'Nay, nay, if you have forgot,' cries Mrs. Ellison, 'I will tell you more another time; but come, will you go home? my dinner is ready by this time, and you shall dine with me.'
'Talk not to me of dinners,' cries Amelia; 'my stomach is too full already.'
'Nay, but, dear madam,' answered Mrs. Ellison, 'let me beseech you to go home with me. I do not care,' says she, whispering, 'to speak before some folks.' 'I have no secret, madam, in the world,' replied Amelia aloud, 'which I would not communicate to this lady; for I shall always acknowledge the highest obligations to her for the secrets she hath imparted to me.'
'Madam,' said Mrs. Ellison, 'I do not interfere with obligations. I am glad the lady hath obliged you so much; and I wish all people were equally mindful of obligations. I hope I have omitted no opportunity of endeavouring to oblige Mrs. Booth, as well as I have some other folks.'
'If by other folks, madam, you mean me,' cries Mrs. Atkinson, 'I confess I sincerely believe you intended the same obligation to us both; and I have the pleasure to think it is owing to me that this lady is not as much obliged to you as I am.'
'I protest, madam, I can hardly guess your meaning,' said Mrs. Ellison.--'Do you really intend to affront me, madam?'
'I intend to preserve innocence and virtue, if it be in my power, madam,' answered the other. 'And sure nothing but the most eager resolution to destroy it could induce you to mention such an appointment at such a time.'
'I did not expect this treatment from you, madam,' cries Mrs. Ellison; 'such ingratitude I could not have believed had it been reported to me by any other.'
'Such impudence,' answered Mrs. Atkinson, 'must exceed, I think, all belief; but, when women once abandon that modesty which is the characteristic of their sex, they seldom set any bounds to their assurance.'
'I could not have believed this to have been in human nature,' cries Mrs. Ellison. 'Is this the woman whom I have fed, have cloathed, have supported; who owes to my charity and my intercessions that she is not at this day destitute of all the necessaries of life?'
'I own it all,' answered Mrs. Atkinson; 'and I add the favour of a masquerade ticket to the number. Could I have thought, madam, that you would before my face have asked another lady to go to the same place with the same man?--but I ask your pardon; I impute rather more assurance to you than you are mistress of.--You have endeavoured to keep the assignation a secret from me; and it was by mere accident only that I discovered it; unless there are some guardian angels that in general protect innocence and virtue; though, I may say, I have not always found them so watchful.'
'Indeed, madam,' said Mrs. Ellison, 'you are not worth my answer; nor will I stay a moment longer with such a person.--So, Mrs. Booth, you have your choice, madam, whether you will go with me, or remain in the company of this lady.'
'If so, madam,' answered Mrs. Booth, 'I shall not be long in determining to stay where I am.'
Mrs. Ellison then, casting a look of great indignation at both the ladies, made a short speech full of invectives against Mrs. Atkinson, and not without oblique hints of ingratitude against poor Amelia; after which she burst out of the room, and out of the house, and made haste to her own home, in a condition of mind to which fortune without guilt cannot, I believe, reduce any one.
Indeed, how much the superiority of misery is on the side of wickedness may appear to every reader who will compare the present situation of Amelia with that of Mrs. Ellison. Fortune had attacked the former with almost the highest degree of her malice. She was involved in a scene of most exquisite distress, and her husband, her principal comfort, torn violently from her arms; yet her sorrow, however exquisite, was all soft and tender, nor was she without many consolations. Her case, however hard, was not absolutely desperate; for scarce any condition of fortune can be so. Art and industry, chance and friends, have often relieved the most distrest circumstances, and converted them into opulence. In all these she had hopes on this side the grave, and perfect virtue and innocence gave her the strongest assurances on the other. Whereas, in the bosom of
