He heard steps to the right in the sand; they came from his mother's garden and were coming to this one--steps of a grown-up person and two small child's steps to one of the other's. "I say, mother, what has the steamer got inside its stomach?" "Ha, ha!" Then there came a woman who gave one the impression of great power and strength. A powerful throat and full chest, exceptionally well made; a dark-looking face, rather large and with a hooked nose; the hair was almost black. She had on a cream-colored muslin dress spotted with bright-red flowers; it was made with a red silk yoke and a belt of the same stuff and colour. It was a striking contrast to her dark complexion, black hair, and clear eyes; she showed her appreciation of the warm spring day by her consummate brilliancy of colouring. But directly she saw the smiling Melancthon face in the window, she let down her red parasol between them. She led her little boy by the hand, a pretty little fellow about four years old, with fair hair and a face like the face of him standing in the window. The boy dropped his mother's hand, opened the gate between the two gardens, and ran past to open the next gate out to the road. As his wife passed by, the clergyman whispered: "I congratulate you! You are charming!" But there was a bitter sweetness in the tone. Ought a clergyman's wife to dress as she did? Without lowering her parasol, she walked on to the open gate and along the road down toward the town; the little boy hastened to shut the gate and ran after her. "Where are you going?--Down to see!" shouted the boy as he ran on. The back of her neck seen under her hat, her figure against the sunlight, her walk, the bright colours ... the clergyman stood in the window drumming on the sill and whistling noiselessly. His glistening eyes continued to follow her--till he got up, giving a powerful push to the sill with all five fingers. "----God does not punish, He is long-suffering, He wishes to save. But not as the leader of an army gives quarter, or a king grants an amnesty (perhaps they won't all understand 'amnesty;' should I say--oblivion?... No, that's not enough; 'merciful oblivion;' well then--); but not as the leader of an army gives quarter or a king grants merciful oblivion; not like that does God judge; no, that would be contrary to God's eternal holiness. Justification is certainly an act of mercy, but it is also an act of judgment. It needs a fundamental law, that is, the claims of the law, which is God's own, must be fulfilled." Now this was decidedly very juridical.