"I was in bed, wide awake, and it was pitch dark. You know you put the cover over the skylight when it rained, the other day, and it has not been taken off. Well, instead of shutting my eyes, I kept them wide open, and looked straight into the dark. I've heard that you can see spirits so, and so I thought I might see my mamma. Pretty soon there was a great hole in the dark, like a whirlpool, and after a minute there was a little light down at the bottom of it. I kept on looking, just as if I were looking down into a deep well, and then there came colors in clouds, sailing about, just like clouds in the sky. Some were red, others pink, others blue, and all colors. Sometimes there would be a pattern of colors, just like figures in a carpet, only they were blocks, not flowers. I didn't dream it. I saw it as plainly as I see the fire this minute. What do you suppose it was, Mr. Rowan?" He had listened with interest, and did not appear to find anything surprising in the recital. "I don't know much about optics," he answered; "but I suppose there is a scientific reason for this, whether it is known or not. I've seen those colors--that is, I did when I was a child; and De Quincey, in his _Opium Confessions_, tells the same story. I don't believe that grown people are likely to see them, for the reason that they shut their eyes, and their minds are more occupied. You have to stare a good while into the dark, and wait what comes, and not think much of anything." "Yes," said Edith. "But what do you guess it is?" Mr. Rowan leaned back in his chair, with his hands clasped behind his head, and considered the matter a moment, some finer intelligence than often showed there kindling behind his bloated face. "I should guess it might be this," he said. "Though the place appears at first to be dark, there are really some particles of light there. And since there are too few of them to keep up a connection in their perfect state, they divide into their colors, and make the clouds you saw. I don't know why particles of light should not separate, when they have a great deal to do, and not much to do it with. Air does." "But what made them move?" Edith asked. "They were never still." "Perhaps they were alive." She stared, with scintillating eyes. Mr. Rowan gave a short, silent laugh. He knew that the child was only questioning in order to keep him. "No reason why not," he said. "According to Sir Humphry Davy, and some other folks, I believe, heat isn't caloric, but repulsive motion. It isn't matter, but it moves, goes where nothing else can, passes through stone and iron, and can't be stopped, and can't be seen. Now, a something that is not matter, and yet is powerful enough to overcome matter, must be spirit. Heat is the soul of light; and if heat is spirit, light is alive. _Voilà tout!_"