“Insupportable —­ unnatural —­ out of the question!”

“And then,” I continued, “though I have only sisterly affection for him now, yet, if forced to be his wife, I can imagine the possibility of conceiving an inevitable, strange, torturing kind of love for him, because he is so talented; and there is often a certain heroic grandeur in his look, manner, and conversation.  In that case, my lot would become unspeakably wretched.  He would not want me to love him; and if I showed the feeling, he would make me sensible that it was a superfluity, unrequired by him, unbecoming in me.  I know he would.”

“And yet St. John is a good man,” said Diana.

“He is a good and a great man; but he forgets, pitilessly, the feelings and claims of little people, in pursuing his own large views.  It is better, therefore, for the insignificant to keep out of his way, lest, in his progress, he should trample them down.  Here he comes!  I will leave you, Diana.”  And I hastened upstairs as I saw him entering the garden.

But I was forced to meet him again at supper.  During that meal he appeared just as composed as usual.  I had thought he would hardly speak to me, and I was certain he had given up the pursuit of his matrimonial scheme:  the sequel showed I was mistaken on both points.  He addressed me precisely in his ordinary manner, or what had, of late, been his ordinary manner —­ one scrupulously polite.  No doubt he had invoked the help of the Holy Spirit to subdue the anger I had roused in him, and now believed he had forgiven me once more.

For the evening reading before prayers, he selected the twenty-first chapter of Revelation.  It was at all times pleasant to listen while from his lips fell the words of the Bible:  never did his fine voice sound at once so sweet and full —­ never did his manner become so impressive in its noble simplicity, as when he delivered the oracles of God:  and to-night that voice took a more solemn tone —­ that manner a more thrilling meaning —­ as he sat in the midst of his household circle (the May moon shining in through the uncurtained window, and rendering almost unnecessary the light of the candle on the table):  as he sat there, bending over the great old Bible, and described from its page the vision of the new heaven and the new earth —­ told how God would come to dwell with men, how He would wipe away all tears from their eyes, and promised that there should be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, nor any more pain, because the former things were passed away.

The succeeding words thrilled me strangely as he spoke them:  especially as I felt, by the slight, indescribable alteration in sound, that in uttering them, his eye had turned on me.

“He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.  But,” was slowly, distinctly read, “the fearful, the unbelieving, &c., shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.”