The first cause of amazement to Rebecca in the manners of Henry was, that he talked with her as well as with her sisters; no visitor else had done so. In appointing a morning’s or an evening’s walk, he proposed her going with the rest; no one had ever required her company before. When he called and she was absent, he asked where she was; no one had ever missed her before. She thanked him most sincerely, and soon perceived that, at those times when he was present, company was more pleasing even than books.
Her astonishment, her gratitude, did not stop here. Henry proceeded in attention; he soon selected her from her sister to tell her the news of the day, answered her observations the first; once gave her a sprig of myrtle from his bosom in preference to another who had praised its beauty; and once—never-to-be-forgotten kindness—sheltered her from a hasty shower with his parapluie, while he lamented to her drenched companions,
“That he had but one to offer.”
From a man whose understanding and person they admire, how dear, how impressive on the female heart is every trait of tenderness! Till now, Rebecca had experienced none; not even of the parental kind: and merely from the overflowings of a kind nature (not in return for affection) had she ever loved her father and her sisters. Sometimes, repulsed by their severity, she transferred the fulness of an affectionate heart upon birds, or the brute creation: but now, her alienated mind was recalled and softened by a sensation that made her long to complain of the burthen it imposed. Those obligations which exact silence are a heavy weight to the grateful; and Rebecca longed to tell Henry “that even the forfeit of her life would be too little to express the full sense she had of the respect he paid to her.” But as modesty forbade not only every kind of declaration, but every insinuation purporting what she felt, she wept through sleepless nights from a load of suppressed explanation; yet still she would not have exchanged this trouble for all the beauty of her sisters.
CHAPTER XXI.
Old John and Hannah Primrose, a prudent hardy couple, who, by many years of peculiar labour and peculiar abstinence, were the least poor of all the neighbouring cottagers, had an only child (who has been named before) called Agnes: and this cottage girl was reckoned, in spite of the beauty of the elder Miss Rymers, by far the prettiest female in the village.
Reader of superior rank, if the passions which rage in the bosom of the inferior class of human kind are beneath your sympathy, throw aside this little history, for Rebecca Rymer and Agnes Primrose are its heroines.
But you, unprejudiced reader, whose liberal observations are not confined to stations, but who consider all mankind alike deserving your investigation; who believe that there exists, in some, knowledge without the advantage of instruction; refinement of sentiment independent of elegant society; honourable pride of heart without dignity of blood; and genius destitute of art to render it conspicuous—you will, perhaps, venture to read on, in hopes that the remainder of this story may deserve your attention, just as the wild herb of the forest, equally with the cultivated plant in the garden, claims the attention of the botanist.
Young William saw in young Agnes even more beauty than was beheld by others; and on those days when he felt no inclination to ride, to shoot, or to hunt, he would contrive, by some secret device, the means to meet with her alone, and give her tokens (if not of his love) at least of his admiration of her beauty, and of the pleasure he enjoyed in her company.
Agnes listened, with a kind of delirious enchantment, to all her elevated and eloquent admirer uttered; and in return for his praises of her charms, and his equivocal replies in respect to his designs towards her, she gave to him her most undisguised thoughts, and her whole enraptured heart.