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168 it deplores. It is the adverse circumstance that gives the triumph. Were I a man, I should delight in difficulties—I should desire toil, exertion, and obstacles. Let the world be before me, and I would make my way in it. I cannot understand sinking under any shape that adversity could take: I should enjoy the struggle, in my strong belief of the success."

"I cannot force myself into hoping," answered Guido, in the same low and melancholy tone. "Even in my happiest moments, while the grass was crowded with flowers beneath me—the sweet monotony of the running water in mine ear, only broken by the cheerful chant of the grasshopper—the boughs of the chestnut, filled with sunshine, dazzling my eyes, till the golden air seemed thronged with lovely shapes,—even then came pale and mournful shadows, whose white faces looked upon me pityingly. Even then, darkness, but a speck at first, would spread and spread till it overhung the atmosphere; and I would lie doubting, and mournful, and encompassed by night."

"And what was this, my beloved brother, but a vain yielding to unbridled imagination, which, like a spring confined to one spot, collects its pure clear waters, and in at once a beauty and a blessing; but which, allowed to spread abroad in