Page:The English humourists of the eighteenth century. A series of lectures, delivered in England, Scotland, and the United States of America (IA englishhumourist00thacrich).pdf/293

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STERNE AND GOLDSMITH.
279

his picture does not do justice to his own complacency. I am glad your shipmates are friendly beings (Eliza was at Deal going back to the Counsellor at Bombay, and indeed it was high time she should be off.) You could least dispense with what is contrary to your own nature, which is soft and gentle, Eliza; it would civilise savages—though pity were it thou shouldest be tainted with the office. Write to me, my child, thy delicious letters. Let them speak the easy carelessness of a heart that opens itself anyhow, every how, such Eliza I write to thee! (the artless rogue, of course he did!) 'And so I should ever love thee, most artlessly, most affectionately if Providence permitted thy residence in the same section of the globe: for I am all that honour and affection can make me 'Thy Bramin.'"

The Bramin continues addressing Mrs. Draper until the departure of the Earl of Chatham, Indiaman, from Deal, on the 2nd of April, 1767. He is amiably anxious about the fresh paint for Eliza's cabin; he is uncommonly solicitous about her companions on board: "I fear the best of your shipmates are only genteel by comparison with the contrasted crew with which thou beholdest them. So was—you know who—from the same fallacy which was put upon your judgment when—but I will not mortify you!"

"You know who" was, of course, Daniel Draper.