ear the wings of Adon-Ai gliding
musical through the air."

He spoke; and, with a low shriek of baffled rage and hate, the Thing was
gone, and through the room rushed, luminous and sudden, the Presence of
silvery light.

As the heavenly visitor stood in the atmosphere of his own lustre,
and looked upon the face of the Theurgist with an aspect of ineffable
tenderness and love, all space seemed lighted from his smile. Along the
blue air without, from that chamber in which his wings had halted, to
the farthest star in the azure distance, it seemed as if the track of
his flight were visible, by a lengthened splendour in the air, like the
column of moonlight on the sea. Like the flower that diffuses perfume as
the very breath of its life, so the emanation of that presence was joy.
Over the world, as a million times swifter than light, than electricity,
the Son of Glory had sped his way to the side of love, his wings had
scattered delight as the morning scatters dew. For that brief moment,
Poverty had ceased to mourn, Disease fled from its prey, and Hope
breathed a dream of Heaven into the darkness of Despair.

"Thou art right," said the melodious Voice. "Thy courage has restored
thy power. Once more, in the haunts of earth, thy soul charms me to thy
side. Wiser now, in the moment when thou comprehendest Death, than when
thy unfettered spirit learned the solemn mystery of Life; the human
affections that thralled and humbled thee awhile bring to thee, in these
last hours of thy mortality, the sublimest heritage of thy race,--the
eternity that commences from the grave."

"O Adon-Ai," said the Chaldean, as, circumfused in the splendour of the
visitant, a glory more radiant than human beauty settled round his form,
and seemed already to belong to the eternity of which the Bright One
spoke, "as men, before they die, see and comprehend the enigmas hidden
from them before (The greatest poet, and one of the noblest thinkers, of
the last age, said, on his deathbed, "Many things obscure to me before,
now clear up, and become visible."--See the 'Life of Schiller.'), "so in
this hour, when the sacrifice of self to another brings the course of
ages to its goal, I see the littleness of Life, compared to the majesty
of Death; but oh, Divine Consoler, even here, even in thy presence,
the affections that inspire me, sadden. To leave behind me in this
bad world, unaided, unprotected, those for whom I die! the wife! the
child!--oh, speak co