XVI. 



LOW PRICES AND LONG FACES. 



DAYS weeks months how you drift away ! bear- 

 ing the present time with all its clamorous and busy 

 sounds of life, into that long wake that stretches far 

 farther than the eye can reach behind us ! How 

 you float past boiling and tumultuous at first, as just 

 escaped from the din and turmoil that marks the ever- 

 lasting conflict of our onward course then gently and 

 deceitfully subsiding off with only a rising ripple here 

 and there, that beckons to the eye and tells of some- 

 thing that will be remembered some duty unper- 

 formed some happiness perceived too late, then, 

 at last, sinking away into the smooth surface that 

 stretches far behind in undistinguishable outline, 

 blending near things and remote into one great 

 PAST, and leaving us to wonder at the intensities 

 of fear and hope, of vanity and usefulness, of evil 



