Hard and long penance, said my father, after some minutes musing, for an
hour of passion, probably for his only error.

Is that your explanation? said the lady. O, improbable. P. might err,
but not be led beyond himself.

I know his cool gray eye and calm complexion seemed to say so, but a
different story is told by the lip that could tremble, and showed what
flashes might pierce those deep blue heavens; and when these over
intellectual beings do swerve aside, it is to fall down a precipice, for
their narrow path lies over such. But he was not one to sin without
making a brave atonement, and that it had become a holy one, was written
on that downcast brow.

The fourth day on these waters, the weather was milder and brighter, so
that we could now see them to some purpose. At night was clear moon,
and, for the first time, from the upper deck, I saw one of the great
steamboats come majestically up. It was glowing with lights, looking
many-eyed and sagacious; in its heavy motion it seemed a dowager queen,
and this motion, with its solemn pulse, and determined sweep, becomes
these smooth waters, especially at night, as much as the dip of the
sail-ship the long billows of the ocean.

But it was not so soon that I learned to appreciate the lake scenery; it
was only after a daily and careless familiarity that I entered into its
beauty, for nature always refuses to be seen by being stared at. Like
Bonaparte, she discharges her face of all expression when she catches
the eye of impertinent curiosity fixed on her. But he who has gone to
sleep in childish ease on her lap, or leaned an aching brow upon her
breast, seeking there comfort with full trust as from a mother, will see