"It is a name dear to every Armenian heart, the name of the hero saint of our race. And yet, Saint Vartan died in a lost battle. He fought against the Persians, who summoned the Armenians to submit to them, and to exchange the law of the Christ for the creed of the fire-worshipper. The Persians were strong and many, the Armenians were few and weak; but this was their answer, and Vartan's: 'We are not better than those before us, who laid down upon this testimony their goods and their bodies. Ask us no more, for the covenant of our faith is not with men, but in bonds indissoluble with God, for whom there is no separation or departure, neither now, nor ever, nor for ever--nor for ever and ever.' That is what we said fifteen hundred years ago, that is what we say to-day, when the darkest hour of the darkest night is falling over our land." A pause followed, broken by Stepanian. "He died in a lost battle. The battle is lost, but the cause triumphs." Jack had covered his face with his hands; but at these words he looked up again. "Then you see, beyond the darkness, a gleam of light?" he said. "Mr. Grayson, I will tell you a parable. Last spring my little son Armenag came with me one day to the vineyard. I showed him two vines. One of them was beautiful, covered with luxuriant leaves and tendrils; the other, a dry, bare stick, with branch and leaf and tendril cut away by a ruthless hand. 'Which of these two will you have for your own, to bear grapes for you by-and-by?' I asked the boy. Of course he chose the beautiful, leafy vine. But the other day, in the ingathering, I brought him there again. Lo! the vine that kept its leaves and branches had only a few poor stunted grapes, while the tree that had been stripped and cut down, was bending beneath the weight of its great clusters of glorious fruit." "And?" said Jack, his eyes eagerly fixed upon the Pastor, who went on-- "I see some clusters ripening even now. Is it nothing, think you, that men and women, and children even, have been witnessing fearlessly unto death for the Lord they love? In very truth, like the witnesses of old, they have been tortured, not accepting deliverance. Many have already joined the noble army of martyrs. And many more are coming--ay, even from this place. Never of late have I stood up to preach, and looked down on the faces beneath me, without the thought that these, my people, may soon be standing in the presence of Christ. And I too--I shall see Him soon." "Are you a prophet?" John Grayson asked, looking with amazement at the calm, refined, intellectual face of this gentleman of the nineteenth century, who spoke of his own martyrdom as certainly, as quietly, and as fearlessly, as if he had said, "I am going to France, or to England."