une was a fact or fancy, made no feature of difference. He thanked
God and took courage. The same instant the door opened, and Dorothy came
in hesitating, and looking strangely anxious. He threw her a
face-question. She gently bowed her head, and gave him a letter with a
broad black border which she held in her hand.

He read it. No room for rational doubt was left. He folded it softly,
gave it back to her, and rising, kneeled down by the bedside, near the
foot, and said--

"Father, whose is the fullness of the earth, I thank Thee that Thou hast
set my brother's heel on the neck of his enemy. But the suddenness of
Thy relief from holy poverty and evil care, has so shaken his heart and
brain, or rather, perhaps, has made him think so keenly of his lack of
faith in his Father in heaven, that he fears Thou hast thrown him the
gift in disdain, as to a dog under the table, though never didst Thou
disdain a dog, and not given it as to a child, from Thy hand into his.
Father, let Thy spirit come with the gift, or take it again, and make
him poor and able to pray."--Here came an _amen_, groaned out as from
the bottom of a dungeon.--"Pardon him, Father," the curate prayed on,
"all his past discontent and the smallness of his faith. Thou art our
Father, and Thou knowest us tenfold better than we know ourselves; we
pray Thee not only to pardon us, but to make all righteous excuse for
us, when we dare not make any for ourselves, for Thou art the truth. We
will try to be better children. We will go on climbing the mount of God
through all the cloudy darkness that swaths it, yea, even in the face of
the worst terrors--that when we reach the top, we shall find no one
there."--Here Dorothy burst into sobs.--"Father!" thus the curate ended
his prayer, "take pity on Thy children. Thou wilt not give them a piece
of bread, in place of a stone--to poison them! The egg Thou givest will
not be a serpent's. We are Thine, and Thou art ours: in us be Thy will
done! Amen."

As he rose from his knees, he saw that the minister had turned his face
to the wall, and lay perfectly still. Rightly judging that he was
renewing the vain effort to rouse, by force of the will, feelings which
had been stunned by the strange shock, he ventured to try a more
authoritative mode of address.

"And now, Mr. Drake, you have got to spend this money," he said, "and
the sooner you set about it the better. Whatever may be your ideas about
the principal, you are boun