my father, who had been abroad in his youth, said, that
his remarks were curious, and shewed him to be a person of reading,
judgment and taste.

Thus was a kind of correspondence begun between him and me, with general
approbation; while every one wondered at, and was pleased with, his
patient veneration of me; for so they called it. However, it was not
doubted but he would soon be more importunate, since his visits were
more frequent, and he acknowledged to my aunt Hervey a passion for me,
accompanied with an awe that he had never known before; to which he
attributed what he called his but seeming acquiescence with my father's
pleasure, and the distance I kept him at. And yet, my dear, this may be
his usual manner of behaviour to our sex; for had not my sister at first
all his reverence?

Mean time, my father, expecting his importunity, kept in readiness the
reports he had heard in his disfavour, to charge them upon him then, as
so many objections to address. And it was highly agreeable to me that he
did so: it would have been strange if it were not; since the person who
could reject Mr. Wyerley's address for the sake of his free opinions,
must have been inexcusable, had she not rejected another's for his freer
practices.

But I should own, that in the letters he sent me upon the general
subject, he more than once inclosed a particular one, declaring his
passionate regards for me, and complaining with fervour enough, of my
reserves. But of these I took not the least notice: for, as I had not
written to him at all, but upon a subject so general, I thought it was
but right to let what he wrote upon one so particular pass off as if I
had never seen it; and the rather, as I was not then at liberty (from
the approbation his letters met with) to break off the correspondence,
unless I had assigned the true reason for doing so. Besides, with all
his respectful assiduities, it was easy to observe, (if it had not been
his general character) that his temper is naturally haughty and violent;
and I had seen too much of that untractable spirit in my brother to like
it in one who hoped to be still more nearly related to me.

I had a little specimen of this temper of his upon the very occasion I
have mentioned: For after he had sent me a third particular letter with
the general one, he asked me the next time he came to Harlowe-Place,
if I had not received such a one from him?--I told him I should never
answer one so sent; and that