Not that his desires would have been a jot more
innocent, but they would have taken a different direction. Instead
of the recklessness of course, such as seems to have distinguished
the conduct of our present subject--instead of his loose indulgences--his
smart, licentious speeches--the sheep's-eye glances, right and
left, which he was but too prone to bestow, without prudence or
precaution, whenever he walked among the fair sisters--he, the said
Alfred, would have taken counsel of a more worldly policy, which
is yet popularly considered a more pious one. He would have kept
his eyes from wandering to and fro; he would have held his blood
in subjection. Patient as a fox on a long scent in autumn, he would
have kept himself lean and circumspect, until, through the help
of lugubrious prayer and lantern visage, he could have beguiled
into matrimony some one feminine member of the flock--not always
fair--whose worldly goods would have sufficed in full atonement
for all those circumspect, self-imposed restraints, which we find
asually so well rewarded. But Alfred Stevens was not a man of this
pious temper.
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