of fashion. Her beauty stood confessed the transcendent inheritance of her offspring. I was indeed remarkable, for a pair of full cheeks, flushed with rosy health, a delicate and significant mouth, two large blue eyes, sparkling with sentimental fire, and overshaded by copious and symmetrical black brows. A vivacity of action, a smooth and flattering tongue, an invariable evenness of temper, and a lofty deportment which I occasionally assumed, contributed to procure me notice, indulgence, and favor.
At the eve of manhood, I felt myself gifted with such a store of warmth and sensibility, as seldom fails of making an impression, especially on the fair sex.
I was excessively fond of caressing the ladies; but merely prompted by caprice, and still more by the fashionable levities of the day, I generally reserved my homage for her that was the most admired. But soon the hour came, when I was to expiate whole years for the petulance and wantonness of youth.
Elmira, Countess Dacosta, had spent the first fifteen years of her life, with a relation in
