pily, did she stammer forth to the two beloved
hearts, "Can I not then die?" "Thou hast died already," said the angel
of the three fond ones, weeping with joy, "Yonder thou seest the sphere
of earth, whence thou comest, still in shade." And the waves of joy
closed on high over the blessed world, and all the happy and all
children looked upon our sphere which still trembled in the shade.

* * * * *

Yea, indeed, is it in shade! But man is higher than his place. He
looks up and spreads the wings of his soul, and when the sixty minutes,
which we call sixty years, have finished striking, he then lifts
himself up, and kindles himself as he rises, and the ashes of his
plumage fall back, and the unveiled soul rises alone, free from earth,
and pure as a musical tone. But here, in the midst of dark life, he
sees the mountains of the future world standing in the morning gold of
a sun that does not arise here. Thus, the inhabitant of the North Pole
in the long night, when the sun has ceased to rise, discerns at twelve
o'clock, a dawn gilding the highest mountains, and he thinks of his
long summer, when it will set no more.

J. O.

[1] Or, perhaps, "angelic garden," meaning a church-yard. The reading
given above is most probably correct.

THE ELEMENTARY SPIRIT.

BY E. T. W. HOFFMANN.

On the 20th of November, 1815, Albert von B----, lieutenant-colonel in
the Prussian service, found himself on the road from Liege to
Aix-la-Chapelle. The corps to which he belonged was on its return from
France to march to Liege to head-quarters on that very day, and was to
remain there for two or three days more. Albert had arrived the
evening before; but in the morning he felt himself attacked by a
strange restlessness, and--as he would hardly have confessed to
himself--an obscure dream, which had haunted him all night, and had
foretold that a very pleasant adventure awaited him at Aix-la-Chapelle,
was the only cause of his sudden departure. Much surprised even at his
own proceeding, he was sitting on the swift horse, which would, he
hoped, take him to the city before nightfall.

A severe cutting autumn wind roared over the bare fields, and awakened
the voices of the leafless wood in the distance, which united their
groans to its howling. Birds of prey came croaking, and followed in
flocks the thick clouds which gathered more and more, until the last
ray of sunlight had vanished, and a faint d