n. The sting of a bee
is sometimes deadly. As free-hearted as she was innocent, the girl
attacked the intruder with her handkerchief, brushed him soundly, and
drove him from the maple shade. How sweet a picture! This good deed
accomplished, with quickened breath, and a deeper blush, she stole a
glance at the youthful stranger, for whom she had been battling with a
dragon in the air.

"He is handsome!" thought she, and blushed redder yet.

How could it be that no dream of bliss grew so strong within him, that,
shattered by its very strength, it should part asunder, and allow him to
perceive the girl among its phantoms? Why, at least, did no smile of
welcome brighten upon his face? She was come, the maid whose soul,
according to the old and beautiful idea, had been severed from his own,
and whom, in all his vague but passionate desires, he yearned to meet.
Her only could he love with a perfect love--him only could she receive
into the depths of her heart--and now her image was faintly blushing in
the fountain by his side; should it pass away, its happy lustre would
never gleam upon his life again.

"How sound he sleeps!" murmured the girl.

She departed, but did not trip along the road so lightly as when she
came.

Now, this girl's father was a thriving country merchant in the
neighborhood, and happened, at that identical time, to be looking out
for just such a young man as David Swan. Had David formed a wayside
acquaintance with the daughter, he would have become the father's clerk,
and all else in natural succession. So here, again, had good
fortune--the best of fortunes--stolen so near, that her garments brushed
against him; and he knew nothing of the matter.

The girl was hardly out of sight, when two men turned aside beneath the
maple shade. Both had dark faces, set off by cloth caps, which were
drawn down aslant over their brows. Their dresses were shabby, yet had a
certain smartness. These were a couple of rascals, who got their living
by whatever the devil sent them, and now, in the interim of other
business, had staked the joint profits of their next piece of villainy
on a game of cards, which was to have been decided here under the trees.
But, finding David asleep by the spring, one of the rogues whispered to
his fellow--

"Hist!--Do you see that bundle under his head?"

The other villain nodded, winked, and leered.

"I'll bet you a horn of brandy," said the first, "that the chap has
either a pocket-