in his turn for sitting in the house and pretending to judge of
what she could know nothing about, and bade her come out and see for
herself how all things were working together for ill.

And although he spoke it in bitter jest, and she was very ill, she
said she would go, and went.

So once more they walked out together, and once more looked over the
cornfields; but when he stretched out his arm and pointed to the long
ridges of blades, and she saw them shrunken and faded in hue, her
heart was grieved within her, and she turned aside and wept over them.

Nevertheless, she said she durst not cease from hope, since an hour
might renew the face of the earth, if God so willed; neither should
she dare to complain, _even the harvest were to fail_. At which words
the Master of the Harvest stopped short, amazed, to look at his wife,
for her soul was growing stronger as her body grew weaker, and she
dared to say things now which she would have had no courage to utter
before.

But of all this he knew nothing, and what he thought, as he listened,
was that she was as weak in mind as in body; and what he said was that
a man must be an idiot who would not complain when he saw the bread
taken from under his very eyes!

And his murmurings and her tears sent a shudder all along the long
ridges of sickly corn blades, and they asked one of another, "Why does
he murmur? and, Why does she weep? Are we not doing all we can? Do we
slumber or sleep, and let opportunities pass by unused? Are we not
watching and waiting against the times of refreshing? Shall we not be
found ready at last? Why does he murmur? and, Why does she weep? Is
she, too, fading and waiting? Has she, too, a master who has lost
patience?"

Meantime, when she opened her Bible that night, she wrote on the
flyleaf the text, "Wherefore should a man complain, a man for the
punishment of his sins?" and after the text the date of the day, and
after the date the words, "Thou dost turn Thy face from us, and we are
troubled; but, Lord, how long, how long?"

And by and by came on the long-delayed times of refreshing, but so
slowly and imperfectly that the change in the corn could scarcely be
detected for a while. Nevertheless, it told at last, and stems
struggled up among the blades, and burst forth into flowers, which
gradually ripened into ears of grain. But a struggle it had been, and
continued to be, for the measure of moisture was scant, and the due
amount of warmth in