As I remember the first fair touch
  Of those beautiful hands that I love so much,
  I seem to thrill as I then was thrilled,
  Kissing the glove that I found unfilled—­
  When I met your gaze, and the queenly bow,
  As you said to me, laughingly, “Keep it now!”
  And dazed and alone in a dream I stand
  Kissing this ghost of your beautiful hand.

  When first I loved, in the long ago,
  And held your hand as I told you so—­
  Pressed and caressed it and gave it a kiss,
  And said “I could die fora hand like this!”
  Little I dreamed love’s fulness yet
  Had to ripen when eyes were wet,
  And prayers were vain in their wild demands
  For one warm touch of your beautiful hands.

  Beautiful Hands!  O Beautiful Hands! 
  Could you reach out of the alien lands
  Where you are lingering, and give me, to-night,
  Only a touch—­were it ever so light—­
  My heart were soothed, and my weary brain
  Would lull itself into rest again;
  For there is no solace the world commands
  Like the caress of your beautiful hands.

* * * * *

Violently winking at the mist that blurs my sight, I regretfully awaken to the here and now.  And is it possible, I sorrowfully muse, that all this glory can have fled away?—­that more than twenty long, long years are spread between me and that happy night?  And is it possible that all the dear old faces—­O, quit it! quit it!  Gather the old scraps up and wad ’em back into oblivion, where they belong!

Yes, but be calm—­be calm!  Think of cheerful things.  You are not all alone. Billy’s living yet.

I know—­and six feet high—­and sag-shouldered—­and owns a tin and stove-store, and can’t hear thunder! Billy!

And the youngest Mills girl—­she’s alive, too.

S’pose I don’t know that?  I married her!

And Doc.—­

Bob married her.  Been in California for more than fifteen years—­on some blasted cattle-ranch, or something,—­and he’s worth a half a million!  And am I less prosperous with this gilded roll?