that
show a master's hand. Sometimes,--to-night, for instance,--the
curtain is accidentally drawn back, and I see a bare arm stretched out
imploringly in the darkness, and an eager, wolfish face watching mine: a
wan, woful face, through which the spirit of the dead korl-cutter looks
out, with its thwarted life, its mighty hunger, its unfinished work. Its
pale, vague lips seem to tremble with a terrible question. "Is this the
End?" they say,--"nothing beyond? no more?" Why, you tell me you have
seen that look in the eyes of dumb brutes,--horses dying under the lash.
I know.

The deep of the night is passing while I write. The gas-light wakens
from the shadows here and there the objects which lie scattered through
the room: only faintly, though; for they belong to the open sunlight. As
I glance at them, they each recall some task or pleasure of the coming
day. A half-moulded child's head; Aphrodite; a bough of forest-leaves;
music; work; homely fragments, in which lie the secrets of all eternal
truth and beauty. Prophetic all! Only this dumb, woful face seems to
belong to and end with the night. I turn to look at it. Has the power
of its desperate need commanded the darkness away? While the room is yet
steeped in heavy shadow, a cool, gray light suddenly touches its head
like a blessing hand, and its groping arm points through the broken
cloud to the far East, where, in the flickering, nebulous crimson, God
has set the promise of the Dawn.

End of Project Gutenberg's Life in the Iron-Mills, by Rebecca Harding Davis

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIFE IN THE IRON-MILLS ***

***** This file should be named 876.txt or 876.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www.gutenberg.org/8/7/876/

Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
will be renamed.

Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules,
set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project
Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific