Poor little birds, moving uneasily in the darkness, threw down tiny fragments from the rocks, and each fragment fell with a sound like the clink of a delicate silver bell; softly the sea moaned, softly the night-wind blew, and softly—­so softly!—­came whispering the spirits of the dead.  Joyous faces could be seen by that lake long, long ago.  In summer, when the lower rim was all blazing with red and yellow flowers, young lovers came to whisper and gaze.  They are dead and gone.  In winter, when the tarn was covered with jetty glossy ice, there were jovial scenes whereof the jollity was shared by a happy few.  Round and round on the glossy surface the skaters flew and passed like gliding ghosts under the gloom of the rocks; the hiss of the iron sounded musically, and the steep wall flung back sharp echoes of harmless laughter.  Each volume of sound was magically magnified, and the gay company carried on their pleasant outing far into the chili winter night.  They are all gone!  One was there oftenest in spring and summer, and the last sun-rays often made her golden hair shine in splendour as she stood gazing wistfully over the solemn lake.  She saw wonders there that coarser spirits could not know; and all her gentle musings passed into poetry—­poetry that was seldom spoken.  Those who loved her never cared to break her sacred stillness as she pondered by the side of the beloved tarn; her language was not known to common folk, for she held high converse with the great of old time; and, when she chanced to speak with me, I understood but dimly, though I had all the sense of beauty and mystery.  A shipwrecked sailor said she looked as if she belonged to God.  Her Master claimed her early.  Dear, your yellow hair will shine no more in the sun that you loved; you have long given over your day-dreams—­and you are now dreamless.  Or perhaps you dwell amid the silent glory of one last long dream of those you loved.  The gorse on the moor moans by your grave, the brackens grow green and tall and wither into dead gold year by year, the lake gleams gloomily in fitful flashes amid its borders of splendour; and you rest softly while the sea calls your lullaby nightly.  Far off, far off, my soul, by quiet seas where the lamps of the Southern Cross hang in the magnificence of the purple sky, there is one who remembers the lake, and the glassy ice, and the blaze of pompous summer, and the shining of that yellow hair.  Peace—­oh, peace!  The sorrow has passed into quiet pensive regret that is nigh akin to gladness.

How many other ineffable days and nights have I known?  All who can feel the thrilling of sea-winds, all who can have even one day amid grass and fair trees, grasp the time of delight, enjoy all beauties, do not pass in coarseness one single minute; and then, when the Guide comes to point your road through the strange gates, you may be like me—­you may repine at nothing, for you will have much good to remember and scanty evil.  It is good for me now to think