An oval, azurous picture was before me,
set in this rolling, surging frame of ambient gold and silver glory.
"It is not for me to see in there," I thought; and I shut my eyes.
The voice that I had heard before spake once more:--
"Learn what thy God would have thee to do. Look up!"
Obeying the mighty behest, I beheld, and an ovaline picture, painted in
the artistry of heaven, let down from the crystalline walls, that I
might not see, and held fast by a cord of gold, safe in an angel's
keeping, God had sent for me to look upon.
It was not such as masters of earth toil to paint. It was a living group
that I saw.
Four figures stood there.
The first one was the face that I had just asked Chloe the semblance of.
Loving past expression's power. The love emitted from those eyes brought
tears into mine, and I heard one of them go dropping down, down into the
cloudy deep below, as one day I had heard one falling elsewhere, on a
cold stone.
Two hands were wafted out towards me, and the lips were just parted, as
if waiting for coming words. I looked and listened, a little blinded by
the glory and my tears.
"Go forth, dear child, to the work thy God appoints for thee to do!"
I looked up a little higher, just over the face of my mother, and, in
holiest benediction, the Hand that had brought me up hither was laid
upon her head.
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