Ethelinde now found a new employment, full of melancholy anxiety, in viewing the distant ocean from her favorite eminence, and fancying every vessel which appeared but as a spot in the grey horizon might possibly bear Montgomery within it. However content she had hitherto been to find herself alone, she now wished for somebody who could tell her which of the ships she saw passing were East-India men. She watched the weather; and made enquiries which nobody heeded; for the people around her were no otherwise solicitous about the wind than as the various points from which it blew produced a cold scenting morning,² or was favourable to their pursuit. Ethelinde, therefore, still indulging her mournful contemplations, wandered about all day on the hills, wishing for intelligence, yet unable to obtain it. The letter promised from the Downs came not; yet five or six days had passed. She knew not all the various delays which occur before a ship actually leaves the river: and she fancied that Montgomery had already quitted the Coast of England.