Persuaded by him he had submitted to seek the refreshment of sleep. But
sleep shed not her poppies upon his busy, anxious head. His mind was
crouded with a thousand fearful phantoms. A child of the valley, he was
a stranger to misfortune and misery. Upon the favoured sons of nature
calamity makes her deepest impression, and an impression least capable
of being erased. And yet Edwin was full of courage and adventure; he
asked no larger boon than to be permitted to face his rival. But his
inquietude was the offspring of love; and his wariness and caution
originated in the docility of his mind, and his anxious attachment to
innocence and spotless rectitude.
Having passed the watches of the night in uneasy and inexhaustible
reflections, he sprung from his couch as soon as the first dawn of day
proclaimed the approaching sun, and took a hasty leave of the hospitable
hermit. Issuing from the grotto, he bent his steps, in obedience to the
direction of Madoc, to that secret path, which had never before been
discovered by any mortal unassisted by the goblins of the abyss. Before
he reached it the golden sun had begun to decline from his meridian
height. He passed along the winding way beneath the impending
precipices, which formed a dark and sullen vault over his head.
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