Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 7.djvu/98

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��THE granitp: monthly,

��was told. He went home, hut not to sleep.

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The (lew sparkled upon the grass the next morning, in the beams of the warm vernal sun, as Edgar Somerton, l)aring his hot lirow, strode rapidly along the Hopkinton road. After a walk of fifteen minutes he turned aside upon the slope where less than a fort- night before he had ramljled with Miss Walker among the May-flowers. The season was early this year, and the white or pink blossoms, now wilted, had given room to a host of variegated flowers, cinque-foils and violets, but- tercups and strawberry flowers, winter- green berries and frail innocents, car- peted the hills with the most pleasing hues. But Edgar found little delight in this outspread gorgeousness. Na- ture takes her mood from the mind ; she laughs with a May-day dancer, but her face clouds when the mind is shad- owed with grief, and though the petty annoyances of life may yield to her soothing art, the deep-seated sorrows are beyond her skill, unless she call to her aid that more potent wizard, — Time. So it came about that the young man wandered soirowfuUy on through wood and meadow-side, until he entered the bed of an ancient water-course, with a tiny rivulet still trickling through the hollow. The sides were thinly wood- ed, with large rocks here and there, covered with mosses or vines. Edgar seated himself upon a mossy stone that was crowned by a yellow blos- somed bush-honeysuckle. It was a cool, shady spot, and the low murmur (jf the brook blending with the soft love-notes of the ([uiet birds made the silence musical while the new green leaves and the bursting buds seemed ready to join in the song as they were touched by the warm gold of the sift- ing sunshine. '• Ah," sighed the dis- consolate youth, " everything is happy in this world but I. The breeze caresses the blossoms, and the leaves hold out their lips to the gales ; the birds talk of love to one another, and

��I. only I, am alone and forsaken, .Mas, can it be but a year since 1 thought that in the path of duty no shade could cloud my happiness? But ah ! it is easy to gaze only at the stars when the earth is dark, but when some bright illusion of this frail, but too beautiful, world gleams upon the 'sight, the stars cjuickly lose their celestial charm. Yet it is sheer mad- ness in me to love such a being as Miss Walker : she is an angel from another planet, walking across the Milky Way in heaven — a spirit to be worshijoed by an humble student rather than loved."

Whether it was that the purling brook stole his senses away, or that his calmer reason regained its sway, cer- tain it is that he felt more and more satisfied that his love for Miss Walker was not such as the heart reciuires for its sovereign joy, but only a kind of exalted reverence, which, in this earthly life, could never even hope for its due reward. He would love her still as he loved the clouds or the sunshine, and her memory should shed a luster over his whole life ; and was not that enough ? Lo\'e withers unless watered with the dew of hope, and hope was crone for ever. .\mid such' thoughts, therefore, his soul grew calmer. The rill seemed to say, " Never mind, never mind," and the birds talked in very plain words, which he understooci perfectly well, though for his life he could not have told what they said. There were some blue violets under a tittle bank which actually smiled at him, though they were so \'ery modest that when he looked again their down- cast eyes were quite sober. The woods here were full of the largest and most dewy pure May-flowers, which linger in the shade for weeks when their rash sisters of the sunny hills have perished. Surely this was the green valley of happiness where all evil things turn to good. The drowsy hum of the bees about the bush-honeysuckle over his head, the murmur of the brook beside him, the twitter of the birds and the whispers of the windy leaves blended

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