Once upon a time a little boy came,
during his play, to the bank of a river. The
waters of the river were very dark and wild, and there
was so black a cloud over the river that the little
boy could not see the further shore. An icy
wind came up from the cloud and chilled the little
boy, and he trembled with cold and fear as the wind
smote his cheeks and ran its slender icicle fingers
through his yellow curls. An old man sat on
the bank of the river; he was very, very old; his head
and shoulders were covered with a black mantle; and
his beard was white as snow.
“Will you come with me, little boy?” asked
the old man.
“Where?” inquired the little boy.
“To yonder shore,” replied the old man.
“Oh, no; not to that dark shore,”
said the little boy. “I should be afraid
to go.”
“But think of the sunlight always
there,” said the old man, “the birds and
flowers; and remember there is no pain, nor anything
of that kind to vex you.”
The little boy looked and saw the
dark cloud hanging over the waters, and he felt the
cold wind come up from the river; moreover, the sight
of the strange man terrified him. So, hearing
his mother calling him, the little boy ran back to
his home, leaving the old man by the river alone.
Many years after that time the little
boy came again to the river; but he was not a little
boy now,-he was a big, strong man.
“The river is the same,”
said he; “the wind is the same cold, cutting
wind of ice, and the same black cloud obscures yonder
shore. I wonder where the strange old man can
be.”
“I am he,” said a solemn voice.
The man turned and looked on him who
spoke, and he saw a warrior clad in black armor and
wielding an iron sword.
“No, you are not he!”
cried the man. “You are a warrior come
to do me harm.”
“I am indeed a warrior,”
said the other. “Come with me across the
river.”
“No,” replied the man,
“I will not go with you. Hark, I hear the
voices of my wife and children calling to me,-I
will return to them!”
The warrior strove to hold him fast
and bear him across the river to the yonder shore,
but the man prevailed against him and returned to his
wife and little ones, and the warrior was left upon
the river-bank.
Then many years went by and the strong
man became old and feeble. He found no pleasure
in the world, for he was weary of living. His
wife and children were dead, and the old man was alone.
So one day in those years he came to the bank of
the river for the third time, and he saw that the
waters had become quiet and that the wind which came
up from the river was warm and gentle and smelled
of flowers; there was no dark cloud overhanging the
yonder shore, but in its place was a golden mist through
which the old man could see people walking on the yonder
shore and stretching out their hands to him, and he
could hear them calling him by name. Then he
knew they were the voices of his dear ones.
“I am weary and lonesome,”
cried the old man. “All have gone before
me: father, mother, wife, children,-all
whom I have loved. I see them and hear them
on yonder shore, but who will bear me to them?”
Then a spirit came in answer to this
cry. But the spirit was not a strange old man
nor yet an armored warrior; but as he came to the
river’s bank that day he was a gentle angel,
clad in white; his face was very beautiful, and there
was divine tenderness in his eyes.
“Rest thy head upon my bosom,”
said the angel, “and I will bear thee across
the river to those who call thee.”
So, with the sweet peace of a little
child sinking to his slumbers, the old man drooped
in the arms of the angel and was borne across the river
to those who stood upon the yonder shore and called.