had fallen on Maurice, still sitting motionless with his
hands before his eyes--Maurice her husband; yes, there he sat, the man
whom her own willfulness had dragged to the brink of ruin, whose faith
and honor she had tempted, whose honest purpose she had shaken and
destroyed, who was so crushed with remorse for his own weakness that
he dared not look her in the face; and as she gazed at him, Nea's
whole heart yearned with generous pity over the man who had brought
her to poverty, but whom she loved and would love to her life's end.

And Maurice, sitting crushed with that awful remorse, felt his hands
drawn down from his face, and saw Nea's beautiful face smiling at him
through her tears, felt the smooth brown head nestle to his breast,
and heard the low sobbing words--

"For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, till death us do part,
have I not promised, Maurice? Take me to your heart and comfort me
with your love, for in all the world I have no one but you--no one but
you!"

CHAPTER X.

IN DEEP WATERS.

Let our unceasing, earnest prayer
Be, too, for light, for strength to bear
Our portion of the weight of care
That crushes into dumb despair
One half the human race.

O suffering, sad humanity!
O ye afflicted ones, who lie
Steep'd to the lips in misery,
Longing, and yet afraid to die,
Patient though sorely tried!
I pledge you in this cup of grief,
Where floats the fennel's bitter leaf!
The battle of our life is brief,
The alarm, the struggle, the relief;
Then sleep we side by side.

LONGFELLOW.

Nea had to learn by bitter experience that the fruits of disobedience
and deceit are like the apples of Sodom, fair to the sight, but mere
ashes to the taste, and in her better mood she owned that her
punishment was just.

Slowly and laboriously, with infinite care and pains, she set herself
to unlearn the lessons of her life. For wealth she had poverty; for
ease and luxury, privation and toil; but in all her troubles her
strong will and pride sustained her; and though she suffered, and
Heaven only knew how she suffered! she never complained or murmured
until the end came.

For her pride sustained her; and when that failed, her love came to
her aid.

How she loved him, how she clung to him in those days, no one but
Maurice knew; in her bitterest hours his words had power to comfort
her and take the sting from