waltzing in novels, the ecstasy of it, the wild impassioned delight.
Consult GUY LIVINGSTONE and OUIDA. Well, it was not at all like that.

I do not exactly remember what occurred. We started, there was a buzz.
I think there was a collision. I became extremely dizzy.... When
I recovered my senses, it was _not_ to find the dark grey eyes of
CECILIA bending over me with an expression of anxiety. No, she was not
there. I went to bed: I know there was a great contusion on my elbow.

Next morning, it was winter, everyone was going to skate. Now I could
not skate. At school, when there was a skating holiday, I always
passed it beside the fire, which I had all to myself, roasting apples,
and reading _Ivanhoe_. These were among my happiest hours. However,
I did not tell CECILIA that I could not skate. I pretended (it seemed
safe) to be desperately fond of hunting, and to despise skating.
Besides I had work, literary work, I told CECILIA, an article on Miss
AUSTEN. This pleased her, but nobody accepted the article. In fact, I
was bent on secretly learning to skate. I sent to town for a pair of
"Acmes," for I knew I never could manage all the straps and buckles
of the ordinary modern skate. I knew of a pond where nobody came, and
thither, under cover of night, I smuggled a bed-room chair. They say
that pushing a chair in front of you is a good way to learn. My terror
was extreme; it would be awkward to be caught, at a friend's house,
stealing a bed-room chair. That I ventured this risk shows how fond of
CECILIA I was. I reached the pond safely, and hid the chair in a dry
ditch. Next day, when presumed to be engaged on literary labours, I
sneaked back, sat down on my chair, and tried to put on the skates.
It always seemed so easy when one saw an expert do it, like Mercury
donning his winged shoon, and sailing over the ice. But my hands grew
blue as I struggled with the key and the nuts, till I became certain