“On and on--there was no rest. At length I espied a sunny island, a thousand leagues at sea. I alighted, and walked, and ran, and danced upon the velvet grass--or methought I was alone at last. Alone, alone! where temptation could not assail me, nor the flatterer’s words beguile! Alone before God, and in prayer! But, as I knelt, that awful voice cried out to me again:--‘Thou wert my friend; thou art mine enemy--begone!’ Where was the source of this awful mandate? It came from the earth; it came on the winds. Then my soul drank from the waters of affliction, and despair gnawed at my brain. The voice came again, but with other words--‘To love so young!--a lamb and a wolf--so young!--a killing frost--destitution--marriage crime--there is blood!--death!’ How little I suspected these words (to me so thrilling) were the very same which the Seeress had just interwoven with my eternal destiny! Alone, and yet alone! Oh now for a friend--ONE MORTAL FRIEND--to support and guide me! Truly, none can estimate the value of human sympathy but they who are destitute of its consolations! “At this instant a youth saluted me, and clasped me in his arms. His smile was sweet, and in his demeanor there was such an appearance of deep affection for me that, in my ecstasy, I did not, could not, resist his embrace. ‘I am thine!--thine forever!’ he whispered, ‘I have known thee from childhood!--I furnished thee with wings!’ As he spoke, Love’s sweet delirium took possession of my soul, and I was conscious only of intense, unearthly delight. After the vividness of this rapture had subsided, we sank into slumber, imparadised in each other’s arms. “When I awoke, the youth was gone. I thought he would return, and was satisfied. BUT HE CAME NOT. Then the air was filled with hisses. Ten thousand angry serpents could not have uttered a noise so dreadful. I thought my lover’s name was Theodore, and called to him, when, awful presence! a legion of demons rose up at the sound of his name! They were a black, bony, frightful throng, and they greeted me with a terrible shout of exultation. They danced round and round me, [Illustration] until, from dizziness, I could not see. Then I cursed most bitterly, but they only laughed and hissed. Then the spirit of Murder came into my heart, FOR I KNEW MY SHAME!” * * * * * The cold sweat stood on Maria’s fair forehead--and this dream, so fraught with terror, (and, as time proved, with reality,) lived in her heart. On awakening at the moment, though in a fright, she believed it to be a visitation of nightmare, and soon slept more quietly.