was standing in a reverie,
incapable of thought, deadly pale, and perfectly motionless.

CHAPTEE XXV. -- Sarah Without Hope.

How Sarah returned to Dalton's cabin she herself knew not. Such was the
tumult which the communication then made to her by Mave, had occasioned
in her mind, that, the scene which had just taken place, altogether
appeared to her excited spirit like a troubled dream, whose impressions
were too unreal and deceptive to be depended on for a moment. The
reaction from the passive state in which Mave had left her, was, to a
temperament like her's, perfectly overwhelming. Her pulse beat high,
her cheek burned, and her eye flashed with more than its usual fire
and overpowering brilliancy, and, with the exception of one impression
alone, all her thoughts were so rapid and indistinct as to resemble the
careering clouds which fly in tumult and confusion along the troubled
sky, with nothing stationary but the sun far above, and which, in this
case, might be said to resemble the bright conviction of Dalton's love
for her, that Mave's assurance had left behind it. On re-entering the
cabin, without being properly conscious of what she either did or said,
she once more knelt by the side of Dalton's bed, and hastily taking his
unresisting hand, was about to speak; but a difficulty how to shape her
language held her in a painful and troubled suspense for some moments,
during which Dalton could plainly perceive the excitement, or rather
rapture, by which she was actuated. At length a gush of hot and burning
tears enabled her to speak, and she said:

"Con Dalton--dear Con, is it true? can it be true?--oh, no--no--but,
then, she says it--is it true that you like me--like me!--no, no--that
word is too wake--is it true that you love me? but no--it can't
be--there never was so much happiness intended for me; and then, if it
should be true--oh, if it was possible, how will I bear it? what will
I do? what--is to be the consequence? for my love for you is beyond all
belief--beyond all that tongue can tell. I can't stand this struggle--my
head is giddy--I scarcely know what I'm sayin', or is it a dhrame that
I'll waken from, and find it false--false?"

Dalton pressed her hand, and looking tenderly upon her face, replied:

"Dear Sarah, forgive me; your dhrame is both thrue and false. It is true
that I like you--that I pity you; but you forbid me to say that--well it
is true, I say, that I like you; but I can't say