fer as heaven and earth,
But women, worst and best, as heaven and hell."

He felt so keenly now that she had been his better angel for more than
twenty years; that but for her he might long ago have deteriorated to
selfishness and cynicism, or sunk into that careless philosophy which
believes only in the tangible, the material, and the present.

A good woman's lot may be linked to that of a bad man; she may even
love him very dearly, and yet retain much of her purer, better nature
amidst all the mire in which she is steeped; but it is not so with us.
To care for a bad woman is to be dragged down to her level, inch by
inch, till the intellect itself becomes sapped in a daily degradation
of the heart. From such slavery emancipation is cheap under any
suffering, at any sacrifice. The lopping of a limb is a painful
process, but above a gangrened wound experienced surgeons amputate
without scruple or remorse.

On the other hand, a true woman's affection is of all earthly
influences the noblest and most elevating. It encourages the highest
and gentlest qualities of man's nature--his enterprise, courage,
patience, sympathy, above all, his trust. Happy the pilgrim on whose
life such a beacon-star has shone out to guide him in the right way;
thrice happy if it sets not until it has lured him so far that he will
never again turn aside from the path.

Such reflections as these, while they added to his sense of loss and
loneliness, yet took so much of the sting out of Mr. Bruce's great
sorrow, that he could realise it for minutes at a time without being
goaded to madness or stunned to apathy by the pain.

There had been no warning--no preparation. He had left her that
morning as usual, after smoking a cigar in her society on the lawn,
while she tied, and snipped, and gathered the flowers of her pretty
garden. He had visited the stable, ordered the pony-carriage, seen the
keeper, and been to look at an Alderney cow. It was one of his idle
days, yet, after twenty years of marriage, such days he still liked to
spend, if possible, in the company of his wife. So he strolled back to
write his letters in her boudoir, and entered it at the garden door,
expecting to find her, as usual, busied in some graceful feminine
employment.

Her work was heaped on the sofa; a book she had been reading lay open
on the table; the very flowers she gathered an hour ago had the dew on
them still. He could not finish his first letter without consul