relapses into
her sweet reverie. Her thought fixes on no subject; her mind is
intent on no idea; her soul is melted into dreamy delight; her only
consciousness is perfect bliss! Sweet sounds still echo in her ear, and
still her pure pulse beats, from the first embrace of passion.

The door opens, and her father enters, leaning upon the arm of her
beloved. Yes, he has told all! Mr. Dacre approached, and, bending down,
pressed the lips of his child. It was the seal to their plighted faith,
and told, without speech, that the blessing of a parent mingled with the
vows of a lover! No other intimation was at present necessary;' but she,
the daughter, thought now only of her father, that friend of her long
life, whose love had ne'er been wanting: was she about to leave him? She
arose, she threw her arms around his neck and wept.

The young Duke walked away, that his presence might not control the full
expression of her hallowed soul. 'This jewel is mine,' was his thought;
'what, what have I done to be so blessed?'

In a few minutes he again joined them, and was seated by her side; and
Mr. Dacre considerately remembered that he wished to see his steward,
and they were left alone. Their eyes meet, and their soft looks tell
that they were thinking of each other. His arm steals round the back of
her chair, and with his other hand he gently captures hers.

First love, first love! how many a glowing bard has sung thy beauties!
How many a poor devil of a prosing novelist, like myself, has echoed
all our superiors, the poets, teach us! No doubt, thou rosy god of young
Desire, thou art a most bewitching little demon; and yet, for my part,
give me last love.

Ask a man which turned out best, the first horse he bought, or the one
he now canters on? Ask--but in short there is nothing in which knowledge
is more important and experience more valuable than in love. When we
first love, we are enamoured of our own imaginations. Our thoughts are
high, our feelings rise from out the deepest caves of the tumultuous
tide of our full life. We look around for one to share our exquisite
existence, and sanctify the beauties of our being.

But those beauties are only in our thoughts. We feel like heroes,
when we are but boys. Yet our mistress must bear a relation, not to
ourselves, but to our imagination. She must be a real heroine, while our
perfection is but ideal. And the quick and dangerous fancy of our race
will, at first, rise to the pitch