The Greatest Regency Romance Novels. Maria Edgeworth

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СКАЧАТЬ had sent her upstairs that no other addresses might be a hindrance to his designs.--This pleased him very well, and he ran directly to the room where he was informed she was, and after some little discourse, which he thought was becoming enough from a person of his condition to one of her's, began to treat her with freedoms which she could not help resisting with more fierceness than he had been accustomed to from women of a much higher rank; but as he had no great notion of virtue, especially among people of her sphere, he mistook all she said or did for artifice; and imagining she enhanced the merit of the gift only to enhance the recompence, he told her he would make her a handsome settlement, and offered, as an earnest of his future gratitude, a purse of money. The generous maid fired with a noble disdain at a proposal, which she looked on only as an additional insult, struck down the purse with the utmost indignation and cried, she was not of the number of those who thought gold an equivalent for infamy; and that mean as she appeared, not all his wealth should bribe her to a dishonourable action. At first he endeavoured to laugh her out of such idle notions as he called them, and was so far from being rebuffed at any thing she said, that he began to kiss and toy with her more freely than before, telling her he would bring her into a better humour; but he was wholly deceived in his expectations, if he had any of the nature he pretended, for she became so irritated at being treated in this manner, that she called out to the servants to come to her assistance, and protected she would not stay an hour longer in the house if she could not be secured from such impertinencies; on which he said she was a silly romantic fool, and flung out of the room.

      Mrs. C----ge hearing there had been some bustle, came up soon after and found Louisa in tears: she immediately complained, of mr. B----n's behaviour to her, and said, tho' she acknowledged herself under many obligations to her for the favours she had conferred on her, she could not think of remaining in a place where, tho' she could not say her virtue had any severe trials, because she had a natural detestation to crimes of the kind that gentleman and some others had mentioned, yet her person was liable to be affronted. The milliner, who was surprized to hear her talk in this manner, but who understood her trade perfectly well, answered, that he was the best conditioned civil gentleman in the world;--that she did not know how it happened;--that she was certain indeed he loved her; and that it was in his power to make her a very happy woman if she were inclined to accept his offers;--but she would perswade her to nothing.

      These kind of discourses created a kind of abhorrence in Louisa, as they plainly shewed her, what before she had some reason to believe, that she was in the house of one who would think nothing a crime that she found it her own interest to promote. However, she thought it would be imprudent to break too abruptly with her, and contented herself for the present with encasing her promise that neither mr. B----n, nor any other person should for the future give her the least interruption of the like sort.

      From this day, however, she was continually ruminating how she should quit her house, without running the risque of disobliging her so far as not to be employed by her; for tho' she found herself at present free from any of those importunities to which both by nature and principles she was so averse, yet she could not answer to herself the continuing in a place where virtue was treated as a thing of little or no consequence, and where she knew not how soon she might again be subjected to affronts.

      Amidst these meditations the thoughts of Dorilaus frequently intervened: she reflected on the obligations she had to him, and the mighty difference between the morals of that truly noble and generous man, and most of those she had seen at mrs. C----ge's: she wondered at herself at the antipathy she had to him as a husband, whom she so dearly loved and honoured as a friend; yet nothing could make her wish to be again on the same terms with him she had lately been. It also greatly added to her affliction that she knew not how to direct to her brother; for at the time of his departure, little suspicious of having any occasion to change the place of her abode, she had left the care of that entirely to Dorilaus. She was one morning very much lost in thought on the odd circumstances of her fortune, when a Gazette happening to lye upon the table, she cast her eye, without design, upon the following advertisement.

      'Whereas a young gentlewoman has lately

       thought fit to abscond from her best friends,

       and with the most diligent search that could possibly

       be made after her has not yet been heard of,

       this is to acquaint her that if she pleases to return,

       she shall hereafter have no disturbance of that

       nature which it is supposed occasioned her withdrawing

       herself, but live entirely according to

       her own inclinations; and this the advertiser

       hereof gives his word and honour (neither of

       which she has any cause to doubt) faithfully to

       adhere to.'

       'It shall also be at her choice to live either at

       the house she quitted, or to be again under the

       care of that gentlewoman who was entrusted

       with her education: she is therefore requested to

       conceal herself no longer, lest her youth, beauty,

       and inexperience of the town should betray her

       innocence into those very snares she fears to fall

       into.'

      The very beginning of this paragraph gave her a conjecture it was meant for no other than herself; and the more she read, the more she grew convinced, of it.--It must be so, cryed she; every word,--every circumstance confirms it.--How unhappy am I that I cannot return so perfect an affection!--Instead of detesting my ingratitude, he only fears I should receive the punishment of it.--What man but Dorilaus would behave thus to the creature of his benevolence?--If I have any merits, do not I owe them to his goodness?--My brother and myself, two poor exposed and wretched foundlings, what but his bounty rear'd us to what we are?--Hard fate!--unlucky passion that drives me from his presence and protection.

      Yet, would she say again, if he has indeed subdued that passion;--if he resolves to think of me as before he entertained it; if I were certain he would receive me as a child, how great would be, the blessing!

      This confederation had so much effect on her, that she was half determined to comply with the advertisement; but when she remembered to have read that where love is sincere and violent, it requires a length of time to be erased, and that those possessed of it are incapable of knowing even their own strength, and, as he had said to her himself, that there was no answering for the consequences, she grew instantly of another mind, and thought that putting herself again into the power of such a passion was running too great a hazard.

      The continual agitations of her mind, joined to want of air, a quite different way of life, and perhaps fitting more closely to work than she had been accustomed, threw her at length into a kind of languishing indisposition, which, tho' it did not confine her to her bed, occasioned a loss of appetite, and frequent faintings, which were very alarming to her. Mrs. C----ge was extremely concerned to observe this change in her, and would have the opinion of her own physician, who said that she had symptoms of an approaching consumption, and that it was absolutely necessary she should be removed into the country for some time.

      Louisa readily complied with this advice, not only because she imagined it might be of service for the recovery of her health, but also as it furnished her with a pretence for leaving mrs. C----ge's house, to which she was determined to return no more as a boarder. The good woman with whom she had lodged at first recommended her to a friend of her's at Windsor, where she immediately СКАЧАТЬ