'Much obliged for your flattering opinion,' said I. 'But see here, my bonny Jane, did it never enter into your innocent little heart to think how _you_ would love?' 'Oh yes,' she answered quickly; 'but that is all guess-work. I don't know, because I haven't yet found a man to my taste.' Of course I knew that I could not be to her taste; but a plain man does not like to be told that he is ugly, though he may be perfectly conscious of the fact. And so this avowal, which was made with the most unthinking honesty and simplicity, while it added weight to my despair, by a very usual consequence, made me desperate. 'You are certain,' I asked, after a pause, 'that you do not know what love is by experience?' 'Perfectly,' she answered, half laughing. 'And that you mean to know, some time?' 'To be sure,' said she, 'when the right man and the right time come.' 'I do not know,' said I, beginning slowly and calmly; but before the sentence was half completed, my voice and thoughts had escaped from under my control; 'I do not know who the right man for you may be, but I--_I_ love you--love you--love you!' She looked at me for a few seconds, with a countenance filled with astonishment, not unmingled with alarm. She would have thought it a jest; but my manner probably convinced her that I was far from jesting. She tried to smile, but it was a painful effort, and she found it much easier to conceal her face in her hands and weep. My recollection of the subsequent events of that evening is extremely dim. There was a confused crowd of flying thoughts; many tears and much friendship on one side, and much love on the other. She had received me as I knew she would, and though by the confession there was a great weight removed from my breast, the anguish was not less intense. One thing, however, among the hurried occurrences of that hour, I did not lose sight of, and that was pride. She did not suspect at the time how much of my heart, not to say existence, was bound up in her, or how greatly both were affected by her answer. The closing scene of the interview is the one which I most love to remember. We were standing at the door, her hand in mine, a mournful smile on her lips, and a tear in her eye. That bright, gentle face was pale with sorrow, and pity, and pain, and above all with fear. I gazed on it a moment, but in that moment the picture was graven indelibly on my memory. The 'good night' was spoken; and that is the last time I ever saw my cousin Jane. The next morning I sat down at an inn by the way-side, several miles distant from home, and sent back a few lines of farewell: