Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1914-02-18
TO-DAY'S INSTALLMENT.
Thirty first chaptsr-continued.

were the preparations that had led up
to this marriage If God was making
| it? God makes all marriages that are
| blessed by His church, and therefore
He overrules to His own good ends all
human impulses, however sordid or
selfish they may be.
After that thought came to me
nothing else seemed to matter, and
nothing however Earring or incongru-
| GUS, was able to lower the exaltation
of my spirit
But the service, which had this eff
feet upon me, appeared to have an ex-
actly opposite effect on Lord Raa. His
nervousness increased visibly, though
he did his best to conceal it by
| looked like derision.
Thus when the bishop stepped
down to us and said:
James Charles Munster, wilt thou
take Mary, here present, for thy law
full wife. according to the rite of our
holy Mother the Church. my husband
halted and stammered over his an
swer saying beneath his breath, 81
thought / was a hereto"
But when the corresponding uues-
ton was put to me, and Father Dan
thinking ! must be nervous, leaned
over to me and whispered, Don't
worry. child, take your time l re-
piled in a loud, clear, unfaltering
voice:
Il will"
And again. when my husband had
to put the ring and the gold and sill
yer on the salver Che fumbIed and
dropped them as he did so. and fun
bled and dropped them a second time
when he had to take them up after
| they had been blessed, laughing too
| audibly at his own awkwardness),
and then repeat after the bishop:
With this ring l thee wed; this
| gold and silver I thee give; with my
| BODY ! thee worship, and with all my
worldly goods / thee endow,' he ten
| dered the ring slowly and with an OBJ
vious effort.
B. | took it without trembling, be-
cause | was thinking that, in spite of
| all | had heard of his ways of life,
! this solemn and sacred sacrament
made him mine and no ones else's.
1t is all very mysterious; / can not
account for it; l only know II was so.
and that, everything considered. it
was perhaps the strangest fact of all
my life.
| l remember that more than once
| during the ceremony Father Dan
| spoke to me softly and caressingly.
as if to a child, but l felt no need
of his comforting, for my strength
| was from a higher scource.
Like Prayer.
' l also remember that it was after
wards said that all through the cere-
/ mony the eyes of the newly welded
couple seemed sedulously to shun
each other, but If did not look at
my husband it was because my mar
! riage was like prayer to me, car
rying me back. with its sense of pur-
ity and sancity, to the little sunlit
church in Rome where Mildred
| BanlIes had taken her vows.
After the marriage service there
was nuptial mass and benediction
Especial dispeusation from Romeo,
and that raised to a still higher pitch
the spiritual exaltation which sus-
tanned me.
Father Dan read the Epistle begin
ming Let wives be subject to their
husbands" and then the bishop read
the Gospel concluding. Therefore
now they are not two, but one flesh:
what therefore Gcd hath Joined to-
gether let no man put asunder
l had trembled when l thought of
these solemn and sonorous words in
the solitude of my own room, but
now that they were spoken before
the congregation l had no fear, no
misgiving, nothing but a sense of
rapture and conservation
The last words being spoken and
Lord Raa and ! being man and wife,
we stepped into the sacristy to sign
the register, and not even there did
my spirit fail me. ! took up the pen
and signed my name without a ire
NOR But hardly had | done so when
heard a rumbling murmur of
voices about me-first the Bishops
voice Gin such 4 worldly tone) and
then my fathers and then my hus-
bands, and then the voices of many
others. in light conversation mingled
with trills of laughter. And then, in
a moment, a twinkling, as fast as a
snowflake melts upon a stream. the
spell of the marriage service seemed
to break.
have heard since that my eyes
were wet at that moment and
seemed to have been crying all
through the ceremony l know Moth
ing about that, but l do know that
/ felt a kind OF internal Shudder ana
that it was just as if my soul had
suddenly awakened from an intoxi-
eating drug.
The organ began to play the We'd
ding March, and my husband, putting
my arm throug his, said Come
There was much audible whisper
ing among the people waiting for us
in the church. and as we walked to-
wards the door l saw ghostly faces
smiling at me on every side, and
heard ghostly voices speaking in
whispers that We're like the back
ward plash of wavelets on the shore.
"Sakes alive, how white she's
looking. though" said somebody, and
then somebody else said could not
help but hear it
Dear heart knows if her father
has done right for all that"
l did not look at anybody. but l
saw Martins mother at the back.
! -, fvfp nd