e things too hard, too hard," said Miss Du Prel. "I used to
think _I_ was bad in that way, but I am phlegmatic compared with you.
One would suppose that----"

"Valeria, don't, don't, don't," cried Mrs. Temperley. "I can't stand
it." Her teeth were still set tight and hard, her hands were clenched.

"Very well, very well. Tell me what you have been making of this
ridiculous old world, where everything goes wrong and everybody is
stupid or wicked, or both."

Mrs. Temperley's face relaxed a little, though the signs of some strong
emotion were still visible.

"Well, to answer the general by the particular, I have spent the
morning, accompanied by a nice young brood of Cochin-China fowls, in
Craddock churchyard."

"Oh, I hate a churchyard," exclaimed Miss Du Prel, with a shudder. "It
makes one think of the hideous mockery of life, and the more one would
like to die, the worse seems the brutality of death and his hideous
accompaniments. It is such a savage denial of all human aspirations and
affections and hopes. Ah, it is horrible!" The sharply-outlined face
grew haggard and white, as its owner crouched over the fire.

"Heaven knows! but it was very serene and very lovely up there this
morning."

"Ah!" exclaimed Valeria with a burst of strange enthusiasm and sadness,
that revealed all the fire and yearning and power that had raised her
above her fellows in the scale of consciousness, with the penalty of a
life of solitude and of sorrow.

"Surely it is not without meaning that the places of the dead are the
serenest spots on earth," said Mrs. Temperley. "If I could keep myself
in the mood that the place induces, I think I should not mind anything
very much any more. The sunshine seems to rest more tenderly there than
elsewhere, and the winds have a reverence for the graves, as if they
felt it time that the dead were left in peace--the 'happier dead,' as
poor immortal Tithonius calls them, who has not the gift of death. And
the grey old tower and the weather stains on the stones; there is a
conspiracy of beauty in the place, that holds one as one is held by
music."

"Ah! I know the magic of these things; it tempts one to believe at times
that Nature is _not_ all blind and unpitying. But that is a delusion: if
there were any pity in Nature, the human spirit would not be dowered
with such infinite and terrible longings and such capacities and dreams
and prayers and then--then insulted with the mockery of death and
an