a whiff of jealousy on the sudden turn of a corner, I had lighted

it up afresh at the pure taper of Eliza but about three months
before, - swearing, as I did it, that it should last me through the

whole journey. - Why should I dissemble the matter? I had sworn to
her eternalfidelity; - she had a right to my whole heart: - to

divide my affections was to lessen them; - to expose them was to
risk them: where there is risk there may be loss: - and what wilt

thou have, Yorick, to answer to a heart so full of trust and
confidence - so good, so gentle, and unreproaching!

- I will not go to Brussels, replied I, interrupting myself. - But
my imagination went on, - I recalled her looks at that crisis of

our separation, when neither of us had power to say adieu! I
look'd at the picture she had tied in a black riband about my neck,

- and blush'd as I look'd at it. - I would have given the world to
have kiss'd it, - but was ashamed. - And shall this tender flower,

said I, pressing it between my hands, - shall it be smitten to its
very root, - and smitten, Yorick! by thee, who hast promised to

shelter it in thy breast?
Eternal Fountain of Happiness! said I, kneeling down upon the

ground, - be thou my witness - and every pure spirit which tastes
it, be my witness also, That I would not travel to Brussels, unless

Eliza went along with me, did the road lead me towards heaven!
In transports of this kind, the heart, in spite of the

understanding, will always say too much.
THE LETTER. AMIENS.

Fortune had not smiled upon La Fleur; for he had been unsuccessful
in his feats of chivalry, - and not one thing had offered to

signalise his zeal for my service from the time that he had entered
into it, which was almost four-and-twenty hours. The poor soul

burn'd with impatience; and the Count de L-'s servant coming with
the letter, being the first practicable occasion which offer'd, La

Fleur had laid hold of it; and, in order to do honour to his
master, had taken him into a back parlour in the auberge, and

treated him with a cup or two of the best wine in Picardy; and the
Count de L-'s servant, in return, and not to be behindhand in

politeness with La Fleur, had taken him back with him to the
Count's hotel. La Fleur's prevenancy (for there was a passport in

his very looks) soon set every servant in the kitchen at ease with
him; and as a Frenchman, whatever be his talents, has no sort of

prudery in showing them, La Fleur, in less than five minutes, had
pulled out his fife, and leading off the dance himself with the

first note, set the fille de chambre, the maitre d'hotel, the cook,
the scullion, and all the house-hold, dogs and cats, besides an old

monkey, a dancing: I suppose there never was a merrier kitchen
since the flood.

Madame de L-, in passing from her brother's apartments to her own,
hearing so much jollity below stairs, rung up her fille de chambre

to ask about it; and, hearing it was the English gentleman's
servant, who had set the whole house merry with his pipe, she

ordered him up.
As the poor fellow could not present himself empty, he had loaded

himself in going up stairs with a thousand compliments to Madame de
L-, on the part of his master, - added a long apocrypha of

inquiries after Madame de L-'s health, - told her, that Monsieur
his master was au desespoire for her re-establishment from the

fatigues of her journey, - and, to close all, that Monsieur had
received the letter which Madame had done him the honour - And he

has done me the honour, said Madame de L-, interrupting La Fleur,
to send a billet in return.

Madame de L- had said this with such a tone of reliance upon the
fact, that La Fleur had not power to disappoint her expectations; -

he trembled for my honour, - and possibly might not altogether be
unconcerned for his own, as a man capable of being attached to a

master who could be wanting en egards vis e vis d'une femme! so
that when Madame de L- asked La Fleur if he had brought a letter, -

O qu'oui, said La Fleur: so laying down his hat upon the ground,
and taking hold of the flap of his right side pocket with his left

hand, he began to search for the letter with his right; - then
contrariwise. - Diable! then sought every pocket - pocket by

pocket, round, not forgetting his fob: - Peste! - then La Fleur
emptied them upon the floor, - pulled out a dirty cravat, - a

handkerchief, - a comb, - a whip lash, - a nightcap, - then gave a
peep into his hat, - Quelle etourderie! He had left the letter

upon the table in the auberge; - he would run for it, and be back
with it in three minutes.

I had just finished my supper when La Fleur came in to give me an
account of his adventure: he told the whole story simply as it was:

and only added that if Monsieur had forgot (par hazard) to answer
Madame's letter, the arrangement gave him an opportunity to recover

the faux pas; - and if not, that things were only as they were.
Now I was not altogether sure of my etiquette, whether I ought to

have wrote or no; - but if I had, - a devil himself could not have
been angry: 'twas but the officious zeal of a well meaning creature

for my honour; and, however he might have mistook the road, - or
embarrassed me in so doing, - his heart was in no fault, - I was

under no necessity to write; - and, what weighed more than all, -
he did not look as if he had done amiss.

- 'Tis all very well, La Fleur, said I. - 'Twas sufficient. La
Fleur flew out of the room like lightning, and returned with pen,

ink, and paper, in his hand; and, coming up to the table, laid them
close before me, with such a delight in his countenance, that I

could not help taking up the pen.
I began and began again; and, though I had nothing to say, and that

nothing might have been expressed in half a dozen lines, I made
half a dozen different beginnings, and could no way please myself.

In short, I was in no mood to write.
La Fleur stepp'd out and brought a little water in a glass to

dilute my ink, - then fetch'd sand and seal-wax. - It was all one;
I wrote, and blotted, and tore off, and burnt, and wrote again. -

Le diable l'emporte! said I, half to myself, - I cannot write this
self-same letter, throwing the pen down despairingly as I said it.

As soon as I had cast down my pen, La Fleur advanced with the most
respectful carriage up to the table, and making a thousand

apologies for the liberty he was going to take, told me he had a
letter in his pocket wrote by a drummer in his regiment to a

corporal's wife, which he durst say would suit the occasion.
I had a mind to let the poor fellow have his humour. - Then

prithee, said I, let me see it.
La Fleur instantly pulled out a little dirty pocket book cramm'd

full of small letters and billet-doux in a sad condition, and
laying it upon the table, and then untying the string which held

them all together, run them over, one by one, till he came to the
letter in question, - La voila! said he, clapping his hands: so,

unfolding it first, he laid it open before me, and retired three
steps from the table whilst I read it.

THE LETTER.
Madame,

Je suis penetre de la douleur la plus vive, et reduit en meme temps
au desespoir par ce retour imprevu du Caporal qui rend notre

entrevue de ce soir la chose du monde la plus impossible.
Mais vive la joie! et toute la mienne sera de penser e vous.

L'amour n'est rien sans sentiment.
Et le sentiment est encore moins sans amour.

On dit qu'on ne doit jamais se desesperer.
On dit aussi que Monsieur le Caporal monte la garde Mercredi: alors

ce cera mon tour.
Chacun e son tour.