"You do your daughter injustice, Mrs. Clifford, and me no less, in

this opinion. But I do not seek to remind you of misunderstandings

and mistakes, the memory of which can do no good. My purpose now

is to renew the offer to you which I originally made to Mr. Clifford.

My attachment to your daughter remains unaltered, and I am happy

to say that fortune has favored me so far as to enable me to place

her in a situation of comparative comfort and independence which

I could not offer then--"

"Which is as much as to say that she don't enjoy comfort and

independence where she is; and if she does not, sir, to whom is it

all owing, sir, but to you and your father? By your means it is

that we are reduced to poverty; but you shall see, sir, that we

are not entirely wanting in independence. My answer, sir, is just

the same as Mr. Clifford's was. I am very much obliged to you for

THE HONOR you intend my family, but we must decline it. As for the

comfort and independence which you proffer to my daughter, I am

happy to inform you that she can receive it at any moment from a

source perhaps far more able than yourself to afford both, if her

perversity does not stand in the way, as it did when young Roberts

made his offers. Mr. Perkins, sir, the excellent young man that

you tried to murder, is to be here, sir, this very morning, to see

my daughter. Here's his letter, sir, which you may read, that you

may be under no apprehensions that my daughter will ever suffer

from a want of comfort and independence."

She flung a letter down on the sofa beside her, but I simply bowed,

and declined looking at it. I did not, however, yield the contest

in this manner. I urged all that might properly be urged on the

subject, and with as much earnestness as could be permitted in an

interview with a lady--and such a lady!--but, as the reader may

suppose, my toils were taken in vain: all that I could suggest,

either in the shape of reason or expostulation, only served to make

her more and more dogged, and to increase her tone of insolence;

and sore, stung with vexation, disappointed, and something more

than bewildered, I dashed almost headlong out of the house, without

seeing either Julia or her father, precisely at the moment when

Mr. Perkins was about to enter.




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