nd repose. Above this resting-place the
trees of the forest interlace their spreading branches, loaded with
amazing leaves and fruit; while companies of rainbow-hued birds,
standing very upright upon nothing in particular, entertain themselves
by holding singularly indigestible looking cherries and mulberries in
their yellow beaks.

And so, Katherine, resting in dreamy quiet within the shade of the
embroidered curtains, was even as the Hart pasturing in temporary
security before the quaint pavilion. The mark of her bereavement was
upon her sensibly still--would be so until the end. Often in the night,
when Denny had at last left her, she would wake suddenly and stretch
her arms out across the vacant space of the wide bed, calling softly to
the beloved one who could give no answer; and then recollecting, would
sob herself again to sleep. Often too, as Ormiston's step sounded
through the Chapel-Room when he came to pay her those short, frequent
visits, bringing the clean freshness of the outer air along with him,
Katherine would look up in a wondering gladness, cheating herself for
an instant with unreasoning delight--look up, only to know her sorrow,
and feel the knife turn in the wound. Nevertheless these days made, in
the main, for peace and healing. On more than one occasion she
petitioned that Julius March should come and read to her, choosing, as
the book he should read from, Spencer's _Faerie Queene_. He obeyed, in
manner calm, in spirit deeply moved. Katherine spoke little. But her
charm was great, as she lay, her eyes changeful in colour as a moorland
stream, listening to those intricate stanzas, in which the large hope,
the pride of honourable deeds, the virtue, the patriotism, the
masculine fearlessness, the ideality, the fantastic imagination, of the
English Renaissance so nobly finds voice. They comforted her mind, set
by instinct and training to welcome all splendid adventures of romance,
of nature, and of faith. They carried her back, in dear remembrance, to
the perplexing and enchanting discoveries which Richard Calmady's visit
to Ormiston Castle--the many-towered, gray house looking eastward
across the unquiet sea--had brought to her. And specially did they
recall to her that first evening--even yet she grew hot as she thought
of it--when the supposed gentleman-jockey, whom she had purposed
treating with gay and reducing indifference, proved not only fine
scholar and fine gentleman, but absolute and indis