Here Joe just glanced at Miss Hughes, and turned a deeper red than ever.
"Certainly he ought," said another. "Will any of us do Joe?"
Upon this Joe exhibited fresh symptoms of being uncomfortable, which were hailed by a general burst of laughter.
"I'll tell you what, ladies," said Mrs. Lewis, "if I'm not greatly mistaken, Joe has got a sweetheart already."
Another lady said, that to her certain knowledge he had two, and another that he had three, and so on: he standing among them the whole time, with his eyes fixed upon the ground, vexed to death to think that Miss Hughes should hear these libels, and frightened out of his wits lest she should be disposed to believe them.
At length he made his escape, and being induced, by the conversation which had just passed, to ponder upon the matter, he was soon led to the conclusion that the fair daughter of Mr. Hughes had made an impression on his heart, and that, unless he could marry her, he would marry nobody, and must be for ever miserable, with other like deductions which young men are in the habit of making from similar premises. The discovery was not unattended by many misgivings. The great difference of station, then existing between them, appeared to interpose an almost insurmountable obstacle in the way of their marriage; and, further, he had no reason to suppose that the young lady entertained for him any other sentiments than those with which she might be naturally disposed to regard the son of a friend whom she had known so long. These considerations rendered him as unhappy as the most passionate lover could desire to be—he ate little, drank little, slept less, lost his spirits; and, in short, exhibited a great variety of symptoms sufficiently dangerous in any case, but particularly so in one, where the patient had mainly to depend upon the preservation of his powers of fun and comicality for a distant chance of the fulfilment of his hopes.
CHAPTER III.
1794 to 1797.