essence of thoughts divine; one whose shape and mould, whose heart and
genius, would, had Poesy never before dreamed it, have called forth the
first notion of spirits resembling mortals, but not of them,--no,
Gertrude! while I remember you, the faith, the trust in brighter shapes
and fairer natures than the world knows of, comes clinging to my heart;
and still will I think that Fairies might have watched over your sleep
and Spirits have ministered to your dreams.



CHAPTER III.

FEELINGS.

GERTRUDE and her companions proceeded by slow and, to her, delightful
stages to Rotterdam. Trevylyan sat by her side, and her hand was ever in
his; and when her delicate frame became sensible of fatigue, her head
drooped on his shoulder as its natural resting-place. Her father was a
man who had lived long enough to have encountered many reverses of
fortune, and they had left him, as I am apt to believe long adversity
usually does leave its prey, somewhat chilled and somewhat hardened to
affection; passive and quiet of hope, resigned to the worst as to the
common order of events, and expecting little from the best, as an
unlooked-for incident in the regularity of human afflictions. He was
insensible of his daughter's danger, for he was not one whom the fear of
love endows with prophetic vision; and he lived tranquilly in the
present, without asking what new misfortune awaited him in the future.
Yet he loved his child, his only child, with whatever of affection was
left him by the many shocks his heart had received; and in her
approaching connection with one rich and noble as Trevylyan, he felt even