s
kisses.

Ah! happy youth and maiden, thus bedewed with life's nectar of
blessedness! What are earth's sorrows to you? Heaven is in you, and
eternity only can satisfy the infinite desires of such hearts.

But as the days passed, the material body of the mother wasted away,
and her spirit was growing bright in its coming glory. She wished
much to see her beloved Anna in a holy marriage union before she
left this world. So a few weeks after the betrothal, Gotleib led his
bride to the marriage altar. It was a festive scene of the heart's
happiness even beside the bed of death. Madame Hendrickson felt that
she, too, was adorning for a beautiful bridal--and earthly care
being thus removed from her heart, she was altogether happy.

And the good, true-hearted Anna, in white bridal garments and virgin
innocence, looked to the loving mother and happy Gotleib like an
angel of God. Even the Professor Eberhard thought thus, and quite
certain it is, that the good minister spoke as if a heavenly
inspiration flowed into him, as he bound the two into an eternal
_oneness_ of being. "Little children!" said he, "love one another!
was the teaching of the great God, as he walked upon the earth.
Hence love is the holy of the holies. And it flows from God even as
heat flows from the material sun--and as the sun is in its own heat
and light, so God is in love."

And taking the marriage ring, he placed it on the soft, white,
rose-tipped finger of the bride, and said,

"How beautiful and expressive is this symbol of union, showing the
conjunction of good and truth, which conjunction first exists in the
Lord, for His love is the inmost, and His wisdom is like the golden
bond of truth encasing and protecting love. And this love of the
Lord flowing into man is received, protected, and guarded by woman's
truth, until, in her fitness and perfect adaptation to him, she
becomes the love of the wisdom of the man's love, and the twain are
no longer two, but one."

The fresh spring days were now coming--Madame Hendrickson went to an
eternal spring. But the heart of the loving Anna rose above the
earthly sorrow of separation, as if upheld by her husband's strong
faith; her imagination delighted itself in following the beloved
mother into her new and beautiful state of being.

Gotleib felt that now it was good for him to return to the home of
his childhood, for it was more delightful to live apart from the
strife and toil of men. In the simple co