Grant me only the poor and scanty boon,
that you would then conceive your right. Dismiss me, I intreat you. I
cannot bear my situation. My former days have all been sunshine, my
former companions have all been kindness. I have not been educated to
encounter persecution, and misfortunes, and horrors. I cannot encounter
them. I cannot survive it."
As she pronounced these words, she sunk, feeble, languid, and
breathless, upon the knees of the attendant. They hastened to raise her.
They soothed her ingenuous affliction, and assured her that she should
not be intruded upon by him of whom she had formed so groundless
apprehensions. Since then she was invited to partake of a slight
refreshment accompanied only by persons of her own sex, she did not long
hesitate, and was easily persuaded to acquiesce. The unostentatious
kindness of the invitation, and the modesty of the entertainment she
expected, dissipated her fears. It was from solitude that she now wished
to escape; and it was to that simple and temperate relaxation that she
had experienced among the inhabitants of Clwyd, to which she was
desirous to repair.
She was conducted towards a saloon, which had less indeed of a sumptuous
and royal appearance, but was more beautiful, more gay, more voluptuous,
and more extatic than that which had been the scene of the temptation of
the morning.
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