t you must seek such thoughts a little, and then you will find them
oftener. Won't you, Emmerence?"

"Yes, indeed I will: you are right: it is always well to admonish me.
If you ask me often, you'll soon find I shall have more to tell you.
I'm not so very stupid."

"You're a dear girl," said Ivo. He was on the point of taking her hand,
but restrained himself with an effort, though he could not prevent
himself from being more and more absorbed in admiration of her frank
and sterling ways.

With a heavy heart Ivo returned to the convent. He admired the heroic
endurance of his mother, and vowed to imitate it. But another subject
occupied him. Through suffering and pain the paradise of his parental
home had uprisen from its ashes, and he saw what an inexhaustible
source of happiness is found in the attachment of two loving hearts
which cling together the more closely the more rudely they are tossed
by life's storms and changes. The undying sorrow of his heart broke
forth again. He thought of Emmerence; and, sitting in the dark valley
of pines, he wept. Down in the dingle was heard the harsh clang of a
saw-mill; and Ivo wished that the boards being sawed there might be
nailed into his coffin.

In the next holidays he was again almost constantly at home. Life was
happy and peaceful there now. Valentine was regenerated, and a petulant
word was never heard. Each member of the household behaved with tender
consideration to all the others, and the Palm Sundays of early
childhood seemed to have returned. But this very calm was to Ivo a
source of unrest; in this very peace grew for him a tree of discord. He
saw, with unmantled clearness, the solitary gloom of his own future,
and knew that the happiness he witnessed was never to be his.

Two important events enhanced the interest of this vacation. Johnnie,
Constantine's father, had had a house built for his son. Valentine and
his sons had erected it; and Joseph, who became master-builder about
this time, spoke the customary poem or oration.

The whole village had assembled before the building: the master and the
journeymen were on the summit, engaged in fastening the crown of a
young fir, hung with ribbons of all colors, to the peak of the gable.
All were on the alert for Joseph's first performance. After a simple
salutation, he began:--

[Illustration: Joseph's first performance.]

"Here you see I have climb'd up unbidden:
If I had had a horse I would have ridd