I was kneeling beside her,
and she put her hand upon my head, and let it rest there for a moment,
while her lips moved as if she were praying.
"'Kiss me, Nelly,' said she, growing fainter: kiss me again for
Clarence.'
"A little while after she died."
For a long time you remain with only that letter, and your thought, for
company. You pace up and down your chamber: again you seat yourself, and
lean your head upon the table, enfeebled by the very grief that you
cherish still. The whole day passes thus: you excuse yourself from all
companionship: you have not the heart to tell the story of your troubles
to Dalton,--least of all, to Miss Dalton. How is this? Is sorrow too
selfish, or too holy?
Toward nightfall there is a calmer and stronger feeling. The voice of
the present world comes to your ear again. But you move away from it
unobserved to that stronger voice of God in the Cataract. Great masses
of angry cloud hang over the west; but beneath them the red harvest sun
shines over the long reach of Canadian shore, and bathes the whirling
rapids in splendor. You stroll alone over the quaking bridge, and under
the giant trees of the Island, to the edge of the British Fall.
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