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He returned home earlier than usual the next day, and fixed theroom

He then carefully wiped away the dust fro, theBut his interest was chiefly occupied with the curious carving

of the frame This he cleaned as well as he could with a brush; and then

he proceeded to a minute exa some index to the intention of the carver In this,

however, he was unsuccessful; and, at length, pausing with soazed vacantly for a fewhe said, half aloud: "What

a strange thing a mirror is! and what a wondrous affinity exists between

it and a ination! For this roolass, is the same, and yet not the same It is not the mere

representation of the roo about it in a story I like All its commonness has disappeared

The ion of fact into the real of it to me has clothed with interest

that which was otherwise hard and bare; just as one sees with delight

upon the stage the representation of a character fro unendurably wearisome But is it not

rather that art rescues nature frorading injustice of our anxious everyday life, and,

appealing to the iree as she really is, and as she represents herself to the eye of the

child, whose every-day life, fearless and una world around hi? That skeleton, now--I al

there so still, with eyes only for the unseen, like a watch-tower

looking across all the waste of this busy world into the quiet regions

of rest beyond And yet I know every bone and every joint in it as well

as my own fist And that old battle-axe looks as if any ht up by athrough casque, and skull, and brain, invading the Unknoith

yet another bewildered ghost I should like to live in THAT rooet into it"