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Then she hesitated a moment, a low melody came from the organ, and the words of the beautiful lullaby fell from her lips: "Sweet and low, sweet and low, Wind of the western sea; Low, low, breathe and blow, Wind of the western sea; Over the rolling waters go, Come from the dying moon and blow, Blow him again to me, While my little one, while my pretty one sleeps."
Here he makes a round nest of fine grass and upon a couch of thistledown he sleeps in peace, now and then waking to partake of the little hoard of nuts which he has gathered, or he may even dare to frolic about upon the snow in the cold winter moonlight, leaving behind him no trace, save the fairy tracery of his tiny footprints.
The Frenchman and woman never leave her day or night. He is on guard with weapons and a night light at her door, and the maid sleeps in the room. "And she has other secret helpers!" groaned the baffled Ram Lal. "She is writing and receiving letters all the time. And yet none of these come or go by the post.
Alas! he is dead; he sleeps; he cannot hear! Then they turn again to tears and curses, feeling that no help or comfort can come from the clay-cold form. The intensity of grief finds strange language for its utterance. A girl, mourning over her father, cries: 'Mi l'hannu crucifissatu Cume Ghiesu Cristu in croce. Once only, in Viale's collection, does any friend of the dead remember mercy.
Then Madame Prune, who sleeps with her mouth wide open, showing her rows of blackened teeth; from her throat arises an intermittent sound like the grunting of a sow. Oh! poor Madame Prune! how hideous she is!! Next, M. Sucre, a mere mummy for the time being. And finally, at his side, last of the row, is their servant, Mademoiselle Dede!
The sinking paleness of death fell on him; but with it there fell, as if shed from the wings of some pitying spirit, a beautiful expression of peace, like that of a wearied child who sleeps. So he lay for a few moments. They saw that the mighty hand was on him.
"We are preparing the state apartments, dear little Fraeulein," replied Corporal Fritz, rubbing his hands with an air of great enjoyment. "But why? For whom?" "For whom? Why, for the King, to be sure"; and Corporal Fritz clapped his hand to the side of his hat like a loyal soldier. "Don't you know, dear little Fraeulein, that His Majesty sleeps here to-night, on his way to Ehrenbreitstein?"
The new hopes, the fond yearnings, the terrified misgivings, the timid belief, and weak confidence; the child that is born and dies smiling prettily and the mother's heart is rent so, that it can love, or hope, or suffer no more. Allah is God! She sleeps by the little fezzes. Hark! the guns are booming over the water, and His Highness is coming from his prayers.
I am fully prepared; am undressed, and ready for the combat. I have made a mighty sacrifice! Youth, fortune, fame, all blasted; life renounced, and infamy ascertained! It is but just then that I should have full enjoyment of the fleeting bliss. Surely this hussy sleeps? No! I hear her stir! She is at the door! And now ! Heaven and hell are leagued against me, to frustrate my success!
Their carriage was now engaged in threading narrow, shadowed thoroughfares which wound through what might have been a city of the dead. From midnight till cock-crow old-world Paris sleeps, and the windows of the high houses on either side of the deserted streets through which they were now driving were all closely shuttered.
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