Page:Lady Anne Granard 3.pdf/305

Rh and almost frightened to death, and the nakedness of the land exposed to two young men—and all this managed by a proud woman in her perfect senses. I can't understand this. 'Tis an inexplicable page in the book of human nature!" "Now I think 'he that runs may read it.' Pride is always inconsistent, and, nine times out of ten, united to meanness, bordering on dishonesty. Extravagance demands her food from avarice, and Lady Anne was providing for some expected triumph, and hoarding up with one hand what she meant to throw away with the other. But we will say no more; the ladies are coming down stairs. I must hurry Isabella away." And if the young mother soon forgot, in the beauty of her smiling boy (by degrees recalling her to memory, and at length fondly clasping her neck), that faded remnant of her once beautiful but never tender mother, shall we not rejoice in her joy, and own her happiness is well founded? She had omitted no duty, even in all the confusion of her late engagements, and she had been grateful for the only kind attentions she ever could remember to have received, and for ever blotted from her mind the many mortifications heaped on her innocent