Oh, my own who did this, thanks is no word between you and me. Do we thank the star that shines in the dark-blue velvet of the skies? We gaze only, and are drawn thither. For we thank a giver for a human gift; it is in silence that we give thanks for the things that are divine. Oh, I try to speak of what cannot be spoken! Who shall set words to your music?
Let me picture you again, with face half turned from where I sat, tuning the keys which I thought so rebellious into a rain of enchanted harmony. Rebellious, too, was your hair, rising upward in waves of smouldering gold from your face. And through Schubert you spoke to me, he but the medium or the alphabet of your thought, and I was almost jealous of the dead because he touched the tips of your fingers. Then from the trim garden at Leipsic spoke that sweet formal soul, a message of congratulation to me, or so I took it, and Beethoven with fuller voice said the same, and from frozen Poland and from wind-beaten Majorca came another smile. And when those sweet words were done, came other sweet words without interpreter; and the room was emptied and the larger lights were quenched, and only on the walls leaped the shadows and the shine of the flames that plunged on the hearth. Once by night the Temple was bright to the prophet with the glory of the Lord, and the hot coal from the altar opened and inspired his lips. With what new vision and eyes enlightened must he have looked on the world after that night when God revealed Himself. And by this revelation which has come to me all things are made new, winter is turned to spring, the lonely places are desert no more, and the whole world is in flower with the royal purple of the blossoms of Love.
And now that I know it was inevitable from the first, I can hardly believe that it was I who only a few weeks ago made plans to force myself from the possibility. It was ordained from the beginning, and the patient march of the centuries, every step, every year, was bringing us together; myriads of subtle influences conspired to work it, and how excellent is the miracle they have made! Sunlight and wind, and the love and sorrow and joy of a thousand generations, have made the body and soul of this girl; for me was she predestined, and for me has the whole creation laboured. Blindly but inevitably it wrought, even as the shell deep in some blue cave of the ocean thinks only that some piece of grit has got between its iridescent valves, yet all the time it is busy making the pearl that shall lie on the neck of some queen yet unborn.