t his hopes were to be fulfilled; and afterwards, when
as yet he had seen nothing of the convent but its walls, and of the nuns
not so much as their robes; while he had merely heard the chanting of
the service, there were dim auguries under the walls and in the sound of
the voices to justify his frail hope. And, indeed, however faint those
so unaccountable presentiments might be, never was human passion more
vehemently excited than the General's curiosity at that moment. There
are no small events for the heart; the heart exaggerates everything; the
heart weighs the fall of a fourteen-year-old Empire and the dropping of
a woman's glove in the same scales, and the glove is nearly always
the heavier of the two. So here are the facts in all their prosaic
simplicity. The facts first, the emotions will follow.

An hour after the General landed on the island, the royal authority was
re-established there. Some few Constitutional Spaniards who had found
their way thither after the fall of Cadiz were allowed to charter
a vessel and sail for London. So there was neither resistance nor
reaction. But the change of government could not be effected in the
little town without a mass, at which the two divisions under the
General's command were obliged to be present. Now, it was upon this mass
that the General had built his hopes of gaining some information as
to the sisters in the convent; he was quite unaware how absolutely the
Carmelites were cut off from the world; but he knew that there might be
among them one whom he held dearer than life, dearer than honour.

His hopes were cruelly dashed at once. Mass, it is true, was celebrated
in state. In honour of such a solemnity, the curtains which always hid
the choir were drawn back to display its riches, its valuable paintings
and shrines so bright with gems that they eclipsed the glories of
the ex-votos of gold and silver hung up by sailors of the port on
the columns in the nave. But all the nuns had taken refuge in the
organ-loft. And yet, in spite of this first check, during this very mass
of thanksgiving, the most intimately thrilling drama that ever set a
man's heart beating opened out widely before him.

The sister who played the organ aroused such intense enthusiasm, that
not a single man regretted that he had come to the service. Even the men
in the ranks were delighted, and the officers were in ecstasy. As for
the General, he was seemingly calm and indifferent. The sensations