Page:The Naval Officer (1829), vol. 2.djvu/159

 my Emily; and two days after the attainment of my rank, I mentioned to my father my in tention of paying a visit to —— Hall.

He was at the time in high good humou we were sitting over our bottle of claret, after an excellent têfe-d-tête dinner, during which I contributed very much to his amusement by the recital of some of my late adventures. He shuddered at my danger in the hurricane, and his good-humoured sides had well nigh cracked with laughter when I recounted my pranks at Quebec and Prince Edward's Island. When I spoke of Miss Somerville, my father said he had no doubt she would be happy to see me— that she was now grown a very beautiful girl, and was the toast of the county.

I received this information with an apparent cool indifference which I was far from feeling inwardly, for my heart beat at the intelligence. "Perhaps," said I, picking my teeth, and looking at my mouth in a little ivory etui—"per-