LOVES OF A BACHELOR. 347 



Rebina herself. I should have added that, at the time they and I 

 had surprised each other under such unpleasant circumstances, they 

 were returning home from E , at which they had been on avisit. 



For some months after this ill-starred adventure I sickened at the 

 simple pronunciation of the word lady, and confined myself as much 

 as possible to my own apartments. 



About a year afterwards accident again threw me in the way of 

 the sex, and the arrows of Cupid were a second time infixed in my 

 poor heai-t. Circumstances had transpired which led me to believe 

 that Mary Ann Bennett, a young lady to whom I had been recently 

 introduced by a female acquaintance of hers, had formed a somewhat 

 flattering estimate both of my principles and person. She was the 

 only daughter of a physician who resided in the same town as myself. 

 I studiously sought to cultivate a further acquaintance with her, and 

 every new interview we had together served only to deepen the con- 

 viction I felt of being regarded by her with something more tender 

 than mere friendship. 



I accordingly resolved (never dreaming of the possibility of a re- 

 fusal) on soliciting her consent to be led by me to the hymeneal 

 altar, and lest s^ome of the thousand-and-one accidents which are 

 ever and anon occurring to prevent the celebration of the marriage 

 ceremony in protracted courtships — and this, too, when both parties 

 were in the first instance most devotedly attached to, each other — • 

 recollecting, I say, this fact, I had no sooner formed the resolution 

 in question than I carried it into effect ; but, as I have always laboured 

 under a considerable degree of constitutional bashfulness, especially 

 when conversing with marriageable ladies, I preferred making the 

 important overture to Mary Ann by letters rathe, than verbally in 

 propria persona. The purport of the epistle I addressed to her was 

 that I had been deeply smitten by her charms — that to my eyes and 

 mind she possessed intellectual accomplishments and personal attrac- 

 tions infinitely superior to those of any other lady in the world — that 

 my future happiness, if not existence, was entirely at her mercy — 

 that I adopted this method of imploring her hand in marriage in pre- 

 ference to any other for reasons I should afterwards explain to her — 

 and concluded by begging of her, in the most urgent terms, to relieve 

 me from the intolerable state of suspense l was then in, by returning 

 me a decisive answer of some one kind or other, in the space of two 

 hours at longest. 



The momentous letter was no sooner enclosed than it was des- 

 patched by a special messenger; and I confined myself in my apart- 

 ments until I should learn the result. From the moment the bearer 

 of my epistle to Miss Bennett departed, until the expiration of the 

 limited time, my mind was almost torn to pieces — if such an expression 

 be a sufficiently correct one, between the conflicting passions of hope 

 and fear — between the hope of the acceptance of my proposal, and tiie 

 dread of its being rejected ; for, though formerly self-confident of being 

 deep in Mary Ann's affections, I was not altogether without an ap- 

 prehension, now that the nmmentous crisis had arrived, that I might 

 nave been after all only deceiving myself. Sit or lie on the sofa, I 

 could not. I paced through my room with my watch in my hand, 



