id stag. Away through the open the beautiful creature
seemed to float before him, and Heinrich followed in hot chase. Across
grassy clearings and through dim vistas of pines, over brooks and among
boulders and through close underwood, the fleet quarry led him without
stop or stay, till at last it reached the hanging rock which was Itha's
cell, and there it stood at bay; and alarmed by the clatter of hoofs, a
tall pale woman, rudely clad in her poor forest garb, came to the
entrance.

Surprised at so strange a sight, the Count drew rein and stared at the
woman. Despite the lapse of time and her pallor and emaciation, in an
instant he recognised the wife whom he believed dead, and she too
recognised the husband she had loved.

How shall I tell of all that was said between those two by that lonely
hermitage in the depth of the forest? As in the old days, she was
eager to forgive everything; but it was in vain that the Count besought
her to return to the life which she had forgotten for so many years.
Long had she been dead and buried, so far as earthly things were
concerned. She would prefer, despite the hardness and the pain, to
spend in this peaceful spot what time was yet allotted to her, but that
she longed once more to hear the music of the holy bells, to kneel once
more before the altar of God.

What plea could Heinrich use to shake her resolution? His shame and
remorse, even his love, held him tongue-tied. He saw that she was no
longer the meek gentle Swabian maiden who had shrunk and wept at every
hasty word and sharp glance of his. He had slain all human love in
her; nothing survived save that large charity of the Saints which binds
them to all suffering souls on the earth.

Wofully he consented to her one wish. A simple cell was prepared for
her in the wood beside the chapel of Our Lady in the Meadow, and there
she dwelt until, in a little while, her gentle spirit was called home.

The Story of the Lost Brother

This is the story written in the chronicle of the Priory of Kilgrimol,
which is in Amounderness. It tells of the ancient years before that
great inroad of the sea which broke down the high firs of the western
forest of Amounderness, and left behind it those tracts of sand and
shingle that are now called the Blowing Sands. In those days Oswald
the Gentle was Prior of Kilgrimol, and he beheld the inroad of the sea;
and afterwards he lived through the suffering and sorrow of the great