ant still grew there
abundantly, and the villagers still kept the knowledge of its medical
value taught them by the old monks of Furness. For these curious,
patient herbalists had discovered the blessing hidden in the fair,
poisonous amaryllis, long before modern physicians called it
"belladonna."

The plant, with all its lovely relations, had settled in the garden at
Seat-Ambar. Aspatria's mother had loved them all: the girl could still
remember her thin white hands clasping the golden jonquils in her
coffin. This memory was in her heart, as she hastened through the
lonely place one evening in spring. It ought to have been a pleasant
spot, for it was full of snowdrops and daffodils, and many sweet
old-fashioned shrubs and flowers; but it was a stormy night, and the
blossoms were plashed and downcast, and all the birds in hiding from
the fierce wind and driving rain.

She was glad to get out of the gray, wet, shivery atmosphere, and
to come into the large hall, ruddy and glowing with fire and
candle-light. Her brothers William and Brune sat at the table. Will
was counting money; it stood in small gold and silver pillars
before him. Brune was making fishing-flies. Both looked up at her
entrance; they did not think words necessary for such a little
maid. Yet both loved her; she was their only sister, and both gave
her the respect to which she was entitled as co-heir with them of
the Ambar estate.

She was just sixteen, and not yet beautiful. She was too young for
beauty. Her form was not developed; she would probably gain two or
three inches in height; and her face, though exquisitely modelled,
wanted the refining which comes either from a multitude of complex
emotions or is given at once by some great heart-sorrow. Yet she had
fascination for those capable of feeling her charm. Her large brown
eyes had their childlike clearness; they looked every one in the face
with its security of good-will. Her mouth was a tempting mouth; the
lips had not lost their bow-shape; they were red and pouting, but
withal ever ready to part. She might have been born with a smile. Her
hair, soft and dark, had that rarest quality of soft hair,--a tendency
to make itself into little curls and tendrils and stray down the white
throat and over the white brow; yet it was carefully parted and
confined in two long braids, tied at the ends with a black ribbon.

She wore a black dress. It was plainly made, and its broad ruffle
around the open thr