I am going again this afternoon:  every hour not passed with her is lost.

I will seek a favorable occasion of telling her the whole happiness of my life depends on her tenderness.

Before I write again, my fate will possibly be determined:  with every reason to hope, the timidity inseparable from love makes me dread a full explanation of my sentiments:  if her native softness should have deceived me—­but I will not study to be unhappy.

    Adieu! 
      Your affectionate
          Ed. Rivers.

LETTER 95.

To Miss Rivers, Clarges Street.

Silleri, March 20.

I have been telling Fitzgerald I am jealous of his prodigious attention to Emily, whose cecisbeo he has been the last ten days:  the simpleton took me seriously, and began to vindicate himself, by explaining the nature of his regard for her, pleading her late indisposition as an excuse for shewing her some extraordinary civilities.

I let him harangue ten minutes, then stops me him short, puts on my poetical face, and repeats,

  “When sweet Emily complains,
  I have sense of all her pains;
  But for little Bella, I
  Do not only grieve, but die.”

He smiled, kissed my hand, praised my amazing penetration, and was going to take this opportunity of saying a thousand civil things, when my divine Rivers appeared on the side of the hill; I flew to meet him, and left my love to finish the conversation alone.

Twelve o’clock.

I am the happiest of all possible women; Fitzgerald is in the sullens about your brother; surely there is no pleasure in nature equal to that of plaguing a fellow who really loves one, especially if he has as much merit as Fitzgerald, for otherwise he would not be worth tormenting.  He had better not pout with me:  I believe I know who will be tired first.

Eight in the evening.

I have passed a most delicious day:  Fitzgerald took it into his wise head to endeavor to make me jealous of a little pert French-woman, the wife of a Croix de St. Louis, who I know he despises; I then thought myself at full liberty to play off all my airs, which I did with ineffable success, and have sent him home in a humor to hang himself.  Your brother stays the evening, so does a very handsome fellow I have been flirting with all the day:  Fitz was engaged here too, but I told him it was impossible for him not to attend Madame La Brosse to Quebec; he looked at me with a spite in his countenance which charmed me to the soul, and handed the fair lady to his carriole.

I’ll teach him to coquet, Lucy; let him take his Madame La Brosse:  indeed, as her husband is at Montreal, I don’t see how he can avoid pursuing his conquest:  I am delighted, because I know she is his aversion.

Emily calls me to cards.  Adieu! my dear little Lucy.

      Yours,
          A. Fermor.