told her as much! How many times she had replied
that it was not herself, but that in which she believed, that was the
real cause of this feeling! It was that ancient and true religion; the
religion of the primitive church, as she found it in the fragments of
the Scriptures that had come down from the ancients.

Aurora had learnt this faith from childhood; it was, indeed, a tradition
of the house preserved unbroken these hundred years in the midst of the
jarring creeds, whose disciples threatened and destroyed each other. On
the one hand, the gorgeous rite of the Vice-Pope, with the priests and
the monks, claimed dominion, and really held a large share, both over
the body and the soul; on the other, the Leaguers, with their bold,
harsh, and flowerless creed, were equally over-bearing and equally
bigoted. Around them the Bushmen wandered without a god; the Romany
called upon the full moon. Within courts and cities the gay and the
learned alike mocked at all faith, and believed in gold alone.

Cruelty reigned everywhere; mercy, except in the name of honour, there
was none; humanity was unknown. A few, a very few only, had knowledge of
or held to the leading tenets, which, in the time of the ancients, were
assented to by everyone, such as the duty of humanity to all, the duty
of saving and protecting life, of kindness and gentleness. These few,
with their pastors, simple and unassuming, had no power or influence;
yet they existed here and there, a living protest against the
lawlessness and brutality of the time.

Among these the house of Thyma had in former days been conspicuous, but
of late years the barons of Thyma had, more from policy than from aught
else, rather ignored their ancestral faith, leaning towards the League,
which was then powerful in that kingdom. To have acted otherwise would
have been to exclude himself from all appointments. But Aurora, learning
the old faith at her mother's knee, had become too deeply imbued with
its moral beauty to consent to this course. By degrees, as she grew up,
it became in her a passion; more than a faith, a passion; the object of
her life.

A girl, indeed, can do but little in our iron days, but that little she
did. The chapel beside the castle, long since fallen to decay, was, at
her earnest request, repaired; a pastor came and remained as chaplain,
and services, of the simplest kind, but serious and full of meaning,
took place twice a week. To these she drew as many as po