arse, and, unbolting the door,
a young lady sprung out, and shrieking, ran directly to the public-house,
to the infinite astonishment and affright of the whole family, who
believed it was the spirit of the deceased person, whose body lay in the
carriage. Renaldo, who was with difficulty restrained from interposing
in behalf of the clergyman against such odds, no sooner perceived this
apparition, than, supposing her to be some distressed damsel, his
Quixotism awoke, he descended in an instant, and rushed into the house,
among those that pursued the fair phantom. Don Diego and the physician
took the same road, while the real clergyman and Joshua tarried with the
ladies, who were, by this time, very much interested in the event.

Melvil found the young lady in the hands of the old gentleman, who had
released her from the hearse, and who now bitterly upbraided her for her
folly and disobedience; while she protested with great vivacity, that
whatever she might suffer from his severity, she would never submit to
the hateful match he had proposed, nor break the promise she had already
made to the gentleman who now attempted to rescue her from the tyranny of
a cruel father. This declaration was followed by a plentiful shower of
tears, which the father could not behold with unmoistened eyes, although
he reviled her with marks of uncommon displeasure; and turning to the
Count, "I appeal to you, sir," said he, "whether I have not reason to
curse the undutiful obstinacy of that pert baggage, and renounce her for
ever as an alien to my blood. She has, for some months, been solicited
in marriage by an honest citizen, a thirty thousand pound man; and
instead of listening to such an advantageous proposal, she hath bestowed
her heart upon a young fellow not worth a groat. Ah! you degenerate
hussy, this comes of your plays and romances. If thy mother were not a
woman of an unexceptionable life and conversation, I should verily
believe thou art no child of mine. Run away with a beggar! for shame!"

"I suppose," replied Renaldo, "the person to whom your daughter's
affection inclines, is that clergyman who exerted himself so manfully at
the door?" "Clergyman!" cried the other, "adad! he has more of the devil
than the church about him. A ruffian! he has, for aught I know, murdered
the worthy gentleman whom I intended for my son-in-law; and the rogue, if
I had not kept out of his way, would, I suppose, have served me with the
same sa