ilings and made bright borders among the grass at the edge
of the road; forget-me-nots were mixed up with dandelions, and
wallflowers bloomed side by side with dead-nettles.

At the end of the village, on a rise overlooking the river, stood the
parish church, a grey, old Early-English building whose priceless
architecture had mercifully not been tampered with by the ruthless hand
of the so-called restorer. With a little difficulty Lenox found the
cottage of the caretaker, whose wife presently came up clanking the big
keys and unlocked the west door for them. The interior was most
beautiful: the graceful sandstone pillars, the interlacing arches, the
delicate tracery of the windows with their old stained glass, the black
oak roof, the carved choir stalls, the ancient rood-screen, the blazoned
shields and faded banners, the Lancastrian tombs and the Elizabethan
brasses, all combined to give that atmosphere which Milton expressed in
his _Il Penseroso_; and as the afternoon sunlight flooded through the
old stained glass, and cast blue and crimson gleams on the tiled floor
of the chancel, the glorious building seemed like the prayers of many
generations crystallized into stone.

Their guide, a young woman in a sun-bonnet, took them round to show them
the various points of interest. It was when they had duly examined the
banners and the Norman font, the carving on the miserere seats and the
motto on the base of the lectern, and had listened rather wearily to the
sing-song description of them poured out, like a lesson learned by rote,
from the lips of their conductress, that in the side chapel they came
face to face with an ancient tomb. It was an unusually beautiful one,
carved in marble, probably by some Italian master-craftsman of the late
fifteenth century. A knight clad in full armour lay stretched out in his
last sleep; his clasped hands rested over the good sword whose handle
formed a cross upon his breast; the attitude of the inclined head and
the sculpture of the strong, lined, noble face in its utter repose were
magnificent, and recalled the marvellous art that created the busts of
the emperors in the days of Rome's zenith. Round the base of the tomb
were small figures in the costume of the period, somewhat defaced and
worn, with finely-carved pilasters between the panels. At the end was a
coat of arms.

Lenox walked round with the others, admiring the beauty of the
sculpture, though rather bored by the eloquence o