"And why should you blush about it so?"
Never mind that—this was, and ever has been, if not the happiest, the loveliest moment of my life.
On turning back, that I might, should fortune favour me, obtain some farther traces of her, I just glimpsed her as she entered a carriage, which drove away in the direction of Datchet.
Once again, then, was I at fault, still possessing not the faintest suspicion of her retreat, for resident in the neighbourhood I was now confident she must be.
It was six years and more since I had heard her voice. From that moment I had dwelt upon it and her, with all my mind, with all my heart, and with all my soul. But then, this might have been an ideal passion, as has happened to many of us, and we have never been less enamoured than when in the immediate presence of its object: but in this instance it was very different, creating a kind of fretful happiness quite intolerable. Byron says, in his ever-glowing way, that—
"Sweeter far than this, than these, than all,
Is first and passionate love!"
But, he should have added, what probably he meant, early love. Love at twenty is as nothing, unless one's a fool. Downright love exists only with boyish and the wildest romance, infinitely removed from every grain of common sense. I will give an instance of this boyish weakness, though a ridiculous one.
There was a maid-servant in Eton, who was a modest, respectable, and certainly very pretty girl. Notwithstanding the stoutness of her ancle, she had made a deep impression on many of the bigger boys, though probably not one of them had exchanged a syllable with her. This girl now became betrothed to a Windsor tradesman. No sooner was this ascertained, than her admirers let him plainly know, that should he presume to prosecute his design, it should cost him dearly. Several of them now never met the poor fellow without insulting him; and I remember one boy, more ardent than the rest, went into his shop and fought him chivalrously, like a good knight and true. So high did the feud now run, that the shop-keepers sided with their townsman, and for months half the school was each evening engaged in a spirited skirmish with the Windsor mobility for this Fair Maid of Perth; and I believe that, in consequence of the excitement they evinced on the occasion, the match was postponed for nearly two years. The boy who particularised himself for his pugnacious prowess has since become a preacher in the open fields, and a zealous supporter of the miraculously unknown tongues.
"But these are foolish things to all the wise," and particularly so to me, though my head was altogether turned, and my heart too. My days were more than ever dedicated to roaming over the country; and in the evening I used to love to scull my skiff far up the stream, and then float quietly down while I watched the sun setting, and the luxurious yet modest forget-me-not, on the banks; then leave my boat to sit motionless on a retired stile, and listen to "the still small voice" of the mysterious bat, or the drowsy soothing hum of the beetle. One of these evenings, by the bye, was productive of a little adventure.
I had just accomplished "the shallows," and was now rowing hard against the stream opposite Boveney Church, when I was startled for the moment by the sounds of a number of female voices, some of which even amounted to screams. On looking over my shoulder, I now observed an enormous pleasure-barge, with its deck and cabin crowded with a numerous party of ladies and gentlemen. It was drawn up the stream by three or four horses. At this spot the stream ran with such rapidity, that a boat which was fastened to the stern, had broken away, and the ladies became, in a degree, panic-struck, when they saw their only means of communication with the shore quickly floating away from them.