THE WANDERER

Or

Female Difficulties

FANNY BURNEY

CONTENTS

VOLUME I

CHAPTER I
CHAPTER II
CHAPTER III
CHAPTER IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTER VI
CHAPTER VII
CHAPTER VIII
CHAPTER IX
CHAPTER X
CHAPTER XI
CHAPTER XII
CHAPTER XIII
CHAPTER XIV
CHAPTER XV
CHAPTER XVI
CHAPTER XVII
CHAPTER XVIII
CHAPTER XIX

[Pg xvii]

TO DOCTOR BURNEY,
FRS and correspondent to the institute
of France[1]

The earliest pride of my heart was to inscribe to my much-loved Fatherthe first public effort of my pen; though the timid offering,unobtrusive and anonymous, was long unpresented; and, even at last,reached its destination through a zeal as secret as it was kind, bymeans which he would never reveal; and with which, till within theselast few months, I have myself been unacquainted.

With what grateful delight do I cast, now, at the same revered feetwhere I prostrated that first essay, this, my latest attempt!

Your name I did not dare then pronounce; and myself I believed to be'wrapt up in a mantle of impenetrable obscurity[2].' Little did Iforesee the indulgence that would bring me forward! and that my dearfather himself, whom, even while, urged by filial feelings, and yetnameless, I invoked,[3] I thought would be foremost to aid, nay, chargeme to shun the public eye; that He, whom I dreaded to see blush at myproduction, should be the first to tell me not to blush at it myself!The happy moment when he spoke to me those unexpected words, is everpresent, and still gay to my memory.

The early part of this immediate tribute has already twice traversed theocean in manuscript: I had planned and begun it before the end of thelast century but the bitter, and ever to be deplored affliction withwhich this new era opened to our family, in depriving us of the darlingof our hearts,...