"You bid me take back my love, sweetheart," he said. "I can no more so do than cause yon sun to cease shining at your bidding! An no earthly marriage may be ours, yet no power can sever the sweet union of our souls, which, perchance, being more wholly given to God's service here on earth, shall so be only the more closely joined together in Him to all eternity. There is in heaven no 'marrying nor giving in marriage,' yet I trow, the promise that we shall be 'as the angels' hath in it the hid secret of a deeper love and bliss than our earth-bound hearts can yet imagine. Can we, dear heart, but wear our cross bravely here, our future crown will be but the brighter, and our love shine with greater radiance. Yet--oh, my sweet wife--whom now in a few short days I hoped to call mine own--my spirit fails me in this dark hour of suffering! How can we bear our severed lives through the weary years that lie before us? Is there yet for us no hope, nowhere for us in this bright world one gleam of light in our darkness? Nay, Primrose, I cannot take your bitter words for truth. In three days will be our looked-for wedding-day! I cannot let you go! I will defy these horrid shades of evil, and you shall be mine here as well as in eternity! No ill shall have power to touch the loved wife who is to be the light of my home, the God-given treasure to lead me ever nearer Him!" "Then let me lead you now, dear heart!" cried Primrose, through her bitter tears. "It is even now this higher path of duty that we are called to tread--a painful, stony path, which leads away from all the fair hopes so soon to have been realised--from that dear home for which we have together looked and longed, and which is so nearly ours--and yet a path we must tread, Percival, even if with bleeding feet and breaking hearts! It is a bitter struggle to keep my vow, Percival, and sorely am I tempted to believe this new grief of ours to be but an idle dream, from which I shall presently awake to find all sunlight as before; but in the very depths of my heart I know my vow to be right in the sight of God. Tempt me no more, beloved! Here, where the vision of the fair immortal maiden first touched the secret springs of your heart, must you vow, as she of old, to forsake all mortal longing, and retain only in your heart that love which is eternal, in whose unalterable light we may yet walk this weary earth with footsteps lightened by a tender, loving friendship, which none may sever, and which shall bind us even in this present world in an unseen bond, which is but the shadow of that which shall be hereafter."