something mournful in seeing the beautiful day die with all its pomp and
music, its sunshine, and songs of birds."

"And yet," replied Falkland, "if I remember the time when my feelings
were more in unison with yours (for at present external objects have lost
for me much of their influence and attraction), the melancholy you
perceive has in it a vague and ineffable sweetness not to be exchanged
for more exhilarated spirits. The melancholy which arises from no cause
within ourselves is like music--it enchants us in proportion to its
effect upon our feelings. Perhaps its chief charm (though this it
requires the contamination of after years before we can fathom and
define) is in the purity of the sources it springs from. Our feelings
can be but little sullied and worn while they can yet respond to the
passionless and primal sympathies of Nature; and the sadness you speak
of is so void of bitterness, so allied to the best and most delicious
sensations we enjoy, that I should imagine the very happiness of Heaven
partook rather of melancholy than mirth."

There was a pause of some moments. It was rarely that Falkland alluded
even so slightly to the futurity of another world; and when he did, it
was never in a careless and commonplace manner, but in a tone which sank
deep into Emily's heart. "Look," she said, at length, "at that beautiful
star! the first and brightest! I have often thought it was like the
promise of life beyond the tomb--a pledge to us that, even in the depths
of midnight, the earth shall have a light, unquenched and unquenchable,
from Heaven!"

Emily turned to Falkland as she said this, and her countenance sparkled
with the enthusiasm she felt. But his face was deadly pale. There went
over it, like a cloud, an expression of changeful and unutterable