Year: 1878

| have no right," she said.
/ She had nerved herself to speak
steadily, and, though her words


were cold, there was the hight of a
great, unuttsrable pity shining in


her eyes.


Still he was on his knees before


her, and again be kissed her gar
ment's hem, and blessed her.


Il love yOu," he cried-I adore
you worship you. You are my
only God But l know | am not


worthy to kiss the dust before your
footsteps. Yet you will give me
your hand before 1 go, and tell me
to sin no more, and hope"


1t was trying her almost too far.
She could not speak, but she held
her trembling little hand towards
him, and he seized it and covered It
with burning kisses.


'sYou have saved me-" he cried.
81 will try and be better man, that
you may not regret having wasted
your pity upon me. God has sent
you to be my guardian angel, and
when I have repented and reformed
my ways ! will come back to show
you the victory you have wrought
over sin and shame"


He darted through the door into
the darkness and was gone, while
Beatrice went back to the quiet lit
tie parsonage with bitter pain in
her young heart, yet soothed some
what by the thought that he would
come back again. But Ralph Viii
tons nature was not of that sort to
60 away in solitude and repent. A
nature that could do this would new
er have been guilty of an act that
needed it to do so, and would not
do it if it had, and Ralph Wilton,
with his proud, fiery, impetuous na-
ture crushed with remOrse, yet
smarting with humiliation, believing
nothing, having faith in nothing to
turn to for a support, could not
stand the ordeal. For a month OF
two he strove manfully to carry out
his determination, but he brooded
over the past rather than looked to
the future, until he bred in his heart
such a sense of his own utter un-
worthiness, and a wild despair that
she could never be his, that at
last he cursed God, and Fate and
Chance, and plunged into the
widest of excuses, such as he had
never been guilty of before, to try
and forget his misery.


While Beatrice, mp in that little
seaside parsonage, still trusted and
hoped and prayed for him, endur-
ing the '9ong, dull anguish Of pa
thence" until a year went by, when,
her uncle dying suddenly, she was
left alone in the world.


From one of her uncle's old
friends who came up from London
to the funeral she heard news of
Ralph.


eyes," he said, be was. a fine
young man, but he has gone com
pletely to the bad. He has broken
out of bounds altogether during
the last few months. There was q
time when he seemed to have re-
formed completely, but it only
lasted few months. A great pity,
too, with such a fine fortune, to 90
to the bad" And the gentleman
shook his head gravely and slipped
some more of the full-bOdied funer-
al port.


And Beatrice of course, should
have cast him out of her thoughts as
if he were utterly bad and hardened
in sin instead of being week and er-
ring, and thanked the Deity for her
happy escape, since she was not as he
was. What she did do was to learn
his address, and when the funeral
was over take the train for London.


1t was night when she reached the
city and was driven at once to his
chambers. The valet said his orders
were imperative to admit no one, but
the ehink of golden soVersigns
smoothed that difficulty, and she
turned the lock and noiselessly open
ed the door.


He did not stir at her approach.
A fiekering candle was the only
light in the room, and he sat with his
head buried in his hands and bowed
upon the table before him, on which
lay an open pistol-case and an envel-
Ope addressed with her own name.


Her thoughts flew back to q day q
year ago, and the shore of a sunset
sea when she had been as unconscious
of his approach as be now of hers.
She moved noiselessly across the
room until she stood behind him and
could here the low means that passed
his lips. Then she laid her hand
softly upon his shoulder, and, bend
ing down, whispered, "Ralphl"


He sprang from his seat and stood
with his whole body quiyering before
her.


The hot blood was crimson in her
cheeks, but her eyes we're full Of
modesty and love. It was
the purest, noblest moment of her
life, let prudes prste what they viii.


The wild agony had not vet died
out of his face, and utter beWildeF-
nent was mingled with it now. He
could not bring himself to belieye his
great Joy all at once. He moved to-
ward the table and laid his hand on
one of the pistols.


"Do not mock me-" be cried. "I
am happy now. Let me die before"


She moved nearer to him and
reached up her arms and flung them
about his neck.


81 love you Ralph" she said sim
ply.


A great gasp stopped his utteranee
for moment. Then he sank upon
his knees before her with her hand in
his.


81 am not worthy. Ny darling,
my darlingl my guardian angell'


Was she not? Surely it is some
thing to have saved a human soul.


Russian hospitality is dazzling.
The entertainments which are given
by the richest mobiles in st. Peters
burg excel anything that can be seen
because nowhere else can