e
exposed to the harsh treatment I wish to avoid. If, on the other hand, my
proposal does not meet your views, I have one favour to ask by granting
which you will earn my everlasting gratitude. This is that you will
endeavour to see me no more, and will take care not to be present in any
company in which you think I am to be found. Thus you will help me to
forget you, and this is the least you can do for me. You may guess that I
shall never be happy till I have become your wife or have forgotten you.
Farewell! I reckon upon seeing you on Sunday."

This letter affected me. I felt that it was dictated by prudent,
virtuous, and honourable feelings, and I found even more merit in the
intellectual endowments of the girl than in her beauty. I blushed at
having in a manner led her astray, and I should have thought myself
worthy of punishment if I had been capable of refusing the hand offered
to me with so much nobility of feeling. And a second but still a powerful
consideration made me look complacently upon a fortune larger than I
could reasonably expect to win. Nevertheless, the idea of the marriage
state, for which I felt I had no vocation, made me tremble.

I knew myself too well not to be aware that as a married man I should be
unhappy, and, consequently, with the best intentions I should fail in
making the woman's life a happy one. My uncertainty in the four days
which she had wisely left me convinced me that I was not in love with
her. In spite of that, so weak was I that I could not summon up courage
to reject her offer--still less to tell her so frankly, which would have
made her esteem me.

During these four days I was entirely absorbed in this one subject. I
bitterly repented of having outraged her modesty, for I now esteemed and
respected her, but yet I could not make up my mind to repair the wrong I
had done her. I could not bear to incur her dislike, but the idea of
tying myself down was dreadful to me; and such is the condition of a man
who has to choose between two alternatives, and cannot make up his mind.

Fearing lest my evil genius should take me to the opera or elsewhere, and
in spite of myself make me miss my appointment, I resolved to dine with
the Lambertini without having come to any decision. The pious niece of
the Pope was at mass when I reached her house. I found Tiretta engaged in
playing on the flute, but as soon as he saw me he dropped the instrument,
ran up to me, embraced me, and gave me bac