"And yet," remarked Bergan, musingly, "the spirit, the idea, that informed those bodies, and gave them identity, is not lost, as your Mercury shows plainly. The being that you have created lives, and glows with all his proper warmth and fire, even though his original substance has not only returned whence it came, but has helped to frame an entirely different being." "The natural body and the spiritual body," returned Astra. "Not that the two processes are really analogous,--I do not mean that,--but one naturally suggests the other to the mind. And, seeing how I am thus able to accomplish a kind of resurrection, in a way that I understand, I do not find it difficult to believe that the Almighty can do it, in a way that I do not understand, and far more perfectly,--retaining not only the indwelling spirit, but enough of the individual clay to justify Job's saying, 'In my flesh I shall see God.'" The thought kept them both silent, for a moment; then Bergan turned to see what else of interest was to be found in the studio. The completed works were not many; Miss Lyte was still too young to have made a large accumulation of such things. There was a bust, with a very sweet and noble expression, wherein she had embodied her recollections of a fellow student in art. There was a half-sleepy, half-ashamed boy-face, looking out from under the shadow of a drooping hat, representing "Little Boy Blue," of nursery fame. There was a winged cherub, with an exceedingly lovely, innocent face,--a very incarnation of celestial joy and peace. In relief, there was a stout urchin, ankle-deep in water, laden with pond-lilies, and looking for more. Finally, there were innumerable studies, sketches, and designs, with all the warmth and freshness of the original inspiration lingering about them; which interested Bergan scarcely less than the finished work, as admitting him still more freely into the arcana of the artist's mind and method. He was especially interested to observe in how many directions the genius of Miss Lyte had tried its wing. There were studies, and even finished pictures, in oil and in crayon; there was an exquisitely-cut cameo, fastened on a background of velvet; there were designs for stained-glass windows; and in all, there was a curious medley of subjects,--scriptural, mythological, historical, domestic, and still-life. It was plain that she had been slowly feeling her way to some point, where she could take her final stand, and see her life-work lying clear and fair before her. Had she found it? Looking at the Mercury, Bergan could almost believe that she had; but, glancing again at her deep, wistful eyes, he doubted it. A little more time, a profounder and wider experience, would settle her genius, fix her aims, and make her capable of things far higher than aught that she had yet achieved.