"I shall never have a chance at a cathe-
dral," he would reply. "And, besides, it
always seems to me so material and so im-
pertinent to build a little structure of stone
and wood in which to worship God!"

You see what he was like? He was frivo-
lous, yet one could never tell when he would
become eloquently earnest.

Brainard went off suddenly Westward one
day. I suspected that Jessica was at the
bottom of it, but I asked no questions; and
I did not hear from him for months. Then I
got a letter from Colorado.

"I have married a mountain woman," he
wrote. "None of your puny breed of modern
femininity, but a remnant left over from the
heroic ages, -- a primitive woman, grand and
vast of spirit, capable of true and steadfast
wifehood. No sophistry about her; no
knowledge even that there is sophistry.
Heavens! man, do you remember the ron-
deaux and triolets I used to write to those
pretty creatures back East? It would take
a Saga man of the old Norseland to write
for my mountain woman. If I were an
artist, I would paint her with the north star