then accept from the poet.  The only condition that honour, that chivalry insisted on was the removal of the man.  But there were other ways of getting rid of a man besides the clumsy device of death.  Might he not be considered to have effaced himself sufficiently by marriage?  As far as Lucia was concerned he could see very little difference between the two processes; in fact, marriage was, if anything, the safer.  For the important thing was that she should know somehow; that he should hand over his gift to her before it was too late.  And suppose—­suppose he should fail to remove himself in time?  Beholding the years as they now stretched before him, it seemed to him that he would never die.

There was another consideration which concerned his honour, not as a man but as a poet.  He knew what it was in him to do.  The nature of the gift was such that if he brought it to her to-day she would know that he had given her his best; if he kept it till to-morrow it would be his best no longer.  Besides, it was only a gift when you looked at it one way.  He was giving her (as he believed) an immortal thing; but its very immortality gave it a certain material value.  The thing might be sold for much, and its price might go far towards covering that debt he owed her, or it might be held by her as a sort of security.  He could see that his marriage would be a hindrance to speedy payment on any other system.

He rose, unlocked a drawer, and took from it the manuscript of the nine and twenty sonnets and the sealed envelope that contained his testament concerning them.  He had looked at them but once since he had put them away three years ago, and that was on the night of his engagement.  Looking at them again he knew he was not mistaken in his judgement, when calmly, surely, and persistently he had thought of the thing as immortal.  But according to another condition that his honour had laid down, its immortality depended upon her.  At this point honour itself raised the question whether it was fair to throw on her the burden of so great a decision?  She might hesitate to deny him so large a part of his immortality, and yet object to being so intimately, so personally bound up with it.  He could see her delicate conscience straining under the choice.

But surely she knew him well enough to know that he had left her free?  She would know that he could accept nothing from her pity, not even a portion of his immortality.  She would trust his sincerity; for that at any rate had never failed her.  And since what he had written he had written, she would see that unless he destroyed it with his own hands the decision as to publication must rest with her.  It concerned her so intimately, so personally, that it could not be given to the world without her consent.  Whether what he had written should have been written was another matter.  If she thought not, if her refinement accused him of a sin against good taste, that would only make his problem simpler.  Even