u say, madam. Make your arrangements as you
please.

Evening had now spread her dusky mantle over the face of nature. The
stars glistened in the sky. The breeze's rustling wing was in the tree.
The "slitty sound" of the low murmuring brook, and the far off
water-fall, were faintly heard. The twinkling fire-fly arose from the
surrounding verdure and illuminated the air with a thousand transient
gleams. The mingling discordance of curs and watch-dogs echoed in the
distant village, from whence the frequent lights darted their palely
lustre thro' the gloom. The solitary whippoorwills stationed themselves
along the woody glens, the groves and rocky pastures, and sung a requiem
to departed summer. A dark cloud was rising in the west, across whose
gloomy front the vivid lightning bent its forky spires.

Alonzo and Melissa moved slowly to the village; she appeared enraptured
with the melancholy splendours of the evening, but the other subject
engaged the mental attention of Alonzo.

Beauman arrived the next day. He gave his hand to Alonzo with seeming
warmth of friendship. If it was reciprocated, it must have been
affected. There was no alteration in the manners and conversation of
Melissa: her conversation, as usual, was sprightly and interesting.
After dinner she retired, and her father requested Alonzo and Beauman to
withdraw with him to a private room. After they were seated, the old
gentleman thus addressed them:

"I have called you here, gentlemen, to perform my duty as a parent to my
daughter, and as a friend to you. You are both suitors to Melissa; while
your addresses were merely formal, they were innocent; but when they
became serious they were dangerous. Your pretensions I consider equal,
and between honourable pretenders, who are worthy of my daughter,
I shall not attempt to influence her choice. That choice, however, can
rest only on one: she has engaged to decide between you. I am come to
make, in her name, this decision. The following are my terms:--No
quarrel or difficulty shall arise between you, gentlemen, in consequence
of her determination. Nothing shall go abroad respecting the affair;
it shall be ended under my roof. As soon as I have pronounced her
declaration, you shall both depart and absent my house for at least two
weeks, as it would be improper for my daughter to see either of you at
present: after that period I shall be happy to receive your
visits."--Alonzo and Beauman pledged their honour to a