It was not long before I began to feel some inklings of a disposition to imitate Sir Thomas. Fortunately Mr. Fielding did not observe it in me; and he on his side was so brisk and jovial-hearted that he easily found enough of conversation for us both. And he was so prolific that I am sure he would have been the last to notice it. My bosom was no longer torn with the same pain when my thoughts reverted to Cynthia. My wits were so deadened that I had a sort of sweet sorrow instead; the sorrow whose expression is an amiable snuffling melancholy, and a tender reflection on the days that are past. I was fast sinking into the depths of this maudlin condition, when a diversion occurred that mercifully kept me from it, even as my mind tottered on the brink. A servant entered with the information that a woman was at the hall door demanding to see the justice on a most particular business. In an instant a great possibility possessed me completely, and startled me out of the bibulous lassitude that was creeping upon me. "What kind of a woman?" I asked eagerly, "A very beautiful woman, a most adorably beautiful woman, with the voice of a nightingale and as dainty in her carriage as, as---- Fielding, an you love me, give me a simile--as dainty as----" "The swift Camilla," says he instantly, "the virgin Volscian queen, as she 'Flies o'er th' unbending corn, or skims along the main,' in the crude language of the crookbacked Twickenham bard. If you were not so drunk I would give it you in Virgil's eleganter tongue." "I don't know what the female's like in her carriage," says the fellow, regarding us both with a very natural bewilderment, "for she's not come in no carriage, do you see. She's come afoot. But she's a shortish wench, with a pert tongue, and she's a-crying like fun." Prosaic as this description was, and sensibly differing as it did from the one I had furnished, I was sure that the female was no other than Cynthia. That there could be other shortish wenches in the world with pert tongues, who were capable of crying like fun, never entered my head. It may have been that I had so continually brooded on her fate, or the guilt of my conscience was so keen as to lead me to this conclusion on such slender grounds. Relieved as I was, I yet had some twinges of contrition. Despite my heavy-witted state I was fully alive to it, and mightily uneasy as to the figure I must make in her eyes. "A pretty kettle of fish," says I, "that I should be as drunk----" "As a lord," suggested Mr. Fielding. "As drunk as a lord on our wedding-day. I pray you have pity on my state, sir, and help me out as much as you can." "My dear fellow," says Mr. Fielding, "this is no sort of talk. It is unworthy of you. Why, nothing could have been better contrived, sir. Can anything be more commendable than that a man should begin as he means to go on. One cannot begin too soon to bring up one's wife properly."