'I'm afraid we've done too much,' said Mr. Bell. 'You're

suffering now from having lived so long in that Milton air.

'I am tired,' said Mr. Hale. 'But it is not Milton air. I'm

fifty-five years of age, and that little fact of itself accounts

for any loss of strength.' 'Nonsense! I'm upwards of sixty, and feel no loss of strength,

either bodily or mental. Don't let me hear you talking so.

Fifty-five! why, you're quite a young man.' Mr. Hale shook his head. 'These last few years!' said he. But

after a minute's pause, he raised himself from his half recumbent

position, in one of Mr. Bell's luxurious easy-chairs, and said

with a kind of trembling earnestness: 'Bell! you're not to think, that if I could have foreseen all

that would come of my change of opinion, and my resignation of my

living--no! not even if I could have known how she would have

suffered,--that I would undo it--the act of open acknowledgment

that I no longer held the same faith as the church in which I was

a priest. As I think now, even if I could have foreseen that

cruellest martyrdom of suffering, through the sufferings of one

whom I loved, I would have done just the same as far as that step

of openly leaving the church went. I might have done differently,

and acted more wisely, in all that I subsequently did for my

family. But I don't think God endued me with over-much wisdom or

strength,' he added, falling hack into his old position.

Mr. Bell blew his nose ostentatiously before answering. Then he

said: 'He gave you strength to do what your conscience told you was

right; and I don't see that we need any higher or holier strength

than that; or wisdom either. I know I have not that much; and yet

men set me down in their fool's books as a wise man; an

independent character; strong-minded, and all that cant. The

veriest idiot who obeys his own simple law of right, if it be but

in wiping his shoes on a door-mat, is wiser and stronger than I.

But what gulls men are!' There was a pause. Mr. Hale spoke first, in continuation of his

thought: 'About Margaret.' 'Well! about Margaret. What then?' 'If I die----' 'Nonsense!' 'What will become of her--I often think? I suppose the Lennoxes

will ask her to live with them. I try to think they will. Her

aunt Shaw loved her well in her own quiet way; but she forgets to

love the absent.' 'A very common fault. What sort of people are the Lennoxes?' 'He, handsome, fluent, and agreeable. Edith, a sweet little

spoiled beauty. Margaret loves her with all her heart, and Edith

with as much of her heart as she can spare.' 'Now, Hale; you know that girl of yours has got pretty nearly all

my heart. I told you that before. Of course, as your daughter, as

my god-daughter, I took great interest in her before I saw her

the last time. But this visit that I paid to you at Milton made

me her slave. I went, a willing old victim, following the car of

the conqueror. For, indeed, she looks as grand and serene as one

who has struggled, and may be struggling, and yet has the victory

secure in sight. Yes, in spite of all her present anxieties, that

was the look on her face. And so, all I have is at her service,

if she needs it; and will be hers, whether she will or no, when I

die. Moreover, I myself, will be her preux chevalier, sixty and

gouty though I be. Seriously, old friend, your daughter shall be

my principal charge in life, and all the help that either my wit

or my wisdom or my willing heart can give, shall be hers. I don't

choose her out as a subject for fretting. Something, I know of

old, you must have to worry yourself about, or you wouldn't be

happy. But you're going to outlive me by many a long year. You

spare, thin men are always tempting and always cheating Death!

It's the stout, florid fellows like me, that always go off

first.' If Mr. Bell had had a prophetic eye he might have seen the torch

all but inverted, and the angel with the grave and composed face

standing very nigh, beckoning to his friend. That night Mr. Hale

laid his head down on the pillow on which it never more should

stir with life. The servant who entered his room in the morning,

received no answer to his speech; drew near the bed, and saw the

calm, beautiful face lying white and cold under the ineffaceable

seal of death. The attitude was exquisitely easy; there had been

no pain--no struggle. The action of the heart must have ceased as

he lay down.




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