"Gratitude!" interrupted Mr. Vincent: "he is no hero, to my mind, who would be content with gratitude, instead of love."
"You need not alarm yourself: Miss Portman does not seem inclined to put you to the trial, you see," said Mr. Percival, smiling. "Now it is really to be regretted, that she deprived you of an opportunity of fighting some of the gentlemen in Mrs. Freke's train, or of delivering her from the perilous height of one of those rocking-stones. It would have been a new incident in a novel."
"How that poor girl screamed!" said Belinda. "Was her terror real or affected?"
"Partly real, partly affected, I fancy," said Mr. Percival.
"I pity her," said Mr. Vincent; "for Mrs. Freke leads her a weary life."
"She is certainly to be pitied, but also to be blamed," said Mr. Percival. "You do not know her history. Miss Moreton ran away from her friends to live with this Mrs. Freke, who has led her into all kinds of mischief and absurdity. The girl is weak and vain, and believes that every thing becomes her which Mrs. Freke assures her is becoming. At one time she was persuaded to go to a public ball with her arms as bare as Juno's, and her feet as naked as Mad. Tallien's. At another time Miss Moreton (who unfortunately has never heard the Greek proverb, that half is better than the whole,) was persuaded by Mrs. Freke to lay aside, her half boots, and to equip herself in men's whole boots; and thus she rode about the country, to the amazement of all the world. These are trifles; but women who love to set the world at defiance in trifles seldom respect its opinion in matters of consequence. Miss Moreton's whole boots in the morning, and her bare feet in the evening, were talked of by every body, till she gave them more to talk of about her attachment to a young officer. Mrs. Freke, whose philosophy is professedly latitudinarian in morals, laughed at the girl's prejudice in favour of the ceremony of marriage. So did the officer; for Miss Moreton had no fortune. It is suspected that the young lady did not feel the difficulty, which philosophers are sometimes said to find in suiting their practice to their theory. The _unenlightened_ world reprobated the theory much, and the practice more. I am inclined, in spite of scandal, to think the poor girl was only imprudent: at all events, she repents her folly too late. She has now no friend upon earth but Mrs. Freke, who is, in fact, her worst enemy, and who tyrannizes over her without mercy. Imagine what it is to be the butt of a buffoon!"
