Yet did man ever adore a mistress so fatal and destroying as this poor shadow of the dead which he desired?
It was not until New Year's Eve that Stella came again.

Once more enervated and exhausted by the waves, Morris sank into a doze whence, as before, he was awakened by the sound of heavenly music to which, on this night, was added the scent of perfume.

Then he opened his eyes--to behold Stella.

As she had been at first, so she was now, only more lovely--a hundred times lovelier than the imagination can paint, or the pen can tell.

Here was nothing pale or deathlike, no sheeted, melancholy spectre, but a radiant being whose garment was the light, and whose eyes glowed like the heart of some deep jewel.