Callonbys, (which up to this instant I believed him in ignorance of;)
he expatiated upon the prospect of my repairing that misfortune, and
obtaining a fortune considerably larger; he cautiously abstained from
mentioning the personal charms of the young lady, supposing, from my
lachrymose look, that my heart had not yet recovered the shock of Lady
Jane's perfidy, and rather preferred to dwell upon the escape such a
marriage could open to me from the mockery of the mess-table, the jesting
of my brother officers, and the life-long raillery of the service,
wherever the story reached.

The fatal facility of my disposition, so often and so frankly chronicled
in these Confessions--the openness to be led whither any one might take
the trouble to conduct me--the easy indifference to assume any character
which might be pressed upon me, by chance, accident, or design, assisted
by my share of three flasks of champagne, induced me first to listen
--then to attend to--soon after to suggest--and finally, absolutely to
concur in and agree to a proposal, which, at any other moment, I must
have regarded as downright insanity. As the clock struck two, I had just
affixed my name to an agreement, for Jack Waller had so much of method in
his madness, that, fearful of my retracting in the morning, he had
committed the whole to writing, which, as a specimen of Jack's legal
talents I copy from the original document now in my posession.

"The Plough, Cheltenham, Tuesday night or morning, two o'clock--be
the same more or less. I, Harry Lorrequer, sub. in his Majesty's
__th regiment of foot, on the one part; and I, John Waller, commonly
called Jack Waller, of the __th light dragoons on the other; hereby
promise and agree, each for himself, and not one for the other, to
the following conditions, which are hereafter subjoined, to wit, the
aforesaid Jack Waller is to serve, obey, and humbly follow the