Nearest and dearest of all, the “beloved Kate” held him in highest honor.  The ripples that disturbed the smooth flow of their early life had died away and left an unruffled current.  To the childless wife, he was child, husband, and lover.  No sphere so lofty, but he could come quickly down to perform the lowliest duties.  The empty platter, silently placed on the dinner-table, was the signal for his descent from Parnassus to the money-earning graver.  No angel-faces kept him from lighting the morning fire and setting on the breakfast-kettle before his Kitty awoke.  Their life became one.  Her very spirit passed into his.  By day and by night her love surrounded him.  In his moments of fierce inspiration, when he would arise from his bed to sketch or write the thoughts that tore his brain, she, too, arose and sat by his side, silent, motionless, soothing him only by the tenderness of her presence.  Years and wintry fortunes made havoc of her beauty, but love renewed it day by day for the eyes of her lover, and their hands only met in firmer clasp as they neared the Dark River.

It was reached at last.  No violent steep, but a gentle and gracious slope led to the cold waters that had no bitterness for him.  Shining already in the glory of the celestial city, his eyes rested upon the dear form that had stood by his side through all these years, and with waning strength he cried, “Stay!  Keep as you are! You have been ever an angel to me:  I will draw you.”  And, summoning his forces, he sketched his last portrait of the fond and faithful wife.  Then, comforting her with the shortness of their separation, assuring her that he should always be about her to take care of her, he set his face steadfastly towards the Beautiful Gate.  So joyful was his passage, so triumphant his march, that the very sight was to them that could behold it as if heaven itself were come down to meet him.  Even the sorrowing wife could but listen enraptured to the sweet songs he chanted to his Maker’s praise; but, “They are not mine, my beloved!” he tenderly cried; “No! they are not mine!” The strain he heard was of a higher mood; and continually sounding as he went, with melodious noise, in notes on high, he entered in through the gates into the City.

* * * * *

THE FIRST VISIT TO WASHINGTON.

One chill morning in the autumn of 1826, in the town of Keene, New Hampshire, lights might have been seen at an unusually early hour in the windows of a yellow one-story-and-a-half house, that stood—­and still stands, perhaps—­on the corner of the main street and the Swanzey road.

There was living in that house a blind widow, the mother of a large family of children, now mostly scattered; and the occasion of the unseasonable lights was the departure from home of a son yet left to her, upon a long and uncertain adventure.