The son of a rich farmer, I had been sent to Paris to complete my studies. During the four years that I lived in that great city, I retained my awkwardness of manner, and my simplicity of style, but I had rapidly lost the ingenuousness of my sentiments. I returned to these mountains almost learned, but at the same time nearly incredulous as to every thing calculated to make us live happily beneath a thatched roof, surrounded by a family, with the prospect of the grave before us. When Eva Meredith was happy, her felicity began to afford me useful lessons. “They deceived me there,” I said. “There _are_ true hearts, then; there are souls as pure as these children. The pleasure of a moment is not every thing in this life of ours; there are feelings which do not expire with the year; we can love for a length of time, perhaps forever.” And whilst I contemplated the love of William and Eva, I recovered my former artless peasant’s nature. I began to dream of a virtuous, sincere woman; one who was industrious, and would adorn my home by her diligence and solicitude. I saw myself proud of the sweet firmness of her countenance, disclosing the faithful and even austere wife. Certes, these were not my dreams at Paris, at the end of a boisterous evening passed with my comrades. But a terrible misfortune had fallen like a thunderbolt upon Eva Meredith, and this made me slower in understanding the great lessons each day unfolded to me. Eva always sat near the window with her eyes sadly fixed on the heavens. This position, which is peculiar to those who indulge in reveries, attracted my attention but little at first, but before long it created a deep impression. Whilst my book lay open on my knees, I watched Madame Meredith, and being sure that her eyes would not detect me, I observed her closely. Eva gazed up to heaven, and my eyes followed the same direction as hers. “Ah!” I said, with a half smile, “she thinks that she will rejoin him above!” and I would turn to my book, thinking how happy it was for the weakness of woman, that such fancies came to the aid of her grief. As I told you, my sojourn in the midst of students had filled my head with notions of an evil tendency. But each day I saw Eva in the same attitude, and each day my reflections were recalled to the same subject. By degrees I began to think that hers was a pleasant dream; and I even regretted that I could not believe it a true one. The soul, heaven, an eternity, all that my curate had formerly impressed on me, passed through my mind, as I sat at eve before the open window, and I said, “What the old curate taught me is more consoling than the cold realities which science discloses;” and then I would look on Eva, who still gazed on the heavens, whilst the bell of the village church sounded in the distance, and the rays of the setting sun shone brightly upon the cross of the steeple. And often did I return and sit near that poor widow, firm in her grief as in her holy hopes.