Well, most men have some plan of life, into which all the strength and the keen, fine feeling of their nature enter; but generally they try to make it real in early youth, and, balked then, laugh ever afterwards at their own folly. This poor old Knowles had begun to block out his dream when he was a gaunt, gray-haired man of sixty. I have known men so build their heart's blood, and brains into their work, that, when it tumbled down, their lives went with it. His fell that dull day in October; but if it hurt him, no man knew it. He sat there, looking at the broad plateau, whistling softly to himself, a long time. He had meant that a great many hearts should be made better and happier there; he had dreamed----God knows what he had dreamed, of which this reality was the foundation,--of how much world-freedom, or beauty, or kindly life this was the heart or seed. It was all over now. All the afternoon the muddy sky hung low over the hills and dull prairie, while he sat there looking at the dingy gloom: just as you and I have done, perhaps, some time, thwarted in some true hope,--sore and bitter against God, because He did not see how much His universe needed our pet reform. He got up at last, and without a sigh went slowly away, leaving the courage and self-reliance of his life behind him, buried with that one beautiful, fair dream of life. He never came back again. People said Knowles was quieter since his loss; but I think only God saw the depth of the difference. When he was leaving the plateau, that day, he looked back at it, as if to say good-bye,--not to the dingy fields and river, but to the Something he had nursed so long in his rugged heart, and given up now forever. As he looked, the warm, red sun came out, lighting up with a heartsome warmth the whole gray day. Some blessing power seemed to look at him from this grave yard of his hopes, from the gloomy hills, the prairie, and the river, which he never was to see again. His hope accomplished could not have looked at him with surer content and fulfilment. He turned away, ungrateful and moody. Long afterwards he remembered the calm and brightness which his hand had not been raised to make, and understood the meaning of its promise.