dead,——and dashed himself down in the snow in a fit of passion. It was
the first time that the youth had ever been sorely tried; all his hidden
and unconscious love for the fair lost girl had flowed up from the bottom
of his heart; and at once the sole object which had blest his life and
made him the happiest of the happy was taken away and cruelly destroyed,
so that, sullen, wrathful, baffled, and despairing, there he lay, cursing
his existence, and in too great agony to think of prayer. “God,” he then
thought, “has forsaken me, and why should he think on me, when he suffers
one so good and beautiful as Hannah to be frozen to death?” God thought
both of him and of Hannah, and through his infinite mercy forgave the
sinner in his wild turbulence of passion. William Grieve had never gone
to bed without joining in prayer; and he revered the Sabbath day and kept
it holy. Much is forgiven to the human heart by him who so fearfully
framed it; and God is not slow to pardon the love which one human being
bears to another, in his frailty, even though that love forget or arraign
his own unsleeping providence. His voice has told us to love one another;
and William loved Hannah in simplicity, innocence, and truth. That she
should perish, was a thought so dreadful, that, in its agony, God seemed
a ruthless being——“Blow——blow——blow, and drift us up forever,——we cannot
be far asunder. O Hannah,——Hannah!——think ye not that the fearful God has
forsaken us?”
As the boy groaned these words passionately through his quivering lips,
there was a sudden lowness in the air, and he heard the barking of his
absent dog, while the one at his feet hurried off in the direction of the
sound, and soon loudly joined the cry. It was not a bark of surprise,
or anger, or fear, but of recognition and love. William sprang up from
his bed in the snow, and with his heart knocking at his bosom even to
sickness, he rushed headlong through the drifts, with a giant’s strength,
and fell down half dead with joy and terror beside the body of Hannah Lee.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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