Such is the life of man—toil and disappointment. The day is too short; our strength insufficient to satisfy the greed of avarice. Our doom is labour, our earnings dust; the fruit cultivated with so much care contains but ashes. All is vanity!

Such was the substance of the cloud of sad thoughts which rose upon me as I stood by the corpse of my father. Rich and prosperous, and untarnished in my integrity, I had come to receive his last blessing. Gladness and generosity glowed in my bosom. With more than the hopes of my youth realised, I had returned to the scenes of my childhood; the anticipations of ambition were in blossom, and the fruit of many was set. There was but one in all the earth whom the munificent tale of Providence could have awakened to disinterested thankfulness, and there he lay, apparelled for the tomb. It was then that I first felt the truth of Mr. Herbert's opinions on old age; and I trembled to think that, by the course of nature, I now myself stood next to the grave.

To meet contemptuous Death instead of my father, who had so kindly loved me, was truly a stunning blow. It shattered, as it were, my whole mind, and my thoughts were as fragments. I could determine nothing; I scarcely even recollected that I had seen my contrite son at the door. Poor lad! he ascribed to resentment that absence with which I was visited, and my seeming indifference to him, and he retired to the garden to deplore my displeasure. I saw him not again that night, for I spent it alone with the dead.

Early in the morning, before sunrise, the afflicted youth, unable longer to endure the thought of being cast off from my affection, came into the room. At the sight of him, I reproached myself for having so slightly heeded him; but before I could speak, he took my hand, and looking for a moment on the still remains on the bed, he said, with an intreating voice, “Oh, my father!”