gth of the
room; and round the walls were disposed tables for whist or loo, where
the elders amused themselves with as much pleasure, and not less noise.

I fear that I gave my fair partner but a poor impression of an
aide-de-camp's gallantry--answering at random, speaking vaguely and
without coherence, my eyes fixed on Miss Bellew, delighted when by
chance I could catch a look from her, and fretful and impatient when she
smiled at some remark of her partner. In fact, love has as many stages
as a fever; and I was in that acute period of the malady when the
feeling of devotion, growing every moment stronger, is checkered by a
doubt lest the object of your affections should really be indifferent
to you--thus suggesting all the torturing agonies of jealousy to your
distracted mind. At such times as these a man can scarcely be very
agreeable even to the girl he loves; but he is a confounded bore to a
chance acquaintance. So, indeed, did poor Mary Dillon seem to think; and
as, at the conclusion of the dance, I resigned her hand to a lieutenant
somebody, with pink cheeks, black eyebrows, and a most martial air, I
saw she looked upon her escape as a direct mercy from Providence.

Just at this moment, Mr. Dillon, who had only been waiting for the
propitious moment to pounce upon me, seized me by the arm, and led
me down the room. There was a charming woman dying to know me in one
corner; the best cock-shooting in Ireland wished to make my acquaintance
in another; thirty thousand pounds, and a nice little property in
Leitrim, was sighing for me near the fire; and three old ladies, the
_gros bonnets_ of the land, had kept the fourth place at the whist
table vacant for _my_ sake, and were at length growing impatient at my
absence.

_Non sunt mea verba_, good reader. Such was Mr. Dillon's representation
to me, as he hurried me along, presenting me as he went to every one we
met--a ceremony in which I soon learned to perform my part respectably,
by merely repeating a formula I had adopted for my guidance: 'Delighted
to know you, Mr. Burke!' or, 'Charmed to make your acquaintance, Mrs.
French!' for, as nine-tenths of the men were called by the one, and
nearly all the ladies by the other appellation, I seldom blundered in my
addresses.

The evening wore on, but the vigour of the party seemed unabated. The
fatigues of fashionable life seemed to be as little known in Ireland
as its apathy and its ennui Poor, benighted people! you ap