"Thy hands are filled with early flowers,
Thy step is on the wind;
The innocent and keen delight
Of youth is on thy mind;
That glad fresh feeling that bestows
Itself the gladness which it knows,
The pure, the undefined;
And thou art in that happy hour
Of feeling's uncurbed, early power."

The spring dawned bright and beautiful over Wimbledon, and when the first
blue-birds sang on the budding boughs, and the grass was springing green
in streets and by-ways, the tenants of "Summer Home" returned; and a
bright young girl, with dark abundant hair hanging in a rich profusion of
shiny ringlets over her white, uncovered shoulders, was seen skipping
lightly through the gardens and grounds, pruning shrubs, transplanting
flowers, and training truant vines over arbors and alcoves.

It was Florence Howard, resplendent in the light of her girlish beauty,
and buoyant overflow of health and happiness. Often, in her morning
strolls, she noticed a tall, graceful boy, in a blue frock-coat, with a
shining morocco cap placed over a head of light curly hair, passing
along, satchel in hand, to the seminary on the hill, and every night she
saw him disappear within the forest that lay to the northward of her
father's residence.

She wondered what became of him, for the woods were wide and deep, and it
must be a long way to the other side. There surely could be no habitation
within their precincts, and Florence's curiosity was strongly excited to
fathom the mystery, which in her eyes surrounded the fair-haired youth.

"Father," said she one evening, as she sat beside him on the western
terrace, "I don't like being confined herewith these stupid tutors. I
wish you would let me go to school at the seminary."

"Your advantages at home are far superior, my daughter," answered her
father.

"O, but I should like the air and exercise, and the company of children
of my own age so much," pursued she, poking her little fingers through
her father's silvered locks, and leaning up against his side in a very
coaxing attitude. "I shall become the saddest mope in the world if I am
cooped up here."

"I apprehend small danger of that," returned her father, laughing, "for
you have appeared to me, since our last return, a wilder romp than ever
before."

"O, that's only because I'm so glad to get to this delightful