A Bride of the Plains

st way

his touch which seemed to soothe the wild paroxysm of her grief. She raised her tear-stained face to his, a

"and light the candle? It

hasty efforts to smooth her hair and to wipe her face with her apron. Then she turned into

rimmed spectacles on his nose and

through very slowly. When he had f

ous," he said, with a short sigh;

word from me to assure him that I would always love him and that I would wait for him. Why was that letter kept from me? Why was I not allowed to reply to it? My father would not have kept the letter from me, had he not been strick

"who even at this moment forgives an erring

oked the personification of revolt, he placed his warm, g

nt things in the scheme of God's entire creation th

happy," murmured Elsa

he patted her hands tenderly, "but it does not happen to have been God's way. Now

dully, "if father had not been stricken down with illness the very next

t unfinished, broken by

y, "then you might perhaps have been happy according to your own light

nd once more her eye

be happy again,

good God has given to us all. The only thing is that we can't always be happy in our own way; but the other ways-if they are God's ways-are very much better, believe me. Why He chose to part you from Andor

being happy in our way. There could be no wrong in two people ca

k of the 'might-have-been' is a closed one for u

iterated, with the obstinacy of a vain regret;

e happy in God's way: you are going to do your duty by your mother and your father, and, above all, by your husband. You are going to fill your life by thoughts of God first and then of others, instead of filling it with purely selfish joys. You are going to walk up the road of life, my child, with duty to guide you over

e kind priest, who after life's vicissitudes had found anchorage in this forlorn village in the midst of the plains, knew exactly how to deal with these childlike souls. Like those who live their lives upon the sea, the Hungarian peasant sees only immensity around him, and above him that wonderful dome which hides its ineffable my

he sowing of the maize and the corn, the travail of the earth and the growing and developing of the stately heads of maize from one tiny, dried, yellow grain-th

said. I will not say that she ceased to regret, nor that the grief of her heart was laid low, but her heart wa

oom side by side-he the consoler and she the healed. The flickering candle light played curious and fantastic tricks with their forms and faces, lighting up now and then the wrinkled,

Pater Bonifácius at last, "just the prayer which our de

er fair head was bowed, her face hidden in her hands. Word for word no

low, raftered room, Pater Bonifácius laid his hand upo