Amru received the son of the Mukaukas as a father might; after examining the result of his labors he found it far superior to his own efforts in the same direction, and he charged Orion to carry out the new division of the country, which he confirmed excepting in a few details.

Perform your duty and do your utmost in the future to go on as you have begun!” cried Amru; and the young man replied: 

“In this bitter and yet happy interval I have become clear on many points.”

“And may I ask on what?” asked the governor.  “I would gladly hear.”

“I have discovered, my lord,” replied Orion, “that there is no such thing as happiness or unhappiness in the sense men give to the words.  Life appears to each of us as we ourselves paint it.  Hard times which come into our lives from outside are often no more than a brief night from which a brighter day presently dawns—­or the stab of a surgeon’s knife, which makes us sounder than before.  What men call grief is, times without number, a path to greater ease; whereas the ordinary happiness of mankind flows, swiftly as running waters, down from that delightful sense of ease.  Like a ship, which, when her rudder is lost, is more likely to ride out the storm on the high seas than near the sheltering coast, so a man who has lost himself may easily recover himself and his true happiness in the wildest turmoil of life, but rarely and with difficulty if his existence runs calmly on.  All other blessings are comparatively worthless if we are not upheld by the consciousness of fulfilling the task of life in faithful earnest, and of cheerfully dealing with the problems it sets before us.  The lost one was found as soon as he placed his whole being and faculties at the service of a higher duty, with God in his heart and before his eyes.  I have learnt from my own experience, and from Paula’s good friends, to strive untiringly after what is right, and to find my own weal in that of others.

“The sense of lost liberty is hard to bear; but leave me love, and give me room and opportunity to prove my best powers in the service of the community, even in a prison—­and though I cannot be perfectly happy, for that is impossible without freedom—­I will be far happier than such an idle and useless spendthrift of time and abilities as I used to be among the dissipations of the capital.”

“Then enjoy the consciousness of duty well performed, with liberty and love,” replied the governor.  “And believe me, my friend, your father in Paradise will no more grudge you all that is loveliest and best than I do.  You are on the road where every curse is turned to blessing.”

The three marriages which Amru had promised to provide for, were celebrated with due splendor.

That of Orion and Paula was a day never to be forgotten by the gay world of Memphis.  Bishop John performed the ceremony, and the young couple at once took possession of the beautiful house left them by Katharina, the real Bride of the Nile.  If it could have been granted to her to read Paula’s and Orion’s hearts, and see how they held her in remembrance, she would have found that to them she was no longer the childish water-wagtail, and that they knew how to value the sacrifice of her young life.