e
Trenby. Well, then, he must bear the consequences; for even at this
hour he could not make up his mind to blame his father more than
his father had blamed himself.

And as he lay watching the waving of the green trees, and inhaling
the scent of the lilies and violets from the garden below him, he
began to think of Shetland with a great longing. The bare, brown,
treeless land called him with a hundred voices, and thoughts of
Nanna came like a small bird winging the still, blue air. For sorrow
can endear a place as well as joy; and the little hut on the bare
moor, in which he could see Nanna working at her braiding or her
knitting, was the spot on all the earth that drew his soul with an
irresistible desire.

Oh, how he wanted to see Nanna! Oh, how he wanted to see her! Just to
hold her hand, and kiss her face, and sit by her side for an hour
or two! He did not wish either her conscience or his own less tender,
but he thought that now, perhaps, they might be cousins and friends,
and so comfort and help each other in the daily trials of their
hard, lonely lives.

One day, when he was much stronger, as he sat by the open window
thinking of these things, John Priestly came to read to him. John
had a faculty of choosing the sweetest and most comfortable
portions of the Book in his hand. This selection was not without
purpose. He had learned from David's delirious complainings the
intense piety of the youth, and the spiritual despair which had
intensified his sufferings. And he hoped God, through him, would
say a word of comfort to the sorrowful heart. So he chose, with
the sweet determination of love, the most glorious and the most
abounding words of the divine Father.

David listened with a reserved acceptance. It was in a measure a new
Scripture to him. It appeared partial. When John read, with a kind
of triumph, that the Lord "is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing
that _any_ should perish, but that _all_ should come to repentance,"
David made a slight movement of dissent; and John asked:

"Is not that a noble love? Thee believes in it, David?"

"No."

The word was softly but positively uttered.

"What then, David?"

"'Some men and angels are predestined unto everlasting life, and
others foreordained to everlasting death; and their number is so
certain and definite that it cannot be either increased or
diminished.'" And David quoted these words from the Confession of
Faith with such confidence and despai