sked me some very
intelligent questions about Count Saxe's exploits in the Rhine
campaigns. As we talked we walked along a narrow road by a field, in
which some women were at work, digging and planting. Among the workers
I recognized at once the unfortunate Lisa. She was poorly but cleanly
clad, and although it was plain she labored hard, she was inexpert,
and did not accomplish a great deal.

All of the women, except Lisa, were coarse peasant women, with stout
arms and legs, broad backs, and but little inferior in physical
strength to men. Lisa, on the contrary, was more delicate, more thin
and pale than she had ever been before. She worked steadily, neither
turning to the right nor to the left, not even when one of the women
pointed to her and uttered a jeer, which was greeted with coarse
laughter. Her pale face colored faintly, but she made no response,
going on with her work. Father Benart opened his mouth to call out a
reproof to the women, who joined in taunting the unfortunate girl, but
changed his mind.

"No," he said aloud, "it is just that she should bear her punishment,
and this public shame may save some other girl from the same downward
path, but God is more merciful than man."

While we were standing in the road beside the field we saw a great,
lumbering coach approaching, which the little priest at once
recognized as that of his brother, the bishop. His Grace had not been
expected until the afternoon, but here he was at eight o'clock in the
morning. I suspected the bishop had not enjoyed a very good lodging
the night before. When the coach drew near we saw the bishop sitting
in it alone. As soon as it was close enough it was stopped, and the
bishop called to his brother, invited him to step within, and
recognizing me as the Tatar prince with whom he was acquainted,
extended the same civility to me. We both accepted and mounted into
the coach, which proceeded toward the chateau of Capello, where his
Grace said he was going on a particular errand. I fancied the bishop
preferred the cookery of the chateau to that of Father Benart's
housekeeper.

His Grace had sharp eyes, and had observed the scene going on in the
fields, about which he inquired. Father Benart told him it was Lisa,
with whose story the bishop was perfectly acquainted.

"That is one of the things that I wish especially to speak to
you about," said the bishop to Father Benart, in the tone of a
schoolmaster and without regarding my presen