, the
images, may be many, but the acme of eloquence is in the rapidity of
their expression.
Wilton, then, did not in any degree presume. He discoursed upon
nothing; he did not even attempt to lead. The Duke led the
conversation, and he followed: but it was like that famous entry of
the Roman emperor, where an eagle was seen hovering round and round
his head: the royal bird followed, indeed, the monarch; but in his
flight took ten times a wider scope: the people hailed with loud
gratulations the approach of Caesar, but in the attendant bird
they recognised Jove. The Duke, however, who had taste, as we have
said, and feeling, and who, in regard to conversational powers, was
not a vain roan, was delighted with his guest, and laid himself out
to lead Wilton on towards subjects on which he thought he would
shine: but there was one very extraordinary thing in the history of
that afternoon. There was not a servant in the hall--no, neither the
laced and ribanded lackey lately hired in London, the old blue
bottles from the country mansion, the stately butler and his
understrapper of the cellaret, nor the Duke's own French gentleman,
who stood very close to his master's elbow during the whole of dinner
time--there was not one that did not clearly and perfectly perceive
that their young lady was in love with her handsome deliverer, and
did not comment upon it in their several spheres, when they quitted
the room. Every one felt positive that the matter was all arranged,
and the wedding was soon to take place; and, to say the truth, so
much had Wilton in general won upon their esteem by one means or
another, that the only objection urged against him, in the various
councils which were held upon the subject, was, that his name was
Brown, that he had not a vis-a-vis, and that he kept only two horses.
The two or three last sentences, it must be owned, are lamentable
digressions; for we have not yet stated what the extraordinary thing
was. It was not in the least degree extraordinary that the servants
should all find out the secret of Laura's heart; for her eyes told it
every time that she looked at Wilton; but it is very extraordinary,
indeed, that her father should never find it out, when every one else
that was present did. Is it that there is a magic haze which
surrounds love, that can never be penetrated by the eyes of parents
or guardians, till some particular allotted moment is arrived? I
cannot tell; so, however, has it always proved, and so in all
probability