"Let me go on, please. You are very generous, and you want to persuade me that I undervalue myself. You would convince me, if you could, that I am a great deal worthier than I think myself. I know better. You are very modest, and you would like to make me believe that you will never be a much more distinguished man than you are already, but again I know better. Probably you wouldn't become much more than you are, if you were to marry me, but that is because I should be a clog upon your life." "Will you let me say one word at this point, Barbara?" broke in Duncan, in spite of her effort to prevent. "You are wronging yourself and you are wronging me. As God lives I tell you there is no woman in the world so fit to be my wife as you are. My only wish is that I were worthy to have such a wife! I intend, of course, to achieve all that I can--to make the best use I can of such faculties as I possess, but nothing imaginable could so greatly help me to do that as the inspiration of your love, and the stimulus of knowing that you were to be always by my side, to share in all the good that might come to me, to cheer me in disappointment to help me endure, and above all, to strengthen me for my work in the world by your wise and loving counsel. For you are a very wise woman, Barbara, though you do not know it. You look things squarely in the face. You think soundly because you think with absolute and fearless sincerity. You are shy and timid, and self-distrustful. Thank God, you will never grow completely out of that, as so many women do. Your modesty will always remain a crown of glory to your character. But as you grow older, retaining your instinctive impulse to do well every duty that may lie before you, you will acquire enough of self-confidence to equip you for all emergencies. You are very young yet--even younger in feeling than in years. You will grow with every year into a more perfect womanhood." An occasional tear was by this time trickling down the girl's cheeks. How could it be otherwise when the man she loved and honored above all others was so tenderly saying such things of her, and to her, with a sincerity too greatly passionate to be open to any doubt? How could it be otherwise when she knew that she must put aside the love of this man, her hero--the only love, as she knew in her inmost soul, that she could ever think of with rejoicing so long as she should live? She would have interrupted the passionate pleading if her voice had been under control. As it was she sat silent, while he went on.