eest the wounds of love in saints are always painted
by us with holy flames ascending from them. Have good courage, sweet
child, and pray with fervor for this youth; for there be no prayers
sweeter before the throne of God than those of spotless maidens. The
Scripture saith, 'My beloved feedeth among the lilies.'"

At this moment the sharp, decided tramp of Elsie was heard reentering
the garden.

"Come, Agnes," she said, "It is time for you to begin your prayers, or,
the saints know, I shall not get you to bed till midnight. I suppose
prayers are a good thing," she added, seating herself wearily; "but if
one must have so many of them, one must get about them early. There's
reason in all things."

Agnes, who had been sitting abstractedly on the parapet, with her head
drooped over the lily-spray, now seemed to collect herself. She rose up
in a grave and thoughtful manner, and, going forward to the shrine of
the Madonna, removed the flowers of the morning, and holding the vase
under the spout of the fountain, all feathered with waving maiden-hair,
filled it with fresh water, the drops falling from it in a thousand
little silver rings in the moonlight.

"I have a thought," said the monk to himself, drawing from his girdle
a pencil and hastily sketching by the moonlight. What he drew was a
fragile maiden form, sitting with clasped hands on a mossy ruin, gazing
on a spray of white lilies which lay before her. He called it, The
Blessed Virgin pondering the Lily of the Annunciation.

"Hast thou ever reflected," he said to Agnes, "what that lily might be
like which the angel Gabriel brought to our Lady?--for, trust me, it was
no mortal flower, but grew by the river of life. I have often meditated
thereon, that it was like unto living silver with a light in itself,
like the moon,--even as our Lord's garments in the Transfiguration,
which glistened like the snow. I have cast about in myself by what
device a painter might represent so marvellous a flower."

"Now, brother Antonio," said Elsie, "if you begin to talk to the child
about such matters, our Lady alone knows when we shall get to bed. I am
sure I'm as good a Christian as anybody; but, as I said, there's reason
in all things, and one cannot always be wondering and inquiring into
heavenly matters,--as to every feather in Saint Michael's wings, and as
to our Lady's girdle and shoe-strings and thimble and work-basket; and
when one gets through with our Lady, then one has