my lady, he is too lordly a creature, by much; and can’t bear disappointment, nor ever could.

Said he, Well, Lady Davers, you should not, of all persons, find fault with me; for I bore a great deal from you, before I was at all angry.

Yes, replied she: but when I had gone a little too far, as I own I did, you made me pay for it severely enough! You know you did, sauce-box. And the poor thing too, added she, that I took with me for my advocate, so low had he brought me! he treated her in such a manner as made my heart ache for her: But part was art, I know, to make me think the better of her.

Indeed, sister, said he, there was very little of that; for, at that time, I cared not what you thought, nor had complaisance enough to have given a shilling for your good or bad opinion of her or me. And, I own, I was displeased to be broken in upon, after your provocations, by either of you and she must learn that lesson, never to come near me, when I am in those humours; which shall be as little as possible: For, after a while, if let alone, I always come to myself, and am sorry for the violence of a temper, so like my dear sister’s here: And, for this reason think it is no matter how few witnesses I have of its intemperance, while it lasts; especially since every witness, whether they merit it or not, as you see in my Pamela’s case, must be a sufferer by it, if, unsent for, they come in my way.

He repeated the same lesson to me again, and enforced it and owned, that he was angry with me in earnest, just then; though more with himself, afterwards, for being so: But when, Pamela, said he, you wanted to transfer all my displeasure upon yourself, it was so much braving me with your merit, as if I must soon end my anger, if placed there; or it was making it so light to you, that I was truly displeased: for, continued he, I cannot bear that you should wish, on any occasion whatever, to have me angry with you, or not to value my displeasure as the heaviest misfortune that could befall you.

But, sir, said I, you know, that what I did was to try to reconcile my lady; and, as she herself observed, it was paying her a high regard. It was so, replied he; but never think of making a compliment to her, or any body living, at my expense. Besides, she had behaved herself so intolerably, that I began to think you had stooped too much, and more than I ought to permit my wife to do; and acts of meanness are what I can’t endure in any body, but especially where I love: and as she had been guilty of a very signal one, I had much rather have renounced her at that time, than have been reconciled to her.

Sir, said I, I hope I shall always comport myself so, as not wilfully to disoblige you for the future; and the rather do I hope this, as I am sure I shall want only to know your pleasure to obey it. But this instance shews me, that I may much offend, without designing it in the least.

Now, Pamela, replied he, don’t be too serious: I hope I shan’t be a very tyrannical husband to you: Yet do I not pretend to be perfect, or to be always governed by reason in my first transports; and I expect, from your affection, that you will bear with me when you find me wrong. I have no ungrateful spirit, and can, when cool, enter as impartially into myself as most men; and then I am always kind and acknowledging, in proportion as I have been out of the way.

But to convince you, my dear, continued he, of your fault, (I mean, with regard to the impetuosity of my temper; for there was no fault in your intention, that I acknowledge,) I’ll observe only, that you met, when you came to me, while I was so out of humour, a reception you did not expect, and a harsh word or two that you did not deserve. Now, had you not broken in upon me while my anger lasted, but staid till I had come to you, or sent to desire your company, you’d have seen none of this; but that affectionate behaviour, which I doubt not you’ll always merit, and I shall always take pleasure in expressing: and in this temper shall you always find a proper influence over me: But you must not suppose, whenever I am out of humour, that, in opposing yourself to my passion, you oppose a proper butt to it; but when you are so good, like the slender reed, to bend to the hurricane, rather than, like the sturdy oak, to resist it, you will always stand firm in my kind opinion, while a contrary conduct would uproot you, with all your excellencies, from my soul.

Sir, said I, I will endeavour to conform myself, in all things, to your will. I make no doubt but you will: and I’ll endeavour to make my will as conformable to reason as I can. And let me tell you, that this belief of you is one of the inducements I have had to marry at all: for nobody was more averse to this state than myself; and, now we are upon this subject, I’ll tell you why I was so averse.

We people of fortune, or such as are born to large expectations, of both sexes, are generally educated wrong. You have occasionally touched upon this, Pamela, several times in your journal, so justly, that I need say the less to you. We are usually so headstrong, so violent in our wills, that we very little bear control.

Humoured by our nurses, through the faults of our parents, we practise first upon them; and shew the gratitude of our dispositions, in an insolence that ought rather to be checked and restrained, than encouraged.

Next, we are to be indulged in every thing at school; and our masters and mistresses are rewarded with further grateful instances of our boisterous behaviour.

But, in our wise parents’ eyes, all looks well, all is forgiven and excused; and for no other reason, but because we are theirs.

Our next progression is, we exercise our spirits, when brought home, to the torment and regret of our parents themselves, and torture their hearts by our undutiful and perverse behaviour to them, which, however ungrateful in us, is but the natural consequence of their culpable indulgence to us, from infancy upwards.

And then, next, after we have, perhaps, half broken their hearts, a wife is looked out for: convenience, or birth, or fortune, are the first motives, affection the last (if it is at all consulted): and two people thus educated, thus trained up, in a course of unnatural ingratitude, and who have been headstrong torments to every one who has had a share in their education, as well as to those to whom they owe their being, are brought together; and what can be expected, but that they should pursue, and carry on, the same comfortable conduct in matrimony, and join most heartily to plague one another? And, in some measure, indeed, this is right; because hereby they revenge the cause of all those who have been aggrieved and insulted by them, upon one another.

The gentleman has never been controlled: the lady has never been contradicted.

He cannot bear it from one whose new relation, he thinks, should oblige her to shew a quite contrary conduct.

She thinks it very barbarous, now, for the first time, to be opposed in her will, and that by a man from whom she expected nothing but tenderness.

So great is the difference between what they both expect from one another, and what they both find in each other, that no wonder misunderstandings happen; that these ripen to quarrels; that acts of unkindness pass, which, even had the first motive to their union been affection, as usually it is not, would have effaced all manner of tender impressions on both sides.