res which they revived in his memory, than of the sweet
oblivion which they brought of the many painful and perilous prospects
with which he had more recently become familiar. He had no thought of
the present, and the pictures of the past were all rich and ravishing.
To his wandering sense at that moment there came a sweet vision of
beauty and love--of an affection warmly cherished--green as the summer
leaves--fresh as its flowers--flinging odors about his spirit, and
re-awakening in its fullest extent the partially slumbering
passion--reviving many a hope, and provoking with many a delicious
anticipation. The form of the one, lovely beyond comparison, flitted
before him, while her name, murmured with words of passion by his parted
lips, carried with its utterance a sweet promise of a pure faith, and an
unforgetting affection. Never once, since the hour of his departure from
home, had he, in his waking moments, permitted that name to find a place
upon his lips, and now syllabled into sound by them in his unconscious
dreams, it fell with a stunning influence upon an auditor, whose heart
grew colder in due proportion with the unconscious but warm tenderness
of epithet with which his tongue coupled its utterance.

The now completely unhappy Lucy stood sad and statue-like. She heard
enough to teach her the true character of her own feelings for one,
whose articulated dreams had revealed the secret of his passion for
another; and almost forgetting for a while the office upon which she had
come, she continued to give ear to those sounds which brought to her
heart only additional misery.

How long Ralph, in his mental wanderings, would have gone on, as we have
seen, incoherently developing his heart's history, may not be said.
Gathering courage at last, with a noble energy, the maiden proceeded to
her proposed duty, and his slumbers were broken. With a half-awakened
consciousness he raised himself partially up in his couch, and sought to
listen. He was not deceived; a whispered sentence came to his ears,
addressed to himself, and succeeded by a pause of several moments'
continuance. Again his name was uttered. Half doubting his senses, he
passed his hand repeatedly over his eyes, and again listened for the
repetition of that voice, the identity of which he had as yet failed
utterly to distinguish. The sounds were repeated, and the words grew
more and more distinct. He now caught in part the tenor of the sentence,
though imper