CHAP. XXIV.


Mary still continued weak and low, though it was spring, and all nature
began to look gay; with more than usual brightness the sun shone, and a
little robin which she had cherished during the winter sung one of his
best songs. The family were particularly civil this fine morning, and
tried to prevail on her to walk out. Any thing like kindness melted her;
she consented.

Softer emotions banished her melancholy, and she directed her steps to
the habitation she had rendered comfortable.

Emerging out of a dreary chamber, all nature looked cheerful; when she
had last walked out, snow covered the ground, and bleak winds pierced
her through and through: now the hedges were green, the blossoms adorned
the trees, and the birds sung. She reached the dwelling, without being
much exhausted and while she rested there, observed the children
sporting on the grass, with improved complexions. The mother with tears
thanked her deliverer, and pointed out her comforts. Mary's tears flowed
not only from sympathy, but a complication of feelings and recollections
the affections which bound her to her fellow creatures began again to
play, and reanimated nature. She observed the change in herself, tried
to account for it, and wrote with her pencil a rhapsody on sensibility.

"Sensibility is the most exquisite feeling of which the human soul is
susceptible: when it pervades us, we feel happy; and could it last
unmixed, we might form some conjecture of the bliss of those
paradisiacal days, when the obedient passions were under the dominion of