seashell, so delicate you feared to look straight at it lest the blush die 
away to be seen no more. | wished I were painter so as to paint them 
all: but could 1? And the buds, ready for flowering, were fairer than 
the flower, and had moss upon them, so that I thought I had found a 
colony of God's moss roses growing wild. When spring comes round 
and the dwarf roses bloom, go you, good friend, and watch for them as 
for the coming of a longed-for comrade; and bring some of the love- 
liest away with you and and press them in a book, and write in the book 
where you found them, their color, when you gathered them, and their 
sweet capricious ways, 
and confess you love 
<| them, whereat, mayhap, 
ilthey may learn to love 
yyou in return—who 
knows? For a mile 
land more along the 
banks the wild parsnip 
was swaying to the touch 
sof every wind—whorls of 
y) gold was what they were 
—and looking across a 
mile of them was look- 
ing at a pathway of 
wrought gold, and who 
was I, to walk on gold- 
caved streets before my 
time, or to stand, as 
sometimes | did, when 
the flowers stood tall, in golden corridors? Once, just once, a rivulet 
crossed the path. I saw it glint among the grasses and come slyly 
closer, like some living thing filled with curiosity, and then it ran under 
our bridge as one affrightened, but the water was clear and intent on 
its journey. If | spoke to it in passing, it either heard not, or, if hear- 
ing, made no reply, nor even gave a backward look. Perhaps its ret- 
icence was to hide ignorance, for perchance it knew not whither it was 
going, only knowing it was time to haste like a truant child overtaken 
by the dark; and | cried, ‘‘ You are going to the sea,’’ but no word did 
it reply, only there was audible laughter such as I loved to listen to; 
and | seemed to be bent on talking to the rivulet, for I said, ‘‘ You are 
134 
THE BRIDGE 
