Can you please help me rephrase these sentences taken from Letter 7 of Richardson's Pamelea, please? Thank you very much in advance.
1) Her master gave her two suits of fine Flanders laced head-clothes, three pairs of fine silk clothes, several ribbons and top-knots of all colours, four pairs of white cotton stockings, three pairs of the fine silk ones, and two pairs of rich stays (corsets).
(Are all the items still used today?)
2) She was astonished and unable to speak. Her master recommended she shouldn’t blush.
3) After listening to her master’s words she was embarrassed and ready to cry. She blushed to the ears (How can I rephrase this?)
4) She was so confounded at these words, you might have beat her down with a feather (How can I rephrase this?).
5) She couldn’t understand why he had given her all those fine things himself instead of having Mrs Jervis give them to her. She believed she wouldn’t be so embarrassed now.
6) She decided to tell everything to Mrs Jervis, the house supervisor who was on her side.
7) Mrs Jervis said to her: “God put it into his heart to be good to you; and you must double your diligence”. (Rephrase?). “It looked to me, she said, as if he would fit you in dress for a waiting-maid’s place on Lady Danver’s own person”.
8) Pamela insists that her father had always put into her head to be cautious and to renounce worldy display.
9) She has always been respectful of social conventions, virtuous and shy.However,her shy nature is in contrast with her virtue and her writing skill.
10) Her plain clothes contrast with the fine clothes her master had given her and are the expression of her Puritan (puritanical) values.
Pamelea, = Pamela?
1. (head clothes & stays - very selcome; more for costumes with the head clothes but stays still in some girdles )
2. ok
3. "even her ears were red"
4. the expression is more like "blow her over with a feather"
5. so embarrassed now.
6. supervisor,
7. "work twice as hard"
8. insisted that he had / insists that he has (sequence of tense)
9. in contrast to her virtue
10. had = has
Sra