He went on, disregarding--'My family is above my present situation, confidential though it be; but I would at once quit my present post--I would open an extensive establishment for refreshment at some fashionable watering-place. My connexions could not fail to make it succeed. You should merely superintend--have a large establishment under you--and enjoy the society and amusements for which you are eminently fitted. We would have a library of romance and poetry--attend the theatre weekly--and,'--(finishing as if to clench the whole) 'Charlotte, do you know what my property consists of? I have four hundred pounds and expectations!' If Charlotte had not been guarded, what would have been the effect of the library of poetry and romance? But her own poetry, romance, and honest heart, all went the same way, and she cried out--'I don't care what you have, not I. I've promised, and I'll be true--get along with you!' The village girl, hard pressed, was breaking out. 'You bid me go. Cruel girl! your commands shall be obeyed. I go abroad! You know the disturbed state of the Continent.--In some conflict for liberty, where the desperate poniard is uplifted--there--' 'Oh! don't talk so dreadful. Pray--' 'Do you bid me pause? At a word from you. You are the arbitress of my destiny.' 'No; I've nothing to do--do go! Only promise you'll not do nothing dangerous--' 'Reject me, and life is intolerable. Where the maddened crowd rise upon their tyrants, there in thickest of the fray--' 'You'll be the first to take to your heels, I'll be bound! Ain't you ashamed of yourself, to be ranting and frightening a poor girl that fashion?' cried the friendly dragon Martha, descending on them. 'Do you apply that language to me, ma'am?' 'That I do! and richly you deserve it, too, sir! See if your missus doesn't hear of your tricks, if I find you at this again.' The 'sex' fairly scolded the courteous Delaford off the field; and though she turned her wrath on Charlotte for having encouraged him, and wondered what the poor young man over the seas would think of it, her interposition had never been so welcome. Charlotte cried herself into tranquillity, and was only farther disturbed by a dismal epistle, conveyed by the shoe-boy on the morning of departure, breathing the language of despair, and yet announcing that she had better think twice of the four hundred pounds and expectations, for that it was her destiny that she and no other should be the bride of Delaford. 'If I could only know he would do nothing rash!' sighed Charlotte. Jane comforted her; Martha held that he was the last man in the world who would do anything rash. Miss Conway's Marianne, who was left behind, treated Charlotte as something ignominious, but looked so ill, miserable, and pining, that Miss Mercy was persuaded she was going into a decline, and treated her with greater kindness than she had met since she was a child.