They began to be solicitous for a compensation
for what they had already imparted; and, recollecting the loneliness
of the place, and the vagabond character of his companions, he was
glad to give them a gratuity, and to hasten homewards.
He sat down to his studies, but his brain was too full of what he had
seen and heard; his eye was upon the page, but his fancy still
returned to the tower; and he was continually picturing the little
window, with the beautiful head peeping out; or the door half open,
and the nymph-like form within. He retired to bed, but the same object
haunted his dreams. He was young and susceptible; and the excited
state of his feelings, from wandering among the abodes of departed
grace and gallantry, had predisposed him for a sudden impression from
female beauty.
The next morning, he strolled again in the direction of the tower. It
was still more forlorn, by the broad glare of day, than in the gloom
of evening. The walls were crumbling, and weeds and moss were growing
in every crevice. It had the look of a prison, rather than a
dwelling-house. In one angle, however, he remarked a window which
seemed an exception to the surrounding squalidness. There was a
curtain drawn within it, and flowers standing on the window-stone.
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