vision, and beheld her then, locked in her chamber, should I have been
so happy? Oh, what fools vanity and pride make of us! Even then, with
my heart high-strung with hope and courage, had I known the truth, I
should have abandoned my friends, the voyage, and Europe, and returned
in the pilot's boat, to find something more precious than all the
continents and countries of the globe, in the love of that heart which
I was carelessly flinging away."

Here Westwood took breath. The sun was now almost set. The prairie was
still and cool; the heavy dews were beginning to fall; the shadows of
the green and flowered undulations filled the hollows, like a rising
tide; the headland, seen at first so far and small, was growing
gradually large and near; and the horses moved at a quicker
pace. Westwood lighted his cigar, drew a few whiffs, and proceeded.

"We had a voyage of eleven days. But to me an immense amount of
experience was crowded into that brief period. The fine exhilaration
of the start,--the breeze gradually increasing to a gale; then
horrible sea-sickness, home-sickness, love-sickness; after which, the
weather which sailors love, games, gayety, and flirtation. There is no
such social freedom to be enjoyed anywhere as on board an ocean
steamer. The breaking-up of old associations, the opening of a fresh
existence, the necessity of new relationships,--this fuses the crust
of conventionality, quickens the springs of life, and renders
character sympathetic and fluent. The past is easily put away; we
become plastic to new influences; we are delighted at the discovery of
unexpected affinities, and astonished to find in ourselves so much
wit, eloquence, and fine susceptibility, which we did not before dream
we possessed.