A voice came out of the rocks, as if wafted over miles of space, and, mingling with the song of the pines, chanted with it, "The treasure-house of the Lord is in the stones of the earth; from my bosom flow the rivers of life-giving waters"; and gently the sound of tinkling rivulets was added to the deep song of praise. It seemed as if all creation, bent upon doing the task respectively allotted to each of its parts, had met in conclave round that obscure Western river, before the tribunal of a sleeping mortal. As the shadows grew darker, the howl of wild beasts was heard, inexplicably free from the impression of terror, and strangely fitting in with the hymn of inanimate nature. At twilight, a concert of sweet scents rose from the earth, and vaporous clouds bore up the prayer of the fruitful soil, a gentle sound, as of crystal bells, accompanying the sacrifice.
"Let your prayer arise before me as an evening offering," came faintly from somewhere, and the cry of myriads of insects rose to greet the echo. Nothing seemed discordant. Robert, as it were, heard the world-pulse beat, and yet was neither appalled nor astonished; it was the same voice, whose whispers he knew, which was speaking to him now, only it spoke aloud. A moaning sound, muffled and sad, but grave as the voice of a teacher, now rose above the others, and the sleeper knew that it was that of the ocean:
"The floods have lifted up their waves with the voices of many waters. Wonderful are the surges of the sea; wonderful is the Lord on high."
Robert thought how true and how grand was this remorseless servant of the Almighty will. It does its work though fleets brave its decrees, and science peers into its secrets like a child feebly grasping a two-edged sword. It obeys God, and its work, not its voice, is its hymn of praise. But there is another mighty angel at work in the heavens, and the trumpet-tones of his voice ring in the thunder behind those fast-coming clouds. Tawny gold and ashen gray, like the shroud of a fallen world, those clouds sweep up on the horizon; blades of light rend them for a moment, and a livid radiance darts into every crevice of the forest; the song of the pines is hushed, and the hymn of the storm peals out:
"Holy and terrible is thy name.... Fire shall go forth before thee; ... thy lightnings shine upon the world; ... for thou art fearfully magnified!"
A cathedral of ice seems to grow suddenly out of the pine forest; the trees are turned to crystal pinnacles, a world of untrodden snow lies all around, and within the silence of the grave. Rose-colored lights play on the fairy turrets, and turn the ice-pillars to amber and topaz. More sublime than any dream of mediæval enchantment, Robert gazes spellbound on this crowning marvel, and, though no articulate words strike his ear, he is conscious of a life permeating this realm of silence; of a link with all other creatures of God, which, if it spoke, would utter the words that well spontaneously from his own heart:
"Thy knowledge is become too wonderful for me.... Whither shall I go from thy spirit, and whither shall I flee from thy face?"
But he is no idle gazer, treating the world as a show; he is a disciple—the Dante of Nature, led by her to the song-halls of her everlasting concert, taught by her that all things have a voice to glorify God and a mission to execute for him. He may not stay in the heart of the pole, for other lessons are all around him, and the time to learn them is so short—never more than a hundred years, seldom even the third of that time!
The silent world melts from sight, and the earth seems to recede; the blue vault of heaven is nearer; a rushing sound, so awful that his humanity shudders at it, yet so beautiful that it deadens the remembrance of the gentle sounds of the pine-trees, the crystal flower-bells, the wind, and even the rolling of the sea, wraps his being into itself, and holds him in its mighty spell. Worlds of light flash by him; of their size he knows naught, of their qualities less; but their radiance seems to him the face of God, "which no man can look upon and live," while their voice is as that of a thousand cataracts, each ringing forth a separate and harmonious note. "The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament proclaimeth the works of his hands." Did these words come out of the sound, or were they in his own heart, and did the sound draw them into itself, as the great ocean would draw back to its bosom some lonely fragment of its realm, stranded for a moment by the last wave that kissed the shore? Robert could not tell. He scarcely breathed. He would fain have kept this vision for ever; he trembled at the idea of leaving a world after which his own would look like a hive of bees, and whose sounds were so potent that all the sounds of earth, massed together in one, would barely seem a whisper in comparison. But his pilgrimage was not a reward, not even a trial; it was only an apprenticeship. Hardly a transition, save the coming of dawn and a consciousness of some void, and again Robert gazed upon familiar scenes of earth. The sun's forerunner was flushing the sky, and a wall of living water stood before him. He watched intently; no sound came to his ears. Yet he could see the coronal of rainbow-tinted foam rising at the feet of the cataract, and felt as if this must be the very passage through which God's people of old had come dry-shod in the bed of the sea. As he stood below, breathlessly waiting, the crown of the waterfall quivered with a new light, and the sun a crimson disk, rose slowly into sight. It seemed as though a bleeding Host were lifted up to heaven in a chalice of living jewels. A murmur began to rise from the clouds of spray; it grew louder and stronger, and Robert knew that the voice of the cataract had reached his ears at last. It was but a faint echo of that ineffable hymn of the spheres which rang yet in his memory, but it was none the less the sublimest sound he had heard on earth. Vaguely came to his understanding a fragment of its meaning:
"Glory to the Power whose breath has built us into a wall, and whose breath could hurl us like a flood over the corn-fields of man."