"I do know it."

She stood up, not shrinking from his eye now, -her womanly nature, clear and brave, looking out from hers.

"I will not speak of love: you know what that is. You know you need me: you have moulded your very thought and life in mine. It is right it should be so. God meant it. He made them male and female: taught them by that instinct of nearness to know when the two souls mated in eternity had found each other. Then the only true marriage comes. The true souls, lovers, have found each other now, Grey." He came to her,-took her hands in his. "I know that,"-her pale face still lifted. "Then,❞—all the passion of a life in his voice, -"what shall come between us? I tell you, your soul's health and mine depend on this." She did not speak: her breath came laboured and thick.

"I have no words like you,"-raising her hands to her head," but I feel you are wrong in what you say."

I

She tried to collect herself, then went on. "It is true that women sell themselves. did it,-to escape. I was taught wrong, as girls are. It's true, Paul, that women are cramped and unhappy through false marriages, and that there are cursed laws in society that defraud the poor and the slave."

She stopped, pale and frightened, struggling to find utterance, not being used to put her thoughts into words. He watched her keenly.

"But it is not true, Paul,"-with choked eagerness,-"that this life was given to us only to develop our souls, to be free and happy. That will come after-in heaven. It is given here only to those who pray for it. There's something better here."

"What?"

"You will come with me, Grey. You shall not go back to the slavery yonder, dragging out the bit of time God gave you, in which to develop your soul, in coddling brats, and kitchenwork. There are homes where men and women enfranchise themselves from the cursed laws of society-Phalansteries-where each soul develops itself out of the inner centre of eternal truth and love according to its primal bent, to yield to its instincts and affinities. I learned their theory long ago, but I never believed in it until now. We will go there, Grey. We will be governed by the laws of our own nature. It will be a free, beautiful life, my own. Music and Art and Nature shall surround us with an eternal harmony. We will have work, true work, such as suits our native power; these talents smothered in your brain and mine shall come to life in vigorous growth. Here in the world struggling meanly for food, this cannot be. That shall be the true Utopia, Grey. Some day all mankind shall so live. We, now. Will you come?"drawing her softly towards him. "You do not yield"-looking in her face. "I am sincere. No human soul can reach its full stature, unless it be free and happy. There is no chain on women such as marriages like yours."

"You mean to submit?"

"I do. I married that man of my own free will: driven, maybe, by mean fears; but—I did it. I will not forswear myself."

She gained courage as she went on.

"I believe that God Himself, and that our Lord, taught the meaning of a true marriage as you do,-that without that affinity it is none. The curse comes to every woman who disregards it. It has come to me. I'll bear it." "Throw it off. Come out of the foul lie."

I will live no lie, Paul. I never would have gone with John Gurney as his wife, if he had claimed me.'

"Then you are free to be mine,"-coming a step nearer.

She drew back.

"I don't think He taught that. I cannot go behind His words."

"Grey, I will not drag you one step where your free will does not lead you. Last night I said, 'I love this woman so well that I will leave her, sooner than drag her into crime.' You shall do what you think right. I will be silent." "Good bye, then, Paul."

Yet he did not take the offered hand: stood moodily looking down into the water, crushing back something in his heart,-the only thing in his life dear or pleasant, it may be.

"Oh, if women knew what it is to sell themselves! They will marry more purely, maybesoon. I believe that Christ made the marriage vow binding, Paul, because, though some might break it with pure intent, yet, if it were of no avail, as it is in those Homes you talk of, and in

Paul Blecker to Fredericksburg, the night after that bloodiest day for the Federal forces in December. It was the fourth battle in which he had taken part. Now a man grows blasé, in a manner, even of wholesale slaughter; he plodded his way quietly, indifferently almost therefore over the plateau below the first range of hills, his instrument-case in hand, drinking from his brandy-flask now and then to keep down nausea. The night was clear-a low, wan moon peering from the west, a warm wind from the river drifting the heavy billows of smoke away from the battle-field. He picked his steps with difficulty, unwilling to tread upon even the dead: they lay in heaps here, thrown aside by the men who were removing the wounded. The day was lost he fancied he could read on the white upturned faces a bitter defeat. Firing had ceased an hour ago; only at long intervals on the far left a dull throb was heard, as though the heart of the Night pulsed heavily and feverishly in her sleep: no other sound, save the constant, deadening roll of ambulances going out from this Valley of Death. The field where he stood was below the ridge on which were placed Lee's batteries; for ten hours the grand division of Sumner had charged the heights here, the fog shutting out from them all but the impregnable foe in front, and the bit of blue sky above, the last glimpse of life they were to see-charging with the slow, cumulative energy of an ocean-surf upon a rock, and ebbing back at last, spent, leaving behind the drift of a horrible wetness on the grass, and uncounted murdered souls to go back to God.

The night now was bright and colourless, as I said, except where a burning house down by the canal made a faded saffron-glare. The Doctor had entered a small thicket of locusttrees; the moonlight penetrated clearly through their thin trunks, but the dead on the grass lay in shadow. He carried a lantern, therefore, as he gently turned them over, searching for some one. It was a Pennsylvania regiment which had held that wood longest-McKinstry's. Half-a-dozen other men were employed like the Doctor-Irish, generally: they don't forget the fellows that messed with them as quickly as our countrymen do.

"We're in luck, Dan Reilly," said one. "Here's the Docthor himself. Av we had the b'ys now, we'd be complate," turning over one face after another, unmistakably Dutch or

Puritan,

"Ev it's Pat O'Shaughnessy yez want," said another, "he'd be afther gittin' ayont the Mc Manuses, an' here they are. They're Fardowners on'y. Pat's Corkonian, he is; he'll be nearer th❜inemy by a fut, I'll ingage yez."

"He's my cousin" (hard tugging at the dead bodies with one arm: the other hung powerless). "I can't face Mary an' her childher agin an' say I lift her man widout Christian burial.— Howld yer sowl! Dan Reilly, give us a lift; here he is. Are ye dead, Pat?"

One eye in the blackened face opened.

"On'y my leg.

O'Shaughnessy agin th' warld, an' the warld agin th' Divil!"-which was received with a cheer from the Corkonians. "Av yer Honor," insinuated Dan, “ wud attind to this poor man, we'd be proud to diskiver the frind you're in sarch of."

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Blecker glanced at the stout Irishmen about him, with kind faces under all the whisky, and stronger arms than his own."

"I will, boys. You know him-he's in your regiment-Captain McKinstry. He fell in this wood, they tell me."

"I think I know him"-his head to one side. "Woodenish-looking chap, all run up into shoulders, with yellow hair?"

Blecker nodded, and motioned them to carry O'Shaughnessy into a low tool-house near, a shed, half-tumbling down, from a shell that had shattered its side. There was a bench there, where they could lay the wounded man, however. He stooped over the big, mangled body, joking with him—it was the best comfort to Pat to give him a chance to show how little he cared for the surgeon's knife-glancing now and then at the pearly embankment of clouds in the south, or at the delicate locust boughs in black and shivering tracery against the moonlight, trying to shut his ears to the unceasing under-current of moans that reached him in silence.

Seeing him there with his lantern and instruments, they brought him one wounded man after another, to whom he gave what aid he could, and then despatched them in the army waggons, looking impatiently after Dan, in his search for the Captain. He had not known before how much he cared for McKinstry, with a curious protecting care. Other men in the army were more his chums than Mac, but they were coarse, able to take care of themselves. Mac was like that simple-hearted old Israelite in whom there was no guile. In the camp he had been perpetually imposed on by his mengiving them treats of fresh beef and bread, and tracts at the same time. They laughed at him, but were oddly fond of him; he was a sharp disciplinarian, but was too quiet, they had always thought, to have much pluck.

Blecker, glancing at his watch, saw that it was eleven; the moon was sinking fast, her level rays fainter and bluer, as from some farther depth of rest and quiet than before. His keenly-set ears distinguished just then an even tramp among the abrupt sounds without, the feet of two or three men carrying weight.

"He's here, zur," said Dan, who held his feet tenderly enough. 'Aisy now, b'ys. It's not bar'ls ye're liftin'." They laid him down. “Fur up th' ridge he was: not many blue coats furder That's true," in a loud, hearty tone. "I'm doubtin'," in an aside, "it's all over wid him. I'll howld the lantern, zur."

an.

"You, Blecker?" McKinstry muttered, as he opened his eyes with his usual placid smile. 'We've lost the day?"

"Yes. No matter now, Mac. Quiet one moment," cutting the boot from his leg.

"Not fifty of my boys escaped"-a sort of

loyal gentleman was gone to the Master of all honour, to learn a broader manhood and deeds of higher emprise.

Paul Blecker stool silent a moment, and then covered the homely, kind face reverently. "I would as lief have seen a woman die," he said, and turned away.

Two or three men came up, carrying others on a broken door and on a fence-board.

"Hyur's th' Doctor"-laying them on a hillock of grass. "Uh wish ye'd see toh these pore chaps, Doctor," with a strong Maryland accent. One o' them's t'other side, but"and so left them.

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One of thein was a burly western boatman. with mop-like red hair and beard. Blecker looked at him, shook his head, and went on. No use!"-gritting his heavy jaw. "Well!"-swallowing, as if he accepted death in that terrible breath. "Eh, Doctor? Do you hear? Wait a bit"- fumbling at his jacket.

can't-- There's a V in my pocket. I wish you'd send it to the old woman-mother -Mrs. Jane Carr, Cincinnati-with my love." The doctor stopped to speak to him, and then passed to the next, a fair-haired boy, with three bullet-holes in his coat, one in his breast.

"Yes, yes, I knew. But the wound came just as we were charging. Sabre-cut, it was. If I had said I was wounded, the men would have fallen back. I thought we could take that battery; but we did not. No matter. All right. You ought to go."

"No. Have you no message for home?" pushing back the yellow hair as gently as a woman. The mild face grew distorted again and pale.

"I've a letter in my carpet-sack, in our tent. I wrote it last night. It's to Lizzy; you will deliver it, Doctor?"

"I will. Yes."

"It may be lost now, there is such confusion in the camp. The key is in my right pocket, inside the spectacle case: have you got it?" "Yes."

Blecker could hardly keep back a smile: even the pocket-furniture was neatly ordered in the hour of death.

"If it is lost"-turning his head restlessly"light your lantern, Blecker, it is so dark-if it is-tell her"-- his voice was gone. "Tell her," lifting himself suddenly, with the force of death, "to be pure and true. My loving little girl, Lizzy-wife." Blecker drew his head on his shoulder. "I thought the holidays were coming-closing his eyes again wearily-" for us. But God knows. All right!"

His lips moved, but the sound was inaudible; he smiled cheerfully, held Paul's hand closer, and then his head grew heavy as lead, being nothing but clay. For the true knight and

"I did not want to die, though I was not afraid"-looking up anxiously; "but"

But the doctor had left him, and kneeling down in the mud, was turning the wounded Confederate over on his back, that he might see his face.

The boy saw him catch up his lantern, and peer eagerly at him with shortened breath. "What is it? Is he dead?”

"No, not dead," putting down the lantern. But very near it, this man, John Gurney-so near that it needed no deed of Blecker's to make him pass the bound. Only a few moments' neglect. A bandage, a skilful touch or two, care in the hospitals, might save him.

But what claim had he on Paul that he should do this? For a moment the hot blood in the little Doctor's veins throbbed fiercely, as he rose slowly, and, taking his lantern, stood looking down.

"In an hour," glancing critically at him, "he will be dead."

Something within him coolly added, “and Paul Blecker a murderer."

But he choked it down, and picked his steps through scorched winter stubble, dead horses, men, waggon-wheels, across the field; thinking, as he went, of Grey free, his child-love, true, coaxing coming to his tired arms once more; of the home on the farm yonder, he meant to buyhe, the rough, jolly farmer, and she, busy Grey, bustling Grey, with her loving, little fussy ways. Why, it came like a flash to him! Yet, as it came, tugging at his heart with the whole strength of his blood, he turned, this poor, thwarted, passionate little Doctor, and began

ogging back to the locust-woods, passing many wounded men of his own kith and spirit, and going back to Gurney.

Because he was his enemy. "Thank God, I am not utterly debased!"grinding his teeth vehemently.

He walked faster, seeing that the moon was going down, leaving the battle-field in shadow. Overhead, the sinking light, striking upward from the horizon, had worked the black dome into depths of fretted silver. Blecker saw it, though passion made his step unsteady and his eye dim. No man could do a mean, foul deed while God stretched out such a temple-roof as that for his soul to live in, was the thought that dully touched his outer consciousness. But little Grey! If he could go home to her to-morrow, and, lifting her thin, tired face, hold it to his breast, and say: "You're free now for ever!" O God!

He stopped, pulling his coat across his breast in his clenched hands, then, after a moment, went on, his arms falling powerless :

"I'm a child! It is of no use to think of it! Never!"-his hard, black eyes, that in these last few months had grown sad and questioning as a child's, looking to the north hill, as he strode along, as though he were bidding some one good-bye. And when he came to the hillock and knelt down again beside Gurney, there was no malice in them. He was faithful in every touch and draught and probe. With the wish in his heart to thrust the knife into the heart of the unconscious man lying before him, he touched him as though he had been his brother.

Gurney, opening his eyes at last, saw the yellow, haggard face, in its fringe of black beard, as rigid as if cut out of stone, very near his own. The grave, hopeless eyes subdued him.

"Take me out of this," he moaned. "You are going to the hospital"-helping some men to lift him into an ambulance.

"Slowly, my good fellows. I will follow you."

He did follow them. Let us give the man credit for every step of that following, the more that the evil in his blood struggled so fiercely with such a mortal pain as he went. In Fredericksburg, one of the old family-homesteads had been taken for a camp-hospital. As they laid Gurney on a heap of straw in the library, a surgeon passed through the room.

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Story," said Paul, catching his arm, see to that man: this is your post, I believe. I have dressed his wound: I cannot do more."

Story did not know the meaning of that. He stuck his eye-glasses over his hook-nose, and stooped down, being near-sighted. "Hardly worth while to put him under my care, or any. body's. The fellow will not live until morning."

"I don't know. I did what I could."

"Nothing more to be done. Parr's out of lint, did you know? He's enough to provoke Job, that fellow! I warned him especially about lint and supporters. Why, Blecker, you are

worn out," looking at him closer. "It has been a hard fight."

"Yes, I'm tired; it was a hard fight." "I must find Parr about that lint, and"Paul walked to the window, breathing heavy draughts of the fresh morning air. The man would not die, he thought. Grey would never be free. No. Yet, since he was a child, before he began to grapple his way through the world, he had never known such a cheerful quiet as that which filled his eyes with tears now; for if the fight had been hard, Paul Blecker had won the victory. Sunday morning dawned cold and windy. Now and then, volleys of musketry, or a repulse from the Southern batteries on the heights, filled the blue morning sky with belching scarlet flame and smoke: through all, however, the long trains of army-waggons passed over the pontoon bridge, bearing the wounded. About six o'clock some men came out from the camp-hospital. Dr. Blecker stood on the outside of the door: all night he had been there, like some unquiet ghost. Story, the surgeon, met the men. They carried something on a board, covered with an old patchwork quilt. Story lifted the corner of the quilt to see what lay beneath. Doctor Blecker stood in their way, but neither moved nor spoke to them.

Take it to the trenches," said the surgeon, shortly nodding to them.-Your rebel friend, Blecker."

"Dead?" "Yes."

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Story, I did what I could?

"Of course. Past help. When are we to be taken out of this trap, eh!" -going on. "I did what I could."

As the Doctor's parched lips moved, he looked up. How deep the blue was! How the cold air blew his hair about, fresh and boisterous! He went down the field, with a light, springing step, as he used when a boy long ago to run the hayfield. The earth was so full of health, life, beauty, he could have cried or laughed out loud. He stopped on the bridge, seeing only the bright, rushing clouds, the broad river, the sunlight-a little way from him in the world, little Grey.

"I thank Thee," baring his head and bending it: the words died in an awe-struck whisper in his heart-" for Thy great glory, O Lord!"

Will you come a little farther? Let a few months slip by, and let us see what a March day is in the old Pennsylvania hills. The horrors of the war have not crept hither yet, into these hillhomesteads.

Even now, if young Corporal Simpson, or Joe Hainer, or any other of the neighbours' boys come home wounded, it only spices the gossip for the apple-butter parings or spillingmatches. Then the men, being democrats, are reconciled to the ruin of the country, because it has been done by the republicans; and the women can construct secret hiding-places in the meat-cellar for the dozen silver teaspoons and