“Yes,” said Miriam, who had been revolving some such thoughts as the above, “it is a good state of mind for mortal man, when he is content to leave no more definite memorial than the grass, which will sprout kindly and speedily over his grave, if we do not make the spot barren with marble.  Methinks, too, it will be a fresher and better world, when it flings off this great burden of stony memories, which the ages have deemed it a piety to heap upon its back.”

“What you say,” remarked Kenyon, “goes against my whole art.  Sculpture, and the delight which men naturally take in it, appear to me a proof that it is good to work with all time before our view.”

“Well, well,” answered Miriam, “I must not quarrel with you for flinging your heavy stones at poor Posterity; and, to say the truth, I think you are as likely to hit the mark as anybody.  These busts, now, much as I seem to scorn them, make me feel as if you were a magician..  You turn feverish men into cool, quiet marble.  What a blessed change for them!  Would you could do as much for me!”

“O, gladly!” cried Kenyon, who had long wished to model that beautiful and most expressive face.  “When will you begin to sit?”

“Poh! that was not what I meant,” said Miriam.  “Come, show me something else.”

“Do you recognize this?” asked the sculptor.

He took out of his desk a little old-fashioned ivory coffer, yellow with age; it was richly carved with antique figures and foliage; and had Kenyon thought fit to say that Benvenuto Cellini wrought this precious box, the skill and elaborate fancy of the work would by no means have discredited his word, nor the old artist’s fame.  At least, it was evidently a production of Benvenuto’s school and century, and might once have been the jewel-case of some grand lady at the court of the De’ Medici.

Lifting the lid, however, no blaze of diamonds was disclosed, but only, lapped in fleecy cotton, a small, beautifully shaped hand, most delicately sculptured in marble.  Such loving care and nicest art had been lavished here, that the palm really seemed to have a tenderness in its very substance.  Touching those lovely fingers,—­had the jealous sculptor allowed you to touch,—­you could hardly believe that a virgin warmth would not steal from them into your heart.

“Ah, this is very beautiful!” exclaimed Miriam, with a genial smile.  “It is as good in its way as Loulie’s hand with its baby-dimples, which Powers showed me at Florence, evidently valuing it as much as if he had wrought it out of a piece of his great heart.  As good as Harriet Hosmer’s clasped hands of Browning and his wife, symbolizing the individuality and heroic union of two high, poetic lives!  Nay, I do not question that it is better than either of those, because you must have wrought it passionately, in spite of its maiden palm and dainty fingertips.”

“Then you do recognize it?” asked Kenyon.