200
ETHEL CHURCHILL.
CHAPTER XX.
THE MARRIAGE MORNING.
My heart is filled with bitter thought,
My eyes would fain shed tears;
I have been thinking upon past,
And upon future years.
Years past—why should I stir the depths
Beneath their troubled stream?
And years that are as yet to come,
Of them I dread to dream.
Yet wherefore pause upon our way?
'Tis best to hurry on;
For half the dangers that we fear,
We face them, and they're gone.
The morning came when Norbourne Courtenaye was to marry his cousin. He and his mother had arrived at Norbourne Park the evening before, as it had been settled that the ceremony was to be performed in the little chapel Lord Norbourne had himself built. At
