Our parents as good as betrothed us from our earliest infancy. When I was twelve and she was eight, our friends used to remark that we made a charming couple, and our mothers were lost in admiration of us. We would gladly have been married at once we were so fond of one another. We were first cousins, and were often brought together at holiday time. At that period Cordélia had already given me her heart, the budding heart of a little maid of eight. I was a tall, sturdy boy for my age with a fair, almost reddish-brown complexion, passionately devoted to every form of sport, but idle in the school-room. Life in the open air was the one thing that attracted me. Cordélia, who possessed an incli…
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