I know of nothing so laughable as feigned passion. It must put people to a world of trouble, to play extatics, to weep tears, to kiss passionately, to embrace, while the heart is ice, and the temper clouded; to be playing lover, while one is thinking how long it is before dinner.
I had worked myself up into quite a passion. I thought my whole soul was absorbed in this affair. I wished to be married forthwith. I could not think of delay; and in these moods used to press my suit with a mad earnestness, and ask her acknowledged love, with all my heart, and with a temporary sincerity.
One night, we were walking late on the banks of a river, in a beautiful meadow. The town was far above us. Every sound of labor was hushed, and we were alone, in the stillness of a moonlight night, with no witnesses except the stars, and the long shadows of our figures, as we alternately walked and sat by the way. The scene was a bewitching one; the river was calm, and reflected the heavens; the night was balmy with new-mown hay. We were alive with health, and youth, and love. I had been singing low, plaintive airs to her, expressive of ill-requited affection, as we walked along. She said but little. Her face looked pale and thoughtful, as ever and anon she turned her large eyes full upon me, as if to search my very inmost soul. She was deliberating upon my proposal. I was unsuspecting, but free and open to tell her all. Suddenly she threw her arms about my neck, and seemed fainting, by the weight that pressed upon me. I seated her upon the bank of the river, and still she wept, and spoke not a word, while her tears flowed, and her frame trembled. I cried out for help, but she stopped me; and as no one came, I waited till she recovered herself. That night we sat long by the bank of the river, and she gave me her heart, and the compact was sealed by the first kiss I had ever given to pure lips. She then confessed to me all her doubts, and in a dignified manner, which confused while it charmed me, told me the risks she incurred in yielding to her feelings. I had nothing to boast of in the conquest, for while it displayed to me the weakness and tenderness of woman, it told me how weak and inferior I was, in all the essentials of a useful man. It certainly was the most singular confession and compact that ever took place between man and woman, since the time Adam took Eve to wife, in the garden of Paradise.