long ago-yet brought so near by the human interest, which never grows old, threading every line of the terrible tragedy-so impress his imagination, so overmaster his own narrower experiences, that he had almost lost himself in following the footsteps of the poet-king, as he wandered from probity to error, from the heights of magnanimous self-renunciation to the lowest depths of cowardly treachery.

As in the sermon to which Miss Banks had referred he traced the career of Elijah in words that stirred the hearts of his hearers, and for a moment hurried the movements of their pulses, languid from long prosperity, cold from the thraldom of fashion, so now he carried along the stream of his eloquence an attention not easy to arouse; an interest difficult, as he well knew, to awaken.

He

But he was not thinking then either of his audience or himself. His thoughts were in Palestine, with the young lad watching those few sheep in the wilderness. forgot the modern Babylon wherein his own lot was cast; the men and women living in it, who, like the Athenians, are from very weariness and empty-mindedness for ever crying aloud to be told something new. Though his outward eyes rested on rank and beauty, on everything which could please the sight and delight the superficial mind, his imagination showed him scenes of deeper interest, of wide experiences, of wild excitement; and in burning words he tracked the course of David's life from the time when he was anointed by Samuel, as he hoped some day in his own person to eagerly track the paths he followed when fleeing for his life, when speeding to victory.

A wonderful story, truly; story, truly;

stranger than any fiction, wilder in its romance than the heart of man could have conceived; so full of adventure, of danger, of honour, of reward, of anxiety, of peril, that the listeners held their breath as the preacher passed rapidly from point to point of that marvellous biography.

He touched on the inconsistencies of the man's character; the at first sight almost irreconcilable qualities a novelist would have tried to explain and analyse, but which the Scripture narrative passes over without a word of comment. The audacity and modesty, the strength and weakness, the courage and the cowardice, the force and the feebleness, the boundless generosity and the incredible vindictiveness; all these opposite traits Mr. Woodham brought before his hearers, showing the contradictions in the psalmist's nature, and proving that, throughout the whole of his troubled career, he never met with so dangerous, mighty, and insidious a foe as himself.

Even

accus

It was a fine discourse. those present who were tomed to run after good preachers, and follow clerical orators from abbey to chapel and cathedral to church, subsequently confessed they were, for the time, carried off their feet' by the words of this man's address.

Here were no tricks of elocution; no practised action with which to impress his utterances on his hearers. His manner was simplicity itself; his gestures few and far between; and his language, to those accustomed to a more redundant style, might have seemed almost bald. But the latter was not severe from any lack of words in which to clothe his ideas-rather it impressed an attentive listener with the feeling of abundant vitality..

In following him the hearer felt he was not putting out all his strength; that behind the measured sentences, the calm composure, the wonderful fluency, which neither hurried nor hesitated, there was a strong reserve force. And that force was displayed when he came to speak of the murder of Uriah, of the sin for which divine justice mingled bitter with the cup of David's whole future life.

6

Had such an ending been foretold when, tending those few sheep' in the wilderness, he looked eagerly onward over the years to come; when he trod the hills of Palestine young and humble, strong, valiant, faithful, he might well, like Hazael, have asked, 'Is thy servant a dog that he should do this?'

And yet, like Hazael, he did do it.

When Saul sought to destroy him, he spared his adversary's life. When he lay sleeping undreaming of danger, the brave soldier, the sweet singer of Israel, cut off the skirt of the king's robe, and took the cruse of water and the spear from beside his bolster, but let the sleeper dream on unharmed; and now the same man set himself coolly to compass the death of his friend, one of the thirty-and-three who fetched him, at the peril of their own safety, that draught of longed-for water from the well of Bethlehem, but which, when they brought it, he refused to drink, saying,

'Far be it, O Lord, that I should do this. Is not this the blood of the men that went in jeopardy of their lives?

The great argument which has always been used in defence of the poet-king's treachery, Mr. Woodham would not admit as much, if any, excuse for David's baseness.

The Almighty, speaking through His servant Nathan, takes no notice of the penalty incurred by either man or woman, while the king himself, by his silence, evidently feels such penalty to be quite beside the question.

He had sinned; and in the train of that sin followed all the vices which constitute the dark retinue of guilt, amongst them deceit, cowardice, treachery.

What a picture was that the preacher drew of David's heart while he wrote his letter to Joab; of his blunted conscience; his craven fears; his abject terror; his forgetfulness of the God who had raised him to be ruler over Israel; his ingratitude to the servant who had been true to him in his time of need!

All this wickedness planned deliberately also! It might be in the extremest exigency; but still with plenty of time to plot, to contrive, to deliberate, to draw back.

And then the hypocrisy with which he bade the messenger who, fulfilling Joab's command (Joab who afterwards thrust Absolom through the heart while he was yet alive), told the king, Uriah the Hittite is dead,' say to him who sent the tidings,

Let not this thing displease thee, for the sword devoureth one as well as another.'

Ah, had Uriah but died by the sword fairly and honestly, happy might David have been in the after time which he lived through, distracted by bitter feuds and hatred amongst his own children, by the rebellion of Absolom, by the intrigues of Adonijah, so that his last days were disturbed by the machinations of those who would have ousted Solomon from the succession.

A mere outline this of the sermon; the slightest skeleton of a

discourse which the preacher's genius and earnestness made flesh and blood-a living breathing humanity. Only a story of the sin of a sinner; but such a sinner! A story well-nigh three. thousand years old; yet one which fell on the ears of those who heard fresh as though the transgression had been of yesterday, the punishment still to be wrought out.

'There are persons,' so Mr. Woodham said, at the end of his sermon, 'at the present day, as no doubt there have been persons in all days, who think lightly of the sin which called down on David's head the wrath of God. I cannot imagine why this should be. It baffles me to imagine how it has come to pass that reasonable human beings should think or speak lightly of such guilt. We have seen what his sin wrought for the psalmist not merely the death of the child, which is the point where most people seem to think his chastisement ended, but the long series of disasters that followed his footsteps from the time of Uriah's death till he himself waxed old and stricken in years, and the days drew nigh that he should die.

"There is an idea abroad-why, it would be difficult to say-that, under the Gospel dispensation, this crime is not so heinous as under the law. Now this is a total mistake. If there be any difference it is, as modern society is constituted, a more cruel wrong than in the time of Uriah. God forbid I should say the tie of wife and child was less strong in that far-away time, when most men had several wives and many children. Not a line of the Old Testament but forbids this opinion; but yet it seems to me that, in our own case, here amongst us, with a better light shining across

our lives, with a purer day gladdening our existence, the guilt of adultery is greater than even under the old law, when it was enacted that death should be the penalty for such an offence, that "evil might be put away from Israel."

'My friends, do not deceive yourselves. If, under a more merciful dispensation, the punishment is lighter, the crime in the sight of God is none the less. Reading the divine law by the light of history, there is but one in its consequences worse to be found, and that David did not commit. If you bear this fact well in mind, you will be better able to understand the man.

In an age steeped in idolatry, ruler over a people given at the smallest provocation, or indeed at none, to turn and inquire of gods that were not gods, and honour any save Him who made the heaven and the earth, David stood firm.

'I do not say he was always faithful; men such as he rarely are. It seems incredible to us, looking back over his story, that he should have forgotten so often that God who was his God; nevertheless, this remains: he never turned aside to strange altars; he did not make his sons and daughters pass through the fire to Moloch, he offered no human sacrifices; so far as in his weak humanity lay, he obeyed God, he worshipped God, he loved God.'

Mr. Woodham added but a few

words more. He had one great merit sometimes not possessed even by famous preachers. He knew when to stop; he did not weaken the force of the story he had told by recapitulating its details. He had reproduced the man's weakness and his strength, his sin and his repentance; he had given many amongst the congregation something to think of if they

ever meant to think at all; and as he uttered his last sentence he cast a strange, lingering, yearning look around, as though he would fain have learnt if any heart was touched, any conscience wrung by that terrible narrative of sin and treachery, of punishment and repentance.

The vast crowd swept out; nothing common or unclean trailed its long skirts down those paved aisles, I warrant you. No Magdalene among that assemblage, covering her tear-stained face with shrouding hair; no Bathsheba the world wot of; no sinner man could distinguish, walking with downcast eyes and pallid face out from the presence of God, back into the weary dreary world.

Certainly no man or woman present would have imagined Lady Moffat had ever wandered from the path of virtue as, handsome and well dressed, she stood on the pavement exchanging greetings with a very few intimate friends, and bows with those who did not feel privileged to adventure a warmer greeting.

She was looking remarkably well, better in health than had been the case for some time previously, handsome, prosperous, the very ideal of worldly happiness. A slight colour tinged her cheeks; her wonderful eyes drew admiring, almost startled, looks from many persons who that day saw Lady Moffat for the first time, and remembered afterwards they had so seen her. In her sables and her velvets, in her rich attire, in the very zenith of her magnificent beauty, who could have guessed she had ever stood in the morning twilight by the gate of that mean house in the Romfordroad, poor, lonely, and, so far as any efficient help went, friendless?

A change here indeed, my readers, if you think of it, one

only possible in a great city-a metamorphosis that could never have taken place save in the solitude of a multitude, in the utter privacy and secrecy which can be found and compassed nowhere except in the very middle of a mighty crowd.

Thus my lady, with the winter sunshine streaming full upon her unveiled face, with her trailing robes, with her costly furs, with her air of having been a person' which subsequent acquaintance gradually dispelled, with her haughty carriage, with her rare smile, a sight indeed for those who loved the aristocracy—whether of birth or money or both-to feast upon as they passed modestly upon the outside of the pavement, or looked back upon such a vision of beauty and prosperity as they crossed the road opposite St. Theresa's.

As for Sir John, the while he came slowly out tangled amongst an awkward squad of men, he did not look so much unlike the fairy godmother who had wrought such a transformation as might rashly be supposed.

No artist ever represented Cinderella's benefactress as a personally attractive individual, dressed in the extreme of the fashion, and diverting to herself that attention which the glass-slippered young woman properly engrossed.

In similar manner the magician who, with a wave of his wand, changed Mira Palthorpe into Lady Moffat; the narrow house-nothing save her husband's love made beautiful-into a great mansion in Palace Gardens ; the old red shawl into costliest sables; the poor dress which fell in such graceful folds around her young slight figure into silks and velvets a queen might have worn; the humble surroundings into such luxury as could better be catalogued by an

auctioneer than one so ignorant of such articles as a humble novelist; the modest and old-fashioned method of getting along the world's roads to well-appointed carriages and horses, each one of which cost over three times the salary the young fellow who lost all for love received in those far-away days, the magician, I say, who wrought all these miracles came out of church looking, as was very fit indeed, a grim sort of wizard, hard-featured, stern-faced, gray of aspect, worn of soul.

Looking at him, my readers. who are behind the scenes may conclude he found the Galatea himself had created a very doubtful blessing; that during Mr. Woodham's sermon, his thoughts having gone on a long and weary journey, he came out of church exhausted, just as Cinderella's godmother might, if mortal, have felt when the last horse was put to the coach, and the final touch added to her protégée's toilette.

'Are you not well, Sir John? asked Miss Banks, posing on the pavement as one of the ladies-inwaiting.

She was quick enough to see that gray pallor, that something which, like death, had altered the fashion of the man's countenance. She saw the far-away look in his eyes, the trouble in his face, though she could not in the least comprehend what was amiss.

There stood my lady, happy, handsome, healthy. There stood Sir John, grave, gaunt, grievous of aspect, a mate unfit, apparently, for such a spouse.

'Quite well, thank you,' he answered; but I found the church a little close.'

'Yes, it was close,' agreed Lady Moffat. 'The smell of that stuff-' "Incense,' mildly corrected Miss Banks.

"Yes,' went on her ladyship,

accepting the information, but not availing herself of it-'made me feel faint for a time.'

'You do not look faint now, at any rate,' remarked Sir John, glancing at his wife's bright animated face coolly and critically, without one feeling of admiration, with nothing save a wild wonder that she had ever in his eyes possessed a single charm. The incense was bad enough,' he added, turning to Miss Banks, but I really think the ladies' scents and essences were far worse. I could not have believed perfumes might become so disagreeable.'

'But you dislike all perfumes,' said Lady Moffat, in a tone which implied he had in all respects an imperfect and uncultivated taste. 'Well, yes,' he answered thoughtfully, 'perhaps I do.'

Even the scent of flowers? asked Miss Banks.

'I am afraid I must plead guilty,' he said, looking at the lady, who he found was gazing curiously at him.

Many people cannot sit in the room even with a rose,' she observed carelessly. 'And what did you think of Mr. Woodham, Sir John?'

'He is a fine preacher, a very fine preacher,' replied Sir John.

'I do not care for him,' said Lady Moffat. I do not like him at all. He is so dreadfully longwinded.'