ave got
to live on? In good years it comes to about 150 pounds, but once, when
my father got into that lawsuit over the dog that was supposed to kill
the sheep, it went down to 70 pounds. That was the winter when two
of the little ones died for want of proper food--nothing else--and I
remember that the rest of us had to walk barefoot in the mud and snow
because there was no money to buy us boots, and only some of us could
go out at once because we had no cloaks to put on. Well, all this may
happen again. And so, Anthony, do you think that I should be right to
throw away thirty pounds a year and to make a quarrel with my aunt, who
is rich and kind-hearted although very over-bearing, and the only friend
we have? If my father died, Anthony, or even was taken ill, and he is
not very strong, what would become of us? Unless Aunt Thompson chose to
help we should all have to go to the workhouse, for girls who have not
been specially trained can earn nothing, except perhaps as domestic
servants, if they are strong enough. I don't want to go away and read
to Aunt Maria and take the pug dog out walking, although it is true I
should like to see Italy, but I must--can't you understand--I must.
So please reproach me no more, for it is hard to bear--especially from
you."

"Stop! For God's sake, stop!" said Anthony. "I am a brute to have spoken
like that, and I'm helpless; that's the worst of it. Oh! my darling,
don't you understand? Don't you understand----?"

"No," answered Barbara, shaking her head and beginning to cry.

"That I love you, that I have always loved you, and that I always shall
love you until--until--the moon ceases to shine?" and he pointed to that
orb which had appeared above the sea.

"They say that it is dead already, and no doubt will come to an end like
everything else," remarked Barbara, seeking to gain time.

Then for a while she sought nothing more, who found herself lost in her
lover's arms.

So there they plighted their troth, that was, they swore, more enduring
than the moon, for indeed they so believed.

"Nothing shall part us except death," he said.

"Why should death part us?" she answered, looking him bravely in the
eyes. "I mean to live beyond death, and while I live and wherever I live
death shall _not_ part us, if you'll be true to me."

"I'll not fail in that," he answered.

And so their souls melted into rapture and were lifted up beyond the
world. The song of the nightingales w