rd to the porteress, "we have been to visit a
holy place."

"All places are holy with holy thoughts, my brother."

"Dear father, good night," said the Religious; "the blessings of all the
saints be on thee,--and on thee, Stephen, though thou dost not kneel to
them."

"Good night, mine own child," said Gerard.

"I could believe in saints when I am with thee," murmured Stephen; "Good
night,--SYBIL."

Book 2 Chapter 9

When Gerard and his friend quitted the convent they proceeded at a brisk
pace, into the heart of the town. The streets were nearly empty; and
with the exception of some occasional burst of brawl or merriment from
a beer-shop, all was still. The chief street of Mowbray, called
Castle Street after the ruins of the old baronial stronghold in its
neighbourhood, was as significant of the present civilization of this
community as the haughty keep had been of its ancient dependence. The
dimensions of Castle Street were not unworthy of the metropolis: it
traversed a great portion of the town, and was proportionately wide; its
broad pavements and its blazing gas-lights indicated its modern order
and prosperity; while on each side of the street rose huge warehouses,
not as beautiful as the palaces of Venice, but in their way not less
remarkable; magnificent shops; and here and there, though rarely, some
ancient factory built among the fields in the infancy of Mowbray by some
mill-owner not sufficiently prophetic of the future, or sufficiently
confident in the energy and enterprise of his fellow-citizens, to
foresee that the scene of his labours would be the future eye-sore of a
flourishing posterity.

Pursuing their course along Castle Street for about a quarter of a mile,
Gerard and Stephen turned down a street which intersected it, and so
on, through a variety of ways and winding lanes, till they arrived at an
open portion of the town, a district where streets and squares and even
rows, disappeared, and where the tall chimneys and bulky barrack-looking
buildings that rose in all directions, clustering yet isolated,
announced that they were in the principal scene of the industry of
Mowbray. Crossing this open ground they gained a suburb, but one of
a very different description to that in which was situate the convent
where they had parted with Sybil. This one was populous, noisy, and
lighted. It was Saturday night; the streets were thronged; an infinite
population kept swarming to and fro the close