The Waverley novels, by Sir Walter Scott, complete in 12 vol., printed from the latest English ed., embracing the author's last corrections, prefaces & notes.

594 WAVERLEY NOVELS.
in the esteem and love of all who know you, and I drag on the life of a
miserable impostor, indebted for the marks of.regard I receive to a tissue
of deceit and lies, which the slightest accident may unravel. He has produced me to his friends, since, the estate opened to him, as a daughter of a
Scotchman of rank, banished on account of the Viscount of Dundee's wars
- that is, our Fr's old friend Clavers, you know - and he says I was educated in a Scotch convent; indeed, I lived in such a place long enough to
enable me to support the character. But when a countryman approaches
me, and begins to talk, as they all do, of the various families engaged in
Dundee's affair, and to make inquiries into my connexions, and when I see
his eye bent on mine with such an expression of agony, my terror brings
me to the very risk of detection. Good-nature and politeness have hitherto
saved me, as they prevented people from pressing on me with distressing
questions. But how long -O how long, will this be the case! -And if I
bring this disgrace on him, he will hate me - he will kill me, for as much
as he loves me; he is as jealous of his family honour now, as ever he was
careless about it. I have been in England four months, and have often
thought of writing to you; and yet, such are the dangers that might arise
from an intercepted letter, that I have hitherto forborne. But now I am
obliged to run the risk.' Last week I saw your great friend, the D. of A.
He came to my box, and sate by me; and something in the play put him
in mind of you - Gracious Heaven! he told over your whole London journey to all who were in the box, but particularly to the wretched creature
who was the occasion of it all. If he had known if he could have conceived, beside whom he. was sitting, and to whom the story was told! -I
suffered with courage, like an Indian at the stake, while they are rending
his fibres and boring his eyes, and while he smiles applause at each wellimagined contrivance of his tortures. It was too much for me at last,
Jeanie - I fainted; and my agony was imputed partly to the heat of the
place, and partly to my extreme sensibility; and, hypocrite all over, I encouraged both opinions- any thing but discovery! Luckily he was not
there. But the incident has more alarms. I am obliged to meet your great
man often; and he seldom sees me without talking of E. D. and J. D., and
R. B. and D. D., as persons in whom my amiable sensibility is interested.
My amiable sensibility! i -And then the cruel tone of light indifference
with which persons in the fashionable world speak together on the most
affecting subjects! To hear my guilt, my follyj my agony, the foibles and
weaknesses of my friends - even your heroic exertions, Jeanie, spoken of
in the drolling style which is the present tone in fashionable life - Scarce
all that I formerly endured is equal to this state of irritation- then it was
blows and stabs-now it is pricking to death with needles and pins. -HeI mean the D. -goes down next month to spend the shooting-season in
Scotland -he says, he makes a point of always dining one day at the
Manse - be on your guard, and do not betray yourself, should he mention
me-Yourself, alas! you have nothing to betray-nothing to fear; you, the
pure, the virtuous, the heroine of unstained faith, unblemished purity, what
can you have to fear from the world or its proudest minions? It is E. whose
life is once more in your hands - it is E. whom you are to save from being
plucked of her borrowed plumes, discovered, branded, and trodden down,
first by him, perhaps, who has raised her to this dizzy pinnacle i - The enclosure will reach you twice a-year - do not refuse it - it is out of my own
allowance, and may be twice as much when you want it. With you it may
do good - with me it never can.
"W rite to me soon, Jeanie, or I shall remain in the agonizing apprehension that this has fallen into wrong hands-Address simply to L. S., under
cover, to the Reverend George Whiterose, in the Minster-Close, York. He
thinks I correspond with some of my noble Jacobite relations who are in
Scotland. How high-church and jacobitical zeal would burn in his cheeks,