n."]

It was almost dawn when Glendower returned to his home. Fearful of
disturbing his wife, he stole with mute steps to the damp and rugged
chamber, where the last son of a princely line, and the legitimate
owner of lands and halls which ducal rank might have envied, held his
miserable asylum. The first faint streaks of coming light broke through
the shutterless and shattered windows, and he saw that she reclined in
a deep sleep upon the chair beside their child's couch. She would not go
to bed herself till Glendower returned, and she had sat up, watching and
praying, and listening for his footsteps, till, in the utter exhaustion
of debility and sickness, sleep had fallen upon her. Glendower bent over
her.

"Sleep," said he, "sleep on! The wicked do not come to thee now. Thou
art in a world that has no fellowship with this,--a world from which
even happiness is not banished! Nor woe nor pain, nor memory of the
past nor despair of all before thee, make the characters of thy present
state! Thou forestallest the forgetfulness of the grave, and thy heart
concentrates all earth's comfort in one word,--'Oblivion! 'Beautiful,
how beautiful thou art even yet! that smile, that momentary blush, years
have not conquered them. They are as when, my young bride, thou didst
lean first upon my bosom, and dream that sorrow was no more! And I have
brought thee unto this! These green walls make thy bridal chamber, yon
fragments of bread thy bridal board. Well! it is no matter! thou art on
thy way to a land where all things, even a breaking heart, are at rest.
I weep not; wherefore should I weep? Tears are not for the dead, but
their survivors. I would rather see thee drop inch by inch into the
grave, and smile as I beheld it, than save thee for an inheritance of
sin. What is there in this little and sordid life that we should strive
to hold it? What in this dreadful dream that we should fear to wake?"

And Glendower knelt beside his wife, and, despite his words, tears
flowed fast and gushingly down his cheeks; and wearied as he was, he
watched upon her slumbers, till they fell from the eyes to which his
presence was more joyous than the day.

It was a beautiful thing, even in sorrow, to see that couple, whom want
could not debase, nor misfortune, which makes even generosity selfish,
divorce! All that Fate had stripped from the poetry and graces of life,
had not shaken one leaf from the romance of their green and unwithered
affection