MISADVENTURES OF A LOVER. ,547 



Scotch proverbs that the greatest thief is generally the readiest and 

 loudest in shouting " Gude keep honesty ?"' Let it not be inferred 

 from this that I impute any thing dishonest, either in intention or deed, 

 to my parents. Perish the thought ! unless I had ample and unde- 

 niable proof of their guilt, whereas I have not a particle of such a 

 commodity. All I wish the reader to understand is that I know no- 

 thing whatever of the honesty or dishonesty of my parents. 



1 have only two further observations to make in the way of pre- 

 mising, and those are that, though my parents were poor, they con- 

 trived to give me an excellent education, and tliat before I was 

 done with school some little money fell into the family by the death 

 of a relation. 



Now, then, for my story. I doubt if ever any body had a more 

 ample allowance than I of what is called the tender passion. I have 

 often chided Nature for her unequal distribution of her gifts. Love 

 is certainly a good thing; but then it is quite possible to have too 

 much as well as too little of a good thing. I know this in not a com- 

 monly received doctrine. I cannot help that. John Locke used to 

 say that the rejection by the generality of mankind of any given pro- 

 position, if true^ does not change it into error. So say I. And I say 

 moreover, as an illustration, that in ajflfairs of the heart Nature has 

 been a great deal too kind to me. If I could interrogate her lady- 

 ship, I would ask why she was so injudicious, why so capricious as to 

 form my heart of love altogether, while she has formed thousands of 

 bipeds without one particle of that element in their composition. 

 However, experience has taught me that there is no help for it now; 

 it is my wisdom to submit to the ordinations of Fate with all the phi- 

 losophy I can muster for the purpose. 



I am not only unusually susceptible of the exercise of the tender 

 passion, I have not only a remarkable aptitude for loving, but I 

 love with an ardour which has, I am convinced, no parallel. Fur- 

 thermore, I was a precocious lover. If it is asked how early the age 

 at which I first felt myself a slave to love, the answer is — I cannot 

 tell. I have been a lover, a devoted lover, ever since I recollect. I 

 managed, however, to conceal from the world the flame that burned 

 in my heart, at the hazard of being consumed by it, until my twen- 

 tieth year.* A rather unfortunate occurrence then revealed it to a 

 wicked world. The object of my then regards was as pretty a young 

 girl, Louisa by name, a^ ever put foot on the ground. She had come 

 from a distant part of the country to reside for a few weeks with a 

 friend settled in the town in which I then dwelt. I saw her taking a 



walk one day on the opposite side of the narrow but deep river S . 



Tiie sight was sufficient. I was spell-bound at once. It may be pro- 

 per to advertise the reader at this stage of the story that it is one of 



• It is right to mention that, thou-jh I iiave been times without niimher in love — to 

 S])eak a truth, I liave never hei'n many successive days out of it — I only advert to tiiose 

 a/lventiires with the sex wfiich, by sojim; ill-starred circumstance or other, became 

 known to the world. I would not mention even them, but for the circumstance that 

 grossly incorrect versions of these adventures have, somehow or other, pone abroad. I 

 am anxious that the naked truth should lie known ; for, though matters are bad enough 

 as they are, the malicious ingenuity of tiie world has made tliem ten times worse. 



