ian, and nature and duty, it would seem, should
prompt him to guard my happiness as well as my interest; but I know in
the one instance he fails, and I fear in the other I am suffering. All
my family fear him, and none of them love me. I am my parents' youngest
child. Oh, sir! England is not the only country where it is a curse to
be a younger child. My father died when I was an infant. My mother was
affectionate and indulgent; my sisters were harsh and tyrannical, and
in very early girlhood taught me to hate them. My mother was made
miserable by their treatment of me; and my brother, too, quarrelled
with her because she would not subject me to the servility of the
discipline he prescribed. This quarrel ripened into hate, and he never
came to the house or spoke to my mother for years.

"The day before she died, and when her recovery was thought to be
impossible, he came with a prepared will and witnesses, which in their
presence he almost forced her to sign: in this will I was greatly
wronged, and this brother has tauntingly told me the cause of this was
my being the means of prejudicing our mother against him.

"He married a coarse, vulgar Kentucky woman, and brought her into the
house. She was insolent and disrespectful toward my mother, and I
resented it. She left the house, and died a few months after. Since
that day, though I was almost a child, my life has been one of constant
persecution on the part of my brother and sisters. I am compelled to
endure it, but do so under protest; if not in words, I do in manner,
and this I am persuaded you have on more than one occasion observed.
Please do not consider me impertinent, nor let it influence you in your
opinion of me, when I tell you my brother has rudely said to me that I
was too forward in my intercourse with you. It is humiliating to say
this to you; but I must, for it explains my conduct, which save in this
regard has been motiveless.

"A lady born to the inheritance of fortune is very unpleasantly
situated, both toward her family and to the world. These seem
solicitous to take greater interest in her pecuniary affairs than in
her personal happiness, and are always careful to warn her that her
money is more sought than herself--distracting her mind and feelings,
and keeping her constantly miserable. Since my school-days I have been
companionless. If I have gone into society, I have been under the guard
of one or the other of my sisters. These are cold, austere,