“I thank you inexpressibly. Sometimes when sad memories oppress me, how I shall long to have you charm them away by that magical spell that bears my thoughts from this 467 world to the next. There are some songs which you must learn for my sake.”
Ah! at that moment, as she stood there robed in a soft stainless white muslin, with a cluster of double pomegranate flowers glowing in her silky hair, the girl was very lovely, very attractive, so full of youthful grace, so winning in her beautiful enthusiasm,—yet Ulpian Grey’s heart did not wander for an instant from one who slept dreamlessly under the sculptured urn on the marble altar of the mausoleum.
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“Why are the dead not dead? Who can undo What time hath done? Who can win back the wind? Beckon lost music from a broken lute? Renew the redness of a last year’s rose? Or dig the sunken sunset from the deep?” |
“Dr. Grey, if my voice can chase away one vexing thought, one wearying care or melancholy memory, I shall feel that I have additional reason to thank God for the precious gift.”
“I have not seen you look so happy for three years. Indeed, my little sister, you have much for which to be grateful, and in the midst of your blessings try to recollect those grand words of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, ‘The soul is a God in exile.’ My child, look to it that your expatriation ends with the shores of time, for—
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‘Yea, this is life; make this forenoon sublime, This afternoon a psalm, this night a prayer, And time is conquered, and thy crown is won.’” |
For some seconds Salome did not speak, for the shadow on his countenance fell upon her heart, and looking reverently up at him, she thought of Richter’s mournful dictum,—“Great souls attract sorrows, as mountains tempests.”
“Dr. Grey, want of patience is the cause of half my difficulties and defeats, and plunges me continually into the slough of distrust and rebellious questioning. I find it so hard 468 to stand still, and let God do his will, and work in his own way.”
“My dear Salome, patience is only practical faith, and the want of it causes two-thirds of the world’s woes. I often find it necessary to humble my own pride, and tame my restless spirit by recurring to the last words of Schiller, ‘Calmer and calmer! many difficult things are growing plain and clear to me. Let us be patient.’ Child, sing me one song more, and then come out and show me where you propose to place those grape-arbors we spoke of yesterday. This is the last opportunity I shall have to direct your workmen.”
An hour later Salome fastened a sprig of Grand Duke jasmine in the button-hole of his coat,—shook hands with him for the day, and though she smiled in recognition of his final bow as he drove down the avenue, her thoughts were busy with the dreaded separation that awaited her on the morrow and, while her lips were mute, the cry of her heart was,—