s full of
wonder; yet to none saving to you, Reverend Mother, can I tell of that
which I have seen."

"Tell me all, dear Antony," said the Prioress. "Sister Mary Rebecca says
thy symptoms point to a Divine Vision."

Mary Antony chuckled. "For once Sister Mary Rebecca speaks the truth,"
she said. "Have patience with me, Reverend Mother, and I will tell you
all."

The Prioress gently stroked the worn hands lying outside the coverlet.

Mary Antony looked very old in bed. Were it not for the bright twinkling
eyes, she looked too old ever again to stand upon her feet. Yet how she
still bustled upon those same old feet! How diligently she performed her
own duties, and shewed to the other lay-sisters how they should have
performed theirs!

Forty years ago, she had chosen her nook in the Convent burying-ground.
She was even then, among the older members of the Community; yet most of
those who saw her choose it, now lay in their own.

"She will outlive us all," said Mother Sub-Prioress one day, sourly;
angered by some trick of Mary Antony's.

"She is like an ancient parrot," cried Sister Mary Rebecca, anxious to
agree with Mother Sub-Prioress.

Which when Mary Antony heard, she chuckled, and snapped her fingers.

"Please God, I shall live long enough," she said, "to thrust Mother
Sub-Prioress into a sackcloth shroud; also, to crack nuts upon the
sepulchre of Sister Mary Rebecca."

But none of these remarks reached the Prioress. She loved the old
lay-sister, knowing the aged body held a faithful and zealous heart, and
a mind which, in its quaint simplicity, oft seemed to the Prioress like
the mind of a little child--and of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.

"There is no need for patience, dear Antony," said the Prioress. "I can
sit in stillness beside thee, until thy tale be fully told. Begin at the
beginning."

The slanting rays of the late afternoon sun, piercing through the narrow
window, fell in a golden band of light upon the folded hands, lighting up
the aged face with an almost unearthly radiance.

"I was in the cloisters," began Mary Antony, "awaiting the return from
Vespers of the holy Ladies.

"I go there betimes, because at that hour I am accustomed to hold
converse with a little vain man in a red jerkin, who comes to see me,
when he knows me to be alone. I tell him tales such as he never hears
elsewhere. To-day I planned to tell him how the great Lord Bishop,
arriving unannounced, rode into t