For herself the new worship was a crowning sign of the triumph of Humanity.  Her heart had yearned for some such thing as this—­some public corporate profession of what all now believed.  She had so resented the dulness of folk who were content with action and never considered its springs.  Surely this instinct within her was a true one; she desired to stand with her fellows in some solemn place, consecrated not by priests but by the will of man; to have as her inspirers sweet singing and the peal of organs; to utter her sorrow with thousands beside her at her own feebleness of immolation before the Spirit of all; to sing aloud her praise of the glory of life, and to offer by sacrifice and incense an emblematic homage to That from which she drew her being, and to whom one day she must render it again.  Ah! these Christians had understood human nature, she had told herself a hundred times:  it was true that they had degraded it, darkened light, poisoned thought, misinterpreted instinct; but they had understood that man must worship —­must worship or sink.

For herself she intended to go at least once a week to the little old church half-a-mile away from her home, to kneel there before the sunlit sanctuary, to meditate on sweet mysteries, to present herself to That which she was yearning to love, and to drink, it might be, new draughts of life and power.

Ah! but the Bill must pass first....  She clenched her hands on the rail, and stared steadily before her on the ranks of heads, the open gangways, the great mace on the table, and heard, above the murmur of the crowd outside and the dying whispers within, her own heart beat.

She could not see Him, she knew.  He would come in from beneath through the door that none but He might use, straight into the seat beneath the canopy.  But she would hear His voice—­that must be joy enough for her....

Ah! there was silence now outside; the soft roar had died.  He had come then.  And through swimming eyes she saw the long ridges of heads rise beneath her, and through drumming ears heard the murmur of many feet.  All faces looked this way; and she watched them as a mirror to see the reflected light of His presence.  There was a gentle sobbing somewhere in the air—­was it her own or another’s? ... the click of a door; a great mellow booming over-head, shock after shock, as the huge tenor bells tolled their three strokes; and, in an instant, over the white faces passed a ripple, as if some breeze of passion shook the souls within; there was a swaying here and there; and a passionless voice spoke half a dozen words in Esperanto, out of sight: 

“Englishmen, I assent to the Bill of Worship.”

III

It was not until mid-day breakfast on the following morning that husband and wife met again.  Oliver had slept in town and telephoned about eleven o’clock that he would be home immediately, bringing a guest with him:  and shortly before noon she heard their voices in the hall.