ABSTRACT
THE family at Cranberry Hall were sitting sociably after supper, descanting on the late transactions, admiring the beauty and dignity of Ancuna, and the talents and virtues of our hero; rallying Letitia on her new honours, and predicting her approaching happiness; when squire Aaron entered, with a surly manner and wrathful eye, the certain harbingers of a gathering storm. ‘If ever,’ said he, with an oath, ‘there was a / cool, unfeeling, accomplished villain, it is Tickle. I thought my suspicions were always sufficiently awake: but his cunning and baseness exceed all rule and calculation. One would think he was born to be my eternal tormentor, and the pest of our family. Here, when we had received him with open arms; when he had avowed his constancy to Letitia, before (I may say) men and angels; when honour, interest, reputation, all should bind him to be true; he has been playing a double part, and sporting with my sister’s peace and character, while he was robbing me of the affections and hand of a young lady, who would otherwise have been mine.’ The company expressed great astonishment and indignation at this sally: but he persisted in his affirmations; and, to confirm them, produced the following letter which he had just received from the brother of Miss Moody. /
