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I now request my readers to accept my apology for this long digression, and, without further comment, I will resume the thread of my narrative. I have now introduced the reader to Miss Halcomb, who was destined to be my wife; and I also have before said that I event to send a Sunday with her at Heytesbury, a distance of nearly thirty miles from my father's house.
Halcomb had acted in the same way that my father did, if he had forbidden me his house, and endeavoured by force to prevent my access to his daughter, such was my spirit of opposition, such an abhorrence had I of being driven into or out of any measure, such an innate hatred had I of every thing like tyrannical force, that I am quite sure if he had so acted, I having got the lady's consent, I am quite sure I should have run away with her in a week, in spite of all that could have been done to prevent me.
Nor was this only the start of the moment; on the contrary, I am quite sure that had not the parties complied with my wish, to fix the day before I left the house, I should never have been the husband of Miss Halcomb.
Halcomb made an apology for the absence of his father who was ill, and presented a letter, which had been sent to him by the coach from Botham, directed for my father. The latter having opened and read it, he looked very grave and disconcerted, and said, addressing himself to the young lady, "I am very sorry to inform you, Madam, that I find by this letter, which I have received from Mr.
Halcomb then, for the first time, hinted what sum he intended to give his daughter as a portion. I told him that, for the present, I would hear nothing of the sort; that, as my father would not enable me to make a settlement upon his daughter, I would trust entirely to him, and that I never wished him to mention the subject to me till we were married.
Halcomb, that I hoped he would act a more considerate part, for, as I had gained his daughter's consent, and as I was of age, and his daughter very nearly so, all the fathers in Christendom, nor all the powers on earth, should prevent me from making her my wife.
I had also eagerly watched the countenance of the lady, to endeavour, if possible, to collect whether this Mr. Botham had made any impression upon her heart or not; and from the apathy which it manifested, I felt very little fear on his account. My father was sadly mortified at the circumstance; both at the absence of his old friend Halcomb, and his new acquaintance Botham.
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