It was dead when I lifted it up.

Beside it was an egg.

It too was dead. Ah, how I wept--

* * *

This Morning.

How my heart beats. To-day A MAN passed. He passed:
actually passed.

From my window I saw him go by the garden gate and out
into the meadow beside the river where my Tchupvskja
flower is growing!

How beautiful he looked! Not tall like Alexis Alexovitch,
ah, no! but so short and wide and round--shaped like the
beautiful cabbage that died last week.

He wore a velvet jacket and he carried a camp stool and an
easel on his back, and in his face was a curved pipe with
a long stem, and his face was not red and rough like the
face of Alexis, but mild and beautiful and with a smile
that played on it like moonlight over putty.

Do I love him? I cannot tell. Not yet. Love is a gentle
plant. You cannot force its growth.