e of prayer which had flowed down the quaint
old shadowy street, bowing all heads as the wind bowed the scarlet
tassels of neighboring clover-fields, was passed, and all the world
resumed the work of earth just where they left off when the bell began.

"Good even to you, pretty maiden!" said the cavalier, approaching the
stall of the orange-woman with the easy, confident air of one secure
of a ready welcome, and bending down on the yet prayerful maiden the
glances of a pair of piercing hazel eyes that looked out on each side of
his aquiline nose with the keenness of a falcon's.

"Good even to you, pretty one! We shall take you for a saint, and
worship you in right earnest, if you raise not those eyelashes soon."

"Sir! my lord!" said the girl,--a bright color flushing into her smooth
brown cheeks, and her large dreamy eyes suddenly upraised with a
flutter, as of a bird about to take flight.

"Agnes, bethink yourself!" said the white-haired dame;--"the gentleman
asks the price of your oranges;--be alive, child!"

"Ah, my lord," said the young girl, "here are a dozen fine ones."

"Well, you shall give them me, pretty one," said the young man, throwing
a gold piece down on the stand with a careless ring.

"Here, Agnes, run to the stall of Raphael the poulterer for change,"
said the adroit dame, picking up the gold.

"Nay, good mother, by your leave," said the unabashed cavalier; "I make
my change with youth and beauty thus!" And with the word he stooped down
and kissed the fair forehead between the eyes.

"For shame, Sir!" said the elderly woman, raising her distaff,--her
great glittering eyes flashing beneath her silver hair like tongues of
lightning from a white cloud, "Have a care!--this child is named for
blessed Saint Agnes, and is under her protection."

"The saints must pray for us, when their beauty makes us forget
ourselves," said the young cavalier, with a smile. "Look me in the face,
little one," he added;--"say, wilt thou pray for me?"

The maiden raised her large serious eyes, and surveyed the haughty,
handsome face with that look of sober inquiry which one sometimes sees
in young children, and the blush slowly faded from, her cheek, as a
cloud fades after sunset.

"Yes, my lord," she answered, with a grave simplicity,--"I will pray for
you."

"And hang this upon the shrine of Saint Agnes for my sake," he added,
drawing from his finger a diamond ring, which he dropped into her hand;
and before m