Page:The Cottagers of Glenburnie - Hamilton (1808).djvu/136

 Bell has unfortunately attached herself? These races! How unfit a scene for a young woman in my daughter's station; and under how unfit a conductor will she there appear! I wish I had been more firm; but I could not. O that she were not too headstrong to take advice, and too self-sufficient to think that she stands in need of an adviser. I am troubled about her intimacy with these Flinders's more than I can express."

"But, Sir," said Mrs Mason, "have you not a right to dictate to your daughter what company she ought to keep? If you really think Mrs Flinders an improper associate, why do you permit her to go to her house?"

"Because," replied Mr Stewart, "I cannot bear to see my child unhappy. I have not courage to encounter sour looks, and all the murmurings of discontent. This girl, who is when in good humour so lively and engaging, treats every opposition to her will as an act of