long ago, to restore the former into my possession, I was resolved likewise to retain what little remained of the latter.

'I will not describe to you the passion into which these words, and the resolute air in which they were spoken, threw him: nor will I trou. ble you with the whole scene which succeeded Out came, you may be well assured, the story of the mistress; and out it did 6 come, with all the embellishments which anger and disdain could bestow upon it.

between us.

'Mr. Fitzpatrick seemed a little thunderstruck with this, and more confused than I had seen, him; though his ideas are always confused enough, Heaven knows. He did not, however, ' endeavour to exculpate himself; but took a method which almost equally confounded me. What was this but recrimination! He affected

to be jealous : -he may, for ought I know, 'be inclined enough to jealousy in his natural temper; nay, he must have had it from nature, < or the devil must have put it into his head; for I defy all the world to cast a just aspersion on 'my character: nay, the most scandalous tongues have never dared censure my reputation. My 'fame, I thank Heaven, hath been always as < spotless as my life; and let falsehood itself accuse that, if it dare. No, my dear Graveairs, however provoked, however ill-treated, how. ever injured in my love, I have firmly resolved never to give the least room for censure on this account. And yet, my dear, there are some people so malicious, some tongues so venomous, that no innocence can escape them. The most undesigned word, the most accidental look, the least familiarity, the most innocent freedom, ⚫ will be misconstrued, and magnified into I

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know not what, by some people. But I de< spise, my dear Graveairs, I despise all such slander. No such malice, I assure you, ever gave me an uneasy moment. No, no, I pro• mise you I am above all that. But where was I O! let me see; I told you my husband was jealous-And of whom, pray?-Why of whom but the lieutenant I mentioned to you ' before! He was obliged to resort above a year ' and more back, to find any object for this unaccountable passion, if, indeed, he really felt any such, and was not an arrant counterfeit, in order to abuse me.

"But I have tired you already with too many particulars. I will now bring my story to a very speedy conclusion. In short, then, after many scenes very unworthy to be repeated, in which my cousin engaged so heartily on my side, that Mr. Fitzpatrick at last turned her out of 'doors; when he found I was neither to be sooth

ed nor bullied into compliance, he took a very 'violent method indeed. Perhaps you will cón. 'clude he beat me; but this, though he hath approached very near to it, he never actually did. He confined me to my room, without suffering 6 me to have either pen, ink, paper, or book; and a servant every day made my bed, and 'brought me my food.

"When I had remained a week under this imprisonment, he made me a visit, and, with the ' voice of a schoolmaster, or, what is often much the same, of a tyrant, asked me, "If I would "yet comply?" I answered very stoutly, "That "I would die first."" Then so you shall, and "be d-ned," cries he; "for you shall never 66 go alive out of this room,"

Here I remained a fortnight longer; and, to C say the truth, my constancy was almost subdued, and I began to think of submission; when one day, in the absence of my husband, who was gone abroad for some short time, by the greatest good fortune in the world, an accident happened.-I-at a time when I began to give way to 'the utmost despair-every thing would be ex'cusable at such a time-at that very time I re'ceived-But it would take up an hour to tell you all particulars.-In one word, then (for I will not tire you with circumstances), gold, the 'common key to all padlocks, opened my door, and set me at liberty.

'I now made haste to Dublin, where I imme'diately procured a passage to England; and was proceeding to Bath, in order to throw myself into the protection of my aunt, or of your fa ther, or of any relation who would afford it me. My husband overtook me last night, at the in n where I lay, and which you left a few minutes before me.; but I had the good luck to escap him, and to follow you.

' And thus, my dear, ends my history; a tragical one, I am sure, it is to myself; but, perhaps, I ought rather to apologize to you for its * dulness.'

Sophia heaved a deep sigh, and answered, ' In'deed, Harriet, I pity you from my soul! But what could you expect? Why, why, would 'you marry an Irishman?'

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Upon my word,' replied her cousin, your 'censure is unjust. There are, among the Irish, 6 men of as much worth and honour as any among *the English; nay, to speak the truth, genero'sity of spirit is rather more common among

them. I have known some examples there, too, ' of good husbands; and I believe these are not 6 very plenty in England. Ask me, rather, what 'I could expect when I married a fool; and I 'will tell you a solemn truth; I did not know him to be so.'-' Can no man,' said Sophia, in a very low and altered voice, do you think, make a bad husband, who is not a fool ?'- That,' answered the other, is too general a negative; 'but none, I believe, is so likely as a fool to prove so. Among my acquaintance, the silliest

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'fellows are the worst husbands; and I will ven ture to assert, as a fact, that a man of sense rarely behaves very ill to a wife, who deserves very well.'

CHAP. VIII.

A dreadful alarm in the inn, with the arrival of an unexpected friend of Mrs. Fitzpatrick. SOPHIA now, at the desire of her cousin, related -not what follows, but what hath gone before, in this history: for which reason the reader will, I suppose, excuse me for not repeating it over again.

One remark, however, I cannot forbear making on her narrative, namely, that she made no more mention of Jones, from the beginning to the end, than if there had been no such person alive. This I will neither endeavour to account for, nor to excuse. Indeed, if this may be called a kind of dishonesty, it seems the more inexcusable, from the apparent openness and ex

plicit sincerity of the other lady. But so it

was.

Just as Sophia arrived at the conclusion of her story, there arrived in the room, where the two ladies were sitting, a noise, not unlike, in loudness, to that of a pack of hounds just let out from their kennel; nor, in shrillness, to cats, when caterwauling; or to screech-owls; or, in deed, more like (for what animal can resemble a human voice?) to those sounds, which, in the pleasant mansions of that gate which seems to de rive its name from a duplicity of tongues, issue from the mouths, and sometimes from the nos. trils, of those fair river nymphs, ycleped of old the Naïades; in the vulgar tongue translated oyster-wenches: for when, instead of the ancient libations of milk and honey and oil, the rich distillation from the juniper-berry, or, perhaps, from malt, hath, by the early devotion of their votaries, been poured forth in great abundance, should any daring tongue, with unhallowed li cense, profane, i. e. depreciate, the delicate fat Milton oyster, the plaice sound and firm, the flounder as much alive as when in the water, the shrimp as big as a prawn, the fine cod alive but a few hours ago, or any other of the various treasures which those water deities, who fish the sea and rivers, have committed to the care of the nymphs, the angry Naïades lift up their immortal voices, and the profane wretch is struck deaf for his im piety.

Such was the noise which now burst from one of the rooms below; and soon the thunder, which Jong had rattled at a distance, began to approach nearer and nearer, till, having ascended by des grees up stairs, it at last entered the apartment