(bold fellow!) seated himself upon the same bench, though at a
respectful distance. Julia blushed again, and cast down her beautiful
eyes.

You know very well, reader, how two persons, who are not acquainted,
always begin a conversation. The weather is the topic first touched
upon;--and that hackneyed subject merges easily and naturally into more
agreeable discourse. So it was with Julia and her gallant; in less than
half an hour after seating themselves on that bench, they were sociably
and unrestrainedly conversing on the theatres, the opera, the last
novel, and other matters and things pertaining to the world of fashion
and amusement. The lady judged her companion, by a slight peculiarity in
his accent, to be a foreigner--a circumstance that raised him still more
in her estimation, for our amorous American ladies adore foreigners. He
was also a man of wit, education and talent; and Julia became completely
fascinated with him. He proposed an exchange of cards; she assented, and
found her new friend to be the 'Signor Montoni'; and he subsequently
informed her that he was an Italian teacher of languages--a piece of
information that gave her pleasure, as his following a profession was a
pretty certain indication that he was poor.

When Julia returned home, the Italian accompanied her to the door. The
next day they met again, and the next; and the intimacy between them
increased so rapidly, that within a week after their confidential chat
on the Common, Montoni called on Julia at her residence. But the lady
noticed that he had suddenly grown reserved and bashful; and he made
this and their other interviews provokingly short. She had hoped to have
found in him an impetuous and impassioned lover--one who needed but the
opportunity to pluck the ripe fruit so temptingly held out to him; but
she found him, instead, an apparently cold and passionless man, taking
no advantage of his intimacy with her, and treating her with a distant
respect that precluded all hope in her bosom of a successful amour.

In vain did the beautiful wanton assail him with inviting glances and
seductive smiles; in vain did she, while in his presence, recline upon
the sofa in attitudes of the most voluptuous abandonment; in vain did
she, as if unconsciously, display to his gaze charms which might have
moved an anchorite--a neck and shoulders of exquisite proportions, and a
bosom glowing and swelling with a thousand suppressed fires. He
withstood all th