“Neighbour!” said the old man, stopping at the cottage where his young guide’s mother dwelt, “how is it that the folks are nearly all in black today? I have seen a mourning ribbon or a piece of crape on almost everyone.”
She could not tell, the woman said.
“Why, you yourself—you wear the colour too!” he cried. “Windows are closed that never used to be by day. What does this mean?”
Again the woman said she could not tell.
“We must go back,” said the old man, hurriedly. “We must see what this is.”
“No, no,” cried the child, detaining him. “Remember what you promised. Our way is to the old green lane, where she and I so often were, and where you found us more than once making those garlands for her garden. Do not turn back!”
“Where is she now?” said the old man. “Tell me that.”
“Do you not know?” returned the child. “Did we not leave her, but just now?”
“True. True. It was her we left—was it!”
He pressed his hand upon his brow, looked vacantly round, and as if impelled by a sudden thought, crossed the road, and entered the sexton’s house. He and his deaf assistant were sitting before the fire. Both rose up, on seeing who it was.
The child made a hasty sign to them with his hand. It was the action of an instant, but that, and the old man’s look, were quite enough.
“Do you—do you bury anyone today?” he said, eagerly.
“No, no! Who should we bury, sir?” returned the sexton.
“Aye, who indeed! I say with you, who indeed?”
“It is a holiday with us, good sir,” returned the sexton mildly. “We have no work to do today.”
“Why then, I’ll go where you will,” said the old man, turning to the child. “You’re sure of what you tell me? You would not deceive me? I am changed even in the little time since you last saw me.”
“Go thy ways with him, sir,” cried the sexton, “and Heaven be with ye both!”
“I am quite ready,” said the old man, meekly. “Come, boy, come—” and so submitted to be led away.
And now the bell—the bell she had so often heard by night and day, and listened to with solemn pleasure almost as a living voice—rung its remorseless toll for her, so young, so beautiful, so good. Decrepit age, and vigorous life, and blooming youth, and helpless infancy, poured forth—on crutches, in the pride of strength and health, in the full blush of promise, in the mere dawn of life—to gather round her tomb. Old men were there, whose eyes were dim and senses failing—grandmothers, who might have died ten years ago, and still been old—the deaf, the blind, the lame, the palsied, the living dead in many shapes and forms, to see the closing of that early grave. What was the death it would shut in, to that which still could crawl and creep above it!
Along the crowded path they bore her now; pure as the newly-fallen snow that covered it; whose day on earth had been as fleeting. Under that porch, where she had sat when Heaven in its mercy brought her to that peaceful spot, she passed again, and the old church received her in its quiet shade.
They carried her to one old nook, where she had many and many a time sat musing, and laid their burden softly on the pavement. The light streamed on it through the coloured window—a window, where the boughs of trees were ever rustling in the summer, and where the birds sang sweetly all day long. With every breath of air that stirred among those branches in the sunshine, some trembling, changing light, would fall upon her grave.
Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Many a young hand dropped in its little wreath, many a stifled sob was heard. Some—and they were not a few—knelt down. All were sincere and truthful in their sorrow.
The service done, the mourners stood apart, and the villagers closed round to look into the grave before the pavement stone should be replaced. One called to mind how he had seen her sitting on that very spot, and how her book had fallen on her lap, and she was gazing with a pensive face upon the sky. Another told, how he had wondered much that one so delicate as she, should be so bold; how she had never feared to enter the church alone at night, but had loved to linger there when all was quiet; and even to climb the tower stair, with no more light than that of the moon rays stealing through the loopholes in the thick old wall. A whisper went about among the oldest there, that she had seen and talked with angels; and when they called to mind how she had looked, and spoken, and her early death, some thought it might be so, indeed. Thus, coming to the grave in little knots, and glancing down, and giving place to others, and falling off in whispering groups of three or four, the church was cleared in time of all but the sexton and the mourning friends.
They saw the vault covered and the stone fixed down. Then, when the dusk of evening had come on, and not a sound disturbed the sacred stillness of the place—when the bright moon poured in her light on tomb and monument, on pillar, wall, and arch, and most of all (it seemed to them) upon her quiet grave—in that calm time, when all outward things and inward thoughts teem with assurances of immortality, and worldly hopes and fears are humbled in the dust before them—then, with tranquil and submissive hearts they turned away, and left the child with God.
Oh! it is hard to take to heart the lesson that such deaths will teach, but let no man reject it, for
