Yet withal there are sparks of spirit in her that pique your pride,
lofty as it is. You offer flowers, which she accepts with a kind smile,
not of coquetry, but of simplest thankfulness. She is not the girl to
gratify your vanity with any half-show of tenderness. And if there lived
ever in her heart an old girlish liking for the schoolboy Clarence, it is
all gone before the romantic lover of the elegant Laura; or at most it
lies in some obscure corner of her soul, never to be brought to light.
You enter upon the new pursuits, which your father has advised, with a
lofty consciousness, not only of the strength of your mind, but of your
heart. You relieve your opening professional study with long letters to
Miss Dalton, full of Shakspearean compliments, and touched off with very
dainty elaboration. And you receive pleasant, gossiping notes in
answer,--full of quotations, but meaning very little.
Youth is in a grand flush, like the hot days of ending summer; and
pleasant dreams thrall your spirit, like the smoky atmosphere that
bathes the landscape of an August day. Hope rides high in the heavens,
as when the summer sun mounts nearest to the zenith.
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