ped in the
clinging folds of her long blue robe, still leaned forward from the
marble background of the apse, compassionate for the suffering ones of
earth, with imploring hands and ceaseless dropping tears, symbol of love
abounding--a symbol, too, of the dignity of those who suffer and are
pure in heart.

This sanctuary was almost a home to the maiden, who came hither to
praise or question, for life was full of enigmas. Here, too, where she
came from duty and deep devotion, with an intricate sensitiveness of
conscience which often rendered her unintelligible to her confessor, she
lingered for delight. For the tracery on the arches--the color, the
wonderful delicacy of the sculpture--were of that time when art was
suggestive and faint, in tint and meaning, like a dream, and its message
was always spiritual.

"It is not Thou, O Christ," she said, "who willest pain; but thy
children, who are not always loving!"

For in her reverie she was comforted by that vision of a legendary time
when the Holy Mother had stood, beautiful, compassionate, and
commanding, in this field of flaming scarlet lilies; when a great
emperor had obeyed her bidding, and San Donato, the Duomo of Murano, had
arisen as a refuge for the sorrowing.

In tender language of the people it was the mother church--"Matrice."

She made a cushion of her cloak and laid the little one upon it, for he
still slept and she would not waken him; and then, though the quaint,
inlaid pavement was cold and bare, she knelt again, her rosary dropping
from her hands as she shyly whispered the burden of her strange new
confession to this ever-waiting, tender Mother--her confession more full
of pain than joy, yet already dear, and a thing not to be surrendered,
though it should bring her only pain.

But there was no other friend to whom she told it.

Soon, alas! the days grew over-full of pain, and Marina came more often
to the Mater Dolorosa, for the little Zuane had not grown stronger with
the coming of the spring; sleep came to him more easily, but it did not
bring refreshment, and the roses on his cheeks were only signs of
failing bloom. Passionately Marina's loving prayers were breathed
before the shrine of the Madonna San Donato, but the little one grew
weaker every day, till, after a long night of watching, a sweet-voiced
nun stood with Marina beside the cradle.

"The burden of the baby's suffering life is changed to blessing," she
said. "Earth held no joy for