eal soul among the shifty creatures, is her husband; and have we not
the word of heaven directing her to submit herself to him who is her
husband before all others? That peerless Adiante had previously erred in
the upper sphere where she received her condemnation, but such a sphere
is ladder and ladder and silver ladder high above your hair-splitting
pates, you children of earth, and it is not for you to act on the
verdict in decrying her: rather 'tis for you to raise hymns of worship
to a saint.

Thus did the ingenious Patrick change his ground and gain his argument
with the celerity of one who wins a game by playing it without an
adversary. Mr. Adister had sprung a new sense in him on the subject of
the renunciation of the religion. No thought of a possible apostasy had
ever occurred to the youth, and as he was aware that the difference
of their faith had been the main cause of the division of Adiante and
Philip, he could at least consent to think well of her down here, that
is, on our flat surface of earth. Up there, among the immortals, he was
compelled to shake his head at her still, and more than sadly in certain
moods of exaltation, reprovingly; though she interested him beyond all
her sisterhood above, it had to be confessed.

They traversed a banqueting-hall hung with portraits, to two or three
of which the master of Earlsfont carelessly pointed, for his guest to
be interested in them or not as he might please. A reception-hall flung
folding-doors on a grand drawing-room, where the fires in the grates
went through the ceremony of warming nobody, and made a show of keeping
the house alive. A modern steel cuirass, helmet and plume at a corner of
the armoury reminded Mr. Adister to say that he had worn the uniform in
his day. He cast an odd look at the old shell containing him when he was
a brilliant youth. Patrick was marched on to Colonel Arthur's rooms,
and to Captain David's, the sailor. Their father talked of his two sons.
They appeared to satisfy him. If that was the case, they could hardly
have thrown off their religion. Already Patrick had a dread of naming
the daughter. An idea struck him that she might be the person who had
been guilty of it over there on the Continent. What if she had done it,
upon a review of her treatment of her lover, and gone into a convent to
wait for Philip to come and claim her?--saying, 'Philip, I've put the
knife to my father's love of me; love me double'; and so she just half