his guard. Reine might be said to live
alone at La Thuiliere, for her father could hardly be regarded seriously
as a protector. Julien's visits might have compromised her, and the
young man's severe principles of rectitude forbade him to cause scandal
which he could not repair. He was not thinking of marriage, and even had
his thoughts inclined that way, the proprieties and usages of society
which he had always in some degree respected, would not allow him to
wed a peasant girl. It was evident, therefore, that both prudence and
uprightness would enjoin him to carry on any future relations with
Mademoiselle Vincart with the greatest possible reserve.

Nevertheless, and in spite of these sage reflections, the enchanting
image of Reine haunted him more than was at all reasonable. Often,
during his hours of watchfulness, he would see her threading the avenues
of the forest, her dark hair half floating in the breeze, and wearing
her white hood and her skirt bordered with ivy. Since the spring had
returned, she had become associated in his mind with all the magical
effects of nature's renewal. He discovered the liquid light of her dark
eyes in the rippling darkness of the streams; the lilies recalled the
faintly tinted paleness of her cheeks; the silene roses, scattered
throughout the hedges, called forth the remembrance of the young
maiden's rosy lips, and the vernal odor of the leaves appeared to him
like an emanation of her graceful and wholesome nature.

This state of feeling began to act like an obsession, a sort of
witchcraft, which alarmed him. What was she really, this strange
creature? A peasant indeed, apparently; but there was also something
more refined and cultivated about her, due, doubtless, to her having
received her education in a city school. She both felt and expressed
herself differently from ordinary country girls, although retaining the
frankness and untutored charm of rustic natures. She exercised an uneasy
fascination over Julien, and at times he returned to the superstitious
impression made upon him by Reine's behavior and discourse in the
forest. He again questioned with himself whether this female form,
in its untamed beauty, did not enfold some spirit of temptation, some
insidious fairy, similar to the Melusine, who appeared to Count Raymond
in the forest of Poitiers.

Most of the time he would himself laugh at this extravagant supposition,
but, while endeavoring to make light of his own cowardic