My children, you must remember that I am speaking of an old-fashioned time, and I travelled down to Hillsbro' by coach.

The promenade of a fashionable watering-place had hitherto been my idea of the country.
Imagine, then, how my hungry eyes devoured the new beauties presented to them.

I had provided myself with a book, and I had hoped to fall asleep over it, yet here I was with my eyes riveted to a pane of glass, afraid to wink lest I should miss something.

Grace's warning, "You will fret yourself to death, you will be back before a month," grew faint in my ears.

When night shut out my new world and I fell asleep, I dreamed of extraordinary phenomena--trees stalking about the plains, fairies leaping out of the foam of the rivers.
I opened my eyes to a rose-coloured dawn.