“I thought you were looking at that gentleman,” pointing to a low cot. “Yes, as I said, he has been dying these two days; and a hard time we’ve had of it with his endless screeching and screaming for somebody to pray for him! But hard praying it would take, in my opinion, to do much good for the likes o’ him! Why, madam, you should have heard his raving—it would have made your hair stand on end!”
Ellen approached the bed. Before her lay, though pale and motionless as in the cold embrace of death, a being of God-like impress. His jetty locks flung from his upturned face, fell in loose masses on his pillow, displaying a brow which bore the stamp of high and lofty intellect: while drooping lashes of the same dark hue, pressing so heavily on his marble cheek, contrasted strangely with the deathly pallor of his chiseled features, on which were marked deep furrows—not such as wrought by either time or care, but mighty convulsions of the soul!
It was a dreary night in the month of November—the dark spirit-wind which had all day murmured in sullen grandeur the funeral dirge of the departing year among the leafless branches of the mighty forest, as the sun sunk in the cloudy west, and the gray mists of evening closed in around the cheerless earth, swept forth in strains louder and more terrific, until the naked branches of the towering oaks danced in wild glee, as it rushed past them howling along through the caverns of the giant mountains, and playing its rude gambols round their hoary heads, exulting in barbarian triumph over the gentler spirits of earth.
But though he had frightened the spirits of song from the woods, and chained the melody of the little brooks, banishing from the laughing fields the spirits of the flowers, and leaving them all barren and desolate—yet some of these sweet fugitives had sought a refuge in the habitations of man—for, in a neat little cottage, sheltered in the valley beneath, one might be seen peeping from the petaled cup of a snowy japonica. And as it looked forth from its pearly bed, when the storm had passed by, sweet delicious tones of a thousand lutes and harps, as touched by the spirits of the sunbeams and showers, burst upon the ear, filling the room with an atmosphere of strange delicious melody. Forth, on aerial pinions, floated the little flower-spirit, and lit upon the mossy sepals of a bursting rose-bud—beneath upon a downy couch lay a sleeping babe—above and around hovered a choir of cherub angels, some playing with its golden locks, and others whispering sweet words of peace and love, parting its rosy lips with a bright, sweet smile.
On wings of dreamy light was a shadowy form of beauty inconceivable! Its long, fair hair floated on the rosy air, while encircling its radiant brow was a chaplet of beautiful flowers, sparkling with dew drops fresh from heaven’s own bowers. This bright and glorious being, sent from the presence of the great “I Am!” to guard the footsteps of this precious child, just purified from every stain of earth in the regenerating waters of the sacred font—the image of its God restored; the object of a Saviour’s fondest love; a spectacle for angels and for men.
As the little flower-spirit gazed entranced upon this glorious scene, a tear drop seemed to sparkle in the angel’s eye. In mute surprise it left its mossy couch and lit upon a drooping floweret grasped within the sleeper’s tiny hand, and as it gazed to where the angel’s eyes seemed bent, there lay exposed to view that infant’s fluttering heart, pure and white as fresh fallen snow-flakes; and there, too, glistened the angel’s tear. And then was borne on zephyr’s wings, a sweet and sorrowful supplication to the Majesty enthroned on high, “Oh, Father! give to me the power to banish from this little heart those dark and dreary shadows that are hovering near: that I may bring it thee when life shall cease, all pure and beautiful as now it is, a trophy worthy the redeeming love of thy dear Son.”
And a voice, like the murmuring of many waters as they rush through the caverns of the deep, replied:
“My laws are fixed, immutable—man was made for glory, pure and holy—the breath which animates his clay is breath of Deity—it gave the power of a God, the power to choose between the good and ill. Those dark forms you so dread, are the effects of laws transgressed; for it is written in my sacred word—‘the father’s sins are visited upon the child.’ ”
“But, oh!” still pleaded the angel-voice, “this babe is sinless, stainless, pure as those sweet flowers that wave upon the banks of Paradise.”