be the last that we will hear, for we cannot be telling stories to each other and singing songs all night. We must stop somewhere, else we may get out of tune, and that is the worst thing that could happen to any sound.” This is what the last and least sound sang:

The student, astonished at the coincidence of the other stories with fancies which he himself had at some time possessed, was more amazed, even to agitation, upon hearing this little song. His memory, which had been excited almost to a human state, assured him that the very words had been composed by him that evening, during the performance of one of the pieces. His mind, affected by all these thoughts, was no longer passive; it struggled with his sound-nature, and a sad and perplexing contest arose. His agitation must have been apparent, for his neighbor, who had frequently addressed him, now spoke :

"One has been omitted, and one, too, I am convinced, of no ordinary nature. This sound has been housed near me; he is a distant connection, I find, and there is something peculiar about his nature which makes me desire to know more." At this the student-sound could no longer restrain himself, and more to himself than to the rest, gave expression to his disturbed consciousness:

"I am," he said, " from the Septuor of Beethoven, and if I would, could put my music into words; but I am sadly perplexed since I feel that my life is somewhat more varied and completer than I could thus sing. Whatever I have

heard to-night in this little gathering has been old and well known to me. It is as if I had been in turn each who has spoken or sung. I know not why, I am not happy. I feel orphaned; something is lacking." Thus musing, alternately his sound-nature and soul-nature was uppermost. He thought to himself, "If I might but touch the strings of the violin from which I came, I think I should be satisfied." So he slipped out of the figure in the Death-bed of Calvin which he had occupiedthe syndic with the handsome leg and essayed to reach the violin. But there was movement elsewhere also. The various sounds that had contributed to the evening's merrymaking, upon hearing the student's voice, recognized, as his neighbor from the first had done, a presence toward which they were drawn. His words had excited in each the same longing, for all felt, even though faintly, that the humanity which it was their highest aspiration again to enter, was present with them, although in a less positive and attractive form than usual. It was in the student's brain, in fact, that each had received that perfection of life which only thus is granted tc sounds; the words which they uttered were the product of that union between the music

giver's and the music receiver's mind; and it was the dim recollection of having given birth to these fancies that now so perplexed the hapless student-sound. He, once deprived of even the limited corporeity afforded by the figure in the picture, was reduced to a pitiable state; as a sound, he was in part drawn toward the violin, in part, if one might so say, drawn into the soul with which it formed a union; as a soul, craving a union with its body, he was attracted not only to the habitation he had just left, but also as if it were a great way off to the more perfect one which preceded. Now, moreover, was he aware of the congregation of sounds vainly seeking him. The rest were indeed moving hither and thither, all in search of the human presence, faintly shadowed to them, assuredly recognized as the complement of their life, but inexplicably vagrant and unattainable. His sound-nature was too controlling to admit of his being revealed to them, and was itself filled with a longing to enter into its own alter ego, the soul-nature: that was degraded and almost powerless, because it had disengaged itself from its natural tenement. But struggling is so much opposed to the nature of sound, which is passive, that his soul grew more and more conscious of its

powers; the memory grew stronger, and he thought:

"How insufficient my abode in the figure of the picture was. I was indeed a sound as I now am, but I could see little and hear little. I had fine affinities, it is true, with other sounds, yet they lacked much that I have possessed. It was like a dream and seemed unreal. But I can remember how once - it was long ago—I had larger life. I lived in a student. I was not thus beaten about, homeless and unsatisfied. I was housed in a noble body that had sensibility and fineness of vision, and hearing and scent. O, that I might once more be in my old home! "

This wish also was energetic; the sound shrank to its proportional measure while the soul became enlarged and was borne by its fervent wish toward its old seat. As it passed out, it was aware, by its still musical affinity, of the aspiration ever growing fainter to it, though in reality more earnest, of the congregation of sounds within praying to be allowed to accompany it. Fragments of melodies entered for a moment the soul, but were not retained. Doubtless these followed still, long after it was conscious of their presence. Itself, as before, found its way through the key