to you, and call to you to stay with them, while
they gently murmur, 'We love you; love us, and do not leave us.'

"You can easily imagine, then, the deep enthusiastic feeling and the
religious sentiment of a person always in a similar state of ecstasy.
Even if blind, abandoned by his friends, do you think there is nothing to
envy in his lot? or that his destiny is not infinitely happier than our
own? For my own part I have not the slightest doubt of it.

"But you will, doubtless, say such a condition is impossible--the mind
of man would break down under such a load of happiness. And, moreover,
whence could such happiness be derived? What organs could transmit,
and where could it find, such a sensation of universal life?

"This, ladies, is a question to which I can give you no answer; but I ask
you to listen and then judge.

"The very day I arrived at the chalet I had made a singular remark--the
blind girl was especially uneasy about the bees.

"While the wind was roaring without Raesel sat with her head on her hands
listening attentively.

"'Father,' said she, 'I think at the end of the apiary the third hive on
the right is still open. Go and see. The wind blows from the north; all
the bees are home; you can shut the hive.'

"And her father having gone out by a side door, when he returned he
said--

"'It is all right, my child; I have closed the hive.'

"Half an hour afterwards the girl, rousing herself once more from her
reverie, murmured--

"'There are no more bees about, but under the roof of the apiary there
are some waiting; they are in the sixth hive near the door; please go and
let them in, father.'

"The old man left the house at once. He was away more than a quarter of
an hour; then he came back and told his daughter that everything was as
she wished it--the bees had just gone into their hive.

"The child nodded, and replied--

"'Thank you, father.'

"Then she seemed to doze again.

"I was standing by the stove, lost in a labyrinth of reflections; how
could that poor blind girl know that from such or such a hive there were
still some bees absent, or that such a hive had been left open? This
seemed inexplicable to me; but having been in the house hardly one hour,
I did not feel justified in asking my hosts any questions with regard to
their daughter, for it is sometimes painful to talk to people on subjects
which interest them very nearly. I concluded that Young gave way to his
daughter's fa