Page:The Naval Officer (1829), vol. 2.djvu/160

 haps she may be grown a fine girl: she bade fair to be so when I saw her; but fine girls are very plenty now-a-days, since the Vaccine has turned out the small-pox. Besides, the girls have now another chance of a good shape; they are allowed to take the air, instead of sitting all day, with their feet in the stocks and their dear sweet noses bent over a French grammar, under the rod of a French governess."

Why I took so much pains to conceal from the best of parents, the real state of my heart, I know not, except that, from habit, deceit was to me more readily at hand than candour; certainly my attachment to this fair and virtuous creature could not cause me to blush, except at my own unworthiness of so much excellence. My father looked disappointed; I know not why; but I afterwards learned that the subject of our union had, since my brother's death, been discussed and agreed to between him and Mr. Somerville;