Page:Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey (1st edition), Volume 3 (Agnes Grey).djvu/202

194 the sweet song of the happy lark: then my spirit of misanthropy began to melt away beneath the soft, pure air, and genial sunshine; but sad thoughts of early childhood, and yearnings for departed joys, or for a brighter future lot, arose instead.

As my eyes wandered over the steep banks covered with young grass and green-leaved plants, and surmounted by budding hedges, I longed intensely for some familiar flower that might recall the woody dales or green hillsides of home—the brown moorlands, of course, were out of the question. Such a discovery would make my eyes gush out with water, no doubt; but that was one of my greatest enjoyments now.

At length, I descried, high up between the twisted roots of an oak, three lovely primroses, peeping so sweetly from their hiding place that the tears already started at the sight, but they grew so high above me, that I tried in vain to gather one or two to dream over and to carry with me; I could not reach them, unless I climbed the bank, which I was deterred from doing by hearing a footstep, at that moment behind me, and was therefore, about to turn away, when I was startled by the