passion: if I did not give all where I felt all, and endow the woman who
loves me fondly with my whole heart and my whole fortune.

"I press for a speedy marriage with my Emily--for why, in truth, should
it be delayed? A delay implies a doubt, which I cast from me as unworthy.
It is impossible that my sentiments can change towards Emily--that at any
age she can be anything but the sole object of my love. Why, then, wait?
I entreat you, my dear Uncle, to come down and reconcile my dear mother
to our union, and I address you as a man of the world, qui mores hominum
multorum vidit et urbes, who will not feel any of the weak scruples and
fears which agitate a lady who has scarcely ever left her village.

"Pray, come down to us immediately. I am quite confident that--apart from
considerations of fortune--you will admire and approve of my Emily.--Your
affectionate Nephew, Arthur Pendennis, Jr."

When the Major had concluded the perusal of this letter, his countenance
assumed an expression of such rage and horror that Glowry, the
surgeon-official, felt in his pocket for his lancet, which he always
carried in his card-case, and thought his respected friend was going into
a fit. The intelligence was indeed sufficient to agitate Pendennis. The
head of the Pendennises going to marry an actress ten years his senior,--
a headstrong boy going to plunge into matrimony. "The mother has spoiled
the young rascal," groaned the Major inwardly, "with her cursed
sentimentality and romantic rubbish. My nephew marry a tragedy queen!
Gracious mercy, people will laugh at me so that I shall not dare show my
head!" And he thought with an inexpressible pang that he must give up
Lord Steyne's dinner at Richmond, and must lose his rest and pass the
night in an abominable tight mail-coach, instead of taking pleasure, as
he had promised himself, in some of the most agreeable and select society