 at the same time, used all her rhetoric to point out the splendid advantages that must result from this union.
Ah! why, my Lord, cried I interrupting him—why then have you solicited my consent to an application, which if such are Lord Belmont's views, never can prove successful.
Dearest Miss Seymour, cried he warmly, how can you form a conclusion so alarming and so perfectly unjust, merely from a simple explanation which you force me to give you. If you will only listen to me, you will find these apprehensions quite imaginary, and wholly void of foundation. Had fate indeed placed you in that situation, in which till so lately I beheld you doomed to remain, unconnected and unknown, obscure in rank, and distinguished only by your elegance, your merit, and accomplishments; in this case, though you

must ever have continued the first and dearest object of my affections, yet my friends I allow might have objected; and the certainty that Lord Belmont's approbation was not to be hoped for where no circumstances of birth or fortune presented themselves, has not only tortured my bosom ever since the moment in which I was favoured with your acquaintance, but has been the origin of all that inconsistency of conduct which must have often perplexed and even sometimes perhaps offended you. Determined at one moment to conquer an attachment that I knew must involve me in all the difficulties of disunion with my family, I sedulously avoided you with fortitude and forbearance; conscious the next of my utter inability to struggle against a passion which insinuated itself into my heart beyond all power of resistance, I sought with avidity what I had before shunned with apprehension,

and gave myself wholly up to the delightful illusions of hope and tenderness. Such being the fluctuating state of my mind for many months past, what was the relief, the exultation I experienced, on the discovery I made at Hubert Hill. The knowledge of your real rank and situation at once relieved me from all the misery of this continual contest between inclination and principle. My whole soul was in a tumult of joy. Lord Belmont's approbation I considered as secured; and from that instant eagerly watched an opportunity for pouring out at your feet the feelings with which it was overwhelmed. When, there, too, I found the sympathetic softness of my Hermione—
Oh stop! for heaven's sake! cried I, interrupting him impatiently. Would to God you had never found the moment you desired. I foresee a world of trouble and misery from my unpardonable

folly and weakness. Oh! what on earth could make me so unguarded
