Tell us, child, of thy wanderings
in the forest, and of the sufferings that one so tender must have
undergone among a barbarous people. There is pleasure in listening to all
thou hast seen and felt, now that we know there is an end to unhappiness."
She spoke to an ear that was deaf to language like this. Narra-mattah
evidently understood her words, while their meaning was wrapped in an
obscurity that she neither wished to nor was capable of comprehending.
Keeping a gaze, in which pleasure and wonder were powerfully blended, on
that soft look of affection which beamed from her mother's eye, she felt
hurriedly among the folds of her dress, and drawing a belt that was gaily
ornamented after the most ingenious fashion of her adopted people, she
approached her half-pleased, half-distressed parent, and, with hands that
trembled equally with timidity and pleasure, she arranged it around her
person in a manner to show its richness to the best advantage. Pleased
with her performance, the artless being eagerly sought approbation in eyes
that bespoke little else than regret.
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