returns, that we must keep the enchantress at bay. Then the poor lad
will be safe, providing always that she and her Colonel have not made
a rake of him by that time. Alas, what a wretch am I not to be able
to do more for him! Child, you have seen him?"

"I danced with him, sir, but I was too much terrified to look in his
face. And I saw his cocked hat over the thorn hedge."

"Fancy free," muttered Mr. Belamour. "Fair exile for a cocked hat
and diamond shoe-buckles! You would not recognise him again, nor
his voice?"

"No, sir. He scarcely spoke, and I was attending to my steps."

Mr. Belamour laughed, and then asked Aurelia for the passage in the
_Iliad_ where Venus carries off Paris in a cloud. He thanked her
somewhat absently, and then said,

"Dr. Godfrey said something of coming hither before he goes to his
living in Dorsetshire. May I ask of you the favour of writing and
begging him to fix a day not far off, mentioning likewise that my
sister-in-law has been here."

To this invitation Dr. Godfrey replied that he would deviate from the
slow progress of his family coach, and ride to Bowstead, spending two
nights there the next week; and to Aurelia's greater amazement, she
was next requested to write a billet to the Mistresses Treforth in
Mr. Belamour's name, asking them to bestow their company on him for
the second evening of Dr. Godfrey's visit.