FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   376   377   378   379   380   381   382   383   384   385   386   387   388   389   390   391   392   393   394   395   396   397   398   399   400  
401   402   403   404   405   406   407   408   409   410   411   412   413   414   415   >>  
ur careful minds. Clara at such times often returned to her former habits of free converse and gay sally; and though our four hearts alone beat in the world, those four hearts were happy. One day, on our return from the town of Como, with a laden boat, we expected as usual to be met at the port by Clara and Evelyn, and we were somewhat surprised to see the beach vacant. I, as my nature prompted, would not prognosticate evil, but explained it away as a mere casual incident. Not so Adrian. He was seized with sudden trembling and apprehension, and he called to me with vehemence to steer quickly for land, and, when near, leapt from the boat, half falling into the water; and, scrambling up the steep bank, hastened along the narrow strip of garden, the only level space between the lake and the mountain. I followed without delay; the garden and inner court were empty, so was the house, whose every room we visited. Adrian called loudly upon Clara's name, and was about to rush up the near mountain-path, when the door of a summer-house at the end of the garden slowly opened, and Clara appeared, not advancing towards us, but leaning against a column of the building with blanched cheeks, in a posture of utter despondency. Adrian sprang towards her with a cry of joy, and folded her delightedly in his arms. She withdrew from his embrace, and, without a word, again entered the summer-house. Her quivering lips, her despairing heart refused to afford her voice to express our misfortune. Poor little Evelyn had, while playing with her, been seized with sudden fever, and now lay torpid and speechless on a little couch in the summer-house. For a whole fortnight we unceasingly watched beside the poor child, as his life declined under the ravages of a virulent typhus. His little form and tiny lineaments encaged the embryo of the world-spanning mind of man. Man's nature, brimful of passions and affections, would have had an home in that little heart, whose swift pulsations hurried towards their close. His small hand's fine mechanism, now flaccid and unbent, would in the growth of sinew and muscle, have achieved works of beauty or of strength. His tender rosy feet would have trod in firm manhood the bowers and glades of earth-- these reflections were now of little use: he lay, thought and strength suspended, waiting unresisting the final blow. We watched at his bedside, and when the access of fever was on him, we neither spoke nor looked at
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   376   377   378   379   380   381   382   383   384   385   386   387   388   389   390   391   392   393   394   395   396   397   398   399   400  
401   402   403   404   405   406   407   408   409   410   411   412   413   414   415   >>  



Top keywords:

summer

 

garden

 
Adrian
 

nature

 

called

 

sudden

 

Evelyn

 
seized
 
strength
 

mountain


watched

 

hearts

 

bedside

 
ravages
 

unceasingly

 

speechless

 

virulent

 
declined
 

fortnight

 

entered


quivering

 

despairing

 

looked

 

withdrew

 

embrace

 

refused

 
playing
 

typhus

 

access

 

afford


express

 

misfortune

 

torpid

 

muscle

 

achieved

 

beauty

 

growth

 

unbent

 

suspended

 

mechanism


flaccid

 
tender
 

reflections

 

manhood

 

bowers

 
glades
 

thought

 

brimful

 

spanning

 

embryo