long and eloquent, and went home to Malcolm Forde's heart.

From the first, from that first hour in which the slumbering depths of his spirit had been stirred with a sudden rush of religious enthusiasm-like that strange ruffling of Siloam's still waters beneath the breath of God's angel-from that initial hour in which, beside the clay-cold corpse of her who should have been his wife, he dedicated his life to the service of his God, he had meant to do something—to make a name which should mark him out from the unnoted ranks of the Church-to accomplish a work which should be in itself the noblest monument that he could raise to the memory of his lost bride. Not in a quiet country parish could he find the fulness of his desires. It was something to have made a ripple upon this stagnant pool; something to have stirred the foul scum of indifference that had defiled these tideless waters. But having done this successfully, having awakened new life and vigour in this slumberous flock, he began to think in all earnestness that it was time for him to be moving forward. The life here was in no manner unpleasing to him; it was sweet rather, sweet in its utter peacefulness, and the fruition of all his present desires. He knew himself beloved and honoured; knew himself to have acquired

unwittingly the first place, and not the second, in the hearts and minds of this congregation. But all this was not enough to the man who had made St. Paul his typical churchman-to the man who boasted of himself as a soldier and servant of Christ. Very sweet was this pleasant resting-place; very dear the affection that greeted him on every side; the blushing cheeks and reverent eyes of school-children lifted to him as he went along the quiet street; the warm praises of men and women; the genial welcome that greeted him in every household; the hushed expectancy and upward look of rapt attention that marked his entrance to the pulpit. But precious though these things might be to him, they were not the accomplishment of his mission. It was as a pilgrim he had entered the Church; a teacher whose influence for good could not be used in too wide a field. Not in this smooth garden-ground could he find room for his labour; his soul yearned for the pathless forest, to stand with the pioneer's axe on his shoulder alone in the primeval wilderness, with a new world to conquer, a new race of men to gather into the fold of Christ.

This having been in his thoughts from the very first-a desire that had mingled with his dreams, sleeping and waking, from the beginning-it would

have been curiously inconsistent had he shrunk from

its realisation now.

And yet he sat for a long time with that letter in his hand, deliberating, with a painful perplexity, on the course which he should take. Nor did that lengthy reverie make an end of his deliberation. He who had been wont to decide all things swiftly (his life-path being so narrow a thread, leading straight to one given point, his scheme of existence hardly allowing room for irresolution) was now utterly at fault, tossed upon a sea of doubt, perplexed beyond measure.

Alas, almost unawares, that mathematically adjusted scheme of his existence had fallen out of gear: the wheels were clogged that had gone so smoothly, the machine no longer worked with that even swiftness which had made his life so easy. He was no longer able to concentrate all his thoughts and desires upon one point, but was dragged to this side and to that by contending influences. In a word, he had given himself a new idol. That idea of foreign service, of toiling for his Master in an untrodden world, of being able to say, 'This work is mine, and mine only!' which a little while ago had been to him so exhilarating a notion, had now lost its charm.

'Never to see her any more,' he said to himself; 'not even to know her fate! Could I endure that?

O, I know but too well that she is not worthy of my love, that she is not worthy to divide my heart with the service of my God, not worthy that for her sake I should be false to the vow that I made beside Alice Fraser's death-bed; and yet I cannot tear my heart away from her. Sometimes I say to myself that this is not love at all, only a base earthly passion, a slavish worship of her beauty. Sometimes I half believe that I never truly loved before, that my affection for Alice was only a sublimated friendship, that the true passion is this, and this only.'

He thought of David, and that fatal hour in which the King of Israel, the chosen of the Lord, walked alone upon the housetop, and beheld the woman whose beauty was to be his ruin; thought and wondered at that strange solemn story with its pathetic ending. Was he stronger or wiser than David, when for the magic of a lovely face he was ready to give his soul into bondage ?

For three days and three nights he abandoned himself to the demon of uncertainty; for three days. and three nights he wrestled with the devil, and Satan came to him in but too fair a guise, wearing the shape of the woman he loved. In the end he conquered, or believed that he had conquered. There was no immediate necessity for a decisive

reply to that letter, but he determined to accept the mission that had been offered him; and he began to make his arrangements with that view.

It

Having once made up his mind as to his future, it was of course his duty to communicate that fact to the Vicar without loss of time. So upon the first evening that he found himself at liberty, he walked out to the Vicarage to make this announcement. was an evening in the middle of March-gray and cold, but calm withal, for the blusterous winds had spent their fury in the morning, and there was only a distant mysterious sound of fitful gusts sweeping across the moorland ever and anon, like the sighing of a discontented Titan. There was a dim line of primrose light still lingering behind the western edge of the hills when Malcolm Forde passed under the Bar, and out into the open country that lay beyond that ancient archway. He looked at the dim gray landscape with a sudden touch of sadness. How often had his eyes looked upon these familiar things without seeing them! The time might soon come when to remember this place, in its quiet English beauty, would be positive pain, just as it had been pain to him sometimes in this place to recall the mountains and lochs of his native land.

'If I could but have lived here all the days of my