Sometimes I can hear the harp alone in you, and then I like you; but when
the bagpipe begins, you are worse than a big bumblebee with a bad cold."
"I know it," said John sorrowfully. "My only hope is that the harp will
outlast the bee."
"At least that was a chord finely struck," said the parson warmly. After
another silence he went on.
"Martin Luther--he was a cathedral organ. And so it goes. And so the whole
past sounds to me: it is the music of the world: it is the vast choir of the
ever-living dead." He gazed dreamily up at the heavens: "Plato! he is the
music of the stars."
After a little while, bending over and looking at the earth and speaking in
a tone of unconscious humility, he added:
"The most that we can do is to begin a strain that will swell the general
volume and last on after we have perished. As for me, when I am gone, I
should like the memory of my life to give out the sound of a flute."
He slipped his hand softly into the breastpocket of his coat and more softly
drew something out.
"Would you like a little music?" he asked shyly, his cold beautiful face all
at once taking on an expression of angelic sweetness.
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