f arch
sweetness and playfulness that he scarce knew whether to call childlike
confidence or maiden trust. But the look in her eyes went to his heart,
and was treasured there, like the memory of a sunbeam, for many long
days to come.

CHAPTER VIII. TURBULENT SPIRITS.

The four sons of Res Vychan went back to Dynevor together, there to
settle down, outwardly at least, to a quiet and uneventful life, chiefly
diversified by hunting and fishing, and such adventures as are
inseparable from those pastimes in which eager lads are engrossed.

Wendot both looked and felt older for his experiences in the castle of
Rhuddlan. His face had lost much of its boyishness, and had taken a
thoughtfulness beyond his years. Sometimes he appeared considerably
oppressed by the weight of the responsibility with which he had charged
himself, and would watch the movements and listen to the talk of the
twins with but slightly concealed uneasiness.

Yet as days merged into weeks, and weeks lengthened into months, and
still there had been nothing to alarm him unduly, he began, as the
inclement winter drew on, to breathe more freely; for in the winter
months all hostilities of necessity ceased, for the mountain passes were
always blocked with snow, and both travelling and fighting were
practically out of the question for a considerable time.

Wendot, too, had matters enough to occupy his mind quite apart from the
charge of his two haughty brothers. He had his own estates to administer
-- no light task for a youth not yet eighteen -- and his large household
to order; and though Griffeth gave him every help, Llewelyn and Howel
stood sullenly aloof, and would not appear to take the least interest in
anything that appertained to Dynevor, although they gave no reason for
their conduct, and were not in other ways unfriendly to their brothers.

The country was for the time being quiet and at peace. Exhausted by its
own internal struggles and by the late disastrous campaign against the
English, the land was, as it were, resting and recruiting itself, in
preparation, perhaps, for another outbreak later on. In the meantime,
sanguine spirits like those of Wendot and Griffeth began to cherish
hopes that the long and weary struggle was over at last, and that the
nation, as a nation, would begin to realize the wisdom and the advantage
of making a friend and ally of the powerful monarch of England, instead
of provoking him to acts of tyranny and re