The
gentler spirit of the maiden's sex was uppermost, and the sad story of
his crime, which at their last meeting had been told her, lay with heavy
influence at her heart. She was a gentle creature, and though dwelling
in a wilderness, such is the prevailing influence upon female character,
of the kind of education acquirable in the southern,--or, we may add,
and thus perhaps furnish the reason for any peculiarity in this respect,
the slave-holding states--that she partook in a large degree of that
excessive delicacy, as well of spirit as of person, which, while a
marked characteristic of that entire region, is apt to become of itself
a disease, exhibiting itself too frequently in a nervousness and
timidity that unfit its owner for the ruder necessities of life, and
permit it to abide only under its more serene and summer aspects. The
tale of blood, and its awful consequences, were perpetually recurring to
her imagination. Her fancy described and dwelt upon its details, her
thoughts wove it into a thousand startling tissues, until, though
believing his crime unpremeditated, she almost shrank from the embrace
of her lover, because of the blood so recently upon his hands.
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