he meeting kiss of lovers, the sob of those that part.
Listen! prayers and curses, sighs and laughter; the soft breathing of
the sleeping, the fretful feet of pain; voices of pity, voices of hate;
the glad song of the strong, the foolish complaining of the weak. Listen
to it, Paul! Right and wrong, good and evil, hope and despair, it is but
one voice--a single note, drawn by the sweep of the Player's hand across
the quivering strings of man. What is the meaning of it, Paul? Can you
read it? Sometimes it seems to me a note of joy, so full, so endless,
so complete, that I cry: 'Blessed be the Lord whose hammers have beaten
upon us, whose fires have shaped us to His ends!' And sometimes it
sounds to me a dying note, so that I could curse Him who in wantonness
has wrung it from the anguish of His creatures--till I would that
I could fling myself, Prometheus like, between Him and His victims,
calling: 'My darkness, but their light; my agony, O God; their hope!'"

The faint light from a neighbouring gas-lamp fell upon his face that
an hour before I had seen the face of a wild beast. The ugly mouth was
quivering, tears stood in his great, tender eyes. Could his prayer in
that moment have been granted, could he have pressed against his bosom
all the pain of the world, he would have rejoiced.

He shook himself together with a laugh. "Come, Paul, we have had a busy
afternoon, and I'm thirsty. Let us drink some beer, my boy, good sound
beer, and plenty of it."

My mother fell ill that winter. Mountain born and mountain bred, the
close streets had never agreed with her, and scolded by all of us, she
promised, "come the fine weather," to put sentiment behind her, and go
away from them.

"I'm thinking she will," said Hal, gripping my shoulder with his strong
hand, "but it'll be by herself that she'll go, lad. My wonder is," he
continued, "that she has held out so long. If anything, it is you that
have kept her alive. Now that you are off her mind to a certain extent,
she is worrying about your father, I expect. These women, they never
will believe a man can take care of himself, even in Heaven. She's never
quite trusted the Lord with him, and never will till she's there to give
an eye to things herself."

Hal's prophecy fell true. She left "come the fine weather," as she had
promised: I remember it was the first day primroses were hawked in the
street. But another death had occurred just before; which, concerning me
closely as i