oh, Dame, why is it so?"

"I do not know, my dear," answered the Dame, "but I know that we must
learn it or we cannot live in the world. Now sleep, for you have been
almost too long at the Farm."

She felt the Dame's strong hands upon her head, she heard the voices of
the maids and the men, crying, "Sing us a song, dear Dame! Will you not
sing us a song?"

Then the Dame began an old, sad ballad of a knight that loved a lady
and went for her sake to fight the Pagans; but the moon rose cold over
her marble tomb when he came back, and her falcon wailed beneath his
hood. There was much more of this quaint sorrow and though she never
could remember it she thought of it always when she walked in orchards.

Then she felt that she was being lifted, and in her dream she heard the
Dame's deep voice:

"Push her through the wicket--hurry, Joan, she must be off the Farm soon
or it will be too late, poor child! Is Karen saddled? Push her!--make
haste, make haste! I hear the river--make haste, there! Push!"

"I will not leave the Farm! I will not!" she muttered and struggled to
wake and fight with Joan. The red sun cut her opening eyes like a knife,
she fought the arms that held her arms and struggled awake, staring into
Joan's brown eyes.

But was it Joan? Joan wore no white cap, no tight black dress. The red
glow in her eyes, was it the sun or a crimson cushion beneath her head?
Whose stern, bearded lips unbent and smiled at her?

"Push, keep pushing!" he said, and raised and lowered her arms.

"Smell this, dear friend," and a strong, smarting odour filled her
nostrils, so that she coughed and choked.

"That is better," said someone; "we were frightened. Why did you not
tell us your heart was weaker than usual?"

The office nurse fanned her; a strong light was in her face.

"The doctor felt terribly about you--that cordial was not so very
strong, he thought. You are all right, now?"

"It was Lotte that kept the cordial-room," she said vaguely, but with
speaking her mind cleared and she came to herself again.

"Was I--was it for long?" she asked.

"It was longer than we liked," said the nurse; "of course, you had no
idea of what was happening to you. We tried everything."

"I know that a great deal happened," she said; "let me see the doctor
before I go."

The Last Lesson

THE CASTLE ON THE DUNES

I saw much of my friend as the years hurried by us; years in which I
seemed to myself to lag shamefully, s