MISADVENTURES OF A LOVEU. 161 



Miss Jackson after this. I never wished to see her : I could not after 

 what had occurred, again look her in the face. 



It was long before I recovered from the effects of this new shock. 

 I had well nigh determined never again to speak to woman kind ; 

 but a little reflection served to convince me, that, constituted as 

 society was, that was impossible, unless I turned hermit. 



CHAP. V. 



IT is the error of a great many, even of those who are considered 

 sensible men, that they run from one extreme to another. This was 

 the next error I committed in love matters. I resolved, as the best 

 way of avoiding the recurrence of such mishaps as I had already en- 

 countered, to dispense with all and every thing in the shape of court- 

 ship, or lovemaking, and by some means or other get married at 

 once. This resolution was taken shortly after the execution of Cor- 

 der, of Red Barn notoriety. The statement, fact I may say, was 

 then going the round of the journals, that though Corder was an 

 unprincipled man himself, he had been married to an amiable and 

 excellent woman, and that his marriage with that woman was the 

 result of an advertisement, headed " Matrimony," in the Sunday 

 Times ; was, in other words, the result of a notification in that paper 

 that he wanted a wife. Why, thought I, might not I be equally 

 fortunate, and the world never be the wiser as to the way in which I 

 had been led to form a matrimonial connection. The idea struck 

 me as a happy one. I resolved to put it into effect without any 

 unnecessary loss of time. Accordingly, taking my pen and paper, I 

 that moment drew up the following advertisement, and caused it to 

 be published in the Morning Herald, that Journal being then, as I 

 believe it is still, the medium most generally made use of for sending 

 forth such notices to the fair world : 



" Matrimony. Circumstances which it is unnecessary here to detail 

 having prevented the Advertiser from mingling much in female 

 society, he takes this opportunity of appealing to the heart, and soli- 

 citing the hand, of any young lady who, like himself, possesses a good 

 temper, arid a disposition to be happy. If the partiality of private 

 friendship has not exaggerated his personal appearance, he flatters 

 himself that no lady, however fastidious in taste, will be dissatisfied 

 with him on that score. As regards his principles and disposition he 

 takes on himself to say though the statement would doubtless come 

 with a better grace from another that the former are perfectly 

 unexceptionable, and the latter of the most amiable and affectionate 

 kind. In fine, at the risk of being thought egotistical by those who 

 know him not, the Advertiser ventures to say that it is extremely 

 seldom that any young lady^' desirous of entering the matrimonial 

 state that state especially appointed by the Deity himself for the 

 happiness of his creatures has such an opportunity presented her. 

 The strictest confidence may be relied on, on the Advertiser's part, 

 and he expects the same confidence on the part of any female making 



