But, all this while, we have been standing by Zenobia's grave. I have

never since beheld it, but make no question that the grass grew all the

better, on that little parallelogram of pasture land, for the decay of

the beautiful woman who slept beneath. How Nature seems to love us!

And how readily, nevertheless, without a sigh or a complaint, she

converts us to a meaner purpose, when her highest one--that of a

conscious intellectual life and sensibility has been untimely balked!

While Zenobia lived, Nature was proud of her, and directed all eyes

upon that radiant presence, as her fairest handiwork. Zenobia

perished. Will not Nature shed a tear? Ah, no!--she adopts the

calamity at once into her system, and is just as well pleased, for

aught we can see, with the tuft of ranker vegetation that grew out of

Zenobia's heart, as with all the beauty which has bequeathed us no

earthly representative except in this crop of weeds. It is because the

spirit is inestimable that the lifeless body is so little valued.




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