Page:Tales of the Wild and the Wonderful (1825).djvu/171

 agonies even in the soft arms of rewarding love. Ten o’clock struck: the decisive moment was come. Without taking leave, William started from his bride, and left the house to range the forest. “Whither go you, William?” said her mother, following him, alarmed. “I have shot a deer, which I had forgotten,” answered the youth. She still entreated, and Catherine looked terrified, for she felt that there was something (though she knew not what) to fear, from his distracted manner. But their supplications were unheeded. William sprung from them both, and hastened into the forest.

The moon was on the wane, and gleamed a dark red light above the horizon. Grey clouds flew rapidly past, and sometimes darkened the surrounding country, which was soon relighted up by the wild and glittering moonlight. The birch and aspen trees nodded like spectres in the shade; and to William the silver poplar was a white shadowy figure, which solemnly waved, and beckoned him to return. He started, and felt as if the two extraordinary interpositions to his plan, and the repeated falls of the picture, were the last admonitions of his departing angel, who thus warned him against the commission of an unblessed deed. Once more he wavered in his in-