Reluctantly he departed. I withdrew to my own room, and, when in bed, endeavored to analyze his memoir. I tried to be impartial, and judge by reason alone, if he were worthy of my affection; but love confused reason, or rather the mischievous god construed everything in his own favor, and demanded blind faith, which, like charity, covers a multitude of sins. Inexperienced, too, in the ways of men, I knew not of that seductive eloquence which dazzles the mind through the heart; besides, I was so young and confiding—it was so charming a thing to be loved—that I did not care to inquire too closely into cause and effect, and crediting all, and happy in the belief, I fell asleep.
The next day my lover came and spent two hours with me. He brought me a beautiful diamond ring, the token of our engagement—the gems set in the form of a star,—and a miniature of himself, which he placed around my neck.
“This will serve to recall me to your memory sometimes, while I am gone,” he remarked, playfully.
“If a woman loves a man, she needs nothing to recall him to mind, and if she does not, where is the use of a portrait?”
“Ah! you little logician;—little philosopher, you confute me at all points.”
“Am I not right, though?”
“Yes; you are always right, at least in my opinion.”
“I shall sing in the Opera of Somnambula to-morrow night; will you be there to hear me? but I forget, you will leave this evening, and of course cannot come.”