"
Ah, David, David, I know not what to think of those strange words;
but old Soolsby seemed well to understand thee, and he called thee
"a first-best gentleman." Is my story long? Well, it was so
strange, and it fixed itself upon my mind so deeply, and thy
writings at the hut have been so much in my hands and in my mind,
that I have put it all down here. When I asked Soolsby how it came
he had been rumoured dead, he said that he himself had been the
cause of it; but for what purpose he would not say, save that he was
going a long voyage, and had made up his mind to return no more. "I
had a friend," he said, "and I was set to go and see that friend
again. . . . But the years go on, and friends have an end. Life
spills faster than the years," he said. And he would say no more,
but would walk with me even to my father's door. "May the Blessed
Virgin and all the Saints be with you," he said at parting, "if you
will have a blessing from them. And tell him who is beyond and away
in Egypt that old Soolsby's busy making a chair for him to sit in
when the scarlet cloth is spread, and the East and West come to
salaam before him.
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