Page:The genius - Carl Grosse tr Joseph Trapp 1796.djvu/290

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love. Thus was I tormented with my own sensations, at a period when it only depended on me to have put myself in possession of all the happiness I coveted.

In the evening we generally used to walk in the garden. Once we sat down on a seat made of green fed, where Adela became more and more serious, and even melancholy at last. My own heart was so heavy, that I could not for all the world, have uttered a syllable. We both wept, and knew not why. Adela then laying hold of my hand, exclaimed in a tender tone, "Dear Carlos, your sister's temper makes her very wretched. Well for her if the soon leaves this world; but will you forget her then?"

I answered this question, so abundantly fraught with delicate sentiment, in a vague and inadequate manner. The canker of sadness began to consume the best faculties of my being, and Adela, who perceived it, likewise fretted, and injured her health.

One day, being uncommonly low spirited, I took my fowling-piece and went to hide myself in the thickest part of the adjacent