"I watched a log in the fireplace burning"
1 They whispered it one to another and
under the spell of its transfiguring lay
bent forward, they witnessed the last act
in a pine-tree pantomime.

A dazzling transformation scene it was:
in the glow they could see, summed up,
each transition of light and heat that went
before: dawn's tender flame, the fierce
blaze of high noon, ruby rays of evening
streaming now across the Bowl--hill-girt
lake without--gathered, all gathered,
in a golden age behind them to feed the sap
of a noble tree, here poured forth, amid a
radiant ballet of flame and spark, to furnish
life, light--inspiration--to a Council Fire.

"I watched a log in the fireplace burning,%
Oh! if I, too, could only be
Sure to give back the love and laughter,
That Life so freely gave to me!"

Tanpa, the Guardian, softly breathed
it. And in the eye of more than one girl
the wish was transmuted into a tear,--
[[176]]

p175 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p176w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p177

v?