There Was Nothing Wrong In The Sentiment; And Yet I Instantly
Reproached My Heart With It In The Bitterest And Most Reprobate Of
Expressions.
It had ever, as I told the reader, been one of the singular
blessings of my life, to be
Almost every hour of it miserably in
love with some one; and my last flame happening to be blown out by
a whiff of jealousy on the sudden turn of a corner, I had lighted
it up afresh at the pure taper of Eliza but about three months
before, - swearing, as I did it, that it should last me through the
whole journey. - Why should I dissemble the matter? I had sworn to
her eternal fidelity; - she had a right to my whole heart: - to
divide my affections was to lessen them; - to expose them was to
risk them: where there is risk there may be loss: - and what wilt
thou have, Yorick, to answer to a heart so full of trust and
confidence - so good, so gentle, and unreproaching!
- I will not go to Brussels, replied I, interrupting myself. - But
my imagination went on, - I recalled her looks at that crisis of our
separation, when neither of us had power to say adieu! I look'd at
the picture she had tied in a black riband about my neck, - and
blush'd as I look'd at it. - I would have given the world to have
kiss'd it, - but was ashamed. - And shall this tender flower, said I,
pressing it between my hands, - shall it be smitten to its very
root, - and smitten, Yorick! by thee, who hast promised to shelter
it in thy breast?
Eternal Fountain of Happiness! said I, kneeling down upon the
ground, - be thou my witness - and every pure spirit which tastes it,
be my witness also, That I would not travel to Brussels, unless
Eliza went along with me, did the road lead me towards heaven!
In transports of this kind, the heart, in spite of the
understanding, will always say too much.
THE LETTER. AMIENS.
Fortune had not smiled upon La Fleur; for he had been unsuccessful
in his feats of chivalry, - and not one thing had offered to
signalise his zeal for my service from the time that he had entered
into it, which was almost four-and-twenty hours. The poor soul
burn'd with impatience; and the Count de L-'s servant coming with
the letter, being the first practicable occasion which offer'd, La
Fleur had laid hold of it; and, in order to do honour to his
master, had taken him into a back parlour in the auberge, and
treated him with a cup or two of the best wine in Picardy; and the
Count de L-'s servant, in return, and not to be behindhand in
politeness with La Fleur, had taken him back with him to the
Count's hotel. La Fleur's PREVENANCY (for there was a passport in
his very looks) soon set every servant in the kitchen at ease with
him; and as a Frenchman, whatever be his talents, has no sort of
prudery in showing them, La Fleur, in less than five minutes, had
pulled out his fife, and leading off the dance himself with the
first note, set the fille de chambre, the maitre d'hotel, the cook,
the scullion, and all the house-hold, dogs and cats, besides an old
monkey, a dancing: I suppose there never was a merrier kitchen
since the flood.
Madame de L-, in passing from her brother's apartments to her own,
hearing so much jollity below stairs, rung up her fille de chambre
to ask about it; and, hearing it was the English gentleman's
servant, who had set the whole house merry with his pipe, she
ordered him up.
As the poor fellow could not present himself empty, he had loaded
himself in going up stairs with a thousand compliments to Madame de
L-, on the part of his master, - added a long apocrypha of inquiries
after Madame de L-'s health, - told her, that Monsieur his master
was au desespoire for her re-establishment from the fatigues of her
journey, - and, to close all, that Monsieur had received the letter
which Madame had done him the honour - And he has done me the
honour, said Madame de L-, interrupting La Fleur, to send a billet
in return.
Madame de L- had said this with such a tone of reliance upon the
fact, that La Fleur had not power to disappoint her expectations; -
he trembled for my honour, - and possibly might not altogether be
unconcerned for his own, as a man capable of being attached to a
master who could be wanting en egards vis a vis d'une femme! so
that when Madame de L- asked La Fleur if he had brought a letter, -
O qu'oui, said La Fleur: so laying down his hat upon the ground,
and taking hold of the flap of his right side pocket with his left
hand, he began to search for the letter with his right; - then
contrariwise. - Diable! then sought every pocket - pocket by pocket,
round, not forgetting his fob: - Peste! - then La Fleur emptied them
upon the floor, - pulled out a dirty cravat, - a handkerchief, - a
comb, - a whip lash, - a nightcap, - then gave a peep into his hat, -
Quelle etourderie! He had left the letter upon the table in the
auberge; - he would run for it, and be back with it in three
minutes.
I had just finished my supper when La Fleur came in to give me an
account of his adventure: he told the whole story simply as it
was: and only added that if Monsieur had forgot (par hazard) to
answer Madame's letter, the arrangement gave him an opportunity to
recover the faux pas; - and if not, that things were only as they
were.
Now I was not altogether sure of my etiquette, whether I ought to
have wrote or no; - but if I had, - a devil himself could not have
been angry:
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