s terrible devastations in a female breast: Vanessa was
excessively vain. She was fond of dress; impatient to be admired; very
romantic in her turn of mind; superior in her own opinion to all her
sex; full of pertness, gaiety, and pride; not without some agreeable
accomplishments, but far from being either beautiful or genteel:
Ambitious at any rate to be esteemed a wit; and with that view always
affecting to keep company with wits; a great reader, and a violent
admirer of poetry; happy in the thoughts of being reputed Swift's
concubine; but still aiming to be his wife. By nature haughty and
disdainful, looking with contempt upon her inferiors; and with the
smiles of self-approbation upon her equals; but upon Dr. Swift, with the
eyes of love: Her love was no doubt founded in vanity.

Though Vanessa had exerted all the arts of her sex, to intangle Swift in
matrimony; she was yet unsuccessful. She had lost her reputation, and
the narrowness of her income, and coldness of her lover contributed to
make her miserable, and to increase the phrensical disposition of her
mind. In this melancholly situation she remained several years, during
which time Cadenus (Swift) visited her frequently. She often press'd him
to marry her: His answers were rather turns of wit, than positive
denials; till at last being unable to sustain the weight of misery any
longer, she wrote a very tender epistle to him, insisting peremptorily
upon a serious answer, and an immediate acceptance, or absolute refusal
of her as his wife. His reply was delivered by his own hand. He brought
it with him when he made his final visit; and throwing down the letter
upon the table with great passion, hastened back to his house, carrying
in his countenance the frown of anger, and indignation. Vanessa did not
survive many days the letter delivered to her by Swift, but during that
short interval she was sufficiently composed, to cancel a will made in
his favour, and to make another, wherein she left her fortune (which by
a long retirement was in some measure retrieved) to her two executors,
Dr. Berkley the late lord bishop of Cloyne, and Mr. Marshal one of the
king's Serjeants at law. Thus perished under all the agonies of despair,
Mrs. Esther Vanhomrich; a miserable example of an ill-spent life,
fantastic wit, visionary schemes, and female weakness.

It is strange that vanity should have so great a prevalence in the
female breast, and yet it is certain that to this prin