declared to the stranger, in the flash of animation which spoke
openly in her countenance; eye speaking to lip and cheek, and
these, in turn, responding with a kindred sentiment to the already
tell-tale eye.

William Hinkley, from a little distance, beheld this meeting. He
had lingered with the curiosity which belongs to the natural
apprehension of the lover. He saw them approach--nay, fancied
he beheld the mutual expression of their sympathizing eyes, and
he turned away, and hurried homeward, with the feeling of a heart
already overborne, and defrauded in all its hopes and expectations.
The flowers were threatened with blight in his Eden: but he did
not conjecture, poor fellow, that a serpent had indeed entered it!






CHAPTER VII.

THE GOOD YOUNG MAN IN MEDITATION.





Perhaps, it may be assumed, with tolerable safety, that no first
villany is ever entirely deliberate. There is something in events
to give it direction--something to egg it on--to point out time,