n Col. Malcome and asked his consent to the delay of my proposed
nuptials with Rufus, till some change should occur in mother's health.
Dr. Potipher thinks she will hardly survive the trying weather of the
approaching spring.

"Poor, dear mother! what shall I do without her? But I may not linger
long behind.

"I used to think I was very miserable, when I pined in ignorance of
Edgar's love, and grew jealous of his attentions to gentle Edith
Malcome; but what were those petty griefs, compared with the agony of
having known the sweet possession of his heart, and lost it,--lost it,
too, through my own selfish folly and weakness? Truly, there's naught so
bitter as self-reproach. Heaven only knows what I have suffered since
that dreadful night, when I fled from his angry, reproachful looks, and
locked myself in the solitude of my chamber. And that freezing, distant
recognition on the following morning! O, what a shuddering horror will
ever creep over me with the memory of Franconia Notch! And Mount
Washington,--which was for aye to tower above all other scenes of
grandeur earth's broadest extent could afford,--a thought of it unnerves
my soul with grief. What short-sighted mortals are we!

"I think my father suspects my secret and reproaches himself for giving
me so free access to Edgar's company. I would not wonder if the delay he
has urged to my marriage were influenced as much by this sad knowledge
as my mother's failing health. Col. Malcome gave a reluctant assent, at
which I am surprised. When his sweet daughter is sinking slowly into
the grave, 'tis strange he can think of any earthly interest.

"I have looked mournfully toward the cedar forest to-night, and thought
of the poor lone hermit in his humble hut, and wished, O, how fervently
wished! that I, like him, had a habitation afar from the world's hollow
throngs, where I could sit and brood in solitude over my broken heart!

"Am I not a living, breathing, suffering example of the truth of Byron's
eloquent words?

'The day drags on, though storms keep out the sun,
And thus the heart will break, yet brokenly live on.'"

Florence closed her journal, and approached the window.

As she was dropping the curtain to retire, a dark figure moving
stealthily under the leafless branches of the lindens, which stood in
rows on the least public side of the house, arrested her attention. The
remembrance of a similar appearance she had once seen crossed her mind,
and