Malplaquet, where she had been now retained for almost three years; in which time she had made herself so necessary and so agreeable to her lady, that

nothing I believe could have prevailed on her to part with so valuable an acquisition.
What made her company so particularly desirable, was the astonishing fund of information she had treasured up, by sitting in her father's shop. Her mind was a kind of circulating library in little, and I sincerely wish romances were always attended with the same good effects they produced in her; for there is scarcely a good moral inculcated by them that she did not act up to. Not that she had not formed a decided opinion of writings as well as writers; but she rarely broached that opinion, thinking with Madam DACIER that silence was the best ornament of the female sex. It was evident, however, that it was wisely and judiciously chosen, for at the head of her favourite authors she placed Dr. JOHNSON; though I rather think her great admiration of him must have been as a critic, for the Doctor is known to have entertained a rooted dislike to mythology, and indeed every figurative writing which does not square with what he calls truth and morality; whereas Emma maintained that morality being the noblest drift of literature, those writings were the most perfect which brought virtue into danger, that she might rise the more triumphant; and that such productions received an additional force and beauty from allegory and mythological allusion.

The various merits of our literary Abigail will gradually unfold themselves as we go on. I thought it necessary to say so much, to account for Mrs. Malplaquet's determination of disclosing to her the business of Standfast's audacity, and to advise with her what steps she should take.
Emma heard the whole affair with great deliberation, and, pausing for some moments, her lady asked her of what she was considering?

'I am looking, madam,' said she, 'over the catalogue of my mind, to see if I have ever read any thing like it, and, upon recollection, the same thing occurs in the Nonjuror, one of CIBBER's plays; which is taken from the Tartuffe of MOLIERE; who had it I believe from PLAUTUS:—and if I might advise, you should serve your parson as the lady in that play does hers.'

'How is that?' said Mrs. Malplaquet, 'for I really forget.'
'Why madam,' replied Emma, 'she pretends to be caught in his snare, while she is laying one for him; and placing