ous eyes.

"And this," enthusiastically added Eularia, opening another reliquary
set with emeralds and pearls, "is our most precious relic,--one of the
small feathers from the wing of the holy angel, Saint Gabriel."

To the intense horror of Eularia, a silver laugh of unmistakable
amusement greeted this holy relic.

"Beatrice! hast thou no reverence?"

"Not for angels' feathers," answered Beatrice, still laughing. "Well, I
did think you had more sense!"

"I can assure thee, thou wilt shock Father Bruno if thou allowest
thyself to commit such improprieties."

"I shall shock him, then. How excessively absurd!"

Eularia took her unpromising pupil out of the sacristy more hastily than
she had led her in. And perhaps it was as well for Beatrice that Father
Bruno arrived the next day.

They reached Bury Castle in safety. The Countess had been very much
interested in Father Bruno's story, and most readily acceded to his
request to leave Beatrice as her visitor until he should have a home to
which he could take her. And Beatrice de Malpas, the daughter of a
baronial house in Cheshire, was a very different person in the
estimation of a Christian noble from Belasez, daughter of the Jew
pedlar.

Rather to her surprise, she found herself seated above the salt, that
is, treated as a lady of rank: and the embargo being over which had
confined her to Margaret's apartments, she took her place at the Earl's
table in the banquet-hall. Earl Hubert's quick eyes soon found out the
addition to his supper-party, and he condescended to remark that she was
extremely pretty, and quite an ornament to the hall. Beatrice herself
was much pleased to find her old friend Doucebelle seated next to her,
and they soon began to converse on recent events.

It is a curious fact as concerns human nature, that however long friends
may have been parted, their conversation nearly always turns on what has
happened just before they met again. They do not speak of what
delighted or agonised them ten years ago, though the effect may have
extended to the whole of their subsequent lives. They talk of last
week's journey, or of yesterday's snow-storm.

Beatrice fully expected Doucebelle's sympathy on the subject of relics,
and she was disappointed to find it not forthcoming. Doucebelle was
rather inclined to be shocked than amused. The angel's feather, in her
eyes, was provocative of any thing rather than ridicule: and Beatrice,
who had antici