expression of pain which she was puzzled
to understand.

The service went on. The sermon was long and tiresome, to judge from the
impulsive movement of relief on the part of the little girl when all was
at last over. She was well satisfied when her companion went down the
aisle at an unusually rapid pace. The rustics generally lingered to hear
when there was to be an auction, what letters were to be distributed,
and other announcements by which a scattered congregation, rarely
meeting through the week, might be made aware of matters secular and
parochial which it was important for them to know.

The butterfly worshippers had, as it were, flown away when the mass of
the congregation streamed out from the door. Long, narrow black lines
stretched off in every direction as over the well-trodden paths the
cottagers plodded away to their homes after this the periodical great
event, recreation, and social gathering of their hard-working lives.

Alone the little woman in black took her way. Her goal was on the long
rocky ridge that bounded the eastern horizon like a transplanted bit of
the Jura. There was no path for her to follow, but she made her way over
the meadows with the sure instinct of the swallow winging its flight to
its winter home. He who careth for the birds would surely care for her.
It was plain she was one of the humble of the earth in every sense of
the word. Her black head kerchief was old and worn, and her
clumsily-fitting, coarse cloth "sacque" stood out below her waist as if
it were of sheet iron, while her spare skirts fell below it like a
drooping flower-bell from its open calyx above. She was not thinking of
her clothes. Her heart was warbling a song of thanksgiving.

CHAPTER II.

AT THE PASTOR'S.

Monday morning had come, with work for the workers and pleasure for the
pleasure-seekers. The curate at Kulleby was one of the workers, and yet
Monday, instead of Sunday, was really his day of rest. His last sermon
having been delivered, fairly given over to his hearers to be digested,
the new one was not to be begun before Tuesday. There must be one day in
the week in which to draw a free breath before the real labour of his
life was to be recommenced. The introduction to the discourse once
mastered, as the first link, he added day by day to the lengthening
chain--a perpetual wearying weight to him, and, it might be supposed, to
become so for his hearers.

This would be a mistake. Had the cur