hastily quitted the room, leaving him in a paroxysm of rage and
mortification. As I ascended the stairs, I heard him open the
parlour-door with violence, and take two or three rapid strides in the
direction in which I was moving. I was now much frightened, and ran
the whole way until I reached my room, and having locked the door, I
listened breathlessly, but heard no sound. This relieved me for
the present; but so much had I been overcome by the agitation and
annoyance attendant upon the scene which I had just passed through,
that when my cousin Emily knocked at the door, I was weeping in great
agitation. You will readily conceive my distress, when you reflect
upon my strong dislike to my cousin Edward, combined with my youth and
extreme inexperience. Any proposal of such a nature must have agitated
me; but that it should come from the man whom, of all others, I
instinctively most loathed and abhorred, and to whom I had, as clearly
as manner could do it, expressed the state of my feelings, was almost
too annoying to be borne; it was a calamity, too, in which I could not
claim the sympathy of my cousin Emily, which had always been extended
to me in my minor grievances. Still I hoped that it might not be
unattended with good; for I thought that one inevitable and most
welcome consequence would result from this painful _éclaircissement_,
in the discontinuance of my cousin's odious persecution.

When I arose next morning, it was with the fervent hope that I
might never again behold his face, or even hear his name; but such
a consummation, though devoutedly to be wished, was hardly likely to
occur. The painful impressions of yesterday were too vivid to be
at once erased; and I could not help feeling some dim foreboding of
coming annoyance and evil. To expect on my cousin's part anything like
delicacy or consideration for me, was out of the question. I saw that
he had set his heart upon my property, and that he was not likely