Miss Sharp Begins to Make Friends

And now, being received as a member of the amiable family whose
portraits we have sketched in the foregoing pages, it became naturally
Rebecca's duty to make herself, as she said, agreeable to her
benefactors, and to gain their confidence to the utmost of her power.
Who can but admire this quality of gratitude in an unprotected orphan;
and, if there entered some degree of selfishness into her calculations,
who can say but that her prudence was perfectly justifiable?

"I am alone in the world," said the friendless girl. "I have nothing to look
for but what my own labour can bring me; and while that little
pink-faced chit Amelia, with not half my sense, has ten thousand pounds
and an establishment secure, poor Rebecca (and my figure is far better
than hers) has only herself and her own wits to trust to. Well, let us
see if my wits cannot provide me with an honourable maintenance, and if
some day or the other I cannot show Miss Amelia my real superiority
over her. Not that I dislike poor Amelia: who can dislike such a
harmless, good-natured creature?--only it will be a fine day when I can
take my place above her in the world, as why, indeed, should I not?"

Thus it was that our little romantic friend formed visions of the
future for herself--nor must we be scandalised that, in all her castles
in the air, a husband was the principal inhabitant. Of what else have
young ladies to think, but husbands? Of what else do their dear mammas
think? "I must be my own mamma," said Rebecca; not without a tingling
consciousness of defeat, as she thought over her little misadventure
with Jos Sedley.