records as you have for theirs,--when you return after a long interval
of years to a house like that, you stand, as stood Darrell, a forlorn
stranger under your own roof-tree. What cared he for those who had last
gathered round those hearths with their chill steely grates, whose forms
had reclined on those formal couches, whose feet had worn away the gloss
from those costly carpets? Histories in the lives of many might be
recorded within those walls. "Lovers there had breathed their first
vows; bridal feasts had been held; babes had crowed in the arms of proud
young mothers; politicians there had been raised into ministers;
ministers there had fallen back into independent members;" through those
doors corpses had been borne forth to relentless vaults. For these races
and their records what cared the owner? Their writing was not on the
walls. Sponged out, as from a slate, their reckonings with Time; leaving
dim, here and there, some chance scratch of his own, blurred and bygone.
Leaning against the mantelpiece, Darrell gazed round the room with a
vague wistful look, as if seeking to conjure up associations that might
link the present hour to that past life which had slipped away elsewhere;
and his profile, reflected on the mirror behind, pale and mournful,
seemed like that ghost of himself which his memory silently evoked.

The man is but little altered externally since we saw him last, however
inly changed since he last stood on those unwelcoming floors; the form
still retained the same vigour and symmetry,--the same unspeakable
dignity of mien and bearing; the same thoughtful bend of the proud neck,
--so distinct, in its elastic rebound, from the stoop of debility or age.
'thick as ever the rich mass of dark-brown hair, though, when in the
impatience of some painful thought his hand swept the loose curls from
his forehead, the silver threads might now be seen shooting here and
there,--vanishing almost as soon as seen. No, whatever the baptismal
register may say to the contrary, that man is not old,--not even elderly;