chatter. Apart from all this sat Beulah; she had remembered the
matron's words, and stopped just at the verge of the woods, whence
she could see the white palings of the asylum. Above her the winter
breeze moaned and roared in the pine tops; it was the sad but dearly
loved forest music that she so often stole out to listen to. Every
breath which sighed through the emerald boughs seemed to sweep a
sympathetic chord in her soul, and she raised her arms toward the
trees as though she longed to clasp the mighty musical box of nature
to her heart. The far-off blue of a cloudless sky looked in upon
her, like a watchful guardian; the sunlight fell slantingly, now
mellowing the brown leaves and knotted trunks, and now seeming to
shun the darker spots and recesses where shadows lurked. For a time
the girl forgot all but the quiet and majestic beauty of the scene.
She loved nature as only those can whose sources of pleasure have
been sadly curtailed, and her heart went out, so to speak, after
birds, and trees, and flowers, sunshine and stars, and the voices of
sweeping winds. An open volume lay on her lap; it was Longfellow's
Poems, the book Eugene had sent her, and leaves were turned down at
"Excelsior" and the "Psalm of Life." The changing countenance
indexed very accurately the emotions which were excited by this
communion with Nature. There was an uplifted look, a brave, glad,
hopeful light in the gray eyes, generally so troubled in their
expression. A sacred song rose on the evening air, a solemn but
beautiful hymn. She sang the words of the great strength-giving
poet, the "Psalm of Life":

"Tell me not in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream;
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem."