To the Earl of Belmont.
My Lord,
YOUR Lordship will be perhaps surprized
–Yet why surprized? Lady
Julia is absolutely an immense fine creature:
and though marriage, to those who know
life, cannot but seem an impertinent affair,
and what will subject me to infinite ridicule;
yet custom, and what one owes to one's
rank, and keeping up a family!–
In short, my Lord, people of a certain
consequence being above those romantic
views which pair the vulgar, I chose rather
to apply to your Lordship than the
Lady, and flatter myself my estate will
bear the strictest inspection: not but that,
I assure your Lordship, I set a due value
on Lady Julia's charms; and, though I
have visited every court in Europe, and
seen all that is lovely in the Beau sex,
never yet beheld the fair whom I would so
soon wish to see fill the rank of Lady Viscountess
Fondville as her Ladyship.
If my pretensions are so happy as to be
favourably received by your Lordship, I will
beg leave to wait on Lady Julia to-morrow,
and my lawyer shall attend your Lordship's
wherever and whenever you please to appoint.
Believe me, my Lord, with the most
perfect devotion,
Your Lordship's
most Obedient and
very Humble Servant,
Fondville.
