hurt so! You, my sweet rose-lady, whom I had torn, and crushed, and made to bleed! Christine, pale, sad Christine! To spend one moment weeping at your feet, trying a little to soothe and comfort and console you, to atone a little for the sorrow I had caused you, to pour out my love and my remorse before you! Oh, good God! But of course, of course, I knew that I might as well hope to speak with one who was dead. I, a married man, had no right, even in my own secret thoughts, to wish for such a meeting between you and me. And you, despising me, you would fly from me, you would never permit me to draw near to you. And yet, it is so hard to reconcile one's self to the truth, even when one can have no doubt about it, I would go on hoping, in spite of the hopelessness, in spite of the fact that I had no right to hope--hoping that somehow the impossible might come to pass. But at the same time, I would think: 'How else? Is there any other way?' Necessarily, it occurred to me to write. But the idea of writing was repugnant. I never could tell the half of what I had to tell by writing; and then, what assurance had I that you would read my letter? (What assurance have I, even now?) So, for the time being, I put the plan of writing out of my head; and went back, and asked again: 'How else?' Was there no possible method by which I could let you know what weighed so heavily, so heavily, upon my mind? Sometimes the most absurd notions would seize hold of me, with all the force of realities. For a little while, this would become not merely a theory, as of a thing conceivable, but a conviction, as of a thing actual; that, thinking of you as constantly and as intently as I did, by some occult means in nature, my spirit was enabled to transcend the limitations of space and matter, and to reach yours, and to communicate with it. For hours at a stretch, I would sit here at my studio window, harboring this delicious fancy: that now, at this very moment, by the operation of some subtle psychic force, you were receiving the message which my heart was sending you. I had read of such things in wonder-tales, even in serious pseudoscientific treatises. Why might there not be something in them? But, as I have said, only for a little while could a fancy like this hold its place. In a little while my common-sense would assert itself, and bring the dismal truth looming up again stark before me. All of a sudden, one day, I thought of my painting. It made my pulse leap. It seemed like an inspiration. I would paint a picture which--if you saw it; and if I sent it to the exhibition, you would very likely see it--which would tell you the whole story. In a fever of impatience to get the picture begun, and without having stopped to determine what the picture was to be, I procured canvas, paints, brushes. Then I paused, and asked: 'But what shall I paint?' It did not require much thinking, to make the futility of the whole design clear to me.