"
They crossed themselves, and whiffed out a protective prayer or two.
"Ah-h--a miracle, a wonder! Dark work of enchantment."
I let it go at that. Then I read in a low voice, to as many as
could crowd their shaven heads within hearing distance, part of
the account of the miracle of the restoration of the well, and
was accompanied by astonished and reverent ejaculations all through:
"Ah-h-h!" "How true!" "Amazing, amazing!" "These be the very
haps as they happened, in marvelous exactness!" And might they
take this strange thing in their hands, and feel of it and examine
it?--they would be very careful. Yes. So they took it, handling
it as cautiously and devoutly as if it had been some holy thing
come from some supernatural region; and gently felt of its texture,
caressed its pleasant smooth surface with lingering touch, and
scanned the mysterious characters with fascinated eyes. These
grouped bent heads, these charmed faces, these speaking eyes
--how beautiful to me! For was not this my darling, and was not
all this mute wonder and interest and homage a most eloquent
tribute and unforced compliment to it? I knew, then, how a mother
feels when women, whether strangers or friends, take her new baby,
and close themselves about it with one eager impulse, and bend
their heads over it in a tranced adoration that makes all the rest
of the universe vanish out of their consciousness and be as if it
were not, for that time.
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