Diana was glad to have the conversation broken up. When the hour for the drive came, and she sank into the luxurious, satiny depths of the landau, her thoughts involuntarily recurred to it. The carriage was so very comfortable! It rolled smoothly along, over good roads, drawn by well-trotting horses; the motion was delightful. Diana's thoughts rolled on too. Suddenly Mr. Brandt leaned over towards her. "Is this carriage a 'worldly' indulgence, Mrs. Masters?" Diana started. "I don't know," she said. "Ah," said the other, laughing at her startled face,--"I am glad to see that even you may have a doubt on that subject. You cannot blame less etherealized persons, like my wife and me, if we go on contentedly, with no doubts." "But you mistake me,"--said Diana. "You said, you did not know." "Because I don't know you." "What has that to do with it?" "If I knew you well, Mr. Brandt, I should know whether this carriage is the Lord's or not." The expression of the gentleman's face upon this was hardly agreeable; he sat back in his seat and looked at the prospect; and so Diana tried to do, but for a time the landscape to her was indistinguishable. Her thoughts went back to the mills and the mill people; pale, apathetic, reserved, sometimes stern, they had struck her painfully as a set of people who did not own kindred with other classes of their fellow-creatures; apart, alone, without instruction, without sympathy; not enjoying this life, nor on the way to enjoy the next. The marks of poverty were on them too, abundantly. Diana's mind was too full of these people to allow her leisure for the beauties of nature; or if she felt these, to let her feel them without a great sense of contrast. Then she did not know whether she had spoken wisely. Alone in her room at night with Basil she began to talk about it. She wished that he would begin; but he did not, so she must. "Basil,--did I say too much to Mr. Brandt to-day?" "I guess not." Diana knew by the tone of these words that her husband was on this subject contented. "What do you think of the mill people?" "I am very curious to find out what impression they make on you." "Basil," said Diana, her voice trembling, "they break my heart!" "What's to be done in that case?" "I don't know. Nothing follows upon that. But how do you feel?" "Very much as if I would like to prove the realizing of that old prophecy--'To whom he was not spoken of, they shall see; and they that have not heard shall understand.'" "That is just how I feel, Basil. But they do not go to church, people say; how could you get at them?" "We could look them up at their own homes; we could arrange meetings for them that they would like; we could work ourselves into their affections, by degrees, and _then_ the door would be open for us to bring Christ in. We could give them help too, where help is needed." "_We_, Basil?" "Don't you feel as I do? You said so," he answered with a grave smile.