"I did."
"It made no sound?"
"None."
"Then how did its engines move, if it HAD engines?" pursued Aloysius--"Had you no curiosity about it?"
"I'm afraid I hadn't--I was really too nervous! Morgana begged me to go inside, but I could not!"
Don Aloysius was silent for a minute or two, out of gentle tolerance. He recognised that Lady Kingswood belonged to the ordinary class of good, kindly women not overburdened with brains, to whom thought, particularly of a scientific or reflective nature, would be a kind of physical suffering. And how fortunate it is that there are, and always will be such women! Many of them are gifted with the supreme talent of making happiness around themselves,--and in this way they benefit humanity more than the often too self-absorbed student of things which are frequently "past finding out."
"I understand your feeling";--he said, at last--"And I hardly wonder at your very natural fears. I must admit that I think human daring is going too fast and too far--the science of to-day is not tending to make men and women happier--and after all, happiness is the great goal."
A slight sigh escaped him, and Lady Kingswood looked at his fine, composed features with deep interest.
"Do you think God meant us to be happy?" she asked, gently.
"It is a dubious question!" he answered--"When we view the majesty and loveliness of nature--we cannot but believe we were intended to enjoy the splendid treasures of beauty freely spread out before us,--then again, if we look back thousands of years and consider the great civilisations of the past that have withered into dust and are now forgotten, we cannot help wondering why there should be such a waste of life for apparently no purpose. I speak in a secular sense,--of course my Church has but one reply to doubt, or what we call 'despair of God's mercy'--that it is sin. We are not permitted to criticise or to question the Divine."
"And surely that is best!" said Lady Kingswood, "and surely you have found happiness, or what is nearest to happiness, in your beautiful Faith?"
His eyes were shadowed by deep gravity.
"Miladi, I have never sought happiness," he replied; "From my earliest boyhood I felt it was not for me. Among the comrades of my youth many started the race of life with me--happiness was the winning post they had in view--and they tried many ways to reach it--some through ambition, some through wealth, some through love--but I have never chanced to meet one of them who was either happy or satisfied. MY mind was set on nothing for myself--except this--to grope through the darkness for the Great Mind behind the Universe--to drop my own 'ego' into it, as a drop of rain into the sea--and so--to be content! And in this way I have learned much,--more than I consider myself worthy to know. Modern science of the surface kind--(not the true deep discoveries)--has done its best to detach the rain-drop from the sea!--but it has failed. I stay where I have plunged my soul!"