"What is it?"

"`Remember!'"

"Ah!" John Thurston's long-drawn exclamation, which ended with a heavy
sigh, astonished Bartle.

"There's more in it than I reckoned, seemingly," said he as he turned to
Margaret's cell, and opened her wicket to pass in the supper.

"Here's a message for you, Meg, from Master Ewring the miller. Let's
see what _you'll_ say to it--`Remember!'"

"`Remember!'" cried Margaret in a pained tone. "Don't I always
remember? isn't it misery to me to remember? And can't I guess what he
means--`Remember from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the
first works'? Eh, then there's repentance yet for them that have
fallen! `I will fight against thee, _except_ thou repent.' God bless
you, Bartle: you've given me a buffet and yet a hope."

"That's a proper powerful word, is that!" said Bartle. "Never knew one
word do so much afore."

There was more power in that one word from Holy Writ than Bartle
guessed. The single word, sent home to their consciences by the Holy
Ghost, brought quit different messages to the two to whom it was sent.
To John Thurston it did not say, "Remember from whence thou hast
fallen." That was the message with which it was charged for Margaret.
But to John it said, "Call to remembrance the former days, in which,
after that ye were illuminated, ye endured a great flight of afflictions
... knowing in yourselves that ye have in Heaven a better and an
enduring substance. Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath
great recompense of reward." That was John's message, and it found him
just on the brink of casting his confidence away, and stopped him.

Mr Ewring had never spent an angelet better than in securing the
transmission of that one word, which was the instrument in God's hand to
save two immortal souls.

As he reached the top of Tenant's Lane, he met Ursula Felstede, carrying
a large bundle, with which she tried to hide her face, and to slink
past. The miller stopped.

"Good den, Ursula. Wither away?"

"Truly, Master, to the whitster's with this bundle."

The whitster meant what we should now call a dyer and cleaner.

"Do you mind, Ursula, what the Prophet Daniel saith, that `many shall be
purified and made white'? Methinks it is going on now. White, as no
fuller on earth can white them! May you and I be so cleansed, friend!
Good den."

Ursula courtesied and escaped, and Mr Ewring passed through the gate,
and went up to his desolate