“Oh, Julia!”

“Nay, Arthur, I like it as it is.  It was in your nature to have known me, and to have courted me in the old way; but it would have been poor and tame, and made up of a few faded flowers and scraps of verses; and think what I have had—­a daring hero between me and a wild beast—­a brave, devoted and passionate lover, who, in spite of scorn and rejection, hunted for me through night and tempest, to rescue me from death, who takes me up in his strong arms, carries me over a flood, and nourishes me back to life, and goes proudly away, asking nothing but the great boon of serving me.  Oh!  I had a thousand times rather have this!  It is now a beautiful romance.  But I am to have my ring, and”—­

“Be my sweet and blessed sovereign lady; to be served and worshipped, and to hear music and poetry; whose word and wish is to be law in all the realm of love.”

“From which you are not to depart for two full months of thirty-one days each.”

Then she conducted him to the apartment in which we beheld her the night before.

“This,” pushing open the door, into the room, warm and sweet with the odor of flowers, “is your own special room, to be yours, always.”

“Always?” a little plaintively.

“Always—­until—­until—­I—­we give you another.”

“Good night, Arthur.”

“Good night, Julia.”

She tripped down the hall, and turned her bright face to catch a kiss, and throw it back.

With a sweet unrest in her full heart, the young maiden on her couch, set herself to count up the gathered treasures of the wonderful day.

How was it?  Did her riding skirt really get under her feet?  Would he have caught her in his arms if she had not fallen?  She thought he would.

And so she mused; and at last in slumber dreamed sweet maiden’s dreams of love and heaven.

And Bart found himself in a marvellous forest, wandering with Julia, wondrous in her fresh and tender beauty, on through endless glades, amid the gush of bird-songs, and the fragrance of flowers.

And there in the dream land whence I called them, I leave them.  Why should I awake them again?  For them can another day so bright and happy ever dawn?  I who love them, could have kept them for a bright brief space longer.  I could have heard the sparkling voice of Bart, and the answering laugh of Julia—­and then I should listen and not hear—­look anxiously around and not see!

I part in real sorrow with these bright children of my fancy, sweet awakeners of old time memories, placed amid far off scenes, to win from others, tenderness and love if they may.  And may they be remembered as forever lingering in perennial youth and love, in the land of dreams.