Now Bice learned my words and followed me. She knew my utterance. I was the master--she the disciple. But here was one who could lead me. I would be the follower and disciple. From her I could learn more than in all my life I could ever discover by my own unassisted efforts. It was mine, therefore, to struggle to overcome the lisping, stammering utterance of my purely earthly music; to gain from her some knowledge of the mood of that holier, heavenly expression, so that at last I might be able in some degree to speak to this exile the language of the home which she loved; that we, by holding commune in this language, might rise together to a higher spiritual realm, and that she in her solitude might receive at least some associate. So I proposed to her to come back and stay with me again. She consented at once. Before that memorable evening I purified my heart by fasting and prayer. I was like one who was seeking to ascend into heaven to take part in that celestial communion, to join in the New Song, the music of the angels. By fasting and prayer I sought so to ascend, and to find thoughts and fit utterance for those thoughts. I looked upon my office as similar to that of the holy prophets of old. I felt that I had a power of utterance if the Divine One would only inspire. I fasted and prayed that so I might reduce this grosser material frame, and sharpen and quicken every nerve, and stimulate every fibre of the brain. So alone could I most nearly approach to the commune of spirits. Thus had those saints and prophets of old done when they had entered upon the search after this communion, and they had received their reward, even the visitation of angels and the vision of the blessed. A prophet--yes--now, in these days, it is left for the prophet to utter forth his inspiration by no other way than that of music. So I fasted and prayed. I took up the words from the holy priesthood, and I said, as they say: Munda cor meum, ac labia mea, Omnipotens Deus, qui labia Isaiae prophetae, calculo mundasti ignito! For so Isaiah had been exalted till he heard the language of heaven, the music of the seraphim. She, my divinity, my adored, enshrined again in my house, bore herself as before--kind to me and gentle beyond all expression, but with thoughts of her own that placed between us a gulf as wide as that which separates the mortal from the immortal. On that evening she was with me in the parlor which looks out upon the Northwest Arm. The moon shone down there, the dark, rocky hills on the opposite side rose in heavy masses. The servants were away in the city. We were alone. Ah, my Cremona! if a material instrument were ever able to utter forth sounds to which immortals might listen, thou, best gift of my father, thou canst utter them!