“Heaven bless you! who wants you to help it?” exclaimed the delighted Hammond, as he rained his kisses, and she smiled through her tears, and showed how perfect her happiness was, in confessing her love.
“Lamora, will you be mine? Will you go home with me?”
She looked at him unflinchingly in the face, and a seraphic light seemed to suffuse her eyes and countenance as she answered:
“Yes, I will go to your home with you and be yours.”
“Ah! who on earth does not envy me!” exclaimed the overjoyed lover. “You are mine; your promise is given. You feel no regrets?”
“No; none at all,” she answered, with the same bewitching sweetness.
“I thank Providence for this,” said Hammond, fervently. “You have intrusted your happiness into my hands, and never, no, never shall you regret it.”
Ah! they were happy moments to both. It was “love’s young dream,” in all its measureless hight and depth; their cup was pressed down and running over.
They talked and chatted, and billed and cooed, and replighted and revowed, as only young lovers can in the fulness of their hearts, and when an hour or two had slipped by in this delightful manner, then they began to discuss the matter practically.
“Will you leave your friends, without acquainting them of your determination?” he inquired.