found but one resting place; it lingered about her young girlhood with a

caressing regret; it dwelt upon it as the one brief interval of her life

that bore no curse. She saw herself again in the budding grace of her

twelve years, decked in her dainty pride of ribbons, consorting with the

bees and the butterflies, believing in fairies, holding confidential

converse with the flowers, busying herself all day long with airy trifles

that were as weighty to her as the affairs that tax the brains of

diplomats and emperors. She was without sin, then, and unacquainted

with grief; the world was full of sunshine and her heart was full of music.

From that--to this!

"If I could only die!" she said. "If I could only go back, and be as I

was then, for one hour--and hold my father's hand in mine again, and see

all the household about me, as in that old innocent time--and then die!

My God, I am humbled, my pride is all gone, my stubborn heart repents

-have pity!"

When the spring morning dawned, the form still sat there, the elbows

resting upon the table and the face upon the hands. All day long the

figure sat there, the sunshine enriching its costly raiment and flashing

from its jewels; twilight came, and presently the stars, but still the

figure remained; the moon found it there still, and framed the picture

with the shadow of the window sash, and flooded, it with mellow light; by

and by the darkness swallowed it up, and later the gray dawn revealed it

again; the new day grew toward its prime, and still the forlorn presence

was undisturbed.

651

The Gilded Age