re browsing on the glade with her two
fawns at her side. But for him we should not then have seen the antlers
of the red-deer, for the Forest was indeed a most savage place, and
haunted--such was the superstition at which they who scorned it
trembled--haunted by the ghost of a huntsman whom a jealous rival had
murdered as he stooped, after the chase, at a little mountain well that
ever since oozed out blood. What converse passed between us two in all
those still shadowy solitudes! Into what depths of human nature did he
teach our wondering eyes to look down! Oh! what was to become of us, we
sometimes thought in sadness that all at once made our spirits
sink--like a lark falling suddenly to earth, struck by the fear of some
unwonted shadow from above--what was to become of us when the mandate
should arrive for him to leave the Manse for ever, and sail away in a
ship to India never more to return! Ever as that dreaded day drew
nearer, more frequent was the haze in our eyes; and in our blindness, we
knew not that such tears ought to have been far more rueful still, for
that he then lay under orders for a longer and more lamentable voyage--a
voyage over a narrow strait to the Eternal shore. All--all at once he
drooped; on one fatal morning the dread decay began; with no
forewarning, the springs on which his being had so lightly--so
proudly--so grandly moved--gave way. Between one Sabbath and another his
bright eyes darkened--and while all the people were assembled at the
sacrament, the soul of Emilius Godfrey soared up to Heaven. It was
indeed a dreadful death, serene and sainted though it were; and not a
hall--not a house--not a hut--not a shieling within all the circle of
those wide mountains, that did not on that night mourn as if it had lost
a son. All the vast parish attended his funeral--Lowlanders and
Highlanders in their own garb of grief. And have time and tempest now
blackened the white marble of that monument--is that inscription now
hard to be read--the name of Emilius Godfrey in green obliteration--nor
haply one surviving who ever saw the light of the countenance of him
there interred! Forgotten as if he had never been! for few were that
glorious orphan's kindred--and they lived in a foreign land--forgotten
but by one heart, faithful through all the chances and changes of this
restless world! And therein enshrined among all its holiest
remembrances, shall be the image of Emilius Godfrey, till it too, like
his, s