 man of equal honour and bravery, but passionate and haughty, valuing himself on his descent. The second is devoted to the church, and is already a Bishop. The interest of his family, and his own merits, it is not doubted, will one day if he lives, give him a place in the sacred college. The third, Signor Jeronymo (or, as he is sometimes called, the Barone) della Porretta, has a regiment in the service of the king of Sardinia. The sister is the favourite of them all. She is lovely in her person, gentle in her manners, and has high, but just, notions of the nobility of her descent, of the honour of her sex, and of what is due to her own character. She is pious, charitable, beneficent. Her three brothers preferred her interests to their own. Her father used to call her, The pride of his life; her mother, Her other self; her own Clementina.
[CLEMENTINA!—Ah! Lucy, what a pretty name is Clementina!]

I became intimate with Signor Jeronymo at Rome, near two years before I had the honour to be known to the rest of his family, except by his report, which he made run very high in my favour. He was master of many fine qualities; but had contracted friendship with a set of dissolute young men of rank, with whom he was very earnest to make me acquainted. I allowed myself to be often in their company; but, as they were totally abandoned in their morals, it was in hopes, by degrees, to draw him from them: But a love of pleasure had got fast hold of him; and his other companions prevailed over his good-nature. He had courage, but not enough to resist their libertine attacks upon his morals.
Such a friendship could not hold, while each stood his ground; and neither would advance to meet the other. In short, we parted, nor held a correspondence in absence: But afterwards meeting, by accident, at Padua, and Jeronymo having, in the interim, been led into inconveniencies, he avowed a change of principles, and the friendship was renewed.
It however held not many months: A Lady, less celebrated for virtue than beauty, obtained an influence over him, against warning, against promise.
On being expostulated with, and his promise claimed, he resented the friendly freedom. He was passionate; and, on this occasion, less polite than it was natural for him to be: He even defied his friend. My dear Jeronymo
