dness, first stumble
on the vestibule of manhood. Did you never observe him shaving and
scraping his pimpled face till it resembled a featherless goose, reaping
nothing but lather, and dirt, and a little intangible fuzz? That is the
first symptom of love. Did you never observe him wrestling with a pair
of boots two numbers too small, as Jacob wrestled with the angel? That
is another symptom of love. His callous heel slowly and painfully yields
to the pressure of his perspiring paroxysms until his feet are folded
like fans and driven home in the pinching leather; and as he sits at
church with them hid under the bench, his uneasy squirms are symptoms of
the tortures of the infernal regions, and the worm that dieth not; but
that is only the penalty of loving. When he begins to wander through the
fragrant meadows and talk to himself among the buttercups and clover
blossoms, it is a sure sign that the golden shaft of the winged god has
sped from its bended bow. Love's archer has shot a poisoned arrow which
wounds but never kills. The sweet venom has done its work. The fever of
the amorous wound drives the red current bounding through his veins, and
his brain now reels with the delirium of the tender passion. His soul is
wrapped in visions of dreamy black eyes peeping out from under raven
curls, and cheeks like gardens of roses. To him the world is transformed
into a blooming Eden, and _she_ is its only Eve. He hears her voice in
the sound of the laughing waters, the fluttering of her heart in the
summer evening's last sigh that shuts the rose; and he sits on the bank
of the river all day long and writes poetry to her. Thus he writes:

"As I sit by this river's crystal wave,
Whose flow'ry banks its waters lave,
Me-thinks I see in its glassy mirror,
A face which to me, than life is dearer.
Oh, 'tis the face of my Gwendolin,
As pure as an angel, free from sin.
It looks into mine with one sweet eye,
While the other is turned to the starry sky.
Could I the ocean's bulk contain,
Could I but drink the watery main,
I'd scarce be half as full of the sea,
As my heart is full of love for thee!"

Thus he lives and loves, and writes poetry by day, and tosses on his bed
at night, like the restless sea, and dreams, and dreams, and dreams,
until, in the ecstacy of his dream, he grabs a pillow.

One bright summer day, a rural youth took his sweetheart to a Baptist
baptizing; and, in addition to his