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Chapter 2d.
I'ls est dangereux de tout dire
aux enfants, il est plus dangereuse
encore de leur laisser tout ignorer [?]
Marmontel

A heavy price must all pay, who thus err
In some shape: Let none hope to fly the danger
For sooner or late, Love is his own avenger
Byron

The young man whom I had seen at the Cottage, was
not, as I then imagined the brother of Lucy, Lo, he was
her betrothed husband, & William, for that was his name
had lost both his parents in his early childhood, they were
poor day labourers who at their death left nothing for the
support of their only child; Nature had been kinder to him
than fortune; the boy possessed a sprightly intelligence
countenance, & such "winning ways," as Mrs Donald said, that he
quite gained the hearts of this good couple & they
adopted him as their son, thinking it a pity that such
a fine little fellow should go to the poor house. As he grew
up, William by his fidelity & industry amply repaid the
kindness of Donald. Lucy was his constant companion, &
playmate, & often too, his assistant in the lighter labours
of the farm. She could drop corn--bind sheaves, & gather
apples, or turn the hay. In all seasons & all places
making hay in the warm summer day, or shelling corn in
the chimney corner, whether the summer's sun were shining or
the storms of winter howled around
them, all occupations were alike to Lucy & William, if they did but
share each others labours. Their days of childhood [were?]
passed--but the old folks still thought of them as children
& were so fond of William, that they forgot he was not indeed
their son & allowed him & their daughter to live together
in the familiarity & fondness of Brother & sister. William took care
however to remind Lucy that though he called her sister, she was
something still dearer, ( would one day, he hoped, be still nearer.
A hope, which he ventured one day to express to the old
man & which he was not forbidden to indulge, though, as
Donald told him, they were yet too young--mere children, but at
the end of five or six years if he would be a good lad, he should
have Lucy, & a snug little cabbin & farm to boot, if by his
labour he should assit in earning the sum
necessary for such a purchase: