Page:Lady Anne Granard 3.pdf/47

Rh cruel, nay, a wicked prejudice; but your father knew it would avail against you in the world, and, in order to obviate it, he committed an act of gross injustice, by actually leaving you all the fortune his misconduct had left himself, to the ruin of his own amiable son.' "I will not attempt to tell you what I felt; in fact, the excess of my suffering relieved itself, for I fainted, and for several hours successively relapsed as the recollection of what I had heard came over me. Mrs. Mortimer, alarmed, revealed the cause to Lady Osmond, who loved me very much, and could not forbear to relate what had occurred to her son, expressing at once the excess of her pity to me and her fear of his father. You will anticipate the consequence: Charles did not resemble his father; he had no prejudices regarding my birth; he thought my father justified in giving his female child the fortune which would protect her from contempt, since her son could easily be provided for by his rich uncle, and he secretly determined never to renounce one whose claims on his pity were not less strong than he felt them on his affections. In the course of our travels, every thing was arranged by letter, for I was closely watched, and, on arriving in England, was placed in a small, superior establishment in Piccadilly, designed for orphans, after they had quitted boarding-school. I