Markland, with Fanny by her side, was sitting
near a window sad and silent.
Just one year has passed since their introduction to the reader. But
what a change one year has wrought! The heart's bright sunshine
rested then on every object. Woodbine Lodge was then a paradise.
Now, there is scarcely a ray of this warm sunshine. Yet there had
been no bereavement--no affliction; nothing that we refer to a
mysterious Providence. No,--but the tempter was admitted. He came
with specious words and deceiving pretences. He vailed the present
good, and magnified the worth of things possessing no power to
satisfy the heart. Too surely has he suceeded in the accomplishment
of his evil work.
At the time of the reader's introduction to Woodbine Lodge, a bright
day was going down in beauty; and there was not a pulse in nature
that did not beat in unison with the hearts of its happy denizens. A
summer day was again drawing to its close, but sobbing itself away
in tears. And they were in tears also, whose spirits, but a single
year gone by, reflected only the light and beauty of nature.
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