 women can help being gratified however they may wish to repress it, were, in some degree, pleasing to her, had yet repeatedly declared to Lady Horatia and to Montague Thorold himself, that she felt not, and was persuaded she never should feel for him, that tender preference, without which she never would marry. This declaration they both imputed to that affection for Willoughby, which the uncertainty

of her own situation continued to nourish. Persuaded as they both were, that Willoughby had promised to become the husband of Miss Fitz Hayman, which every body but Celestina had long believed, Lady Horatia doubted not but that the merit and attachment of Montague Thorold, the similarity of their taste, Celestina's regard for his father, and the easy competence which with him she could possess and which she often declared was the condition of life she would prefer, would altogether induce her to reward his ardent affection with her hand, as soon as it became certain that Willoughby, either from interested motives or from conviction of their too near relationship, absolutely and for ever relinquished all pretensions to it. She was, therefore, glad that the accidental meeting which had so much affected Celestina was likely to hasten this period; and far from seeing it in the unfavourable light Thorold himself did, she told him, as soon as Celestina

left the room, that for him no circumstance could be more favourable.
Lady Horatia had long since transferred entirely to Montague Thorold those good wishes which she had at first expressed towards Vavasour. His great fortune, his handsome figure, and his apparent affection for Celestina, had for some time interested her for him; and she imputed his extravagant vivacity, and even his violent irregularities, to his youth and unchecked habits of gratification. Before her, Vavasour had at first so far restrained the intemperate sallies of his ungovernable temper, that she was for some time disposed to think well of his heart and his understanding: but soon finding that this semblance of moderation availed him not, and that he gained nothing on the inflexible heart of Celestina, he became tired of it, and relapsed into such a wild way of talking, and of boasting of actions still wilder, that Lady Horatia was no longer able to excuse him; and though she still received him at her house with civility,

she entirely approved of the resolution Celestina had made never to listen to him as a lover.
It was just at that period that Montague Thorold, who on Celestina's first arrival in town had not availed himself of the permission he had obtained to see her, came to solicit of Lady Horatia that indulgence
