scales of the pine bark to red gold.
Here it was dry and sheltered, with the thick carpet of pine-needles
underfoot and the thick roof of branches overhead: and but for dread of
wild creatures she thought she might well pass the night in this place.
To-morrow she would wander further and learn how life might be
sustained in the forest.

The last ray of sunshine died away; the deep woods began to blacken; a
cool air sighed in the high tops of the trees. It was very homeless
and lonely. She took heart, however, remembering God's goodness to
her, and placing her confidence in His care.

Suddenly she perceived a glimmering of lights among the pines. Torches
they seemed, a long way off; and she thought it must be the retainers
of the Count, who, finding she had not been killed by her fall, had
sent them out to seek for her. The lights drew nearer, and she sat
very still, resigned to her fate whatsoever it might be. And yet
nearer they came, till at length by their shining she saw a great stag
with lordly antlers, and on the tines of the antlers glittered tongues
of flame.

Slowly the beautiful creature came up to her and regarded her with his
large soft brown eyes. Then he moved away a little and looked back, as
though he were bidding her follow him. She rose and walked by his
side, and he led her far through the forest, till they came to an
overhanging rock beside a brook, and there he stopped.

In this hidden nook of the mountain-forest she made her home. With
branches and stones and turf she walled in the open hollow of the rock.
In marshy places she gathered the thick spongy mosses, yellow and red,
and dried them in the sun for warmth at night in the cold weather. She
lived on roots and berries, acorns and nuts and wild fruit, and these
in their time of plenty she stored against the winter. Birds' eggs she
found in the spring; in due season the hinds, with their young, came to
her and gave her milk for many days; the wild bees provided her with
honey. With slow and painful toil she wove the cotton-grass and the
fibres of the bark of the birch, so that she should not lack for
clothing.

In the warm summer months there was a great tranquillity and hushed joy
in this hard life. A tender magic breathed in the colour and music of
the forest, in its long pauses of windless day-dreaming, in its breezy
frolic with the sunshine. The trees and boulders were kindly; and the
turf reminded her of her mother's bos