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and was evidently pleased with the fiction from which she derived a momentary addition to her consequence. How far Mr Mollins was deceived by these representations I know not; but his attentions, which seemed during the race-week to have been rather slackened, became now more assiduous than ever. This you will perceive, from the hints incidentally scattered through these letters; but nothing they contain, would lead one to suspect, that they had then formed any serious engagement. I was the less suspicious of this, because I was persuaded that Bell would be too proud of having made a conquest of a man of rank and fortune to conceal a circumstance so flattering. At length, in a few hasty lines, written to inform me, that she was next day to set off on a jaunt to the Highlands with the Spurtons, Flinders, and Mr Mollins; she so far let me into the secret, as to say, that "she approached the crisis of her fate, and that she would soon be either the most mi-
