He seldom did anything like other men, acting upon principles which we may hereafter pause upon for a moment; and he did not now come at once to the declaration which Alice felt was hanging upon his lips, but went on to speak of things apparently of far less interest. "You will give me this half hour, or this hour, I know, sweet lady; and afterwards you shall give me more or not as you please. I had some idea of detaining you before you went out; but I am glad I did not, because I think when one has anything of great importance to say--anything, I mean, which deeply interests and moves us, in which the whole feelings of our hearts are engaged--I think that there is no place we can so well choose as in the face of nature, under the free canopy of heaven. One's spirit feels confined and crushed in chambers built by hands; one's heart has not room to expand; one's soul has not space to breathe forth at liberty." He saw that by this time Alice's emotion had a little subsided; she had even ventured, at the last words, to look up in his face; and he now went on, coming nearer to the matter of his thoughts. "Alice," he said, "dear Alice, I would beseech you not to agitate yourself, and yet I must speak to you on subjects which will create much emotion." Did Alice think, even for a moment, that he was too confident--that he was too sure of possessing such great influence over her mind? She did not; but even if such an idea had presented itself for a moment, it would have vanished immediately, for he went on: "I know that I must greatly agitate and move you; for if my brightest and dearest hopes are true, that heart is too deep and too intense in all its feelings not to be agitated by the words you must hear, and the words you must speak; and if those hopes are not true, if, like so many other of life's illusions, they have given me a moment of brightness but to plunge me in the deeper night, that heart is too gentle and too kind to tell me that the whole of the rest of my life is misery, without feeling wrung and pained. Alice, I have sought you, not to tell you that I love you; for that you must have known long----" "Oh no!" she cried, suddenly looking up through a flood of bright and happy tears, "Oh no! I might think so, but I could not be sure of it!" Langford smiled, and pressed her hand to his lips. "Do not think me presumptuous," he answered; "do not think me presumptuous when I say, that those words and that look have already given a reply, and made me most happy. Oh no! I am not presumptuous, for I know Alice Herbert too well not to feel that such words, and such a look, may well spare my agitating her further, on one subject at least. Yet tell me, Alice, am I as happy as I dream myself to be?" For a moment she made him no answer, and he added, "Oh speak!" "What can I say, Langford?" she murmured, in a low voice; "you, who know the human heart so well, must have read mine perhaps too deeply."