the great subject made known that day to Peter and Suneva.
For to Norsemen, slavery is the greatest of all earthly ills, and
Peter's eyes flashed with indignation, and he spoke of Snorro not only
with respect, but with something also like a noble envy of his
privileges.

"If I had twenty years less, I would man a ship of mine own, and go to
the African coast as a privateer, I would that. What a joy I should
give my two hands in freeing the captives, and hanging those slavers
in a slack rope at the yard-arm."

"Nay, Peter, thou would not be brutal."

"Yes, I would be a brute with brutes; that is so, my minister. Even
St. James thinks as I do--'He shall have judgment without mercy that
showeth no mercy.' That is a good way, I think. I am glad Snorro hath
gone to look after them. I would be right glad if he had Thor's hammer
in his big hands."

"He hath a Lancaster gun, Peter."

"But that is not like seeing the knife redden in the hand. Oh, no!"

"Peter, we are Christians, and not heathens."

"I am sorry if the words grieve thee. Often I have wondered why David
wrote some of the hard words he did write. I wonder no more. He wrote
them against the men who sell human life for gold. If I was Jan
Vedder, I would read those words every morning to my men. The knife
that is sharpened on the word of God, cuts deep--that is so."

"Jan hath done his part well, Peter, and I wish that he could see us
this night. It hath been a day of blessing to this house, and I am
right happy to have been counted in it."

Then he went away, but that night Margaret and her son once more slept
in their old room under Peter Fae's roof. It affected her to see that
nothing had been changed. A pair of slippers she had forgotten still
stood by the hearthstone. Her mother's Bible had been placed upon her
dressing table. The geranium she had planted, was still in the window;
it had been watered and cared for, and had grown to be a large and
luxuriant plant. She thought of the last day she had occupied that
room, and of the many bitter hours she had spent in it, and she
contrasted them with the joy and the hope of her return.

But when we say to ourselves, "I will be grateful," it is very seldom
the heart consents to our determination; and Margaret, exhausted with
emotion, was almost shocked to find that she could not realize, with
any degree of warmth, the mercy and blessing that had come to her. She
was the more dissatisfied, because as soon as