who has supported you from childhood, who took you, a helpless infant, without a friend to protect you from every evil incident to deserted infancy? Did I not treat you, love you, as a blessing sent from heaven?"
Matilda was drowned in tears at this representation of her forlorn state; with a deep sigh she answered, "Yes, Sir, all this I acknowledge, and heaven can witness for me how grateful I was for your kindness, until my delicacy was alarmed by freedoms I thought improper from our near connexion."
"One question more, (said he;) should you have been offended at those freedoms, (as you call very innocent attentions,) had they been offered by a man who designed to make you his wife?"
Matilda started, "His wife! 'tis a strange question, but I answer, yes, Sir, I should; for confined as my knowledge of mankind was, nature and decency had taught me the impropriety of such behaviour."
"Perhaps,
