Page 431 - The model orator, or, Young folks' speaker : containing the choicest recitations and readings from the best authors for schools, public entertainments, social gatherings, Sunday schools, etc. : including recitals in prose and verse ...

My eyes grew strangely dim !
It pained my heart to hear him sigh;
I could have wept for him.

He spoke of sunny Italy;
Of Venice and her isles;
Of dark-mustachioed cavaliers
And fair signoras' smiles;
Of music melting- on the ear ;
Of moonlight upon bowers;
And fair hands wreathing silken curls,
With gay and fragrant flowers.

He said his father’s castle
Frowned upon a distant alio re,
(A castle, Tucy, think of that—■
He is a Count, or more!)
That solitude was in its walls.
Drear, prison-like arid lone ;
Ungladdened by the smi'e of love,
Or woman's kindly tone.

We parted at my father’s door,
The moonlight sweetly shone;
And I was standing at his side,
My arm upon his own,
He pressed my hand at parting ;
And to-night he will be here,
While pa is at his game of chess,
And ma is nowhere near.

Excuse me, dearest Lueyf
15yt, indeed, I cannot write.
To-morrow I will tell you more;
He will be here to-night.
[An interval of twenty-Lour hours L ks elapsed.]