Miss Rachel Pringle to Miss Isabella Tod--LONDON.
My Dear Bell--How delusive are the flatteries of fortune! The wealth that has been showered upon us, beyond all our hopes, has brought no pleasure to my heart, and I pour my unavailing sighs for your absence, when I would communicate the cause of my unhappiness.Captain Sabre has been most assiduous in his attentions, and I must confess to your sympathising bosom, that I do begin to find that he has an interest in mine.But my mother will not listen to his proposals, nor allow me to give him any encouragement, till the fatal legacy is settled.What can be her motive for this, I am unable to divine; for the captain's fortune is farbeyond what I could ever have expected without the legacy, and equal to all I could hope for with it.If, therefore, there is any doubt of the legacy being paid, she should allow me to accept him; and if there is none, what can I do better? In the meantime, we are going about seeing the sights; but the general mourning is a great drawback on the splendour of gaiety.It ends, however, next Sunday; and then the ladies, like the spring flowers, will be all in full blossom.I was with the Argents at the opera on Saturday last, and it far surpassed my ideas of grandeur.But the singing was not good--I never could make out the end or the beginning of a song, and it was drowned with the violins; the scenery, however, was lovely; but I must not say a word about the dancers, only that the females behaved in a manner so shocking, that I could scarcely believe it was possible for the delicacy of our sex to do.They are, however, all foreigners, who are, you know, naturally of a licentious character, especially the French women.
We have taken an elegant house in Baker Street, where we go on Monday next, and our own new carriage is to be home in the course of the week.All this, which has been done by the advice of Mrs.Argent, gives my mother great uneasiness, in case anything should yet happen to the legacy.My brother, however, who knows the law better than her, only laughs at her fears, and my father has found such a wonderful deal to do in religion here, that he is quite delighted, and is busy from morning to night in writing letters, and giving charitable donations.I am soon to be no less busy, but in another manner.Mrs.Argent has advised us to get in accomplished masters for me, so that, as soon as we are removed into our own local habitation, I am to begin with drawing and music, and the foreign languages.I am not, however, to learn much of the piano; Mrs.A.thinks it would take up more time than I can now afford; but I am to be cultivated in my singing, and she is to try if the master that taught Miss Stephens has an hour to spare--and to use her influence to persuade him to give it to me, although he only receives pupils for perfectioning, except they belong to families of distinction.
