s, as though it were another's story
he was telling.

"I was young, with a decided aptitude for commercial life, ambitious,
determined to make my way in life, but with little capital besides sound
health and a good education. She was the daughter of a wealthy man. We
speak in this country of 'mining kings;' he might be denominated an
'agricultural king.' He prided himself upon his hundreds of fertile
acres, his miles of forest, his immense dairy, his blooded horses, his
magnificent barns and granaries, his beautiful home. She was the younger
daughter--his especial pet and pride. For a while, as a friend and
acquaintance of his two daughters, I was welcome at his home; later, as
a lover of the younger, I was banished and its doors closed against me.
Our love was no foolish boy and girl romance, and we had no word of
kindly counsel; only unreasoning, stubborn opposition. What followed
was only what might have been expected. Strong in our love for and trust
in each other, we went to a neighboring village, and, going to a little
country parsonage, were married, without one thought of the madness, the
folly of what we were doing. We found the minister and his family seated
outside the house under a sort of arbor of flowering shrubs, and I
remember it was her wish that the ceremony be performed there. Never can
I forget her as she stood there, her hand trembling in mine at the
strangeness of the situation, her cheeks flushed with excitement, her
lips quivering as she made the responses, the slanting sunbeams kissing
her hair and brow and the fragrant, snowy petals of the mock-orange
falling about her.

"A few weeks of unalloyed happiness followed; then gradually my eyes
were opened to the wrong I had done her. My heart smote me as I saw her,
day by day, performing household tasks to which she was unaccustomed,
subjected to petty trials and privations, denying herself in many little
ways in order to help me. She never murmured, but her very fortitude and
cheerfulness were a constant reproach to me.

"But a few months elapsed when we found that another was coming to share
our home and our love. We rejoiced together, but my heart reproached me
more bitterly than ever as I realized how ill prepared she was for what
awaited her. Our trials and privations brought us only closer to each
other, but my brain was racked with anxiety and my heart bled as day by
day I saw the dawning motherhood in her eyes,--the growing tenderness,
th