"Nothing particular," said Kingsley. He spoke with his customary lightness, but there was a dash of seriousness in his voice, not as though he was troubled by the reflections which were passing through his mind, but with a dim consciousness that something better than he was able to accomplish might have been evolved. "That seems to me to have been the method of it--nothing particular. Shall I try to explain myself?" "Please, dear. But kiss me first." "Even in this kiss, my own dear wife," said Kingsley, "which, in what it means to me, all the gold in the world could not purchase-- Ah, Nansie, dear, how truly I love you!" "And I you, Kingsley, with all the strength of my heart and soul." "That is the beauty of it, and it is that which makes it unpurchasable. It is my love for you, and yours for me; it is my faith in you and yours in me, springing out of my heart and soul as it springs out of yours, that makes me feel how inexpressibly dear you are to me, and to know that my spiritual life would not have been complete without you. But I am flying off at a tangent again." "You were speaking of the method of your education, my darling." "Yes, ending in nothing particular. God knows whether the fault is in it or me, but so it strikes me just now. I have a smattering of Greek and Latin, but nothing really tangible, I am afraid; nothing which would warrant me in calling myself a scholar. Say that I _were_ one, a scholar and a man, I do not see (because, perhaps, after all, the fault or the deficiency is in my nature) how I could make a fortune out of it. For you, Nansie." "I know, my dear," said Nansie, "that you are thinking of me." "I confess that, if I allowed it to take possession of me, I should be more than perplexed; I should be seriously troubled. But, to go on. I seem not to be able, except in words, to express myself or do myself justice. For instance, I look into the stream, and see a wave of stars. There is a poem there, and I feel it, but I could not write it. Pitiful to reflect, isn't it? because, in our circumstances, it might be sold for--twopence; but even that we might find useful." "A great deal more, dear, if you could write it." "If I could! There's the rub. Here, as I look around me, and at every step I have taken, I see pictures; but I could not paint them. Now, how is that?" "Perhaps, my dear," said Nansie, timidly, "it is because life has never been so serious to you as it is now with me by your side."