secured her affections? Thus reasoned Alonzo, but the reasoning tended not to allay the tempest which was gathering in his bosom. He ordered his horse, and was in a short time at the seat of Melissa’s father. 12 It was summer, and towards evening when he arrived. Melissa was sitting by the window when he entered the hall. She arose and received him with a smile. “I have just been thinking of an evening’s walk, said she, but had no one to attend me, and you have come just in time to perform that office. I will order tea immediately, while you rest from the fatigues of your journey.” 13 When tea was served up, a servant entered the room with a letter which he had found in the yard. Melissa received it.—“’Tis a letter, said she, which I sent by Beauman, to a lady in New-London, and the careless man has lost it.” Turning to Alonzo, “I forgot to tell you that your friend Beauman has been with us a few days; he left us this morning.” “My friend!” replied Alonzo, hastily. “Is he not your friend?” enquired Melissa. “I beg pardon, madam,” answered he, “my mind was absent.” “He requested us to present his respects to his friend Alonzo,” said she. Alonzo bowed and turned the conversation. They walked out and took a winding path which led along pleasant fields by a gliding stream, through a little grove and up a sloping eminence, which commanded an extensive prospect of the surrounding country; Long Island, and the sound between that and the main land, and the opening thereof to the distant ocean. A soft and silent shower had descended; a thousand transitory gems trembled upon the foliage glittering the western ray.—A bright rainbow sat upon a southern cloud; the light gales whispered among the branches, agitated the young harvest to billowy motion, or waved the tops of the distant 14 deep green forest with majestic grandeur. Flocks, herds, and cottages were scattered over the variegated landscape. 14 Hills piled on hills, receding, faded from the pursuing eye, mingling with the blue mist which hovered around the extreme verge of the horizon. “This is a most beautiful scene,” said Melissa. “It is indeed, replied Alonzo; can New-London boast so charming a prospect?”
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