answer me. I wanted to go to the top, but he was certain I would be too
tired if I did. But I heard the chime, Endecott! that was beautiful.
Beautiful! I am very glad I was there."

"I'll take you to the top" said Mr. Linden, "it will not tire me.
Faith, I have brought you another wedding present--talking of 'ancient'
things."

"What is that, Endecott?" she said, with a bright amused face.--"Only a
fern leaf. One that waved a few thousand years before the deluge, and
was safely bedded in stone when the children of Israel passed through
the Red Sea. I went to see an old antiquarian friend this morning, and
out of his precious things he chose one for mine." And Mr. Linden laid
in her hand the little rough stone; rough on one side, but on the other
where the hammer had split it through, the brown face was smooth, and
the black leaf lay marked out in all its delicate tracery.

"Endecott, what is this?" Faith exclaimed, in her low tones of
delight.--"A fossil leaf."

"Of a fern? How beautiful! Where did it come from?" She had risen in
her delight, and stood by Mr. Linden at the dressing-table.--"This one
from Bohemia. Do you see the perfection of every leafet?"

"How wonderful! how beautiful!" Faith repeated, studying the fossil.
"It brings up those words, Endecott:--'A thousand years in thy sight
are but as yesterday when it is past; or as a watch in the night.'"

"Yes, and these--'The counsel of the Lord, that shall stand.' Compare
this fern leaf with the mighty palaces of Babylon and Nineveh. Through
untold ages this has kept its wavy fragile outline, _they_ are marked
only by 'the line of confusion and the stones of emptiness.'"

Faith looked up, with such an eye of intelligence and interest as again
would have puzzled Mr. Pulteney.

"Did your old antiquary send this to me, Endecott?" she said looking
down at it again.--"To you, darling."

"I have seen nothing so good to-day, Endy. I am very glad of it."

"Do you remember, Sunbeam, the time when I told you I liked stones? and
you looked at me. I remember the look now!" So did Faith, by the
conscious light and colour that came into her face, different from
those of three minutes ago, and the grateful recognition her eyes gave
to Mr. Linden.

"I don't know much more now," she said, in very lowliness, "about
stones, but you can teach me, Endecott."

"Yes, I will leave no stone unturned for your amusement," he said,
laughing. "Faith, if I were not so much afr