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ANNE OF THE ISLAND

ever have thought him ugly—but he really is!—with those inspired eyes and that intellectual brow which the roughly-falling hair hid on week days.

“It was a splendid sermon and I could have listened to it forever, and it made me feel utterly wretched. Oh, I wish I was like you, Anne.

“He caught up with me on the road home, and grinned as cheerfully as usual. But his grin could never deceive me again. I had seen the real Jonas. I wondered if he could ever see the real PHIL—whom nobody, not even you, Anne, has ever seen yet.

“‘Jonas,’ I said—I forgot to call him Mr. Blake. Wasn’t it dreadful? But there are times when things like that don’t matter—‘Jonas, you were born to be a minister. You couldn’t be anything else.’

“‘No, I couldn’t,’ he said soberly. ‘I tried to be something else for a long time—I didn’t want to be a minister. But I came to see at last that it was the work given me to do—and God helping me, I shall try to do it.’

“His voice was low and reverent. I thought that he would do his work and do it well and nobly; and happy the woman fitted by nature and training to help him do it. She would be no feather, blown about by every fickle wind of fancy. She would always know what hat to put on. Probably she would have only one. Ministers never have much money. But she wouldn’t mind having one hat or none at all, because she would have Jonas.

“Anne Shirley, don’t you dare to say or hint or