stream and been heard of no more.--No, I am too much a lover of
genius, I sometimes think, and too often get impatient with dull people,
so that, in their weak talk, where nothing is taken for granted, I look
forward to some future possible state of development, when a gesture
passing between a beatified human soul and an archangel shall signify as
much as the complete history of a planet, from the time when it curdled
to the time when its sun was burned out. And yet, when a strong brain is
weighed with a true heart, it seems to me like balancing a bubble against
a wedge of gold.

--It takes a very true man to be a fitting companion for a woman of
genius, but not a very great one. I am not sure that she will not
embroider her ideal better on a plain ground than on one with a brilliant
pattern already worked in its texture. But as the very essence of genius
is truthfulness, contact with realities, (which are always ideas behind
shows of form or language,) nothing is so contemptible as falsehood and
pretence in its eyes. Now it is not easy to find a perfectly true woman,
and it is very hard to find a perfectly true man. And a woman of genius,
who has the sagacity to choose such a one as her companion, shows more of
the divine gift in so doing than in her finest talk or her most brilliant
work of letters or of art.

I have been a good while coming at a secret, for which I wished to
prepare you before telling it. I think there is a kindly feeling growing
up between Iris and our young Marylander. Not that I suppose there is
any distinct understanding between them, but that the affinity which has
drawn him from the remote corner where he sat to the side of the young
girl is quietly bringing their two natures together. Just now she is all
given up to another; but when he no longer calls upon her daily thoughts
and cares, I warn you not to be surprised, if this bud of friendship open
like the evening primrose, with a sound as of a sudden stolen kiss, and
lo! the flower of full-blown love lies unfolded before you.

And now the days had come for our little friend, whose whims and
weaknesses had interested us, perhaps, as much as his better traits, to
make ready for that long journey which is easier to the cripple than to
the strong man, and on which none enters so willingly as he who has borne
the life-long load of infirmity during his earthly pilgrimage. At this
point, under most circumstances, I would close the doors