Bright was his eye, and glistening while he spoke; but when he opened the fair folds that conveyed to him thoughts of his mistress, its radiancy was gone!
"THEODORE,
"I am aware of the utter frustration of your hopes; I am convinced that at the end of a year you will not be a step nearer to fortune than you are now; why then keep my hand for you? What I say briefly, you will interpret fully. You are now the guardian of my happiness; as such I address you. Thursday, so you consent, will be my wedding day.
ROSALIE."
Such was the letter, upon the address and seal of which Theodore had imprinted a score of kisses before he opened it. "Fortune is in the mood," said Theodore with a sigh, so deeply drawn, that any one who had heard it would have imagined he had breathed his spirit out along with it—"Fortune is in the mood, and let her have her humor out! I shall answer the letter; my reply to her shall convey what she desires—nothing more! she is incapable of entering into my feelings, and unworthy of being made acquainted with them; I shall not condescend even to complain!"
"ROSALIE,
"You are free!
THEODORE."
Such was the answer which Theodore despatched to Rosalie. O the enviable restlessness of the mind upon the first shock of thwarted affection! How it turns every way for the solace which it feels it can no more meet with, except in the perfect extinction of consciousness. Find it an anodyne!—you cannot. A drug may close the eye for a time, but the soul will not sleep a wink: it lies broad awake, to agony distinct, palpable, immediate;—howsoever memory may be cheated to lose for the present the traces of the cause. Then for the start, the spasm, the groan which, while the body lies free, attest the presence and activity of the mental rack! Better walk than go to sleep! A heath, without a soul but yourself upon it!—an ink-black sky, pouring down torrents—wind, lightning, thunder, as though the vault above was crackling and disparting into fragments!—any thing to mount above the pitch of your own solitude, and darkness, and tempest; and overcome them, or attract and divert your contemplation from them, or threaten every moment to put an end to them and you!
Theodore's friend scarcely knew him the next morning. He glanced at him, and took no further notice. 'Twas the best way, though people there are who imagine that it rests with a man in a fever, at his own option to remain in it, or to become convalescent.