The next day was devoted to an examination of our premises and the
neighborhood. The result of this examination was such as to render
us better satisfied with the change that we had made. We were
still young enough to be sensible to the loveliness of novelty.
Everything wore that purple light which the eye of youth confers
upon the object. And then there was repose. That harassing strife
of the "blind heart" was at rest. I had no more suspicions; and
my wife looked and spoke as if she had never had either doubts of
me, or fears of herself, within her bosom. I was happiness itself,
when, by the unreserved ease and gayety of her deportment she
persuaded me that she suffered no regrets. I little fancied how
much the change in my wife's manner had arisen from the involuntary
change which had been going on in mine. I now looked the love which
I felt; and she felt, in the improvement of my looks, the renewal
of that fond passion which I had never ceased to feel, but which
I had only too much ceased to show while suffering from the "blind
heart."
She resumed her old amusements with new industry. Our
little parlor received constant accessions of new pictures. All our
leisure was employed in exploring the scenery of the neighborhood;
and not a bit of forest, or patch of hill, or streak of rivulet or
stream, to whiah the genius of art could lend loveliness, but she
picked up, in these happy rambles, and worked into fitting places
upon our cottage walls.
Our good old hostess became attached to us. She virtually surrendered
the management of the household to my wife. She was old and quite
infirm; and was frequently confined for days to her chamber; which
must have been a solitary place enough before our coming. My wife
became a companion to her in these periods of painful seclusion,
and thus provided her with a luxury which had been long denied
her. Under these circumstances we had very much our own way. The
old lady had few associates, and these were generally very worthy
people. They soon became our associates also, and under the
influence of better feelings than had governed me for a long time
past, I now found myself in a condition of comfoft, cheerfulness,
and peace, which I fancied I had forfeited for ever.
Two weeks after our arrival, Kingsley took his departure for Texas,
on a visit. He proposed to be absent two months. His object, as
he had described it before, in some pleasant exaggerations, was
to select some favorable spots for purchase, which should combine
as nearly as possible the three prime requisites of salubrity,
fertility, and beauty. His object was to speculate; "and this was
to be done," he said, "at an early hour of the day." "The Spanish
proverb," he was wont to say, "which regulates the eating of oranges,
is not a bad rule to govern a man in making his speculations.
Speculations (oranges) are gold at morning, silver at noon, and
lead at night. It is your wise man," he added, "who buys and sells
early; your merely sensible man who does so at midday; while your
dunce, waiting for an increased appetite at evening, swallows
nothing but lead."