| Notes |
["Also mentioned in Grieder, source.\r\n\r\nconcerning paratext:\r\n{Name of translator on title page}\r\n{Name of female author NOT on title page}\r\n{Dedication present}\r\nTo her Grace the Duchess of Devonshire.\r\nMadam,\r\nI humbly beg your Grace's Permission to put this little Book under your Protection; an honour which I should not have ventured to aspire to, had not the Work in the Original been stored with those Sentiments of Virtue and Religion /\r\nwith which your Grace's illustrious Ancestors have ever been peculiarly blessed. I flatter myself, it has not suffered by the Translation.\r\nI hope I shall not be thought severe, if I say it was difficult, in this light, dissipated Age, to find a Lady of Quality, to whom a Moral Tale might, with Propriety, be addressed: I found it so, till the Duchess of Devonshire was pointed out to me as a Young Lady in whose Mind are centered those many Virtues which concure to adorn fer Fa-/\r\nmily; and who would not disdain to patronize a Work originally written, and since translated, by a Woman.\r\n[...]\r\n[signed:] R. Roberts.\r\n\r\n{Preface present} by the translator\r\nix-xvi The Translator's Preface\r\nIt being customary to prefix an address to the Public to every Book with which they are presented; either to apologize for the writing of it, to bespeak their good opinion, or give some account why it was written; I shall so far comply with general custom, as to let the World know, this has been translated some years, and was un dertaken at the/\r\nx\r\nrequest of the late Dr. Hawkesworth; who recommended it to me as a Novel of that delicate kind which was peculiarly adapted to a Female Writer; abounding with moral and religious truths; and being originally written by a Woman justly celebrated among the French Authors, was the more suitable to a Translator of the same Sex.\r\nIt was always designed for the press, but accident alone has postponed the publication. I am proud of saing it was, when in manuscript, revised, corrected, and approved by the above-mentioned Author. [../..]\r\nxi\r\nalas! this exalted Genius is no more! [...]\r\nxii\r\nBut let me advise my fair young Readers to avoid, with terror, the rock on which so many have split; nor think that by copying Heroines, of whose success they so ardently read, they shall be able to make proselytes to Virtue of those to whom Vice /\r\nxiii\r\nis become habitual [...]\r\nxv\r\nBut it is not my design to give a Dissertation on Modern Romance: All that I shall further add is, That the purport of this little Moral Tale, throughout the whole, seems to be to inculcate every Moral Virtue, to enforce every Religious Tenet. Such /\r\nxvi\r\ncertainly was the Author's design in writing; such has been mine in translating it. That it may answer our joint end is the sincere Wish of\r\nThe Editor.\r\nsvdjun10chawton"]
|