_Augusta_ [smiling]. Dare I?

_Lewis._ Certainly. I am----

_Augusta._ Sincerity, constancy itself.

_Lewis._ Certainly.

_Augusta_ [pointing to the door at which Lisette went out]. There went
a proof of your unparalleled fidelity!

_Lewis_ [laughing]. Nay, now, you are----

_Augusta._ Fortunately, I was the only witness; yet think if your
favourite lady had seen it!

_Lewis._ She would excuse me.

_Augusta._ But if she also loved you?

_Lewis._ Then she would still more readily overlook such a trifle.

_Augusta._ Your lightness must grieve her.

_Lewis_ [laughing]. Then hers would be quite an old-fashioned love.

_Augusta_ [surprised]. Old-fashioned! What am I to understand by that?

_Lewis._ I mean, [with affected seriousness] a love, such as does not
now exist; a true, sincere love.

_Augusta._ Have you any reason to doubt the existence of such a love?

_Lewis._ Too many.

_Augusta._ You have been deceived then?

_Lewis._ Oh, a thousand times--and undoubtedly shall again.

_Augusta._ You exaggerate.

_Lewis._ No, no. With the first object of my passion, I was up to the
ears in love. My goddess, to reward my cruel sufferings, allowed me
only a place by her chair, and the honour of being marked as her most
obedient slave; I sighed, languished, complained, despaired: saw at
last, what she meant, and was cured--forever, as I presumed; but, alas!
I soon trusted another. Well; there I was made use of to excite the
jealousy of her inconstant favourite.

_Augusta._ You misrepresent, Mr. Brook.

_Lewis._ Another bright angel then delighted to have an attendant to
hand her to her carriage, to accompany her wherever she thought proper;
there again I was--but I tire you with all these melancholy instances
of my delusion.

_Augusta._ If all this be true, I pity you.

_Lewis._ Once, indeed, I got a dangerous illness by my folly; but it
cured me effectually.

_Augusta._ And now you chuse the way of retaliation?

_Lewis._ Why not?

_Augusta._ But did you ever reflect how many an innocent breast you
robbed of its peace?

_Lewis._ I cannot reproach myself with that.

_Augusta._ How many you have plunged in sorrow?

_Lewis_ [goodnaturedly]. Not a single one. As for protestations of
love, extravagant praises of their beauty, and so forth, they are mere
words of course; ladies know that very well from their childhood--a
woman of sense never trusts them.

_Augusta._ Yet how unfortunate must she