CHAPTER XVII.

MY FIRST SERMON IN THE SEABOARD PARISH.

In the hope that some of the shipwrecked mariners might be present in

the church the next day, I proceeded to consider my morning’s sermon for

the occasion. There was no difficulty in taking care at the same time

that it should be suitable to the congregation, whether those sailors

were there or not. I turned over in my mind several subjects. I thought,

for instance, of showing them how this ocean that lay watchful and ready

all about our island, all about the earth, was but a visible type or

symbol of two other oceans, one very still, the other very awful and

fierce; in fact, that three oceans surrounded us: one of the known

world; one of the unseen world, that is, of death; one of the

spirit--the devouring ocean of evil--and might I not have added yet

another, encompassing and silencing all the rest--that of truth!

The visible ocean seemed to make war upon the land, and the dwellers

thereon. Restrained by the will of God and by him made subject more and

more to the advancing knowledge of those who were created to rule over

it, it was yet like a half-tamed beast ever ready to break loose and

devour its masters. Of course this would have been but one aspect or

appearance of it--for it was in truth all service; but this was the

aspect I knew it must bear to those, seafaring themselves or not, to

whom I had to speak. Then I thought I might show, that its power, like

that of all things that man is ready to fear, had one barrier over which

no commotion, no might of driving wind, could carry it, beyond which its

loudest waves were dumb--the barrier of death. Hitherto and no further

could its power reach. It could kill the body. It could dash in pieces

the last little cock-boat to which the man clung, but thus it swept the

man beyond its own region into the second sea of stillness, which we

call death, out upon which the thoughts of those that are left behind

can follow him only in great longings, vague conjectures, and mighty

faith. Then I thought I could show them how, raving in fear, or lying

still in calm deceit, there lay about the life of man a far more fearful

ocean than that which threatened his body; for this would cast, could it

but get a hold of him, both body and soul into hell--the sea of evil,

of vice, of sin, of wrong-doing--they might call it by what name they

pleased. This made war against the very essence of life, against God

who is the truth, against love, against fairness, against fatherhood,

motherhood, sisterhood, brotherhood, manhood, womanhood, against

tenderness and grace and beauty, gathering into one pulp of festering

death all that is noble, lovely, worshipful in the human nature made so

divine that the one fearless man, the Lord Jesus Christ, shared it with

us. This, I thought I might make them understand, was the only terrible

sea, the only hopeless ocean from whose awful shore we must shrink and

flee, the end of every voyage upon whose bosom was the bottom of its

filthy waters, beyond the reach of all that is thought or spoken in the

light, beyond life itself, but for the hand that reaches down from the

upper ocean of truth, the hand of the Redeemer of men. I thought, I

say, for a while, that I could make this, not definite, but very real to

them. But I did not feel quite confident about it. Might they not in the

symbolism forget the thing symbolised? And would not the symbol itself

be ready to fade quite from their memory, or to return only in the

vaguest shadow? And with the thought I perceived a far more excellent

way. For the power of the truth lies of course in its revelation to the

mind, and while for this there are a thousand means, none are so mighty

as its embodiment in human beings and human life. There it is itself

alive and active. And amongst these, what embodiment comes near to that

in him who was perfect man in virtue of being at the root of the secret

of humanity, in virtue of being the eternal Son of God? We are his sons

in time: he is his Son in eternity, of whose sea time is but the broken

sparkle. Therefore, I would talk to them about--but I will treat my

reader now as if he were not my reader, but one of my congregation

on that bright Sunday, my first in the Seaboard Parish, with the sea

outside the church, flashing in the sunlight.

While I stood at the lectern, which was in front of the altar-screen,

I could see little of my congregation, partly from my being on a level

with them, partly from the necessity for keeping my eyes and thoughts

upon that which I read. When, however, I rose from prayer in the

pulpit; then I felt, as usual with me, that I was personally present for

personal influence with my people, and then I saw, to my great pleasure,

that one long bench nearly in the middle of the church was full of such

sunburnt men as could not be mistaken for any but mariners, even if

their torn and worn garments had not revealed that they must be the

very men about whom we had been so much interested. Not only were they

behaving with perfect decorum, but their rough faces wore an aspect of

solemnity which I do not suppose was by any means their usual aspect.

I gave them no text. I had one myself, which was the necessary thing.

They should have it by and by.

“Once upon a time,” I said, “a man went up a mountain, and stayed there

till it was dark, and stayed on. Now, a man who finds himself on a

mountain as the sun is going down, especially if he is alone, makes

haste to get down before it is dark. But this man went up when the sun

was going down, and, as I say, continued there for a good long while

after it was dark. You will want to know why. I will tell you. He wished

to be alone. He hadn’t a house of his own. He never had all the time he

lived. He hadn’t even a room of his own into which he could go, and bolt

the door of it. True, he had kind friends, who gave him a bed: but they

were all poor people, and their houses were small, and very likely they

had large families, and he could not always find a quiet place to go

into. And I dare say, if he had had a room, he would have been a little

troubled with the children constantly coming to find him; for however

much he loved them--and no man was ever so fond of children as he

was--he needed to be left quiet sometimes. So, upon this occasion, he

went up the mountain just to be quiet. He had been all day with a crowd

of people, and he felt that it was time to be alone. For he had been

talking with men all day, which tires and sometimes confuses a man’s

thoughts, and now he wanted to talk with God--for that makes a man

strong, and puts all the confusion in order again, and lets a man know

what he is about. So he went to the top of the hill. That was his secret

chamber. It had no door; but that did not matter--no one could see him

but God. There he stayed for hours--sometimes, I suppose, kneeling in

his prayer to God; sometimes sitting, tired with his own thinking, on

a stone; sometimes walking about, looking forward to what would come

next--not anxious about it, but contemplating it. For just before he

came up here, some of the people who had been with him wanted to make

him a king; and this would not do--this was not what God wanted of him,

and therefore he got rid of them, and came up here to talk to God. It

was so quiet up here! The earth had almost vanished. He could see just

the bare hilltop beneath him, a glimmer below, and the sky and the stars

over his head. The people had all gone away to their own homes, and

perhaps next day would hardly think about him at all, busy catching

fish, or digging their gardens, or making things for their houses. But

he knew that God would not forget him the next day any more than this

day, and that God had sent him not to be the king that these people

wanted him to be, but their servant. So, to make his heart strong, I

say, he went up into the mountain alone to have a talk with his Father.

How quiet it all was up here, I say, and how noisy it had been down

there a little while ago! But God had been in the noise then as much

as he was in the quiet now--the only difference being that he could not

then be alone with him. I need not tell you who this man was--it was the

king of men, the servant of men, the Lord Jesus Christ, the everlasting

son of our Father in heaven.

“Now this mountain on which he was praying had a small lake at the foot

of it--that is, about thirteen miles long, and five miles broad. Not

wanting even his usual companions to be with him this evening--partly, I

presume, because they were of the same mind as those who desired to take

him by force and make him a king--he had sent them away in their boat,

to go across this water to the other side, where were their homes and

their families. Now, it was not pitch dark either on the mountain-top or

on the water down below; yet I doubt if any other man than he would have

been keen-eyed enough to discover that little boat down in the middle

of the lake, much distressed by the west wind that blew right in their

teeth. But he loved every man in it so much, that I think even as he was

talking to his Father, his eyes would now and then go looking for and

finding it--watching it on its way across to the other side. You must

remember that it was a little boat; and there are often tremendous

storms upon these small lakes with great mountains about them. For the

wind will come all at once, rushing down through the clefts in as sudden

a squall as ever overtook a sailor at sea. And then, you know, there is

no sea-room. If the wind get the better of them, they are on the shore

in a few minutes, whichever way the wind may blow. He saw them worn out

at the oar, toiling in rowing, for the wind was contrary unto them. So

the time for loneliness and prayer was over, and the time to go down out

of his secret chamber and help his brethren was come. He did not need to

turn and say good-bye to his Father, as if he dwelt on that mountain-top

alone: his Father was down there on the lake as well. He went straight

down. Could not his Father, if he too was down on the lake, help them

without him? Yes. But he wanted him to do it, that they might see that

he did it. Otherwise they would only have thought that the wind fell and

the waves lay down, without supposing for a moment that their Master or

his Father had had anything to do with it. They would have done just as

people do now-a-days: they think that the help comes of itself, instead

of by the will of him who determined from the first that men should be

helped. So the Master went down the hill. When he reached the border

of the lake, the wind being from the other side, he must have found the

waves breaking furiously upon the rocks. But that made no difference to

him. He looked out as he stood alone on the edge amidst the rushing wind

and the noise of the water, out over the waves under the clear, starry

sky, saw where the tiny boat was tossed about like a nutshell, and set

out.”

The mariners had been staring at me up to this point, leaning forward on

their benches, for sailors are nearly as fond of a good yarn as they are

of tobacco; and I heard afterwards that they had voted parson’s yarn a

good one. Now, however, I saw one of them, probably more ignorant than

the others, cast a questioning glance at his neighbour. It was not

returned, and he fell again into a listening attitude. He had no idea

of what was coming. He probably thought parson had forgotten to say how

Jesus had come by a boat.

“The companions of our Lord had not been willing to go away and leave

him behind. Now, I dare say, they wished more than ever that he had been

with them--not that they thought he could do anything with a storm, only

that somehow they would have been less afraid with his face to look at.

They had seen him cure men of dreadful diseases; they had seen him turn

water into wine--some of them; they had seen him feed five thousand

people the day before with five loaves and two small fishes; but had one

of their number suggested that if he had been with them, they would have

been safe from the storm, they would not have talked any nonsense about

the laws of nature, not having learned that kind of nonsense, but they

would have said that was quite a different thing--altogether too much to

expect or believe: _nobody_ could make the wind mind what it was about,

or keep the water from drowning you if you fell into it and couldn’t

swim; or such-like.

“At length, when they were nearly worn out, taking feebler and feebler

strokes, sometimes missing the water altogether, at other times burying

their oars in it up to the handles--as they rose on the crest of a huge

wave, one of them gave a cry, and they all stopped rowing and stared,

leaning forward to peer through the darkness. And through the spray

which the wind tore from the tops of the waves and scattered before

it like dust, they saw, perhaps a hundred yards or so from the boat,

something standing up from the surface of the water. It seemed to move

towards them. It was a shape like a man. They all cried out with fear,

as was natural, for they thought it must be a ghost.”

How the faces of the sailors strained towards me at this part of the

story! I was afraid one of them especially was on the point of getting

up to speak, as we have heard of sailors doing in church. I went on.

“But then, over the noise of the wind and the waters came the voice they

knew so well. It said, ‘Be of good cheer: it is I. Be not afraid.’ I

should think, between wonder and gladness, they hardly knew for some

moments where they were or what they were about. Peter was the first to

recover himself apparently. In the first flush of his delight he felt

strong and full of courage. ‘Lord, if it be thou,’ he said, ‘bid me come

unto thee on the water.’ Jesus just said, ‘Come;’ and Peter unshipped

his oar, and scrambled over the gunwale on to the sea. But when he let

go his hold of the boat, and began to look about him, and saw how the

wind was tearing the water, and how it tossed and raved between him and

Jesus, he began to be afraid. And as soon as he began to be afraid he

began to sink; but he had, notwithstanding his fear, just sense enough

to do the one sensible thing; he cried out, ‘Lord, save me.’ And Jesus

put out his hand, and took hold of him, and lifted him up out of the

water, and said to him, ‘O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou

doubt? And then they got into the boat, and the wind fell all at once,

and altogether.

“Now, you will not think that Peter was a coward, will you? It wasn’t

that he hadn’t courage, but that he hadn’t enough of it. And why was it

that he hadn’t enough of it? Because he hadn’t faith enough. Peter was

always very easily impressed with the look of things. It wasn’t at all

likely that a man should be able to walk on the water; and yet Peter

found himself standing on the water: you would have thought that when

once he found himself standing on the water, he need not be afraid of

the wind and the waves that lay between him and Jesus. But they looked

so ugly that the fearfulness of them took hold of his heart, and his

courage went. You would have thought that the greatest trial of his

courage was over when he got out of the boat, and that there was

comparatively little more ahead of him. Yet the sight of the waves and

the blast of the boisterous wind were too much for him. I will tell you

how I fancy it was; and I think there are several instances of the same

kind of thing in Peter’s life. When he got out of the boat, and found

himself standing on the water, he began to think much of himself for

being able to do so, and fancy himself better and greater than his

companions, and an especial favourite of God above them. Now, there is

nothing that kills faith sooner than pride. The two are directly against

each other. The moment that Peter grew proud, and began to think about

himself instead of about his Master, he began to lose his faith, and

then he grew afraid, and then he began to sink--and that brought him to

his senses. Then he forgot himself and remembered his Master, and

then the hand of the Lord caught him, and the voice of the Lord gently

rebuked him for the smallness of his faith, asking, ‘Wherefore

didst thou doubt?’ I wonder if Peter was able to read his own heart

sufficiently well to answer that _wherefore_. I do not think it likely

at this period of his history. But God has immeasurable patience, and

before he had done teaching Peter, even in this life, he had made him

know quite well that pride and conceit were at the root of all his

failures. Jesus did not point it out to him now. Faith was the only

thing that would reveal that to him, as well as cure him of it; and was,

therefore, the only thing he required of him in his rebuke. I suspect

Peter was helped back into the boat by the eager hands of his companions

already in a humbler state of mind than when he left it; but before

his pride would be quite overcome, it would need that same voice of

loving-kindness to call him Satan, and the voice of the cock to bring to

his mind his loud boast, and his sneaking denial; nay, even the voice

of one who had never seen the Lord till after his death, but was yet a

readier disciple than he--the voice of St. Paul, to rebuke him because

he dissembled, and was not downright honest. But at the last even he

gained the crown of martyrdom, enduring all extremes, nailed to the

cross like his Master, rather than deny his name. This should teach

us to distrust ourselves, and yet have great hope for ourselves, and

endless patience with other people. But to return to the story and what

the story itself teaches us.

“If the disciples had known that Jesus saw them from the top of the

mountain, and was watching them all the time, would they have been

frightened at the storm, as I have little doubt they were, for they

were only fresh-water fishermen, you know? Well, to answer my own

question”--I went on in haste, for I saw one or two of the sailors with

an audible answer hovering on their lips--“I don’t know that, as they

then were, it would have made so much difference to them; for none of

them had risen much above the look of the things nearest them yet. But

supposing you, who know something about him, were alone on the sea, and

expecting your boat to be swamped every moment--if you found out all

at once, that he was looking down at you from some lofty hilltop, and

seeing all round about you in time and space too, would you be afraid?

He might mean you to go to the bottom, you know. Would you mind going

to the bottom with him looking at you? I do not think I should mind it

myself. But I must take care lest I be boastful like Peter.

“Why should we be afraid of anything with him looking at us who is the

Saviour of men? But we are afraid of him instead, because we do not

believe that he is what he says he is--the Saviour of men. We do not

believe what he offers us is salvation. We think it is slavery, and

therefore continue slaves. Friends, I will speak to you who think you

do believe in him. I am not going to say that you do not believe in him;

but I hope I am going to make you say to yourselves that you too deserve

to have those words of the Saviour spoken to you that were spoken to

Peter, ‘O ye of little faith!’ Floating on the sea of your troubles,

all kinds of fears and anxieties assailing you, is He not on the

mountain-top? Sees he not the little boat of your fortunes tossed with

the waves and the contrary wind? Assuredly he will come to you walking

on the waters. It may not be in the way you wish, but if not, you will

say at last, ‘This is better.’ It may be that he will come in a form

that will make you cry out for fear in the weakness of your faith, as

the disciples cried out--not believing any more than they did, that it

can be he. But will not each of you arouse his courage that to you also

he may say, as to the woman with the sick daughter whose confidence he

so sorely tried, ‘Great is thy faith’? Will you not rouse yourself, I

say, that you may do him justice, and cast off the slavery of your own

dread? O ye of little faith, wherefore will ye doubt? Do not think that

the Lord sees and will not come. Down the mountain assuredly he will

come, and you are now as safe in your troubles as the disciples were in

theirs with Jesus looking on. They did not know it, but it was so: the

Lord was watching them. And when you look back upon your past lives,

cannot you see some instances of the same kind--when you felt and acted

as if the Lord had forgotten you, and found afterwards that he had been

watching you all the time?

“But the reason why you do not trust him more is that you obey him so

little. If you would only, ask what God would have you to do, you would

soon find your confidence growing. It is because you are proud, and

envious, and greedy after gain, that you do not trust him more. Ah!

trust him if it were only to get rid of these evil things, and be clean

and beautiful in heart.

“O sailors with me on the ocean of life, will you, knowing that he is

watching you from his mountain-top, do and say the things that hurt,

and wrong, and disappoint him? Sailors on the waters that surround this

globe, though there be no great mountain that overlooks the little lake

on which you float, not the less does he behold you, and care for you,

and watch over you. Will you do that which is unpleasing, distressful

to him? Will you be irreverent, cruel, coarse? Will you say evil things,

lie, and delight in vile stories and reports, with his eye on you,

watching your ship on its watery ways, ever ready to come over the waves

to help you? It is a fine thing, sailors, to fear nothing; but it would

be far finer to fear nothing _because_ he is above all, and over all,

and in you all. For his sake and for his love, give up everything bad,

and take him for your captain. He will be both captain and pilot to you,

and steer you safe into the port of glory. Now to God the Father,” &c.

This is very nearly the sermon I preached that first Sunday morning. I

followed it up with a short enforcement in the afternoon.

END OF VOL. I.

THE SEABOARD PARISH

BY GEORGE MAC DONALD, LL.D.

VOLUME II.

CONTENTS OF VOL. II.

I. ANOTHER SUNDAY EVENING

II. NICEBOOTS

III. THE BLACKSMITH

IV. THE LIFE-BOAT

V. MR. PERCIVALE

VI. THE SHADOW OF DEATH

VII. AT THE FARM

VIII. THE KEEVE IX. THE WALK TO CHURCH

X. THE OLD CASTLE

XI. JOE AND HIS TROUBLE

XII. A SMALL ADVENTURE

XIII. THE HARVEST

CHAPTER I.

ANOTHER SUNDAY EVENING.

In the evening we met in Connie’s room, as usual, to have our talk. And

this is what came out of it.

The window was open. The sun was in the west. We sat a little aside out

of the course of his radiance, and let him look full into the room. Only

Wynnie sat back in a dark corner, as if she would get out of his way.

Below him the sea lay bluer than you could believe even when you saw

it--blue with a delicate yet deep silky blue, the exquisiteness of which

was thrown up by the brilliant white lines of its lapping on the high

coast, to the northward. We had just sat down, when Dora broke out

with--

“I saw Niceboots at church. He did stare at you, papa, as if he had

never heard a sermon before.”

“I daresay he never heard such a sermon before!” said Connie, with the

perfect confidence of inexperience and partiality--not to say ignorance,

seeing she had not heard the sermon herself.

Here Wynnie spoke from her dark corner, apparently forcing herself to

speak, and thereby giving what seemed an unpleasant tone to what she

said.

“Well, papa, I don’t know what to think. You are always telling us to

trust in Him; but how can we, if we are not good?”

“The first good thing you can do is to look up to him. That is the

beginning of trust in him, and the most sensible thing that it is

possible for us to do. That is faith.”

“But it’s no use sometimes.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because you--I mean I--can’t feel good, or care about it at all.”

“But is that any ground for saying that it is no use--that he does not

heed you? that he disregards the look cast up to him? that, till the

heart goes with the will, he who made himself strong to be the helper

of the weak, who pities most those who are most destitute--and who

so destitute as those who do not love what they want to love--except,

indeed, those who don’t want to love?--that, till you are well on

towards all right by earnestly seeking it, he won’t help you? You are to

judge him from yourself, are you?--forgetting that all the misery in you

is just because you have not got his grand presence with you?”

I spoke so earnestly as to be somewhat incoherent in words. But my

reader will understand. Wynnie was silent. Connie, as if partly to help

her sister, followed on the same side.

“I don’t know exactly how to say what I mean, papa, but I wish I could

get this lovely afternoon, all full of sunshine and blue, into unity

with all that you teach us about Jesus Christ. I wish this beautiful

day came in with my thought of him, like the frame--gold and red and

blue--that you have to that picture of him at home. Why doesn’t it?”

“Just because you have not enough of faith in him, my dear. You do not

know him well enough yet. You do not yet believe that he means you all

gladness, heartily, honestly, thoroughly.”

“And no suffering, papa?”

“I did not say that, my dear. There you are on your couch and can’t

move. But he does mean you such gladness, such a full sunny air and blue

sea of blessedness that this suffering shall count for little in it;

nay more, shall be taken in for part, and, like the rocks that interfere

with the roll of the sea, flash out the white that glorifies and

intensifies the whole--to pass away by and by, I trust, none the less.

What a chance you have, my Connie, of believing in him, of offering upon

his altar!”

“But,” said my wife, “are not these feelings in a great measure

dependent upon the state of one’s health? I find it so different when

the sunshine is inside me as well as outside me.”

“Not a doubt of it, my dear. But that is only the more reason for

rising above all that. From the way some people speak of physical

difficulties--I don’t mean you, wife--you would think that they were not

merely the inevitable which they are, but the insurmountable which they

are not. That they are physical and not spiritual is not only a great

consolation, but a strong argument for overcoming them. For all that is

physical is put, or is in the process of being put, under the feet of

the spiritual. Do not mistake me. I do not say you can make yourself

feel merry or happy when you are in a physical condition which is

contrary to such mental condition. But you can withdraw from it--not all

at once; but by practice and effort you can learn to withdraw from it,

refusing to allow your judgments and actions to be ruled by it. You can

climb up out of the fogs, and sit quiet in the sunlight on the hillside

of faith. You cannot be merry down below in the fog, for there is the

fog; but you can every now and then fly with the dove-wings of the soul

up into the clear, to remind yourself that all this passes away, is but

an accident, and that the sun shines always, although it may not at any

given moment be shining on you. ‘What does that matter?’ you will learn

to say. ‘It is enough for me to know that the sun does shine, and that

this is only a weary fog that is round about me for the moment. I shall

come out into the light beyond presently.’ This is faith--faith in God,

who is the light, and is all in all. I believe that the most glorious

instances of calmness in suffering are thus achieved; that the sufferers

really do not suffer what one of us would if thrown into their physical

condition without the refuge of their spiritual condition as well; for

they have taken refuge in the inner chamber. Out of the spring of their

life a power goes forth that quenches the flames of the furnace of their

suffering, so far at least that it does not touch the deep life, cannot

make them miserable, does not drive them from the possession of their

soul in patience, which is the divine citadel of the suffering. Do you

understand me, Connie?”

“I do, papa. I think perfectly.”

“Still less, then, is the fact that the difficulty is physical to be

used as an excuse for giving way to ill-temper, and, in fact, leaving

ourselves to be tossed and shaken by every tremble of our nerves. That

is as if a man should give himself into the hands and will and caprice

of an organ-grinder, to work upon him, not with the music of the

spheres, but with the wretched growling of the streets.”

“But,” said Wynnie, “I have heard you yourself, papa, make excuse for

people’s ill-temper on this very ground, that they were out of health.

Indeed,” she went on, half-crying, “I have heard you do so for myself,

when you did not know that I was within hearing.”

“Yes, my dear, most assuredly. It is no fiction, but a real difference

that lies between excusing ourselves and excusing other people. No doubt

the same excuse is just for ourselves that is just for other people. But

we can do something to put ourselves right upon a higher principle,

and therefore we should not waste our time in excusing, or even in

condemning ourselves, but make haste up the hill. Where we cannot

work--that is, in the life of another--we have time to make all the

excuse we can. Nay more; it is only justice there. We are not bound to

insist on our own rights, even of excuse; the wisest thing often is to

forego them. But we are bound by heaven, earth, and hell to give them

to other people. And, besides, what a comfort to ourselves to be able to

say, ‘It is true So-and-so was cross to-day. But it wasn’t in the least

that he wasn’t friendly, or didn’t like me; it was only that he had

eaten something that hadn’t agreed with him. I could see it in his eye.

He had one of his headaches.’ Thus, you see, justice to our neighbour,

and comfort to ourselves, is one and the same thing. But it would be

a sad thing to have to think that when we found ourselves in the same

ungracious condition, from whatever cause, we had only to submit to it,

saying, ‘It is a law of nature,’ as even those who talk most about laws

will not do, when those laws come between them and their own comfort.

They are ready enough then to call in the aid of higher laws, which,

so far from being contradictory, overrule the lower to get things

into something like habitable, endurable condition. It may be a law of

nature; but what has the Law of the Spirit of Life to _propound anent_

it? as the Scotch lawyers would say.”

A little pause followed, during which I hope some of us were thinking.

That Wynnie, at least, was, her next question made evident.

“What you say about a law of nature and a law of the Spirit makes me

think again how that walking on the water has always been a puzzle to

me.”

“It could hardly be other, seeing that we cannot possibly understand

it,” I answered.

“But I find it so hard to believe. Can’t you say something, papa, to

help me to believe it?”

“I think if you admit what goes before, you will find there is nothing

against reason in the story.”

“Tell me, please, what you mean.”

“If all things were made by Jesus, the Word of God, would it be

reasonable that the water that he had created should be able to drown

him?”

“It might drown his body.”

“It would if he had not the power over it still, to prevent it from

laying hold of him. But just think for a moment. God is a Spirit. Spirit

is greater than matter. Spirit makes matter. Think what it was for a

human body to have such a divine creative power dwelling in it as that

which dwelt in the human form of Jesus! What power, and influence, and

utter rule that spirit must have over the body in which it dwells! We

cannot imagine how much; but if we have so much power over our bodies,

how much more must the pure, divine Jesus, have had over his! I suspect

this miracle was wrought, not through anything done to the water, but

through the power of the spirit over the body of Jesus, which was all

obedient thereto. I am not explaining the miracle, for that I cannot do.

One day I think it will be plain common sense to us. But now I am only

showing you what seems to me to bring us a step nearer to the essential

region of the miracle, and so far make it easier to believe. If we look

at the history of our Lord, we shall find that, true real human body

as his was, it was yet used by his spirit after a fashion in which we

cannot yet use our bodies. And this is only reasonable. Let me give you

an instance. You remember how, on the Mount of Transfiguration, that

body shone so that the light of it illuminated all his garments. You do

not surely suppose that this shine was external--physical light, as we

say, _merely?_ No doubt it was physical light, for how else would their

eyes have seen it? But where did it come from? What was its source? I

think it was a natural outburst of glory from the mind of Jesus, filled

with the perfect life of communion with his Father--the light of his

divine blessedness taking form in physical radiance that permeated and

glorified all that surrounded him. As the body is the expression of the

soul, as the face of Jesus himself was the expression of the being, the

thought, the love of Jesus in like manner this radiance was the natural

expression of his gladness, even in the face of that of which they had

been talking--Moses, Elias, and he--namely, the decease that he should

accomplish at Jerusalem. Again, after his resurrection, he convinced the

hands, as well as eyes, of doubting Thomas, that he was indeed there

in the body; and yet that body could appear and disappear as the Lord

willed. All this is full of marvel, I grant you; but probably far more

intelligible to us in a further state of existence than some of the most

simple facts with regard to our own bodies are to us now, only that we

are so used to them that we never think how unintelligible they really

are.”

“But then about Peter, papa? What you have been saying will not apply to

Peter’s body, you know.”

“I confess there is more difficulty there. But if you can suppose that

such power were indwelling in Jesus, you cannot limit the sphere of

its action. As he is the head of the body, his church, in all spiritual

things, so I firmly believe, however little we can understand about it,

is he in all natural things as well. Peter’s faith in him brought even

Peter’s body within the sphere of the outgoing power of the Master.

Do you suppose that because Peter ceased to be brave and trusting,

therefore Jesus withdrew from him some sustaining power, and allowed

him to sink? I do not believe it. I believe Peter’s sinking followed

naturally upon his loss of confidence. Thus he fell away from the life

of the Master; was no longer, in that way I mean, connected with

the Head, was instantly under the dominion of the natural law of

gravitation, as we call it, and began to sink. Therefore the Lord must

take other means to save him. He must draw nigh to him in a bodily

manner. The pride of Peter had withdrawn him from the immediate

spiritual influence of Christ, conquering his matter; and therefore the

Lord must come over the stormy space between, come nearer to him in the

body, and from his own height of safety above the sphere of the natural

law, stretch out to him the arm of physical aid, lift him up, lead him

to the boat. The whole salvation of the human race is figured in this

story. It is all Christ, my love.--Does this help you to believe at

all?”

“I think it does, papa. But it wants thinking over a good deal. I always

find as I think, that lighter bits shine out here and there in a thing

I have no hope of understanding altogether. That always helps me to

believe that the rest might be understood too, if I were only clever

enough.”

“Simple enough, not clever enough, my dear.”

“But there’s one thing,” said my wife, “that is more interesting to me

than what you have been talking about. It is the other instances in the

life of St. Peter in which you said he failed in a similar manner from

pride or self-satisfaction.”

“One, at least, seems to me very clear. You have often remarked to me,

Ethel, how little praise servants can stand; how almost invariably after

you have commended the diligence or skill of any of your household,

as you felt bound to do, one of the first visible results was either a

falling away in the performance by which she had gained the praise, or a

more or less violent access, according to the nature of the individual,

of self-conceit, soon breaking out in bad temper or impertinence. Now

you will see precisely the same kind of thing in Peter.”

Here I opened my New Testament, and read fragmentarily, “‘But whom say

ye that I am?... Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God....

Blessed art thou, Simon.... My Father hath revealed that unto thee. I

will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.... I must suffer

many things, and be killed, and be raised again the third day.... Be it

far from thee, Lord. This shall not be unto thee.... Get thee behind me,

Satan. Thou art an offence unto me.’ Just contemplate the change here

in the words of our Lord. ‘Blessed art thou.’ ‘Thou art an offence unto

me.’ Think what change has passed on Peter’s mood before the second of

these words could be addressed to him to whom the first had just been

spoken. The Lord had praised him. Peter grew self-sufficient, even to

the rebuking of him whose praise had so uplifted him. But it is ever

so. A man will gain a great moral victory: glad first, then uplifted,

he will fall before a paltry temptation. I have sometimes wondered, too,

whether his denial of our Lord had anything to do with his satisfaction

with himself for making that onslaught upon the high priest’s servant.

It was a brave thing and a faithful to draw a single sword against a

multitude. In his fiery eagerness and inexperience, the blow, well meant

to cleave Malchus’s head, missed, and only cut off his ear; but Peter

had herein justified his confident saying that he would not deny him. He

was not one to deny his Lord who had been the first to confess him! Yet

ere the cock had crowed, ere the morning had dawned, the vulgar grandeur

of the palace of the high priest (for let it be art itself, it was

vulgar grandeur beside that grandeur which it caused Peter to deny), and

the accusing tone of a maid-servant, were enough to make him quail whom

the crowd with lanterns, and torches, and weapons, had only roused to

fight. True, he was excited then, and now he was cold in the middle of

the night, with Jesus gone from his sight a prisoner, and for the faces

of friends that had there surrounded him and strengthened him with their

sympathy, now only the faces of those who were, or whom at least Peter

thought to be on the other side, looking at him curiously, as a strange

intruder into their domains. Alas, that the courage which led him to

follow the Lord should have thus led him, not to deny him, but into the

denial of him! Yet why should I say _alas?_ If the denial of our Lord

lay in his heart a possible thing, only prevented by his being kept in

favourable circumstances for confessing him, it was a thousand times

better that he should deny him, and thus know what a poor weak thing

that heart of his was, trust it no more, and give it up to the Master

to make it strong, and pure, and grand. For such an end the Lord was

willing to bear all the pain of Peter’s denial. O, the love of that Son

of Man, who in the midst of all the wretched weaknesses of those who

surrounded him, loved the best in them, and looked forward to his own

victory for them that they might become all that they were meant to

be--like him; that the lovely glimmerings of truth and love that were

in them now--the breakings forth of the light that lighteneth every

man--might grow into the perfect human day; loving them even the more

that they were so helpless, so oppressed, so far from that ideal which

was their life, and which all their dim desires were reaching after!”

Here I ceased, and a little overcome with the great picture in my soul

to which I had been able only to give the poorest expression, rose, and

retired to my own room. There I could only fall on my knees and pray

that the Lord Christ, who had died for me, might have his own way with

me--that it might be worth his while to have done what he did and what

he was doing now for me. To my Elder Brother, my Lord, and my God, I

gave myself yet again, confidently, because he cared to have me, and my

very breath was his. I _would_ be what he wanted, who knew all about it,

and had done everything that I might be a son of God--a living glory of

gladness.

CHAPTER II.

NICEBOOTS.

The next morning the captain of the lost vessel called upon me early

to thank me for himself and his men. He was a fine honest-looking burly

fellow, dressed in blue from head to heel. He might have sat for a

portrait of Chaucer’s shipman, as far as his hue and the first look of

him went. It was clear that “in many a tempest had his beard be shake,”

and certainly “the hote somer had made his hew all broun;” but farther

the likeness would hardly go, for the “good fellow” which Chaucer

applies with such irony to the shipman of his time, who would filch

wine, and drown all the captives he made in a sea-fight, was clearly

applicable in good earnest to this shipman. Still, I thought I had

something to bring against him, and therefore before we parted I said to

him--

“They tell me, captain, that your vessel was not seaworthy, and that you

could not but have known that.”

“She was my own craft, sir, and I judged her fit for several voyages

more. If she had been A 1 she couldn’t have been mine; and a man must do

what he can for his family.”

“But you were risking your life, you know.”

“A few chances more or less don’t much signify to a sailor, sir. There

ain’t nothing to be done without risk. You’ll find an old tub go voyage

after voyage, and she beyond bail, and a clipper fresh off the stocks go

down in the harbour. It’s all in the luck, sir, I assure you.”

“Well, if it were your own life I should have nothing to say, seeing you

have a family to look after; but what about the poor fellows who made

the voyage with you? Did they know what kind of a vessel they were

embarking in?”

“Wherever the captain’s ready to go he’ll always find men ready to

follow him. Bless you, sir, they never asks no questions. If a sailor

was always to be thinking of the chances, he’d never set his foot off

shore.”

“Still, I don’t think it’s right they shouldn’t know.”

“I daresay they knowed all about the old brig as well as I did myself.

You gets to know all about a craft just as you do about her captain.

She’s got a character of her own, and she can’t hide it long, any more

than you can hide yours, sir, begging your pardon.”

“I daresay that’s all correct, but still I shouldn’t like anyone to say

to me, ‘You ought to have told me, captain.’ Therefore, you see, I’m

telling you, captain, and now I’m clear.--Have a glass of wine before

you go,” I concluded, ringing the bell.

“Thank you, sir. I’ll turn over what you’ve been saying, and anyhow I

take it kind of you.”

So we parted. I have never seen him since, and shall not, most likely,

in this world. But he looked like a man that could understand why and

wherefore I spoke as I did. And I had the advantage of having had a

chance of doing something for him first of all. Let no man who wants to

do anything for the soul of a man lose a chance of doing something for

his body. He ought to be willing, and ready, which is more than willing,

to do that whether or not; but there are those who need this reminder.

Of many a soul Jesus laid hold by healing the suffering the body brought

upon it. No one but himself can tell how much the nucleus of the church

was composed of and by those who had received health from his hands,

loving-kindness from the word of his mouth. My own opinion is that

herein lay the very germ of the kernel of what is now the ancient,

was then the infant church; that from them, next to the disciples

themselves, went forth the chief power of life in love, for they too

had seen the Lord, and in their own humble way could preach and teach

concerning him. What memories of him theirs must have been!

Things went on very quietly, that is, as I mean now, from the view-point

of a historian, without much to record bearing notably upon after

events, for the greater part of the next week. I wandered about my

parish, making acquaintance with different people in an outside sort of

way, only now and then finding an opportunity of seeing into their

souls except by conclusion. But I enjoyed endlessly the aspects of the

country. It was not picturesque except in parts. There was little wood

and there were no hills, only undulations, though many of them were

steep enough even from a pedestrian’s point of view. Neither, however,

were there any plains except high moorland tracts. But the impression of

the whole country was large, airy, sunshiny, and it was clasped in the

arms of the infinite, awful, yet how bountiful sea--if one will look at

the ocean in its world-wide, not to say its eternal aspects, and not out

of the fears of a hidebound love of life! The sea and the sky, I must

confess, dwarfed the earth, made it of small account beside them; but

who could complain of such an influence? At least, not I.

My children bathed in this sea every day, and gathered strength and

knowledge from it. It was, as I have indicated, a dangerous coast to

bathe upon. The sweep of the tides varied with the varying sands that

were cast up. There was now in one place, now in another, a strong

_undertow_, as they called it--a reflux, that is, of the inflowing

waters, which was quite sufficient to carry those who could not swim out

into the great deep, and rendered much exertion necessary, even in those

who could, to regain the shore. But there was a fine strong Cornish

woman to take charge of the ladies and the little boys, and she,

watching the ways of the wild monster, knew the when and the where, and

all about it.

Connie got out upon the downs every day. She improved in health

certainly, and we thought a little even in her powers of motion. The

weather continued superb. What rain there was fell at night, just enough

for Nature to wash her face with and so look quite fresh in the morning.

We contrived a dinner on the sands on the other side of the bay, for the

Friday of this same week.

The morning rose gloriously. Harry and Charlie were turning the house

upside down, to judge by their noise, long before I was in the humour to

get up, for I had been reading late the night before. I never made

much objection to mere noise, knowing that I could stop it the moment

I pleased, and knowing, which was of more consequence, that so far from

there being anything wrong in making a noise, the sea would make noise

enough in our ears before we left Kilkhaven. The moment, however, that

I heard a thread of whining or a burst of anger in the noise, I would

interfere at once--treating these just as things that must be dismissed

at once. Harry and Charlie were, I say, to use their own form of speech,

making such a row that morning, however, that I was afraid of some

injury to the house or furniture, which were not our own. So I opened my

door and called out--

“Harry! Charlie! What on earth are you about?”

“Nothing, papa,” answered Charlie. “Only it’s so jolly!”

“What is jolly, my boy?” I asked.

“O, I don’t know, papa! It’s _so_ jolly!”

“Is it the sunshine?” thought I; “and the wind? God’s world all over?

The God of gladness in the hearts of the lads? Is it that? No wonder,

then, that they cannot tell yet what it is!”

I withdrew into my room; and so far from seeking to put an end to the

noise--I knew Connie did not mind it--listened to it with a kind of

reverence, as the outcome of a gladness which the God of joy had kindled

in their hearts. Soon after, however, I heard certain dim growls of

expostulation from Harry, and having, from experience, ground for

believing that the elder was tyrannising over the younger, I stopped

that and the noise together, sending Charlie to find out where the tide

would be between one and two o’clock, and Harry to run to the top of

the hill, and find out the direction of the wind. Before I was dressed,

Charlie was knocking at my door with the news that it would be half-tide

about one; and Harry speedily followed with the discovery that the wind

was north-east by south-west, which of course determined that the sun

would shine all day.

As the dinner-hour drew near, the servants went over, with Walter at

their head, to choose a rock convenient for a table, under the shelter

of the rocks on the sands across the bay. Thither, when Walter returned,

we bore our Connie, carrying her litter close by the edge of the

retreating tide, which sometimes broke in a ripple of music under her,

wetting our feet with innocuous rush. The child’s delight was extreme,

as she thus skimmed the edge of the ocean, with the little ones

gambolling about her, and her mamma and Wynnie walking quietly on the

landward side, for she wished to have no one between her and the sea.

After scrambling with difficulty over some rocky ledges, and stopping

at Connie’s request, to let her look into a deep pool in the sand, which

somehow or other retained the water after the rest had retreated, we set

her down near the mouth of a cave, in the shadow of a rock. And there

was our dinner nicely laid for us on a flat rock in front of the cave.

The cliffs rose behind us, with curiously curved and variously angled

strata. The sun in his full splendour threw dark shadows on the

brilliant yellow sand, more and more of which appeared as the bright

blue water withdrew itself, now rippling over it as if it meant to hide

it all up again, now uncovering more as it withdrew for another rush.

Before we had finished our dinner, the foremost wavelets appeared so far

away over the plain of the sand, that it seemed a long walk to the edge

that had been almost at our feet a little while ago. Between us and it

lay a lovely desert of glittering sand.

When even Charlie and Harry had arrived at the conclusion that it was

time to stop eating, we left the shadow and went out into the sun,

carrying Connie and laying her down in the midst of “the ribbed

sea-sand,” which was very ribby to-day. On a shawl a little way off from

her lay her baby, crowing and kicking with the same jollity that had

possessed the boys ever since the morning. I wandered about with Wynnie

on the sands, picking up amongst other things strange creatures in thin

shells ending in vegetable-like tufts, if I remember rightly. My wife

sat on the end of Connie’s litter, and Dora and the boys, a little way

off, were trying how far the full force of three wooden spades could, in

digging a hole, keep ahead of the water which was ever tumbling in the

sand from the sides of the same. Behind, the servants were busy washing

the plates in a pool, and burying the fragments of the feast; for I made

it a rule wherever we went that the fair face of nature was not to be

defiled. I have always taken the part of excursionists in these

latter days of running to and fro, against those who complain that the

loveliest places are being destroyed by their inroads. But there is

one most offensive, even disgusting habit amongst them--that of leaving

bones, fragments of meat pies, and worse than all, pieces of greasy

paper about the place, which I cannot excuse, or at least defend. Even

the surface of Cumberland and Westmoreland lakes will be defiled

with these floating abominations--not abominations at all if they are

decently burned or buried when done with, but certainly abominations

when left to be cast hither and thither in the wind, over the grass, or

on the eddy and ripple of the pure water, for days after those who

have thus left their shame behind them have returned to their shops or

factories. I forgive them for trampling down the grass and the ferns.

That cannot be helped, and in comparison of the good they get, is not

to be considered at all. But why should they leave such a savage trail

behind them as this, forgetting too that though they have done with the

spot, there are others coming after them to whom these remnants must be

an offence?

At length in our roaming, Wynnie and I approached a long low ridge of

rock, rising towards the sea into which it ran. Crossing this, we came

suddenly upon the painter whom Dora had called Niceboots, sitting with a

small easel before him. We were right above him ere we knew. He had his

back towards us, so that we saw at once what he was painting.

“O, papa!” cried Wynnie involuntarily, and the painter looked round.

“I beg your pardon,” I said. “We came over from the other side, and did

not see you before. I hope we have not disturbed you much.”

“Not in the least,” he answered courteously, and rose as he spoke.

I saw that the subject on his easel suggested that of which Wynnie had

been making a sketch at the same time, on the day when Connie first lay

on the top of the opposite cliff. But he was not even looking in the

same direction now.

“Do you mind having your work seen before it is finished?”

“Not in the least, if the spectators will do me the favour to remember

that most processes have to go through a seemingly chaotic stage,” he

answered.

I was struck with the mode and tone of the remark.

“Here is no common man,” I said to myself, and responded to him in

something of a similar style.

“I wish we could always keep that in mind with regard to human beings

themselves, as well as their works,” I said aloud.

The painter looked at me, and I looked at him.

“We speak each from the experience of his own profession, I presume,” he

said.

“But,” I returned, glancing at the little picture in oils upon his

easel, “your work here, though my knowledge of painting is next to

nothing--perhaps I ought to say nothing at all--this picture must have

long ago passed the chaotic stage.”

“It is nearly as much finished as I care to make it,” he returned. “I

hardly count this work at all. I am chiefly amusing, or rather pleasing,

my own fancy at present.”

“Apparently,” I remarked, “you had the conical rock outside the hay for

your model, and now you are finishing it with your back turned towards

it. How is that?”

“I will soon explain,” he answered. “The moment I saw this rock, it

reminded me of Dante’s Purgatory.”

“Ah, you are a reader of Dante?” I said. “In the original, I hope.”

“Yes. A friend of mine, a brother painter, an Italian, set me going with

that, and once going with Dante, nobody could well stop. I never knew

what intensity _per se_ was till I began to read Dante.”

“That is quite my own feeling. Now, to return to your picture.”

“Without departing at all from natural forms, I thought to make it

suggest the Purgatorio to anyone who remembered the description given of

the place _ab extra_ by Ulysses, in the end of the twenty-sixth canto

of the Inferno. Of course, that thing there is a mere rock, yet it

has certain mountain forms about it. I have put it at a much greater

distance, you see, and have sought to make it look a solitary mountain

in the midst of a great water. You will discover even now that the

circles of the Purgatory are suggested without any approach, I think, to

artificial structure; and there are occasional hints at figures, which

you cannot definitely detach from the rocks--which, by the way, you must

remember, were in one part full of sculptures. I have kept the mountain

near enough, however, to indicate the great expanse of wild flowers on

the top, which Matilda was so busy gathering. I want to indicate too the

wind up there in the terrestrial paradise, ever and always blowing one

way. You remember, Mr. Walton?”--for the young man, getting animated,

began to talk as if we had known each other for some time--and here he

repeated the purport of Dante’s words in English:

“An air of sweetness, changeless in its flow,

With no more strength than in a soft wind lies,

Smote peacefully against me on the brow.

By which the leaves all trembling, level-wise,

Did every one bend thitherward to where

The high mount throws its shadow at sunrise.”

“I thought you said you did not use translations?”

“I thought it possible that--Miss Walton (?)” interrogatively

this--“might not follow the Italian so easily, and I feared to seem

pedantic.”

“She won’t lag far behind, I flatter myself,” I returned. “Whose

translation do you quote?”

He hesitated a moment; then said carelessly:

“I have cobbled a few passages after that fashion myself.”

“It has the merit of being near the original at least,” I returned; “and

that seems to me one of the chief merits a translation can possess.”

“Then,” the painter resumed, rather hastily, as if to avoid any further

remark upon his verses, “you see those white things in the air above?”

Here he turned to Wynnie. “Miss Walton will remember--I think she was

making a drawing of the rock at the same time I was--how the seagulls,

or some such birds--only two or three of them--kept flitting about the

top of it?”

“I remember quite well,” answered Wynnie, with a look of appeal to me.

“Yes,” I interposed; “my daughter, in describing what she had been

attempting to draw, spoke especially of the birds over the rock. For she

said the white lapping of the waves looked like spirits trying to get

loose, and the white birds like foam that had broken its chains, and

risen in triumph into the air.”

Here Mr. Niceboots, for as yet I did not know what else to call him,

looked at Wynnie almost with a start.

“How wonderfully that falls in with my fancy about the rock!” he said.

“Purgatory indeed! with imprisoned souls lapping at its foot, and the

free souls winging their way aloft in ether. Well, this world is a kind

of purgatory anyhow--is it not, Mr. Walton?”

“Certainly it is. We are here tried as by fire, to see what our work

is--whether wood, hay, and stubble, or gold and silver and precious

stones.”

“You see,” resumed the painter, “if anybody only glanced at my little

picture, he would take those for sea-birds; but if he looked into it,

and began to suspect me, he would find out that they were Dante and

Beatrice on their way to the sphere of the moon.”

“In one respect at least, then, your picture has the merit of

corresponding to fact; for what thing is there in the world, or what

group of things, in which the natural man will not see merely the things

of nature, but the spiritual man the things of the spirit?”

“I am no theologian,” said the painter, turning away, I thought somewhat

coldly.

But I could see that Wynnie was greatly interested in him. Perhaps she

thought that here was some enlightenment of the riddle of the world for

her, if she could but get at what he was thinking. She was used to my

way of it: here might be something new.

“If I can be of any service to Miss Walton with her drawing, I shall be

happy,” he said, turning again towards me.

But his last gesture had made me a little distrustful of him, and I

received his advances on this point with a coldness which I did not wish

to make more marked than his own towards my last observation.

“You are very kind,” I said; “but Miss Walton does not presume to be an

artist.”

I saw a slight shade pass over Wynnie’s countenance. When I turned to

Mr. Niceboots, a shade of a different sort was on his. Surely I had said

something wrong to cast a gloom on two young faces. I made haste to make

amends.

“We are just going to have some coffee,” I said, “for my servants,

I see, have managed to kindle a fire. Will you come and allow me to

introduce you to Mrs. Walton?”

“With much pleasure,” he answered, rising from the rock whereon, as

he spoke about his picture, he had again seated himself. He was a

fine-built, black-bearded, sunburnt fellow, with clear gray eyes

notwithstanding, a rather Roman nose, and good features generally. But

there was an air of suppression, if not of sadness, about him, however,

did not in the least interfere with the manliness of his countenance, or

of its expression.

“But,” I said, “how am I to effect an introduction, seeing I do not yet

know your name.”

I had had to keep a sharp look-out on myself lest I should call him Mr.

Niceboots. He smiled very graciously and replied,

“My name is Percivale--Charles Percivale.”

“A descendant of Sir Percivale of King Arthur’s Round Table?”

“I cannot count quite so far back,” he answered, “as that--not quite to

the Conquest,” he added, with a slight deepening of his sunburnt hue. “I

do come of a fighting race, but I cannot claim Sir Percivale.”

We were now walking along the edge of the still retreating waves towards

the group upon the sands, Mr. Percivale and I foremost, and Wynnie

lingering behind.

“O, do look here papa!” she cried, from some little distance.

We turned and saw her gazing at something on the sand at her feet.

Hastening back, we found it to be a little narrow line of foam-bubbles,

which the water had left behind it on the sand, slowly breaking and

passing out of sight. Why there should be foam-bubbles there then, and

not always, I do not know. But there they were--and such colours! deep

rose and grassy green and ultramarine blue; and, above all, one dark,

yet brilliant and intensely-burnished, metallic gold. All of them were

of a solid-looking burnished colour, like opaque body-colour laid on

behind translucent crystal. Those little ocean bubbles were well worth

turning to see; and so I said to Wynnie. But, as we gazed, they went on

vanishing, one by one. Every moment a heavenly glory of hue burst, and

was nowhere.

We walked away again towards the rest of our party.

“Don’t you think those bubbles more beautiful than any precious stones

you ever saw, papa?”

“Yes, my love, I think they are, except it be the opal. In the opal, God

seems to have fixed the evanescent and made the vanishing eternal.”

“And flowers are more beautiful things than jewels?’ she said

interrogatively.

“Many--perhaps most flowers are,” I granted. “And did you ever see such

curves and delicate textures anywhere else as in the clouds, papa?”

“I think not--in the cirrhous clouds at least--the frozen ones. But what

are you putting me to my catechism for in this way, my child?”

“O, papa, I could go on a long time with that catechism; but I will end

with one question more, which you will perhaps find a little harder to

answer. Only I daresay you have had an answer ready for years lest one

of us should ask you some day.”

“No, my love. I never got an answer ready for anything lest one of my

children should ask me. But it is not surprising either that children

should be puzzled about the things that have puzzled their father, or

that by the time they are able to put the questions, he should have

found out some sort of an answer to most of them. Go on with your

catechism, Wynnie. Now for your puzzle!”

“It’s not a funny question, papa; it’s a very serious one. I can’t think

why the unchanging God should have made all the most beautiful things

wither and grow ugly, or burst and vanish, or die somehow and be no

more. Mamma is not so beautiful as she once was, is she?”

“In one way, no; but in another and better way, much more so. But we

will not talk about her kind of beauty just now; we will keep to the

more material loveliness of which you have been speaking--though, in

truth, no loveliness can be only material. Well, then, for my answer;

it is, I think, because God loves the beauty so much that he makes all

beautiful things vanish quickly.”

“I do not understand you, papa.”

“I daresay not, my dear. But I will explain to you a little, if Mr.

Percivale will excuse me.”

“On the contrary, I am greatly interested, both in the question and the

answer.”

“Well, then, Wynnie; everything has a soul and a body, or something like

them. By the body we know the soul. But we are always ready to love the

body instead of the soul. Therefore, God makes the body die continually,

that we may learn to love the soul indeed. The world is full of

beautiful things, but God has saved many men from loving the mere bodies

of them, by making them poor; and more still by reminding them that

if they be as rich as Croesus all their lives, they will be as poor

as Diogenes--poorer, without even a tub--when this world, with all its

pictures, scenery, books, and--alas for some Christians!--bibles even,

shall have vanished away.”

“Why do you say _alas_, papa--if they are Christians especially?”

“I say _alas_ only from their point of view, not from mine. I mean

such as are always talking and arguing from the Bible, and never giving

themselves any trouble to do what it tells them. They insist on the

anise and cummin, and forget the judgment, mercy, and faith. These

worship the body of the truth, and forget the soul of it. If the flowers

were not perishable, we should cease to contemplate their beauty, either

blinded by the passion for hoarding the bodies of them, or dulled by

the hebetude of commonplaceness that the constant presence of them would

occasion. To compare great things with small, the flowers wither, the

bubbles break, the clouds and sunsets pass, for the very same holy

reason, in the degree of its application to them, for which the Lord

withdrew from his disciples and ascended again to his Father--that the

Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, the Soul of things, might come to them

and abide with them, and so the Son return, and the Father be revealed.

The flower is not its loveliness, and its loveliness we must love,

else we shall only treat them as flower-greedy children, who gather and

gather, and fill hands and baskets, from a mere desire of acquisition,

excusable enough in them, but the same in kind, however harmless in

mode, and degree, and object, as the avarice of the miser. Therefore

God, that we may always have them, and ever learn to love their beauty,

and yet more their truth, sends the beneficent winter that we may think

about what we have lost, and welcome them when they come again with

greater tenderness and love, with clearer eyes to see, and purer hearts

to understand, the spirit that dwells in them. We cannot do without

the ‘winter of our discontent.’ Shakspere surely saw that when he makes

Titania say, in _A Midsummer Night’s Dream_:

‘The human mortals want their winter here’--

namely, to set things right; and none of those editors who would alter

the line seem to have been capable of understanding its import.”

“I think I understand you a little,” answered Wynnie. Then, changing her

tone, “I told you, papa, you would have an answer ready; didn’t I?”

“Yes, my child; but with this difference--I found the answer to meet my

own necessities, not yours.”

“And so you had it ready for me when I wanted it.”

“Just so. That is the only certainty you have in regard to what you

give away. No one who has not tasted it and found it good has a right to

offer any spiritual dish to his neighbour.”

Mr. Percivale took no part in our conversation. The moment I had

presented him to Mrs. Walton and Connie, and he had paid his respects by

a somewhat stately old-world obeisance, he merged the salutation into a

farewell, and, either forgetting my offer of coffee, or having changed

his mind, withdrew, a little to my disappointment, for, notwithstanding

his lack of response where some things he said would have led me to

expect it, I had begun to feel much interested in him.

He was scarcely beyond hearing, when Dora came up to me from her

digging, with an eager look on her sunny face.

“Hasn’t he got nice boots, papa?”

“Indeed, my dear, I am unable to support you in that assertion, for I

never saw his boots.”

“I did, then,” returned the child; “and I never saw such nice boots.”

“I accept the statement willingly,” I replied; and we heard no more of

the boots, for his name was now substituted for his nickname. Nor did

I see himself again for some days--not in fact till next Sunday--though

why he should come to church at all was something of a puzzle to me,

especially when I knew him better.

CHAPTER III.

THE BLACKSMITH.

The next day I set out after breakfast to inquire about a blacksmith.

It was not every or any blacksmith that would do. I must not fix on

the first to do my work because he was the first. There was one in the

village, I soon learned; but I found him an ordinary man, who, I have no

doubt, could shoe a horse and avoid the quick, but from whom any greater

delicacy of touch was not to be expected. Inquiring further, I heard

of a young smith who had lately settled in a hamlet a couple of miles

distant, but still within the parish. In the afternoon I set out to find

him. To my surprise, he was a pale-faced, thoughtful-looking man, with

a huge frame, which appeared worn rather than naturally thin, and large

eyes that looked at the anvil as if it was the horizon of the world. He

had got a horse-shoe in his tongs when I entered. Notwithstanding the

fire that glowed on the hearth, and the sparks that flew like a nimbus

in eruption from about his person, the place looked very dark to me

entering from the glorious blaze of the almost noontide sun, and felt

cool after the deep lane through which I had come, and which had seemed

a very reservoir of sunbeams. I could see the smith by the glow of his

horse-shoe; but all between me and the shoe was dark.

“Good-morning,” I said. “It is a good thing to find a man by his work. I

heard you half a mile off or so, and now I see you, but only by the glow

of your work. It is a grand thing to work in fire.”

He lifted his hammered hand to his forehead courteously, and as lightly

as if the hammer had been the butt-end of a whip.

“I don’t know if you would say the same if you had to work at it in

weather like this,” he answered.

“If I did not,” I returned, “that would be the fault of my weakness, and

would not affect the assertion I have just made, that it is a fine thing

to work in fire.”

“Well, you may be right,” he rejoined with a sigh, as, throwing the

horse-shoe he had been fashioning from the tongs on the ground, he next

let the hammer drop beside the anvil, and leaning against it held his

head for a moment between his hands, and regarded the floor. “It does

not much matter to me,” he went on, “if I only get through my work and

have done with it. No man shall say I shirked what I’d got to do. And

then when it’s over there won’t be a word to say agen me, or--”

He did not finish the sentence. And now I could see the sunlight lying

in a somewhat dreary patch, if the word _dreary_ can be truly used with

respect to any manifestation of sunlight, on the dark clay floor.

“I hope you are not ill,” I said.

He made no answer, but taking up his tongs caught with it from a beam

one of a number of roughly-finished horse-shoes which hung there, and

put it on the fire to be fashioned to a certain fit. While he turned it

in the fire, and blew the bellows, I stood regarding him. “This man will

do for my work,” I said to myself; “though I should not wonder from the

look of him if it was the last piece of work he ever did under the New

Jerusalem.” The smith’s words broke in on my meditations.

“When I was a little boy,” he said, “I once wanted to stay at home from

school. I had, I believe, a little headache, but nothing worth minding.

I told my mother that I had a headache, and she kept me, and I helped

her at her spinning, which was what I liked best of anything. But in the

afternoon the Methodist preacher came in to see my mother, and he asked

me what was the matter with me, and my mother answered for me that I had

a bad head, and he looked at me; and as my head was quite well by this

time, I could not help feeling guilty. And he saw my look, I suppose,

sir, for I can’t account for what he said any other way; and he turned

to me, and he said to me, solemn-like, ‘Is your head bad enough to send

you to the Lord Jesus to make you whole?’ I could not speak a word,

partly from bashfulness, I suppose, for I was but ten years old. So he

followed it up, as they say: ‘Then you ought to be at school,’ says he.

I said nothing, because I couldn’t. But never since then have I given in

as long as I could stand. And I can stand now, and lift my hammer, too,”

he said, as he took the horse-shoe from the forge, laid it on the anvil,

and again made a nimbus of coruscating iron.

“You are just the man I want,” I said. “I’ve got a job for you, down to

Kilkhaven, as you say in these parts.”

“What is it, sir? Something about the church? I should ha’ thought the

church was all spick and span by this time.”

“I see you know who I am,” I said.

“Of course I do,” he answered. “I don’t go to church myself, being

brought up a Methodist; but anything that happens in the parish is known

the next day all over it.”

“You won’t mind doing my job though you are a Methodist, will you?” I

asked.

“Not I, sir. If I’ve read right, it’s the fault of the Church that we

don’t pull all alongside. You turned us out, sir; we didn’t go out of

ourselves. At least, if all they say is true, which I can’t be sure of,

you know, in this world.”

“You are quite right there though,” I answered. “And in doing so,

the Church had the worst of it--as all that judge and punish their

neighbours have. But you have been the worse for it, too: all of

which is to be laid to the charge of the Church. For there is not one

clergyman I know--mind, I say, that I know--who would have made such a

cruel speech to a boy as that the Methodist parson made to you.”

“But it did me good, sir?”

“Are you sure of that? I am not. Are you sure, first of all, it did

not make you proud? Are you sure it has not made you work beyond your

strength--I don’t mean your strength of arm, for clearly that is all

that could be wished, but of your chest, your lungs? Is there not

some danger of your leaving someone who is dependent on you too soon

unprovided for? Is there not some danger of your having worked as if God

were a hard master?--of your having worked fiercely, indignantly, as if

he wronged you by not caring for you, not understanding you?”

He returned me no answer, but hammered momently on his anvil. Whether he

felt what I meant, or was offended at my remark, I could not then tell.

I thought it best to conclude the interview with business.

“I have a delicate little job that wants nice handling, and I fancy you

are just the man to do it to my mind,” I said.

“What is it, sir?” he asked, in a friendly manner enough.

“If you will excuse me, I would rather show it to you than talk about

it,” I returned.

“As you please, sir. When do you want me?”

“The first hour you can come.”

“To-morrow morning?”

“If you feel inclined.”

“For that matter, I’d rather go to bed.”

“Come to me instead: it’s light work.”

“I will, sir--at ten o’clock.”

“If you please.”

And so it was arranged.

CHAPTER IV.

THE LIFE-BOAT.

The next day rose glorious. Indeed, early as the sun rose, I saw him

rise--saw him, from the down above the house, over the land to the east

and north, ascend triumphant into his own light, which had prepared the

way for him; while the clouds that hung over the sea glowed out with

a faint flush, as anticipating the hour when the west should clasp the

declining glory in a richer though less dazzling splendour, and shine

out the bride of the bridegroom east, which behold each other from afar

across the intervening world, and never mingle but in the sight of the

eyes. The clear pure light of the morning made me long for the truth in

my heart, which alone could make me pure and clear as the morning, tune

me up to the concert-pitch of the nature around me. And the wind that

blew from the sunrise made me hope in the God who had first breathed

into my nostrils the breath of life, that he would at length so fill

me with his breath, his wind, his spirit, that I should think only his

thoughts and live his life, finding therein my own life, only glorified

infinitely.

After breakfast and prayers, I would go to the church to await the

arrival of my new acquaintance the smith. In order to obtain entrance, I

had, however, to go to the cottage of the sexton. This was not my first

visit there, so that I may now venture to take my reader with me. To

reach the door, I had to cross a hollow by a bridge, built, for the sake

of the road, over what had once been the course of a rivulet from

the heights above. Now it was a kind of little glen, or what would in

Scotland be called a den, I think, grown with grass and wild flowers and

ferns, some of them, rare and fine. The roof of the cottage came down to

the road, and, until you came quite near, you could not but wonder where

the body that supported this head could be. But you soon saw that the

ground fell suddenly away, leaving a bank against which the cottage was

built. Crossing a garden of the smallest, the principal flowers of which

were the stonecrop on its walls, by a flag-paved path, you entered the

building, and, to your surprise, found yourself, not in a little cottage

kitchen, as you expected, but in a waste-looking space, that seemed to

have forgotten the use for which it had been built. There was a sort

of loft along one side of it, and it was heaped with indescribable

lumber-looking stuff with here and there a hint at possible machinery.

The place had been a mill for grinding corn, and its wheel had been

driven by the stream which had run for ages in the hollow of which I

have already spoken. But when the canal came to be constructed, the

stream had to be turned aside from its former course, and indeed was now

employed upon occasion to feed the canal; so that the mill of necessity

had fallen into disuse and decay. Crossing this floor, you entered

another door, and turning sharp to the left, went down a few steps of

a ladder-sort of stair, and after knocking your hat against a beam,

emerged in the comfortable quaint little cottage kitchen you had

expected earlier. A cheerful though small fire burns in the

grate--for even here the hearth-fire has vanished from the records of

cottage-life--and is pleasant here even in the height of summer, though

it is counted needful only for cooking purposes. The ceiling, which

consists only of the joists and the boards that floor the bedroom above,

is so low, that necessity, if not politeness, would compel you to take

off your already-bruised hat. Some of these joists, you will find, are

made further useful by supporting each a shelf, before which hangs

a little curtain of printed cotton, concealing the few stores and

postponed eatables of the house--forming, in fact, both store-room and

larder of the family. On the walls hang several coloured prints, and

within a deep glazed frame the figure of a ship in full dress, carved in

rather high relief in sycamore.

As I now entered, Mrs. Coombes rose from a high-backed settle near the

fire, and bade me good-morning with a courtesy.

“What a lovely day it is, Mrs. Coombes! It is so bright over the sea,”

I said, going to the one little window which looked out on the great

Atlantic, “that one almost expects a great merchant navy to come sailing

into Kilkhaven--sunk to the water’s edge with silks, and ivory, and

spices, and apes, and peacocks, like the ships of Solomon that we read

about--just as the sun gets up to the noonstead.”

Before I record her answer, I turn to my reader, who in the spirit

accompanies me, and have a little talk with him. I always make it a rule

to speak freely with the less as with the more educated of my friends. I

never _talk down_ to them, except I be expressly explaining something to

them. The law of the world is as the law of the family. Those children

grow much the faster who hear all that is going on in the house.

Reaching ever above themselves, they arrive at an understanding at

fifteen, which, in the usual way of things, they would not reach before

five-and-twenty or thirty; and this in a natural way, and without any

necessary priggishness, except such as may belong to their parents.

Therefore I always spoke to the poor and uneducated as to my own

people,--freely, not much caring whether I should be quite understood or

not; for I believed in influences not to be measured by the measure of

the understanding.

But what was the old woman’s answer? It was this:

“I know, sir. And when I was as young as you”--I was not so very young,

my reader may well think--“I thought like that about the sea myself.

Everything come from the sea. For my boy Willie he du bring me home the

beautifullest parrot and the talkingest you ever see, and the red shawl

all worked over with flowers: I’ll show it to you some day, sir, when

you have time. He made that ship you see in the frame there, sir, all

with his own knife, out on a bit o’ wood that he got at the Marishes, as

they calls it, sir--a bit of an island somewheres in the great sea. But

the parrot’s gone dead like the rest of them, sir.--Where am I? and what

am I talking about?” she added, looking down at her knitting as if she

had dropped a stitch, or rather as if she had forgotten what she was

making, and therefore what was to come next.

“You were telling me how you used to think of the sea--”

“When I was as young as you. I remember, sir. Well, that lasted a long

time--lasted till my third boy fell asleep in the wide water; for it du

call it falling asleep, don’t it, sir?”

“The Bible certainly does,” I answered.

“It’s the Bible I be meaning, of course,” she returned. “Well, after

that, but I don’t know what began it, only I did begin to think about

the sea as something that took away things and didn’t bring them no

more. And somehow or other she never look so blue after that, and she

give me the shivers. But now, sir, she always looks to me like one o’

the shining ones that come to fetch the pilgrims. You’ve heard tell of

the _Pilgrim’s Progress_, I daresay, sir, among the poor people; for

they du say it was written by a tinker, though there be a power o’ good

things in it that I think the gentlefolk would like if they knowed it.”

“I do know the book--nearly as well as I know the Bible,” I answered;

“and the shining ones are very beautiful in it. I am glad you can think

of the sea that way.”

“It’s looking in at the window all day as I go about the house,” she

answered, “and all night too when I’m asleep; and if I hadn’t learned to

think of it that way, it would have driven me mad, I du believe. I

was forced to think that way about it, or not think at all. And that

wouldn’t be easy, with the sound of it in your ears the last thing at

night and the first thing in the morning.”

“The truth of things is indeed the only refuge from the look of things,”

I replied. “But now I want the key of the church, if you will trust me

with it, for I have something to do there this morning; and the key of

the tower as well, if you please.”

With her old smile, ripened only by age, she reached the ponderous keys

from the nail where they hung, and gave them into my hand. I left her

in the shadow of her dwelling, and stepped forth into the sunlight. The

first thing I observed was the blacksmith waiting for me at the church

door.

Now that I saw him in the full light of day, and now that he wore his

morning face upon which the blackness of labour had not yet gathered,

I could see more plainly how far he was from well. There was a flush on

his thin cheek by which the less used exercise of walking revealed

his inward weakness, and the light in his eyes had something of the

far-country in them--“the light that never was on sea or shore.” But his

speech was cheerful, for he had been walking in the light of this world,

and that had done something to make the light within him shine a little

more freely.

“How do you find yourself to-day?” I asked.

“Quite well, sir, I thank you,” he answered. “A day like this does a man

good. But,” he added, and his countenance fell, “the heart knoweth its

own bitterness.”

“It may know it too much,” I returned, “just because it refuses to let a

stranger intermeddle therewith.”

He made no reply. I turned the key in the great lock, and the

iron-studded oak opened and let us into the solemn gloom.

It did not require many minutes to make the man understand what I wanted

of him.

“We must begin at the bells and work down,” he said.

So we went up into the tower, where, with the help of a candle I fetched

for him from the cottage, he made a good many minute measurements; found

that carpenter’s work was necessary for the adjustment of the hammers

and cranks and the leading of the rods, undertook the management of the

whole, and in the course of an hour and a half went home to do what had

to be done before any fixing could be commenced, assuring me that he had

no doubt of bringing the job to a satisfactory conclusion, although

the force of the blow on the bell would doubtless have to be regulated

afterwards by repeated trials.

“In a fortnight, I hope you will be able to play a tune to the parish,

sir,” he added, as he took his leave.

I resolved, if possible, to know more of the man, and find out his

trouble, if haply I might be able to give him any comfort, for I was all

but certain that there was a deeper cause for his gloom than the state

of his health.

When he was gone I stood with the key of the church in my hand, and

looked about me. Nature at least was in glorious health--sunshine in her

eyes, light fantastic cloud-images passing through her brain, her breath

coming and going in soft breezes perfumed with the scents of meadows and

wild flowers, and her green robe shining in the motions of her

gladness. I turned to lock the church door, though in my heart I greatly

disapproved of locking the doors of churches, and only did so now

because it was not my church, and I had no business to force my opinions

upon other customs. But when I turned I received a kind of questioning

shock. There was the fallen world, as men call it, shining in glory

and gladness, because God was there; here was the way into the lost

Paradise, yea, the door into an infinitely higher Eden than that ever

had or ever could have been, iron-clamped and riveted, gloomy and

low-browed like the entrance to a sepulchre, and surrounded with the

grim heads of grotesque monsters of the deep. What did it mean? Here was

contrast enough to require harmonising, or if that might not be, then

accounting for. Perhaps it was enough to say that although God made both

the kingdom of nature and the kingdom of grace, yet the symbol of the

latter was the work of man, and might not altogether correspond to

God’s idea of the matter. I turned away thoughtful, and went through the

churchyard with my eye on the graves.

As I left the churchyard, still looking to the earth, the sound of

voices reached my ear. I looked up. There, down below me, at the foot

of the high bank on which I stood, lay a gorgeous shining thing upon

the bosom of the canal, full of men, and surrounded by men, women,

and children, delighting in its beauty. I had never seen such a thing

before, but I knew at once, as by instinct, which of course it could not

have been, that it was the life-boat. But in its gorgeous colours, red

and white and green, it looked more like the galley that bore Cleopatra

to Actium. Nor, floating so light on the top of the water, and broad in

the beam withal, curved upward and ornamented at stern and stem, did it

look at all like a creature formed to battle with the fierce elements. A

pleasure-boat for floating between river banks it seemed, drawn by

swans mayhap, and regarded in its course by fair eyes from green

terrace-walks, or oriel windows of ancient houses on verdant lawns. Ten

men sat on the thwarts, and one in the stern by the yet useless rudder,

while men and boys drew the showy thing by a rope downward to the

lock-gates. The men in the boat, wore blue jerseys, but you could see

little of the colour for strange unshapely things that they wore above

them, like an armour cut out of a row of organ pipes. They were their

cork-jackets; for every man had to be made into a life-boat himself. I

descended the bank, and stood on the edge of the canal as it drew

near. Then I saw that every oar was loosely but firmly fastened to the

rowlock, so that it could be dropped and caught again in a moment; and

that the gay sides of the unwieldy-looking creature were festooned with

ropes from the gunwale, for the men to lay hold of when she capsized,

for the earlier custom of fastening the men to their seats had been

quite given up, because their weight under the water might prevent

the boat from righting itself again, and the men could not come to the

surface. Now they had a better chance in their freedom, though why they

should not be loosely attached to the boat, I do not quite see.

They towed the shining thing through the upper gate of the lock, and

slowly she sank from my sight, and for some moments was no more to be

seen, for I had remained standing where first she passed me. All at

once there she was beyond the covert of the lock-head, abroad and free,

fleeting from the strokes of ten swift oars over the still waters of the

bay towards the waves that roared further out where the ground-swell

was broken by the rise of the sandy coast. There was no vessel in danger

now, as the talk of the spectators informed me; it was only for exercise

and show that they went out. It seemed all child’s play for a time;

but when they got among the broken waves, then it looked quite another

thing. The motion of the waters laid hold upon her, and soon tossed her

fearfully, now revealing the whole of her capacity on the near side of

one of their slopes, now hiding her whole bulk in one of their hollows

beyond. She, careless as a child in the troubles of the world, floated

about amongst them with what appeared too much buoyancy for the promise

of a safe return. Again and again she was driven from her course

towards the low rocks on the other side of the bay, and again and again,

returned to disport herself, like a sea-animal, as it seemed, upon the

backs of the wild, rolling, and bursting billows.

“Can she go no further?” I asked of the captain of the coastguard, whom

I found standing by my side.

“Not without some danger,” he answered.

“What, then, must it be in a storm!” I remarked.

“Then of course,” he returned, “they must take their chance. But there

is no good in running risks for nothing. That swell is quite enough for

exercise.”

“But is it enough to accustom them to face the danger that will come?” I

asked.

“With danger comes courage,” said the old sailor.

“Were you ever afraid?”

“No, sir. I don’t think I ever was afraid. Yes, I believe I was once for

one moment, no more, when I fell from the maintop-gallant yard, and felt

myself falling. But it was soon over, for I only fell into the maintop.

I was expecting the smash on deck when I was brought up there. But,” he

resumed, “I don’t care much about the life-boat. My rockets are worth

a good deal more, as you may see, sir, before the winter is over; for

seldom does a winter pass without at least two or three wrecks close by

here on this coast. The full force of the Atlantic breaks here, sir. I

_have_ seen a life-boat--not that one--_she’s_ done nothing yet--pitched

stern over stem; not capsized, you know, sir, in the ordinary way, but

struck by a wave behind while she was just hanging in the balance on the

knife-edge of a wave, and flung a somerset, as I say, stern over stem,

and four of her men lost.”

While we spoke I saw on the pier-head the tall figure of the painter

looking earnestly at the boat. I thought he was regarding it chiefly

from an artistic point of view, but I became aware before long that that

would not have been consistent with the character of Charles Percivale.

He had been, I learned afterwards, a crack oarsman at Oxford, and

had belonged to the University boat, so that he had some almost

class-sympathy with the doings of the crew.

In a little while the boat sped swiftly back, entered the lock, was

lifted above the level of the storm-heaved ocean, and floated up the

smooth canal calmly as if she had never known what trouble was. Away up

to the pretty little Tudor-fashioned house in which she lay--one could

almost fancy dreaming of storms to come--she went, as softly as if

moved only by her “own sweet will,” in the calm consolation for her

imprisonment of having tried her strength, and found therein good hope

of success for the time when she should rush to the rescue of men

from that to which, as a monster that begets monsters, she a watching

Perseis, lay ready to offer battle. The poor little boat lying in her

little house watching the ocean, was something signified in my eyes,

and not less so after what came in the course of changing seasons and

gathered storms.

All this time I had the keys in my hand, and now went back to the

cottage to restore them to their place upon the wall. When I entered

there was a young woman of a sweet interesting countenance talking to

Mrs. Coombes. Now as it happened, I had never yet seen the daughter who

lived with her, and thought this was she.

“I’ve found your daughter at last then?” I said, approaching them.

“Not yet, sir. She goes out to work, and her hands be pretty full at

present. But this be almost my daughter, sir,” she added. “This is my

next daughter, Mary Trehern, from the south. She’s got a place near by,

to be near her mother that is to be, that’s me.”

Mary was hanging her head and blushing, as the old woman spoke.

“I understand,” I said. “And when are you going to get your new mother,

Mary? Soon I hope.”

But she gave me no reply--only hung her head lower and blushed deeper.

Mrs. Coombes spoke for her.

“She’s shy, you see, sir. But if she was to speak her mind, she would

ask you whether you wouldn’t marry her and Willie when he comes home

from his next voyage.”

Mary’s hands were trembling now, and she turned half away.

“With all my heart,” I said.

The girl tried to turn towards me, but could not. I looked at her face

a little more closely. Through all its tremor, there was a look of

constancy that greatly pleased me. I tried to make her speak.

“When do you expect Willie home?” I said.

She made a little gasp and murmur, but no articulate words came.

“Don’t be frightened, Mary,” said her mother, as I found she always

called her. “The gentleman won’t be sharp with you.”

She lifted a pair of soft brown eyes with one glance and a smile, and

then sank them again.

“He’ll be home in about a month, we think,” answered the mother. “She’s

a good ship he’s aboard of, and makes good voyages.”

“It is time to think about the bans, then,” I said.

“If you please, sir,” said the mother.

“Just come to me about it, and I will attend to it--when you think

proper.”

I thought I could hear a murmured “Thank you, sir,” from the girl, but

I could not be certain that she spoke. I shook hands with them, and went

for a stroll on the other side of the bay.

CHAPTER V.

MR. PERCIVALE.

When I reached home I found that Connie was already on her watch-tower.

For while I was away, they had carried her out that she might see the

life-boat. I followed her, and found the whole family about her couch,

and with them Mr. Percivale, who was showing her some sketches that he

had made in the neighbourhood. Connie knew nothing of drawing; but

she seemed to me always to catch the feeling of a thing. Her remarks

therefore were generally worth listening to, and Mr. Percivale was

evidently interested in them. Wynnie stood behind Connie, looking over

her shoulder at the drawing in her hand.

“How do you get that shade of green?” I heard her ask as I came up.

And then Mr. Percivale proceeded to tell her; from which beginning they

went on to other things, till Mr. Percivale said--

“But it is hardly fair, Miss Walton; to criticise my work while you keep

your own under cover.”

“I wasn’t criticising, Mr. Percivale; was I, Connie?”

“I didn’t hear her make a single remark, Mr. Percivale,” said Connie,

taking her sister’s side.

To my surprise they were talking away with the young man as if they had

known him for years, and my wife was seated at the foot of the couch,

apparently taking no exception to the suddenness of the intimacy. I am

afraid, when I think of it, that a good many springs would be missing

from the world’s history if they might not flow till the papas gave

their wise consideration to everything about the course they were to

take.

“I think, though,” added Connie, “it is only fair that Mr. Percivale

_should_ see your work, Wynnie.”

“Then I will fetch my portfolio, if Mr. Percivale will promise to

remember that I have no opinion of it. At the same time, if I could

do what I wanted to do, I think I should not be ashamed of showing my

drawings even to him.”

And now I was surprised to find how like grown women my daughters could

talk. To me they always spoke like the children they were; but when I

heard them now it seemed as if they had started all at once into ladies

experienced in the ways of society. There they were chatting lightly,

airily, and yet decidedly, a slight tone of badinage interwoven, with a

young man of grace and dignity, whom they had only seen once before, and

who had advanced no farther, with Connie at least, than a stately bow.

They had, however, been a whole hour together before I arrived, and

their mother had been with them all the while, which gives great courage

to good girls, while, I am told, it shuts the mouths of those who are

sly. But then it must be remembered that there are as great differences

in mothers as in girls. And besides, I believe wise girls have an

instinct about men that all the experience of other men cannot overtake.

But yet again, there are many girls foolish enough to mistake a mere

impulse for instinct, and vanity for insight.

As Wynnie spoke, she turned and went back to the house to fetch some of

her work. Now, had she been going a message for me, she would have

gone like the wind; but on this occasion she stepped along in a stately

manner, far from devoid of grace, but equally free from frolic or

eagerness. And I could not help noting as well that Mr. Percivale’s eyes

followed her. What I felt or fancied is of no consequence to anybody.

I do not think, even if I were writing an autobiography, I should be

forced to tell _all_ about myself. But an autobiography is further from

my fancy, however much I may have trenched upon its limits, than any

other form of literature with which I am acquainted.

She was not long in returning, however, though she came back with the

same dignified motion.

“There is nothing really worth either showing or concealing,” she said

to Mr. Percivale, as she handed him the portfolio, to help himself, as

it were. She then turned away, as if a little feeling of shyness had

come over her, and began to look for something to do about Connie. I

could see that, although she had hitherto been almost indifferent about

the merit of her drawings, she had a new-born wish that they might not

appear altogether contemptible in the eyes of Mr. Percivale. And I saw,

too, that Connie’s wide eyes were taking in everything. It was wonderful

how Connie’s deprivations had made her keen in observing. Now she

hastened to her sister’s rescue even from such a slight inconvenience

as the shadow of embarrassment in which she found herself--perhaps

from having seen some unusual expression in my face, of which I was

unconscious, though conscious enough of what might have occasioned such.

“Give me your hand, Wynnie,” said Connie, “and help me to move one inch

further on my side.--I may move just that much on my side, mayn’t I,

papa?”

“I think you had better not, my dear, if you can do without it,” I

answered; for the doctor’s injunctions had been strong.

“Very well, papa; but I feel as if it would do me good.”

“Mr. Turner will be here next week, you know; and you must try to stick

to his rules till he comes to see you. Perhaps he will let you relax a

little.”

Connie smiled very sweetly and lay still, while Wynnie stood holding her

hand.

Meantime Mr. Percivale, having received the drawings, had walked away

with them towards what they called the storm tower--a little building

standing square to the points of the compass, from little windows, in

which the coastguard could see with their telescopes along the coast on

both sides and far out to sea. This tower stood on the very edge of

the cliff, but behind it there was a steep descent, to reach which

apparently he went round the tower and disappeared. He evidently wanted

to make a leisurely examination of the drawings--somewhat formidable

for Wynnie, I thought. At the same time, it impressed me favourably with

regard to the young man that he was not inclined to pay a set of stupid

and untrue compliments the instant the portfolio was opened, but, on

the contrary, in order to speak what was real about them, would take the

trouble to make himself in some adequate measure acquainted with them.

I therefore, to Wynnie’s relief, I fear, strolled after him, seeing no

harm in taking a peep at his person, while he was taking a peep at my

daughter’s mind. I went round the tower to the other side, and there saw

him at a little distance below me, but further out on a great rock that

overhung the sea, connected with the cliff by a long narrow isthmus, a

few yards lower than the cliff itself, only just broad enough to admit

of a footpath along its top, and on one side going sheer down with a

smooth hard rock-face to the sands below. The other side was less

steep, and had some grass upon it. But the path was too narrow, and

the precipice too steep, for me to trust my head with the business of

guiding my feet along it. So I stood and saw him from the mainland--saw

his head at least bent over the drawings; saw how slowly he turned from

one to the other; saw how, after having gone over them once, he turned

to the beginning and went over them again, even more slowly than before;

saw how he turned the third time to the first. Then, getting tired, I

went back to the group on the down; caught sight of Charlie and Harry

turning heels over head down the slope toward the house; found that my

wife had gone home--in fact, that only Connie and Wynnie were left.

The sun had disappeared under a cloud, and the sea had turned a little

slaty; the yellow flowers in the short down-grass no longer caught the

eye with their gold, and the wind that bent their tops had just the

suspicion of an edge in it. And Wynnie’s face looked a little cloudy

too, I thought, and I feared that it was my fault. I fancied there was

just a tinge of beseeching in Connie’s eye, as I looked at her, thinking

there might be danger for her in the sunlessness of the wind. But I do

not know that all this, even the clouding of the sun, may not have come

out of my own mind, the result of my not being quite satisfied with

myself because of the mood I had been in. My feeling had altered

considerably in the mean time.

“Run, Wynnie, and ask Mr. Percivale, with my compliments, to come

and lunch with us,” I said--more to let her see I was not displeased,

however I might have looked, than for any other reason. She

went--sedately as before.

Almost as soon as she was gone, I saw that I had put her in a

difficulty. For I had discovered, very soon after coming into these

parts, that her head was no more steady than my own on high places, for

she up had never been used to such in our own level country, except,

indeed, on the stair that led down to the old quarry and the well,

where, I can remember now, she always laid her hand on the balustrade

with some degree of tremor, although she had been in the way of going

up and down from childhood. But if she could not cross that narrow and

really dangerous isthmus, still less could she call to a man she had

never seen but once, across the intervening chasm. I therefore set off

after her, leaving Connie lying there in loneliness, between the sea and

the sky. But when I got to the other side of the little tower, instead

of finding her standing hesitating on the brink of action, there she was

on the rock beyond. Mr. Percivale had risen, and was evidently giving

an answer to my invitation; at least, the next moment she turned to come

back, and he followed. I stood trembling almost to see her cross the

knife-back of that ledge. If I had not been almost fascinated, I should

have turned and left them to come together, lest the evil fancy should

cross her mind that I was watching them, for it was one thing to watch

him with her drawings, and quite another to watch him with herself.

But I stood and stared as she crossed. In the middle of the path,

however--up to which point she had been walking with perfect steadiness

and composure--she lifted her eyes--by what influence I cannot tell--saw

me, looked as if she saw ghost, half lifted her arms, swayed as if she

would fall, and, indeed, was falling over the precipice when Percivale,

who was close behind her caught her in his arms, almost too late for

both of them. So nearly down was she already, that her weight bent him

over the rocky side, till it seemed as if he must yield, or his body

snap. For he bent from the waist, and looked as if his feet only kept a

hold on the ground. It was all over in a moment, but in that moment it

made a sun-picture on my brain, which returns, ever and again, with such

vivid agony that I cannot hope to get rid of it till I get rid of the

brain itself in which lies the impress. In another moment they were at

my side--she with a wan, terrified smile, he in a ruddy alarm. I was

unable to speak, and could only, with trembling steps, lead the way from

the dreadful spot. I reproached myself afterwards for my want of faith

in God; but I had not had time to correct myself yet. Without a word

on their side either, they followed me. Before we reached Connie, I

recovered myself sufficiently to say, “Not a word to Connie,” and they

understood me. I told Wynnie to run to the house, and send Walter to

help me to carry Connie home. She went, and, until Walter came, I talked

to Mr. Percivale as if nothing had happened. And what made me feel yet

more friendly towards him was, that he did not do as some young men

wishing to ingratiate themselves would have done: he did not offer to

help me to carry Connie home. I saw that the offer rose in his mind,

and that he repressed it. He understood that I must consider such a

permission as a privilege not to be accorded to the acquaintance of a

day; that I must know him better before I could allow the weight of

my child to rest on his strength. I was even grateful to him for this

knowledge of human nature. But he responded cordially to my invitation

to lunch with us, and walked by my side as Walter and I bore the

precious burden home.

During our meal, he made himself quite agreeable; talked well on the

topics of the day, not altogether as a man who had made up his mind,

but not the less, rather the more, as a man who had thought about them,

and one who did not find it so easy to come to a conclusion as most

people do--or possibly as not feeling the necessity of coming to a

conclusion, and therefore preferring to allow the conclusion to grow

instead of constructing one for immediate use. This I rather liked than

otherwise. His behaviour, I need hardly say, after what I have told of

him already, was entirely that of a gentleman; and his education was

good. But what I did not like was, that as often as the conversation

made a bend in the direction of religious matters, he was sure to bend

it away in some other direction as soon as ever he laid his next hold

upon it. This, however, might have various reasons to account for it,

and I would wait.

After lunch, as we rose from the table, he took Wynnie’s portfolio from

the side-table where he had laid it, and with no more than a bow and

thanks returned it to her. She, I thought, looked a little disappointed,

though she said as lightly as she could:

“I am afraid you have not found anything worthy of criticism in my poor

attempts, Mr. Percivale?”

“On the contrary, I shall be most happy to tell you what I think of them

if you would like to hear the impression they have made upon me,” he

replied, holding out his hand to take the portfolio again.

“I shall be greatly obliged to you,” she said, returning it, “for I have

had no one to help me since I left school, except a book called _Modern

Painters_, which I think has the most beautiful things in it I ever

read, but which I lay down every now and then with a kind of despair, as

if I never could do anything worth doing. How long the next volume is in

coming! Do you know the author, Mr. Percivale?”

“I wish I did. He has given me much help. I do not say I can agree with

everything he writes; but when I do not, I have such a respect for him

that I always feel as if he must be right whether he seems to me to be

right or not. And if he is severe, it is with the severity of love that

will speak only the truth.”

This last speech fell on my ear like the tone of a church bell. “That

will do, my friend,” thought I. But I said nothing to interrupt.

By this time he had laid the portfolio open on the side-table, and

placed a chair in front of it for my daughter. Then seating himself by

her side, but without the least approach to familiarity, he began to

talk to her about her drawings, praising, in general, the feeling, but

finding fault with the want of nicety in the execution--at least so it

appeared to me from what I could understand of the conversation.

“But,” said my daughter, “it seems to me that if you get the feeling

right, that is the main thing.”

“No doubt,” returned Mr. Percivale; “so much the main thing that any

imperfection or coarseness or untruth which interferes with it becomes

of the greatest consequence.”

“But can it really interfere with the feeling?”

“Perhaps not with most people, simply because most people observe so

badly that their recollections of nature are all blurred and blotted and

indistinct, and therefore the imperfections we are speaking of do not

affect them. But with the more cultivated it is otherwise. It is for

them you ought to work, for you do not thereby lose the others. Besides,

the feeling is always intensified by the finish, for that belongs to the

feeling too, and must, I should think, have some influence even where it

is not noted.”

“But is it not a hopeless thing to attempt the finish of nature?”

“Not at all; to the degree, that is, in which you can represent anything

else of nature. But in this drawing now you have no representative

of, nothing to hint at or recall the feeling of the exquisiteness

of nature’s finish. Why should you not at least have drawn a true

horizon-line there? Has the absolute truth of the meeting of sea and sky

nothing to do with the feeling which such a landscape produces? I should

have thought you would have learned that, if anything, from Mr. Ruskin.”

Mr. Percivale spoke earnestly. Wynnie, either from disappointment or

despair, probably from a mixture of both, apparently fancied that, or

rather felt as if, he was scolding her, and got cross. This was anything

but dignified, especially with a stranger, and one who was doing his

best to help her. And yet, somehow, I must with shame confess I was not

altogether sorry to see it. In fact, my reader, I must just uncover my

sin, and say that I felt a little jealous of Mr. Percivale. The negative

reason was that I had not yet learned to love him. The only cure

for jealousy is love. But I was ashamed too of Wynnie’s behaving so

childishly. Her face flushed, the tears came in her eyes, and she rose,

saying, with a little choke in her voice--

“I see it’s no use trying. I won’t intrude any more into things I am

incapable of. I am much obliged to you, Mr. Percivale, for showing me

how presumptuous I have been.”

The painter rose as she rose, looking greatly concerned. But he did not

attempt to answer her. Indeed she gave him no time. He could only spring

after her to open the door for her. A more than respectful bow as she

left the room was his only adieu. But when he turned his face again

towards me, it expressed even a degree of consternation.

“I fear,” he said, approaching me with an almost military step, much at

variance with the shadow upon his countenance, “I fear I have been rude

to Miss Walton, but nothing was farther--”

“You mistake entirely, Mr. Percivale. I heard all you were saying, and

you were not in the least rude. On the contrary, I consider you were

very kind to take the trouble with her you did. Allow me to make the

apology for my daughter which I am sure she will wish made when she

recovers from the disappointment of finding more obstacles in the way of

her favourite pursuit than she had previously supposed. She is only

too ready to lose heart, and she paid too little attention to your

approbation and too much--in proportion, I mean--to your--criticism. She

felt discouraged and lost her temper, but more with herself and her poor

attempts, I venture to assure you, than with your remarks upon them. She

is too much given to despising her own efforts.”

“But I must have been to blame if I caused any such feeling with regard

to those drawings, for I assure you they contain great promise.”

“I am glad you think so. That I should myself be of the same opinion can

be of no consequence.”

“Miss Walton at least sees what ought to be represented. All she needs

is greater severity in the quality of representation. And that would

have grown without any remark from onlookers. Only a friendly criticism

is sometimes a great help. It opens the eyes a little sooner than they

would have opened of themselves. And time,” he added, with a half sigh

and with an appeal in his tone, as if he would justify himself to my

conscience, “is half the battle in this world. It is over so soon.”

“No sooner than it ought to be,” I rejoined.

“So it may appear to you,” he returned; “for you, I presume to

conjecture, have worked hard and done much. I may or may not have worked

hard--sometimes I think I have, sometimes I think I have not--but I

certainly have done little. Here I am nearly thirty, and have made no

mark on the world yet.”

“I don’t know that that is of so much consequence,” I said. “I have

never hoped for more than to rub out a few of the marks already made.”

“Perhaps you are right,” he returned. “Every man has something he can

do, and more, I suppose, that he can’t do. But I have no right to turn a

visit into a visitation. Will you please tell Miss Walton that I am very

sorry I presumed on the privileges of a drawing-master, and gave her

pain. It was so far from my intention that it will be a lesson to me for

the future.”

With these words he took his leave, and I could not help being greatly

pleased both with them and with his bearing. He was clearly anything but

a common man.

CHAPTER VI.

THE SHADOW OP DEATH.

When Wynnie appeared at dinner she looked ashamed of herself, and her

face betrayed that she had been crying. But I said nothing, for I had

confidence that all she needed was time to come to herself, that the

voice that speaks louder than any thunder might make its stillness

heard. And when I came home from my walk the next morning I found Mr.

Percivale once more in the group about Connie, and evidently on the best

possible terms with all. The same afternoon Wynnie went out sketching

with Dora. I had no doubt that she had made some sort of apology to Mr.

Percivale; but I did not make the slightest attempt to discover what

had passed between them, for though it is of all things desirable that

children should be quite open with their parents, I was most anxious to

lay upon them no burden of obligation. For such burden lies against the

door of utterance, and makes it the more difficult to open. It paralyses

the speech of the soul. What I desired was that they should trust me so

that faith should overcome all difficulty that might lie in the way of

their being open with me. That end is not to be gained by any urging of

admonition. Against such, growing years at least, if nothing else, will

bring a strong reaction. Nor even, if so gained would the gain be at all

of the right sort. The openness would not be faith. Besides, a parent

must respect the spiritual person of his child, and approach it with

reverence, for that too looks the Father in the face, and has an

audience with him into which no earthly parent can enter even if he

dared to desire it. Therefore I trusted my child. And when I saw that

she looked at me a little shyly when we next met, I only sought to show

her the more tenderness and confidence, telling her all about my plans

with the bells, and my talks with the smith and Mrs. Coombes. She

listened with just such interest as I had always been accustomed to see

in her, asking such questions, and making such remarks as I might

have expected, but I still felt that there was the thread of a little

uneasiness through the web of our intercourse,--such a thread of a false

colour as one may sometimes find wandering through the labour of the

loom, and seek with pains to draw from the woven stuff. But it was for

Wynnie to take it out, not for me. And she did not leave it long. For

as she bade me good-night in my study, she said suddenly, yet with

hesitating openness,

“Papa, I told Mr. Percivale that I was sorry I had behaved so badly

about the drawings.”

“You did right, my child,” I replied. At the same moment a pang of

anxiety passed through me lest under the influence of her repentance she

should have said anything more than becoming. But I banished the doubt

instantly as faithlessness in the womanly instincts of my child. For

we men are always so ready and anxious to keep women right, like the

wretched creature, Laertes, in _Hamlet_, who reads his sister such a

lesson on her maidenly duties, but declines almost with contempt to

listen to a word from her as to any co-relative obligation on his side!

And here I may remark in regard to one of the vexed questions of the

day--the rights of women--that what women demand it is not for men to

withhold. It is not their business to lay the law for women. That women

must lay down for themselves. I confess that, although I must herein

seem to many of my readers old-fashioned and conservative, I should not

like to see any woman I cared much for either in parliament or in an

anatomical class-room; but on the other hand I feel that women must be

left free to settle that matter. If it is not good, good women will find

it out and recoil from it. If it is good then God give them good

speed. One thing they _have_ a right to--a far wider and more valuable

education than they have been in the way of receiving. When the mothers

are well taught the generations will grow in knowledge at a fourfold

rate. But still the teaching of life is better than all the schools,

and common sense than all learning. This common sense is a rare gift,

scantier in none than in those who lay claim to it on the ground of

following commonplace, worldly, and prudential maxims. But I must return

to my Wynnie.

“And what did Mr. Percivale say?” I resumed, for she was silent.

“He took the blame all on himself, papa.”

“Like a gentleman,” I said.

“But I could not leave it so, you know, papa, because that was not the

truth.”

“Well?”

“I told him that I had lost my temper from disappointment; that I

had thought I did not care for my drawings because I was so far from

satisfied with them, but when he made me feel that they were worth

nothing, then I found from the vexation I felt that I had cared for

them. But I do think, papa, I was more ashamed of having shown them, and

vexed with myself, than cross with him. But I was very silly.”

“Well, and what did he say?”

“He began to praise them then. But you know I could not take much of

that, for what could he do?”

“You might give him credit for a little honesty, at least.”

“Yes; but things may be true in a way, you know, and not mean much.”

“He seems to have succeeded in reconciling you to the prosecution

of your efforts, however; for I saw you go out with your sketching

apparatus this afternoon.”

“Yes,” she answered shyly. “He was so kind that somehow I got heart to

try again. He’s very nice, isn’t he?”

My answer was not quite ready.

“Don’t you like him, papa?”

“Well--I like him--yes. But we must not be in haste with our judgments,

you know. I have had very little opportunity of seeing into him. There

is much in him that I like, but--”

“But what? please, papa.”

“To tell the truth then, Wynnie, for I can speak my mind to you,

my child, there is a certain shyness of approaching the subject of

religion; so that I have my fears lest he should belong to any of these

new schools of a fragmentary philosophy which acknowledge no source of

truth but the testimony of the senses and the deductions made therefrom

by the intellect.”

“But is not that a hasty conclusion, papa?”

“That is a hasty question, my dear. I have come to no conclusion. I was

only speaking confidentially about my fears.”

“Perhaps, papa, it’s only that he’s not sure enough, and is afraid of

appearing to profess more than he believes. I’m sure, if that’s it, I

have the greatest sympathy with him.”

I looked at her, and saw the tears gathering fast in her eyes.

“Pray to God on the chance of his hearing you, my darling, and go to

sleep,” I said. “I will not think hardly of you because you cannot be so

sure as I am. How could you be? You have not had my experience. Perhaps

you are right about Mr. Percivale too. But it would be an awkward thing

to get intimate with him, you know, and then find out that we did not

like him after all. You couldn’t like a man much, could you, who did not

believe in anything greater than himself, anything marvellous, grand,

beyond our understanding--who thought that he had come out of the dirt

and was going back to the dirt?”

“I could, papa, if he tried to do his duty notwithstanding--for I’m sure

I couldn’t. I should cry myself to death.”

“You are right, my child. I should honour him too. But I should be very

sorry for him. For he would be so disappointed in himself.”

I do not know whether this was the best answer to make, but I had little

time to think.

“But you don’t know that he’s like that.”

“I do not, my dear. And more, I will not associate the idea with him

till I know for certain. We will leave it to ignorant old ladies who lay

claim to an instinct for theology to jump at conclusions, and reserve

ours--as even such a man as we have been supposing might well teach

us--till we have sufficient facts from which to draw them. Now go to

bed, my child.”

“Good-night then, dear papa,” she said, and left me with a kiss.