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Guy Mannering, Or, the Astrologer — Volume 01 by Sir Walter Scott
page 55 of 336 (16%)
disappeared.

It was one hour after midnight, and the prospect around was
lovely. The grey old towers of the ruin, partly entire, partly
broken, here bearing the rusty weather-stains of ages, and there
partially mantled with ivy, stretched along the verge of the dark
rock which rose on Mannering's right hand. In his front was the
quiet bay, whose little waves, crisping and sparkling to the
moonbeams, rolled successively along its surface, and dashed with
a soft and murmuring ripple against the silvery beach. To the left
the woods advanced far into the ocean, waving in the moonlight
along ground of an undulating and varied form, and presenting
those varieties of light and shade, and that interesting
combination of glade and thicket, upon which the eye delights to
rest, charmed with what it sees, yet curious to pierce still
deeper into the intricacies of the woodland scenery. Above rolled
the planets, each, by its own liquid orbit of light, distinguished
from the inferior or more distant stars. So strangely can
imagination deceive even those by whose volition it has been
excited, that Mannering, while gazing upon these brilliant bodies,
was half inclined to believe in the influence ascribed to them by
superstition over human events. But Mannering was a youthful
lover, and might perhaps be influenced by the feelings so
exquisitely expressed by a modern poet:--

For fable is Love's world, his home, his birthplace:
Delightedly dwells he 'mong fays, and talismans,
And spirits, and delightedly believes
Divinities, being himself divine
The intelligible forms of ancient poets,
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