Page:The Naval Officer (1829), vol. 1.djvu/269

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THE NAVAL OFFICER.
265

knowing the name of the young gentleman who had conferred such an obligation upon him. I answered that my name was Mildmay; for I had no time to tell a lie.

"I should be happy to think," said he, "that you were the son of my old friend and schoolfellow, Mr. Mildmay, of ——; but that cannot well be," said he, "for he had only two sons— one at college, the other as brave a sailor as ever lived, and now in the Mediterranean; but perhaps you are some relation of his?"

He had just concluded this speech, and before I had time to reply to it, the door opened, and Miss Somerville entered. We have all heard a great deal about "love at first sight;" but I contend, that the man who would not, at the very first glimpse of Emily Somerville, have fallen desperately in love with her, could have had neither heart nor soul. If I thought her lovely when she lay in a state of insensibility, what did I think of her when her form had