higher notes of feeling, and then again ran off in a wild
voluntary of fanciful mirth. He was supported and excited by kindred
spirits, who felt the same impulse of mood and time; and even those of
more cold and calculating habits were hurried along by the torrent. Many
ladies declined the dance, which still went forward, and under various
pretences joined the party to which the 'handsome young Englishman'
seemed to have attached himself. He was presented to several of the first
rank, and his manners, which for the present were altogether free from
the bashful restraint by which, in a moment of less excitation, they were
usually clouded, gave universal delight.

Flora Mac-Ivor appeared to be the only female present who regarded him
with a degree of coldness and reserve; yet even she could not suppress a
sort of wonder at talents which, in the course of their acquaintance, she
had never seen displayed with equal brilliancy and impressive effect. I
do not know whether she might not feel a momentary regret at having taken
so decisive a resolution upon the addresses of a lover who seemed fitted
so well to fill a high place in the highest stations of society.
Certainly she had hitherto accounted among the incurable deficiencies of
Edward's disposition the mauvaise honte which, as she had been educated
in the first foreign circles, and was little acquainted with the shyness
of English manners, was in her opinion too nearly related to timidity and
imbecility of disposition. But if a passing wish occurred that Waverley
could have rendered himself uniformly thus amiable and attractive, its
influence was momentary; for circumstances had arisen since they met
which rendered in her eyes the resolution she had formed respecting him
final and irrevocable.

With opposite feelings Rose Bradwardine bent her whole soul to listen.
She felt a secret triumph at the public tribute paid to one whose merit
she had learned to prize too early and too fondly. Without a thought of
jealousy, without a feeling of fear, pain, or doubt, and undisturbed by a
single selfish consideration, she resigned herself to the pleasure of
observing the general murmur of applause. When Waverley spoke, her ear
was exclusively filled with his voice, when others answered, her eye took
its turn of observation, and seemed to watch his reply. Perhaps the
delight which she experienced in the course of that evening, though
transient, and followed by much sorrow, was in its