thought. There
was something so overpowering, so redundant about her, I expected to be
weighed down,--overshadowed. She going to Grandison Place! Alas, what a
transformation there would be! Adieu to the quiet walks, the evening
readings, the morning flower gatherings; adieu to sentiment and
tranquillity, to poetry and romance. Why had Mrs. Linwood invited so
strange a guest? Perhaps she was self-invited.

"I tell you what I am going for," she said, bending her face to mine and
speaking in a whisper that sounded like a whistle in my ear; "I am going
to animate that man of stone. Why have not you done it, juxtaposited as
you are? You do not make use of the fire-arms with which nature has
supplied you. If I had such a pair of eyes, I would slay like David my
tens of thousands every day."

"The difficulty would be in finding victims," I answered. "The
inhabitants of the town where I reside do not number more than two or
three thousand."

"Oh! I would make it populous. I would draw worshippers from the four
points of the earth,--and yet it would be a greater triumph to subdue
one proud, hitherto impregnable heart."

Her eyes flashed like gunpowder as she uttered this, _sotto voce_ it is
true, but still loud enough to be heard half across the room.

"Goodby," she suddenly exclaimed, "they are beckoning me; I must go; try
to like me, precious creature; I shall be quite miserable if you do
not."

Then passing her arm round me, an arm firm, polished, and white as
ivory, she gave me a loud, emphatic kiss, laughed, and left me almost as
much confused as if one of the other sex had taken the same liberty.

"Is she," thought I, "a young man in disguise?"

CHAPTER XXII.

What am I writing?

Sometimes I throw down the pen, saying to myself, "it is all folly, all
verbiage. There is a history within worth perusing, but I cannot bring
it forth to light. I turn over page after page with the fingers of
thought. I see characters glowing or darkened with passion,--lines
alternately bright and shadowy, distinct and obscure, and it seems an
easy thing to make a transcript of these for the outward world."

Easy! it requires the recording angel's pen to register the history of
the human heart. "The thoughts that breathe, the thoughts that burn,"
how can they be expressed? The mere act of clothing them in words makes
them grow cold and dull. The molten gold, the fused iron hardens and
chills in the forming mould.

Easy! "O