At first the words were faint and indistinct, not rendered so by
distance, but rather resembling the dim pages of a book which we
strive to read by an imperfect and gradually brightening light. In
such a manner, as the prayer proceeded, did those voices strengthen
upon the ear; till at length the petition ended, and the
conversation of an aged man, and of a woman broken and decayed like
himself, became distinctly audible to the lady as she knelt. But those
strangers appeared not to stand in the hollow depth between the
three hills. Their voices were encompassed and reechoed by the walls
of a chamber, the windows of which were rattling in the breeze; the
regular vibration of a clock, the crackling of a fire, and the
tinkling of the embers as they fell among the ashes, rendered the
scene almost as vivid as if painted to the eye. By a melancholy hearth
sat these two old people, the man calmly despondent, the woman
querulous and tearfull and their words were all of sorrow. They
spoke of a daughter, a wanderer they knew not where, bearing
dishonor along with her, and leaving shame and affliction to bring
their gray heads to the grave. They alluded also to other and more
recent wo, but in the midst of their talk their voices seemed to
melt into the sound of the wind sweeping mournfully among the autumn
leaves; and when the lady lifted her eyes, there was she kneeling in
the hollow between three hills.
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