'GOD'S PEACE' 309
handclasp is the evening prayer's angel-guard. If the impossible could be imagined, and she to-night came to my door and asked me to let her in, I should flee as from a desecration and should feel myself accursed. I should feel like one standing at the source of purity who sees it defiled by mirroring his picture.
When once more I sit in my room with her roses in front of me, I suddenly long to show her how much her friendship means to me. I fasten one of the roses on a sheet of paper and write underneath, ' From one, whom it has made sane.' I huny up through the wood to the miller's house and place it over the door. I know it will fall into the right hands, for the father is blind. Again I wander homewards while the nightingales are singing in my heart.
29"! OF JULY.
I SAT this morning down at the harbour, waiting XIV for the arrival of the steamer from the capi- tal. To escape possible acquaintances amongst the passengers, I sat a little apart near the storing- house for lately arrived goods. I amused myself by looking down on the shining-green posts in the water, where crabs crawled amongst firmly-fixed mussels. I thought of old days, of what an ex- citement it was when the steamer, then the only means of communication, brought visitors from the capital. The excitement started at early dawn. Then, as now, the hour for arrival was very uncer- tain. Under normal conditions the steamer sailed
