wn cutting, which I should
esteem much more though it were a plain round one, than the
nicest in the world cut by other hands; however I am afraid
she would think this presumption, after my suffering the
other to get spoiled. If you think you can excuse me to her
for this, I should be glad if you would ask her...."

Page was a little older than Jefferson, and the young man thought much
of his advice. Six months later we find Page advising him to go to
Miss Rebecca Burwell and "lay siege in form."

There were many objections to this--first, the necessity of keeping
the matter secret, and of "treating with a ward before obtaining
the consent of her guardian," which at that time was considered
dishonourable, and second, Jefferson's own state of suspense and
uneasiness, since the lady had given him no grounds for hope.

"If I am to succeed [he wrote], the sooner I know it the
less uneasiness I shall have to go through. If I am to meet
with disappointment, the sooner I know it, the more of life
I shall have to wear it off; and if I do meet with one, I
hope and verily believe it will be the last.

"I assure you that I almost envy you your present freedom
and I assure you that if Belinda will not accept of my
heart, it shall never be offered to another."

In his letters he habitually spoke of Miss Burwell as "Belinda,"
presumably on account of the fear which he expresses to Page, that the
letters might possibly fall into other hands. In some of his letters
he spells "Belinda" backward, and with exaggerated caution, in Greek
letters.

Finally, with much fear and trembling, he took his friend's advice,
and laid siege to the fair Rebecca in due form. The day
afterward--October 7, 1763--he confided in Page:

"In the most melancholy fit that ever a poor soul was, I sit
down to write you. Last night, as merry as agreeable company
and dancing with Belinda could make me, I never could have
thought that the succeeding sun would have seen me so
wretched as I now am!

"I was prepared to say a great deal. I had dressed up in my
own mind, such thoughts as occurred to me, in as moving
language as I knew how, and expected to have performed in a
tolerably creditable manner. But ... when I had an
opportunity of venting them, a few broken sentences, uttered
in great disorder, and interrupted by pauses of uncommon