“Dear Madam:  Twenty times have I taken up my pen to write to you, and as often has my trembling hand refused to obey the dictates of my heart—­a heart which, though calm and serene amidst the clashing of arms and all the din and horrors of war, trembles with diffidence and the fear of giving offence when it attempts to address you on a subject so important to his happiness.  Dear Madam, your charms have lighted up a flame in my bosom which can never be extinguished; your heavenly image is too deeply impressed ever to be effaced....

“On you alone my happiness depends, and will you doom me to languish in despair?  Shall I expect no return to the most sincere, ardent, and disinterested passion?  Do you feel no pity in your gentle bosom for the man who would die to make you happy?...

“Consider before you doom me to misery, which I have not deserved but by loving you too extravgantly.  Consult your own happiness, and if incompatible, forget there is so unhappy a wretch; for may I perish if I would give you one moment’s inquietude to purchase the greatest possible felicity to myself.  Whatever my fate is, my most ardent wish is for your happiness, and my latest breath will be to implore the blessing of heaven on the idol and only wish of my soul....”

And Alexander Hamilton wrote this of his “Betty”:  “I suspect ... that if others knew the charm of my sweetheart as I do, I would have a great number of competitors.  I wish I could give you an idea of her.  You have no conception of how sweet a girl she is.  It is only in my heart that her image is truly drawn.  She has a lovely form, and still more lovely mind.  She is all Goodness, the gentlest, the dearest, the tenderest of her sex—­Ah, Betsey, How I love her...."[276]

And let those who doubt that there was romance in the wooing of the old days read the story of Agnes Surrage, the humble kitchen maid, who, while scrubbing the tavern floor, attracted the attention of handsome Harry Frankland, custom officer of Boston, scion of a noble English family.  With a suspiciously sudden interest in her, he obtained permission from her parents to have her educated, and for a number of years she was given the best training and culture that money could purchase.  Then, when she was twenty-four, Frankland wished to marry her; but his proud family would not consent, and even threatened to disinherit him.  The couple, in despair, defied all conventionalities, and Frankland took her to live with him at his Boston residence.  Conservative Boston was properly scandalized—­so much so that the lovers retired to a beautiful country home near the city, where for some time they lived in what the New Englanders considered ungodly happiness.  Then the couple visited England, hoping that the elder Franklands would forgive, but the family snubbed the beautiful American, and made life so unpleasant for her that young Frankland took her to Madrid.  Finally at Lisbon the crisis came; for in the terrors of the famous earthquake he was injured and separated from her, and in his misery he vowed that when he found her, he would marry her in spite of all.  This he did, and upon their return to Boston they were received as kindly as before they had been scornfully rejected.