ding the light slightly above her
head, she examined her claims to his regard. Her expressive face, her
starry eyes, her crimson, pouting lips, her long dark hair, her
slight, virginal figure in its gown of white muslin scantily trimmed
with English thread-lace, her small, bare feet, her air of childlike,
curious happiness,--all these things, taken together, pleased and
satisfied her desires, though she knew not how or why.

Then she composed herself with intentional earnestness. She must "say
her prayers." As yet it was only saying prayers with Aspatria,--only a
holy habit. A large Book of Common Prayer stood open against an oaken
rest on a table; a cushion of black velvet was beneath it. Ere she
knelt, she reflected that it was very late, and that her Collect and
Lord's Prayer would be sufficient. Youth has such confidence in the
sympathy of God. She dropped softly on her knees and said her portion.
God would understand the rest. The little ceremony soothed her, as a
mother's kiss might have done; and with a happy sigh she put out the
light. The old house was dark and still, but her guardian angel saw
her small hands loose lying on the snowy linen, and heard her whisper,
"Dear God! how happy I am!" And this joyous orison was the acceptable
prayer that left the smile of peace upon her sleeping face.

In the guest-chamber Ulfar Fenwick was also holding a session with
himself. He had come to his room very wide awake; midnight was an
early hour to him. And the incidents he had been telling filled his
mind with images of the past. He could not at once put them aside.
Women he had loved and left visited his memory,--light loves of a
season, in which both had declared themselves broken-hearted at
parting, and both had known that they would very soon forget. Neither
was much to blame: the maid had long ceased to remember his vows and
kisses; he, in some cases, had forgotten her name. Yet, sitting there
by the glowing oak logs, he had visions of fair faces in all kinds of
surroundings,--in lighted halls, in moon-lit groves under the great
stars of the tropics, on the Shetland seas when the aurora made for
lovers an enchanted atmosphere and a light in which beauty was
glorified. Well, they had passed as April passes, and now,--

As a glimpse of a burnt-out ember
Recalls a regret of the sun,
He remembered, forgot, and remembered
What love saw done and undone.

Aspatria was different from all. He whispered her st