not leave us! do not leave us!' they cried. I, too, I cried, 'Do not
leave us! we adore thee! stay!' Flowers, bursting from the seed,
bathed her in their fragrance which uttered, 'Stay!' The giant Enakim
came forth from Jupiter, leading Gold and its friends and all the
Spirits of the Astral Regions which are joined with him, and they
said, 'We are thine for seven hundred years.' At last came Death on
his pale horse, crying, 'I will obey thee!' One and all fell prostrate
before her. Could you but have seen them! They covered as it were a
vast plain, and they cried aloud to her, 'We have nurtured thee, thou
art our child; do not abandon us!' At length Life issued from her Ruby
Waters, and said, 'I will not leave thee!' then, finding Seraphita
silent, she flamed upon her as the sun, crying out, 'I am light!' '_The
light_ is there!' cried Seraphita, pointing to the clouds where stood
the archangels; but she was wearied out; Desire had wrung her nerves,
she could only cry, 'My God! my God!' Ah! many an Angelic Spirit,
scaling the mountain and nigh to the summit, has set his foot upon a
rolling stone which plunged him back into the abyss! All these lost
Spirits adored her constancy; they stood around her,--a choir without
a song,--weeping and whispering, 'Courage!' At last she conquered;
Desire--let loose upon her in every Shape and every Species--was
vanquished. She stood in prayer, and when at last her eyes were lifted
she saw the feet of Angels circling in the Heavens."

"She saw the feet of Angels?" repeated Wilfrid.

"Yes," said the old man.

"Was it a dream that she told you?" asked Wilfrid.

"A dream as real as your life," answered David; "I was there."