he knelt down, and said his own prayer there, not
in sorrow so much as in awe (for even his memory had no recollection of
her), and in pity for the pangs which the gentle soul in life had
been made to suffer. To this cross she brought them; for this heavenly
bridegroom she exchanged the husband who had wooed her, the traitor
who had left her. A thousand such hillocks lay round about, the gentle
daisies springing out of the grass over them, and each bearing its
cross and requiescat. A nun, veiled in black, was kneeling hard by, at a
sleeping sister's bedside (so fresh made, that the spring had scarce
had time to spin a coverlid for it); beyond the cemetery walls you had
glimpses of life and the world, and the spires and gables of the city. A
bird came down from a roof opposite, and lit first on a cross, and then
on the grass below it, whence it flew away presently with a leaf in its
mouth: then came a sound as of chanting, from the chapel of the
sisters hard by; others had long since filled the place which poor Mary
Magdeleine once had there, were kneeling at the same stall, and hearing
the same hymns and prayers in which her stricken heart had found
consolation. Might she sleep in peace--might she sleep in peace; and we,
too, when our struggles and pains are over! But the earth is the Lord's
as the heaven is; we are alike his creatures here and yonder. I took a
little flower off the hillock and kissed it, and went my way, like
the bird that had just lighted on the cross by me, back into the world
again. Silent receptacle of death; tranquil depth of calm, out of reach
of tempest and trouble! I felt as one who had been walking below the
sea, and treading amidst the bones of shipwrecks.

CHAPTER XIV.

THE CAMPAIGN OF 1707, 1708.

During the whole of the year which succeeded that in which the glorious
battle of Ramillies had been fought, our army made no movement of
importance, much to the disgust of very many of our officers remaining
inactive in Flanders, who said that his Grace the Captain-General had
had fighting enough, and was all for money now, and the enjoyment of his
five thousand a year and his splendid palace at Woodstock, which was
now being built. And his Grace had sufficient occupation fighting his
enemies at home this year, where it began to be whispered that his favor
was decreasing, and his duchess losing her hold on the Queen, who was
transferring her royal affections to the famous Mrs. Masham,