his sister, and also with her friend Miss Mortimer, whom she repeatedly saw in company with Hamilton, without suspecting their mutual love. This absence of apprehensions on that subject, was not entirely owing to the simple naïvete of Louisa's character, but also to other circumstances.
Within a few days after the ball, Sir Edward Hamden publicly made his addresses to Maria Mortimer, and both her father and uncle thinking her affections unengaged, with much pleasure expressed their approbation of the offer, and rather too hastily announced their conviction, that it could not fail to be agreeable to Miss Mortimer. Maria, though unalterably resolved to be either the wife of Hamilton, or of none; yet apprehending as both her father and uncle were very positive, and even violent in their opinions and resolutions, a very dis-
