not know the modern customs or mode of love-making, so thought it better to wait and not run any risk of endangering my prospects of years and years of pleasure by imprudent haste. Haste, that might destroy an intensity of sublime happiness that mortal rarely enjoys; haste, that might sever a chord of love that could not be re-united; haste, that might for ever and ever render two lives bound up in each other miserable.
So we continued to enjoy each other's company undisturbed, unopposed, and apparently unheeded. Meda's sympathies were my sympathies, Meda's joys were my joys. I was going to say that Meda's sorrows were my sorrows; but, now that I think of it, Meda had never known what sorrow was. Could we but have divined what was in store for us? Could we but have known in time the great calamity that was hanging, ay, thickening over us, then would we have shunned one another, as we would have shunned that king of darkness that destroys all peace and all happiness
