With the utmost gentleness she laid the heart down and bent towards another.
"This is the heart of a mother who lost all her blessed treasures; see how cruelly wounded it is; but it is the strongest of all, because the strength of a mother's heart is unequalled by any other—and God has a special place awaiting it when the great Day comes."
From heart to heart the snow-maiden moved, with bent head and gentle hands.
The circle of glow-worms round her brow flickered and sparkled like a magic flower.
"This heart," said the snow-maiden, raising a very dark object in her hand, "is black, because it is that of a great sinner; and sometimes the glow that guards it becomes quite small and dim, almost goes out; because the heart suffers greatly of its own wickedness; it was saved because it broke.
"I found it very far off, in a place amongst rocks; and when I tried to raise it, it began to roll away from me, always farther, so that I had to run, to run after it with an anxious feeling that I would not be able to save it. It left traces of blood wherever it passed, so at last I discovered it in a dark hole beside a skull that grimaced at me with a hollow grin: when finally I held it in my warm hand I knew that it was at rest, and I carried it home very slowly.
"Whilst I retraced my steps along the weary way I had come, I sang to it, soft simple songs that children love. As I sang I felt the warm blood trickle through my fingers, and upon the snow I saw that all the drops of blood had run together into the form of a small red cross, which marked upon the whiteness a sign of forgiveness.
"I looked at my hand and noticed that the drops of blood had turned into tears which left no more stain where they fell, but had washed from my fingers all traces of soil. This heart also needs me, but in another way; I always sing to it those simple songs, for it must forget all else except the days when it was at its mother's knee." Stretching her hands across the circle of light the tall vision in the dazzling robe seemed to bless the many waiting throbbing hearts.
"I call this place my garden of expectation! And one day a great joy will arise from it; ... songs of praise sung by myriads of heavenly voices; ... and this light is but feeble compared to the light which will shine that day."
Eric was still on his knees; he looked up at that glorious form beside him, and as entranced he watched, her long white hair turned into a soft misty veil that flowed down upon the ice like the mantle of a saint, and the circle of glow-worms had become a halo round the face, that was the face of one of God's own angels.