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111

simple cadence of the old hymn, the mellow tones of the organ, against the muted background of the music of the sea was very lovely:

"Now the day is over,
Night is drawing nigh,
Shadows of the evening
Steal across the sky."

   It was like another world, a place divorced from material things and devoted to reverence and taste alone. Conscious of the girl beside me, one who felt all this as much as I, the weight of spiritual satisfaction was almost too much to bear.

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   Following the benediction, the worshippers retrieved their lanterns and filled out, to descend the rocky path as the little church returned to darkness and silence. Walking down the path in the lantern light, I knew I had experienced something rare and perfect. Never before or since, have I felt so at peace, so conscious of the possibilities that life presents. It seemed that everything unimportant had been filtered from my outlook, leaving a picture of only beautiful and essential things. Fortunately nothing was clouded by any suspicion of transience. 

   Circling the hotel, we proceeded across the rocks and into the barren fields beyond. Picking our way through the outcrops, we reached an escarpment overlooking the ocean. There we stood for a long time under the stars. In the infinite arch of the heavens, Deneb and Capella and Vega burned brilliantly. The pale waning moon floated low over the sea, casting a white shimmer of reflection. The stillness was pleasantly disturbed by the ground swell breaking along the shore. The breeze, sometimes laden with fine spray, felt clean and good. The fragrance of wild flowers drifted around us. Far to the south, the beacon on Cape Ann flashed through a pin-hole in the black curtain of the night. Here at last we were free, all artificialities stripped away and life a long white road, clean, fine. Here were the things that counted! Beauty, rectitude, taste, faith, ideals.

   I hadn't intended to quote from my YANKEE piece but since I gave it a great deal of thought as I wrote it, it expresses quite well the effect that the Shoals experience had on me and as such, it probably has a place in this account. I was to go to Shoals again in 1924 and 1925 but in 1924, I kept a full diary and have a good record. In 1925, I let my diary fall by the wayside in the spring, so there is no record.