It was hard to finish the hymn, but I would not have dispensed with the Gloria.
'What is it, Phoebe ?' I asked gently, when I had finished.

'I am sorry that I have made you cry.' 'You need not be sorry,' she sobbed at last, with difficulty: 'it eases my head, and I thought nothing would ever draw a tear from me again.

I was too miserable to cry, and they say--I have read it somewhere, in the days when I used to read--that there is no such thing as a tear in hell.' I tried not to look astonished at this strange speech.

I must let this poor creature talk, or how should I ever find out the root of her disease?
so I answered quietly that no doubt she was right, that in that place of outer darkness there should be weeping, without tears, and a gnashing of teeth, beside which our bitterest human sorrow would seem like nothing.
'That is true,' she returned, with a groan; 'but, Miss Garston, hell has begun for me here; for three years I have been in torment, and rightly too,--and rightly too,--for I never was a good woman, never like Susan, who read her Bible and went to church.

Oh, she is a good creature, is Susan.' 'I am glad to hear it, Phoebe: so, you see, your affliction, heavy as it is,--and I am not saying it is not heavy,--is not without alleviation.
The Merciful Father, who has laid this cross upon you, has given you this kind companion as a consoler.