mental powers and physical
system. He felt, though he could give no reason why, that some calamity
was about to befall himself and the fair being by his side; and he
strove to arouse himself and shake off the gloomy thoughts; but if he
succeeded, it was only momentary, and they would again rush back with an
increased power. He had been subject, since his unfortunate quarrel with
his cousin, to gloomy reveries and depressions of spirits--but never
before had he felt exactly as now; and though in all former cases the
event referred to had been the cause of his sad abstractions, yet in the
present instance it scarcely held a place in his thoughts. Could it be a
presentiment, he asked himself, sent to warn him of danger and prepare
him to meet it? But the question he could not answer.

The night, or rather the morning, though clear overhead, was uncommonly
dark; and the stars, what few could be discerned, shed only pale, faint
gleams, as though their lights were about to be extinguished. For some
time both Algernon and Ella continued their journey without exchanging a
syllable--she too, as well as himself, being deeply absorbed in no very
pleasant reflections. She thought of him, of his hard fate, to meet with
so many bitter disappointments at an age so young; and at last, for no
premeditated, no intentional crime, be forced to fly from home and
friends, and all he held dear, to wander in a far off land, among
strangers--or worse, among the solitudes of the wilderness--exposed to a
thousand dangers from wild savage beasts, and wilder and more savage
human beings; and perhaps, withal, be branded as a felon and fugitive
from justice. She thought what must be his feelings, his sense of utter
desolation, with none around to sympathize--no sweet being by his side
to whisper a single word of encouragement and hope; or, should the worst
prove true, to share his painful lot, and endeavor to render less
burdensome his remorseful thoughts, by smiles of endearment and looks of
love. She thought, too, that to-morrow--perhaps today--he would take his
departure, peradventure never to behold her again; and this was the
saddest of the train. Until she saw him, Ella had never known what it
was to love--perchance she did not now--but at least she had experienced
those fluttering sensations, those deep and strange emotions, those
involuntary yearnings of the heart toward some object in his presence,
that aching void in his absence, which the m