I know not how long we remained thus. At last, in a trembling voice,
and with a somewhat constrained and impatient tone, she said: "You have
wept over me; I have called you brother, you have adopted me for your
sister, and yet we dare not look at each other? A tear," she added, "a
disinterested tear from an unknown heart is more than my life is
worth,--more than it has ever yet called forth!" Then with a slightly
reproachful accent she said: "Am I then become once more a stranger to
you, since I no longer require your care? Oh, as to me," she proceeded
in a resolute tone of confidence, "I know nothing of you but your name
and countenance, but I know your heart! A century could not teach me
more!"
"For my part," said I, faltering, "I would wish to learn nothing of all
that makes you a being like unto ourselves, and bound by the same links
as us to this wretched world. I require but to know this,--that you
have traversed it, and that you have allowed me to contemplate you from
afar, and to remember you always."
"Oh, do not deceive yourself thus!" she replied; "do not see in me a
deified delusion of your own heart; I should have to suffer too much
when the chimera vanished.
Pages:
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81