Another peculiarity of taste he had, which was to present
me with a dozen pairs of the whitest kid gloves at a time:
these he would divert himself with drawing on me, and then
biting off the fingers' ends; all which fooleries of a sickly
appetite, the old gentleman paid more liberally for than most
others did for more essential favours. This lasted till a
violent cough, seizing and laying him up, deliver'd me from
this most innocent and insipid trifler, for I never heard more
of him after his first retreat.
You may be sure a by-job of this sort interfer'd with no
other pursuit, or plan of life; which I led, in truth, with a
modesty and reserve that was less the work of virtue than of
exhausted novelty, a glut of pleasure, and easy circumstances,
that made me indifferent to any engagements in which pleasure
and profit were not eminently united; and such I could, with
the less impatience, wait for at the hands of time and for-
tune, as I was satisfy'd I could never mend my pennyworths,
having evidently been serv'd at the top of market, and even
been pamper'd with dainties: besides that, in the sacrifice
of a few momentary impulses, I found a secret satisfaction in
respecting myself, as well as preserving the life and fresh-
ness of my complexion. Louisa and Emily did not carry indeed
their reserve so high as I did; but still they were far from
cheap or abandon'd tho' two of their adventures seem'd to con-
tradict this general character, which, for their singularity,
I shall give you in course, beginning first with Emily's:
Louisa and she went one night to a ball, the first in
the habit of a shepherdess, Emily in that of a shepherd: I
saw them in their dresses before they went, and nothing in
nature could represent a prettier boy than this last did,
being so fair and well limbed.
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