Delusion; or, The Witch of New England

lcome, heaven's

in to wear the

ek, and the meek

iles as it draw

unny south, O

ya

ian summer, corresponding to the St. Martin summer of the eastern continent, although

seemed as if happy nature had been arrested in a moment of joy, and turned into a mourner. The intense stillness pressed on the heart. No chirp of bird or hum of insect broke the deep silence. From time to time a leaf, "yellow and sere," loosened, as it were, by invisible fin

river was on one side, and on the promontory thus formed, were left some of the largest trees of the forest that covered the whole country when our fathers

describe was almost as solitary as if man had never invaded it. The trees upon it were the largest growth of elm and oak, and

-like, unpainted, solitary, but for the silent tenants of its grave-yard. A grass-grown path connected the church with the dwell

formed, and, had it not been for her fresh and radiant health, she would have possessed that pensive, poetic expression that painters love. She was not indeed beautiful, but hers was one of those countenances in which

rs and ten, and his black dress indicated his profession. His slippers and pipe presented a picture of repose from the

o much care and neatness that it was seen at once that a feminine taste h

it over the fireplace, carefully guarded by a curtain, indic

nterest some object from the window, and the old man to enjoy his pipe; but at last the nigh

ted herself by her father: her countenanc

d, "I fear your life is too solitary; your young heart yearns for comp

s, but there was a tear in her eye, cal

her book. I fear he is timid and sensitive, and does not like that you should see his poor labor-

Dinah has brought them while I have been gazing idly at the river. It shall not happen again. What book shall

efface the impression of her sigh and blush, by assuming a gayety of manner

and will surely distinguish himself, and he must not be suffered to languish in pov

e, and the long autumn ev

d. At the close of the evening, Paul and Dinah, both Afr

, the blacks kneeled down

actised; and those Puritans, who would not bend the knee to God except

cheeks, and gave her hand to Paul, and the family

gland clergymen. He had been educated in England, and was an excellent classical scholar; indeed, his pas

ldness of his disposition had never permitted him to become either a bigot nor a persecutor. He had been all his life a dil

n who were educated in the mother country; but such education

ng and domestic erudition, to the faithful slave Dinah. Edith had grown up, indeed, without other female inf

not natural to her age or disposition. Solitude is said to be the nurse of geniu

f genius;-far from it. The purest affections seem to us to have left the most enduring monuments. Among a thousand others, at least with woman, we

, but yearning for associates of her own age and sex. After her father, her affections had found obje

mind that had nothing to do with the technical distinctions of the day. Edith Grafton was formed for gentleness and love, to suffer patiently, to submit gracefully, to think more of ot