When we went to bed that night, a shower was prowling about the horizon, and over on Spruce Mountain the wolves were howling back defiance to the thunders.
What a lovely, savage week it was that followed! Somewhere in it was dissolved a Sunday; but we were scarcely aware of it, there was so little to mark the day.
In that week we learned one fact that was new to us, and that was the profound melancholy that reigns in the woods. Looking back, we could recollect that the impression had always, though unconsciously, been the same. Is it that in the forest Pan alone is the chosen god? and that there is still mourned that day when
"The parting genius was with sighing rent."
Or is the sadness because He who once came down to walk among the trees, and call through the dews, comes no more?
Whatever may be the reason, melancholy is enthroned in the forest.
IV.
A DIAMOND-WASHING.
On one of those days, Blanch and I, after a severe dispute on the subject with Sally, did a washing. Sally said we shouldn't; but wash we would, and wash we did.
We rose at early white dawn, kilted up our wrappers, shouldered our clothes-bag, took soap, matches, and kindlings, and started. A path led us past the new frame-house and a grove beyond it to the wash-room. This was a noble apartment about forty rods long by thirty wide, and was walled in by cedar and pine columns with the branches and foliage left on, a great improvement on Solomon's building. The cornice was delicately traced against a pale-blue ceiling frescoed with silver, the most beautiful ceiling I have ever seen. The carpet was a green velvet pile, thickly diapered with small gold-colored and white flowers in an irregular pattern, and beaded all over with crystals. Near the door by which we entered was one of the most charming imitations of rustic scenery to be found at home or abroad. A huge granite boulder, broken and hollowed roughly, had a thread of sparkling water bubbling up through a rift in it, and overflowing its basin in a rivulet. Near this stood two forked poles with a large copper kettle suspended from a cross-pole. Underneath the kettle were the ashes of more than one fire. Countless birds flew about, singing as well as if they had been sent to Paris. On the whole, it was a picture which would have drawn a crowd at any exhibition.
Wood was there, covered from the dew with green boughs. We placed our kindlings, lighted them with a match scraped inside Blanch's slipper, and soon a blue column of smoke was rising straight into the morning air, and the flames were growing. Then we filled the great kettle with water from the fountain of Arethusa, and, as soon as it was warm, began to wash. For one hour there was nothing but silence and scrubbing; then a loud war-whoop through Sally's hands announced that breakfast was ready. By that time our clothes were all washed and bubbling in the boiler. Looking about then, we saw that every cedar pillar had a golden capital; cloth of gold was spread here and there in long stretches, and the frescoes had changed their shape, and, instead of silver, were rosy and golden.