425

MY BONNET OF BLUE, 427

DARK-BROWED MARTHA, 429

WIMBLEDON;

OR

THE HERMIT OF THE CEDARS.

CHAPTER I.

"The stars are out, and by their glistening light,
I fain would whisper in thine ear a tale;
Wilt hear it kindly? and if long and dull
Believe me far more deeply grieved than thou."

Clear and loud on the hushed silence of the midnight hour rang the chimes
of the village clock, from the tall steeple-tower of the quaint old
church of Wimbledon, while several ambitious chickens rose from their
neighboring perches, piped a shrill answering salute, and sank to their
nocturnal slumbers again. But nor clock nor chanticleer disturbed
Wimbledon. Still she slept on beneath the blossoming stars; and by their
soft, inspiring light, with your permission, gentle reader, we'll enter
the sleeping village.

Dim gleams of snowy cottages, peeping through a wealth of embowering
vines, steal on our star-lighted vision as we roam along the grassy
streets, and we scent the breath of gardens odorous with the sweets of
dew-watered flowers. Above and around we hear the musical stir of the
night wind among boughs and branches of luxuriant foliage, while ever and
anon it comes from afar with a deep-toned, solemn murmur, as though it
swept o'er forests of cedar and mournfully-echoing pine. Still roaming
on, the low rippling of flowing waters comes soothingly to our ears, and
we pause on the bank of a flower-bordered river that goes sweetly singing
on its way to the distant ocean. A tiny sailboat lies in a sheltering
cove, rocked gently to and fro by the swaying current. On a hill beyond
the stream we mark a large white-belfried building, relieved against a
dark background of wide-stretching timber-land. And turning our delighted
footsteps down an avenue of lofty cedar and linden trees, there rises at
length before our vision a splendid mansion, built after a most beautiful
style of architecture, with deep, bay windows, long corridors and
vine-covered terraces. Magnificent gardens, displaying the perfection of
taste, lay sloping to the southward. On the east the silvery river was
seen glancing through the shrubbery that adorn