"Of what colour were her eyes and hair?" inquired Orinda.
"Light—both very light."
Orinda, who was a brunette, caught herself on the point of saying, that she had rarely seen much expression in the countenance of a blonde; but she checked the remark, and Sunderland proceeded.
"The lady in question had a splendidly bound album, which she produced and talked about on all occasions, and seemed to regard with so much pride and admiration, that if a lover could possibly have been jealous of a book, I was, at times, very near becoming so. It was half filled with amatory verses by juvenile rhymesters, and with tasteless insipid drawings in water colours, by boarding-school misses: which drawings my Dulcinea persisted in calling paintings. She also persisted in urging me to write 'a piece of poetry' in her album, and I persevered in declaring my utter inability: as my few attempts at versification had hitherto proved entire failures. At last, I reluctantly consented, recollecting to have heard of sudden fits of inspiration, and of miraculous gifts of poetical genius, with which even milkmaids and cobblers have been unexpectedly visited. So taking the album with me, I retired to the solitude of my apartment at the City Hall, concluding with Macbeth that when a thing is to be well done, 'tis well to do it quickly. Here I manfully made my preparations 'to saddle Pegasus and ride up Parnassus'—but in vain. With me the winged steed of Apollo was as obstinate as a Spanish mule on the Sierra Morena. Not an inch would he stir. There was not even the slightest flutter in his pinions; and the mountain of the Muses looked to me as inaccessible as—as what shall I say—"
"I will help you to a simile," replied Orinda; "as inaccessible as the sublime and stupendous precipice to which you West Pointers have given the elegant and appropriate title of Butter Hill."
"Exactly," responded Sunderland. "Parnassus looked like Butter Hill. Well, then—to be brief (as every man says when he suspects himself to be tedious), I sat up till one o'clock, vainly endeavouring to manufacture something that might stand for poetry. But I had no rhymes for my ideas, and no ideas for my rhymes. I found it impossible to make both go together. I at last determined to write my verses in prose till I had arranged the sense, and afterwards to put them into measure and rhyme. I tried every sort of measure from six feet to ten, and I essayed consecutive rhymes and alternate rhymes, but all was in vain. I found that I must either sacrifice the sense to the sound, or the sound to the sense. At length, I thought of the Bouts Rimées of the French. So I wrote down, near the right hand edge of my paper, a whole column of familiar rhymes, such as mine, thine, tears, fears, light, bright, &c. And now I congratulated myself on having accomplished one-half of my task, supposing that I should find it comparatively easy to do the filling up. But all was to no purpose. I could effect nothing that I thought even tolerable, and I was too proud to write badly and be laughed at. However, I must acknowledge that, could I have been certain that my 'piece of poetry' would be seen only by the fair damsel herself, I might easily have screwed my courage to the sticking place; for greatly as I was smitten with the beauty of my little nymph, I had a secret misgiving that she had never sacrificed to Minerva."
Our hero paused a moment to admire the radiance of the smile that now lighted up the countenance of Orinda.
"In short," continued he, "I sat up till 'night's candles were burnt out,' both literally and metaphorically, and I then retired in despair to my pillow, from whence I did not rise till ten o'clock in the morning.
"That evening I carried back the album to my fair one; but she still refused to let me off, and insisted that I should take it with me to West Point, to which place I was to return next day. I did so, hoping to catch some inspiration from the mountain air, and the mountain scenery. I ought to have recollected that few of the poets on record, either lived among mountains, or wrote while visiting them. The sons of song are too often fated to set up their household gods, and strike their lyres, in dark narrow streets and dismal alleys.
"As soon as the steamboat had cleared the city, I took out my pocket-book and pencil, and prepared for the onset. I now regarded the ever-beautiful scenery of the magnificent Hudson with a new interest. I thought the Palisades would do something for me; but my imagination remained as sterile and as impenetrable as their eternal rocks. The broad expanse of the Tappan Sea lay like a resplendent mirror around me, but it reflected no image that I could transfer to my tablets. We came into the Highlands, but the old Dundeberg rumbled nothing in my fancy's ears, Anthony's Nose looked coldly down upon me, and the Sugar Loaf suggested no idea of sweetness. We proceeded along, but Buttermilk Falls reminded me not of the fountain of Helicon, and Bull Hill and Breakneck Hill seemed too rugged ever to be smoothed into verse.