ld and wayward
impulses, who had drunk deeply in youth of pleasure and excitement. He
had married a beautiful young wife, who had died childless in the first
year of their marriage, and he had abandoned himself after this event
to a despairing seclusion, devoted to art and music. He had filled the
great house with fine pictures, he had written a book of poems, and
some curious stilted volumes of autobiographical prose; but he had no
art of expression, and his books had seemed like a powerless attempt to
give utterance to wild and melancholy musings; they were written in a
pompous and elaborate style, which divested the thoughts of such charm
as they might have possessed.

He had lived thus to a considerable age in a wilful sadness, unloving
and unloved. He had cared nothing for the people of the place,
entertained no visitors; rambling, a proud solitary figure, about the
demesne, or immured for days together in his library. Had the story
not been true, it would have appeared like some elaborate fiction.

He built this little temple in memory of the wife whom he had lost, and
often visited it, spending hours on hot summer days wandering about the
little lake, or sitting silent in the portico. We went up to the
building. It was a mere alcove, open to the air. But what arrested my
attention was a marble figure of a young man, in a sitting position,
lightly clad in a tunic, the neck, arms, and knees bare; one knee was
flung over the other, and the chin was propped on an arm, the elbow of
which rested on the knee. The face was a wonderful and expressive
piece of work. The boy seemed to be staring out, not seeing what he
looked upon, but lost in a deep agony of thought. The face was
wonderfully pure and beautiful; and the anguish seemed not the anguish
of remorse, but the pain of looking upon things both sweet and
beautiful, and of yet being unable to take a share in them. The whole
figure denoted a listless melancholy. It was the work of a famous
French sculptor, who seemed to have worked under close and minute
direction; and my friend told me that no less than three statues had
been completed before the owner was satisfied.

On the pedestal were sculptured the pathetic words, _Oimoi mal authis_.
There was a look of revolt of dumb anger upon the face that lay behind
its utter and hopeless sadness. I knew too well, by a swift instinct,
what the statue stood for. Here was one, made for life, activity, and
joy,