My aunt laid down her knitting, looked at me over the rim of her spectacles, and
took snuff.I said nothing.
"How many times have you been in love, Isaac?" said she.
It was now my turn to say
"Pshaw!"Judging from her look of assurance, I could not possibly have made a more satisfactory reply.
My aunt finished the needle she was upon—smoothed the stocking leg over her knee, and looking at me with a very comical expression, said,—"Isaac, you are a sad fellow!"
I did not like the tone of this: it sounded very much as if it would have been in the mouth of any one else
'bad fellow.'And she went on to ask me in a very bantering way, if my stock of youthful loves was not nearly exhausted; and she cited the episode of the fair-haired Enrica, as perhaps the most tempting that I could draw from my experience.
A better man than myself,—if he had only a fair share of vanity,—would have been nettled at this; and I replied somewhat tartly, that I had never professed to write my experiences. These might be more or less tempting; but certainly, if they were of a kind which I have attempted