Stephen stretched out his hand.  “Pardon me,” he said, “I cannot part with that.  I have brought a copy to leave with you,” and he gave Lizzy another paper.

Mechanically she restored to him the first one, and gazed earnestly into his face.  Its worn and harrowed features, its look of graven patience, smote her like a cry.  She was about to speak to him eagerly and with sympathy, but he was gone.  His errand was finished,—­the last thing he could do for Mercy.  She watched his feeble steps as he walked away, and her pity revealed to her the history of his past.

“How he loved her! how he loved her!” she said, and watched his figure lingeringly, till it was out of sight.

This is the sonnet which was cut on the stone above Mercy’s grave:—­

  EMIGRAVIT.

  With sails full set, the ship her anchor weighs;
  Strange names shine out beneath her figure-head: 
  What glad farewells with eager eyes are said! 
  What cheer for him who goes, and him who stays! 
  Fair skies, rich lands, new homes, and untried days
  Some go to seek:  the rest but wait instead
  Until the next stanch ship her flag shall raise. 
  Who knows what myriad colonies there are
  Of fairest fields, and rich, undreamed-of gains,
  Thick-planted in the distant shining plains
  Which we call sky because they lie so far? 
  Oh, write of me, not,—­“Died in bitter pains,”
  But, “Emigrated to another star!”