A LETTER.

A cool soft breeze went through the curtains of my couch, and I awoke.
The blooms of the peasant-briars and the court-roses were waving together
over my head. The sigh of the wind had breathed itself out over the far
heath, and ere it died in my fairy forest of lowly plants and bushes, had
found and fanned the cheeks that lay down hot and athirst for air. It
gave me new life, and I rose refreshed. Something fluttered to the
ground. I thought it was a leaf from a white rose above me, but I looked.
At my feet lay a piece of paper. I took it up. It had been folded very
hastily, and had no address, but who could have a better right to unfold
it than I! It might be nothing; it might be a letter. Should I open it?
Should I not rather seize the opportunity of setting things right between
my heart and my uncle by taking it to him unopened? Only, if it were
indeed--I dared hardly even in thought complete the supposition--might it
not be a wrong to the youth? Might not the paper contain a confidence?
might it not be the messenger of a heart that trusted me before even it
knew my name? Would I inaugurate our acquaintance with an act of
treachery, or at least distrust? Right or wrong, thus my heart reasoned,
and to its reasoning I gave heed. "It will," I said, "be time enough to
resolve, when I know concerning what!" This, I now see, was juggling; for
the question was whether I should be open with my uncle or not. "It might
be," I said to myself, "that, the moment I knew the contents of the
paper, I should reproach myself that I had not read it at once!" I sat
down on a bush of heather, and unfolded it. This is what I found, written
with a pencil:--

"I am the man to whom you talked so kindly over your garden wall
yesterday. I fear you may think me presuming and impertinent. Presuming I