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On the subject of the first of the two circumstances, she did, after a little reflection, venture the following question "Might he not?--Is not it possible, that when enquiring, as you thought, into the state of your affections, he ht have Mr Martin's interest in view? But Harriet rejected the suspicion with spirit

"Mr Martin! No indeed!--There was not a hint of Mr Martin I hope I know better now, than to care for Mr Martin, or to be suspected of it"

When Harriet had closed her evidence, she appealed to her dear Miss Woodhouse, to say whether she had not good ground for hope

"I never should have presumed to think of it at first," said she, "but for you You told me to observe him carefully, and let his behaviour be the rule of mine--and so I have But now I seem to feel that I may deserve hi so very wonderful"

The bitter feelings occasioned by this speech, the s, made the utmost exertion necessary on Emma's side, to enable her to say on reply, "Harriet, I will only venture to declare, that Mr Knightley is the last ive any wo for her more than he really does"

Harriet seemed ready to worship her friend for a sentence so satisfactory; and Emma was only saved from raptures and fondness, which at that moment would have been dreadful penance, by the sound of her father's footsteps He was coitated to encounter him "She could not compose herself-- Mr Woodhouse would be alareh another door--and the one, this was the spontaneous burst of Es: "Oh God! that I had never seen her!"

The rest of the day, the following night, were hardly enough for her thoughts--She was bewildered amidst the confusion of all that had rushed on her within the last few hours Every ht a fresh surprize; and every surprize must be matter of humiliation to her--How to understand it all! How to understand the deceptions she had been thus practising on herself, and living under!--The blunders, the blindness of her own head and heart!--she sat still, she walked about, she tried her own room, she tried the shrubbery--in every place, every posture, she perceived that she had acted most weakly; that she had been iree; that she had been i; that she retched, and should probably find this day but the beginning of wretchedness