osted in this unusual strain, after repeated
instances of his reserve and supposed inconstancy, considered the
question as a fresh insult, and, summoning her whole pride to her
assistance, replied, with affected tranquillity, or rather with an air of
scorn, that she had no title to judge, neither did she pretend to condemn
his conduct. This answer, so wide of that tenderness and concern which
had hitherto manifested itself in the disposition of his amiable
mistress, deprived him of all power to carry on the conversation, and he
retired with a low bow, fully convinced of his having irretrievably lost
the place he had possessed in her affection; for, to his imagination,
warped and blinded by his misfortunes, her demeanour seemed fraught, not
with a transient gleam of anger, which a respectful lover would soon have
appeased, but with that contempt and indifference which denote a total
absence of affection and esteem. She, on the other hand, misconstrued
his sudden retreat; and now they beheld the actions of each other through
the false medium of prejudice and resentment. To such fatal
misunderstandings the peace and happiness of whole families often fall a
sacrifice.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

OUR ADVENTURER BECOMES ABSOLUTE IN HIS POWER OVER THE PASSIONS OF HIS
FRIEND, AND EFFECTS ONE HALF OF HIS AIM.

Influenced by this dire mistake, the breast of those unhappy lovers
began to be invaded with the horrors of jealousy. The tender-hearted
Monimia endeavoured to devour her griefs in silence; she in secret
bemoaned her forlorn fate without ceasing; her tears flowed without
intermission from night to morn, and from morn to night. She sought not
to know the object for which she was forsaken; she meant not to upbraid
her undoer; her aim was to find a sequestered corner, in which she could
indulge her sorrow; where she could brood over the melancholy remembrance
of her former felicity; where she could recollect those happy scenes she
had enjoyed under the wings of her indulgent parents, when her whole life
was a revolution of pleasures, and she was surrounded with affluence,
pomp, and admiration; where she could, unmolested, dwell upon the
wretched comparison between her past and present condition, and paint
every circumstance of her misery in the most aggravating colours, that
they might make the deeper impression upon her mind, and the more
speedily contribute to that dissolution for which she ardently wished, as
a tot