ong into the Chapel, and with difficulty obtained a seat
at the far end; a woman who had not been within the walls of a chapel
or church for long years--a grim woman, in iron grey. There she sate
unnoticed, in her remote corner; and before the preacher had done, her
face was hidden behind her clasped hands, and she was weeping such tears
as she had not wept since childhood.

On leaving church, Darrell said little more to the Colonel than this:
"Your nephew takes me by surprise. The Church wants such men. He will
have a grand career, if life be spared to him." Then he sank into a
reverie, from which he broke abruptly: "Your nephew was, at school with
my boy. Had my son lived, what had been his career?"

The Colonel, never encouraging painful subjects, made no rejoinder.

"Bring George to see me to-morrow. I shrunk from asking it before: I
thought the sight of him would too much revive old sorrows; but I feel I
should accustom myself to face every memory. Bring him."

The next day the Colonel took George to Darrell's; but George had been
pre-engaged till late at noon, and Darrell was just leaving home, and at
his street door, when the uncle and nephew came. They respected his time
too much to accept his offer to come in, but walked beside him for a few
minutes, as he bestowed upon George those compliments which are sweet to
the ears of rising men from the lips of those who have risen.

"I remember you, George, as a boy," said Darrell, "and thanked you then
for good advice to a schoolfellow, who is lost to your counsels now." He
faltered an instant, but went on firmly: "You had then a slight defect
in utterance, which, I understand from your uncle, increased as you
grew older; so that I never anticipated for you the fame that you are
achieving. Orator fit--you must have been admirably taught. In the
management of your voice, in the excellence of your delivery, I see
that you are one of the few who deem that the Divine Word should not
be unworthily uttered. The debater on beer bills may be excused from
studying the orator's effects; but all that enforce, dignify, adorn,
make the becoming studies of him who strives by eloquence to people
heaven; whose task it is to adjure the thoughtless, animate the languid,
soften the callous, humble the proud, alarm the guilty, comfort the
sorrowful, call back to the fold the lost. Is the culture to be slovenly
where the glebe is so fertile? The only field left in modern times for
the