finest creature in the universe. I would give half my estate, Booth,
she loved me as well as she doth you. Though, on second consideration,
I believe I should repent that bargain; for then, very possibly, I
should not care a farthing for her."

"You will pardon me, dear colonel," answered Booth; "but to me there
appears somewhat very singular in your way of thinking. Beauty is
indeed the object of liking, great qualities of admiration, good ones
of esteem; but the devil take me if I think anything but love to be
the object of love."

"Is there not something too selfish," replied James, "in that opinion?
but, without considering it in that light, is it not of all things the
most insipid? all oil! all sugar! zounds! it is enough to cloy the
sharp-set appetite of a parson. Acids surely are the most likely to
quicken."

"I do not love reasoning in allegories," cries Booth; "but with regard
to love, I declare I never found anything cloying in it. I have lived
almost alone with my wife near three years together, was never tired
with her company, nor ever wished for any other; and I am sure I never
tasted any of the acid you mention to quicken my appetite."

"This is all very extraordinary and romantic to me," answered the
colonel. "If I was to be shut up three years with the same woman,
which Heaven forbid! nothing, I think, could keep me alive but a
temper as violent as that of Miss Matthews. As to love, it would make
me sick to death in the twentieth part of that time. If I was so
condemned, let me see, what would I wish the woman to be? I think no
one virtue would be sufficient. With the spirit of a tigress I would