Page:Ethel Churchill 1.pdf/60

54 the light was extinguished, and Walter turned slowly away. "It is all dark now," said he, "and the better suited to me. Why should I even wish for her love? What have I to offer? only my hopes; and what are they?" As he spake, his eyes rested on the graves below. "Yes," muttered the youth, "they are sufficient answer; they are indeed the end of all human hope." Mechanically he turned from one to another. Some were recently banded down with osiers, and the grass was varied with primrose roots; on some the foxglove grew luxuriantly, while others had a tombstone, carved with a name and a brief epitaph. "Ay," said Walter, "this rude verse long outlasts those for whom it is written. The writer, the reader, the sorrow which it embalmed, have long past away,—not so the verse itself. Poetry is the immortality of earth: where shall we look for our noblest thoughts, and our tenderest feelings, but in its eternal pages? The spirit within me asserts its divine