Entering the house, empty now of all but those who were left of its
usual inmates, including his sister's friend, the beautiful
Helene--whom he had hardly had an opportunity to more than greet on
his return from England--an overpowering sense of desolation fell upon
him. Seating himself near his mother's favourite window, the young
man's loneliness and bereavement found vent in tears. All the past
came vividly before him--a mother's life-long devotion and tender
care; her thousand winning ways and loving endearments; her pride in
his future career and prospects; and the recollection of the many
innocent confidences which a mother loves to pour into the ear of a
handsome, grown-up son, whose filial affection and chivalrous devotion
assure her that she still possesses charms to which her husband and
his contemporaries of a previous generation had been wont sedulously
to pay tribute. "Ah, beautiful mother, it is not to-day nor to-morrow
that I shall fully realize that I am to see thee no more on earth,"
said the young man musingly, as he left his seat and strode nervously
up and down the room, while his favourite hound from a rug by the
large open fire-place eyed his agitated movements.
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