but I was grievously wrong."

The father humbled himself before the son, but in his humiliation became
majestic, and in after years, when he was dead and gone, there was no
scene in the long intercourse with him which lived with a brighter and
fairer light in the son's memory.

"You know nothing then against Susan?"

"Nothing!"

"I found a bit of a letter on your desk from Cadman. I could not help
reading it. Had that anything to do with her?"

"Nothing!"

"Father, you seem faint and you tremble; hadn't you better go in doors
and take something, and lie down? We cannot get home till to-morrow."

The father went to the inn with difficulty; he had tasted no food for
many hours, and had not slept for some time, but he could neither eat nor
sleep. Hitherto God's will had appeared to him ascertainable with
comparative ease, and he had been as certain of the Divine direction as
if he had seen a finger-post or heard the word in his ear. But now he
was dazed and, in doubt. He was convinced that his rescue by Susan was
an interposition of Providence, and if so, then all his former
conclusions were wrong. What was he to do? How was he henceforth to
know the mind of his Master? Oh, how he wished he had lived in the days
when the oracle was not darkened--in the days of Moses, when God spake
from the Mount, when there was the continual burnt-offering at the door
of the tabernacle, "where I will meet you, to speak there unto thee."
God really did intend that Robert should marry Susan! "If righteousness
and judgment," he cried, inverting the Psalm, "are the habitation of His
throne, clouds and darkness are round about Him." But he submitted.
"Thou art wiser than I," he prayed. It was mere presumption then to have
risked the loss of his soul in the blind belief that it was for God's
cause. The sin had been committed, the lie had been uttered; would God
pardon him? and it was mercifully whispered to him that he was forgiven
for His sake. So was he saved from uttermost despair.

In the evening he said he would go out and breathe a little fresh air
before bedtime. It was a perfectly unsullied night, with no moon, but
with brilliant stars. Father and son sat upon a bench facing the sea,
and the lighthouse from the rock sent its bright beam across the water.
There is consolation and hope in those vivid rays. They speak of
something superior to the darkness or storm--something which has been
raised by human intelli