"I have placed it under a better safeguard," replied Maria in a tremulous
voice, and she looked it Marcus with an appeal for sympathy. "Now, for
the last time, I ask you: Will you accede to my demands or will you
not?"

"I will not," said Demetrius resolutely.

"Then I must find a new agent to manage the estates."

"You will soon find one; but your land--which is our land too--will
become a desert. Poor land! If you destroy its shrines and sanctuaries
you will destroy its soul; for they are the soul of the land. The first
inhabitants gathered round the sanctuary, and on that sanctuary and the
gods that dwell there the peasant founds his hopes of increase on what he
sows and plants, and of prosperity for his wife and children and cattle
and all that he has. In destroying his shrines you ruin his hopes, and
with them all the joy of life. I know the peasant; he believes that his
labors must be vain if you deprive him of the gods that make it thrive.
He sows in hope, in the swelling of the grain he sees the hand of the
gods who claim his joyful thanksgiving after the harvest is gathered in.
You are depriving him of all that encourages and uplifts and rejoices his
soul when you ruin his shrines and altars!"

"But I give him other and better ones," replied Mary.

"Take care then that they are such as he can appreciate," said Demetrius
gravely. "Persuade him to love, to believe, to hope in the creed you
force upon him; but do not rob him of what he trusts in before he is
prepared to accept the substitute you offer him.--Now, let me go; we are
neither of us in the temper to make the best arrangements for the future.