To the Chevalier Dubois, at Malta.

Nothing material, my dear Dubois, has occurred since my last. Zilia is obliging in her deportment, and attentive to her studies. My brother, sister, the fair Indian, and myself, are seldom asunder: Miss St. Clare generally makes one in all our little parties; and though she is never chearful, yet is there a complacency in her manners, which makes even her melancholy pleasing. As you express a curiosity to know the remainder of her history, I will gratify it, by making it the subject of this letter.

“The day after I was pronounced to be out of danger, continued she, my maid brought me a letter, which, by the superscription, I knew to be from St. Far: I opened it with some emotion, and found it contained these lines:

“When a general joy, my dear madam, is spread over a family, instead of that universal horror which so lately reigned in it, shall not he, who so bitterly shared the grief, express the raptures which fill his heart at the happy vicissitude? I must, I do, amiable Maria: your parents, your brother, your sister, felt all that paternal, and fraternal love could excite; but there is an affection, which produces feelings too strong for words to express, and in which the mute language of the eye is more eloquent than any phrases which the tongue can furnish. Such feelings for you, lovely Maria, pardon the confession, has possessed my soul; surely, my eyes must have been faithful interpreters of it. That timidity which restrained me from breathing my passion, before your late dreadful accident, gave way to despair; and in the bosom of friendship, I poured out all my complaints. Your brother heard, and pitied me: he has encouraged me to hope, he has promised to be a warm advocate in my cause; but let me not be deemed presumptuous or ungrateful, if I reject all advocates but love; if I wish only him to plead for me in a heart, where I have no desire to succeed but by his influence.