how as you may be happy, and, if you treat my Angela
right, you'll be just the happiest and luckiest man in the three
kingdoms, including Ireland the Royal Family, and, if you treat her
wrong, worse will come to you; and her poor mother's last words, as I
heard with my own ears, will come true to you, and serve you right--
and there's all the milk upon the floor. And God bless you both, my
dears, is the prayer of an old woman."

And here the worthy soul broke down, and began to cry, nor were
Angela's eyes free from tears.

After this little episode, breakfast proceeded in something like the
usual way. Church was at 10.30, and, a while before the hour, Arthur
and Angela strolled down to the spot that had already become as holy
ground to them, and looked into each other's eyes, and said again the
same sweet words. Then they went on, and mingling with the little
congregation--that did not number more than thirty souls--they passed
into the cool quiet of the church.

"Lawks!" said a woman, as they went by, "ain't she just a beauty. What
a pretty wedding they'd make!"

Arthur overheard it, and noted the woman, and afterwards found a
pretext to give her five shillings, because he said it was a lucky
omen.

On the communion-table of the pretty little church there was spread
the "fair white cloth" of the rubric. It was the day for the monthly
celebration of the Sacrament, that met the religious requirements of
the village.

"Will you stay to the Sacrament with me?" whispered Angela to her
lover, in the interval between their seating themselves and the entry
of the clergyman, Mr. Fraser's _locum tenens_.

Arthur nodded assent.

And so, when the time came, those two went up together to the altar-
rails, and, kneeling side by side, ate of the bread and drank of the
cup, and, rising, departed thence with a new link between them. For,
be sure, part of the prayers which they offered up at that high moment
were in humble petition to the Almighty to set His solemn seal and
blessing on their love. Indeed, so far as Angela was concerned, there
were few acts of her simple life that she did not consecrate by
prayer, how much more, then, was she bent on bringing this, the
greatest of all her acts, before her Maker's throne.

Strange indeed, and full of a holy promise, is the yearning with which
we turn to Heaven to seek sanctification of our deeds, feeling our
weakness and craving strength from the source of strength; a yearning