ABSTRACT
When Montgomery was departed, Colonel Chesterville went again to Sir Edward, who waited for him in his study. He related the conversation between Montgomery and his daughter; the note which Ethelinde had sent him; and what had afterwards passed with Montgomery. With mingled pity, sorrow, and vexation, Sir Edward heard the relation: he now felt too certainly what he had hitherto only suspected – that the affections of Ethelinde were fixed on Montgomery; and he saw that her father, moved by his tenderness for her, and his pity and partiality to Montgomery, was doubtful whether he ought to oppose a passion which he could not disapprove, and to the propriety of which only fortune was wanting. The Colonel remembered his own conduct, and found it difficult to blame that of Montgomery: and naturally of a temper somewhat warm and romantic, the military life he had led had added more to his honour than to his prudence. Sir Edward found therefore that a very little encouragement would persuade him he was acting right in suffering his daughter to give herself to the man she loved; and that he reproached himself with extreme bitterness, for his own indiscretion in having deprived her of that fortune, which, however small, would have diminished somewhat of the extreme indiscretion she would now commit, in marrying, portionless herself, a man who had neither income nor profession of any kind. In the course of his conversation, Colonel Chesterville had not only dropped enough to convince Sir Edward that such were his feelings, but had touched on the possibility of procuring a commission in the English army for Montgomery, and of the young people’s living with him till they could afford an establishment of their own. As these were rather hints than proposals, Sir Edward attempted not to convince him of their impracticability; but contented himself for the present, with beseeching him to reflect on Ethelinde’s illness, and to save her as much as possible from the repetition of scenes likely to encrease it. He said, that he would consider of what could be done for Montgomery; and would recommend it to the Colonel to suffer nothing to delay the journey to Bristol; and to say as little as possible to Ethelinde of Montgomery, but to appear as if he considered the affair to be at an end.
