oblige her more than by never mentioning, or if possible thinking on, a
circumstance which must bring to my mind an accident that might be
grievous to me to think on. She proceeded thus: "What I have done is in
my own eyes a trifle, and perhaps infinitely less than would have become
me to do. And if you think of engaging in any business where a larger
sum may be serviceable to you, I shall not be over-rigid either as to
the security or interest." I endeavoured to express all the gratitude in
my power to this profusion of goodness, though perhaps it was my enemy,
and began to afflict my mind with more agonies than all the miseries I
had underwent; it affected me with severer reflections than poverty,
distress, and prisons united had been able to make me feel; for, sir,
these acts and professions of kindness, which were sufficient to have
raised in a good heart the most violent passion of friendship to one of
the same, or to age and ugliness in a different sex, came to me from a
woman, a young and beautiful woman; one whose perfections I had long
known, and for whom I had long conceived a violent passion, though with
a despair which made me endeavour rather to curb and conceal, than to
nourish or acquaint her with it. In short, they came upon me united with
beauty, softness, and tenderness: such bewitching smiles!--O Mr Adams,
in that moment I lost myself, and, forgetting our different situations,
nor considering what return I was making to her goodness by desiring
her, who had given me so much, to bestow her all, I laid gently hold on
her hand, and, conveying it to my lips, I prest it with inconceivable
ardour; then, lifting up my swimming eyes, I saw her face and neck
overspread with one blush; she offered to withdraw her hand, yet not so
as to deliver it from mine, though I held it with the gentlest force. We
both stood trembling; her eyes cast on the ground, and mine stedfastly
fixed on her. Good G--d, what was then the condition of my soul! burning
with love, desire, admiration, gratitude, and every tender passion, all
bent on one charming object. Passion at last got the better of both