A Face Illumined

by E. P. Roe


Preface




As may be gathered from the following pages, my title was obtained
a a number of years ago, and the story has since been taking form
and color in my mind. What has become of the beautiful but discordant
face I saw at the concert garden I do not know, but I trust that
that the countenance it suggested, and its changes may not prove
so vague and unsatisfactory as to be indistinct to the reader. It
has looked upon the writer during the past year almost like the face
of a living maiden, and I have felt, in a way that would be hard
to explain, that I have had but little to do with its expressions,
and that forces and influences over which I had no control were
moulding character.

The old garden, and the aged man who grew young within it, are not
creations, but sacred memories.

That the book may tend to ennoble other faces than that of Ida
Mayhew, is the earnest wish of

E. P. Roe.