life. The young gentleman himself is only
passing this way on his travels westward.

"So, I am to start at once, now that my education is
completed--completed; I like the term--as if education were not always
progressive, rounded off by death only. Well, at least, I am grateful to
leave this tiresome routine of lessons, and yet there is something of
mournfulness in this abrupt entrance into life.

"I have just opened the window, and would gladly look forth upon the
morning. But this screen of Cherokee roses hangs before me like a
curtain, shedding fragrance from every fold. In parting its clusters
with my hands, tenderly--for to my fancy, flowers are sensitive and
recoil from a rude touch--the dew that has been all night asleep in
their heart, bathes my hands with its sweet rain, and through the
opening comes a gush of odor from the great magnolia that reaches out
its boughs so near my window, that I could lean forth and shake the
drops from those snowy chalices, as they gleam and tremble in the bright
air.

"What a beautiful world is this. The very breath one draws leaves a
delicious languor behind it, a languor that falls upon the senses and
gives back to the whole being a dreamy quietude that makes the mere
effort of existence an exquisite enjoyment. And yet there is a feeling
of strange loneliness in it all. It is pleasant to be happy, but oh! how
more than pleasant to have some one near, to whom all these charming
sensations can be expressed. I think one is never quite content alone,
but then who ever is really content?

"How exquisitely pure every thing seems; my little chamber here, with
its delicate matting and snowy draperies, looks like the nest of a
ring-dove, it is so white and quiet. The sweet visions which visit me
here are melodious as the warbling of the young bird, when the early
morning wakens it, as the dawn has just aroused me.

"I have been now three days beneath my guardian's roof. Dear Neathcote,
I love it already for its singular beauty! I shall never forget the
strange feelings which crowded my bosom, as the carriage passed through
the park gates and rolled slowly up the broad avenue. I threw open the
window and leaned out with the eagerness of a child to catch a sight of
my new home. When, as a sudden turn in the road brought the front of the
mansion in full view, I shrunk into my seat again, trembling from a
vague fear, which had as much of joy as pain in it.

"I grew fairly dizzy and