ing to assure the
immortality of the composition of which it forms a part. If we don't
believe that, if we are not content to have it so, how is it possible to
believe in any divine purpose, any scheme of justice at all? Look at the
indescribable waste of life on all sides of us. If only in the case of
humanity, people are dying by hundreds every minute, unheeded,
unlamented, unrecorded. Human life is such a little thing!--as little as
the life of the leaf or the raindrop. And yet in the death of these last
we are able to perceive the working of a vast system which must be the
outcome of a direct purpose, and whereby the best interest of each
species is furthered. And so, the human race. Why should it be less
than lesser things? One man dies in order that two may live. A
confederacy--as in the case of our own Rebellion--perishes in order that
a nation may endure. Everywhere, in short, the individual sacrifices his
individual existence in order that it may contribute to and fertilize
the growth of his species. So far as I am concerned, I am perfectly
content to have it so. I should ask nothing better, when my own time
comes, than the assurance that, in one way or another, my death had a
significance,--that it was for a person or a principle, and not merely a
natural phenomenon. I may not be able to believe that; but there is one
belief possible to all of us,--I mean that, if not in death, then
assuredly in life, we have been of service to our race and time. We are
often told that the indispensable thing does not exist. I think the same
may be said of the useless one. I don't believe even the humblest of
God's creatures goes out of life without having been at one time or
another an influence for good. I even have hopes of Diogenes. Some day
there will be a scrap of refuse or an ugly little bug which mars the
symmetry of the pool, and Diogenes will eat it,--and perhaps die of
indigestion as a martyr to principle!"

The silence which followed her words was broken by a hoarse sob from Mr.
Rathbawne, and, turning, they saw that his head had fallen back against
the chair, with his eyes, wide and staring, fixed upon the glass roof,
and his breath coming in short, thick gasps from between his parted
lips. In an instant Natalie was on her knees by his side, with her arms
about him.

"Don't be frightened," she said, looking up at Cavendish with a brave
little smile. "It's his heart. He has had these attacks frequently of
late. W