n which itself falls dead on the top of them. But it is not so.
Every year I live I am more convinced that the waste of life lies in the
love we have not given, the powers we have not used, the selfish
prudence which will risk nothing, and which, shirking pain, misses
happiness as well. No one ever yet was the poorer in the long-run for
having once in a lifetime 'let out all the length of all the reins.'"

"You mean it did me good," said Rachel, "and that _he_ was a kind of
benefactor in disguise. I dare say you are right, but you see I don't
take a burning interest in my own character. I don't find my mental
stand-point--isn't that what Mrs. Loftus calls it?--very engrossing."

"He was a benefactor, all the same," said Hester, with decision. "I did
not think so at the time, and if I could have driven over him in an
omnibus I would have done so with pleasure. But I believe that the day
will come when you will cover that grave with a handsome monument,
erected out of gratitude to him for not marrying you. And now, Rachel,
will you forgive me beforehand for what I am going to say?"

"Oh!" said Rachel, ruefully. "When you say that I know it is the prelude
to something frightful. You are getting out a dagger, and I shall be its
sheath directly."

"You are a true prophet, Rachel."

"Yes, executioner."

"My dear, dear friend, whom I love best in the world, when that happened
my heart was wrung for you. I would have given everything I had, life
itself--not that that is saying much--to have saved you from that hour."

"I know it."

"But I should have been the real enemy if I had had power to save you,
which, thank God! I had not. That hour had to be. It was necessary. You
may not care about your own character, but I do. There is something
stubborn and inflexible in you--the seamy side of your courage and
steadfastness--which cannot readily enter into the feelings of others or
put itself in their place. I think it is want of imagination--I mean the
power of seeing things as they are. You are the kind of woman who, if
you had married comfortably some one you rather liked, might have become
like Sybell Loftus, who never understands any feeling beyond her own
microscopic ones, and who measures love by her own small preference for
Doll. You would have had no more sympathy than she has. People, like
Sybell, believe one can only sympathize with what one has experienced.
That is why they are always saying, 'as a mother,' or 'as