And now Time, the humbler of proud
beautiful women, had given him his revenge: the portrait,
scorned and rejected when the colour and sparkle of life was
in the face, had been looked on once more by its subject and
had caused her to weep at the change in herself.
To return. One wishes in these moments of meeting, of
surprise and sudden revealings, that it were permissible to
speak from the heart, since then the very truth might have
more balm than bitterness in it. "Grieve not, dear friend of
old days, that I have not escaped the illusion common to all
--the idea that those we have not looked on this long time
--full five years, let us say--have remained as they were
while we ourselves have been moving onwards and downwards in
that path in which our feet are set. No one, however hardened
he may be, can escape a shock of surprise and pain; but now
the illusion I cherished has gone--now I have seen with my
physical eyes, and a new image, with Time's writing on it, has
taken the place of the old and brighter one, I would not have
it otherwise. No, not if I could would I call back the
vanished lustre, since all these changes, above all that
wistful look in the eyes, do but serve to make you dearer, my
sister and friend and fellow-traveller in a land where we
cannot find a permanent resting-place."
Alas! it cannot be spoken, and we cannot comfort a sister if
she cannot divine the thought; but to brood over these
inevitable changes is as idle as it is to lament that we were
born into this mutable world.
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