We chatted awhile of the sunset. Then I accompanied her to the edge of the hill. Under her sacred hair her face retained girl-contours. The wrinkles were not too deep. She seemed not to have changed as mothers often do, when, under decades of inevitable sorrow, the features are recarved into the special mask of middle age, and finally into the very different mask of senility. She had yet the authority of Beauty. She wore her white hair with a Quakerish-feminine skill most admirably adapted to that ancient forehead. I divined she had learned that at sixteen. What a long time to be remembering. We were spirits that at once met and understood. She said: “My son, I have walked all my life across this valley, or up this hill, or toward that green mountain where you are going. I never walked as far as I wanted to. But walking even so short a path makes for consolation.” Now she laid aside antique grandeur and took on plain vanity. “Do you know how old I am?” “About eighty-five.” “I’m ninety-two years old, young man, and I’m going to live ten years more.” It was getting late. I said, “I am glad indeed to have met you.” She answered, “I am sorry my valley has not been kind.” I ventured to ask, “So it’s _your_ valley?” I had touched a raw nerve. I was completely shaken by the suddenness of her answer. “Mine! Mine! Mine!” she shrieked. Kneeling, she beat up the dust of the road with her cane. And then “Mine! Mine! Mine!” shaking her outstretched arms over that amphitheatre, as though she would drag it all to her breast. She was out of breath and trembling. At length she smiled, and added so quietly it seemed another person. “And they shall not take it away from me.” I helped her to her feet. She was once more the Martha Washington sort.... I remember her last sentence. In a royal tone, that was three times an accolade, in a motherly tone that was caressing and slow she half-sung the pretty words:-- “Good evening, young man. I wish you well.” The man at the next house took me in. In the course of the evening he assured me that the old lady did own the valley, and that she ruled it with a rod of iron. The family graveyard was full of heirs who had grown to old age and died of old age hoping in vain to outlive, and to inherit her authority. WITH A ROSE, TO BRUNHILDE BRUNHILDE, with the young Norn soul That has no peace, and grim as those That spun the thread of life, give heed: Peace is concealed in every rose. And in these petals peace I bring: A jewel clearer than the dew: A perfume subtler than the breath Of Spring with which it circles you. Peace I have found, asleep, awake, By many paths, on many a strand. Peace overspreads the sky with stars. Peace is concealed within your hand. And when at night I clasp it there I wonder how you never know The strength you shed from finger-tips: The treasure that consoles me so.