"Willingly," answered Ernest; and then he added, smiling, "MethinksI never saw the Great Stone Face look so hospitably at a stranger."The poet sat down on the bench beside him, and he and Ernest talkedtogether. Often had the poet held intercourse with the wittiest andthe wisest, but never before with a man like Ernest, whose thoughtsand feelings gushed up with such a natural freedom, and who made greattruths so familiar by his simple utterance of them. Angels, as hadbeen so often said, seemed to have wrought with him at his labor inthe fields; angels seemed to have sat with him by the fireside; and,dwelling with angels as friend with friends, he had imbibed thesublimity of their ideas, and imbued it with the sweet and lowly charmof household words. So thought the poet. And Ernest, on the otherhand, was moved and agitated by the living images which the poet flungout of his mind, and which peopled all the air about thecottage-door with shapes of beauty, both gay and pensive. Thesympathies of these two men instructed them with a profounder sensethan either could have attained alone. Their minds accorded into onestrain, and made delightful music which neither of them could haveclaimed as all his own, nor distinguished his own share from theother's. They led one another, as it were, into a high pavilion oftheir thoughts, so remote, and hitherto so dim, that they had neverentered it before, and so beautiful that they desired to be therealways.
As Ernest listened to the poet, he imagined that the Great StoneFace was bending forward to listen too. He gazed earnestly into thepoet's glowing eyes.
"Who are you, my strangely gifted guest?" he said.
The poet laid his finger on the volume that Ernest had beenreading.
"You have read these poems," said he. "You know me, then- for Iwrote them."Again, and still more earnestly than before, Ernest examined thepoet's features; then turned towards the Great Stone Face; thenback, with an uncertain aspect, to his guest. But his countenancefell; he shook his head, and sighed.
"Wherefore are you sad?" inquired the poet.
"Because, replied Ernest, "all through life I have awaited thefulfilment of a prophecy; and, when I read these poems, I hoped thatit might be fulfilled in you.""You hoped," answered the poet, faintly smiling, "to find in me thelikeness of the Great Stone Face. And you are disappointed, asformerly with Mr. Gathergold, and Old Blood-and-Thunder, and Old StonyPhiz. Yes, Ernest, it is my doom. You must add my name to theillustrious three, and record another failure of your hopes. For- inshame and sadness do I speak it, Ernest- I am not worthy to betypified by yonder benign and majestic image.""And why?" asked Ernest. He pointed to the volume- "Are not thosethoughts divine?""They have a strain of the Divinity," replied the poet. "You canhear in them the far-off echo of a heavenly song. But my life, dearErnest, has not corresponded with my thought. I have had grand dreams,but they have been only dreams, because I have lived- and that, too,by own choice- among poor and mean realities. Sometimes even- shallI dare to say it?- I lack faith in the grandeur, the beauty, and thegoodness, which my own works are said to have made more evident innature and in human life. Why, then, pure seeker of the good and true,shouldst thou hope to find me, in yonder image of the divine!"The poet spoke sadly, and his eyes were dim with tears. So,likewise, were those of Ernest.
At the hour of sunset, as had long been his frequent custom, Ernestwas to discourse to an assemblage of the neighboring inhabitants, inthe open air. He and the poet, arm in arm, still talking together asthey went along, proceeded to the spot. It was a small nook amongthe hills, with a gray precipice behind, the stern front of whichwas relieved by the pleasant foliage of many creeping plants, thatmade a tapestry for the naked rock, by hanging their festoons from allits rugged angles. At a small elevation above the ground, set in arich frame-work of verdure, there appeared a niche, spacious enough toadmit a human figure, with freedom for such gestures asspontaneously accompany earnest thought and genuine emotion. Into thisnatural pulpit Ernest ascended, and threw a look of familiarkindness around upon his audience. They stood, or sat, or reclinedupon the grass, as seemed good to each, with the departing sunshinefalling obliquely over them, and mingling its subdued cheerfulnesswith the solemnity of a grove of ancient trees, beneath and amid theboughs of which the golden rays were constrained to pass. In anotherdirection was seen the Great Stone Face, with the same cheer, combinedwith the same solemnity, in its benignant aspect.
Ernest began to speak, giving to the people of what was in hisheart and mind. His words had power, because they accorded with histhoughts; and his thoughts had reality and depth, because theyharmonized with the life which he had always lived. It was not merebreath that this preacher uttered; they were the words of life,because a life of good deeds and holy love was melted into them.
Pearls, pure and rich, had been dissolved into this preciousdraught. The poet, as he listened, felt that the being and characterof Ernest were a nobler strain of poetry than he had ever written. Hiseyes glistening with tears, he gazed reverentially at the venerableman, and said within himself that never was there an aspect soworthy of a prophet and a sage as that mild, sweet, thoughtfulcountenance, with the glory of white hair diffused about it. At adistance, but distinctly to be seen, high up in the golden light ofthe setting sun, appeared the Great Stone Face, with hoary mistsaround it, like the white hairs around the brow of Ernest. Its look ofgrand beneficence seemed to embrace the world.
