But yesterday I saw a smiling infant in its
fond mother's arms; a thousand dimpling smiles played around its
beautiful features, and its eyes beamed with brilliancy; thou didst
approach, and lay thy icy hand upon its fluttering pulses, and all
was still. The parted lips had closed with the passing smile yet
upon them, the eye had ceased to roll, that little form was cold
and motionless as the clods of the valley, life had ebbed away, the
mysterious link that bound the soul to the body was broken; the spirit
had departed; many witnessed the expiring struggle, but none saw the
spirit as it took its flight from its clay tenement; yet it had gone
with thee over yon dark stream.
Again I entered the chamber where a father lay, upon whom a numerous
family were dependant. Thou wast there; thy icy breath was upon him;
thy agonizing throes were depicted on his pallid countenance; his
expansive chest heaved laboriously; his shortening breath came up
convulsively, and his eyes seemed starting from their sockets. He had
been called suddenly--unexpectedly to meet thee. A tearful wife and
children gathered around the bed, formed an interesting group, and
strove in vain to allay the agony of the husband and father. But a
sterner blow, and that wife was a widow, those children fatherless.
Thou hadst taken that father to "that undiscovered country from whose
bourne no traveler e'er returns." That weeping wife and those children
"were cast abandoned on the world's wide stage, doomed in scanty
poverty to roam.
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