re, as it flared and flickered over the deep lines
and high features of Githa, the Earl's wife, and the calm, unwrinkled,
solemn face of the melancholy Vala.

CHAPTER II.

While these conferences took place in the house of Godwin, Harold, on his
way to London, dismissed his train to precede him to his father's roof,
and, striking across the country, rode fast and alone towards the old
Roman abode of Hilda. Months had elapsed since he had seen or heard of
Edith. News at that time, I need not say, was rare and scarce, and
limited to public events, either transmitted by special nuncius or
passing pilgrim, or borne from lip to lip by the talk of the scattered
multitude. But even in his busy and anxious duties, Harold had in vain
sought to banish from his heart the image of that young girl, whose life
he needed no Vala to predict to him was interwoven with the fibres of his
own. The obstacles which, while he yielded to, he held unjust and
tyrannical, obstacles allowed by his reluctant reason and his secret
ambition--not sanctified by conscience--only inflamed the deep strength
of the solitary passion his life had known; a passion that, dating from
the very childhood of Edith, had, often unknown to himself, animated his
desire of fame, and mingled with his visions of power. Nor, though hope
was far and dim, was it extinct. The legitimate heir of Edward the
Confessor was a prince living in the Court of the Emperor, of fair
repute, and himself wedded; and Edward's health, always precarious,
seemed to forbid any very prolonged existence to the reigning king.
Therefore, he thought that through the successor, whose throne would rest
in safety upon Harold's support, he might easily obtain that dispensation
from the Pope which he knew the present king would never ask--a
dispensation rarely indeed, if ever, accorded to any subject, and which,
therefore, needed all a king's power to back it.

So in that hope, and fearful lest it should be quenched for ever by
Edith's adoption of the veil and the irrevocable vow, with a beating,
disturbed, but joyful heart he rode over field and through forest to the
old Roman house.

He emerged at length to the rear of the villa, and the sun, fast
hastening to its decline, shone full upon the rude columns of the Druid
temple. And there, as he had seen her before, when he had first spoken
of love and its barriers, he beheld the young maiden.

He sprang from his horse, and leaving the