to kiss,
and the like; for certainly, if pride will not turn the brain, nothing
can.

However, the next time my gentleman came, I had not courage enough, or
not ill nature enough, to treat him in the rude manner I had resolved to
do, and it was very well I did not; for soon after, I had another letter
from Amy, in which was the mortifying news, and indeed surprising to me,
that my prince (as I, with a secret pleasure, had called him) was very
much hurt by a bruise he had received in hunting and engaging with a
wild boar, a cruel and desperate sport which the noblemen of Germany, it
seems, much delight in.

This alarmed me indeed, and the more because Amy wrote me word that his
gentleman was gone away express to him, not without apprehensions that
he should find his master was dead before his coming home; but that he
(the gentleman) had promised her that as soon as he arrived he would
send back the same courier to her with an account of his master's
health, and of the main affair; and that he had obliged Amy to stay at
Paris fourteen days for his return; she having promised him before to
make it her business to go to England and to find me out for his lord if
he sent her such orders; and he was to send her a bill for fifty
pistoles for her journey. So Amy told me she waited for the answer.

This was a blow to me several ways; for, first, I was in a state of
uncertainty as to his person, whether he was alive or dead; and I was
not unconcerned in that part, I assure you; for I had an inexpressible
affection remaining for his person, besides the degree to which it was
revived by the view of a firmer interest in him. But this was not all,
for in losing him I forever lost the prospect of all the gaiety and
glory that had made such an impression upon my imagination.

In this state of uncertainty, I say, by Amy's letter, I was like still
to remain another fortnight; and had I now continued the resolution of
using my merchant in the rude manner I once intended, I had made perhaps
a sorry piece of work of it indeed, and it was very well my heart failed
me as it did.

However, I treated him with a great many shuffles, and feigned stories
to keep him off from any closer conferences than we had already had,
that I might act afterwards as occasion might offer, one way or other.
But that which mortified me most was, that Amy did not write, though the
fourteen days were expired. At last, to my great surprise, when I was,
with th