And he began to look more cheerful and contented.  He again looked at his mansion and broad fields, and again he opened his book.  The jokes were better now than a little while before.

But the bees buzzed on; the trees sang their old soothing song; the air remained warm; and soon Moses Grant began to nod assent to his book, though the matters it contained were not of opinion, but of fancy.  By which I mean that he grew sleepy.

* * * * *

Sudden darkness fell upon the earth.  The sun, after sending its rays to glitter in the river so brightly that Moses Grant put his hand over his eyes as he looked from his arbor-door, went out, and the blackness of night wrapped itself about the world.  The elms, that had rattled their deep green leaves in the wind, and the birch, that had so gracefully bowed its slender, yellowish head, were all colorless now.  There was no storm-cloud to veil the heavens, and yet the sad-faced moon came not out to remind the world of their lost loves and deferred hopes—­nor the stars, to twinkle in their silence, as though there were a great Soul in the skies that longed to speak to men, but had no utterance save a thousand love-lit eyes.  All was darkness—­dense, universal.

Yet Moses Grant had sat unmoved in his vine-grown arbor.  His soul was passionless, his face was calm.  His book had fallen to the ground, and his head rested on the back of his chair.

Suddenly there came a visitor to the arbor.  Moses raised his head and saw a being—­whether man or woman I can not tell—­with a face, oh! so bright and calm, with eyes that looked from the deepest soul, and a pure forehead that spoke of unworldly rest—­a face that shone in its own vista of light when all around was dark.  The Presence bore an open book in its hands, and came and stood before Moses Grant and looked earnestly into his face.

‘Who are you?’ he cried, half in fear, before the calm look of his visitor, and half in confidence, because of the look of love.

‘I am the census-taker.’

‘No, no; it was he who came a little while ago.’

’He was one census-taker—­he came to learn how much you seemed to possess; I come to learn your real possessions.  I am the real census-taker.’

Moses Grant knew not what it meant; he sat speechless, in wonder.  He would have fled, but he knew not where he could flee in the darkness; he must remain with his strange visitor, as all men must one day stand alone with an awakened Conscience.

‘When were you born?’ asked the Presence.

‘Sixty years ago,’ answered Moses.

’You understand me not.  I do not ask for the time when you were born into your outward show of life, but when you commenced to live.’

‘Still I do not know your meaning,’ said Moses.

’Then you have not yet been born.  You exist—­you do not live.  Say not again that you have lived sixty years, for your being has not yet expanded into life.’