He had tried not to think much of Magdalen, and during the novelty and excitement of travelling he had not felt the bitter pain tugging at his heart as it was tugging now, causing him to cry out, in his anguish: “Oh, Magda, my darling! how can I live without you?” He had his father’s letter with him, and he read it again there in the dim light, and was struck, as he had never before been, with that clause which said: “And if, in the course of your life, there is one thing more than another which you desire, I pray Heaven to grant it to you!” He had read these lines many times, but they never impressed him so forcibly as now. It was his father’s last invocation to Heaven in his behalf. The one thing more than another which he desired was Magdalen, and why had God withheld her from him? Why had He not heard and answered the father’s prayer? Why had He dealt so harshly by the son, taking from him everything which had hitherto made life desirable? These were hard questions for a creature to ask its Creator. And Roger felt hard and rebellious as he asked them, with his face among the cones and withered pines, and from the pitiless skies above him there came no answer back, for it is not thus that God will have His children question Him. Roger could not be submissive then, and for hours he sat there alone, battling with his sorrow, and never trying to pray until at the very last, when with a cry such as a wayward child gives when the will is finally broken, he covered his face with his hands and prayed earnestly to be forgiven for all the wicked, rebellious feelings he had cherished, and for strength to bear whatever the future had in store for him. After that he never gave way again as he had done before, though he went often to that rock under the pine, and made it a kind of Bethel where, unseen by mortal eye, he could tell his troubles to God, and go away with the burden somewhat lightened.