The funeral day was a very sore one to Paul Blackthorn.  He would have given the world to be there, and have heard the beautiful words of hope which received his friend to his resting-place, but he could not get so far.  He had tried to carry a message to a house not half so far off as the church, but his knees seemed to give way under him, and his legs ached so much that he could hardly get home.  Somehow, a black suit, just such as Harold’s, had come home for him at the same time; but this could not hinder him from feeling that he was but a stranger, and one who had no real place in the home where he lived.  There was the house full of people, who would only make their remarks on him—­Miss Hardman (who was very critical of the coffin-plate), the school-master, and some of the upper-servants of the house—­and poor Mrs. King and Matilda, who could not help being gratified at the attention to their darling, were obliged to go down and be civil to them; while Ellen, less used to restraint, was shut into her own room crying; and Harold was standing on the stairs, very red, but a good deal engaged with his long hat-band.  Poor Paul! he had not even his usual refuge—­his own bed to lie upon and hide his face—­for that had been taken away to make room for the coffin to be carried down.

There, they were going at last, when it had seemed as if the bustle and confusion would never cease.  There was Alfred leaving the door where he had so often played, carried upon the shoulders of six lads in white frocks, his old school-fellows and Paul’s Confirmation friends.  How Paul envied them for doing him that last service!  There was his mother, always patient and composed, holding Harold’s arm—­Harold, who must be her stay and help, but looking so slight, so boyish, and so young, then the two girls, Ellen so overpowered with crying that her sister had to lead her; Mrs. Crabbe with Betsey Hardman, who held up a great white handkerchief, for other people’s visible grief always upset her, as she said; and besides, she felt it a duty to cry at such a time; and the rest two and two, quite a train, in their black suits:  how unlike the dreary pauper funerals Paul had watched away at Upperscote!  That respectable look seemed to make him further off and more desolate, like one cut off, whom no one would follow, no one would weep for.  Alfred, who had called him a brother, was gone, and here he was alone!

The others were taking their dear one once more to the church where they had so often prayed that he might have a happy issue out of all his afflictions.

They were met by Mr. Cope, ending his loving intercourse with Alfred by reading out the blessed promise of Resurrection—­the assurance that the body they were sowing in weakness would be raised in power; so that the noble boy, whom they had seen fade away like a drooping flower, would rise again blossoming forth in glory, after the Image of the Incorruptible—­that Image, thought Mr. Cope, as he read on, which he faithfully