t from her own shoulders to those of another: "Oh,
madam! was it you who spoke? Surely I thought it was your dead starling
that you taught to call you by that name--but whose neck you wrung when
it called it once too often!"

Having shot her forked shaft and come off victor, she smiled so sweetly
upon the gentleman pensioner that for such ample thanks he had been
reading still had she not risen, laid her work aside, and with a deep
and graceful courtesy to the merry group left the room. When she was
gone one sighed, and another laughed, and a third breathed, "O the
heavens! to love and be loved like that!"

Damaris threaded the palace ways until she reached the chamber which she
shared with a laughter-loving girl from her own countryside. Closed and
darkened was the little room, but the maid of honor, moving to the
window, drew the hangings and let the sunshine in. From a cabinet she
took a book in manuscript, then with it in her hands knelt upon the
window-seat and looked out upon the Thames. She did not read what was
written upon the leaves; those canzones and sonnets that were her
love-letters were known to her by heart, but she liked to feel them in
her hands while her gaze went down the river that had borne his ship out
to sea. Where was now the ship? Like a white sea-bird her fancy followed
it by day and by night, now here, now there, through storm and sunshine.
It was of the dignity of her nature that she could look steadfastly upon
the vision of it in storm or in battle. There were times when she was
sure that it was in danger, when her every breath was a prayer, and
there were times, as on this soft autumnal day, when her spirit drowsed
in a languor of content, a sweet assurance of all love, all life to
come. His words lay beneath her hand and in her heart; she pressed her
brow against the glass, and as from a watch-tower looked out upon the
earth, a fenced garden, and the sea a sure path and Time a strong ally
speeding her lover's approach. For a long time she knelt thus, lapped in
happy dreams; then the door opened and in came her chamber-fellow.
"Damaris!" she said, and again, "Oh, Damaris, Damaris!"

Damaris arose from the window-seat and laid her love-letters away. "In
trouble again, Cecily?" she asked, and her voice was like a caress, for
the girl was younger than herself. "I know thy 'Oh, Damaris, Damaris!'"
She closed the cabinet, then turning, put her arm around her fellow
maid. "What is't, sweeting?