"I have spoken of my ambitions first, and of your capacity to help them, not because such things are first in my estimation, but because you have treated them as worthy of being put first. There are much higher things to be thought of. What a man _achieves_ is of far less consequence than what a man _is_. That which I ask of you is to help me _be_ the best that I am capable of being, and for you to _be_ it with me. I want to make the most, the best, the happiest life for you that is possible. If I am permitted to do that, with you to help me do it, it will be an achievement of far greater benefit to the world than any possible external success can be. The home is immeasurably more important, as a factor in human life, and in national life, than the mart, or the senate, or the pulpit, or any other influence can be. It is in happy homes that the saving virtues of humanity are born and nourished. From such homes, more than from all the pulpits, and all the institutions of learning, there flows an influence for good that sweetens all life, preserves morality, and keeps us human beings fit to live. Oh, Barbara, you will never know how longingly I dream of such a home with you at its head! You cannot know how absolutely the worthiness of my life depends upon such a linking of it with yours." The girl had completely given way to her emotions now, but with that resolute self-mastery which was a dominant note in her nature, she presently controlled herself. The picture that his words had created in her imagination was alluring in the extreme. But she was strong enough to put the dream of happiness aside. "You do not know all," she said. "You have not heard all I have to tell you. You haven't heard the most important part of it. I have only told you what I thought on that evening when--when you asked--questions. I still think that ought to settle the matter, but you seem to think--perhaps you might have convinced me, or at least--oh, you don't know! There are other reasons--stronger reasons, reasons that nothing can remove." "Tell me of them. I can imagine no reason whatever that could satisfy me."