Fleeting as were the dreams of old, Remembered like a tale that’s told, They pass away!” 

How did I know, too, but, that, ere I saw my darling again, months might elapse, during which time all thoughts of me might be banished from her heart?

One proverb tells us that “absence makes the heart grow fonder;” another, equally entitled to belief, warns anxious lovers that “out of sight” is to be “out of mind.”

Which of the two could I credit?

Besides, even if she were constant and true to me, Mrs Clyde would certainly never give her consent to our engagement, I was confident—no, not if we both lived and loved until doomsday!

All these bitter thoughts flashed through my mind in a moment, one after the other.

I was angry, indignant, wretched.

Chapter Three.

“Nil Desperandum.”

CONTENTS

 To-morrow’s sun shall warmer glow, And o’er this gloomy vale of woe Diffuse a brighter ray! 

“O you lovers, you lovers!”—exclaimed little Miss Pimpernell, on my unbosoming myself to her, and recounting the incidents of my unhappy interview with Min’s mother, shortly after I quitted the scene of my discomfiture.—“O you lovers, you lovers! You are always, either on the heights of ecstasy, or deep down in the depths of despair! Be a man, Frank, and let her see what noble stuff there is in you! There is nothing in this world worth the having, which can be obtained by merely looking at it and longing for it. Bear in mind Monsieur Parole’s favourite proverb, ‘On ne peut pas faire une omelette sans casser les oeufs!’ You mustn’t expect that a girl is going to drop into your mouth, like a ripe cherry, the moment you gape for her! Young ladies are not so easily won as that, Master Frank, let me tell you! Put your shoulder to the wheel, my boy! You will have to work and wait. Remember how long it was that Jacob remained in suspense about his first love, Rachel—seven, long years; and, then, he had to serve seven more for her after that!”

“Ah, Miss Pimpernell!”—said I,—“but, seven years were not so much to the long-lived men who existed in 

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