“Nay, beloved,” Miriam replied, very quietly, “except as every true marriage brings us back to Eden.” Then he began gradually to return to full, quiet consciousness, and rising on the couch, he said— “My Rachel! And all the dowry, all the treasure I had saved for thee is gone.” Then burying his face in his hands, the old man wept, quiet, natural tears. But his daughter knelt beside him, and gently drawing down his hands, laid her babe in his arms. “Father,” she said, “see, the God of our fathers has given us the gift and inheritance that cometh of the Lord.” And her husband, standing behind her, laid his hand on her head and said— “See, here is thy hid treasure. Truly thou hast given the best jewel in the world to me.” “What to us were gold and silver?” Rachel pleaded. “God has given us the babes, and also the old riches of our race, the riches of Abraham our father. We are rich in flocks and herds. Wilt thou not come and see?” And the old man laid his trembling hands on her head, and said— “The Lord hath taken away, and the Lord hath given; blessed be the name of the Lord.” [Illustration] [Illustration] CHAPTER XXIX. ENDINGS AND BEGINNINGS. History is a great perpetrator of anachronisms. She is “débordante, frénétique, Inconvenante; ici le nain, là le géant, Tout à la fois.” But “Il faut bien tolérer quelques excès de verve Chez un si grand poète.”[8] All ages in one; all types tossed together _pêle-mêle_; repetitions, contradictions, violent contrasts, inexplicable inconsistencies no novelist would have dared to invent.