is so full," she went on, "that I cannot
think the filmiest thought. I hardly know that I feel: I only know that I
want to weep."

"Weep, then, my word ineffable!" cried Malcolm, and laid himself again at
her feet, kissed them, and was silent.

He was but a fisher-poet--no courtier, no darling of society, no dealer in
fine speeches, no clerk of compliments. All the words he had were the
living blossoms of thought rooted in feeling. His pure clear heart was as
a crystal cup, through which shone the red wine of his love. To himself,
Malcolm stammered as a dumb man, the string of whose tongue has but just
been loosed: to Clementina his speech was as the song of the Lady to
Comus, "divine enchanting ravishment." The God of truth is surely present
at every such marriage-feast of two radiant spirits. Their joy was that
neither had foiled the hope of the other.

And so the herring-boat had indeed carried Clementina over into Paradise,
and this night of the world was to her a twilight of heaven. God alone can
tell what delights it is possible for Him to give to the pure in heart who
shall one day behold Him. Like two that had died and found each other,
they talked until speech rose into silence--they smiled until the dews
which the smiles had sublimed claimed their turn and descended in tears.

All at once they became aware that an eye was upon them. It was the sun.
He was ten degrees up the slope of the sky, and they had never seen him
rise. With the sun came a troublous thought, for with the sun came "a
world of men." Neither they nor the simple fisher-folk, their friends, had
thought of the thing, but now at length it occurred to Clementina that she
would rather not walk up to the door of Lossie House with Malcolm at this
hour of the morning. Yet neither could she well appear alone.

Ere she had spoken Malcolm rose. "You won't mind being left, my lady," he
said, "for a quarter of an hour or so, will you? I want to bring Lizzy to
walk home with you."

He went, and Clementina sat alone on the dune in a reposeful rapture, to
which the sleeplessness of the night gave a certain additional intensity
and richness and strangeness. She watched the great strides of her
fisherman as he walked along the sands, and she seemed not to be left
behind, but to go with him every step. The tide was again falling, and the
sea shone and sparkled and danced with life, and the wet sand gleamed, and
a soft air blew on her cheek, and the lordly