sight. Through this mild radiance he
could trace, at long intervals, shadowy representations of the scenes
through which he had passed in search of his lost child. The gloomy
streets, the lonely houses abandoned to the unburied dead, which he had
explored, alternately appeared and vanished before him in solemn
succession; and ever and anon, as one vision disappeared ere another
rose, he heard afar off a sound as of gentle, womanly voices, murmuring
in solemn accents, 'The search has been made in penitence, in patience,
in prayer, and has not been pursued in vain. The lost shall
return--the beloved shall yet be restored!'

Thus, as it had begun, the vision long continued. Now the scenes
through which he had wandered passed slowly before his eyes, now the
soft voices murmured pityingly in his ear. At length the first
disappeared, and the last became silent; then ensued a long vacant
interval, and then the grey, tranquil light brightened slowly at one
spot, out of which he beheld advancing towards him the form of his lost
child.

She came to his side, she bent lovingly over him; he saw her eyes, with
their old patient, childlike expression, looking sorrowfully down upon
him. His heart revived to a sense of unspeakable awe and contrition,
to emotions of yearning love and mournful hope; his speech returned; he
whispered tremulously, 'Child! child! I repented in bitter woe the
wrong that I did to thee; I sought thee, in my loneliness on earth,
through the long day and the gloomy night! And now the merciful God
has sent thee to pardon me! I loved thee; I wept for thee.'

His voice died within him, for now his outward sensations quickened.
He felt warm tears falling on his cheeks; he felt embracing arms
clasped round him; he heard tenderly repeated, 'Father! speak to me as
you were wont; love me, father, and forgive me, as you loved and
forgave me when I was a little child!'

The sound of that well-remembered voice--which had ever spoken kindly
and reverently to him; which had last addressed him in tones of
despairing supplication; which he had hardly hoped to hear again on
earth--penetrated his whole being, like awakening music in the dead
silence of night. His eyes lost their vacant expression; he raised
himself suddenly on the couch; he saw that what had begun as a vision
had ended as a reality; that his dream had proved the immediate
fore-runner of its own fulfilment; that his daughter in her bodily
presen