may have it."

Not a very gracious manner of presenting a gift, it must be confessed;
but Philippa well knew that nothing of any value was likely to be handed
to her. Moreover, this was the first present that had ever been made to
her. And lastly, a dim notion floated through her mind that it might
have belonged to her mother; and anything connected with that dead and
unknown mother had a sacred charm in her eyes. Her thanks, therefore,
were readily forthcoming. She put the despised bracelet in her pocket;
and as soon as she received her dismissal, ran with a lighter step than
usual to her turret-chamber. Without any distinct reason for doing so,
she drew the bolt, and sitting down by the window, proceeded to examine
her treasure.

It was a plain treasure enough. A band of black enamel, set at
intervals with seed-pearl and beryls, certainly was not worth much;
especially since the snap was gone, one of the beryls and several pearls
were missing, and from the centre ornament, an enamelled rose, a
portrait had apparently been torn away. Did the rose open? Philippa
tried it; for she was anxious to reach the device, if there were one to
reach. The rose opened with some effort, and the device lay before her,
written in small characters, with faded ink, on a scrap of parchment
fitting into the bracelet.

Philippa's one accomplishment, which she owed to her old friend Alina,
was the rare power of reading. It was very seldom that she found any
opportunity of exercising it, yet she had not lost the art. Alina had
been a priest's sister, who in teaching her to read had taught her all
that he knew himself; and Alina in her turn had thus given to Philippa
all that she had to give.

But the characters of the device were so small and faint, that Philippa
consumed half an hour ere she could decipher them. At length she
succeeded in making out a rude rhyme or measure, in the Norman-French
which was to her more familiar than English.

"Quy de cette eaw boyra
Ancor soyf aura;
Mais quy de cette eaw boyra
Que moy luy donneray,
Jamais soif n'aura
A l'eternite."

Devices of the mediaeval period were parted into two divisions--
religious and amatory. Philippa had no difficulty in deciding that this
belonged to the former category; and she guessed in a moment that the
meaning was a moral one; for she was accustomed to such hidden
allegorical allusions. And already she had advanced one step on the
road to th