I04 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 MiiUer'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 



