No more rushed the blue tunics for the mail when the coach
came in--alas, it came no more! The fields remained as when last
cropped, and if we went to the Cottage no merry sound of music came
from the school room. We mounted the stairs without meeting the classic
face or the elastic step and figure of the Professor or his fair
sister, and in vain did we look for the concourse of books where once
he wielded his modest pen and translated his German "_lieder_"
No more mounted in air the beautiful doves that circled and tumbled in
their flight--_my_ doves, that would come at my call and alight
on my hands, head and shoulders, and scramble for the corn I held out
to them in my palms. Sunday after Sunday, week after week, I spent in
the Hive. I looked out of the window but ventured not to go to the
Eyry, for there the music had finally ceased; or if the spirits sang
their dirges in those classic walls, my dim ears did not hear them.
Mr. Ripley's books had gone to swell Rev. Theodore Parker's library.
Were they surrendered without a pang? I will tell you. "Fanny," said
Mr. Ripley, seeing his valued books departing, "I can now understand
how a man would feel if he could attend his own funeral.
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