ou to it. There is none to help them. Give up love, and the petty
hopes of women. Help me. God calls you to the work."

She went, on blindly: he followed her. For years he had set apart this
girl to help him in his scheme: he would not be balked now. He had
great hopes from his plan: he meant to give all he had: it was the
noblest of aims. He thought some day it would work like leaven through
the festering mass under the country he loved so well, and raise it to
a new life. If it failed,--if it failed, and saved one life, his work
was not lost. But it could not fail.

"Home!" he said, stopping her as she reached the stile,--"oh, Margret,
what is home? There is a cry going up night and day from homes like
that den yonder, for help,--and no man listens."

She was weak; her brain faltered.

"Does God call me to this work? Does He call me?" she moaned.

He watched her eagerly.

"He calls you. He waits for your answer. Swear to me that you will
help His people. Give up father and mother and love, and go down as
Christ did. Help me to give liberty and truth and Jesus' love to these
wretches on the brink of hell. Live with them, raise them with you."

She looked up, white; she was a weak, weak woman, sick for her natural
food of love.

"Is it my work?"

"It is your work. Listen to me, Margret," softly. "Who cares for you?
You stand alone to-night. There is not a single human heart that calls
you nearest and best. Shiver, if you will,--it is true. The man you
wasted your soul on left you in the night and cold to go to his
bride,--is sitting by her now, holding her hand in his."

He waited a moment, looking down at her, until she should understand.

"Do you think you deserved this of God? I know that yonder on the muddy
road you looked up to Him, and knew it was not just; that you had done
right, and this was your reward. I know that for these two years you
have trusted in the Christ you worship to make it right, to give you
your heart's desire. Did He do it? Did He hear your prayer? Does He
care for your weak love, when the nations of the earth are going down?
What is your poor hope to Him, when the very land you live in is a
wine-press that will be trodden some day by the fierceness and wrath of
Almighty God? O Christ!--if there be a Christ,--help me to save it!"

He looked up,--his face white with pain. After a time he said to her,--

"Help me, Margret! Your prayer was selfish; it was n