 made, time enough to prevent any ill consequences from his duplicity. Indeed had his fortune been splendid to my wish, and his affection as sincere as I believe

it pretended, to pity alone, not attachment, would he have owed the success which Mrs. Hindon's artful representations and my simple inexperience might perhaps have led me to bestow.
I am afraid indeed Madam, answered she, that my cousin merits not the honor of your good opinion. But as to that plan, though I have long suspected it I never once dreamt of interfering, as I concluded till this moment it had not only the approbation of your own heart, but likewise of Miss Seymour's judgment.
Far from it indeed, cried I. My opinion of Captain Wilmot has ever been such, that independent of the embarrassment of his fortune, this step never should have received my concurrence while I knew my sister's heart was not deeply interested.
You amaze me Madam, for indeed Mrs. Hindon long since gave me to understand

that it was a match where no material objections on either side could possibly be opposed to obstruct its progress.
Mrs. Hindon then spoke from her wishes, not her conviction, for from the beginning I am convinced she dreaded its success.
Well, Madam, said Miss Parsons, I heartily congratulate you on having escaped the snare; for it is a secret to few that Captain Wilmot, from a destructive passion for play, has mortgaged his estate, at no time considerable, to very near its full value, and if he has not already wholly ruined himself, his extravagance, unsubdued by experience, sufficiently proves that such a termination must soon take place. But on this head having received false intelligence, I concluded you acted from the dictates of affection; an idea which was sufficient to deter me from interfering by an explanation

that might have been but indifferently received, and which at all events I could not have been justified for bringing to light.
I thought, cried I, you had begun by indirectly proposing to reveal all. If secrecy was your determined resolution how was this in your power?
I meant all that concerned you, Madam, not what regarded your sister. Of her affairs I was informed, and in divulging my cousin's real situation, from the charges of treachery, however innocent my intention and however beneficial the consequences, I could not have been wholly exculpated, while confidence alone had put it in my power to betray.
Miss Parsons then hastened to inform us, that on the very evening which succeeded that of our arrival in England, Mr
