Six in the evening.
I am just come from dining with the —— regiment, and find I have a visit to pay I was not aware of, to two English ladies who are a few miles out of town: one of them is wife to the major of the regiment, and the other just going to be married to a captain in it, Sir George Clayton, a young handsome baronet, just come to his title and a very fine estate, by the death of a distant relation: he is at present at New York, and I am told they are to be married as soon as he comes back.
Eight o’clock.
I have been making some flying visits to the French ladies; tho’ I have not seen many beauties, yet in general the women are handsome; their manner is easy and obliging, they make the most of their charms by their vivacity, and I certainly cannot be displeas’d with their extreme partiality for the English officers; their own men, who indeed are not very attractive, have not the least chance for any share in their good graces.
Thursday morning.
I am just setting out with a friend for Major Melmoth’s, to pay my compliments to the two ladies: I have no relish for this visit; I hate misses that are going to be married; they are always so full of the dear man, that they have not common civility to other people. I am told however both the ladies are agreeable.
14th. Eight in the evening.
Agreeable, Lucy! she is an angel: ’tis happy for me she is engag’d; nothing else could secure my heart, of which you know I am very tenacious: only think of finding beauty, delicacy, sensibility, all that can charm in woman, hid in a wood in Canada!
You say I am given to be enthusiastic in my approbations, but she is really charming. I am resolv’d not only to have a friendship for her myself, but that you shall, and have told her so; she comes to England as soon as she is married; you are form’d to love each other.
But I must tell you; Major Melmoth kept us a week at his house in the country, in one continued round of rural amusements; by which I do not mean hunting and shooting, but such pleasures as the ladies could share; little rustic balls and parties round the neighbouring country, in which parties we were joined by all the fine women at Montreal. Mrs. Melmoth is a very pleasing, genteel brunette, but Emily Montague—you will say I am in love with her if I describe her, and yet I declare to you I am not: knowing she loves another, to whom she is soon to be united, I see her charms with the same kind of pleasure I do yours; a pleasure, which, tho’ extremely lively, is by our situation without the least mixture of desire.