console Matilda, and the warmest assurances of love and attention to her interests. They all anxiously expected the return of Mr. Weimar next morning, as the crisis on which her future destiny appeared to depend.
At the appointed hour Mr. Weimar sent in his name; her friends had persuaded Matilda to receive him alone, and send for them when she thought it necessary. She had tried all the morning to reconcile herself to his displeasure, but she was resolved to persevere in the resolution she had formed of retiring to a convent, if he made it necessary.
He entered the room with an air of kindness and complacency, took her hand and kissed it, "Let me flatter myself, dearest Matilda, (said he) that you are in better health and disposition than when I left you yesterday. I have passed many uneasy hours lately, indeed I may say truly, from the day you was committed to my care, every hour of my life has been spent in anxiety on your account." "Do not, Sir, (said she) for heaven's sake, do not crush me with the weight of obligations I owe you: a poor forlorn being, without family or friends, as you have justly told me, is entitled to no one's consideration; I am therefore beyond all possibility of return at present, indebted to you for every thing, for the life I enjoy; hard is the task upon me to refuse any thing you request, but as this meeting is to decide once for all, pardon me if I say I cannot marry you, but this deference I owe to your fatherly care of me, I solemnly declare that unless the authors of my being claim my first reverence, I never will encourage or marry any man without your permission; this, Sir, is all I can, or ever will promise in your favour." "Ungrateful girl! (cried he, raising his voice) and is this all, this all you owe to a man who preserved your life, and bestowed his time and fortune to make you what you are?" "Oh! that I had died, (cried Matilda, in an agony) rather than to live and be thus upbraided for
