Tears swell in your eye as you gaze; you cannot tell whence or why they
come. Yet they are tears eloquent of feeling. They speak of
brother-children,--of boyish glee,--of the flush of young health,--of a
mother's devotion,--of the home affections,--of the vanities of
life,--of the wasting years,--of the Death that must shroud what friends
remain, as it has shrouded what friends have gone,--and of that Great
Hope, beaming on your seared manhood dimly from the upper world!
Your wealth suffices for all the luxuries of life; there is no fear of
coming want; health beats strong in your veins; you have learned to hold
a place in the world with a man's strength, and a man's confidence. And
yet in the view of those sweet scenes which belonged to early days, when
neither strength, confidence, nor wealth were yours,--days never to come
again,--a shade of melancholy broods upon your spirit, and covers with
its veil all that fierce pride which your worldly wisdom has wrought.
You visit again with Frank the country homestead of his grandfather: he
is dead; but the old lady still lives; and blind Fanny, now drawing
toward womanhood, wears yet through her darkened life the same air of
placid content, and of sweet trustfulness in Heaven.
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