Ruth 1:16
Penny Dark proposes to Margaret Penhallow in Chapter 4 of A Tangled Web. Although neither of them wants to marry the other, it appears practical to do so. Margaret deliberates:
Finally she remembered that she would certainly have no chance of Aunt Becky’s jug if she stayed an old maid. That tipped the balance. She sat down and wrote a note to Penny. Determined to infuse a little sentiment into her acceptance, she merely sent him a copy of some Bible verse–Ruth’s immortal reply to Naomi. At first Penny didn’t know what the deuce it meant. Then he concluded that she had accepted him. He and Second Peter looked at each other with an air of making up their minds to the inevitable.
In Chapter 23 of Jane of Lantern Hill,
Jane and her father read the Bible, and Jane learns to love it:
‘Whither thou goest I will go; and where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people shall be my people and thy God my God; where thou diest will I die and there will I be buried; the Lord do so to me and more also if aught but death part thee and me.’ The high-water mark of the expression of emotion in any language that I’m acquainted with, Jane… Ruth to Naomi… and all such simple words. Hardly any of more than one syllable… the writer of that verse knew how to marry words as no one else has ever done.
Ruth 1:16
And Ruth said, Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God.
