broad, imperial splendor of this summer noon!--and
myself standing alone in it—yes, utterly
alone!"
"The men I seek must exist: where are they?
How make an acquaintance, when one obsequiously
bows himself away, as I advance? The fault
is surely not all on my side."
There was much more, intimate enough to inspire me with a keen interest in the writer, yet not sufficiently so to make my perusal a painful indiscretion. I yielded to the impulse of the moment, took out my pencil, and wrote a dozen lines on one of the blank pages. They ran something in this wise:
"IGNOTUS IGNOTAE!--You have bestowed without
intending it, and I have taken without your