Here I caught hold of her hand, and said--I don’t know what. What man _does_ know what he says when he makes love? It is wonderful that I can recollect so much as I have set down. I doubt if even Boswell, who was born with a note-book in his hand, could remember all the observations he had occasion to make, both to the lady he did marry and to the great number of ladies he didn’t marry. I don’t think I talked like a hero. I don’t fancy I made use of any of those striking and powerful expressions which I strongly suspect must have been first brought into fashion among novelists by good-natured elderly women, who had either never experienced or had forgotten the characteristics of love-making among thinking beings. To conceal nothing, I don’t think I said very much at all. “Will you love me?” and “Ho, won’t you love me?” and “Ah! can’t you love me?” and “Please, try to love me,” with an occasional Oh and a No, and a sigh, and a smile, and a blush from her, comprise, Eugenio, pretty much all that was said and done between us. I looked without sighing, and she sighed without looking. I sink--sank--sunk my voice into a whisper, and was about to express a very poetical and touching sentiment, when she interrupted me by crying out, “Isn’t that seven o’clock striking?” and before I could collect my senses, so as to enable me to listen to the distant bell and answer her, behold! she exclaimed, “I will be back in a few minutes,” and ran--yes, _ran_--with great speed and surprising grace, down the grounds and out of sight. Much astonished, I beheld her disappear, and then pulling out a cigar, lighted it, and sank, carefully, and after a narrow inspection, upon the grass, at the foot of a tree, and there, like Tityrus, supine but not careless laid, waited for her to return. I tried to think over what I had said to her, and how, on the whole, it struck me, she had received my fervid language; but I found myself chiefly wondering what on earth had drawn her away so hastily, and what connection seven o’clock could have with a proceeding so entirely disagreeable and undesirable. In about five minutes’ time, however, I saw her returning through the trees. She smiled very sweetly on seeing me seated and smoking, and exclaimed with indescribable sauciness, “I think you are very wise to rest yourself after your late severe attack.” “I hope,” I answered a little sarcastically, “that you didn’t run away from me because you were afraid!” “Oh, no,” she exclaimed, with serene candour shining in her countenance; “one of the servants--but I mustn’t tell stories out of school. This is my little secret; so ask me no questions.” “I _must_ ask you one question,” I replied, melted and won over as any petulant child is with a sweetmeat, by her delightful manner, “will you give me leave to love you?”