“You know where you are, I suppose, Montgomery?” said the Earl. “Not I,” answered Edmund, “further than that my present situation is a very enviable one!” This he said with an air of light gallantry, which concealed tolerably well both the reality and the extravagance of his feelings. “You do not know then that this place is the Craigs?” rejoined the Earl. “We are all here to day, for the express purpose of displaying its beauties to Julia and Frances, who have never had an opportunity of visiting it before. We are to attempt the top of the rock, as soon as we have fortified ourselves by luncheon.” “I have seen many of its beauties,” he replied, “but without knowing where I was. My horse, in fact, brought me here this morning, while I was thinking of something else.” Then, too much confounded to talk any thing but nonsense, and too much exhilarated to be silent, he addressed Julia, enquiring if she were aware that the building on the top of the rock was a conservatory. She replied in the negative. “Allow me then,” he rejoined, with seeming playfulness, but breathless from agitation, “allow me to be the first to present you with an offering of its sweets!” As he spoke, he took the remainder of the flowers from his bosom, and gave them to Julia; experiencing, at the moment, an indescribable delight in reversing, as it were, the feeling with which he had placed them there. This was mere trifling; but such was the effect on Edmund’s spirits of all this happiness restored, and without any fault of his too, just at the very moment when he had resigned it all, that, under the intoxicating sense of the present pleasure, he scarcely knew what he said or did; or how sufficiently to enjoy so much felicity while it lasted; for through it all there was a vaguely recognised idea, that it must pass away. Julia took the flowers with a smile, not at all calculated to sober Edmund’s transports, and placed them (of course without thinking what she was doing,) in so enviable a situation, that they were followed by the eyes of our hero, and gazed upon, as their delicate blossoms visibly vibrated to each pulsation of Julia’s heart, till he wished himself, not “a glove upon that hand,” but a fair blossom, &c.