nsion of any body but Colonel Morden. I know it will
not be a mean to prevail upon you to oblige me, if I say that I am well
assured that this gentleman is a skillful swordsman; and that he is as
cool and sedate as skillful. But yet I will add, that, if I had a value
for my life, he should be the last man, except yourself, with whom I
would choose to have a contention.

I have, as you required, been very candid and sincere with you. I have
not aimed at palliation. If you seek not Colonel Morden, it is my
opinion he will not seek you: for he is a man of principle. But if you
seek him, I believe he will not shun you.

Let me re-urge, [it is the effect of my love for you!] that you know your
own guilt in this affair, and should not be again an aggressor. It would
be pity that so brave a man as the Colonel should drop, were you and he
to meet: and, on the other hand, it would be dreadful that you should be
sent to your account unprepared for it, and pursuing a fresh violence.
Moreover, seest thou not, in the deaths of two of thy principal agents,
the hand-writing upon the wall against thee.

My zeal on this occasion may make me guilty of repetition. Indeed I know
not how to quit the subject. But if what I have written, added to your
own remorse and consciousness, cannot prevail, all that I might further
urge would be ineffectual.

Adieu, therefore! Mayst thou repent of the past! and may no new
violences add to thy heavy reflections, and overwhelm thy future hopes!
are the wishes of

Thy true friend,
JOHN BELFORD.

LETTER LX.

MR. LOVELACE, TO JOHN BELFORD, ESQ.
MUNICH, NOV. 11--22.

I received your's this moment, just as I was setting out for Vienna.

As to going to Madrid, or one single step out of the way to avoid Colonel
Morden, let me perish if I do!--You cannot think me so mean a wretch.

And so you own that he has threatened me; but not in gross and
ungentlemanly terms, you say. If he has threatened me like a gentleman,
I will resent his threats like a gentleman. But he has not done as a man
of honour, if he has threatened at all behind my back. I would scorn to
threaten any man to whom I knew how to address myself either personally
or by pen and ink.

As to what you mention of my guilt; of the hand-writing on the wall; of a
legal prosecution, if he meet his fate from my hand; of his skill,
coolness, courage, and such-like poltroon stuff; what can you mean by it?
Surely you cannot beli