e very desperation of their
condition roused and stimulated her.

In the pale moonlight, which lent a wanness of its own to the delicate
face where thoughtful care already mingled with the winning grace and
loveliness of youth, the too bright eye, the spiritual head, the lips
that pressed each other with such high resolve and courage of the
heart, the slight figure firm in its bearing and yet so very weak, told
their silent tale; but told it only to the wind that rustled by, which,
taking up its burden, carried, perhaps to some mother's pillow, faint
dreams of childhood fading in its bloom, and resting in the sleep that
knows no waking.

The night crept on apace, the moon went down, the stars grew pale and
dim, and morning, cold as they, slowly approached. Then, from behind a
distant hill, the noble sun rose up, driving the mists in phantom
shapes before it, and clearing the earth of their ghostly forms till
darkness came again. When it had climbed higher into the sky, and
there was warmth in its cheerful beams, they laid them down to sleep,
upon a bank, hard by some water.

But Nell retained her grasp upon the old man's arm, and long after he
was slumbering soundly, watched him with untiring eyes. Fatigue stole
over her at last; her grasp relaxed, tightened, relaxed again, and they
slept side by side.

A confused sound of voices, mingling with her dreams, awoke her. A man
of very uncouth and rough appearance was standing over them, and two of
his companions were looking on, from a long heavy boat which had come
close to the bank while they were sleeping. The boat had neither oar
nor sail, but was towed by a couple of horses, who, with the rope to
which they were harnessed slack and dripping in the water, were resting
on the path.

'Holloa!' said the man roughly. 'What's the matter here?'

'We were only asleep, Sir,' said Nell. 'We have been walking all
night.'

'A pair of queer travellers to be walking all night,' observed the man
who had first accosted them. 'One of you is a trifle too old for that
sort of work, and the other a trifle too young. Where are you going?'

Nell faltered, and pointed at hazard towards the West, upon which the
man inquired if she meant a certain town which he named. Nell, to
avoid more questioning, said 'Yes, that was the place.'

'Where have you come from?' was the next question; and this being an
easier one to answer, Nell mentioned the name of the village in which
th