"But, dear Lady Susan, do you make this remark from observation? do you believe it to be true?" returned Lady Harriet.

"In our rank of life, my dear niece," said Lady Susan, "where every lady is provided with a waiting-maid, this effect of the love of dress is not so easy to be observed. A young lady who has a number of attendants to correct her deficiences of neatness, may be habitually slatternly, and yet appear only to be politely and elegantly careless. But be assured, on descending into lower life, we should find, that the finest ladies abroad are commonly the most slovenly at home; and that the female who is most elaborately adorned in her drawing-room, is frequently the most negligent in her private apartments."

"A new idea this, Lady Susan," said Lady Harriet," "I must consider the doctrine a little before I insert it in my creed."

Lady Susan took no notice of this remark or the ironical manner in which it was uttered, but proceeded to lament the increasing love of dress in the present age. "When I was a child," said she, "that is, forty or fifty years ago, the usual dress of a cottager was a striped woollen jacket and petticoat, a blue apron, a check handkerchief, short sleeves, by which the arm was left bare for hard work, the hair tightly combed up under a clean mob cap, and a flat felt hat: but now the grandaughters of the good women who wore the dress I have described, appear in printed cotton gowns, with long sleeves, the ends of which are dipped into every thing about which their hands are employed, their long hair in curl-papers, dirty muslin caps, and straw bonnets with faded ribands-and to go a little higher, the servant whose station would formerly have entitled her to a brown stuff gown and clean check apron, now appears in such mode and fashion of dress as her master's daughter would in time past have thought quite sufficient for her Sunday appearance. If we go a little higher, the little tradesman's wife dresses as the Squire's lady would formerly have done, the lady of the Squire imitates the Viscouness, the Viscountess the Dutchess, and the Dutchess the Princess. Thus the rage for personal ornament universally prevails, producing in every rank of society evils of a greater or less degree. The love of dress in the lowest ranks," con

tinued Lady Susan," and in those somewhat above the lowest, is productive perhaps of more gross vice than any other passion whatever. There are no lengths of sin to which the daughters of the poor are not continually led by this inducement. Much has been said, much has been written on this subject; but as yet the evil continues to rage with increasing violence, to the subversion of order and happiness, and will continue so to do, till the higher classes make a stand, and render the love of ornament contemptible and disgraceful by the display of a better taste. The effects of the love of dress," continued the old lady, " in young females of the middle classes and of moderate fortunes are not so grossly immoral, it is true, as among the lowest classes; that is, it does not produce absolutely criminal conduct, or bring the parties to open shame. But I am sorry to see, that even in the middle classes of society, young females are in general so much occupied in dress, that the greater part of their time, their thoughts, and the whole of their pocket money, are sacrificed to it. The love of dress makes them selfish in the extreme; not only rendering them careless of the poor, but often leading them to press their parents beyond what is convenient in affording them the means of indulging this passion. Those precious hours which might be so usefully employed in the service of God, and those powers of mind which are capable of a progressive improvement to all eternity, are all sacrificed by them to this one silly desire, not merely of looking elegant, or of making a respectable appearance in the world, but of ornamenting, varying, and new modeling their clothes, without any reference to that which is pure, that which is lovely, or that which is of good report. And I wish," continued Lady Susan, "that truth would permit me to say, that young or single women only are liable to this kind of folly: but neither age, nor inconvenient circumstances, nor natural deformity, are sufficient to render women rational on these subjects. How often have we reason to deplore the selfishness of mothers of families displayed on these occasions! and how often do we see the love of dress indulged at the expense of a husband who is perhaps wearing out his constitution in exertions to provide a comfortable maintenance for his family!" "In the still higher classes of life," continued Lady Susan, "we may trace the ruin of families too often to

that female vanity which is displayed in the love of dress, where the lady expends what would almost maintain her household, at the milliner's and jeweller's; not to calculate the mischief she does by her example, and the encouragement she gives to the same vanity in all her dependents."

"Well, but my dear aunt," said Lady Harriet, "what would become of our tradesmen and manufacturers, if you could persuade all our young people to lay by their pocket money, instead of spending it upon their own pretty persons? what a strange revolution would your system make in the state of the nation ?"

Lady Susan smiling with much good-humour, thus replied: "Dear niece, far be from me the wish to injure my country, or to hurt a single individual of its inhabitants. On the contrary, I would not wish the females of the present age to spend one farthing less with their tradespeople; but I would wish those who have more than is requisite for themselves, to devote their surplus in clothing the widow and the fatherless: and I ask you my dear niece, if I have fifty pounds to spend with my mercer, does it much matter to him, or to the interest of trade in general, if I spend it in coarse cloth instead of cambric, or in ordinary prints instead of superfine ?"

"O but," said Lady Harriet, "there are all my dear friends the milliners in Bond-street, and elsewhere, Madame Blonde and Madame la Fleur, with a thousand others; besides all the pretty little dress-makers and sempstresses about town, what is to become of them ?"

"Why," returned Lady Susan, "if the same money is to be spent by our young ladies, though on different objects, according to my new plan, we must engage some of these hands, which are thus thrown out of employment, either in working for the poor, or instructing them in reading and needle-work. Remember my dear niece, that I am not advising our young ladies to lay by their money, but to employ it in a new channel."

"Very good!" said Lady Harriet, smiling; "excellent, indeed! Well, I heartily wish that you and the philanthropic Mrs. Trimmer, may be able, between you, to make the Economy of Charity a favourite study of our young people; and if you will provide for the little dress-makers

and my dear Madame la Blonde, I shall make no objection to this new order of things. But I think you must begin by establishing some sumptuary laws, and by fixing some form of dress which must on no account admit of any variation."

Lady Susan courteously listened, while her niece con tinued to this effect :-" But, my dear aunt, you must permit me as the mother of four unmarried daughters, to request that this new attire may be very becoming. Let us have something very picturesque, I beseech you. Do not dress us all like Quakers, I very earnestly entreat you.— Think what my sufferings would be, if compelled to introduce my daughters at court in quilled mobs and nightgowns of Gros de Naples de Tourterelle."

Lady Susan made no answer, no doubt thinking that she had already said enough, as her auditor was in that kind of mood which inclines persons to turn every thing they hear into ridicule. And when she left Mowbray-Hall, which was shortly afterward, she perhaps went away persuaded that she might have spared herself the expense of presenting the Economy of Charity to Lady Harriet, which she had done on her first arrival in the country, having previously taken care to have it bound in such a manner as might not disgrace her niece's elegant work-table. But the Holy Bible saith, Cast thy bread on the waters, and after many days thou shalt find it. And this as will after appear was the case with the excellent Lady Susan.

We now, however, proceed with our history of the Economy of Charity.-After Lady Susan had left MowbrayHall, this volume lay on Lady Harriet's table in her drawing room till her bookseller sent her an assortment of new novels from town. On which occasion it was thrown upon an elegant little book-case in the same room; where it probably might have remained for some time, if Master Robert, wanting some amusement, and having no better at hand, had not taken it into his head, one afternoon, to reach it down from the shelf, when, having turned over its leaves for some time, he bethought himself of drawing the semblance of a cat precisely over the place where his aunt's name was written. This piece of unmannerly wit having been observed by his sister Dorothea, she carried the book up in high glee into the school-room, and handed it round VOL. I.

Q

to the whole party, unchecked by Miss Hartley, who was by no means attached to Lady Susan, whose sentiments, she said, were very uncommon, and quite out of date.

When Master Robert's wit had afforded merriment to his sisters for about a week, it became as much out of date as the Economy of Charity itself, and the book which contained this inimitable sample of the young gentleman's refined satire was forgotten and thrown aside into a cupboard in the school-room, which contained a heterogeneous assortment of broken toys, torn books, and cracked slates.

Some time after this, during the interval of a deep snow which confined the young people for many days to the house, little Margarita, who was commonly made accountable for every thing of any consequence that was lost in the school-room, was one day searching for some stray article in this grand repository of rubbish, when she was led to open this book of which we have spoken so frequently; and being attracted by the story of a poor woman, therein related, who brought her child to school in a dress entirely composed of patches, she put the book by and from that time for many days devoted every spare moment to the reading of it, her young mind, by the divine blessing, being quite occupied with the ideas it suggested.

Margarita was at this time about twelve years of age; a period when the mind often opens rapidly, and when children often begin to think and act for themselves. "What book is that, Miss Margarita," said Miss Hartley, one day, to the little girl, "which you are puzzling over there from morning till night?"

"The Economy of Charity, Ma'am," replied Margarita. "The Economy of Charity!" repeated Miss Hartley : "what nonsense! the most economical way of being charitable is, in my opinion, to keep every thing for ourselves. Charity begins at home, they say; and so does economy: so the person who takes the best care of himself is the one, I should think, who best understands the economy of charity." So saying, she laughed heartily and was joined by all her pupils but Margarita, who simply answered, as she turned over the leaves of the book, "No, Ma'am, that is not the meaning of it: the Economy of Charity is about the way to do good without spending money."

"Yes, yes," said Miss Hartley, renewing her laughter,