Rocking in a quaint old attic chair, with the dear familiar things of home gathered all about her, Memory’s voice is sweet, like a harp tuned in the minor mode when the south wind sweeps the strings.
Bunches of herbs swing from the rafters and fill the room with the wholesome scent of an old-fashioned garden, where rue and heartsease grew. With the fragrance comes the breath from that garden of Mnemosyne, where the simples for heartache nod beside the River of Forgetfulness.
In a flash the world is forgotten, and into the attic come dear faces from that distant land of childhood, where a strange enchantment glorified the commonplace, and made the dreams of night seem real. Footsteps that have long been silent are heard upon the attic floor, and voices, hushed for years, whisper from the shadows from the other end of the room.
A moonbeam creeps into the attic and transfigures the haunted chamber with a sheen of silver mist. From the spinning-wheel come a soft hum and a delicate whir; then a long-lost voice breathes the first notes of an old, old song. The melody changes to a minuet, and the lady in the portrait moves, smiling, from the tarnished gilt frame that surrounds her—then a childish voice says: “Mother, are you asleep?”
Down the street the postman passes, bearing his burden of joy and pain: letters from far-off islands, where the Stars and Stripes gleam against a forest of palms; from the snow-bound fastnesses of the North, where men are searching for gold; from rose-scented valleys and violet fields, where the sun forever shines, and from lands across the sea, where men speak an alien tongue—single messages from one to another; letters that plead for pardon cross the paths of those that are meant to stab; letters written in jest too often find grim earnest at the end of their journey, and letters written in all tenderness meet misunderstandings and pain, when the postman brings them home; letters that deal with affairs of state and shape the destiny of a nation; tidings of happiness and sorrow, birth and death, love and trust, and the thousand pangs of trust betrayed; an hundred joys and as many griefs are all in the postman’s hands.
No wonder, then, that there is a stir in the house, that eyes brighten, hearts beat quickly, and eager steps hasten to the door of destiny, when the postman rings the bell!