“As to the other Gentleman you mention, Mr. W., you know, sir, I have so slight a knowledge of him I can form no judgment, and a case of such consequence requires the nicest distinction of humours and Sentiments.

“But give me leave to assure you, my dear Sir, that a single life is my only Choice;—­and if it were not as I am yet but eighteen hope you will put aside the thoughts of my marrying yet these two or three years at least.

“You are so good as to say you have too great an opinion of my prudence to think I would entertain an indiscreet passion for any one, and I hope Heaven will direct me that I may never disappoint you...."[248]

Even timid, shrinking Betty Sewall, who as a child was so troubled over her spiritual state, was not forced to accept an uncongenial mate; although, of course, the old judge thought she must not remain in the unnatural condition of a spinster.  When she was seventeen her first suitor appeared, with her father’s permission, of course; for the Judge had investigated the young man’s financial standing, and had found him worth at least L600.  To prepare the girl for the ordeal, her father took her into his study and read her the story of the mating of Adam and Eve, “as a soothing and alluring preparation for the thought of matrimony.”  But poor Betty, frightened out of her wits, fled as the hour for the lover’s appearance neared, and hid in a coach in the stable.  The Judge duly records the incident:  “Jany Fourth-day, at night Capt.  Tuthill comes to speak with Betty, who hid herself all alone in the coach for several hours till he was gone, so that we sought at several houses, then at last came in of her self, and look’d very wild."[249]

Necessarily, this suitor was dismissed, and a Mr. Hirst next appeared, but Betty could not consent to his courtship, and the father mournfully notes the belief that this second young man had “taken his final leave.”  A few days later, however, the Judge writes her as follows: 

“Mr. Hirst waits upon you once more to see if you can bid him welcome.  It ought to be seriously considered, that your drawing back from him after all that has passed between you, will be to your Prejudice; and will tend to discourage persons of worth from making their Court to you.  And you had need to consider whether you are able to bear his final Leaving of you, howsoever it may seem gratefull to you at present.  When persons come toward us, we are apt to look upon their Undesirable Circumstances mostly; and therefore to shun them.  But when persons retire from us for good and all, we are in danger of looking only on that which is desirable in them to our woefull Disquiet....  I do not see but that the Match is well liked by judicious persons, and such as are your Cordial Friends, and mine also.