'LILIAS.'
'Friday evening.'
Captain Richard Devereux read this simple little record through, and
then he said:--
'Oh, Sir, may I have it--isn't it mine?'
We who have heard those wondrous aerial echoes of Killarney, when the
breath has left the bugle and its cadences are silent, take up the
broken links of the lost melody with an answer far away, sad and
celestial, real, yet unreal, the fleeting yet lingering spirit of music,
that is past and over, have something in memory by which we can
illustrate the effect of these true voices of the thoughts and
affections that have perished, returning for a few charmed moments
regretfully and sweetly from the sea of eternal silence.
And so that sad and clear farewell, never repeated, was long after, in
many a lonely night, answered by the voice of Devereux.
'Did she--did she know how I loved her? Oh, never, never! I'll never
love any but you. Darling, darling--you can't die. Oh, no, no, no! Your
place knows you still; your place is here--here--here.'
And he smote his breast over that heart which, such as it was, cherished
a pure affection for her.
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