be bare unto me, as I did love, and to stand a
moment, and her eyes to twinkle gently. And I lookt at her with love and
honour in mine eyes, as you shall know, and she to have dancing of sweet
pleasure in her heart, that I so to look upon her with holiness and with
natural love, and surely the last doth be unnatural if that it do lack
the first; but my love did burn upward out of my being, so that the
flame of my spirit did light the fires of my heart, and my Reason to add
coals unto that fire that hath lived for ever, and doth be as that it
shall be never quenched.

And Mine Own in a moment did kneel beside me, and, truly, someways in
her deep intenseness unto me; for our love did make all the world holy,
and she to be both uplifted and as that she must give all the humbleness
of her heart unto the greatness of my love; and this she to feel, and
her deep and utter love, to make it as that she did be all a passion of
humbleness unto me, so that in her soul I did rise in that moment upon
the wings of my love, and to seem that I did be all the world and all
time and all place and all that ever she did need unto her.

And she put out her arms to me, and her eyes did shine with those tears
that do never be shed; and lo! in a moment, she did be upon my heart,
and we two to be husht together in content; for our need did be in the
other. And truly, where there do be two together with love, there doth
be neither lack nor need; but eternal fulfilment.

And in verity this to be my Hope for that which doth come
Afterward--that all doth be leading unto so glad a joy as this, and that
all pain and grief and all that doth make the shaping of Life, doth be
but a process by which we be eternally perfected from living unto
living, unto each Fulfilment that doth be but the doorway unto greater
Fulfilment in the Beloved.

And, presently, Mine Own Maid did loose herself gentle from me, and
washt me and tended me; and very husht and tender, and something
down-ridded of her dear and lovely eyes.

And we then to eat and to drink together, and joy so great and quiet did
be upon us, that it did be as that we had gone into an eternity of peace
and an utter content. And surely, as the thought did stir in me, it did
be of beauty that we did be both of us true unto the other, in that
life, and I never to have kist a maid, until that I kist Mine Own, and
she to have been likewise, and to have fended all men from her, because
that they did be S