The Doctor's Daughter

n a pair of spectacles, astride the wrinkled noses of maturity, that makes the world of sentiment seem a mere n

lden sunbeam across the unborn years: a sunbeam in which our heaviest sorrows become dancing motes, a sunbeam which spans the full interval allotted us between this world and the next. But it is only rational to fear that some of those hug

on of both parties, to the glittering tell-tale diamond on the finger of a dainty hand. I had learned many lessons both from passive observation and active experience, and now as the season of feasting and flirting and mer

of that, when sullied, muddy streams are rushing and bubbling on with a roaring speed, plunging into hollow drains at every street-corner; when sulky foot-passengers pick their uncomfortable way through all the debris of what had been the beauty of the dead season. Fashionable young men, with the extremities of their expensive tweeds turned carefully up, choose their steps over the treacherous crossways, leaning upon their silk umbrellas with an unfeigned expression of utter disapproval, and ladies in trim ulsters and very short skirts pilot themselves along the unclean thoroughfares, with very emphatic airs of impatience and disgust. This is certainly not the season, in those Canadian cities whose winters are so severe, when "the young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love." If there is a time in the year when this worthy sentiment is ignored, and I may say deliberately ostracised, by Canadian youth, it is in the spring. But like all earthly circumstances, this, too, dies a natural death, and is succeeded by a truly enjoyable and suggestive period, that of early summer. It has been my experience to meet with many people who become the victims of a depressing melancholy in the spri

ove to be. This last is the most trying speculation of all. How big a boy's feet invariably look in a fashionable sister's eyes! how long his arms, and how shapeless his hands! Poor blushing youth, is not the ordeal worst for himself, at that period when he scarcely dares trust the most modest of monosyllabic discourses to be articulated by those lips that are warning a waiting public of the dawn of whiskerdom! Freddy, once so lithe and graceful and pretty, had been transformed into an ungainly being, all length, without breadth or thickness. He had not even the advantage of the average immatured youth, he had neither muscle nor physical bulk. He was still a delicate boy with a nervous cough and a fretted look. He was more than ever peevish and self-willed, with this only difference. In his earl

received a letter from Hortense de Beaumont's mother, informing me of the serious illness of my little friend, and entreating me, i

to my vague conjectures. That day was come at length but the tidings were not what I had prepared myself to hear. I persuaded myself that her mother's excessive love had exaggerated the unfortunate condition of my little friend's health, but, nevertheless determined

me. But I may say with truth that I travelled alone, for with the exception of a few crude observations now and then, the silence of discretion was unbroken between us. The lady was old, bulky, and the victim of a prolonged bilious attack all the way. The son was a

behind. Immediately in front of me propped up by innumerable coats and bundles, my lady patron dozed heavily. The thick green veil that screened her bilious expression from the general view quivered and heaved as each deep-drawn breath escaped her powerful nostrils. In her fat lap lay her folded hands with their half-gloves of thick black lace, the pitiful victims of countless flies. The exertion of eating a sandwich had sent her to sleep. The remnants of this popular refreshment were now being actively appreciated by a hungry, buzzing multitude that made their very b

Auburn could have been. My drowsy chaperone was awakened too suddenly, and was therefore very cross and ill-humored for some time after. It was with difficulty we persuaded her to follow us along the track, at the end of which loomed up a dismal wooden building whither we directed our vagrant steps, not knowing what better to do. Here we deposited our sundry parcels and awaited some crisis, we hardly knew what. We were informed that our boat would not reach there before evening, and to escape

nd discreetly kept at a distance. His bashfulness and timid reserve recommended him to my genuine admiration as mu

Canada, but which exposed much prettiness to the ruthless action of the sun and wind on this hot midsummer afternoon. They were using their lips and tongues in a violent manner, accompanying commonplace remarks with the most exaggerated varieties of facial expressions I ever saw. But they were only harbingers of what one meets on landing. These strangely attired damsels in elaborate head-gear and high-heeled shoes strutted about the streets of Ogdensburg in any number. They give life to the pretty town I must admit, and excite the interest of the uninitiated to

d I cannot but wonder why. I was alone, for the most part, with my thoughts, which were far from being cheerful compa

sat a little apart from my friends, leaning over the railing, looking abstractedly into the dark restless water. I was disturbed once by my considerate cav

quired solicitously about the old lady's comfort and spirits, and then considering my duty accomplis

g situation, and considering himself summarily dismissed, he edged

I did not give too much time and attention to the possibly dangerous subject. After all, there was something in him so different from other men, even from Arthur Campbell.

life, and he had always been the same. I had sat upon his knee with my tiny arms twined about his neck, he had told me thrilling tales, had played with me, and had kissed me-not often-but on two or

, self-conscious and reserved to a certain extent; a young lady with her own pronounced tastes and settled opinions, whose

e same. I thought he would always be a dear friend, on whom I could lean and rely, but here my thought was checked. Would I have been satisfied

came whispering itself into my heart at this crisis. I roused myself from my reverie

ted my eyes and ears. I could see nothing defined in the wild panorama about me, only that the darkness was broken here and there, by a darker something, from which tall pine-tops reared themselves majestically, less shrouded than the rest. It was a

sence of man, and all that silent waste of prairie land and towering mountain, which stretches away in an unbroken monotony towards our northern limits, is to me a lifeless, useless mass, and will be so until it has submitted every inch of its wild, untrodden surface to the honest industry of toiling humanity. When these giant mountain-tops look down in friendly

is not good for man to be alone." All the richest and rarest charms of Nature or of Art have never had more than a relative value for me, but give me one short moment of sympathetic human companionship, and with its borrowed light I see beauty above and around me everywhere. Yet how hard it is for us to find this influence that gifts the hours of time with golden opinions, and bears them away as if to the measure of some hallowed strains. There were h

te, what would we do with ourselves if these moments of quiet reverie and placid realizations were taken away from us altogether? One thing is certain. Many a noble generous deed, the outgrowth of one pensive hour, would never have been pe

e reality, as one sees and hears them from the deck of a steamer nearing the shore. There were the lusty shouts of boatmen on the wharf, rising above the ringing of discordant bells, and the rumble of railway trains. There was clanging and clashing of metal on every side, hauling of ropes, pitching and heaving of merchandise, with now a shrill scream from the

distant tower, as we picked our steps along the narrow gangway, and depo