Like Jefferson, she was not a member of any church, although her nature was deeply religious.  Hers was the religion the soul inculcates, not that which is learned by rote in the temple.  She was a Christian because she thought Christ the greatest figure in world history, and also because her own conduct of life was modelled upon Christian principles and virtues.  She was religious for religion’s sake and not for public ostentation.  The mystery of life awed her and while her intelligence could not accept all the doctrines of dogmatic religion she did not go so far as Jefferson, who was a frank agnostic.  She would not admit that we do not know.  The longings and aspirations of her own soul convinced her of the existence of a Supreme Being, First Cause, Divine Intelligence—­ call it what you will—­which had brought out of chaos the wonderful order of the universe.  The human mind was, indeed, helpless to conceive such a First Cause in any form and lay prostrate before the Unknown, yet she herself was an enthusiastic delver into scientific hypothesis and the teachings of Darwin, Spencer, Haeckel had satisfied her intellect if they had failed to content her soul.  The theory of evolution as applied to life on her own little planet appealed strongly to her because it accounted plausibly for the presence of man on earth.  The process through which we had passed could be understood by every intelligence.  The blazing satellite, violently detached from the parent sun starting on its circumscribed orbit—­that was the first stage, the gradual subsidence of the flames and the cooling of the crust—­the second stage:  the gases mingling and forming water which covered the earth—­the third stage; the retreating of the waters and the appearance of the land—­the fourth stage; the appearance of vegetation and animal life—­the fifth stage; then, after a long interval and through constant evolution and change the appearance of man, which was the sixth stage.  What stages still to come, who knows?  This simple account given by science was, after all, practically identical with the biblical legend!

It was when Shirley was face to face with Nature in her wildest and most primitive aspects that this deep rooted religious feeling moved her most strongly.  At these times she felt herself another being, exalted, sublimated, lifted from this little world with its petty affairs and vanities up to dizzy heights.  She had felt the same sensation when for the first time she had viewed the glories of the snow clad Matterhorn, she had felt it when on a summer’s night at sea she had sat on deck and watched with fascinated awe the resplendent radiance of the countless stars, she felt it now as she looked at the foaming, tumbling waves.

“It is so beautiful,” she murmured as she turned to walk.  The ship was rolling a little and she took Jefferson’s arm to steady herself.  Shirley was an athletic girl and had all the ease and grace of carriage that comes of much tennis and golf playing.  Barely twenty-four years old, she was still in the first flush of youth and health, and there was nothing she loved so much as exercise and fresh air.  After a few turns on deck, there was a ruddy glow in her cheeks that was good to see and many an admiring glance was cast at the young couple as they strode briskly up and down past the double rows of elongated steamer chairs.