I have said that, in the first
years of our connection as schoolmates, my feelings in regard to him
might have been easily ripened into friendship; but, in the latter
months of my residence at the academy, although the intrusion of his
ordinary manner had, beyond doubt, in some measure abated, my
sentiments, in nearly similar proportion, partook very much of
positive hatred. Upon one occasion he saw this, I think, and
afterwards avoided or made a show of avoiding me.
It was about the same period, if I remember aright, that, in an
altercation of violence with him, in which he was more than usually
thrown off his guard, and spoke and acted with an openness of demeanor
rather foreign to his nature, I discovered, or fancied I discovered,
in his accent, his air and general appearance, a something which first
startled, and then deeply interested me, by bringing to mind dim
visions of my earliest infancy--wild, confused and thronging memories
of a time when memory herself was yet unborn. I cannot better describe
the sensation which oppressed me than by saying that I could with
difficulty shake off the belief of my having been acquainted with the
being who stood before me, at some epoch very long ago--some point of
the past even infinitely remote. The delusion, however, faded rapidly
as it came; and I mention it at all but to define the day of the last
conversation I there held with my singular namesake.
Pages:
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122