"Please God, and as far as in me lies, you shall never have cause to repent it.... We are here, our two selves, with none to witness this that we do but God.... We are doing what we believe to be right for our own great happiness and well-being.... It would suffice, I believe, for a Scots wedding, simply to declare ourselves man and wife. But I have thought it would please us both to do something more. We are not entering upon this new estate lightly or without due thought.... It will, I know, be to both our minds and comforting to both our hearts, to think that in our loneliness here we have done all we could to supply the deficiencies for which we are not to blame." He spoke with very great emotion. She rejoiced in this fresh evidence of the heights and depths of his nature and his essential goodness of heart, though indeed she had not needed it. Her great dark eyes, fixed on his, were abrim with happy tears. "So," he continued, "We will read together the Form for the Solemnization of Matrimony in this Prayer-book, and then we will inscribe on the front leaf of it the fact that this day we have become man and wife. We will sign our names to it, and we can do no more to comply with man's law.... Is that your will, my dear?" "Yes." "Then here we will kneel and wed," and down they knelt in the sand, with a clear sky and bright sun above, and the blue sea that held them captive dancing and laughing in front; and holding the book between them he read the Service aloud in a deep and reverent voice. Parts of it were of course somewhat incongruous to their situation, but he would not slur or miss a word. The statement that they were gathered together in the face of this congregation almost provoked her to an explosion. For out of the corner of her eye, as she followed his reading, a slight movement on the side of an adjacent sandhill showed her a rabbit, sitting up and watching them with critical attention, and it looked to her just like the frowsy old female in black she had seen hovering about the skirts of a wedding in a London church. And there were parts that brought the colour to her face, though she was familiar with them. Applied to oneself they seemed to hold new point and meaning. However, he read bravely on. No one interfered to show any just cause why they should not lawfully be joined together, nor had either of them any confession of impediment to make. At the "Wilt thou----?" he answered heartily, "I will." And waited for her to do the same when her turn came. When it came to--"Who giveth this woman to be married to this man?"--he answered boldly,--"God." Then they took hands and plighted their troth, reciting the words in the book. But when it came to the putting on of the ring there came an interlude not provided for in the Marriage Service. He had duly provided a plain gold wedding ring. "Where did you get it?" she asked with a look of surprise. "I found it among Macro's treasures."