First Love.

("Vous tes singulier.")     [MARION DELORME, Act I., June, 1829, played 1831.]     MARION (smiling.) You're strange, and yet I love you thus.     DIDIER.    You love me?     Beware, nor with light lips utter that word.     You love me! - know you what it is to love     With love that is the life-blood in one's veins,     The vital air we breathe, a love long-smothered,     Smouldering in silence, kindling, burning, blazing,     And purifying in its growth the soul.     A love that from the heart eats every passion     But its sole self; love without hope or limit,     Deep love that will outlast all happiness;     Speak, speak; is such the love you bear me?     MARION.     Truly.     DIDIER. Ha! but you do not know how I love you!     The day that first I saw you, the dark world     Grew shining, for your eyes lighted my gloom.     Since then, all things have changed; to me you are     Some brightest, unknown creature from the skies.     This irksome life, 'gainst which my heart rebelled,     Seems almost fair and pleasant; for, alas!     Till I knew you wandering, alone, oppressed,     I wept and struggled, I had never loved.     FANNY KEMBLE-BUTLER.