r audience," she answered, trying to
be bright. But she was not bright.

"I believe you came out to the country to day to seek for cheerfulness,"
he said after a pause. "Have you found it?"

"I do not know," she said. "It takes me some time to recover from
shocks; and Mr. Reffold's death was a sorrow to me. What do you think
about death? Have you any theories about life and death, and the bridge
between them? Could you say anything to help one?"

"Nothing," he answered. "Who could? And by what means?"

"Has there been no value in philosophy," she asked, "and the meditations
of learned men?"

"Philosophy!" he sneered. "What has it done for us? It has taught us
some processes of the mind's working; taught us a few wonderful things
which interest the few; but the centuries have come and gone, and the
only thing which the whole human race pants to know, remains unknown:
our beloved ones, shall we meet them, and how?--the great secret of the
universe. We ask for bread, and these philosophers give us a stone.
What help could come from them: or from any one? Death is simply one of
the hard facts of life."

"And the greatest evil," she said.

"We weave our romances about the next world," he continued; "and any
one who has a fresh romance to relate, or an old one dressed up in new
language, will be listened to, and welcomed. That helps some people for
a little while; and when the charm of the romance is over, then they
are ready for another, perhaps more fantastic than the last. But the
plot is always the same: our beloved ones--shall we meet them, and how?
Isn't it pitiful? Why cannot we be more impersonal? These puny, petty
minds of ours! When will they learn to expand?"

"Why should we learn to be more impersonal?" she said. "There was a time
when I felt like that; but now I have learnt something better: that we
need not be ashamed of being human; above all, of having the best of
human instincts, love, and the passionate wish for its continuance, and
the unceasing grief at its withdrawal. There is no indignity in this;
nor any trace of weakmindedness in our restless craving to know about
the Hereafter, and the possibilities of meeting again those whom we have
lost here. It is right, and natural, and lovely that it should be the
most important question. I know that many will say that there _are_
weightier questions: they say so, but do they think so? Do we want to
know first and foremost whether we shall do our work b