as the abode of a genial, though somewhat
impulsive, hospitality. It had broad, smooth-shaven lawns and towering
oaks and elms; there were bosky shades at several points, and not far
from the house there was a little rill spanned by a rustic bridge with
the bark on; there were fruits and flowers, pleasant people, chess,
billiards, rides, walks, and fishing. These were great attractions; but
none of them, nor all of them together, would have been sufficient to
hold me to the place very long. I had been invited for the trout season,
but should, probably, have finished my visit early in the summer had it
not been that upon fair days, when the grass was dry, and the sun was
not too hot, and there was but little wind, there strolled beneath the
lofty elms, or passed lightly through the bosky shades, the form of my
Madeline.

This lady was not, in very truth, my Madeline. She had never given
herself to me, nor had I, in any way, acquired possession of her. But as
I considered her possession the only sufficient reason for the
continuance of my existence, I called her, in my reveries, mine. It may
have been that I would not have been obliged to confine the use of this
possessive pronoun to my reveries had I confessed the state of my
feelings to the lady.

But this was an unusually difficult thing to do. Not only did I dread,
as almost all lovers dread, taking the step which would in an instant
put an end to that delightful season which may be termed the
ante-interrogatory period of love, and which might at the same time
terminate all intercourse or connection with the object of my passion;
but I was, also, dreadfully afraid of John Hinckman. This gentleman was
a good friend of mine, but it would have required a bolder man than I
was at that time to ask him for the gift of his niece, who was the head
of his household, and, according to his own frequent statement, the main
prop of his declining years. Had Madeline acquiesced in my general views
on the subject, I might have felt encouraged to open the matter to Mr.
Hinckman; but, as I said before, I had never asked her whether or not
she would be mine. I thought of these things at all hours of the day and
night, particularly the latter.

I was lying awake one night, in the great bed in my spacious chamber,
when, by the dim light of the new moon, which partially filled the room,
I saw John Hinckman standing by a large chair near the door. I was very
much surprised at this for tw