d the footsteps of my friends
above, and they sent a thrill through my heart. I knew that the helpers
had gone, and that the knight and the lady remained, and spoke low,
gentle, tearful words of him who lay beneath the yet wounded sod. I rose
into a single large primrose that grew by the edge of the grave,
and from the window of its humble, trusting face, looked full in the
countenance of the lady. I felt that I could manifest myself in the
primrose; that it said a part of what I wanted to say; just as in the
old time, I had used to betake myself to a song for the same end. The
flower caught her eye. She stooped and plucked it, saying, "Oh, you
beautiful creature!" and, lightly kissing it, put it in her bosom. It
was the first kiss she had ever given me. But the flower soon began to
wither, and I forsook it.

It was evening. The sun was below the horizon; but his rosy beams yet
illuminated a feathery cloud, that floated high above the world. I
arose, I reached the cloud; and, throwing myself upon it, floated with
it in sight of the sinking sun. He sank, and the cloud grew gray; but
the grayness touched not my heart. It carried its rose-hue within;
for now I could love without needing to be loved again. The moon came
gliding up with all the past in her wan face. She changed my couch into
a ghostly pallor, and threw all the earth below as to the bottom of a
pale sea of dreams. But she could not make me sad. I knew now, that it
is by loving, and not by being loved, that one can come nearest the soul
of another; yea, that, where two love, it is the loving of each other,
and not the being loved by each other, that originates and perfects and
assures their blessedness. I knew that love gives to him that loveth,
power over any soul beloved, even if that soul know him not, bringing
him inwardly close to that spirit; a power that cannot be but for good;
for in proportion as selfishness intrudes, the love ceases, and the
power which springs therefrom dies. Yet all love will, one day, meet
with its return. All true love will, one day, behold its own image in
the eyes of the beloved, and be humbly glad. This is possible in the
realms of lofty Death. "Ah! my friends," thought I, "how I will tend
you, and wait upon you, and haunt you with my love."

"My floating chariot bore me over a great city. Its faint dull sound
steamed up into the air--a sound--how composed?" How many hopeless
cries," thought I, "and how many mad shouts go to