"The Church of England," said the captain, who had not been moved a whit, "says that two sacraments are necessary. I find nothing about stools of repentance. Come, Nelly, my girl, remember that you are a Church-woman."
"Yet," said Angela, "what are we to say when a man is so brave and true, and when he lives the life? Nelly dear—girls all—I think that religion should not be a terror but a great calm and a trust. Let us love each other and do our work and take the simple happiness that God gives, and have faith. What more can we do? To-night, I think, we cannot dance or sing, but I will play to you."
She played to them—grand and solemn music—so that the terror went out of their brains, and the hardening out of their hearts, and next day all was forgotten.
In this manner and this once did Tom Coppin cross Angela's path. Now he will cross it no more, because his work is over. If a man lives on less than the bare necessaries in order to give to others; if he does the work of ten men; if he gives himself no rest any day in the week, what happens to that man when typhus seizes him?
He died, as he had lived, in glory, surrounded by Joyful Jane, Hallelujah Jem, Happy Polly, Thankful Sarah, and the rest of them. His life has been narrated in the "War Cry;" it is specially recorded of him that he was always "on the mountains," which means, in their language, that he was a man of strong faith, free from doubt, and of emotional nature.
The extremely wicked and hardened family, consisting of an old woman and half a dozen daughters, for whose soul's sake he starved himself and thereby fell an easy prey to the disease, have nearly all found a refuge in the workhouse, and are as hardened as ever, though not so wicked, because some kinds of wickedness are not allowed in that place of virtue. Therefore it seems almost as if poor Tom's life has been fooled away. According to a philosophy which makes a great deal of noise just now, every life is but a shadow, a dream, a mockery, a catching at things impossible, and a waste of good material, ending with the last breath. Then all our lives are fooled away, and why not Tom's as well as the rest? But if the older way of thinking is, after all, right, then that life can hardly have been wasted which was freely given—even if the gift was not accepted—for the advantage of others. Because the memory and the example remain, and every example—if boys and girls could only be taught this copy-book truth—is like an inexhaustible horn, always filled with precious seed.
CHAPTER XXXII. BUNKER AT BAY.
Harry was thinking a good deal about the old man's strange story of the houses. There was, to be sure, little dependence to be placed in the rambling, disjointed statements made by so old a man. But, then, this statement was so clear and precise. There were so many children—there were so many houses (three for each child), and he knew exactly what became of all those houses. If the story had been told by a man in the prime of life, it could not have been more exact and detailed. But what were the houses—where were they? And how could he prove that they were his own?