ry and gaming few equalled her; no
one could exceed her in the pursuit of every trifling amusement; she had
neither leisure nor inclination to think, her life passed in an
uninterrupted succession of engagements, without reflection on the past
or consideration on the future consequences.

The lightness of her conduct exposed her to the addresses of many gay
men during the life of her lord; but an attachment was too serious a
thing for her; and while her giddiness and perpetual dissipation exposed
her to suspicion, they preserved her from the vice of which she was
suspected: she daily passed through the ordeal trial; every step she
took was dangerous, but she came off unhurt. Her reputation was indeed
doubtful, but her rank and fortune, and the continual amusements which
her house yielded to her acquaintance, rendered her generally caressed.

Her lord's death made no alteration in her way of life; and as her mind
was never fixed an hour on any subject, she thought not long enough of
marriage to prepare for that state and therefore continued a widow. She
was upwards of forty years old, unchanged in anything but her person,
when she took Lady Mary Jones, I will not say into her care, for that
word never entered into her vocabulary, but into her house. Lady Mary
had naturally a very good understanding, and much vivacity; the latter
met with everything that could assist in its increase in the company of
Lady Sheerness, the other was never thought of: she was initiated into
every diversion at an age when other girls are confined to their
nursery. Her aunt was fond of her and therefore inclined to indulgence,
besides she thought the knowledge of the world, which in her opinion
was the most essential qualification for a woman of fashion, was no way
to be learnt but by an early acquaintance with it.

Lady Mary's age and vivacity rendered this doctrine extremely agreeable,
she was pretty and very lively and entertaining in her conversation,
therefore at fifteen years of age she became the most caressed person in
every company. She entered into all the fashionable tastes, was
coquettish and extravagant; for Lady Sheerness very liberally furnished
her with money and felt a sort of pride in having a niece distinguished
by the fineness of her dress and her profusion in every expense, as it
was well known to have no other source but in her ladyship's generosity.
Though Lady Mary received much adulation, and was the object of general