rtress which must be taken of Nueva Cordoba. With his eyes upon the
gleaming sea he thought of Damaris Sedley, and of Sidney, and of a day
at Windsor when the Queen had showed him much favor, and of a little,
windy knoll, near to his house of Ferne, where, returning from hunting
or hawking, he was wont to check his horse that he might taste the sweet
and sprightly air.

Now this man waited at the threshold of an opening door, and like a
child his fancy gathered door-step flowers, recking nothing of the
widening space behind, the beckoning hands, the strange chambers into
which shortly he must go. Some faint and far monition, some breath of
colder air may have touched him, for now, like a shriven man drowsing
into death, his mind dwelt lightly upon all things, gazed quietly upon a
wide, retreating landscape, and saw that great and small are one. He was
wont to think of Damaris Sedley with ardor, imagining embraces, kisses,
cries of love, sweet lips, warm arms,--but to-night he seemed to see her
in a glass, somewhat dimly. She stood a little remote, quiet, sweet, and
holy, and his spirit chastened itself before her. Dear were his friends
to him; his heart lodged them in spacious chambers and lapped them with
observance; now he thought whimsically and lightly of his guests as
though their lodgings were far removed from that misty central hall
where he himself abode. Loyal with the fantastic loyalty of an earlier
time, practiser of chivalry and Honor's fanatic, for a moment those
things also lost their saliency and edge. Word and deed of this life
appeared of the silver and the moonlight, not of gold and sunlight;
existence a dream and no matter of moment. He plucked the flowers one by
one, looked at them tranquilly, and laid them down, nor thought, This
is Farewell.

Nueva Cordoba lay still amongst her rustling palms; the ocean rippled
gold, and like gold-dust were the scintillating clouds of insects; the
limpid river palely slid between its mangrove banks, a low wind sighed,
a night-bird called; far, far in the forest behind the hill a muffled
roar proclaimed that the jaguar had found its meat. The moon rose--such
a moon as never had England looked upon. Pearl, amethyst, and topaz were
her rings; she made the boss of a vast shield; like God's own candle she
lit the night. "At home the nightingales would sing," thought Sir
Mortimer. "Ah, Philomela, here befits a wilder song than thine!" He
looked towards the _Cygnet_, sti