Welsh's family in early days ; ' and on the 5th of August

^ Carlyle wrote to her, giving her the following tender

'^ little picture of a summer daybreak : " Simday I started

broad awake at 3 a.m., went downstairs, out, smoked a
I cigar on the stool : have not seen so lovely, sad, and

grand a summer weather scene for twenty years back.
Trees stood all as if cast in bronze, not an aspen leaf
stirring ; sky was a silver mirror, getting yellowish to
the north-east ; and only one big star, star of the morn-
ing, visible in the increasing light." f

Sad to him was all that beauty of the opening day,

for he had nothing answering to it in his own dim life.
j * No goal, that looks very glorious to aim towards, now

■ within sight. All my days and hours go to that sad

task of mine.' These few words tell the whole sad story

♦ * Life in London, 1834-1881,' vol. u. p. 188. f ^hid., p. 193.
OPEN SECRET OF IIIS LIFE. 343

of the years during wliich I was working with him.
