short afternoon the western sunshine comes into the study and
strives to stare the ruddy blaze out of countenance but with only a
brief triumph, soon to be succeeded by brighter glories of its
rival. Beautiful it is to see the strengthening gleam, the
deepening light that gradually casts distinct shadows of the human
figure, the table, and the high-backed chairs upon the opposite
wall, and at length, as twilight comes on, replenishes the room with
living radiance and makes life all rose-color. Afar the wayfarer
discerns the flickering flame as it dances upon the windows, and
hails it as a beacon-light of humanity, reminding him, in his cold
and lonely path, that the world is not all snow, and solitude, and
desolation. At eventide, probably, the study was peopled with the
clergyman's wife and family, and children tumbled themselves upon
the hearth-rug, and grave puss sat with her back to the fire, or
gazed, with a semblance of human meditation, into its fervid depths.
Seasonably the plenteous ashes of the day were raked over the
mouldering brands, and from the heap came jets of flame, and an
incense of night-long smoke creeping quietly up the chimney.

Heaven forgive the old clergyman! In his later life, when for
almost ninety winters he had been gladdened by the firelight,--when
it had gleamed upon him from infancy to extreme age, and never
without brightening his spirits as well as his visage, and perhaps
keeping him alive so long,--he had the heart to brick up his
chimney-place and bid farewell to the face of his old friend
forever, why did he not take an eternal leave of the sunshine too?
His sixty cords of wood had probably dwindled to a far less ample
supply in modern times; and it is certain that the parsonage had
grown crazy with time and tempest and pervious to the cold; but
still it was one of the saddest tokens of the decline and fall of