Of late years, music had been her resource, the more efficient in that it ministered to hope.

By degrees even her charitable activity had diminished; since her mother's death she had abandoned the habit of 'district visiting.' As confidence of the one supreme attainment grew in her, the mere accessories of her moral life were allowed to fall away.

She professed no change of opinion, indeed under.
went none, but opinion became, as with most women, distinct from practice.

She still pretended to rejoice as often as she persuaded Wilfrid to go to church, but it was noticeable that she willingly allowed his preference for the better choral services, and seemed to take it for granted that the service was only of full efficacy when performed together with her....
'Let me die now! It is only for this that I have lived!' The cry came from her very heart.

For once Wilfrid had been overcome, had thrown off his rather sad-coloured wooing, had uttered such words as her soul yearned for.