fellow-feeling in another mind. Nay, she could love and dwell with
tenderness on the look and voice of her friend, while her demeanour
expressed the coldest reserve. A sensation with her became a sentiment, and
she never spoke until she had mingled her perceptions of outward objects
with others which were the native growth of her own mind. She was like a
fruitful soil that imbibed the airs and dews of heaven, and gave them forth
again to light in loveliest forms of fruits and flowers; but then she was
often dark and rugged as that soil, raked up, and new sown with unseen
seed.

She dwelt in a cottage whose trim grass-plat sloped down to the waters of
the lake of Ulswater; a beech wood stretched up the hill behind, and a
purling brook gently falling from the acclivity ran through poplar-shaded
banks into the lake. I lived with a farmer whose house was built higher up
among the hills: a dark crag rose behind it, and, exposed to the north, the
snow lay in its crevices the summer through. Before dawn I led my flock to
the sheep-walks, and guarded them through the day. It was a life of toil;
for rain and cold were more frequent than sunshine; but it was my pride to
contemn the elements. My trusty dog watched the sheep as I slipped away to
the rendezvous of my comrades, and thence to the accomplishment of our
schemes. At noon we met again, and we threw away in contempt our peasant
fare, as we built our fire-place and kindled the cheering blaze destined to
cook the game stolen from the neighbouring preserves. Then came the tale of
hair-breadth escapes, combats with dogs, ambush and flight, as gipsey-like
we encompassed our pot. The search after a stray lamb, or the devices by
which we elude or endeavoured to elude punishment, filled up the hours of
afternoon; in the evening my flock went to its fold, and I to my sister.

It was seldom indeed that we escaped, to use an old-fashioned phrase, scot
free. Our dainty fare was often exchanged for blows and imprisonment. Once,