"Would that my old age could be calm and clear, like this sweet evening, and would that my life might sink in brightness as the sun into the sea!"
Then he heard in the distance the splashing of oars, and his eye, keen as of old, looked eagerly towards the horizon. A boat, gently urged on by the wind, was sailing from the north-west. Nearer and nearer it came, and seemed to be directing its course to the rock where the old man sat. At the helm sat a manly form, and at the prow stood a graceful woman with a boy pressed closely to her side. Her hair gleamed golden, as his daughter's used to do; and now she raised her hand, and fluttered a white kerchief as in eager greeting. Sämund's heart beat with glad presentiment, he felt his weakness no longer, but raised himself, unaided, from the stone breastwork, and fixed his gaze on the approaching boat. Now the little vessel came up to the very foot of the rock, he heard the chain rattling round the post, and the sound of familiar voices was borne up to him on the evening air. It was no dream. There were light footsteps beside him, and when he turned to look, Aslog, his lost Aslog, knelt before him, her eyes full of humble penitence, and by her side knelt a fair-haired boy, who stretched out his hands to the old man, and echoed his mother's words in childish accents—"Oh, grandfather, forgive and love us!"
The old man opened his arms, and pressed the welcome suppliants to his heart, and as he kissed his lovely grandson, he said in a voice more mild and soft than was his wont—"Thank God, I shall not die in my loneliness after all!"
And he did not die. From day to day he felt more and more of his old vigour, and when he saw how tenderly Aslog loved her husband, what a faithful husband and father Orm was, and what a dutiful son to himself, he forgot all his disappointed hopes—even the royal diadem that Aslog had rejected. The love of his children and grandchildren made his last days his brightest, and thus the wish of that spring evening was fulfilled, his old age was calm and clear, and his life sank in brightness as the sun into the sea.
Marcus Ward & Co., Royal Ulster Works, Belfast.
