oration, was forgotten. The
people of the valley--Tim--even Tim--all of them were forgotten. I had
found the woman of my firelight, the woman of my cloudland, the woman
of my sunset country down in the mountains to the west. She, had
always been a vague, undefined creature to me--just a woman, and so
elusive as never to get within the grasp of my mind's eye; just a woman
whom I had endowed with every grace; whose kindly spirit shone through
eyes, now brown, now blue, now black, according to my latest whim; who
ofttimes worn, or perhaps feigning weariness, rested on my shoulder a
little head, crowned with a glory of hair sometimes black, and
sometimes golden or auburn, and not infrequently red, a dashing, daring
red. Sometimes she was slender and elf-like, a chic and clinging
creature. Again she was tall and stately, like the women of the
romances. Again she was buxom and blooming, one whose hand you would
take instead of offering an arm. She had been an elusive,
ever-changing creature, but now that I had looked into those grave,
gray eyes, I fixed the form of my picture, and fixed its colors and
fired them in to last for all my time.

Now she is just the woman that every woman ought to be. Her hair is
soft brown and sweeps back from a low white forehead. She has tried to
make it straight and simple, as every woman should, but the angels seem
to have curled it here and mussed it there, so that all her care cannot
hide its wanton waves. Her face is full of life and health, so open,
so candid, that there you read her heart, and you know that it is as
good as she is fair.

She stood before me in a sombre gown, almost ugly in its gray color and
severe lines, but to me she was a quaint figure such as might have
stepped out of the old world and the old time when men lived with a
vengeance, and godliness and ugliness went arm in arm, for Satan had
preempted the beautiful. Against her a homely garb failed. She was
beautiful in spite of her clothes and not because of them. But this is
generally true with women. This one, instead of sharing our admiration
with her gown, claimed it all for herself. Her face had no rival.

I did not turn away. I could not. The gray eyes, once flashing with
the light of kindly humor, now softened with sympathy, now glowed with
pity. Pity! The thought of it stirred me with anger. The justice of
it made me rage. She saw in the chair a thin, broken figure, a drawn
brown face, a w