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as Lady Susan.- She is delicately fair, with fine
grey eyes & dark eyelashes; & from her appearance
one would not suppose her more than five & twenty,
tho' she must in fact be ten years older.— I was cer:
:tainly not disposed to admire her, tho' always hearing
she was beautiful; but I cannot help feeling that
she possesses an uncommon union of Symmetry,
Brilliancy & Grace. — Her address to me was so
gentle, frank, & even affectionate, that, if I had not
known how much she has always disliked me
for marrying M[r]. Vernon, & that we had never
met before, I should have imagined her an at:
:tached friend. — One is apt I believe to connect
assurance of manner with coquetry, & to expect
that an impudent address will naturally attend
an impudent mind; — at least I was myself pre:
:pared for an improper degree of confidence in Lady
Susan; but her countenance is absolutely sweet, &

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her voice & manner winningly mild. — I am sorry
it is so, for what is this but Deceit? — Unfortunately
one knows her too well. — She is clever & agreeable,
has all that knowledge of the world which makes
conversation easy, & talks very well, with a happy
command of language, which is too often used, I believe
to make Black appear White. She has already almost
persuaded me of her being warmly attached to her daugh:
:ter, tho' I have been so long convinced to the contrary.
She speaks of her with so much tenderness & anxiety,
lamenting so bitterly the neglect of her education, which
she represents however as wholly unavoidable, that
I am forced to recollect how many successive springs
her Ladyship spent in Town, while her daughter was
left in Staffordshire to the care of servants, or a
Governess very little better, to prevent my
believing what she says.
     If her manners have so great an influence

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on my resentful heart, you may judge how much
more strongly they operate on M^r. Vernon's generous
temper. — I wish I could be as well satisfied as
he is, that it was really her choice to leave Lang:
:ford for Churchhill; & if she had not stayed three
months there before she discovered that her friend's
manner of Living did not suit her situation or
feelings, I might have believed that concern for
the loss of such a Husband as M^r. Vernon, to whom
her own behaviour was far from unexceptionable
might for a time make her wish for retirement.
But I cannot forget the length of her visit to
the Mainwarings, & when I reflect on the different
mode of life which she led with them from that
to which she must now submit, I can only sup:
:pose that the wish of establishing her reputation
by following, tho' late, the path of propriety, occa:
:sioned her removal from a family where she must