midnight
With these words he flung out of the room , locking the door after him ; so that when Natura rose , as he immediately did , he found himself indeed under confinement , which seemed so shameful a thing to him , that he was ready to tear himself in pieces : -- it was not the grief of having offended so good a father , but the disgrace of the punishment inflicted on him , which gave him the most poignant anguish , and far from feeling any true contrition , he was all rage and madness , which having no means to vent in words , discovered itself in sullenness : -- when the servant to whom he intrusted the key came in to bring him food , he refused to eat , and could scarce restrain himself from throwing in the man 's face what he had brought . It is certain , that while under this circumstance , he was agitated at once by every different unruly passion : -- pride , anger , spleen , thinking himself a man , at finding the treatment of a _ boy _ , made him almost hate the person from whom he received it . -- The apprehensions what farther meaning might be couched in the menace with which his father left him , threw him sometimes into a terror little different from convulsive ; -- but above all , his impatience for seeing his dear Harriot , and the surprize , the grief , and perhaps the resentment , he imagined she must feel on his absenting himself , drove him into a kind of despair . In fine , unable to sustain the violence of his agitations , on the third night , regardless of what consequences might ensue from giving this additional cause of displeasure to his father , he found means to push back the lock of his chamber , and flew down stairs , and out at the street-door with so much speed , that it would have been impossible to have stopped him , had any one heard him , which none happened to do , it being midnight , and all the family in a sound sleep . That he went directly to the lodgings of Harriot , I believe my reader will make no doubt ; but perhaps her character does not yet enough appear , to give any suspicion of the reception he found there . In effect , she was no other than one of those common creatures , who procure a miserable subsistance by the prostitution of their charms ; and as nature had not been sparing to her on that score , and she was yet young , though less so than she appeared thro ' art , she wanted not a number of gallants , who all contributed , more or less , to her living in the manner she did : several of these had happened to come when Natura was with her ; but she having had the precaution to acquaint them with her design of drawing in this young spark for a husband , they took the cue she gave them , each passing before him either for a cousin , or one of the lawyers employed in her pretended suit . It was with one of these equally happy , tho ' less deluded rivals of Natura , that finding he did not come , she had agreed to pass this night ; and her maid , as the servants of such women , for the most part , imitate their mistresses , happened to be at the door , either about to introduce , or let out a lover of her own ; -- the sight of a man at that time of night , with one who belonged to his beloved , immediately fired Natura with jealousy : -- he seized the fellow by the collar , and in a voice hoarse with rage , asked him what business he had there ?