by their lids before her, were dark, impatient, and restless; arched by black eyebrows, that gave a strongly marked character to his countenance: the hair was raven; and the mouth had something of scorn, that mingled with its smile. His age was not above forty, and did not appear so much. He was elegantly dressed, not with any affectation of foppery, but as a finished gentleman; and a certain indescribable air of ease spread itself over all that he said and did, that at once stamped him a man of birth and fashion.

his

After a few moments which he seemed to give Eliza to become acquainted with person, he again lifted up his eye and made some inquiries about her journey. "Did not you meet with a single adventure! and have you really performed this long journey in inglorious safety? It is a shame that the roads should be so good, and so well protected, that a handsome young lady can travel along them with

as much ease as a market woman.

You will not even be able to fill up a sheet of folio post when you write to your friends in the country, unless you possess sentiment; then, indeed, you may go on, like that excellent poet Touchstone, eight years together, almost without his exceptions." Eliza smiled and said, "A sheet of Bath will answer my purpose.

"I am glad to hear you say so, for nothing annoys me more than sentimental young ladies. I was beginning to be afraid you were a little tainted, but I hope to find myself mistaken."

Eliza coloured deeply. She did not know whether he was or not.

"But safety is sometimes dull, and I am afraid you were so."

"No. Mr. Laurence is generally serious, but never dull."

"Mr. Laurence! So he was then your travelling companion?"

"He was so kind as to give me his protection to town."

Perhaps, after all, the roads are not so safe as I have been accustomed to think them," said Mr. Massenburg, in a disturbed voice, and with some lowering of his dark eyebrows; but seeing Eliza's startled look, the cloud dispersed, and he spoke again in his accustomed tone: but she felt that something had jarred upon his mind, and already trembled to excite his anger. Mr. Massenburg's temper had been soured by commerce with the world, and Eliza was such a novice, that with all her care, she soon after again touched a discordant string.

Well," said Mr. Massenburg, "and. how did you leave your Mr. and Mrs. Davenant?"

"Well, quite well, in health, but very unhappy to lose their Eliza. A little time will, I trust, restore to them their accustomed cheerfulness."

"Oh! they have been always so affectionate, so kind, and indulgent, that

I think I can never love them enough! From the earliest dawn of my remem brance, they have shown me the same undeviating affection."

Mr. Massenburg had listened to his daughter thus far, with the utmost impatience; and now rising from his chair, he pushed it backward with a violence that at once recalled Eliza's attention. The dark glances of his eye flashed upon her in anger, and it was by a strong effort that he suppressed the utterance of his first thoughts.

"The amiable warmth of your feelings, Miss Massenburg," he at length said, "makes you overlook the small impropriety of expressing them before me. It is no doubt quite natural and proper, that Mr. and Mrs. Davenant should hold the first place in your heart and estimation; and though I submit to this, I will not submit to invidious comparisons between us. How are you to judge of the motives. and expediency of my conduct."

For a moment the astonished Eliza's eyes were raised to her father's face; but anger, which perhaps is the least controllable in its effects of all the passions, distorted his fine features. Her tears flowed fast, but like a small supply of water on a large fire, only tended to feed the flame.

"I have already given you a hint, Eliza, how much I detest sentiment. Have done with this Niobe-like grief, if you do not mean to irritate me into a fever. There, there, let your uncle and aunt be the Adam and Eve of the world, only draw no comparisons between us."

Eliza suppressed her grief, and assured him that she never meant, never could mean, either comparison, or reproach.

66

Why then these implied censures? But come, no more of this. I am to blame;" and Mr. Massenburg again reseated himself by Eliza, and, banishing from his countenance every trace of his