flower-starred woods around the lake, that a feeling of restlessness,
amounting at times almost to dissatisfaction, took possession of her.
Indeed, as the weeks crept on and she drew near the completion of her
twentieth year, she realized with a sigh that she could no longer call
herself a girl, and began to feel that her life was incomplete, that
something was wanting in it. And this was what was wanting in Angela's
life: she had, if we except her nurse, no one to love, and she had so
much love to give!

Did she but guess it, the still recesses of her heart already tremble
to the footfall of one now drawing near: out of the multitude of the
lives around her, a life is marked to mingle with her own. She does
not know it, but as the first reflection of the dawn strikes the
unconscious sky and shadows the coming of its king, so the red flush
that now so often springs unbidden to her brow, tells of girlhood's
twilight ended, and proclaims the advent of woman's life and love.



"Angela," called her father one day, as he heard her footsteps passing
his study, "come in here; I want to speak to you."

His daughter stopped, and a look of blank astonishment spread itself
over her face. She had not been called into that study for years. She
entered, however, as bidden. Her father, who was seated at his
writing-table, which was piled up with account-books, did not greatly
differ in appearance from what he was when we last saw him twenty
years ago. His frame had grown more massive, and acquired a slight
stoop, but he was still a young, powerful-looking man, and certainly
did not appear a day more than his age of forty-two. The eyes,