ts did I go up to that room alone, and,
with no sound of human proximity to cheer me or to break the wretched
feeling of utter solitude, I endured the same experience. At last I
could bear it no longer, and determined to have a change of air and
surroundings. I hastily packed a travelling-bag and my color-box,
leaving all my extra clothes in the wardrobes and the bureau drawers,
told the landlady I should return in a week or two, and paid her for the
remainder of the time in advance. The last thing I did was to take my
travelling-cap, which hung near the head of my bed. A break in the
wallpaper showed that there was a small door here. Pulling the knob
which had held my cap, the door was readily opened, and disclosed a
small niche in the wall. Leaning against the back of the niche was a
small crucifix with a rude figure of Christ, and suspended from the neck
of the image by a small cord was a triangular object covered with faded
cloth. While I was examining with some interest the hiding-place of
these relics, the landlady entered.

"What are these?" I asked.

"Oh, signore!" she said, half sobbing as she spoke. "Those are relics of
my poor husband. He was an artist like yourself, signore. He was--he
was--ill, very ill--and in mind as well as body, signore. May the
Blessed Virgin rest his soul! He hated the crucifix, he hated the
scapular, he hated the priests. Signore, he--he died without the
sacrament, and cursed the holy water. I have never dared to touch those
relics, signore. But he was a good man, and the best of husbands"; and
she buried her face in her hands.

I took the first train for Naples, and have never been in Rome since.

At the Hermitage

BY E. LEVI BROWN

The October sun was shining hot, but it was cool and pleasant inside the
mill. The brown water in Sawny Creek lapped softly against the rocks in
its bed, and the sycamore and cottonwood trees, which grew from the
water's edge up the steep, muddy banks, stood straight and motionless in
the warm sunny air, no touch of autumn upon them yet; only the
sweet-gums were turning slightly yellow, and the black-gums were tinging
red. It wanted two hours of sunset, but blackbirds were on their way
home, and the thickets were noisy with their crying.

Inside the moss-grown old mill there was music and dancing going on,
for, comfortably reclining on a pile of cotton seed in the rough
ginning-room, with thick festoons of cobwebs everywhere, and bits of