worn when rescued from a watery grave
had been destroyed in the haste with which the requisite attempts had
been made for her resuscitation, and she now appeared in a loose
wrapping dress of dark blue merino, fastened around her slender waist by
worsted cord of the same colour as the robe.

"How cheering the sun shines!" said she to La Louve, as she stopped
beneath a thick row of trees, planted beside a high gravelled walk
facing the south, and on which was a stone bench. "Shall we sit down and
rest ourselves here a few minutes?"

"Why do you ask me?" replied La Louve, almost angrily; then taking off
her nice warm shawl, she folded it in four, and, kneeling down, placed
it on the ground, which was somewhat moist from the extreme shelter
afforded by the overhanging trees, saying, as she did so, "Here, put
your feet on this."

"Oh, but La Louve!" said Fleur-de-Marie, perceiving too late the kind
intention of her companion, "I cannot suffer you to spoil your beautiful
shawl in that way."

"Don't make a fuss about nothing; I tell you the ground is cold and
moist. There, that will do." And, taking the tiny feet of
Fleur-de-Marie, she forcibly placed them on her shawl.

"You spoil me terribly, La Louve."

"It is not for your good behaviour, if I do; always trying to oppose me
in everything I try to do for your good. Are you not very much tired? We
have been walking more than half an hour; I heard twelve o'clock just
strike from Asnieres."

"I do feel rather weary, but still the walk has done me good."

"There now--you were tired, and yet could not tell me so!"

"Pray don't scold me; I assure you I was not conscious of my weariness
until I spoke. It is so delightful to be able to walk out in the air,
after being confined by sickness to your bed, to see the trees, the
green fields, and the beautiful country again, when you had given up all
hope of ever enjoying that happiness, or of feeling the warm beams of
the sun fill you with strength and hope!"

"Certainly, you were desperately ill, and for two days we despaired of
your life. I don't mind telling you, now the danger is over."

"Only imagine, La Louve, that, when I found myself in the water, I could
not help thinking of a very bad, wicked woman, who used to torment me
when I was young, and frighten me by threatening to throw me to the
fishes that they might eat me, and, even after I had grown up, she
wanted to drown me; and I kept thinking that it was my desti