lease speak of common subjects, for I would not meet Mrs. Linwood so
troubled, so agitated, for any consideration. See how beautiful the
sunlight falls is the lawn! How graceful that white cloud floats down
the golden west! As Wilson says:--

'Even in its very motion there is rest.'"

"Yes! the sunlight is very beautiful, and the cloud is very graceful,
and you are beautiful and graceful in your dawning coquetry, the more so
because you know it not. Well--obedience to-day, reward to-morrow,
Gabriella. That was one of my old copies at the academy."

"I remember another, which was a favorite of Mr. Regulus--

'To-morrow never yet
On any human being rose and set.'"

A few more light repartees, and we were at Mrs. Linwood's gate.

"You will not come in?" said I, half asserting, half interrogating.

"To be sure I will. Edith promised me some of her angelic harp music. I
come like Saul to have the evil spirit of discontent subdued by its
divine influence."

Richard was a favorite of Mrs. Linwood. Whether it was that by a woman's
intuition she discovered the state of feeling existing between us, or
whether it was his approaching departure, she was especially kind to him
this evening; she expressed a more than usual interest in his future
prospects.

"This is your last year in college," I heard her say to him. "In a few
months you will feel the dignity and responsibility of manhood. You will
come out from the seclusion of college life into the wide, wide world,
and of its myriad paths, so intricate, yet so trodden, you must choose
one. You are looking forward now, eagerly, impatiently, but then you
will pause and tremble. I pity the young man when he first girds himself
for the real duties of life. The change from thought to action, from
dreams to realities, from hope to fruition or _disappointment_, is so
sudden, so great, he requires the wisdom which is only bought by
experience, the strength gained only by exercise. But it is well," she
added, with great expression, "it is well as it is. If youth could
command the experience of age, it would lose the enthusiasm and zeal
necessary for the conception of great designs; it would lose the
brightness, the energy of hope, and nothing would be attempted, because
every thing would be thought in vain. I did not mean to give you an
essay," she said, smiling at her own earnestness, "but a young friend on
the threshold of manhood is deeply interesting to me. I feel