The winter was coming on, as Cousin Bessie had said every leaf was blown from its bough, and the Autumn sky was grayer and cloudier than ever.
It was a lonely season, especially for one with such a heart full of memories as mine, the wind spoke to me in the most plaintive of whispers, now with the voice of one absent friend, now with that of another. I had no definite grief at this period under the safe protecting roof of my good, kind relatives, only that there was an emptiness about my comfort, which made it incomplete and not quite as satisfactory as it should have been.
Something was stirring in my breast as if with fluttering wings against these fetters of the flesh! Something was always asking, always wishing, always urging me, to do I knew not what 'Taedium vitae.' It is the merciless enemy of mortal man! the robber of our peace, the skeleton in the closet, the dreg in our pleasure-cup, the ruthless spoiler of our fancy-woven webs! It is the separate sorrow of men and women, and is the summing up of the stones of all human lives.
Some have grown weary of idleness, pleasure and wealth, and some are more weary of cold and starvation, and toil, the student is weary of study, and the artist is weary of art, the vicious grow weary of vice, and great men grow weary of fame; old men grow tired on their journey, and children get tired at their play, it is one of those "touches of nature" that makes our world become "kin." For a sigh is a whisper of sorrow, no matter what breast may have heaved it, and pain is a pall, thick and heavy, laid over hopes that are dead.
Some of us have strange lives! secrets, known only to ourselves, that change the face of all nature before our eyes, we are sent adrift on every passing current, to explore the truths of experience for ourselves, and sad lessons some of them are, which we read through our gathering tears, and learn with a beating heart!
As the autumn months drifted on towards a bleak November, I became more and more absorbed, looking wistfully out of the windows, or sitting dreamily before the fire. I often thought of that better land, whither my angel-mother had flown years ago, my father had gone there now, too. Would it not be well if I were with them? Only one more little mound of earth, rising beside theirs, one solitary little mortal falling back from the weary pilgrimage, and lying down to rest by the roadside, one heavy heart less among that throbbing multitude, one faint toiler more, borne from the crowded vineyard.
With my elbows resting on my knees and my face buried in my palms, I sat and thought of all such weird possibilities, as I looked vacantly into the fire. There are times when the world, with its exuberance of pleasure and wealth, is powerless to tempt or cheer us, when its most splendid pageantry is vapid and shallow to our tired gaze, when its laughter and song are a noisy discord, that deafens and distracts us! when its pledges and promises are instruments of selfish purposes and hidden cunning, and its policy, the exponent of a rabid and far-reaching materialism. These are moments, when our passions are at high tide, with our conscience riding on the topmost surface-waves, they are propitious intervals, if we choose to make the best of them, or they may only be fitful breaks in the glad monotony of our sensual, easy-going lives—breaks, that our evil tendencies most often survive, seeing them rise, and surge, and ebb, in fearless defiance, and then quietly resuming their old sway, when the moral struggle has subsided!
One afternoon, I made an effort to rouse myself from this growing lethargy, which had begun to undermine the whole tenor of my character. Zita and Louis were away, at their schools, and cousin Bessie was busy as usual over household duties, Girly was frying meat in the kitchen, and the frizzling, seething noises had almost sent me to sleep in my chair, where I sat sewing. It wanted a half hour yet of dinner-time, so I put on my hat and jacket and sauntered out into the open air.
It was a bracing November day, the dead leaves lay crisp and trodden by the roadside, and the gray clouds flitted in their solemn silence across the low-leaden sky, a light wind swayed the naked tree-tops, and tinged the beaming faces of pedestrians with a healthy roseate hue. This was a happy contrast to my cheerless mood, and with a quickened step, I overtook the stream of gayer people that thronged the lively thoroughfare, and gave myself wholly up to every passing distraction.
I had no particular business to discharge, except to run away from myself, and therefore every little peculiarity, every minute feature of men, women, or things, that suggested themselves to my aimless scrutiny were carefully reviewed and criticized. I went placidly on now casting a passing glance on exhibitions of stale confectionery, now on a display of attractive millinery, again it was a "ten cent" establishment, offering such bargains as might puzzle the most economical house-wife, and finally my attention was caught by a succession of dazzling windows, with their bewildering panorama of Japanese figures and coloured bric-a-brac, windows crowded with fans and parasols, and variegated lamp-shades, oriental trays and glove-boxes, pieces of ware, from whose dirty green surface emptily peered the pale faces of native Japanese, there were whisk-holders, and wall-baskets, and all sorts of ornaments trimmed in Japanese fabrics, looking coaxingly out at the public.