"Well, and—"
"I left it all to him. I knew it would be misery, and I did not care in what way; but then, Marian, O! worse than all, he said it must be my own doing."
"I suppose it must."
"He said he would help me; but I was the only person who had a right to do anything! O, Marian, Marian, I wish I could die."
"It will be over in time!" repeated Marian.
"Yes, but it will not be over. Mamma, papa, O I shall be reproached with it for ever; I shall know I have made him unhappy. O would that I could begin all over again!"
"You will have comfort at last in having been strong. The greater the effort the nobler it is! O, Caroline, do only hold out nobly. It is so glorious to have something to suffer for the sake of doing right!"
"Glorious!" murmured Caroline, her desponding gaze raised to contemplate the grand head, fine brow, firm lips, and dark glancing eye, turned up for a moment in the enthusiastic spirit of self-devotion. That look, unknowing as was Marian that she wore it, penetrated into Caroline's soul, and warmed her too with the temper of martyrdom. "Glorious;" she repeated a second time, and the tone was not so broken and hopeless as before.
"To be sure it is!" said Marian, going on with her own thoughts, "and it is so seldom people can ever partake of it, in ever so slight a degree, in these days; I always think it so beautiful where the account is given of the Apostles' great joy when they found a persecution was really going to begin."
"Persecution—yes, real persecution."