Page:The New Monthly Magazine - Volume 100.djvu/59

Rh him had been—that death alone was to be his deliverer! This was so dreadful a thought, that he did all he could to drive it away. He worked diligently, he whistled, he sang, and he engraved strange names and figures on the walls. He frequently gazed up at the window, though he could only see through it a dead wall, but over that wall were the blue skies. He soon came to know every stone in the wall; he knew where the sun cast its streaks of light, where the little streams of water trickled down when it rained; there was more variety in the sky—it seemed to have compassion upon him, for sometimes the clouds were chased along by the wind; sometimes they assumed strange, fantastic shapes, and arrayed themselves in crimson and gold, like the gorgeous garb of royalty; and sometimes they hung in heavy, dark masses over the lofty wall—the boundary of his external world. But he saw no living things; and once, when a daring swallow rested for a few minutes on the outside ledge of his iron-barred window, he scarcely breathed, in his anxiety to enjoy the sight of it as long as possible.

Winter was his saddest time, for then the snow blocked up his little window, and intervened between him and the skies; then, too, it became so early dark, and daylight was so long of coming. He sang and whistled no longer; he worked, indeed, but not so diligently, for his tormentor—thought—had more power over him. During the short day he could partly escape it; but when it became dark—oh! what had it not then to recal to him! And the worst was, he was obliged to bear it all. He could have silenced another, but he could not hush the voice that spoke within himself. In vain he sought to banish remembrance; it would haunt him, so he dropped his head upon his hands, and listened.

And it spoke to him of the time when he was a little boy with rosy cheeks, who had never done harm to a living being, and who sat or lay in the bright sunshine, humming the song his mother had taught him. And that mother, who loved him so dearly, who worked for him during the day, and slept with him at night—well! She was dead, God be praised! "Perhaps if she had lived," said he to himself.—No, no! Does ha not remember well one day, when the little boy with rosy cheeks was coming from school, that he passed a blind old man who was begging, and holding out his hat in his hand, that he dived quickly into the hat, and caught up the pence some charitable persons had placed in it? No one saw him—no one knew that he had done this—why does he now remember it with such bitter regret?

His mother died, and a neighbouring family received the orphan kindly; consoled, and caressed mm, and he slept by the side of their dog. But they were very poor themselves, and could not maintain him long, therefore he was sent to other people, where some one paid a small board for him, and where he, the little stranger, was far from being well treated. He had too little to eat—and he stole food; therefore he was ignominionsly turned away, and he fell among wicked people. They talked to him of the paths of virtue—but they followed vicious courses themselves and he laughed at their admonitions. He grew older, and he went to be confirmed in the House of God; and there he was