UNCLE IN ENGLAND. 151 



of the want of amusement ; but I professed to 

 despise company of all kinds : dancing was an 

 absurd waste of life, and the stiff country dinners 

 were tiresome. Had my vanity, indeed, been 

 more gratified at the balls and parties to which I 

 was taken, I should, probably, have liked them 

 amazingly; but the truth was, the ladies thought 

 me learned, and were afraid of me, and neither 

 my appearance nor my conversation pleased the 

 other sex ; I therefore discovered that such occu- 

 pations offered but little enjoyment to a culti- 

 vated mind. 



When I arrived at the age of twenty-four, I 

 was a strange compound of selfishness and sen- 

 timent, of folly and learning. Of every species 

 of useful knowledge I was ignorant ; to make or 

 mend my clothes I considered degrading ; and 

 all the details of domestic economy I treated 

 with contempt. My mother reasoned with me, 

 but in vain ; my father interfered, but it was too 

 late ; my habits were formed. My parents could 

 not always conceal their feelings of disappoint- 

 ment, and I withdrew more than ever to my own 

 ideal world of poetry and science, and to studies 

 which, I cannot too often repeat, are praise- 

 worthy only when kept in due subordination. 

 My father once said to me with tears in his? eyes, 

 " The time will come, Gertrude, when you will 

 feel your mistake," and it did indeed come. 



