"I have no patience with Theresa's visionary fancies," said Gerald, petulently, as he glanced over this letter, "I really believe she prizes books and pictures, and her idle dreams, more than the hearts that love her." I have lingered long over this recording of a childhood that lent my loneliness many pleasures; and I must trace more rapidly and briefly the sadder portion of my recollections. Over the next two years let us pass in silence; they saw the last shining of pleasure upon Theresa's experience; they were the resting-place between her young hopefulness and the perplexing cares and disappointments of her energetic and unsatisfied womanhood. Never afterward did life appear to her so rapturous a gift, and intellectual superiority so enchanting, but the hereafter grew silent with its promises, and her spirit weary with its cares. It was not until some months afterward that the journal I am about to quote fell into my hands; but I copy some of its fragments, to portray its writer's feelings. Ah, me! such trustful hearts as hers are those experience depresses soonest. "How happy I have been this summer! I believe those who have spent their childhood in seclusion, and formed their first associations from the lovely creations of nature, love home better than persons _can_ do, who have been always encompassed by the excitements and artificial enjoyments of society. These lose individual consciousness amid the throng of recollections; they cannot trace the progress of their being, nor retain the self-portraying vividness of memory. I am sure that no dweller in cities can feel as I do, when I return to this tranquil village; I can almost imagine I have stepped back into my childhood. Yet, loving this place as I do, I am still anxious to leave it; home, and especially a quiet one, is no place for great successes. Too much of the childish past hangs over it, and discourages exertion, and those who have loved us best and earliest, know least of what we are capable. Every day intercourse fetters judgment, and thought lives in the domestic circle with sealed lips. My kind friends do not comprehend my wishes or emotions; my mother deems them folly, and Gerald, instead of sympathy, tenders me only doubts and fears. But I repel silently such depressing influence; surely the motto of youth should be, _aide-toi_, _et Dieu t'aidera_. . . . . I have been reading that tearful book, the Diary of an Ennuye. What a vivid picture it presents of mental and physical suffering, too intense to be wholly conquered, yet half subdued by the strong power of a thoughtful will. Such depictings of sorrow must be exaggerated, there cannot be so much of grief in a world where hope still liveth. . . . . I have been amusing myself this morning by scribbling verses, and as I gradually became absorbed in my employment, I felt I would willingly relinquish half the future in store for me, could I win a poet's fame. I have