Mother's example, there would be fewer unhappy marriages and wrecked
lives!

But in her secret heart Catherine had also, girl-like, some ideas about
the sort of man she would like to marry, if she might choose. He should
be a minister--that was the nearest she could get to an Officer in those
days; William was a name she particularly liked, and--if only he might be
tall and dark! If you had been there when Katie Mumford first listened to
his preaching you would have seen that he was 'tall and dark' indeed.

But though William Booth loved Catherine with a deep and holy love, which
increased each time they met, yet he was very poor, and he wondered if he
ought, under the circumstances, to ask her to share his lot. He wrote a
letter to her, telling her how perplexed and troubled he was, and her
answer shows us that, right from the very earliest days, before they were
even engaged, her one desire was that his soul should prosper.

'My dear friend,' she begins ... 'The thought that I should cause you any
suffering or increase your perplexity is almost unbearable. I am tempted
to wish that we had never seen each other. Do try to forget me, as far as
the remembrance would injure your usefulness or spoil your peace. If I
have no alternative but to oppose the Will of God, or trample on the
desolations of my own heart, _my choice is made_. "Thy will be done"
is my constant cry. I care not for myself; but Oh, if I cause you to err,
I shall never be happy again.'

It was not the fear of poverty that frightened her, for a few days later
she says:--

'I fear you did not fully understand my difficulty. It was not