A Love Story, by a Bushman | Page 5

the reader's approval:--
THE RETURN.
When the blue-eyed morn doth peep Over the soft hill's verdant steep, Lighting up its shadows deep, I'll think of thee, love, _then!_
When the lightsome lark doth sing Her grateful song to Nature's King, Making all the woodlands ring, I'll think of thee, love, _then!_
Or when plaintive Philomel Shall mourn her mate in some lone dell, And to the night her sorrows tell, I'll think of thee, love, _then!_
When the first green leaf of spring Shall promise of the summer bring, And all around its fragrance fling, I'll think of thee, love, _then!_
Or when the last red leaf shall fall, And winter spread its icy pall, To mind me of the death of all, I'll think of thee, love, _then!_
When the lively morning ray Is dancing on the river's spray, And sunshine gilds the joyous day, I'll think of thee, love, then!
And when the shades of eve steal on, Lengthening as life's sun goes down, Like sweetest constancy alone, I'll think of thee, love, then!
When I see a sweet smile play On coral lips, like Phoebus' ray, Making all look warm and gay, I'll think of thee, love, then!
When steals the tear of pity, too, O'er a cheek, whose crimson hue Looks like rose-leaf dipp'd in dew, I'll think of thee, love, then!
When mirth's pageant joys unbind The gloomy spells that chain my mind, And make me dream of all that's kind, I'll think of thee, love, then!
And when pensive sadness clouds me, When the host of memory crowds me, When the shadowy past enshrouds me, I'll think of thee, love, then!
When seems the bliss of former years,-- Too sweet, too pure, to feel again,-- And long lost hours, scenes, friends, return, I'll think of thee, love, then!

Chapter III.
The Dinner.

"Hues which have words, and speak to ye of heaven."
"Away! there need no words or terms precise, The paltry jargon of the marble mart, Where pedantry gulls folly: we have eyes."
We are told by the members of the silver-fork school, that no tale of fiction can be complete unless it embody the description of a dinner. Let us, therefore, shutting from our view that white-limbed gum-tree, and dismissing from our table tea and damper, [Footnote: Damper. Bushman's fare--unleavened bread] call on memory's fading powers, and feast once more with the rich, the munificent, the intellectual Belliston Gr?me.
Dinner! immortal faculty of eating! to what glorious sense or pre-eminent passion dost thou not contribute? Is not love half fed by thy attractions? Beams ever the eye of lover more bright than when, after gazing with enraptured glance at the coveted haunch, whose fat--a pure white; whose lean--a rich brown--invitingly await the assault. When doth lover's eye sparkle more, than when, at such a moment, it lights on the features of the loved fair one? Is not the supper quadrille the most dangerous and the dearest of all?
Cherished venison! delicate white soup! spare young susceptible bosoms! Again we ask, is not dinner the very aliment of friendship? the hinge on which it turns? Does a man's heart expand to you ere you have returned his dinner? It would be folly to assert it. Cabinet dinners--corporation dinners--election dinners--and vestry dinners--and rail-road dinners--we pass by these things, and triumphantly ask--does not the Ship par excellence--the Ship of Greenwich--annually assemble under its revered roof the luminaries of the nation? Oh, whitebait! called so early to your last account! a tear is all we give, but it flows spontaneously at the memory of your sorrows!
As Mr. Belliston Gr?me was much talked of in his day, it may not be amiss to say a few words regarding him. He was an only child, and at an early age lost his parents. The expense of his education was defrayed by a wealthy uncle, the second partner in a celebrated banking house. His tutor, with whom he may be said to have lived from boyhood--for his uncle had little communication with him, except to write to him one letter half-yearly, when he paid his school bill--was a shy retiring clergyman--a man of very extensive acquirements, and a first rate classical scholar. After a short time, the curate and young Gr?me became attached to each other. The tutor was a bachelor, and Gr?me was his only pupil. The latter was soon inoculated with the classical mania of his preceptor; and, as he grew up, it was quite a treat to hear the pair discourse of Greeks and Romans. A stranger who had then heard them would have imagined that Themistocles and Scipio Africanus were stars of the present generation. When Gr?me was nineteen, his uncle invited him to town for a month--a most unusual proceeding. During this period he studied closely his nephew's character. At the end of this term, Mr. Hargrave and his young charge were on their