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The Hallam Succession

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Šrift:Väiksem АаSuurem Aa

"Ay, for sure! I'll nobbut get my shawl, Miss Hallam. I was turning thee over i' my mind when, I saw thee coming. Is there aught wrong?"

"Why do you ask, Martha?"

"Nay, I'm sure I can't tell; only I can see fine that thou ar'n't same as thou was yesterday."

They were just entering the park, and Elizabeth stood musing while Martha closed the gates. Then, after walking a few yards, she said, "Martha, do you believe the dead can speak to the living?"

"Ay, I do. If t' living will hear, t' dead will speak. There's good men—and John Wesley among 'em—who lived w' one foot i' this world, and one in t' other. I would think man or woman hed varry little o' t' next world about 'em, who hed nivver seen or heard any thing from it. Them that hev sat weeping on their bedside at midnight—them that hev prayed death away from t' cradle side—them that hev wrestled a' night long, as Jacob did, they know whether t' next world visits this world or not. Hev you seen aught, Miss Hallam?"

"I have seen my father, Martha. Indeed I have."

"I don't doubt it, not a minute. He'd hev a reason for coming."

"He came to remind me of a duty and to strengthen me for it. Ah, Martha, Martha! If this cup could pass from me! if this cup could pass from me!"

"Honey, dear, what can Martha do for thee? Ivery Christian some time or other comes to Gethsemane. I hev found that out. Let this cup pass, Lord. Didn't I pray that prayer mysen, night and day?"

"Surely, Martha, about Ben—and God let it pass. But he does not always let it pass when we ask him."

"Then he does what is happen better—if we hev t' heart to trust him—he sends an angel to strengthen us to drink it. I hev seen them as drank it wi' thanksgiving."

"O Martha! I am very, very sorrowful about it."

"And varry often, dearie, it is God's will for us to go forward—thou knows what I mean—to make a Calvary of our breaking hearts, and offer there t' sacrifice that is dearest and hardest. Can ta tell me what ta fears, dearie?"

"Just what you say, Martha, that I must pass from Gethsemane to Calvary, and sacrifice there what is my dearest, sweetest hope; and I shall have to bear it alone."

"Nay, thou wont. It isn't fair o' thee to say that; for thou knows better. My word, Miss Hallam, there's love above and below, and strength all round about. If thee and me didn't believe that, O what a thing it would be!"

"Martha, I may need help, the help of man and the help of woman. Can I trust to Ben and you?"

"I can speak for both of us. We'll wear our last breath i' your service. Neither Ben nor I are made o' stuff that'll shrink in t' wetting. You can count on that, Miss Hallam."

The next evening, just after dusk, Elizabeth was standing at the dining-room window. The butler had just arranged the silver upon the sideboard, and was taking some last orders from his mistress. He was an old man with many infirmities, both of body and temper, but he had served Hallam for fifty years, and was permitted many privileges. One of these was plain speech; and after a moment's consideration upon the directions given him, he said:

"There's summat troubling them as are dead and gone, Miss Hallam. If I was thee, I'd hev Mr. Antony come and do his duty by t' land. They don't like a woman i' their shoes."

"What are you talking about, Jasper?"

"I know right well what I'm talking about, Miss Hallam. What does t' Bible say? T' old men shall see visions—" He had advanced toward the window to draw the blinds, but Elizabeth, with a face pale as ashes, turned quickly to him and said:

"Leave the blinds alone, Jasper."

She stood between him and the window, and he was amazed at the change in her face. "She's like 'em a'," he muttered, angrily, as he went to his own sitting-room. "You may put a bridle in t' wind's mouth as easy as you'll guide a woman. If I hed been t' young squire, I'd hev brokken t' will a' to bits, that I would. 'Leave t' blinds alone, Jasper!' Highty-tighty, she is. But I've saved a bit o' brass, and I'll none stand it, not I!"

So little do we know of the motives of the soul at our side! Elizabeth was very far, indeed, from either pride or anger. But she had seen in the dim garden, peering out from the shrubbery, a white face that filled her with a sick fear. Then she had but one thought, to get Jasper out of the room, and was quite unconscious of having spoken with unusual anger or authority.

When he had gone she softly turned the key in the door, put out the candles, and went to the window. In a few minutes Antony stood facing her, and by a motion, asked to be admitted.

"I don't want any one to know I have been here," he said, as he stood trembling before the fire. "It is raining, I am wet through, shivering, hungry. Elizabeth, why don't you speak?"

"Why are you here—in this way?"

She could hardly get the words out. Her tongue was heavy, her speech as difficult as if she had been in some terror-haunted dream.

"Because I am going away—far away—forever. I wanted to see you first."

"Antony! My brother! Antony, what have you done!"

"Hush, hush. Get me some food and dry clothes."

"Go to my room. You are safer there."

He slipped up the familiar stair, and Elizabeth soon followed him. "Here is wine and sweet-bread. I cannot get into the pantry or call for food without arousing remark. Antony, what is the matter?"

"I am ruined. Eltham and those Darraghs together have done it."

"Thank God! I feared something worse."

"There is worse. I have forged two notes. Together they make nearly L19,000. The first falls due in three days. I have no hope of redeeming it. I am going to the other end of the world. I am glad to go, for I am sick of every thing here. I'll do well yet. You will help me, Elizabeth?"

She could not answer him.

"For our father's sake, for our mother's sake, you must help me away. It will be transportation for life. O, sister, give me another chance. I will put the wrong all right yet."

By this time she had gathered her faculties together.

"Yes, I'll help you, dear. Lie down and rest. I will go to Martha. I can trust the Cravens. Is it Liverpool you want to reach?"

"No, no; any port but Liverpool."

"Will Whitehaven do?"

"The best of all places."

"I will return as quickly as possible."

"But it is raining heavily, and the park is so gloomy. Let me go with you."

"I must go alone."

He looked at her with sorrow and tenderness and bitter shame. Her face showed white as marble against the dead black of her dress, but there was also in it a strength and purpose to which he fully trusted.

"I must ring for my maid and dismiss her, and you had better go to your own old room, Antony;" and as he softly trod the corridor, lined with the faces of his forefathers, Elizabeth followed him in thought, and shuddered at the mental picture she evoked.

Then she rang her bell, gave some trivial order, and excused her maid for the night. A quarter of an hour afterward she was hastening through the park, scarcely heeding the soaking rain, or the chill, or darkness, in the pre-occupation of her thoughts. She had flung a thick shawl over her head and shoulders, a fashion so universal as to greatly lessen her chance of being observed, and when she came to the park gates she looked up and down for some circumstance to guide her further steps. She found it in the lighted windows of the Methodist chapel. There was evidently a service there, and Martha would be present. If she waited patiently she would pass the gates, and she could call her.

But it was a wretched hour before Martha came, and Elizabeth was wet and shivering and sick with many a terror. Fortunately Martha was alone, and the moment Elizabeth spoke she understood, without surprise or explanations, that there was trouble in which she could help.

"Martha, where is Ben?"

"He stopp'd to t' leaders' meeting. He'll be along in a little bit."

"Can he bring a wool-comber's suit and apron, and be at the gates, here, with-his tax-cart in a couple of hours?"

"Yes; I know he can."

"Martha, can you get me some bread and meat, without any one knowing?"

"Ay; I can. Mary'll be up stairs wi' t' baby, I'se warrant. I'll be back wi' it, i' five minutes;" and she left Elizabeth walking restlessly just inside the gates. The five minutes looked an hour to her, but in reality Martha returned very speedily with a small basket of cold meat and bread.

"My brother, Martha, my brother, will be here in two hours. See that Ben is ready. He must be in Whitehaven as soon as possible to-morrow. Don't forget the clothes."

"I'll forget nothing that's needful. Ben'll be waiting. God help, you, Miss Hallam!"

Elizabeth answered with a low cry, and Martha watched her a moment hastening through the rain and darkness, ere she turned back toward the chapel to wait for Ben.

A new terror seized Elizabeth as she returned. What if Jasper had locked the doors? How would it be possible for her to account for her strange absence from the house at that hour? But Antony had also thought of this, and after the main doors had been closed he had softly undone a side entrance, and watched near it for his sister's return. His punishment begun when he saw her wretched condition; but there was no time then for either apologies or reproaches.

"Eat," she said, putting the basket before him; "and Ben will be at the gates with his tax-cart. He will take you to Whitehaven."

"Can I trust Ben?"

She looked at him sadly. "You must have been much wronged, Antony, to doubt the Cravens."

"I have."

"God pity and pardon you."

He ate in silence, glancing furtively at his sister, who sat white and motionless opposite him. There was no light but the fire-light; and the atmosphere of the room had that singular sensitiveness that is apparent enough when the spiritual body is on the alert. It felt full of "presence;" was tremulous, as if stirred by wings; and seemed to press heavily, and to make sighing a relief.

 

After Antony had eaten he lay down upon a couch and fell into an uneasy sleep, and so continued, until Elizabeth touched him, and said, softly, "It is time, my dear. Ben will be waiting." Then he stood up and looked at her. She took his hands, she threw her arms around his neck, she sobbed great, heavy, quiet sobs against his breast. She felt that it was a last farewell—that she would never see his face again.

And Antony could not restrain himself. He kissed her with despairing grief. He made passionate promises of atonement. He came back three times to kiss once more the white cold face so dear to him, and each time he kissed a prayer for his safety and pardon off her lips. At the last moment he said, "Your love is great, Elizabeth. My little boy! I have wronged him shamefully."

"He shall be my child. He shall never know shame. I will take the most loving care of his future. You may trust him to me, Antony."

Then he went away. Elizabeth tried to see him from the window, but the night was dark, and he kept among the shrubbery. At such hours the soul apprehends and has presentiments and feelings which it obeys without analyzing them. She paced the long corridor, feeling no chill and no fear, and seeming to see clearly the pictured faces around her. She was praying; and among them she did not feel as if she was praying aloud. She remembered in that hour many things that her father had said to her about Antony. She knew then the meaning of that strange cry on her mother's dying lips—"A far country! Bring my son home!"

For an hour or two it was only Antony's danger and shame, only Antony's crime, she could think of. But when the reaction came she perceived that she must work as well as pray. Two questions first suggested themselves for her solution.

Should she go to Whaley for advice, or act entirely on her own responsibility?

Would she be able to influence Page and Thorley, the bankers who held her brother's forged notes, by a personal visit?

She dismissed all efforts at reasoning, she determined to let herself be guided by those impressions which we call "instinct." She could not reason, but she tried to feel. And she felt most decidedly that she would have no counselor but her own heart. She, would doubtless do what any lawyer would call "foolish things;" but that was a case where "foolishness" might be the highest wisdom. She said to herself, "My intellect is often at fault, but where Antony and Hallam are concerned I am sure that I can trust my heart."

As to Page and Thorley, she knew that they had had frequently business transactions with her father. Mr. Thorley had once been at the hall; he would know thoroughly the value of the proposal she intended making them; and, upon the whole, it appeared to be the wisest plan to see them personally. In fact, she did not feel as if she could endure the delay and the uncertainty of a correspondence on the subject.

The morning of the second day after Antony's flight she was in London. In business an Englishman throws over politeness. He says, "How do you do?" very much as if he was saying, "Leave me alone;" and he is not inclined to answer questions, save, by "yes" or "no." Elizabeth perceived at once that tears or weakness would damage her cause, and that the only way to meet Antony's wrong was to repair it, and to do this in the plainest and simplest manner possible.

"I am Miss Hallam."

"Take a seat, Miss Hallam."

"You hold two notes of my brothers, one purporting to be drawn by Lord Eltham for L9,000; the other by Squire Francis Horton for L9,600."

"Yes; why 'purporting?'"

"They are forgeries."

"My—! Miss Hallam, do you know what you are saying?"

"I do. My brother has left England. He is ruined."

"I told you, Page!" said Thorley, with much irritation; "but you would believe the rascal."

Elizabeth colored painfully, and Mr. Thorley said, "You must excuse me, Miss Hallam—"

"This is not a question for politeness, but business. I will pay the bills. You know I am sole proprietor of Hallam."

"Yes."

"The case is this. If you suffer the notes to be protested, and the law to take its course, you will get nothing. You may punish Mr. Hallam, if you succeed in finding him; but will not the money be better for you?"

"We have duties as citizens, Miss Hallam."

"There has been no wrong done which I cannot put right. No one knows of this wrong but ourselves. I might plead mercy for so young a man, might tell you that even justice sometimes wisely passes by a fault, might remind you of my father and the unsullied honor of an old name; yes, I might say all this, and more, but I only say, will you let me assume the debt, and pay it?"

"How do you propose to do this, Miss Hallam?"

"The income from the estate is about L5,000 a year. I will make it over to you."

"How will you live?"

"That is my affair."

"There may be very unpleasant constructions put upon your conduct—for it will not be understood."

"I am prepared for that."

"Will you call for our answer in three hours?"

"Will you promise me to take no steps against my brother in the interim?"

"Yes; we can do that. But if we refuse your offer, Miss Hallam?"

"I must then ask your forbearance until I see Lord Eltham and Squire Horton. The humiliation will be very great, but they will not refuse me."

She asked permission to wait in an outer office, and Mr. Page, passing through it an hour afterward, was so touched by the pathetic motionless figure in deep mourning, that he went back to his partner, and said, "Thorley, we are going to agree to Miss Hallam's proposal; why keep her in suspense?"

"There is no need. It is not her fault in any way."

But Elizabeth was obliged to remain two days in London before the necessary papers were drawn out and signed, and they were days of constant terror and anguish. She went neither to Antony's house, nor to his place of business; but remained in her hotel, so anxious on this subject, that she could not force her mind to entertain any other. At length all was arranged, and it did comfort her slightly that both Page and Thorley were touched by her grief and unselfishness into a spontaneous expression of their sympathy with her:

"You have done a good thing, Miss Hallam," said Mr. Page, "and Page and Thorley fully understand and appreciate your motives;" and the kind faces and firm hand-clasps of the two men brought such a look into Elizabeth's sorrowful eyes, that they both turned hurriedly away from her. During her journey home she slept heavily most of the way; but when she awoke among the familiar hills and dales, it was as if she had been roused to consciousness by a surgeon's knife. A quick pang of shame and terror and a keen disappointment turned her heart sick; but with it came also a sense of renewed courage and strength, and a determination to face and conquer every trouble before her.

Jasper met her, and he looked suspiciously at her. For his part, he distrusted all women, and he could not understand why his mistress had found it necessary to go to London. But he was touched in his way by her white, weary face, and he busied himself in making the fire burn bright, and in setting out her dinner table with all the womanly delicacies he knew she liked. If Elizabeth could only have fully trusted him, Jasper would have been true as steel to her, a very sure and certain friend; but he resented trouble from which he was shut out, and he was shrewd enough to feel that it was present, though hidden from him.

"Has any one been here while I was, absent, Jasper?"

"Ay, Squire Fairleigh and Miss Fairleigh called; and Martha Craven was here this morning. I think Martha is talking wi' Nancy Bates now—she looked a bit i' trouble. It's like Ben's wife hes hed a fuss wi' her!"

"I think not, Jasper. Tell her I wish to see her."

The two women stood looking at each other a moment, Elizabeth trembling with anxiety, Martha listening to the retreating steps of Jasper.

"It is a' as you wished, Miss Hallam."

"Is Ben back?"

"Ay, early this morning."

"Did he meet any one he knew?"

"He met Tim Hardcastle just outside Hallam, that night. Tim said, 'Thou's late starting wheriver to, Ben;' and Ben said, 'Nay, I'm early. If a man wants a bit o' good wool he's got to be after it.' This morning he came back wi' tax-cart full o' wool."

"And my brother?"

"He sailed from Whitehaven yesterday."

"To what place?"

"Ben asked no questions. If he doesn't know where Mr. Hallam went to, he can't say as he does. It's best to know nowt, if you are asked."

"O Martha!"

"Hush, dearie! Thou must go and sleep now. Thou's fair worn out. To-morrow'll do for crying."

But sleep comes not to those who call it. Elizabeth in the darkness saw clearly, in the silence felt, the stir and trouble of a stormy sea surging up to her feet. It was not sleep she needed, so much as that soul-repose which comes from a decided mind. Her attitude toward her own little world and toward Richard was still uncertain. She had not felt able to face either subject as yet.

Two days after her return the papers were full of her brother's failure and flight. Many hard things were said of Antony Hallam; and men forgave more easily the reckless speculation which had robbed them, than the want of manly courage which had made him fly from the consequences of his wrongdoing. It was a bitter ordeal for a woman as proud as Elizabeth to face alone. But she resented most of all that debt of shame which had prevented her devoting the income of Hallam to the satisfaction of her brother's creditors. For them she could do nothing, and some of them were wealthy farmers and traders living in the neighborhood of Hallam, and who had had a blind faith in the integrity and solvency of a house with a Hallam at the head of it. These men began to grumble at their loss, and to be quite sure that "t' old squire would nivver hev let 'em lose a farthing;" and to look so pointedly at Miss Hallam, even on Sundays, that she felt the road to and from church a way of sorrow and humiliation.

Nor could she wholly blame them. She knew that her father's good name had induced these men to trust their money with Antony; and she knew, also, that her father would have been very likely to have done as they were constantly asserting he would—"mortgage his last acre to pay them." And she could not explain that terrible first claim to them, since she had decided to bear every personal disgrace and disappointment, rather than suffer the name of Hallam to be dragged through the criminal courts, and associated with a felon.

Not even to Whaley, not even to Richard, would she tell the shameful secret; therefore she must manage her own affairs, and this would necessarily compel her to postpone, perhaps relinquish altogether, her marriage. Her first sorrowful duty was to write to Richard. He got the letter one lovely morning in November. He was breakfasting on the piazza and looking over some estimates for an addition to the conservatory. He was angry and astonished. What could Elizabeth mean by another and an indefinite delay? He was far from regarding Antony's failure as a never-to-be-wiped-out stain, and he was not much astonished at his flight. He had never regarded Antony as a man of moral courage, or even of inflexible moral principles, and he failed to see how Antony's affairs should have the power to overthrow his plans. But Elizabeth positively forbid him to come; positively asserted that her marriage, at a time of such public shame and disapproval, would be a thing impossible to contemplate. She said that she herself had no desire for it, and that every instinct of her nature forbid her to run away from her painful position, and thus incur the charge of cowardice which had been so freely attached to Antony. It was true that the positive sternness of these truths were softened by a despairing tenderness, a depth of sorrow and disappointment, and an avowal of undying love and truth which it was impossible to doubt. But this was small comfort to the young man. His first impulse was one of extreme weariness of the whole affair. He had been put off from year to year, until he felt it a humiliation to accept any further excuses. And this time his humiliation would in a measure be a public one. His preparations for marriage were widely known, for he had spoken freely to his friends of the event. He had spent a large sum of money in adding to and in decorating his home. It was altogether a climax of the most painful nature to him.

 

Elizabeth had fully released him from every obligation, but at the same time she had declared that her whole life would be consecrated to his memory. Richard felt that the release was just as nominal in his own case. He knew that he never could love any woman but Elizabeth Hallam, and that just as long as she loved him, she held him by ties no words could annul. But he accepted her dictum; and the very fullness of his heart, and the very extremity of his disappointment, deprived him of the power to express his true feelings. His letter to Elizabeth was colder and prouder than he meant it to be; and had that sorrowfully resentful air about it which a child wears who is unjustly punished and yet knows not how to defend himself.

It came to Elizabeth after a day of extreme humiliation—the day on which she called her household servants together and dismissed them. She had been able to give them no reason for her action, but a necessity for economy, and to soften the dismissal by no gift. Adversity flatters no one, and not a soul expressed any grief at the sundering of the tie. She was even conscious, as she had frequently been since Antony's failure, of an air, that deeply offended her—a familiarity that was not a friendly one—the covert presumption of the mean-hearted toward their unfortunate superiors. She did not hear the subsequent conversation in the servants' hall, and it was well she did not, for, though the insolence that vaunts itself covertly is hard to bear, it is not so hard as that which visibly hurts the eye and offends the ear.

"Thank goodness!" said Jasper, "I've saved a bit o' brass, and miss may be as highty-tighty as she likes. This is what comes o' lettin' women out o' t' place God put 'em in."

"She's gettin' that near and close," said cook, "I wouldn't stop wi' her for nowt. It's been, 'Ann, be careful here,' and, 'Ann, don't waste there,' till I'se fair sick o' it. She'll not get me to mak' mysen as mean as that. Such like goings on, I nivver!"

"And she's worst to please as iver was!" said Sarah Lister, Miss Hallam's maid. "I'm sure I don't know what's come over her lately. She used to give me many a dress and bit o' lace or ribbon. She gives nowt now. It isn't fair, you know!"

"She's savin' for that foreign chap, that's what it is," said Jasper. "I'll nivver believe but what t' land goes back to t' male heirs some way or t' other. It stands to reason that it should; and she's gettin' a' she can, while she holds t' keys. She'll mak' a mess o' it, see if she doesn't!"

And with this feeling flavoring the household, Elizabeth found the last month of the year a dismal and resentful one. In pursuance of the plans she had laid down for herself, the strictest economy was imperative; for what little she could, now save from the plenty of the old housekeeping, might have to see her through many days. At Christmas she bid "good-bye" to every one of her old servants, and even this simple duty had its trial. She stood a hard ten minutes with the few sovereigns in her hand which would be requisite if she gave them their usual Christmas gratuity. Pride urged her to give it; prudence told her, "You will need it." She was not forgetful of the unkind things that would be said of her, but she replaced the money in her desk with this reflection, "I have paid them fully for their service; I must be just before I am generous."

They left early in the day, and for a few hours Elizabeth was the only soul in the old hall. But at night-fall Ben Craven's tax-cart brought his mother, and a few of her personal belongings, and then the village gossips understood "what Miss Hallam was going to do with hersen." Martha took entire charge of the hall, and of all its treasures; and the lonely mistress went to her room that night with the happy consciousness that all she had was in loving and prudent keeping.

It was also a great comfort to feel that she was not under the constant prying of unsympathetic eyes. Elizabeth had suffered keenly from that bitterest of all oppressions, heart-constraint. She often wished to weep, but did not dare. The first servant that entered the room was her master. She owed him a calm expression of face and pleasant words, and if she failed to give them he rent her secret from her. O be certain that every sorrowful soul sighs for the night, as the watchman of Judaea did for the morning. It longs for the shadows that conceal its tears; it invokes the darkness which gave it back to itself!

With a sense of infinite relief Elizabeth sat in the still house. It was pleasant to hear only Martha's feet going to and fro; to feel that, at last, she was at liberty to speak or to be silent, to smile or to weep, to eat or to let food alone. When Martha brought in her bedroom candle, and said, "Good-night, Miss Hallam; you needn't hev a care about t' house, I'll see to ivery thing," Elizabeth knew all was right, and went with an easy mind to her own room.

Christmas-eve! She had looked forward all the year to it. Richard was to have been at Hallam for Christmas. She had thought of asking Antony and his wife and child, of filling the old rooms with young, bright faces, and of heralding in her new life in the midst of Christmas joys. She had pleased herself with the hope of telling Antony all her plans about "the succession." She had dreamed many a bright dream of her bridal in the old church, and of the lovely home to which she was going soon after the New Year. It was hard to give all up! Still harder to suffer, in addition, misconstruction and visible dislike and contempt.

"Why had it been permitted?" She fell asleep with the question in her heart, and was awakened by the singing of the waits. It was a chill, windy night, with a young moon plunging wildly in and out a sea of black driving clouds. She sat by the fire listening to the dying melody, and thinking of the Christmas-eve when Phyllis stood by her side, and the world seemed so full of happiness and hope. She had had a letter from Phyllis a few days before, a very loving, comforting, trustful letter, and she thought she would read it again. It had been laid within a book which Phyllis had given her, and she brought it to the fireside. It was a volume of poetry, and Elizabeth was not poetical. She could not remember having read a page in this volume, but as she lifted the letter her eyes fell upon these words:

 
"The priests must serve
Each in his course, and we must stand in turn
Awake with sorrow, in the temple dim
To bless the Lord by night."
 

The words affected her strangely; she turned the page backward, and read,

 
"It is the night,
And in the temple of the Lord, not made
By mortal hands, the lights are burning low
Before the altar. Clouds of darkness fill
The vastness of the sacred aisles….
… A few short years ago
And all the temple courts were thronged with those
Who worshiped and gave thanks before they went
To take their rest. Who shall bless
His name at midnight?
 
 
"Lo! a band of pale
Yet joyful priests do minister around
The altar, where the lights are burning low
In the breathless night. Each grave brow wears the crown
Of sorrow, and each heart is kept awake
By its own restless pain: for these are they
To whom the night-watch is appointed. See!
They lift their hands and bless God in the night
Whilst we are sleeping: Those to whom the King
Has measured out a cup of sorrow, sweet
With his dear love; yet very hard to drink,
Are waking in his temple; and the eyes
That cannot sleep for sorrow or for pain
Are lifted up to heaven, and sweet low songs
Broken by patient tears, arise to God.
 
 
"The priests must serve
Each in his course, and we must stand in turn
Awake with sorrow in the temple dim,
To bless the Lord by night. We will not fear
When we are called at midnight by some stroke
Of sudden pain, to rise and minister
Before the Lord. We too will bless his name
In the solemn night, and stretch out our hands to him."
 

And she paused, and lifted a face full of joy and confidence. A new light came into her soul; and, standing up before the Lord, she answered the message in the words of Bunyan, "I am willing with all my heart, Lord!"