Sneer not, ye callous hearted insensibles, ye fastidious prudes, if we inform you that their tears fell in one intermingling shower, that their sighs wafted in one blended breeze.
The sudden opening of the door aroused them to a sense of their improper situation; for who but must consider it improper to find a young lady locked in the arms of a gentleman to whom she had just been introduced? The opening of the door, therefore, caused them quickly to change their position; not so hastily, however, but that the young officer who then entered the room had a glimpse of their situation.——“Aha! said he, have I caught you? Is my philosophic Plato so soon metamorphosed to a bon ton enamarato? But a few hours ago, sir, and you were proof against the whole arcana of beauty, and all the artillery of the graces; but no sooner are you for one moment tete a tete with a fashionable belle, than your heroism and your resolutions are vanquished, your former ties dissolved, and your deceased charmer totally forgotten or neglected, by the virtue of a single glance. Well, so it is: Amor vincit omnia is my motto; to thee all conquering beauty, our firmest determinations must bow. I cannot censure you for discovering, though late, that one living object is really of more intrinsic value than two dead ones. Indeed, sir, I cannot but applaud your determination.”
“The laws of honour, said Alonzo, smiling, compel me to submit to become the subject of your raillery and deception; I am in your power.”
“I acknowledge, said the officer, that I have a little deceived you, my story was fiction founded on truth—the true novel style: but for the deceptive part, you may thank your little gipsey of a nymph there, pointing to Melissa; she planned and I executed.”
“How ready you gentlemen are, replied Melissa, when accused of impropriety, to cast the blame on the defenceless! So it was with our first parents, and so it is still. But you must remember that Alonzo is yet to hear my story; there, sir, I have the advantage of you.”
“Then I confess, said he, looking at Alonzo, you will be too hard for me, and so I will say no more about it.”
Melissa then introduced the young officer to Alonzo, by the appellation of Capt. Wilmot. “He is the son of my deceased uncle, said she, a cousin to whom I am much indebted, as you shall hereafter know.”
A coach drove up to the door, which Melissa informed Alonzo was her uncle’s, and was sent to convey Alfred and her home. “You will have no objection to breakfast with me at my uncle’s, said Alfred, if it be only to keep our cousin Melissa in countenance.”
Alonzo did not hesitate to accept the invitation: They immediately therefore entered the coach, a servant took care of Alonzo’s carriage, and they drove to the seat of Col. D——, who, with his family, received Alonzo with much friendship and politeness. Alfred had apprized them of Alonzo’s arrival in town, and of course he was expected.
Col. D—— was about fifty years old, his manners were majestically grave, and commanding, yet polished and polite. His family consisted of an amiable wife, considerably younger than himself, and three children: the eldest, a son, about ten years of age, and two daughters, one seven, the other four years old. Harmony and cheerfulness reigned in his family, which diffused tranquillity and ease to its members and its guests.