The Last Children; or, The Beautiful Midnight

SIGH! Sigh! Sigh! said the midnight wind, as it swept over the great Brazilian forest. And the tall palms trembled, and waved their green fans, to get all the sea's coolness, which came in the breeze; and their feathery domes swung to and fro, like ships rocking at anchor.

Lilalpa! death must be very beautiful, said Oniato: for death is God's night.

Ah! Oniato, replied Lilalpa, but light is more beautiful than darkness.

Dearest Sister! you must not say so, answered Oniato: darkness is more beautiful than light. We see God better in the darkness.

Why have your thoughts been so often wandering on God lately, my dearest Brother? said Lilalpa. God! God! it is a beautiful word, and makes a strange stir in my heart. Where is God? who is God?

I know not, Lilalpa; but when things make a stir in our hearts they must be real things. There must be a God, though perhaps His Name is not God.

Ah! Oniato, I see why you love the darkness. It is because it makes you think more of God. Beautiful darkness! it feels like a home.

Oh yes, Lilalpa, and when I have listened to the missionaries reasoning with my father, I have sometimes thought that light was really darkness, and darkness really light, and that they had only agreed to look like each other, instead of looking like their own selves.

Indeed the night was beautiful;* j\ust such a night as would be likely to make children talk, like Angels. I wonder how much they under stood of what they were saying to each other. We are all of us born poets, but only a fe.w of us find -it out. V vV They wanHered on. They were lost -In $ne forest. The boughs met,-abp^^their Reads like

4**. the roof of a cathedral. They hear/L the wild v "

beasts arguing with each otheV, cdmplainingly

• r* ^ rather than savagely. Occasionally there Avlfre silences, and they thought they heard the earth breathe; but just as they were going to make certain of it, some night-bird from a lofty branch would suddenly pour forth gushes of clear song into the ear of the ancient night. Why is night ancient, why should it be more ancient than day? Nobody knows, yet everybody says it is so, and feels that it is so.

Every now and then they saw the stars fighting in the sky. So Lilalpa thought: but it was only the tossing of the branches, which kept showing and hiding the stars. There were many sights and many sounds in that wood, which the children did not understand. But they felt them all; and somehow when they felt them, they whispered to themselves, God! God! We enjoy the day time. We feel the night time. In the day time God sees us. In the night time we see God. On earth, to see God means to feel Him. Feeling is mostly the best kind of seeing.

Why had these children left home? They will never return to it. The End of the World will corne in an hour, and they will die in the waters of the wood, and, having been really dead before, will make themselves alive by dying, blessed Waters of the Wood! Blessed all waters, which have wood in them, the Wood of the Cross.

Lilalpa! is not this very solemn? Hark how the wind murmurs I It has a voice like that of our dead pale-faced mother. Lilalpa! I sometimes see my mother, when I sleep. But listen to the wind. It sings as if it was unhappy. Perhaps the wind is a god!

But if it was a god, Oniato, it would not be unhappy.

Lilalpa! more and more I ask who is God? We have no God. We are not like the Chris tians with white faces, such as come to us, and such as they say were kings in this land thousands of years ago. They have a God whom they love. How grand the ruins of their churches are! Our mother was white-faced, they say, and she too had a God and loved Him. Lilalpa! I must have a God, if it is only to have somebody to love.

Lilalpa burst into tears.

Dearest Lilalpa! said Oniato, you know I love you: you know what I mean.

yes, Brother, replied Lilalpa, I am not un happy. I do know what you mean; for I feel the same myself: and yet I love you, oh so much; so much it hurts my heart sometimes!

And Oniato threw his arms round her, and said, We will find God to-night. And a star shone into Lilalpa's tearful eyes. sometimes the stars seem almost to speak by their shining.

Ah! Oniato! I wish our father would not burn those white-faced priests in the fires of the snake-temples. Even now it seems to me as if the wind was full of the sound of those sighs and murmurs which they make in the fire.

And yet, Lilalpa, they are not like the mur murs of pain or anger.

No! that is the strange thing.

Lilalpa! I cannot breathe in my father's palace. I have enticed you here on purpose. Let us find God. If not, let us live in the forest, and die here, like flowers. Let us seek the white-faced man of God whom my father drove into the forest to-day to die of hunger, or to be eaten by the wild beasts. I have hidden a flask of wine in my clothes to take to him, if we can find him.

Oniato! shall we ask those dear stars to lead us to him?

No! Lilalpa, his God will know best where he is. To be sure the eyes of the stars seem to be everywhere. But I think we had better pray to his God instead.

Oniato! see! the earth is on fire!

No! Lilalpa! it is only the fire-flies. Let us follow them. They are the living stars of the w T ood. Perhaps God has sent them to lead us. So they followed the fire-flies.

Sigh! Sigh! Sigh! sang the wind; for it was very tired, as it had been all round the earth. And the fire-flies played round the heads of the children, like glories round the heads of Saints in pictures. Some swung like globe-shaped lamps in front of them, and seemed to lead the way. Many w T ild-beasts were prowling round. The flame-coloured eyes of the pumas looked at the children as they passed. But they dared not touch them; for the beasts saw three Angels with the children, whom the children did not see. Two were the Guardian Angels of the children, and the third was the Angel of the Sacrament of Baptism.

What a silence! Deep, deep, deep silence! Silence above! Silence below! Silence all round!

Oniato, said Lilalpa, silence is more like a god than wind.

It was near midnight. In the heart of the wood a huge flower slowly opened out, and blossomed, and filled the forest with a most exquisite perfume.

Lilalpa! there is the Midnight Flower! How I should like to be a Midnight Flower, with nobody to see me blossom, nobody to smell my fragrance, except God! I suppose He made the rest of the flowers for us, but that one for Himself. He keeps its sweetness for Himself in the lonely darkness. It smells like the flesh of the white-faced priests in the fires, so sweet! The smell of it sometimes comes into my window from the wood. It always makes me think of God.

Dear children! they too were truly Midnight Flowers, and the hour of their blooming was at hand.

Oh! Oniato, what beautiful soft thunder is that?

They had come near a waterfall, under dark cedars. They saw the foam flash under the dark branches.

Oniato! that waterfall speaks to me like the Voice of a God.

Perhaps, Lilalpa, there is no God, except that

Christ who makes the white-faced priests smell sweetly in the fire.

Hush! Hush! Oniato look at the globe of fire-flies under the palm: there is the Christian priest sitting on a rock by the river! His back is resting against the tree.

At that moment it thundered under their feet. The forest rocked and creaked, and the ground quivered, like the sail of a ship when, the wind slackens.

They went up to the priest. He seemed asleep. But it was not so. He had fainted from hunger. His face was very beautiful. When the fire-flies disappeared, it was the colour of moonlight, and shone very marvellously in the dark night, with a soft shining.

Oniato! whispered Lilalpa, it is the light of his God shining upon his face.

It thundered again under their feet. They looked up. Green and purple and crimson meteors were rushing about the sky, and crack ling in the air. Strange children! they were not afraid. They fear nothing, who are seeking God.

They went up to the priest, and poured some wine down his throat, and he revived, and opened his eyes, and looked at them.

My children! who are you?

We are the king's children. We want to know about your God.

He smiled, and kissed them, saying, You shall be king's children indeed! r

Then it thundered again under their feet, and it thundered over their heads, and the trees moaned, and the meteors crackled.

And he told them about Bethlehem.

They heard a hissing noise. A great dark mountain was opposite to them on the other side of the river, and behold! a broad solid flash of violet-coloured lightning split the black mountain in two. Suddenly there was silence.

And he told them about Nazareth.

A distant roar was heard. On came the whirlwind. It rooted up all the trees, and carried them miles into the air. The black mountain sank into the earth with a loud rumbling. But they were not hurt. Then once more the rushing of the river w r as heard in the silent night. It wanted only a few minutes to midnight.

And he told them about Calvary.

And they clasped their hands, and wept.

Behold! ten thousand wild-beasts, howling and moaning, rushed past them, pursued by a great yellow fire, which had broken like a river out of the earth. It did not hurt the priest or the children.

And he told them of the Mount of Olives, and the Ascension, and the coming again to Judgment.

And Lilalpa took hold of Oniato's hand and they both looked up to heaven, and said, Jesus! Jesus!

And the priest smiled, and wept.

And a venerable white-haired old man suddenly appeared at the other side of the river, and said, It is time!

And the priest said, Blessed St. Joseph! I obey.

And he led the children to the edge of the rock, and said, You have given me wine: I will give you water, water with the Blood of Jesus hidden in it.

And he explained Baptism, and they begged to be baptized.

And the heavens opened with a fierce white light; and a huge round glory, like a sunrise, was seen coming swiftly up from the east.

And the priest said, It is the Lord.

And he baptized the children.

And when they were baptized, they said, Come, sweet Jesus!

And the earthquake shook the rock on which they stood, and it rolled over into the deep foamy water, and, as they fell, the priest's arm was round them, and they saw St. Joseph smiling at them, and he pointed upwards where a heavenly Lady, all dressed in golden light, was waiting for them.

At first they thought it was their mother. But the Lady was more beautiful than their mother, and, though it seems strange to say so, her face was more full of love than their mother's was. Yet everybody, who sees that heavenly Lady for the first time, thinks her like his mother, because her beauty is so motherly.

Then they kissed each other, and said, The Angels are whispering in our hearts, that it is Mary of Bethlehem; and they cried, Dear Mary! And all three sank into the cold waters, and it thundered louder than ever, and the water gurg led in their ears, and they clung closer together, and it was painful for a moment. Then their ears were full of the sounds of harps, and they t opened their eyes, and {he water was turned into light, and it was heaven!

And those two were the last children, and so the world ended. Oh it was a beautiful mid night to Oniato and Lilalpa! It is day-time with them now, eternal day-time. happy children! who belong to Jesus, and have been