I told her I was but too well
convinced that at the present moment I did not
possess that interest in her heart, which alone
might entitle me to request her acquiescence in
the views which her father's goodness held out to
me; but I entreated her not at once. to decide
against me, but give me an opportunity to make
way in her affections, if possible, trusting that
time, and the services which I should render to
her father, might have an ultimate effect in my
favour.''
``A most natural and modest request. But what
did the young lady say in reply?''
``She is a noble-hearted girl, Richard Middlemas;
and for her frankness alone, even without
her beauty and her good sense, deserves an emperor.
I cannot express the graceful modesty with
which she told me, that she knew too well the
kindliness, as she was pleased to call it, of my
heart, to expose me to the protracted pain of an
unrequited passion. She candidly informed me
that she had been long engaged to you in secret
---that you had exchanged portraits;---and though
without her father's consent she would never become
yours, yet she felt it impossible that she should
ever so far change her sentiments as to afford the
most distant prospect of success to another.
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