be laid down till the sufferer parts with it at the very gate of Heaven.
At least, so it seems to me. As the years go on it grows heavier, and
it is crushing him almost into the dust now."

"Whom dost thou mean, Heliet?"

"The Lord Earl, our master."

"I can see he is sorely tried; but I never quite understand what his
trouble is."

"The sorrow of being actively hated by the only one whom he loves. The
prospect of being left to die, in wifeless and childless loneliness--
that terrible loneliness of soul which is so much worse to bear than any
mere physical solitude. God, for some wise reason, has shut him up to
Himself. He has deprived him of all human relationship and human love;
has said to him, `Lean on Me, and walk loose from all other ties.' A
wedded man in the eyes of the world, God has called him in reality to be
an anchorite of the Order of Providence, to follow the Lamb
whithersoever He goeth. And unless mine eyes see very wrongly into the
future--as would God they did!--the Master is about to lead this dear
servant into the Gethsemane of His passion, that he may be fashioned
like Him in all things. Ah, Clarice, that takes close cutting!"

"Heliet, what dost thou mean? Canst thou guess what the Lady is about
to do?"

"I think she is going to leave him."

"Alone?--for ever?"

"For earth," said Heliet, softly. "God be thanked, that is not for
ever."

"What an intensely cruel woman she is!" cried Clarice, indignantly.

"Because, I believe, she is a most miserable one."

"Canst thou feel any pity for _her_?"

"It is not so easy as for him. Yet I suspect she needs it even more
than he does. Christ have mercy on them both!"

"I cannot comprehend it," said Clarice.

"I will tell thee one thing," answered Heliet. "I would rather change
with thee than with Sir Edmund the Earl; and a hundred times rather with
thee than with the Lady Margaret. It is hard to suffer; but it is worse
to be the occasion of suffering. Let me die a thousand times over with
Saint Stephen, before I keep the clothes of the persecutors with Saul."

Clarice stooped and lifted the child from the cradle.

"It is growing late," she said. "I suppose we ought not to be up
longer. Good-night, sweetheart, and many thanks for thy counsel. It is
all true, I know; yet--"

"In twenty years, may be--or at the longest, when thou hast seen His
Face in righteousness--dear Clarice, thou wilt know it, and want to add
no _yet_.