It was wonderful, the vast variety of forms into which she threw
her intellect, with no continuity, indeed, but darting up and
dancing, always in a state of preternatural activity--soon
sinking down, as if exhausted by so rapid and feverish a tide of
life--and succeeded by other shapes of a similar wild energy. It
was like nothing so much as the phantasmagoric play of the
northern lights. In the mere exercise of the fancy, however, and
the sportiveness of a growing mind, there might be a little more
than was observable in other children of bright faculties;
except as Pearl, in the dearth of human playmates, was thrown
more upon the visionary throng which she created. The
singularity lay in the hostile feelings with which the child
regarded all these offsprings of her own heart and mind. She
never created a friend, but seemed always to be sowing broadcast
the dragon's teeth, whence sprung a harvest of armed enemies,
against whom she rushed to battle. It was inexpressibly
sad--then what depth of sorrow to a mother, who felt in her own
heart the cause--to observe, in one so young, this constant
recognition of an adverse world, and so fierce a training of the
energies that were to make good her cause in the contest that
must ensue.
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