The Works of George W. M. Reynolds — page 65: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

48 THE COURT OF LONDON of one who has just revealed the love that inspires his heart. Oh, the world has no happiness to compare with this. The most delicious music is dull and vapid in comparison with the melody of the lover’s voicé when softly syllabling the name oi the adored one. Deep, deep into the soul it sinks, not with a force that Jars upon the tender chords of the heart, but gentle and tender, as the balmy breeze laden with the perfume of roses steals upon the strings of an A®olian harp, awakening all the delicious pathos of its murmuring melody. “ You thank me for placing this hand in yours,” said Florence, after a long pause and with a look of innocent fondness flung hastily upon her lover, ‘‘ but have I not also to thank you for thus selecting me from the many ladies of your acquaintance — ”’ ‘No, no,’ interrupted Valentine, with much concentrated enthusiasm in his tone, “ ’tis I who owe all the debt of grati- tude unto you, for, without flattery and without compli- ment, ’tis an angel that thus promises herself to a humble mortal.” In the strain which is usual with lovers in the first hour of their affection’s avowal did Valentine and Florence con- tinue to discourse for some time, and at length the young man found himself touching upon a subject which stole in, as it were, painfully and darkly amidst his present dream of bliss, but on which he nevertheless deemed it requisite to deliver a few comments. “ You are aware, my dear Florence,” he said, “ that not a year has elapsed since the extraordinary and still unac- countable disappearance of my father. You behold me in mourning, because I believe him to be dead. Indeed, what circumstance save his death could possibly prove the solution of the present mystery? In the vigour of his manhood, endowed with all the choicest gifts of fortune, surrounded by affectionate friends, and having everything to render life agreeable, it is not for a moment to be believed that he eould have voluntarily expatriated himself. The same reasons argue with equal strength against the supposition that he could have accomplished his self-destruction. What, then, must I suppose? Hither that he met his death by accident, or that he was foully dealt with. But if it were indeed an accident, some trace would have survived, some ECORMICLIOO KS (E(0)