The Crayon Papers by Washington Irving Read Free Book Online

tripped away, with a tear in her eye, a dimple in her cheek, and a light heart in her bosom. I thought it the prettiest picture of paternal and filial affection I had ever seen.
    When I retired to bed, a new train of thoughts crowded into my brain. “After all,” said I to myself, “it is clear this girl has a soul, though she was not moved by my eloquence. She has all the outward signs and evidences of poetic feeling. She paints well, and has an eye for nature. She is a fine musician, and enters into the very soul of song. What a pity that she knows nothing of poetry! But we will see what is to be done? I am irretrievably in love with her; what then am I to do? Come down to the level of her mind, or endeavor to raise her to some kind of intellectual equality with myself? That is the most generous course. She will look up to me as a benefactor. I shall become associated in her mind with the lofty thoughts and harmonious graces of poetry. She is apparently docile: besides the difference of our ages will give me an ascendency over her. She cannot be above sixteen years of age, and I am full turned to twenty.” So, having built this most delectable of air castles, I fell asleep.
    * * * * *
    The next morning I was quite a different being. I no longer felt fearful of stealing a glance at Julia; on the contrary, I contemplated her steadily, with the benignant eye of a benefactor. Shortly after breakfast I found myself alone with her, as I had on the preceding morning; but I felt nothing of the awkwardness of our previous tete-a-tete. I was elevated by the consciousness of my intellectual superiority and should almost have felt a sentiment of pity for the ignorance of the lovely little being, if I had not felt also the assurance that I should be able to dispel it. “But it is time,” thought I, “to open school.”
    Julia was occupied in arranging some music on her piano. I looked over two or three songs; they were Moore’s Irish melodies.
    “These are pretty things!” said I, flirting the leaves over lightly, and giving a slight shrug, by way of qualifying the opinion.
    “Oh, I love them of all things,” said Julia, “they’re so touching!”
    “Then you like them for the poetry,” said I, with an encouraging smile.
    “Oh, yes; she thought them charmingly written.”
    Now was my time. “Poetry,” said I, assuming a didactic attitude and air, “poetry is one of the most pleasing studies that can occupy a youthful mind. It renders us susceptible of the gentle impulses of humanity, and cherishes a delicate perception of all that is virtuous and elevated in morals, and graceful and beautiful in physics. It—”
    I was going on in a style that would have graced a professor of rhetoric, when I saw a light smile playing about Miss Somerville’s mouth, and that she began to turn over the leaves of a music-book. I recollected her inattention to my discourse of the preceding morning. “There is no fixing her light mind,” thought I, “by abstract theory; we will proceed practically.” As it happened, the identical volume of Milton’s Paradise Lost was lying at hand.
    “Let me recommend to you, my young friend,” said I, in one of those tones of persuasive admonition, which I had so often loved in Glencoe, “let me recommend to you this admirable poem; you will find in it sources of intellectual enjoyment far superior to those songs which have delighted you.” Julia looked at the book, and then at me, with a whimsically dubious air. “Milton’s Paradise Lost?” said she; “oh, I know the greater part of that by heart.”
    I had not expected to find my pupil so far advanced; however, the Paradise Lost is a kind of school book, and its finest passages are given to young ladies as tasks.
    “I find,” said I to myself, “I must not treat her as so complete a novice; her inattention yesterday could not have proceeded from absolute ignorance, but merely from a want of poetic feeling. I’ll try her again.”
    I