easant place, well surrounded by trees and
flowers, the leaves of which were stirred softly in the breath
of a faint summer breeze, strong enough only to carry aloft in
its hands the odor of the blooming rose. This picture faded
slowly. There were shadows in the spaces between the trees.
There were shadows in the dark-growing vine which draped a
column. One could only guess if he caught sight of garb or of
the outline of a form among the shadows. He could only guess,
too, whether he heard music, faint as the breeze, faint as the
incense of the flowers. He could only guess if he had seen the
image of the House Beautiful, that temple known as Home.

"Thoughts," said the Singing Mouse softly. "Thoughts and
remembrances. These are the things that live for ever. It is
only the shadows that are real!"

The solemn note of the bell struck in. It counted twelve. The
new year had come. The chimes of joy arose. But still the faint
music from the Past had not died away, and still the shadows
waved and beckoned on the wall, strong and beautiful, and
enduring, and not like the fading of a dream. So then I knew
that what the Singing Mouse had said was true, and that it is,
indeed, only the shadows that are real.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: Of the Greatest Sorrow...]

[Illustration]

OF THE GREATEST SORROW

A thousand times in the night I reach out (it seems to me), and
touch her hair as it lies spread and dark. A thousand times in
the night I gaze upon her face, her eyes shielded, her lips
gently closed and curved. A thousand times in the night (it
seems to me), I bend above her and whisper, "I love you!" And
she, though asleep and myriads of miles away among the stars,
hears me always and stirs just faintly, and still sleeping
whispers through lips that barely part, "I know!" It is perhaps
that thing called Love which causes me to do this, because I
always whisper, "I love you;" though no word quite is wide and
deep and soft and kind enough to say what is in the soul at
certain times.

Now in lives there are ways. Some have few sorrows and many
things of fortune taken lightly, the things wished coming
easily. Again, others gain only by pain and suffering and long
effort and hard denyings. As it is decreed by chance, the way
with most is to gain all things hardly, and to know always
denial, and always to have longing. That is the way with most.
Of these things I spoke with the Singing Mouse, and told of