nd with real
gratitude; and when she had committed it to memory, and adopted it in
addressing Almighty God, she found her spirits revive, with the hope that
she should one day prove worthy of that kind parent, whom, when she lived
with her, she was too apt to slight and disobey. As her judgment became
more enlightened, she saw more clearly into the errors of her past
education, and became perfectly aware that the love of her too-indulgent
father had been productive of innumerable pains, as well as faults. She
found herself much more happy now than she had ever been in her life; yet
she had never so few indulgences--she had no slaves to wait on her, no
little black children to execute her commands and submit to her temper; she
was not coaxed to the dainties of a luxurious table, nor had costly clothes
spread before her to court her choice, nor any foolish friend to repeat all
she said, as if she were a prodigy of wit and talent; and all these things,
she well remembered, were accorded to her as a kind of inheritance in
Barbadoes; but, along with them, she remembered having violent passions, in
which she committed excesses, for which she afterwards felt keen remorse,
because she saw how they wounded her mother, and shamed even her doting
father--ill-humour and low spirits, that rendered every thing irksome to
her, and many pains and fevers, from which she was now entirely free; and
she found, in the conversation, books, and instructions of her young
friends, amusement to which nothing she had enjoyed before would bear
comparison; for what in life is so delightful as knowledge, except the
sense of having performed some particular benefit to our fellow-creatures?

CHAPTER VII.

It will be readily supposed that, with the hopes now entertained of
Matilda's conduct, Mrs. Harewood did not hesitate to provide the governess
we have spoken of, and accordingly Miss Campbell was soon established in
the family.

She found Matilda rapid in her ideas, persevering in her pursuits, but
prone to resentment on every trifling occasion, and still subject to
finding herself cause for repentance. On these occasions Miss Campbell
conducted herself with composure and dignity, as if she considered a
petulant child below the notice of a sensible woman: by this means the
pride of the culprit was humbled; she was taught to retread her first
steps, and perceive that she was an insignificant being, obliged to the
suffrage of her friends, and