How merrily the ocean murmured in her ear; how radiant an aspect the commonest passer-by seemed to wear! She gained her home,--she looked upon the tree, glancing, with fantastic branches, in the sun.

"Yes, brother mine!" she said, laughing in her joy, "like thee, I HAVE struggled to the light!" She had never hitherto, like the more instructed Daughters of the North, accustomed herself to that delicious Confessional, the transfusion of thought to writing.

Now, suddenly, her heart felt an impulse; a new-born instinct, that bade it commune with itself, bade it disentangle its web of golden fancies,--made her wish to look upon her inmost self as in a glass.

Upsprung from the embrace of Love and Soul--the Eros and the Psyche--their beautiful offspring, Genius! She blushed, she sighed, she trembled as she wrote.

And from the fresh world that she had built for herself, she was awakened to prepare for the glittering stage.