rable ruffian finds means to quiet the suggestions of his
conscience, by some reversionary hope of Heaven's forgiveness.

CHAPTER EIGHT

THEIR FIRST ATTEMPT; WITH A DIGRESSION WHICH SOME READERS MAY THINK
IMPERTINENT.

Be this as it will, our lovers, though real voluptuaries, amidst the
first transports of their enjoyment did not neglect the great political
aim of their conjunction. Teresa's bedchamber, to which our hero
constantly repaired at midnight, was the scene of their deliberations,
and there it was determined that the damsel, in order to avoid suspicion,
should feign herself irritated at the indifference of Ferdinand, her
passion for whom was by this time no secret in the family; and that, with
a view to countenance this affectation, he should upon all occasions
treat her with an air of loftiness and disdain.

So screened from all imputation of fraud, she was furnished by him with
artful instructions how to sound the inclinations of her young mistress,
how to recommend his person and qualifications by the sure methods of
contradiction, comparisons, revilings, and reproach; how to watch the
paroxysms of her disposition, inflame her passions, and improve, for his
advantage, those moments of frailty from which no woman is exempted. In
short, this consummate politician taught his agent to poison the young
lady's mind with insidious conversation, tending to inspire her with the
love of guilty pleasure, to debauch her sentiments, and confound her
ideas of dignity and virtue. After all, the task is not difficult to
lead the unpractised heart astray, by dint of those opportunities her
seducer possessed. The seeds of insinuation seasonably sown upon the
warm luxuriant soil of youth, could hardly fail of shooting up into such
intemperate desires as he wanted to produce, especially when cultured and
cherished in her unguarded hours, by that stimulating discourse which
familiarity admits, and the looser passions, ingrafted in every breast,
are apt to relish and excuse.

Fathom had previously reconnoitred the ground, and discovered some marks
of inflammability in Mademoiselle's constitution; her beauty was not such
as to engage her in those gaieties of amusement which could flatter her
vanity and dissipate her ideas; and she was of an age when the little
loves and young desires take possession of the fancy; he therefore
concluded, that she had the more leisure to indulge these enticing images
of pleasure th