and there were white scarfs and ribbons
“Topsy, you poor child,” she said, as she led her into her room, “don’t give up! _I_ can love you, though I am not like that dear little child. I hope I’ve learnt something of the love of Christ from her. I can love you; I do, and I’ll try to help you to grow up a good Christian girl.”
Miss Ophelia’s voice was more than her words, and more than that were the honest tears that fell down her face. From that hour, she acquired an influence over the mind of the destitute child that she never lost.
“O, my Eva, whose little hour on earth did so much of good,” thought St. Clare, “what account have I to give for my long years?”
There were, for a while, soft whisperings and footfalls in the chamber, as one after another stole in, to look at the dead; and then came the little coffin; and then there was a funeral, and carriages drove to the door, and strangers came and were seated; and there were white scarfs and ribbons, and crape bands, and mourners dressed in black crape; and there were words read from the Bible, and prayers offered; and St. Clare lived, and walked, and moved, as one who has shed every tear;–to the last he saw only one thing, that golden head in the coffin; but then he saw the cloth spread over it, the lid of the coffin closed; and he walked, when he was put beside the others, down to a little place at the bottom of the garden, and there, by the mossy seat where she and Tom had talked, and sung, and read so often, was the little grave. St. Clare stood beside it,–looked vacantly down; he saw them lower the little coffin; he heard, dimly, the solemn words, “I am the resurrection and the Life; he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live;” and, as the earth was cast in and filled up the little grave, he could not realize that it was his Eva that they were hiding from his sight.
Nor was it!–not Eva, but only the frail seed of that bright, immortal form with which she shall yet come forth, in the day of the Lord Jesus!
And then all were gone, and the mourners went back to the place which should know her no more; and Marie’s room was darkened, and she lay on the bed, sobbing and moaning in uncontrollable grief, and calling every moment for the attentions of all her servants. Of course, they had no time to cry,–why should they? the grief was _her_ grief, and she was fully convinced that nobody on earth did, could, or would feel it as she did.
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