ad been poured
into his quiet work of training boys for a clean and thoughtful
manhood--a medical missionary who had given up a brilliant career in
science to take the charge of a hospital in darkest Africa--a beautiful
woman with silver hair who had resigned her dreams of love and marriage
to care for an invalid father, and after his death had made her life a
long, steady search for ways of doing kindnesses to others--a poet who
had walked among the crowded tenements of the great city, bringing
cheer and comfort not only by his songs, but by his wise and patient
works of practical aid--a paralyzed woman who had lain for thirty years
upon her bed, helpless but not hopeless, succeeding by a miracle of
courage in her single aim, never to complain, but always to impart a
bit of joy and peace to every one who came near her. All these, and
other persons like them, people of little consideration in the world,
but now seemingly all full of great contentment and an inward gladness
that made their steps light, were in the company that passed along the
road, talking together of things past and things to come, and singing
now and then with clear voices from which the veil of age and sorrow
was lifted.

John Weightman joined in some of the songs--which were familiar to him
from their use in the church--at first with a touch of hesitation, and
then more confidently. For as they went on his sense of strangeness
and fear at his new experience diminished, and his thoughts began to
take on their habitual assurance and complacency. Were not these
people going to the Celestial City? And was not he in his right place
among them? He had always looked forward to this journey. If they
were sure, each one, of finding a mansion there, could not he be far
more sure? His life had been more fruitful than theirs. He had been a
leader, a founder of new enterprises, a pillar of Church and State, a
prince of the House of Israel. Ten talents had been given him, and he
had made them twenty. His reward would be proportionate. He was glad
that his companions were going to find fit dwellings prepared for them;
but he thought also with a certain pleasure of the surprise that some
of them would feel when they saw his appointed mansion.

So they came to the summit of the moorland and looked over into the
world beyond. It was a vast, green plain, softly rounded like a
shallow vase, and circled with hills of amethyst. A broad, shining
river flowe