red,
Quietly, after her fashion, still knitting; 'Well, I think of it.
Yes, I don't know, Mr. Philip; but only it feels to me strangely,--
Like to the high new bridge they used to build at, below there,
Over the burn and glen, on the road. You won't understand me.....
Sometimes I find myself dreaming at nights about arches and bridges;
Sometimes I dream of a great invisible hand coming down, and
Dropping a great key-stone in the middle.'....

"But while she was speaking,--
So it happened,--a moment she paused from her work, and, pondering,
Laid her hand on her lap. Philip took it, she did not resist.
So he retained her fingers, the knitting being stopped. But emotion
Came all over her more and more, from his hand, from her heart, and
Most from the sweet idea and image her brain was renewing.
So he retained her hand, and, his tears down-dropping on it,
Trembling a long time, kissed it at last: and she ended.
And, as she ended, up rose he, saying: 'What have I heard? Oh!
What have I done, that such words should be said to me? Oh! I see it,
See the great key-stone coming down from the heaven of heavens.'
And he fell at her feet, and buried his face in her apron.
"But, as, under the moon and stars, they went to the cottage,
Elspie sighed and said: 'Be patient, dear Mr. Philip;
Do not do anything hasty. It is all so soon, so sudden.
Do not say anything yet to any one.'

'Elspie,' he answered,
"Does not my friend go on Friday? I then shall see nothing of you:
Do not I myself go on Monday? 'But oh!' he said, 'Elspie,
Do as I bid you, my child; do not go on calling me _Mr._
Might I not just as well be calling you _Miss Elspie?_
Call me, this heavenly night, for once, for the first time, Philip.'
"'Philip,' she said, and laughed, and said she could not say it.
'Philip,' she said. He turned, and kissed the sweet lips as they
said it.
"But, on the morrow, Elspie kept out of the way of Philip;
And, at the evening seat, when he took her hand by the alders,
Drew it back, saying, almost peevishly:

"'No, Mr. Philip;
I was quite right last night: it is too soon, too sudden,
What I told you before was foolish, perhaps,--was hasty.
When I think it over, I am shocked and terrified at it.'"....
"Ere she had spoken two words, had Philip released her fingers;
As she went on, he recoiled, fell back, and shook, and shivered.
There he stood, looking