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After losing a few more amatory battles, the squire is ready to offer his hand and fortune in marriage. Shamela has a moment of doubt. She still nurses a soft spot in her heart for a certain "jolly Parson" to whom she had borne an illegitimate child. But she consoles herself with another of mamma's maxims: "A married Woman injures only her Husband, but a single Woman herself." Like Pamela, she goes through with the marriage.
* Which Fielding followed up in 1742 with a full-scale parody, the second English novel, Joseph Andrews.