regularity and affectionate grace of clock-work; never asked her if
she didn't want any more--would not have refused her if she had asked
for double.

This evening, while the sun was shining with all his evening glory on
Susan Merton's house, Meadows went slowly to his window and pulled
down the blind, and drawing his breath hard shut the loved prospect
out.

He then laid his hand upon the table, and he said: "I swear by the
holy bread and wine I took last month that I will not put myself in
the way of this strong temptation. I swear I will go no more to
Grassmere Farm, never so long as I love Susan." He added faintly,
"Unless they send for me, and they won't do that, and I won't go of my
own accord, I swear it. I have sworn it, however, and I swear it
again--unless they send for me!"

Then he sat by the fire with his head in his hands--a posture he never
was seen in before. Next he wrote a note and sent it hastily with a
horse and cart to that small whitewashed cottage.

Old Mrs. Meadows sat in her doorway reading a theological work called
"Believers' Buttons." She took the note, looked at it. "Why, this is
from John, I think; what can he have to say to me?" She put on her
spectacles again, which she had taken off on the messenger first
accosting her, and deliberately opened, smoothed and read the note. It
ran thus:


"Mother, I am lonely. Come over and stay awhile with me, if you