The monuments
looked calmer and less formal than when daylight bared all their defects
of design or finish; they seemed now worthy of their position beneath
the vaulted roof, and even, adjuncts themselves to the harmony of the
architecture. One among them, noticeable in the daytime for its refined
workmanship, now gleamed out fresher and whiter than the rest, as was
natural, for it had been placed there but a little while; but it had
besides more _expression_, in its very simplicity, than such-like
mementos of stone or marble usually contain. This was the memento of a
husband's regret, and, as such, touching, however vain: a delicate form
drooping on a bier, at whose head stood an angel, with an infant in his
arms, which he raised to heaven with an air of triumph; while at the
foot of the death-bed a figure knelt, in all the relaxed abandonment of
woe. Marvellously, and out of small means, the chisel had conveyed this
impression; for the kneeling figure was mantled from head to foot, and
had its face hidden in the folds of the drapery which skirted the
bier,--veiled, like the face of the tortured father in the old tragic
tale.
While I gazed, I insensibly approached the still group; and while musing
what manner of grief it might be, which could solace by perpetuating its
mere image, I observed two other persons, whose entrance I had not been
aware of, but whose attention was evidently directed to what had
attracted mine.
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