Each fragrant flower that drinks the dew;
And Lucy, at her wheel, shall sing,
In russet gown and apron blue.
The village church, amid the trees,
Where first our marriage vows were given,
With merry peals shall swell the breeze
And point, with taper spire, to Heaven.”
It was certainly a most appropriate and delicately expressed choice for such a lover of natural beauty and quiet happiness as Miss Laura Oriel.
But to return to ——. Mr. Forrester knew that Miss Oriel was expected to arrive there on a certain morning, and, as he had gone down several days previous, he was, of course, on the watch for her. Most impassioned admirers would have rushed out to welcome the object of their thoughts at the very first glimpse of her green veil. But Cecil was no vulgar lover, his taste was excessively refined, and for his own sake, no less than out of regard to the lady’s feelings, he did not choose to behold her in travelling dishabille after a long and dusty ride. He therefore contented himself with watching from an upper window her descent from the stage coach, and then retired to his apartment until the preparatory dinner-bell should summon the élite to the saloon. As I have said before, the day was excessively warm, and all the ventilators (which had been mercifully placed over each door to prevent suffocation) stood wide open, as if the rooms, like their heated occupants, were gasping for breath. Cecil, who had a tolerably correct notion of comfort, had loosed his boot-straps, unbraced his stays, and flung himself upon the bed to indulge a pleasant reverie before he commenced his toilet, when he was suddenly recalled to the scenes of actual life by the sound of a well-known voice.
The apartments to which Miss Oriel and her mother had been conducted (the privilege of selection would be a most unheard-of innovation of the rights of hotel-keepers at such a season) happened to be immediately opposite to the one already occupied by Mr. Forrester. The ventilators of both were open, and, as he heard her voice, he felt a sweet satisfaction in the thought, that the soft southern breeze which was cooling his brow also fanned the ringlets of his beautiful mistress. But really there was no excuse for his listening to her conversation; it was most ungentlemanlike, but at the same time, I am sorry to say, most natural; and though heartily ashamed of him for so doing, I am obliged to confess that he paid the closest attention to every word of their discourse.