Gilbert understood from this last remark that his companion had read what was passing in his mind, and he contented himself by saying: 

“Believe me, Father, I regret their obstinacy.”

“You are young now,” pursued his monitor; “but, trust me, when your old limbs fail you, and your sight waxes dim, your angry deeds will rise like spectres around you and haunt you to the tomb.”

Gilbert attempted no reply, but listened with the air of one who approved the advice, but despaired of ever profiting by it.  After an interval of meditation, Father Omehr arose and spread some soft fleeces in the corner of the room.

“May you sleep soundly, my son,” he said, “and beg of God grace to moderate your angry passions.  Your bed is not very soft, but it is in your power to sanctify it, and then it will be better than the down which muffles those who disdain or neglect to invoke the Divine protection.”

Gilbert knelt down and received the old man’s blessing, who, wishing him a good night, withdrew into his own apartment and closed the door.

CHAPTER II

    The golden sceptre which thou didst reject,
    Is now an angry rod to bruise and break
    Thy disobedience.

Gilbert de Hers, as the good priest withdrew into his own apartment, resumed his seat upon the bench, and soon became absorbed in meditation.  His varying face betrayed the character of each thought as it filed before his mind in rapid review.  For more than an hour he remained in that statue-like state, when we, in a measure, assume a triple being, as the past and the present unite to form a future.

But as all reveries, like life itself, must end, Gilbert at length seemed to be aware of the reality of the unpretending bed in the corner.  Having repeated the prayers which his piety suggested, he extinguished the almost exhausted taper, and threw himself upon the bed.  He could not sleep, however; for, great as the fatigue of the day had been, the excitement was greater.  His mind was perpetually recurring to the events at the spring, from which they wandered to his father’s lonely and anxious chamber:  now he remembered the earnest appeal of Father Omehr, and now pondered the injuries he had received from the house of Stramen.  Through a narrow opening in the wall he could see the noble church sleeping in the moonlight.  Its walls of variegated marble had been built principally at the expense of the Barons of Stramen, for in those days it was not unfrequent for private families to erect magnificent churches from their own resources; and as his eye rested upon the misty window, perhaps he felt that though utterly opposed in all else, there was one thing in common between his own haughty race and the founders of that church—­religion.