"And they had hardly discovered me, when, as he owned afterwards, he was
smitten with a violent love for me, as the manner in which it displayed
itself plainly showed. But to shorten the long recital of my woes, I will
pass over in silence all the artifices employed by Don Fernando for
declaring his passion for me. He bribed all the household, he gave and
offered gifts and presents to my parents; every day was like a holiday or
a merry-making in our street; by night no one could sleep for the music;
the love letters that used to come to my hand, no one knew how, were
innumerable, full of tender pleadings and pledges, containing more
promises and oaths than there were letters in them; all which not only
did not soften me, but hardened my heart against him, as if he had been
my mortal enemy, and as if everything he did to make me yield were done
with the opposite intention. Not that the high-bred bearing of Don
Fernando was disagreeable to me, or that I found his importunities
wearisome; for it gave me a certain sort of satisfaction to find myself
so sought and prized by a gentleman of such distinction, and I was not
displeased at seeing my praises in his letters (for however ugly we women
may be, it seems to me it always pleases us to hear ourselves called
beautiful) but that my own sense of right was opposed to all this, as
well as the repeated advice of my parents, who now very plainly perceived
Don Fernando's purpose, for he cared very little if all the world knew
it. They told me they trusted and confided their honour and good name to
my virtue and rectitude alone, and bade me consider the disparity between
Don Fernando and myself, from which I might conclude that his intentions,
whatever he might say to the contrary, had for their aim his own pleasure
rather than my advantage; and if I were at all desirous of opposing an
obstacle to his unreasonable suit, they were ready, they said, to marry
me at once to anyone I preferred, either among the leading people of our
own town, or of any of those in the neighbourhood; for with their wealth
and my good name, a match might be looked for in any quarter. This offer,
and their sound advice strengthened my resolution, and I never gave Don
Fernando a word in reply that could hold out to him any hope of success,
however remote.
"All this caution of mine, which he must have taken for coyness, had
apparently the effect of increasing his wanton appetite--for that is the
name I give to his passion for me; had it been what he declared it to be,
you would not know of it now, because there would have been no occasion
to tell you of it. At length he learned that my parents were
contemplating marriage for me in order to put an end to his hopes of
obtaining possession of me, or at least to secure additional protectors
to watch over me, and this intelligence or suspicion made him act as you
shall hear. One night, as I was in my chamber with no other companion
than a damsel who waited on me, with the doors carefully locked lest my
honour should be imperilled through any carelessness, I know not nor can
conceive how it happened, but, with all this seclusion and these
precautions, and in the solitude and silence of my retirement, I found
him standing before me, a vision that so astounded me that it deprived my
eyes of sight, and my tongue of speech. I had no power to utter a cry,
nor, I think, did he give me time to utter one, as he immediately
approached me, and taking me in his arms (for, overwhelmed as I was, I
was powerless, I say, to help myself), he began to make such professions
to me that I know not how falsehood could have had the power of dressing
them up to seem so like truth; and the traitor contrived that his tears
should vouch for his words, and his sighs for his sincerity.