After dinner we withdrew into another apartment, where the boy
began to be impertinently troublesome to my niece Liddy. He
wanted a playfellow, forsooth; and would have romped with her,
had she encouraged his advances -- He was even so impudent as to
snatch a kiss, at which she changed countenance, and seemed
uneasy; and though his father checked him for the rudeness of his
behaviour, he became so outrageous as to thrust his hand in her
bosom: an insult to which she did not tamely submit, though one
of the mildest creatures upon earth. Her eyes sparkling with
resentment, she started up, and lent him such a box in the ear,
as sent him staggering to the other side of the room.
'Miss Melford (cried his father), you have treated him with the
utmost propriety -- I am only sorry that the impertinence of any
child of mine should have occasioned this exertion of your spirit,
which I cannot but applaud and admire.' His wife was so far
from assenting to the candour of his apology, that she rose from
the table, and, taking her son by the hand, 'Come, child (said
she), your father cannot abide you.' So saying, she retired with
this hopeful youth, and was followed by her gouvernante: but
neither the one nor the other deigned to take the least notice of
the company.
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