which head were a pair of lively blue eyes, associated
with features of which that softness and that sweetness, so
characteristic of American girls, were the predominant expressions, the
whole being set off by a complexion indicative of glowing health, and
forming, figure, movements, and all taken together, an assemblage of
beauties, far surpassing any that I had ever seen but _once_ in my life.
That _once_ was, too, _two years agone_; and, in such a case and at such
an age, two years, two whole years, is a long, long while! It was a
space as long as the eleventh part of my then life! Here was the
_present_ against the _absent_: here was the power of the _eyes_ pitted
against that of the _memory_: here were all the senses up in arms to
subdue the influence of the thoughts: here was vanity, here was passion,
here was the spot of all spots in the world, and here were also the
life, and the manners and the habits and the pursuits that I delighted
in: here was every thing that imagination can conceive, united in a
conspiracy against the poor little brunette in England! What, then, did
I fall in love at once with this bouquet of lilies and roses? Oh! by no
means. I was, however, so enchanted with _the place_; I so much enjoyed
its tranquillity, the shade of the maple trees, the business of the
farm, the sports of the water and of the woods, that I stayed at it to
the last possible minute, promising, at my departure, to come again as
often as I possibly could; a promise which I most punctually fulfilled.

147. Winter is the great season for jaunting and _dancing_ (called
_frolicking_) in America. In this Province the river and the creeks were
the only _roads_ from settlement to settlement. In summer we travelled
in _canoes_; in winter in _sleighs_ on the ice or snow. During more than
two years I spent all the time I could with my Yankee friends: they were
all fond of me: I talked to them about country affairs, my evident
delight in which they took as a compliment to themselves: the father and
mother treated me as one of their children; the sons as a brother; and
the daughter, who was as modest and as full of sensibility as she was
beautiful, in a way to which a chap much less sanguine than I was would
have given the tenderest interpretation; which treatment I, especially
in the last-mentioned case, most cordially repaid.

148. It is when you meet in company with others of your own age that you
are, in love matters, put, most