nd them lay a delicate tracery of shadows, whilst they
themselves were seated in the eye of the moonlight, and remained for a
while as silent and as still as though they had been the shades of the
painted figures that had once filled the stony frame above them.

"Angela," he said at length--"Angela, listen, and I will tell you
something. My mother, a woman to whom sorrow had become almost an
inspiration, when she was dying, spoke to me something thus: 'There
is,' she said, 'but one thing that I know of that has the power to
make life happy as God meant it to be, and as the folly and weakness
of men and women render it nearly impossible for it to be, and that is
--love. Love has been the consolation of my own existence in the midst
of many troubles; first, the great devotion I bore your father, and
then that which I entertain for yourself. Without these two ties, life
would indeed have been a desert. And yet, though it is a grief to me
to leave you, and though I shrink from the dark passage that lies
before me, so far does that first great love outweigh the love I bear
you, that in my calmer moments I am glad to go, because I know I am
awaited by your father. And from this I wish you to learn a lesson:
look for your happiness in life from the love of your life, for there
only will you find it. Do not fritter away your heart, but seek out
some woman, some one good and pure and true, and in giving her your
devotion, you will reap a full reward, for her happiness will reflect
your own, and, if your choice is right, you will, however stormy your
life may be, lay up for yourself, as I feel that I have done, an
everlasting joy.'"

She listened to him in silence.

"Angela," he went on, boldly enough, now that the ice was broken, "I
have often thought about what my mother said, but until now I have
never _quite_ understood her meaning. I do understand it now. Angela,
do _you_ understand me?"

There was no answer; she sat there upon the fallen masonry, gazing at
the ruins round her, motionless and white as a marble goddess,
forgotten in her desecrated fane.

"Oh, Angela, listen to me--listen to me! I have found the woman of
whom my mother spoke, who must be so 'good and pure and true.' You are
she. I love you, Angela, I love you with my whole life and soul; I
love you for this world and the next. Oh! do not reject me; though I
am so little worthy of you, I will try to grow so. Dearest, can you
love me?"

Still there was s