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ly we got through our task-work, and what vivacity there was in our eyes and fingers! It was the eagerness to get away, as if all our joys lay before us, and at a distance from that place, which gave such activity to our motions. At a hasty glance it might be supposed we were merrily occupied, there was so much alacrity in the bustle we made; but the bent and silent heads offered a strange contradiction to the busy hands. At last the moment came when we were to take our departure. A thrill of terror shot through our veins, as a close post-chaise, sweeping through the trees, stopped suddenly at the door, where we stood in the shadow of the portico, with our cases and boxes waiting for its arrival. The good people of the house, somewhat alarmed, and hardly knowing what construction to put upon this sudden movement, which they connected vaguely with the mysteries of the night before, were dotted about the gravel-walk and under the trees; two very old people and two or three grandchildren, looking up helplessly at us, with a bewildering wonder in their open mouths, which, under any other circumstances, might have amused us; but we were not in a mood to appreciate points of humor. Terror, shapeless and oppressive, shook us both to the core as I handed Astraea into the post-chaise, and, hastily following her, closed the door--leaving the windows open, that we might breathe freely, and see every object distinctly around us, and in advance of us. There was a desperate exultation in that moment, too!--a riotous sense of fierce happiness! I was carrying away Astraea from the whole world! Astraea was giving up the whole world for me! My heart beat loudly, and poured its palpitating blood into my throbbing temples. The postillion cracked his whip, and the panting horses started off with a plunge, as if they would tear up the earth. We turned to each other--our faces were lighted up with a flash of rapture--I clasped her hands in mine, and showered a hundred burning kisses upon them; and when we cleared the little valley, and felt the fresh breeze of the cool uplands upon our cheeks, we thought that, from the days of the first innocence in the garden of Eden to that hour, no two people ever loved each other so passionately, or were ever so profoundly happy! II. The first hour of accomplished love is, perhaps, the only passage in a man's life with which he is perfectly satisfied. It is the only reality that does not disappo
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