eyes, and she consecrated her heart to him.

During the years which followed his return from college, till he was
prepared for ordination, as a priest, he did not once _speak_ to her
of his love, which was growing all the while stronger and deeper, as
the river course that, flowing to the ocean, receives every day
fresh impetus and force from the many tiny springs that commingle
with it. Duncan Melville never _thought_ of wedding another than
Rosalie Sherwood.

It was, as I said, near the time appointed for his ordination, when
he felt, for the first time, as though he had a _right_ to speak
openly with her of all his hopes. He asked her, then, what, in soul
language, he had long before asked, a question which she had as
emphatically, in like language, answered--to be his partner for
life, in weal or woe.

He had tried to calmly consider Rosalie's character as a Christian
minister should consider the character of her whom he would make the
sharer of his peculiar lot; and setting every preference aside,
Duncan felt that she was fitted to assist, and to bear with him. She
was truthful as the day, strong-minded and generous; humane and
charitable: and though no professor of religion, a woman full of
reverence and veneration.

He knew that it was only a fear that she should not _adorn_ the
Christian name, that kept her back from the altar of the church, and
he loved her for that spirit of humility, knowing that she was "on
the Lord's side," and that grace, ere long, would be given to her,
to proclaim it in doing _all_ His commandments.

It was certainly with a joyful and confident heart that, after he
had spoken with Rosalie, Duncan sought his mother, to tell her of
the whole of that bright future which opened now before him.

How then was he overcome with amazement and grief when Mrs. Melville
told him it was a union to which she could never consent! Then, for
the first time in his life, the astonished young man heard of that
stain which was on the name poor Rosalie bore.

He heard the story to the end, and, with a decision and energy that
would have settled the matter with almost any other than his mother,
he declared,

"Yet for all that, I will not give her up."

"It would not be expected that you would fulfil the engagement.
Rosalie herself would not allow it, if she knew the truth of the
matter."

"But she need not know it. There is no existing necessity. Is it not
enough that she is good and precious _t