annot writeand if I

Charles Dickens ElecBook Classics

could, how should I tell her! It is better as it is.”

“Yes, yes, better as it is.”

“What I have been thinking as we came along, and what I am

still thinking now, as I look into your kind strong face which gives

me so much support, is this:If the Republic really does good to

the poor, and they come to be less hungry, and in all ways to suffer

less, she may live a long time: she may even live to be old.”

“What then, my gentle sister?”

“Do you think”; the uncomplaining eyes in which there is so

much endurance, fill with tears, and the lips part a little more and

tremble: “that it will seem long to me, while I wait for her in the

better land where I trust both you and I will be mercifully

sheltered?”

“It cannot be, my child; there is no Time there, and no trouble

there.”

“You comfort me so much! I am so ignorant. Am I to kiss you

now? Is the moment come?”

“Yes.”

She kisses his lips; he kisses hers; they solemnly bless each

other. The spare hand does not tremble as he releases it; nothing

worse than a sweet, bright constancy is in the patient face. She

goes next before himis gone; the knitting-women count Twenty-

Two.

“I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord: he that

believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and