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Had it not been for her cold hands, almost
could I think that she slept and would one day awake, so fair and
peaceful was she in her robes of white. White was she, too, and her
hair was yellow and lay down her almost to the feet. There are many such
still in the tombs at the place where _She_ is, for those who set them
there had a way I know naught of, whereby to keep their beloved out of
the crumbling hand of Decay, even when Death had slain them. Ay, day
by day I came hither, and gazed on her till at last--laugh not at me,
stranger, for I was but a silly lad--I learned to love that dead form,
that shell which once had held a life that no more is. I would creep
up to her and kiss her cold face, and wonder how many men had lived and
died since she was, and who had loved her and embraced her in the days
that long had passed away. And, my Baboon, I think I learned wisdom from
that dead one, for of a truth it taught me of the littleness of life,
and the length of Death, and how all things that are under the sun go
down one path, and are for ever forgotten.


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