Page:While Caroline Was Growing.djvu/307



"For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night."

The grave, steady voice flowed out and mingled with the silver lamplight; the marble sill of the long window was white like the sill of a tomb.

"We spend our years as a tale that is told.

"The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labor and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away."

The hot excitement of this magic night cooled slowly; over Caroline's bubbling spirit there fell a mild, strange calm. A breath from the very caverns of the infinite stole out along the path of that silver lamp, and in the grave, surrendered voice there sounded for the child upon life's threshold echoes of the final tolling.

Entranced by the measured cadences, Caroline stepped forward unconsciously and stood, white against the gray stone, full in the path of the lamp. The heavy, wrinkled lids raised themselves from the deep-set eyes, and the aged reader gazed calmly at the little figure across the court. The withered old hands clasped each other.