To the Countess Melespini.
Paris, June 24, 1759.
Madam,
YOU will receive this form the hands
of that son I have before had the
honor of recommending to your esteem.
I have accompanied him myself hither;
where, being perfectly satisfied with his behavior,
and convinced that generous minds
are best won to virtue by implicit confidence,
I have dissmissed the tutor I intended
to have sent with him to Italy, shall return to
England myself, and depend for his conduct
on his own discretion, his desire of obliging
me, and that nobleness of sentiment which
will make him feel the value of my friendship
for him in its utmost extent.
I have given him letters to the most worthy
person in every court I intend he should
visit; but, as my chief dependence for the
advantages of this tour are on the Count
and yourself, I have advised him to spend
most of his time at Rome, where, honored
by your friendship, I doubt not of his receiving
that last finishing, that delicate
polish, which, I flatter myself, if not deceived
by the fondness of a parent, is all he wants
to make him perfectly amiable.
To you, Madam, and the Count, I commit
him; defend him from the snares of
vice and the contagion of affectation.
You receive him an unexperienced
youth, with lively passions, a warm and affectionate
heart, an enthusiastic imagination,
probity, openness, generosity; and all those
advantages of person and mind, which a liberal
education can bestow. I expect him
from your hands a gentleman, a man of honor
and politeness, with the utmost dignity
of sentiment and character, adorned by that
easy elegance, that refined simplicity of manner,
those unaffected graces of deportment,
so difficult to describe, but which it is scarce
possible to converse much with you without
acquiring.
Sensible of the irresistible power of beauty,
I think it of the utmost consequence with
what part of the female world he converses.
I have from childhood habituated him to
the conversation of the most lovely and polite
amongst the best part of the sex, to give
him an abhorrence to the indelicacy of the
worst. I have endeavoured to impress on
his mind, the most lively ideas of the native
beauty of virtue; and to cultivate in
him that elegance of moral taste, that quick
sensibility, which is a nearer way to rectitude,
than the dull road of inanimate precept.
Continuing the same anxious cares, I
send him to perfect his education, not in
schools or academies, but in the conversation
of the most charming amongst women:
the ardent desire of pleasing you, and becoming
worthy your esteem, inseparable
from the happiness of knowing you, will be
the keenest spur to his attainments; and I
shall see him return all the fond heart of a
parent can wish, from his ambition of being
honored with your friendship.
To you, Madam, I shall make no secret
of my wish, that he may come back to
England unconnected. I have a view for
him beyond his most sanguine hopes, to
which, however, I entreat he may be a
stranger; the charms of the Lady cannot
fail of attaching a heart which has no prepossession,
from which, I conjure you, if
possible, to guard him. I should even hear
with pleasure you permitted him, to a certain
degree, to love you, that he might be
steeled to all other charms. If he is half
as much in love with you as his father,
all other beauties will lay snares for him
in vain.
I am, Madam,
With the most lively esteem,
Your obedient and devoted,
J. Mandeville.
Oh! Heavens! whilst I have been writing,
and thinking nothing of it, the pavilion,
which it seems has been some time prepared,
is raised opposite the window of the saloon,
at the end of a walk leading to the house.
We are to sup in it this evening; it is charmante;
the sight of it, and the idea of its
destination, makes my heart palpitate a little.
Mon Dieu! that ever I should be seduced
into matrimony!
Farewel for an hour or two.
You have no notion what divine dresses
we have making for the masquerade. I
shall not tell you particulars, as I would not
take off the pleasure of surprize; but they
are charming beyond conception.
Do you not doat on a masquerade, Bellville?
For my own part, I think it is the
quintessence of all sublunary joys; and,
without flattering my Lord's taste, I have a
strange fancy this will be the most agreeable
one I ever was at in my life: the scenes,
the drapery, the whole disposition of it is
enchanting.
Heavens! How little a while will it be
that I can write myself, A. Wilmot.
