Then followed all the usual kissings and congratulations, and then
came the breakfast. I hope Alice and Sam were happy, as happy as young
folks can be in such a state of flutter and excitement; but all I know
is, that the rest of the party were thoroughly and utterly miserable.
The certainty that this was the break-up of our happy old society, that
all that was young, and merry, and graceful, among us, was about to
take wing and leave us old folks sitting there lonely and dull. The
thought, that neither Baroona nor Garoopna could ever be again what
they had once been, and that never again we should hear those merry
voices, wakening us in the morning, or ringing pleasant by the river on
the soft summer's evening; these thoughts, I say, made us but a dull
party, although Covetown and the Doctor made talking enough for the
rest of us.
There was something I could not understand about the Doctor. He talked
loud and nervously all breakfast time, and afterwards, when Alice had
retired to change her dress, and we were all standing about talking,
he came up to me in a quiet corner where I was, and took me by the
hand.
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