always best thought of. But I dare say you will not think ill of your
mother, for that would not be dutiful, nor at all agreeable to what
your poor dear grandfather always taught. Nobody can suppose that I am
not come to years of discretion; and you very well know I have always
been a good and tender mother to you; and so I always shall be; and I
am sure you will not think hardly and improperly of my conduct in any
way, for that would be very unkind and unbecoming; and, if I have done
all for the best, to be hardly thought of afterwards would be very
improper indeed. Mr. Thornby [the lawyer] is a very prudent man, and
so I have acted by his advice, which you may well think cannot be
wrong; and his nephew, Mr. Wakefield, is a gentleman that nobody need
be ashamed of owning; and so, since you must be told, you may as well
be told at first as at last--I am married; which I hope and expect you
will think was a very prudent thing. I am sure when you come to know
Mr. Wakefield you will like him prodigiously. He sends his kind
blessing to you, and so I remain your ever loving mother

JANE WAKEFIELD.'

Little as I was attached to personal interest or fearful of being left
without a provision, I own this letter electrified me. Was this the
tone of affection? Had it vanished so instantly? After such strong and
reiterated professions for my sake never to have a second husband, not
only to marry but to cool intirely toward me, and to be only anxious,
in a poor selfish circumlocutory apology, for a conduct which she
herself felt to be highly reprehensible!

The lawyer too! His nephew? Not satisfied with the executorship, he
had engulphed the whole in his family, the stipend of a hundred a year
while I remained at college, and a thousand pounds for the purchase