"Alice May, and Bruising Bill" - читать интересную книгу автора (Ingraham Joseph Holt)

soliloquy,' and casting her eyes upon the inscription, she replaced her bonnet
and was retiring.
`It is indeed beautiful and touching,' said Edward lifting his hat as he stood
by the monument. Will you have the kindness to tell me what young bride lies
buried here?'
The question was put so respectfully, his manner was so pleasing, his face so
intelligently handsome, his voice so rich and low, his eyes so reverential yet
so brilliant, that she could not resist a reply:
`I am ignorant, sir.' She then added apologetically, `I have strayed here, away
from my party, who, calling me till they were tired left me to myself. I must
hasten to find them.'
`I fear you will not find them easy in this labarynth of walks,' said Edward,
seeing her retire. `Allow me to escort you.'
`NoЧ' she answered playfully, yet blushing; `I think I shall not get lost;' and
bounding away he lost sight of her in a bend in the avenue.
For some moments he stood gazing where she had disappeared, and then with a deep
drawn sigh, and with a sensation of gentle melancholy stealing over him, the
first dawning of love, he slowly resumed his ramble. Deep was the impression she
had made upon his heart, and as he walked he was lost in a brown-study, of which
she was the mystic volume.
He had wandered how far and how long, whether five minutes or an hour, he did
not know, when he was aroused by the side of `the terrace of tombs,' by a figure
crossing his path. He looked up and saw it was the maiden of the monument, whose
image love was busily graving upon his heart. She was approaching him, and he
saw that she looked warm, hurried, and a little alarmed.
`I am overjoyed to meet you sir,' she said, coming near him with a hurried step.
`You will think me a very strange person; but I have, as you predicted, really
lost myself! I have been wandering the last half hour through a hundred paths,
and this is the third time I have reappeared before these tombs.'
`Will you do me the honor to accept my guidance,' said Edward.
`You will think me a very foolish girl. I certainly have been very imprudent. As
I cannot hope to find my party in this wilderness, you will oblige me by
conducting me to the entrance where I will wait for them in the carriage.
The young man never felt so happy in his life, as at this moment the lovely
wanderer frankly placed her hand on his arm, and walked by his side.
Edward was not familiar with the avenues, but, listening and hearing the distant
roll of wheels along the turnpike, he carefully noted the direction of the
sound, and struck into the paths that he believed would lead them towards the
highway.
The birds that twittered and chirped in the branches that over-hung their way,
have not betrayed to us their conversation as they walked; and we leave our
readers to imagine what two young, ardent, intellectual, enthusiastic persons,
thus romantically cast upon each others companionship, discoursed about at such
a season.
`There is Spurzheim's tomb, and not far distant and visible from it is the
gateway,' said Edward as they emerged from a shaded avenue which they had been
sometime slowly traversing. `I must now part from you; but to bear with me the
recollection of this hour as the happiest of my life.'
His eyes sought hers, but they were downcast, and her blushing face was averted.
She suddenly withdrew her hand from his arm, for footsteps and voices were