For my part, I cannot express what were my emotions. By degrees I
overcame the extreme shyness that had formerly paralyzed me in her
presence. We were drawn together by sympathy of situation. We had each
lost our best friend in the world; we were each, in some measure thrown
upon the kindness of others. When I came to know her intellectually,
all my ideal picturings of her were confirmed. Her newness to the
world, her delightful susceptibility to every thing beautiful and
agreeable in nature, reminded me of my own emotions when first I
escaped from the convent. Her rectitude of thinking delighted my
judgment; the sweetness of her nature wrapped itself around my heart;
and then her young and tender and budding loveliness, sent a delicious
madness to my brain.
I gazed upon her with a kind of idolatry, as something more than
mortal; and I felt humiliated at the idea of my comparative
unworthiness. Yet she was mortal; and one of mortality's most
susceptible and loving compounds; for she loved me!
How first I discovered the transporting truth I cannot recollect; I
believe it stole upon me by degrees, as a wonder past hope or belief.
We were both at such a tender and loving age; in constant intercourse
with each other; mingling in the same elegant pursuits; for music,
poetry, and painting were our mutual delights, and we were almost
separated from society, among lovely and romantic scenery! Is it
strange that two young hearts thus brought together should readily
twine round each other?
Oh, gods! what a dream - a transient dream! of unalloyed delight then
passed over my soul! Then it was that the world around me was indeed a
paradise, for I had a woman - lovely, delicious woman, to share it with
me. How often have I rambled over the picturesque shores of Sestri, or
climbed its wild mountains, with the coast gemmed with villas, and the
blue sea far below me, and the slender Pharo of Genoa on its romantic
promontory in the distance; and as I sustained the faltering steps of
Bianca, have thought there could no unhappiness enter into so beautiful
a world. Why, oh, why is this budding season of life and love so
transient - why is this rosy cloud of love that sheds such a glow over
the morning of our days so prone to brew up into the whirlwind and the
storm!
I was the first to awaken from this blissful delirium of the
affections. I had gained Bianca's heart: what was I to do with it? I
had no wealth nor prospects to entitle me to her hand. Was I to take
advantage of her ignorance of the world, of her confiding affection,
and draw her down to my own poverty?
