Holy Mother, of whom she was never weary of hearing.  Jean had a rude drawing of the Madonna and Child, given him by Father Austin:  the figures had the angularity and rigidity of Byzantine art, but the artist had represented his subject with reverence, and no lack of skill, and she loved to dwell on the pure mother’s face, and on the longing look in the eyes of the Child.  She accepted wholly the idea of a God who loved mankind, of infinite goodness and mercy:  if she could not as yet enter into the subtlety of doctrine she could give that childlike faith which is the envy of doctrinarians.

CHAPTER IV.

Revelation.

    “I curse the hand that did the deid,
      The heart that thocht the ill,
    The feet that bore him wi’ sik speid,
      The comely youth to kill.”

    Gil Morrice.—­Old ballad.

Jean had often expressed his curiosity to see the interior of the tower, and Hilda had promised to gratify it.  On the 25th of October an opportunity occurred.  She informed her lover that on that day a feast of unusual importance would be held from which none would be absent, and that her mother would be engaged at it from noon to midnight.  On that day, therefore, he walked freely along the cliffs, and was admitted to the dwelling.  He had unconsciously based his idea of its contents upon his recollections of the squalid abode of Marie Torode, where human skulls, skeletons, bones of birds and beasts, dried skins, and other ghastly objects had been so grouped as to add to the superstitious feeling inspired by the repulsive appearance of the crone herself.  His astonishment was therefore proportionate when he saw what to his eyes appeared exceptional luxury.  A wooden partition divided the room on the lower story into two chambers of unequal size:  the larger, in which he stood, was the common dwelling apartment, the other was given over to Hilda.  The upper story, approached by a ladder and also by an external staircase, was sacred to Judith; Tita occupied some outbuildings.  The sitting-room was hung with rich stuffs of warm and glowing colours; here and there fitful rays of the sun flickered upon gold brocade and Oriental embroidery; rugs and mats, which must have been offered for sale in the bazaars of Egypt and Morocco, were littered about in strange contrast with the bracken-strewed floor.  On the walls were inlaid breastplates and helmets, pieces of chain armour, swords and daggers of exquisite workmanship.  On shelves stood drinking vessels of rougher make, but the best that northern craftsmen could produce.  The seats were rude and massive:  one of them, placed by a window fronting the setting sun, was evidently the favourite resting-place of Judith.  Above this seat was a shelf on which lay some of the mysterious scrolls of which Jean had seen specimens in the possession of the fathers.  Instruments of witchcraft, if such existed, must have