46 THE LIFE OF PHILIP HENRY GOSSE. 



"first season had yielded to winter, I loved Jane with 

 "a deep and passionate love, — all the deeper because I 

 " kept the secret close locked in my own bosom. 



'' ' He never told his love ; 

 But let concealment, like a worm i' the bud, 

 Feed on his damask cheek.' 



" The chaps in the office used to rally me about Mary, 

 " who was indeed much the prettier and more vivacious 

 "of the two, and I never undeceived them; but Jane 

 "was my flame. One night I awoke from a dream, in 

 " which she had appeared endowed with a beauty quite 

 " unearthly, and as it were angelic ; so utterly unde- 

 "scribable, and indeed inconceivable, that on waking 

 " I could only recall the general impression, every effort 

 "to reproduce the details of her beauty being vain. 

 " They were not so much gone from memory, as from 

 "the possibility of imagining. There was in truth no 

 "great resemblance in the radiant vision to Jane's 

 "homely face and person ; and yet I intuitively knew it 

 " to be her. 



" My unconquerable bashfulness precluded my ever 

 "hinting my love to Jane. A year or two afterwards, 

 " I was at a ' ball ' at Newell's, the only one which I ever 

 "attended, and the Elson girls were there. It was cus- 

 "tomary for the fellows each to escort a lady home: 

 " I asked Jane to allow me the honour. She took my 

 "arm; and there, under the moon, we walked for full 

 "half a mile, and not a word — literally, not a single 

 " word — broke the awful silence ! I felt the awkward- 

 " ness most painfully ; but the more I sought something 

 "to say, the more my tongue seemed tied to the roof of 

 " my mouth. 



" This boyish passion gradually wore out : I think all 

 "traces of it had ceased long before I visited England 



