HORACE GREELEY'S SORROW

We publish below a pathetic letter written by Mr. Greeley on the death or his little boy. Notwithstanding the fact that more than thirty years have passed since the words were written, they will awaken sympathy in many a heart that has known a similar grief:

My Friend:-The loss of my boy makes a great change in my feelings, plans and prospects. The joy of my life was comprehended in his, and I do not now feel that any personal object can strongly move me henceforth. I had thought of buying a country place, but it was for him. I had begun to love flowers and beautiful objects, because he liked them. Now, all that deeply concerns me is the evidence that we shall live hereafter, and especially that we shall live with and know those we loved here. I mean to act my part while life is spared me, but I no longer covet length of days. If I felt sure on the point of identifying and being with our loved ones in the world to come, I would prefer not to live long. As it is, I am resigned to whatever may be divinely ordered. . . . We had but few hours to prepare for our loss. He went to bed as hearty and happy as ever. At 5 a. m. he died. .  . His mother had bought him a fiddle the day before, which delighted him beyond measure; and he was only induced to lay it up at night by his delight at the idea of coming up in the morning and surprising me by playing on it before I got up. In the morning at daylight I was called to his bedside. The next day, I fol­lowed him to his grave! You cannot guess how golden and lovely his long hair (never cut) looked in the coffin. . . . Pickie was five years old last March. So much grace and wit and poetry were rarely or never blended in so young a child, and to us his form and features were the perfection of beauty. We can never have another child, and life cannot be long enough to efface, though it will temper this sorrow. It differs in kind as well as degree from all that we have hitherto experienced.