thrown over their values in the ides of a month.  Nor was Virginia’s Natural Bridge worn under in a year; nor, in geology, were the eternal Grampians upheaved in an age.  And who shall count the cycles that revolved ere earth’s interior sedimentary strata were crystalized into stone.  Nor Peak of Piko, nor Teneriffe, were chiseled into obelisks in a decade; nor had Mount Athos been turned into Alexander’s statue so soon.  And the bower of Artaxerxes took a whole Persian summer to grow; and the Czar’s Ice Palace a long Muscovite winter to congeal.  No, no:  nor was the Pyramid of Cheops masoned in a month; though, once built, the sands left by the deluge might not have submerged such a pile.  Nor were the broad boughs of Charles’ Oak grown in a spring; though they outlived the royal dynasties of Tudor and Stuart.  Nor were the parts of the great Iliad put together in haste; though old Homer’s temple shall lift up its dome, when St. Peter’s is a legend.  Even man himself lives months ere his Maker deems him fit to be born; and ere his proud shaft gains its full stature, twenty-one long Julian years must elapse.  And his whole mortal life brings not his immortal soul to maturity; nor will all eternity perfect him.  Yea, with uttermost reverence, as to human understanding, increase of dominion seems increase of power; and day by day new planets are being added to elder-born Saturn, even as six thousand years ago our own Earth made one more in this system; so, in incident, not in essence, may the Infinite himself be not less than more infinite now, than when old Aldebaran rolled forth from his hand.  And if time was, when this round Earth, which to innumerable mortals has seemed an empire never to be wholly explored; which, in its seas, concealed all the Indies over four thousand five hundred years; if time was, when this great quarry of Assyrias and Romes was not extant; then, time may have been, when the whole material universe lived its Dark Ages; yea, when the Ineffable Silence, proceeding from its unimaginable remoteness, espied it as an isle in the sea.  And herein is no derogation.  For the Immeasurable’s altitude is not heightened by the arches of Mahomet’s heavens; and were all space a vacuum, yet would it be a fullness; for to Himself His own universe is He.

Thus deeper and deeper into Time’s endless tunnel, does the winged soul, like a night-hawk, wend her wild way; and finds eternities before and behind; and her last limit is her everlasting beginning.

But sent over the broad flooded sphere, even Noah’s dove came back, and perched on his hand.  So comes back my spirit to me, and folds up her wings.

Thus, then, though Time be the mightiest of Alarics, yet is he the mightiest mason of all.  And a tutor, and a counselor, and a physician, and a scribe, and a poet, and a sage, and a king.

Yea, and a gardener, as ere long will be shown.

But first must we return to the glen.

CHAPTER LXXVI A Pleasant Place For A Lounge