are permitted a share in this confidence.
The first of your commands runs thus—

I should imagine, say you, that the debates Sir Charles mentions, between himself and Signor Jeronymo, and his companions, at their first acquaintance, must be not only curious, but edifying.

They are, my good Miss Byron: But as I presume that you Ladies are more intent upon being obeyed in the other articles [See, Lucy, I had better not have dissembled!] I will only at present transcribe for you, with some short connexions, two Letters; by which you will see how generously Mr. Grandison sought to recover his friend to the paths of virtue and honour, when he had formed schemes, in conjunction with, and by the instigation of, other gay young men of rank, to draw him in to be a partaker in their guilt, and an abettor of their enterprizes.
You will judge from these Letters, madam (without shocking you by the recital) what were the common-place pleas of those libertines, despisers of marriage, of the laws of society, and of WOMEN; but as they were subservient to their pleasures.
To the Barone della Porretta.
WILL my Jeronymo allow his friend, his Grandison, the liberty he is going to take with him? If the friendship he professes for him be such a one, as a great mind can, on reflexion, glory in, he will. And what is this liberty, but such as constitutes the essence of true friendship? Allow me, on this occasion, to say, that your Grandison has seen more of the world than most men, who have lived no longer in it, have had an opportunity to see. I was sent abroad for improvement, under the care of a man who proved to be the most intriguing and profligate of those to whom a youth was ever entrusted. I saw in him, the inconvenience, the odiousness, of libertinism; and, by the assistance of an excellent monitor, with whom

I happily became acquainted, and (would it not be false shame, and cowardice, if I did not say) by the Divine assistance, I escaped snares that were laid to corrupt my morals: Hence my dearest friend will the more readily allow me to impart to him some of the lessons that were of so much use to myself.
I am the rather encouraged to take this liberty, as I have often flattered myself, that I have seen my Jeronymo affected by the arguments urged in the course of the conversations that have been held in our select meetings at Padua, and at