" My
unavailing prayers goldenly syllabled by her whose name sounds from
the manger through all the world, may find acceptance with Him who,
though our sins be as scarlet, can wash them white as wool.
Our hearts grew together as one, and along the headlands and the
valleys one shadow went before us, and one shadow followed us, till
the grave gaped hungry and terrible, and I was alone. Faltering in
fear, but lingering in love, I knelt by the deathbed--it was the
middle night, and the first moans of the autumn came down from the
hills, for the frost specks glinted on her golden robes, and the
wind blew chill in her bosom. Heaven was full of stars, and the
half-moon scattered abroad her beauty like a silver rain. Many have
been the middle nights since then, for years lie between me and that
fearfulest of all watches; but a shadow, a sound, or a thought,
turns the key of the dim chamber, and the scene is reproduced.
I see the long locks on the pillow, the smile on the ashen lips, the
thin, cold fingers faintly pressing my own, and hear the broken
voice saying, "I am going now. I am not afraid. Why weep ye? Though
I were to live the full time allotted to man, I should not be more
ready, nor more willing than now." But over this there comes a
shudder and a groan that all the mirthfulness of the careless was
impotent to drown.
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