BY GEORGE MAC DONALD, LL.D.
VOL. III.
CONTENTS OF VOL. III.
I. A WALK WITH MY WIFE
II. OUR LAST SHORE-DINNER
III. A PASTORAL VISIT.
IV. THE ART OF NATURE
V. THE SORE SPOT
VI. THE GATHERING STORM.
VII. THE GATHERED STORM.
VIII. THE SHIPWRECK
IX. THE FUNERAL
X. THE SERMON.
XI. CHANGED PLANS.
XII. THE STUDIO.
XIII. HOME AGAIN.
The autumn was creeping up on the earth, with winter holding by its skirtsbehind; but before I loose my hold of the garments of summer, I must writea chapter about a walk and a talk I had one night with my wife. It hadrained a good deal during the day, but as the sun went down the air beganto clear, and when the moon shone out, near the full, she walked theheavens, not "like one that hath been led astray," but as "queen andhuntress, chaste and fair."
"What a lovely night it is!" said Ethelwyn, who had come into mystudy—where I always sat with unblinded windows, that the night and hercreatures might look in upon me—and had stood gazing out for a moment.
"Shall we go for a little turn?" I said.
"I should like it very much," she answered. "I will go and put on my bonnetat once."
In a minute or two she looked in again, all ready. I rose, laid aside myPlato, and went with her. We turned our steps along the edge of the down,and descended upon the breakwater, where we seated ourselves upon the samespot where in the darkness I had heard the voices of Joe and Agnes. What adifferent night it was from that! The sea lay as quiet as if it could notmove for the moonlight that lay upon it. The glory over it was so mighty inits peacefulness, that the wild element beneath was afraid to toss itselfeven with the motions of its natural unrest. The moon was like the face ofa saint before which the stormy people has grown dumb. The rocks stood upsolid and dark in the universal aether, and the pulse of the ocean throbbedagainst them with a lapping gush, soft as the voice of a passionate childsoothed into shame of its vanished petulance. But the sky was the glory.Although no breath moved below, there was a gentle wind abroad in the upperregions. The air was full of masses of cloud, the vanishing fragments ofthe one great vapour which had been pouring down in rain the most of theday. These masses were all setting with one steady motion eastward into theabysses of space; now obscuring the fair moon, now solemnly sweeping awayfrom before her. As they departed, out shone her marvellous radiance, ascalm as ever. It was plain that she knew nothing of what we called hercovering, her obscuration, the dimming of her glory. She had been busy allthe time weaving her lovely opaline damask on the other side of the mass inwhich we said she was swallowed up.
"Have you ever noticed, wifie," I said, "how the eyes of our minds—almostour bodily eyes—are opened sometimes to the cubicalness of nature, as itwere?"
"I don't know, Harry, for I don't understand your question," she answered.
"Well, it