io 4 MORE POT-POURRI 



time, in the hurry and business of life, even to glance 

 through them. It is an employment that requires rather 

 a peculiar state of mind, a quiet eddy away from the too 

 rapid swirl of ordinary life. Such an occupation must 

 recall to the memory of anyone who has ever read it 

 Professor Max Miiller's preface to his charming little 

 story called 'German Love,' which was published as long 

 ago as 1877. The little book treats of love the eternal 

 familiar subject with that touch of genius that makes 

 originality, and the preface fits so curiously with my 

 thoughts to-night that I think I must quote it : 



' Who has not, once in his life, sat down at a desk 

 where shortly before another sat who now rests in the 

 grave ? Who has not had to open the locks which for 

 long years hid the most sacred secrets of a heart that 

 now lies hidden in the holy calm of the churchyard? 

 Here are the letters which were so loved by him whom 

 we all loved so well; here are pictures and ribbons, and 

 books with marks on every page. Who can now read 

 and decipher them ? Who can gather together the faded 

 and broken leaves of this rose, and endow them once 

 more with living fragrance ? The flames which among 

 the Greeks received the body of the departed for fiery 

 destruction the flames into which the ancients cast 

 everything that had been most dear to the living are 

 still the safest resting-places for such relics. With 

 trembling hesitation, the bereaved friend reads the pages 

 which no eye had ever seen, save the one now closed for 

 ever ; and when he has satisfied himself by a rapid 

 glance that these pages and letters contain nothing 

 which the world calls important, he throws them hastily 

 on the glowing coals; they flame up, and are gone. 



'From such flames the following pages were saved. 

 They were intended at first for the friends only of the 

 lost one ; but as they have found friends amongst 



