Well, it was on a Sabbath in June, as I began to tell you when the remembrance of “Sir Launfal” startled me from my story-telling proprieties; the windows of the little church were opened wide, and doubtless troops of invisible angels had entered in, to see how the congregation would commemorate His death—and probably the assembly had a faint idea of this, for solemn was the expression of every face, and reverent and humble every voice, that joined in the so beautiful and appropriate responses of the liturgy of “dear mother church!” In one of the slips nearest the door, a stranger had seated himself shortly after the opening of the service; though his voice joined with those of the congregation in the supplications and thanksgivings, he seemed at times to be lost in other thoughts than those which _should_ fill the minds of them who gather themselves together to worship Jehovah. He was a man of middle age, and his hair was slightly tinged with gray—exposure, or hardship, or sorrow had made him prematurely old—his form was slightly bent, and his face was brown, as though the burning sunlight of the East had rested long upon it. When the priest turned to the people at the conclusion of the service of the day, and said— “Ye who do truly and earnestly repent you of your sins, and are in love and charity with your neighbors, and intend to lead a new life, following the commandments of God, and walking from henceforth in his holy ways, draw near with faith, and take this holy Sacrament to your comfort; and make your humble confession to Almighty God, devoutly kneeling”; the stranger arose, but seemed as he did so, overcome with strong emotion; but in a moment more he had mastered it, and followed a portion of the congregation to the altar. And he knelt there beside Grace Lovering, and partook with her the consecrated elements; his hands trembled when they grasped the cup filled with the Saviour’s blood, but I do not think that was because of the emotion arising from the thought that he might be partaking unworthily, so much as from the fact that he was once more standing and kneeling in the village church, where since his boyhood he had not trod; it was because he was kneeling beside a woman who as a child had been his embodied dream of all perfection. He had sought her amid the many faces totally strange around him; and when his eyes had turned from one to another, and he knew that thus far they had sought in vain, when they had fallen on her face at last, he knew that it was she—the little girl—the woman middle-aged—whom he sought, and a thrill, and a thought of thanksgiving swept through his soul, as he looked on her still so lovely face. He felt that he had come _home_—he dared to hope that he should never be a wanderer again—and even in that sacred place his wild thoughts finished the romance which had been so long in its narration.