Mark watched the receding figure of the clergyman with a heart too full to express thanks. As soon as Mr. Ewart was out of sight, once more the boy threw himself down on the grass, but no longer in a spirit of despair. Trying to realize the truth, that he was indeed in the presence of the Saviour of whom he had heard—that the same eye which regarded the penitent thief with compassion was now regarding him from heaven—he prayed, with the energy of one whose all is at stake, for pardon, for grace, for the Spirit of God! He rose with a feeling of comfort and relief, though the burden on his heart was not yet removed. He believed that the Lord was _gracious and long-suffering, that Jesus came into the world to save sinners_; he had knocked at the strait gate, which gives entrance into life, and mercy had opened it unto him!
“Upon that place stood a Cross, and a little below, in the bottom, a Sepulchre. So I saw in my dream, that just as Christian came up with the Cross, his burden loosed from off his shoulders, and fell from off his back.”—_Pilgrim’s Progress._
“Well, this has been a pretty end to your fine pilgrimage!” cried Jack, as Mark, resolved to tell the truth, whatever it might cost him, finished the account of his rupture with the farmer.
“The end!” said Mark; “my pilgrimage is scarcely begun.”
“It’s a sort of backward travelling, I should say,” laughed Jack. “You begin with quarrelling and stealing; I wonder what you’ll come to at last?”
Mark was naturally of a quick and ardent spirit, only too ready to avenge insult, whether with his tongue or his hand. But at this moment his pride was subdued, he felt less inclined for angry retort; the young pilgrim was more on his guard; his first fall had taught him to walk carefully. Without replying, therefore, to the taunt of Jack, or continuing the subject at all, he turned to Ann Dowley, and asked her if she could lend him a needle and thread.
“Why, I am afraid that I shall be but a poor hand at the work, but I thought that I might manage to patch up one or two of these great holes, and make my dress look a little more respectable.”
“And why do you wish to look respectable?” asked Madge, glancing at him through the uncombed, unwashed locks that hung loosely over her brow; “we get more when we look ragged.”