LUCY FREEMAN.

LETTER XXX.

TO MISS LUCY FREEMAN.

NEW HAVEN.

I believe your spirits need a cordial indeed, my dear Lucy, after drawing so dreadful a portrait of my swain.  But I call him mine no longer.  I renounce him entirely.  My friends shall be gratified; and if their predictions are verified, I shall be happy in a union with a man of their choice.  General Richman and lady have labored abundantly to prove that my ruin was inevitable if I did not immediately break all intercourse with Major Sanford.  I promised a compliance with their wishes, and have accomplished the task, though a hard one I found it.  Last Thursday he was here, and desired leave to spend an hour with me.  I readily consented, assuring my friends it should be the last hour which I would ever spend in his company.

He told me that he was obliged to leave town for a few days; and as I should probably see Mr. Boyer before his return, he could not depart in peace without once more endeavoring to interest me in his favor, to obtain some token of esteem, some glimpse of hope that I would not utterly reject him, to support him in his absence.  I thanked him for the polite attention he had paid me since our acquaintance, told him that I should ever retain a grateful sense of his partiality to me, that he would ever share my best wishes, but that all connection of the kind to which he alluded must from that time forever cease.

He exerted all his eloquence to obtain a retraction of that sentence, and ran with the greatest volubility through all the protestations, prayers, entreaties, professions, and assurances which love could feel or art contrive.  I had resolution, however, to resist them, and to command my own emotions on the occasion better than my natural sensibility gave me reason to expect.

Finding every effort vain, he rose precipitately, and bade me adieu.  I urged his tarrying to tea; but he declined, saying that he must retire to his chamber, being, in his present state of mind, unfit for any society, as he was banished from mine.  I offered him my hand, which he pressed with ardor to his lips, and, bowing in silence, left the room.

Thus terminated this affair—­an affair which, perhaps, was only the effect of mere gallantry on his part, and of unmeaning pleasantry on mine, and which, I am sorry to say, has given my friends so much anxiety and concern.  I am under obligations to them for their kind solicitude, however causeless it may have been.

As an agreeable companion, as a polite and finished gallant, Major Sanford is all that the most lively fancy could wish.  And as you have always affirmed that I was a little inclined to coquetry, can you wonder at my exercising it upon so happy a subject?  Besides, when I thought more seriously, his liberal fortune was extremely alluring to me, who, you know, have been hitherto confined to the rigid rules of prudence and economy, not to say necessity, in my finances.