This page has been validated.
64
A PICTURE-BOOK
a hare ran across the road, and off they set at full speed. The quiet old maid, who from one year’s end to another had moved only slowly in a narrow circle, now that she was dead, drove over stock and stone along the open high-road. The coffin, which was wrapped in matting, was shook off, and now lay upon the road, whilst horses, driver, and carriage, sped onward in a wild career.
The lark which flew upward singing from the meadow, warbled its morning song above the coffin; it then descended and alighted upon it, pecked at the matting with its beak, as if it were rending to pieces some strange insect.
The lark rose upward again, singing in the clear ether, and I withdrew behind the rosy clouds of morning.
