Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 2.djvu/16

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��MY FRIENDS AND I: MEMORIES.

��•while dwellers in a quiet New Hamp- shire village.

I had a friend once, and companion, in one of those years which we wish to remember and dream of. He w r as my junior by a year or two, but my superior in everything. How I loved his ardent nature, his great warm heart, void of all selfishness; how I admired his manly form, his brilliant intellect, and look, now, after this score and more of years, into his clear earnest eye, and worship the memory of his noble soul, of his bet- ter life !

It was during our later school-days that we first met ; on one of those days between weeks, when, relieved from the weariness of conning ©ur text-books, we sought that freedom which nature gives, and by shadowy, untrodden paths climbed a mountain slope, and upon its rock-crowned, topmost peak introduced ourselves to each other and to the world above us ; not that there was any formal ceremony, for it was many days after that ere we exchanged names, or even thought of it. But we were acquainted, nevertheless.

You know it is always so in our every- day life ; it is a certain principle of at- traction and repulsion in our natures. What was it about that gentleman you called my attention to yesterday, as we were riding in the street car, that caused such a repulsiveness of feeling? It was nothing in outward appearance, for he w as scrupulously and faultlessly dressed. Then why, I ask, that instantaneous, un- taught repudiation independent of will or wisdom? And what was there in that sunny face and in those soul-stirring eyes that we passed upon the corner of the street to-day that caused us to stop and admire, and others to listen and smile, not guessing why? It was not that he was entertaining a little girlish sunbeam there, for the one in the car strove to awaken a child's love for nov- elty, but failed to interest, and the boy shrank away repelled. But I leave the why for philosophers to answer ; we can know the facts.

But I was going to tell you ; this was the first of many pilgrimages that we

��made together, my friend and I, and many pleasures unknown we sought in the forests and among the hills, wherev- er the wildness and the beauty of the scenery won us. I am not going to give you a narration of those experiences, lest they prove wearisome, but pass on to the incidents I intended to sketch.

My student life over, I entered into the more practical and busy affairs of life, leaving my friend to pursue his studies and strive for the fulfilment of his high ambition, which was a noble one. " I would be great," he said one day, as we stood upon an eminence, overlooking the little world of country around us, " I would go through the world like this wind, girded with power to freshen and purify, to sweep away old wrongs and prejudices, just as these leaves of autumn are scattered. I would stir the thoughts of men as these trees are stirred, and with words that would go echoing down the corridors of time. I would possess a knowledge of all lands and all nations ; I would walk in the footsteps of the old masters, and muse above he ashes of de- parted greatness. I would wander among the time-hallowed ruins of Greece and Rome, and look upon those pyra- midal monuments of ancient glory in the land of the Pharaohs; dream among those desolate ruins of antique palaces, the halls of Karnak and the temples of Luxor, century-laden relics of a mum- mied age. Or what more worth the liv- ing for than to see the sun rise above Olivet's sacred mount, or his glorious setting beyond the hills and forests of Lebanon? Think of bathing one's life- stained limbs in the waters of the Jor- dan, and baring his forehead to the dewy winds of Hermon I What more inspir- ing, think you, than to lie in the star- light of Bethlehem, gazing upon the misty outlines of the hills and valleys that had known the wanderings of the ' Son of Man ;' or upon the hillside above the vale of Jehosaphat, watching the moonlight creeping over and around the walls of the 'City of David,' and across the hills of Judea, lighting up the shadows in Gethsemane's garden, and silvering the disturbed waters of far Gal-

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