It was not long before William had his family domesticated in his home. For a while it required most of his time and attention to restore them and Merle to even seemingly well conditions. By the time one was better another would fail, yet this was the happiest period so far in his life, and his contented mind showed forth in his every expression and act. Not that every condition was precisely what he desired, for there were often conflicts between stubborn wills, but he had been disciplined in the stern, hard, rigid school of experience.

The loneliness he had endured in the beautiful home that was the envy of so many, will never be known to any save himself. His wife can never realize it, for she has had her child to occupy her attention. His was a nature hard to understand, as he possessed a pride so deep and strong it was easier for him to endure suffering than to accept pity or sympathy.

The darkest season of his life had been lived alone. In early youth he had been left an orphan, inheriting vast riches. His remembrances of his parents were very vague, and he had neither agreed with nor respected his guardian. He had been practically unrestricted and developed an imperious, haughty temperament, expecting his words and wishes to always command obedience and attention because they always had.

When he met Clarissa, she embodied, to his mind, just the qualities with which he had endowed his ideal of woman. She was beautiful in person, gracious and graceful in deportment, cultured, refined, and gifted with a glorious voice that cultivation had rendered little less than marvellous in power and richness. He immediately gave her all the love that was in his hitherto unexpressed nature, and cherished only one thought—to call her his.

The force and power of his intense nature was great. From his earliest recollections he had been accustomed to obtain everything he had desired, and this fact lent extra power to his purpose to win this woman for his wife.

Never having learned to curb his desires, nor to experience failure, his thoughts went forth ardent and strong, with never a doubt he should win her, and his thoughts were therefore charged with unusually strong magnetism. His wooing was short and ardent, for his imperious nature was unwilling to await patiently what he might desire, and his world of happiness was encompassed within the radius of her presence and affection. He was impatient of any intrusion upon their privacy, and being accustomed to consider his word and wishes as law, he had believed a husband was master and arbiter of his wife's fate and life, and became furiously jealous, exacting and unreasonable.

Some women would have yielded submissively to the demands he made upon her, but Clarissa had herself been nurtured and developed under a regime of independence similar to his own, and likewise thought her wishes should always be consulted. Her beauty and talent had brought her admiration, flattery and homage, and it was impossible that she should be content or satisfied with one person's favor.

She was proud of her husband, loving him beyond all else on earth, but she had ever been used to command—not to obey. Dictation brought forth all the resistance and ire of her nature, and she would not yield. She loved to be noticed, flattered and praised, and William's extreme jealousy was therefore a tax upon her patience. Neither would change to suit the methods of the other, for each thought the other wrong.

Finally there came a climax, unusually severe. Clarissa, thinking herself greatly injured, left him, and taking Dinah, who had been her nurse in childhood, returned to her father. James and Nancy had also been servants in her father's house, following her when she married, and went into her new home. James' sympathy, however, was with his young master, whom he idolized, and he remained with him, trusting in a speedy reunion, but William and Clarissa were too proud to seek each other's forgiveness. Each believed the other to be entirely at fault.

William never had known he was a father, believing she had left him because she preferred a man whom he bitterly hated, therefore never sought to trace or find her. That people should not think he was weak enough to suffer through a fickle woman, he immediately left the place, and sought a new home, where he devoted all his time, wealth and energy to the study of mesmeric influence, the efficacy of which he had heard much. His pride continually said to him—"She has left you of her own choice.—She has disgraced you.—You must never admit you suffer."

When angry, he was actually irresponsible for many of the things he did, and the words he uttered. To so impetuous a nature, no other feeling could be so strong as jealousy, which seemed to render him temporarily insane.

In the very vortex of his passion, Clarissa told him she was about to become a mother. Under any other conditions, how happy such a revelation would have made him! Under such as those in which she had imparted the information, however, she might as well have gone to a person incapable of understanding as to expect him to remember what she said after they had ceased their quarrel.

Of course, she believed he remembered what she had told him, and because it did not soften his anger, making him loving and tender to her, she rushed to the conclusion he did not want to acknowledge the child as his own. Such injustice angered and irritated her, and she had returned to her father, telling him her side of the story. Her father, having always indulged her every whim, felt William was unjust, so made no effort to reconcile the conditions. While Augustus was very young, he passed away, leaving them alone, with plenty of money to care for themselves. Thus both she and William suffered, never learning, even in the severe school of life, to curb the haste of their uncontrolled natures.

There could be no better illustration of their attitude toward one another than that of two positive chemicals, which the chemist of love was trying to assimilate and compound into united action. Being equally positive, they held one another at bay, or at least, at such a distance as to preserve their individualities from the influence of the other, consequently were never drawn into concerted action as the object of each seemed to be to enhance his or her individuality.

Neither being wholly right or wholly wrong, both did as well as they understood, and the stern discipline of suffering was needed to refine their souls and bring into prominence their real value and worth.

In like manner as a diamond when taken from the ground contains within itself all the beauty and excellence it can be made to show, they were obliged to pass through the tests of true love, which declare its real worth, and bring forth such proofs of its superiority over mere physical attraction, as the passage of the diamond through the fierce tests of heat and fire, which proclaim its value beyond that of the ingenious and skillful imitations, for while they become disintegrated and their beauties are destroyed, the real gems only gleam the brighter because of the severity of the test. Like the diamond, the jewel of true love must always possess the ability to rise superior to those conditions which quench and destroy the flame of physical attraction often masquerading under the guise of love. The stronger and purer the love, the greater and more severe the tests it can withstand.

Both William and Clarissa had suffered much; instead, however, of estranging their souls, or, as many would say, their hearts, it only served to draw them nearer together, though they were physically far apart. No other woman could satisfy William's ideals, and no other man could fill William's place in Clarissa's affections, although they were unable to agree or satisfy one another, neither would acknowledge any wrong, so while each longed for the other's love and confidence, neither would make advances toward a reconciliation.

The fires of the furnace of suffering had destroyed much dross in both their natures, while the real jewel of their loves gleamed brighter and brighter as time passed.

Augustus passed his embryotic development and birth under such conditions, while his mother was suffering and smarting from the wounds of supposedly unappreciated love. Clarissa tried to the best of her knowledge to fill the place of both mother and father to him, going to the opposite extreme, mistaking indulgence for the expression of love. In so doing she was quite as selfish as William, who had expected so much from her, finding her own happiness in Augustus' pleasure, deceiving herself into the belief she was unselfish.

Such sentiments can never be unselfish, for does not unselfishness mean the unalloyed pleasure of giving, lovingly and generously to another, without consulting one's own aspirations, that the happiness which they enjoy may be for their good and betterment?