“Happy Walter!” said Madeline. “I was not sighing for Walter, but for you.” “For me?--impossible! I cannot imagine any part of my future life that can cost you a sigh. Ah! that I were more worthy of my happiness.” “Well, then,” said Ellinor, “I sighed for myself;--I sighed to think we should so soon be parted, and that the continuance of your society would then depend not on our mutual love, but the will of another.” “What, Ellinor, and can you suppose that Eugene,--my Eugene,--would not welcome you as warmly as myself? Ah! you misjudge him; I know you have not yet perceived how tender a heart lies beneath all that melancholy and reserve.” “I feel, indeed,” said Ellinor warmly, “as if it were impossible that one whom you love should not be all that is good and noble; yet if this reserve of his should increase, as is at least possible, with increasing years; if our society should become again, as it once was, distasteful to him, should I not lose you, Madeline?” “But his reserve cannot increase: do you not perceive how much it is softened already? Ah! be assured that I will charm it away.” “But what is the cause of the melancholy that even now, at times, evidently preys upon him?--has he never revealed it to you?” “It is merely the early and long habit of solitude and study, Ellinor,” replied Madeline; “and shall I own to you I would scarcely wish that away; his tenderness itself seems linked with his melancholy. It is like a sad but gentle music, that brings tears into our eyes, but which we would not change for gayer airs for the world.” “Well, I must own,” said Ellinor, reluctantly, “that I no longer wonder at your infatuation; I can no longer chide you as I once did; there is, assuredly, something in his voice, his look, which irresistibly sinks into the heart. And there are moments when, what with his eyes and forehead, his countenance seems more beautiful, more impressive, than any I ever beheld. Perhaps, too, for you, it is better, that your lover should be no longer in the first flush of youth. Your nature seems to require something to venerate, as well as to love. And I have ever observed at prayers, that you seem more especially rapt and carried beyond yourself, in those passages which call peculiarly for worship and adoration.” “Yes, dearest,” said Madeline fervently, “I own that Eugene is of all beings, not only of all whom I ever knew, but of whom I ever dreamed, or imagined, the one that I am most fitted to love and to appreciate. His wisdom, but more than that, the lofty tenor of his mind, calls forth all that is highest and best in my own nature. I feel exalted when I listen to him;--and yet, how gentle, with all that nobleness! And to think that he should descend to love me, and so to love me. It is as if a star were to leave its sphere!”