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"But I will not mar my happiness by dark forebodings of the future. Let
me enjoy the sunshine while it lasts. What shall I say to my
father?--what will he say to me when he learns who was the companion of
my lonely mountain stroll, and the rider at my bridle-rein during all
the long, dangerous descent? I fear he will be angry and hurry me away
immediately; and yet, with his discrimination, I think he must discern
the vast superiority of Edgar Lindenwood to that low-bred, mean-souled
Malcome.

"But it is time this record should end, for twilight approaches, and the
shadows of the great mountains darken over the valley."

She closed her journal just as Ellen Williams, returned from her
excursion, burst into the room. She flung her arms around Florence, and
covered her with frantic kisses.

"O, I am so glad to have you safely back!" she exclaimed; "I feared I
should never behold you again. How did you live through a night like
last on that dreadful mountain-top?"

"We had a comfortable shelter," said Florence, returning her friend's
warm embraces.

"Did you wish you were down here in the valley, when the awful storm
overtook you?"

"No, indeed," answered Florence; "my courage rose above all
difficulties. O, Ellen! you know not what you lost, when, chilled by the
blasts that swept Mount Franklin, you grew discouraged and turned back."

"So Ned tells me," said Ellen; "but I saw sublimity enough from Mount
Willard to fill my little soul with rapture, though I had no
artist-companion at my side to point out the grandest views to my
untaught vision."

Here she fixed an arch glance on Florence, who blushed slightly as she
said:

"I do not understand your quizzical looks."

"Probably not," returned Ellen, in a pleasant, bantering tone; "and if I
should tell you Mr. Lindenwood, the young artist of whom I spoke to you
at Niagara, had made his appearance in these regions, no doubt you would
express appropriate surprise at the information. However, your father
has been impressed with his appearance, and sought an introduction. I
saw them in the parlor but a moment since, engaged in conversation."

"Is it possible?" said Florence, her eyes lighting with pleasure.

"Why, very possible," returned Ellen, "and they seemed mutually pleased
with each other. Come, let us make ready and go down. I promised Ned to
return in five minutes."

The young ladies descended to the parlor, where Florence beheld her
father standing before a table, with Edgar at his side, examining a
volume of engravings.

She approached softly, when Major Howard turned, and introduced his
companion as "Mr. Lindenwood, a former acquaintance of hers, who was
visiting the mountains for the purpose of sketching views, and obtaining
geological specimens."

Florence saw at once, by her father's words and manner, that he did not
suspect Edgar's identity with the muffled figure which had been her
companion on the mountains; and, bowing politely, expressed her
"pleasure at again meeting Mr. Lindenwood."

Ellen and her brother joined them, and the evening passed in pleasant
rehearsals of the wonders and adventures of their late expedition to the
"realms of upper air."

As Major Howard led his daughter to the door of her apartment, he
remarked: "That young Lindenwood is a fine fellow. I declare, I never
thought that wild hermit's boy would grow into a refined, polished
gentleman. You hardly recognized him, did you, Florence?"

"He is very much changed in his appearance," said she, briefly.

"Certainly he is," returned her father; "one seldom meets a handsomer
fellow. He tells me there is a great deal of fine scenery through a
place called the Franconia Notch. He is going there in a few days to
complete some sketches. I think we will join him: now we are here, we
may as well see all there is to be seen;--unless you wish to go home,"
he added, finding his daughter silent in regard to the proposed
excursion.

"I wish to go home?" exclaimed she, suddenly; "if you remain here till
that time comes, your head will be white as the snows of these northern
winters."

Laughing at her enthusiasm for mountains, he kissed her cheek and
retired.

CHAPTER XXXVI.

"Most wondrous vision! The broad earth hath not,
Through all her bounds, an object like to thee,
That travellers e'er recorded. Nor a spot
More fit to stir the poet's phantasy;
Grey Old Man of the Mountain, awfully
There, from thy wreath of clouds thou dost uprear
Those features grand,--the same eternally!
Lone dweller 'mid the hills! with gaze austere
Thou lookest down, methinks, on all below thee here."

At the Flume House, three weeks later, we find our little party of
travellers, all in apparently fine spirits and delighted enjoyment of
the wild, enchanting scenery of the Franconia Notch.

"Well, Lindenwood, what do you intend to show us next?" asked Major
Howard, as the group disposed themselves on the sofas of their own
private parlor for an evening of rest and quiet, after a day passed in
visits to different objects in the vicinity. "I declare these mountains
will exhaust me entirely, and I shall be obliged to go away without
beholding one half of their alleged wonders."

Young Williams laughed and said, "You are not half as good a traveller
as your daughter, major. Instead of looking worn and fatigued by her
repeated rambles, she seems more fresh and blooming than on our first
arrival."

"Yes," returned the father, looking affectionately on his daughter, "she
thrives wonderfully on mountains. I recollect, when we stood on the
freezing summit of Washington, she expressed a wish to burrow among its
rocks and pass a life-time there, listening to the winds o' nights, and
other like charming diversions."

"I did not think her disposition so solitary," remarked young Williams.

"O, she was not going to dwell alone! She wanted one companion to share
her habitation. I don't know who it was,--perhaps you were the doomed
one!"

"I dare not presume to think Miss Florence would select me for a doom so
blissful," returned he, gallantly. "Her choice would fall on some of my
more fortunate neighbors."

"Rather say _un_fortunate," said Florence, coloring; "for in that light
I think most people would regard the prospect of a life passed amid the
clouds and storms of Mount Washington."

"Would you thus regard it, Lindenwood?" inquired young Williams, turning
his gaze upon Edgar.

"I don't know," returned the latter. "It might prove an agreeable
summer-home; but I think I would want to fly away on the approach of
winter."

Major Howard drew forth his guide-book and occupied himself turning over
the pages a few moments.

"We have achieved the Flume, the Pool, and the Basin to-day," said he at
length. "Say, Lindenwood, where shall we go to-morrow? You are the
pioneer of the band."

"I have thought, should the day prove fine," answered he, "it would be
pleasant to make an excursion to the summit of Mount Lafayette, or the
'Great Haystack' mountain, as it is sometimes called, which lies several
miles west from this point."

"More mountains towering before us! When shall we have done with them?"
said the major, in a lugubrious tone. "How high is this Haystack you
speak of?"

"But seven hundred feet less than Mount Washington," answered Edgar.

"O dear!" groaned the major. "Heaven save me from attempting the
ascension! Can we do nothing better than tear our clothes and bruise our
shins among brushwood and bridle-paths; clambering up to the sky just to
stare about us a few moments, and then tumbling down headlong, as it
were, to the valleys again?"

"Well," said Edgar, "if the Great Haystack intimidates you, suppose we
ride up through the Notch, and visit the 'Old Man.'"

"What old man?" asked the major.

"The Old Man of the Mountain!"

"I should have no objection to calling on the old fellow," returned
Major Howard, "if he did not live on a mountain; but I cannot think of
climbing up any more of these prodigious steeps,--even to see a king in
his regal palace."

A burst of laughter followed the major's misapprehension of the object
which Lindenwood had proposed to visit.

"It is not a man of flesh and blood we are to see, father," said
Florence, as soon as she could command her voice sufficiently to speak,
"but a granite profile, standing out from a peak of solid rock, exactly
resembling the features of a man's face; whence its name, 'Old Man of
the Mountain.'"

"Ay, that's all, then!" said the major, referring to his guidebook. "I
shall be very glad of the privilege of standing on the ground for once
and looking up at an object; for I confess it afflicts my
kindly-affectioned nature to be forever looking down upon this goodly
earth, as if in disdainful contempt of its manifold beauties. So,
to-morrow, ladies and gentlemen," added he, rising, "we are to pay our
respects to this 'Old Man.' I hear music below. You young people would
like to join the merry groups, I suppose. I'm going down to the office
to enjoy a cigar, and then retire, for my old bones are sadly racked
with the jaunts of to-day. Good-night to you all." Thus saying, he
walked away.

"Would you like to join the dancers, Ellen?" asked Florence, turning to
the fair girl who sat in a rocking-chair by the window, gazing out on
the moon-lit earth.

"I don't care to join the dance," she returned; "but I would like to go
and listen to the music a while."

"Then let us go," said her brother; "that is, if agreeable to Miss
Florence and Mr. Lindenwood."

"I shall be happy to accompany you, Miss Howard," said he, offering
Florence his arm, which she accepted, and the party descended to the
parlors. They were well-lighted, and filled with guests. Edward and
Ellen soon became exhilarated by the music, and joined the cotillons.
Edgar looked in vain for a vacant sofa, and at length asked Florence if
she would not like to walk on the piazzas. She assented, and they went
forth. The evening was cool and delightful. A sweet young moon shed her
pale light o'er the scene, veiling the roughness of the surrounding
country, and heightening its romantic effect.

"I think you are growing less cheerful every day," said he, gazing
tenderly on her downcast features.

"Can you not divine the cause of my depression?" she asked, raising her
dark eyes to his face.

"No," said he, smiling on her. "Won't you tell me?"

"Father says we must return home soon," answered she, turning her face
away.

"Is that an unpleasant prospect to you?" asked he, seeking to obtain a
glance at her averted face.

"Yes," returned she; and he thought a shudder for a moment convulsed the
slender form at his side.

They were both silent several moments, and then he remarked, "I intend
to visit Wimbledon in a few months; may I not hope to see you should I
do so?"

"I presume my father will be happy to receive a visit from you,"
answered she, in a formal tone.

"But his daughter would rather be excused from my company, I am to
understand," said he.

"O, no! not that," returned Florence quickly, turning her face suddenly
toward him, when he saw it was bathed in tears and marked with painful
emotion.

"What distresses you, Florence?" asked he; gently taking her hand in
his. "Will you not tell me?"

"I dare not, Edgar!" answered she, with fast-falling tears. "I have
wronged you, and you will not forgive me."

"Then you do not love me!" said he, looking sadly on her countenance.

"O, yes! I love you," she returned, in a tone of pathetic tenderness,
"Heaven knows, too wildly well! If that could atone for my fault, I
should not fear to give it expression."

"It can!" said he, pressing her hand closely to his heart. "Believe me,
Florence, it can atone for everything."

Encouraged by his tone and manner she spoke. "I am engaged"--he dropped
the hand and started back--"to Rufus Malcome," she concluded, and then
darting quickly into the hall, flew up stairs and locked herself into
her own apartment. She paced the floor hurriedly several minutes, and
then seized her journal,--always her confidant in moments of affliction.

"I knew it would come to this at last," she wrote. "I have acknowledged
my error, and told him of my engagement with Rufus Malcome. It cost me a
struggle, but I knew he must learn it from some source e'er long, and
better from my lips than those of strangers. He will visit Wimbledon,
and then, O horrible thought! I shall be the bride of another; for
father tells me Col. Malcome is desirous the marriage should be
consummated the approaching winter. I got a long, foolish letter from
Rufus yesterday. O dear, how sick and sorry it made me! It is strange
mother never writes. Col. Malcome says she is not as well as when we
left, and this intelligence disposes father to hasten home. O, my poor
bleeding heart! How soon this little day of happiness has past." She
closed the book, and threw herself on the bed. After a while she fell
asleep, and was roused by Ellen, knocking for admittance.

In the morning she met Edgar in the parlor with her father and young
Williams, the three in earnest conversation about their proposed
excursion to the Profile Mountain. He made her a distant bow. She
returned to her room, and not the most urgent entreaties of her father
could induce her to join the party. She pleaded a violent headache, and
Ellen announced her resolve to remain with her. She cared nothing about
the 'Old Man;' she would stay at home and nurse Florence. So the three
gentlemen departed together, and in a few days the Howards had left the
mountain region and set out for Wimbledon.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

"Once more the sound
Of human voices echoes in our ears;
And some commotion dire hath roused
The female ranks. Let's pause and learn
The drift of all this wordy war of tongues."

Back to the Mumbles, the Wimbles and Pimbles, and their clamorous voices
again dinning in our ears. Will we ever be quit of them?

As cold weather approached, and the atmospheric thermometer descended to
the freezing point, the philanthropic one mounted suddenly to blood
heat.

Mrs. Pimble and Mrs. Lawson assumed their green legs and strode over
Wimbledon with pompous, majestic tread. The Woman's Rights Reform shook
off its sluggish torpor, and rose a mighty shape of masculine vigor,
strength and power. As in atonement for past sloth and inertness, the
reformists became more active in their several departments than ever
before. Lectures were delivered, clubs formed, and committees appointed
to visit the people from house to house, and stir them up by way of
remembrance, to engage in the great benevolent enterprises of the day.
At length an indignation meeting was announced to be held at the village
church in Wimbledon. The house was thronged at an early hour, and great
excitement pervaded the assembly, when the chairman and other officers
appeared and ascended the platform, which had been erected for their
convenience. It must be admitted that Dea. Allen, sitting in the glaring
light of the uncurtained windows, contemplated with rather wrathful
visage the ample green damask Bloomers, which adorned the lower limbs of
the several officiating ladies; but he quite forgot his anger when the
president sublimely arose, and, advancing to the front of the stand,
said in a loud, commanding tone:

"We will now proceed with the business of this convention. If there is
any person in the house that wishes to pray, she, or he, can do so. We
hold to liberty and equal rights for all."

She then stood in silence several moments, gazing over the assembly with
a self-possessed and confident air. But it appeared no person was moved
with a spirit of prayer. So the lady president, after a preparatory hem,
proceeded with the duties of her office. She, in a brief speech,
explained the reason for holding this meeting, and the object it had in
view.

"I have spoken in public before," said she; "often has my voice been
raised against tyranny and oppression in all its forms; but never until
to-day has it been my happy privilege to address so large an assembly of
the inhabitants of my native village on the holy subjects of freedom and
philanthropy. It inspires my soul with fresh courage to behold your
eager faces, for they seem to say your minds are awakening to the
demands of the down-trodden portions of your race. We hold this
convention to arouse an interest in the cause of reform, which shall
lead to strong and energetic action.

"It is too painfully true that Wimbledon is a sink of immorality, vice
and pollution, where moral turpitude stalks with giant strides, and
abominable barbarisms are practised under the glaring light of heaven.
(Sensation.) The object of this meeting is to crush the oppressor's
might, and raise his hapless victims to their proper position in
society. I call upon the women of this assembly to rise from the depths
of their degradation, rush boldly in the faces of their enslavers, and
assert their rights; and, having asserted, maintain them, even at the
point of the sword. (Sensation and murmurings.) A series of resolutions
will now be presented for the consideration of the convention."

She turned to Mrs. Lawson, who sat majestically in a large arm-chair,
her strong arms folded on her broad chest, and whispered a few words in
her ear. While she was thus engaged, Mr. Salsify Mumbles rose, and said
in a loud tone: "Gentlemen and ladies, I rise for the purpose"---- On
hearing the sound of his voice, the lady president rushed to the edge of
the platform, and glaring on the upright figure, which shook like an
aspen beneath her fiery eyes, exclaimed, in thundering accents, "What
are you standing there for, you booby-faced, blubber-chopped baboon in
boots?"

"I wish to speak," stammered the terrified man. He could utter no more.

"_You_ speak!" said the lofty president, in a tone of the most supreme
contempt,--"sit down."

The poor creature dropped as quick as though he had received a cannon
ball in his heart.

Mrs. Pimble retired, and Mrs. Secretary Lawson arose, adjusted her green
spectacles, and, taking a roll of papers from the table, advanced to the
front of the stand. Elevating her brows, she said:

"I will now read several resolutions which have been handed in since the
opening of the meeting.

"First, Resolved, That the enfranchised women of Wimbledon use their
combined efforts for the liberation of their suffering sisterhood, who
yet groan beneath the despotic cruelties of the oppressor man."

The secretary sat down. The president arose. "Are there any remarks to
be made on this resolution?" she said.

None were forthcoming.

"Then I move its adoption."

"I second the motion," squealed a little voice from some remote corner.

The secretary came forward. "All in favor of this resolution will please
say, ay."

A score of voices were heard.

"It is unanimously accepted," said she. "I will now proceed to the
reading of the second.

"Resolved, That, as a means of humbling and destroying the tyranny which
the monster man exercises over the larger portion of the women of
Wimbledon, six of the usurpers be converted into lamp-posts, and placed
at the corners of the principal streets, with tin lanterns fixed upon
their heads, to light the cause of philanthropy in its midnight
struggles." (Sensation, and several brawny hands scratching uneasily at
the apex of their craniums.)

The secretary sat down; the lady president arose. "This is a very
spirited as well as elegant resolve," said she, "and cannot fail of
securing universal approbation. Mrs. Secretary, you will please read the
remaining portion, and then all can be adopted by one joint action of
the house."

"There are but two brief ones to follow," said the secretary, again
coming forward.

"First, Resolved, That the tortuous channel of Wimbledon river be made
straight, and the tyrant man be compelled to perform the labor with
three-inch augers and pap-spoons.

"Secondly, Resolved, That, the steeple of this church, which looms so
boldly impious toward the sky, be felled to the ground, and be converted
into a liberty-pole, with the cast-off petticoats of the enfranchised
women of Wimbledon flaunting proudly from its summit, as an emblem of
the downfall of man's bigotry and despotism, and the triumphant
elevation of woman to her proper sphere among the rulers of the earth."

Great sensation as the lady secretary pronounced the foregoing resolves,
with strong impressiveness of tone and manner. As she retired, Dea.
Allen rose. The lady president sprang from her seat.

"Sit down!" shrieked she, bringing her foot to the platform with a
violence that caused it to tremble. But the deacon did not drop at this
sharp command, as Mr. Mumbles had done.

"I thought you held to liberty and equal rights," said he, with an air
of some boldness.

"I do,--and therefore I tell you to sit down."

"I will speak," said he, returning the defiant looks cast upon him by
both president and secretary; "for religion and right demand it. If you
dare profane with your sacrilegious hands the holy steeple of this house
of God, avenging justice will fall with crushing weight upon your guilty
heads."

Having delivered himself of this dread prediction, the deacon sat down.

In her loftiest style, Mrs. Pimble moved the adoption of the
resolutions, vouchsafing no word of comment on the impertinent
interruption. A brawling, discordant shout of "Ay--ay--ay," in every
possible variety of tones, from a swarm of boisterous boys and ranting
rowdies, was declared a unanimous approval, and in a storm of hisses and
hurrahs the indignation meeting triumphantly adjourned.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

"Fare thee well! and if forever,
Still forever, fare _thee well_,
Even though unforgiving, never
'Gainst thee shall my heart rebel.

Yet, O, yet thyself deceive not;
Love may sink by slow decay,
But by sudden wrench, believe not,
Hearts can thus be torn away.
Still thine own its life retaineth,
Still must mine, though bleeding, beat,
And the undying thought which paineth,
Is, that we no more may meet."

Sudden death had entered the home of Louise Edson and made her a widow.
Her husband died of cholera, in a distant city, whence he had gone for
the purchase of goods, and was brought home a corpse. Louise reeled to
earth beneath the sudden and unexpected blow. Her soul was lacerated by
constant memory of the wrong she had done him, and it seemed to her
aroused and trembling conscience that avenging Heaven had taken to
itself the man she had so deeply injured, and left her to grope darkly
on in her own wickedness and sin. True she had been cruelly disappointed,
and through long years compelled to struggle on in all the bitter
loneliness of feelings unreplied to, bound by indissoluble chains to one
who had no tastes or sympathies in common with her. Death had freed her
now, but, ah! too late. The taint of sin was on her soul. She had forgot
her vows at the altar, debased herself and wronged her husband by
listening to words of passion from another. O, far less bitter would
have been her grief, as she stood weeping over his lifeless form, could
she have laid her hand on the cold, damp brow and said, "I have loved
thee ever, and through life's cares and perplexities stood closely at
thy side to cheer and smooth thy pathway." But this she could not say.
She only felt that the soul had gone to God, to learn her falsity and
sin, and looked from the skies upon her with grief and avenging anger.
Bitterly she thought of the man who had led her from the path of
rectitude, and resolved to see him no more. As a self-inflicted penance,
she immured herself within the walls of her own mansion, and determined
to pass the remainder of her life in solitude. Many of her numerous
friends sought admittance to express sympathy and condolence in her
affliction, but she refused to see them and resisted all their
overtures. Only one person gained entrance to her seclusion. That was
Mrs. Stanhope, whose kind heart was deeply pained by the apparently
incurable sorrow that had settled on the mind of her young friend, and
strove, by every effort in her power, to lighten her woes and lead her
to more hopeful views of the future.

"It grieves me," said she, "to see you, in the bloom of youth and
health, immure yourself in a living tomb, and refuse the consolations
you would receive from intercourse with your species."

"I want no more of the world," answered the sufferer; "it has no
pleasure or enjoyment for me."

"But, my dear, you should not allow your feelings to overpower your
better judgment," remonstrated Mrs. Stanhope.

"Ah, my feelings!" said Louise, bitterly, with tears rolling over her
pale cheeks; "they have been my destruction. Had I always controlled
them, I had not been the miserable creature I am to-day."

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